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Post by dem on Oct 9, 2008 11:22:54 GMT
R. Chetwynd-Hayes - The 18th Fontana Book Of Great Ghost Stories (1982) Introduction - R. Chetwynd-Hayes
Roger F. Dunkley - Eye To Eye
Steve Rasnic Tem - Housewarming
Rick Kennett - Kindred Spirits
W. F. Harvey - The Ankardyne Pew
Daphne Froome - Outside Agency
Pamela Hansford Johnson - The Empty Schoolroom
Phillip C. Heath - Off The Deep End
Heather Vineham - The Summer House
Ramsey Campbell - The Ferries
Robert Solomon - The New Old House
Walter De La Mare - Bad Company
Patricia Moynehan - The Old Rectory Well
Tony Richards - Streets Of The City
Marjorie Bowen - Kecksies
Charles Brameld - Above And Beyond
R. Chetwynd-Hayes - The ChairIncludes: Marjorie Bowen - Kecksies: Bowen at her most horribly brilliant. Sir Nicholas and Edward Crediton demand shelter and food at the hovel of Goody Boyle. She informs them that there is already a corpse under her roof, that of Robert Horne who Crediton banished because he was a rival for the hand of Anne, now Mrs. Crediton. Both men mock the dead man and generally behave abominably and when Goody Boyle tells them that the strange friends he made while roaming the marshes are coming to pay their respects, Crediton suggests a jest. He will take Horne’s place and give the outcasts a fright! So they dump the body in a hemlock patch and Sir Nicholas helps wrap his friend in the shroud. They would do well to remember Horne’s oath that he would possess Anne one way or another …. Patricia Moynehan - The Old Rectory Well: Almost on moving in, Nerissa is disturbed by several ghostly presences around the old rectory, while Darrel is prone to sudden rages. The haunting goes back to 1650 when a Captain in Cromwell's army ordered that the well be sealed, fully aware that an Earl was concealed within: the family of loyalist sympathisers who'd assisted him were then taken to the churchyard and murdered. Tony Richards - Streets Of The City: Marshall Harris ran when his girlfriend, Kris, was raped and torn to pieces by a street gang. Twenty years later, he is in love again and plans to marry. A series of violent murders occur, the victims all friends or acquaintances of his, and whenever the murderer is apprehended, each claims a girls voice in his head ordered him to do it. Pamela Hansford Johnson - The Empty Schoolroom: Maud remains behind with M. Fournier and Marie during the school holidays and encounters the sobbing ghost of an ugly girl in a dunces cap. She had been mistreated and humiliated by the embittered headmistress and now it is time to extract revenge ... R. Chetwynd-Hayes - The Chair: The narrator, one of RCH's least sympathetic, buys the antique from the proprietor of a second hand furniture shop who lets on that it "came from a house with an unfortunate history." Sure enough, hardly has he got the chair home than a beautiful woman materialises on the seat, beckoning to him from across the room. Our man, a misogynist, throws an ornament at her and she vanishes, but immediately he regrets his actions and wishes her back. Her reappearances are fleeting and drive him to distraction until he returns to the furniture salesman demanding to know who his ghost was. At the Twilight Home for Distressed Ladies, he learns the tragic history of Miss Emily and Mr. Ascot of Bedford Park, but a further horrible revelation awaits. RCH ends this one on such an enjoyably melodramatic note it made me wonder if he'd imagined it as a shoe-in for another Subotsky anthology movie. Phillip C. Heath - Off The Deep End: Jeffrey, fishing at Bittercrest Lake, reels in the remains of a drowned man, one of two escaped lunatics who were killed in a boat chase when their launch exploded. Daphne Froome - Outside Agency: Grandpa Grant's game improves ten-fold when he acquires the golf clubs that once belonged to a World War II pilot. Steve Rasnic Tem - Housewarming: Judith's tyrant of a father haunts her new house ... or is she just imagining it? Maybe all those noises in the night are the price you pay for moving into an area with a high crime rate? Roger F. Dunkley - Eye To Eye: Myers visits all previous owners of his 1960 Daimler in an effort to fathom why he should always feel as though there's someone with him when driving. He unwittingly uncovers a murder and is pursued by the psychotic killer. Walter De La Mare - Bad Company: The narrator is lured to a decrepit London residence by the spectre of an elderly gent who shared his carriage on the train. When, on impulse, he enters the house, our man discovers what he suspected he would - a decomposing corpse slumped in a corner. But the ghost's main reason for luring there is to reveal his despicable behaviour toward his sisters as exposed in his last will and testament ...
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Post by Johnlprobert on Oct 9, 2008 18:38:21 GMT
Well Dem as I'm sure you already know but for the benefit of RCH heathens out there The Chair first saw print in the 1978 collection The Cradle Demon which was his first book for William Kimber after his Tandem & Fontana paperback experiences. I suppose it's quite possible that The Chair was written while Amicus was an active force in production so who knows?
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Post by dem on Oct 31, 2012 20:02:49 GMT
Charles Brameld - Above And Beyond: Eight years. That's all it takes for Fullingford Court, Helthingham Councils flagship fifteen-storey tower block, to depopulate and run to ruin after it's opening in the early 'seventies. No sooner had she moved in than Mrs. Stellintini, the local gossip, circulated a rumour that the penthouse was haunted in the hope someone would exchange with her. Soon all the tenants were seeing the ghost of an old man, heralding a series of inexplicable tragedies. "The powers-that-be eventually rationalised it all themselves by saying high-rise flats were a mistake anyway, they'd all have to come down." Would that it were so, Mr. Brameld.
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