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Post by monker on Aug 11, 2010 13:41:13 GMT
Yeah, well, I prefer my 'ghosts' Jamesian, too, but I guess it depends on other factors. I either haven't read the Bierce or didn't make the connection because that's the bit that grabbed me.
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Post by Dr Strange on Aug 11, 2010 14:10:20 GMT
I either haven't read the Bierce or didn't make the connection because that's the bit that grabbed me. Charles Ashmore's Trail - one of Bierce's ultra-short stories; which took on a life of it's own, being passed down as a "true" story in various "Unexplained"-type books and magazines. It's on horrormasters.com LATER ADD: Oh, and I am hoping that the "pooh-poohing" quote didn't pass you by, and you don't think that's the way I actually speak...
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Post by Dr Strange on Aug 13, 2010 7:49:40 GMT
Finally got round to the last two -
The Governess’s Story – Miss Hosmer takes up a post as governess to the children of the widowed Lady K, and finds her sleep disturbed every night by what sounds like somebody pacing about in the room above hers and then opening the window - except there is no room above hers because, for some reason, Lady K has had that part of the house drastically altered... [Another run-of-the-mill ghost story, I’m afraid. Except I’m not.]
Mr Oliver Carmichael – Oliver was “an easy-going, high-minded, good fellow, who had never been confronted with any serious problems in life”. All that changes when Oliver becomes obsessed by Miss Rourke, a shop-girl who seems to be Evil incarnate and to have the preternatural ability to torment him in his dreams…
Overall then, I found this collection to be very hit-and-miss. Highlights for me were Mr Mortimer’s Diary, The Downs, The Late Mrs Fowke, and The Picture. At Wordsworth’s prices that still seems like pretty good value for money.
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Post by dem bones on Aug 14, 2010 17:47:44 GMT
Thanks for giving us the lowdown, Dr. S. It does look as if Hugh Lamb, Brian Netherwood and Richard Dalby already ransacked most of the treasures, but i'm still planning to land a copy on next W. End excursion. And according to Am*z*n, the Oliver Onions collection is due out tomorrow (Sunday 15th)!
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Post by Dr Strange on Aug 14, 2010 18:35:42 GMT
Thanks dem, first time I've done one of these short-story review things. Just wondering, how do other people do this - take notes as you go along (kinda interrupts the flow of the story though) or leave it to the end (and risk losing all those spontaneous flashes you get as you read)? Or end up reading the damn things twice - which is what I often did here (OK when they are this short, but probably to be avoided if possible)?
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Post by dem bones on Aug 15, 2010 3:35:13 GMT
Hope you'll do many more! I particularly like that, as well as a synopsis you gave your own thoughts on each story. did you enjoy doing it?
Would be interested to know how the others go about it too. I usually try and take notes for first few pages - location, main players & Co. - but after that, as you say, it can interrupt the flow, so; you know the green strip of card you get when you dismantle a rizla packet? I use them to mark passages which struck me as important, made an impression, etc. If I'm feeling really professional, might even jot down "paragraph 8" on the slip. Provided the story is still fresh in the memory, I find they act as useful triggers when it comes to rattling off some notes. It does nothing to salvage the eventual "review", but it's a great incentive not to give up smoking. Leave it too long though, and it doesn't work. That's how comes, particularly in the case of the novels, many of the write-ups don't get finished. But even then I've found that, wait long enough and someone will eventually step in with their take on the same book and come up with something far less droney.
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Post by monker on Aug 15, 2010 5:36:26 GMT
...Oh, and I am hoping that the "pooh-poohing" quote didn't pass you by, and you don't think that's the way I actually speak... What's good enough for me is good enough for anybody else. There's at least a little irony intended and I can think of worse ways to express one's self. If I wrote everything the way I spoke then I'd be printing all the "um"s and "ah"s and all that and that would be silly, wouldn't it.
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Post by Johnlprobert on Aug 15, 2010 8:25:31 GMT
Thanks dem, first time I've done one of these short-story review things. Just wondering, how do other people do this - take notes as you go along (kinda interrupts the flow of the story though) or leave it to the end (and risk losing all those spontaneous flashes you get as you read)? Or end up reading the damn things twice - which is what I often did here (OK when they are this short, but probably to be avoided if possible)? I just read the stories in twos and threes and then post my thoughts on them on here, which is why the 'reviews' tend to come in batches of twos and threes. Very occasionally I might pencil a few notes, but usually it's all done from memory!
