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Post by šrincess šµuvstarr on Jun 28, 2021 12:19:52 GMT
The nice thread by andydecker about Venice vaultofevil.proboards.com/thread/7546/death-venice got me thinking.
What stories do you feel fit perfectly with a particular city's setting? Where the elements within seem to fit together well, with the storylines utilising places found there, or the story gives off a feel of how we visualise the city in our imagination (It doesn't have to be the mundane real city). I'm thinking of things like the fog shrouded London of myth, or the skyscraper soaring allies of New York, or taking Venice, the ancient, crumbling palazzos overhanging canals. I hope you can understand what I'm trying to say. Once more that isn't well explained. Sorry!  PS: I didn't know where to put this thread. Edited to change souring to soaring. Or perhaps they are souring as well. |
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Post by dem bones on Jun 28, 2021 15:10:40 GMT
I'm only really familiar with parts of London, and there are absolutely loads of novels and shorts that capture something about it, be it the every day a pea souper fantasy Victorian capital, everyday strangeness or soul destroying regeneration. James Herbert captures pre-nineties Whitechapel, Aldgate and Bethnal Green perfectly in The Rats - it really is a great East London novel. Anne Bilson's Suckers is a depressingly real depiction of Canary Wharf and the rise of yuppie. Ramsey Campbell portrays a convincing Muswell Hill/ Highgate/ Holloway Road in Ancient Images down to a sequence set in the Fantasy Centre (RIP). Michael Marshall Smith (various), Christopher Fowler (likewise, the novels Roofworld and Soho Black being two examples, to say nothing of his Bryant and May books), 'Harry Adam Knight's Bedlam ....
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peedeel
Crab On The Rampage
Posts: 61
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Post by peedeel on Jun 28, 2021 16:36:11 GMT
Foggy London long ago: Algernon Blackwood's Confession ā A wounded Canadian soldier returns from the front during the Great War, slightly shell shocked, alone, walks through a thick, unexpected London fog (It is late and heās missed the last train). All looks strange and unusual. He hears a sound. Beside him appears a dead comrade who accompanies him. One minute heās there, then heās gone, only to return seconds later. Silent, expressionless, unsettling. Ultimate the soldier meets a young woman and offers to escort her safely homeā¦ Read HERE.  |
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Post by Shrink Proof on Jun 28, 2021 16:47:25 GMT
The link to the Algernon Blackwood story doesn't want to co-operate. However, "Confession" can be downloaded as a PDF via this site. The site also allows you to download scores of other Algernon Blackwood tales as well, should you be so inclined (legit, they're in the public domain). |
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peedeel
Crab On The Rampage
Posts: 61
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Post by peedeel on Jun 28, 2021 16:58:16 GMT
The link to the Algernon Blackwood story doesn't want to co-operate. However, "Confession" can be downloaded as a PDF via this site. The site also allows you to download scores of other Algernon Blackwood tales as well, should you be so inclined (legit, they're in the public domain). Thanks. My links always have a mind of their own. |
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Post by Jojo Lapin X on Jun 28, 2021 18:09:08 GMT
I hope you can understand what I'm trying to say. No, it makes no sense! |
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Post by šrincess šµuvstarr on Jun 28, 2021 18:46:54 GMT
I hope you can understand what I'm trying to say. No, it makes no sense! Very bad man. |
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Post by ramseycampbell on Jun 29, 2021 6:36:50 GMT
Fritz Leiber's "Smoke Ghost" for Chicago, and his Our Lady of Darkness for San Francisco.
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Post by dem bones on Jun 30, 2021 18:48:27 GMT
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Post by andydecker on Jul 1, 2021 11:28:43 GMT
The adventures of Paul J. McAuley's mysterious occult investigator Mr Carlyle in London comes to mind. Its a shame he didn't write more.
Paul J. McAuley:
Doctor Pretorius and the Lost Temple (Best New Horror 14, Robinson, 2003)
And it begins in South London:
Shaun Hutson - Assassin ( Star, 1989) A lot of Hutson's novels have a London background, can't say if it is a generic name-dropping writers London or an authentic London.
Ben Aaronovitch - Rivers of London (Gollancz, 2011) This is another series of a occult policeman, 8 novels so far. Advertised as urban fantasy and not horror, though. Never read it, but it seems to sell quite good.
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Post by samdawson on Jul 1, 2021 11:35:52 GMT
I thought the first Aaronovitch book was remarkably good. There's a scene in a cellar that was with me for several days.
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Post by samdawson on Jul 1, 2021 11:42:13 GMT
Might be worth saying that the fog-shrouded streets of London were very much a reality. After a series of lethal smogs the 1956 Clean Air Act began their demise, but it took several years for the atmosphere to, as it were, heal itself. I can remember regular, excitingly torch-defeating, massively dense fogs during my 60s childhood, of a type I've never seen in this country since, and it's not that long ago that we threw away my mother's 50s smog masks or used them when sanding etc.
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Post by šrincess šµuvstarr on Jul 1, 2021 12:20:28 GMT
Might be worth saying that the fog-shrouded streets of London were very much a reality. After a series of lethal smogs the 1956 Clean Air Act began their demise, but it took several years for the atmosphere to, as it were, heal itself. I can remember regular, excitingly torch-defeating, massively dense fogs during my 60s childhood, of a type I've never seen in this country since, and it's not that long ago that we threw away my mother's 50s smog masks or used them when sanding etc. I read you could taste it too. How horrible. You still get them in China and India and places, as everyone on here knows, but lockdowns seem to have shown residents what cleaner air is like and that it is possible, and it might alter the way governments approach dealing with air pollution. At least in democracies where public opinion matters, China can always just ignore its citizens. www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-52313972 |
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Post by Dr Strange on Jul 1, 2021 12:39:50 GMT
Ben Aaronovitch - Rivers of London (Gollancz, 2011) This is another series of a occult policeman, 8 novels so far. Advertised as urban fantasy and not horror, though. Never read it, but it seems to sell quite good. I read the first two (or possibly three?) of these and they didn't really work for me. Definitely "urban fantasy" - a genre I now realize (for some reason) I just plain dislike. Obviously, a lot of people do like them though. There's also a related series of graphic novels. |
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