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Post by Dr Strange on Aug 15, 2010 11:56:18 GMT
Yes, except when I felt like it was getting in the way a little of the flow - at which point I decided to stop thinking about what I was thinking, and resigned myself to maybe having to re-read the story if I was going to have anything coherent to say about it. you know the green strip of card you get when you dismantle a rizla packet? I certainly do.
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Post by Shrink Proof on Aug 18, 2013 12:26:33 GMT
Just finished this one and I think that the good Doctor Strange has it taped. My overall feeling was of disappointment at young Amyas (a name I've never previously encountered) dying so soon after his slim volume was published. I feel sure that in time he could have developed something with teeth.
And that would've suited the rather wonderful Wordsworth Editions cover picture a lot better too.
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Post by cauldronbrewer on Sept 24, 2013 17:03:14 GMT
Same here—though I also agree with Shrink Proof that it doesn’t really fit the tone of the stories inside. First time i read Brickett Bottom was in my teens and it was another story i never intended to return to for fear of it not living up to fond memories. i eventually relented for the purpose of this thread and still loved it - though not so much because sadly, it no longer gave me the same sense of dislocation. I first read “Brickett Bottom” in the R. Chetwynd-Hayes and Stephen Jones anthology Great Ghost Stories. It stuck in my mind, and I liked it just as much when I reread it today. It’s all rather too genteel for my tastes, and nothing very much actually happens (or what does happen, happens off-stage). That’s a big part of what made it work for me—there are subtle hints that something truly nasty has happened, but the details are left to the reader’s imagination. It's probably just the period setting but this one has always put me in mind of a small scale Picnic At Hanging Rock in the English countryside. That’s quite a good comparison, down to the unsettling sexual undertones of each (or did I just imagine those?). Mr Kershaw and Mr Wilcox – Lacking the capital necessary to develop his invention, Mr K secured a loan from his wealthy next-door neighbour, Mr W. Now Mr W is calling in the loan and Mr K will lose everything. In a rage, Mr K enters the house of Mr W and strangles him; then, next morning, a stranger arrives to tell Mr K that he will find it “greatly to his advantage” if he calls on Mr W… [This one builds quite nicely, very reminiscent of a “Tales of the Unexpected”, but I found the ending rather weak and disappointing.] In The Woods – A lonely and unhappy 17-year old girl becomes enthralled by the fir woods near her home. But “enthralled” can mean the same as “enslaved”, can’t it? [Very much in the mould of Algernon Blackwood, this one is certainly well-written, with nice descriptions of both the woods and the girl’s mental processes; unfortunately, though, it was always going to come off second-best in any comparison with Blackwood’s nature-based stories.] Agreed on both of these. “In the Woods” doesn’t measure up to some of the other Pan-themed stories of the same time period (of which there were quite a few; one could easily assemble a thick anthology on the theme, if it hasn’t already been done).
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Post by Jojo Lapin X on Sept 24, 2013 18:03:15 GMT
Am I alone, then, in thinking that the epilogue to "Brickett Bottom" explains far too much, and that the story would have been better without it? Still, it is an impressive piece.
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Post by cauldronbrewer on Sept 24, 2013 18:47:00 GMT
Am I alone, then, in thinking that the epilogue to "Brickett Bottom" explains far too much, and that the story would have been better without it? You're not alone. I had that exact thought this time around with the story.
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Post by clarence on Mar 2, 2015 14:27:51 GMT
Another one for my wish list.
Clarence
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Post by ripper on Jun 4, 2021 14:19:31 GMT
It has been stated a few times that In Ghostly Company is a collection best dipped into rather than read cover to cover, and I would agree with that view. Some of the stories didn't inspire me to read more, but the outstanding story, Brickett Bottom, stands up well against other well thought of ghost tales imo. It's a shame the rest of the collection doesn't reach the same quality. It was Brickett Bottom that drew me to the collection, and it remains my favourite of the author's tales. As an aside, Brickett Bottom was dramatised for the South African radio series of the late 60s/early 70s Beyond Midnight. I do think that the Wordsworth edition is a worthwhile purchase at its low price, and if you don't mind reading from a screen then Black Heath have it in their series at an even lower price.
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