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Post by andydecker on Aug 8, 2023 8:38:53 GMT
Ramsey Campbell – Just behind you (PS Publishing, 2009, hc, this edition PS Publishing 2019)
 Cover: Randy Broecker Contents: Fear the Dead (2003)
Digging Deep (2007)
Double Room (2008)
The Place of Revelation (2003)
The Winner (2005)
One Copy Only (2002)
Laid Down (2004)
Unblinking (2005)
Breaking Up (2004)
Respects (2009)
Feeling Remains (2003)
Direct Line (2004)
Skeleton Woods (2005)
The Unbeheld (2002)
The Announcement (2005)
Dragged Down (2008)
Raised by the Moon (2001)
Just Behind You (2005)
Afterword This collection is the first compilation of Ramsey Campbell's stories of the new millennium. Quite a few of these were published originally only in limited editions anthologies. In this regard the PS tradepaperback edition is a nice opportunity for bigger audiences to read them. |
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Post by dem bones on Dec 20, 2023 11:21:09 GMT
The Winner: (Kealan Patrick Burke [ed.], Taverns of the Dead, 2005). A storm having fixed it so lecturer Desmond 'Don't call me Des' Jessop won't be catching the ferry to Belfast any time tonight, he takes shelter in a dockside pub, The Seafarer, 'Theme Night's, Singalong's, Quiz Night's' and hostile local wits on tap. Establishing that Des is a Southerner, the Scousers treat him to their entire repertoire of oh-so 'playful' intimidation. The toilets are a public health hazard, and you are best advised to avoid the dish of the day, but it's what lurks beneath the cellar that Jessop should worry about, as he's been marked out as tonight's "winner".
I'm sure several of our readers will have experienced their own personal Seafarers, so this story doesn't even require a supernatural edge to fulfil its horror quota, but Mr. C provides one gratis.
One Copy Only: (Greg Ketter [ed.], Shelf Life: Fantastic Stories Celebrating Bookshops, 2002). "This was my Father's shop ... He died up there. He said he wouldn't come down until till he'd finished all the books he wanted to read .... He had the strongest mind I've ever come across. "
Even in death, Ken Gregory's father is fiercely protective of his supernaturally rare fantasy titles. Discerning patrons of Books Forever are allowed upstairs to read any given title on the understanding these works are not for sale, nor are they to be removed from the premises. Christine Miles, a magistrate and enthusiast of wholesome heroic fantasy, is among Ken's trusted regulars. Problems arise when 'More 'n Books' across town host the launch of unlovely Clarence Coleman Hope's Third Book of Shagrat Sly. A patron of Books Forever lets on he's read one of Hope's unlisted works. "A disappointment, was he? Writers can be. You're best off just knowing their books."
Digging Deep: (Andy Murray [ed.], Phobic: Modern Horror Stories, 2007). "It's your father. That's right, I'm alive. You've buried me alive ..." Mercy Hill cemetery. Alan Coe is trapped inside a coffin with just a mobile phone between him and slow suffocation. His son and daughter are unavailable, presumed gallivanting, and it doesn't help that, tonight being Halloween, the police have had quite enough prank calls for one evening. Can he convince them that this is for real?
Double Room: (Sarah Eyre & Ra Page [eds.], The New Uncanny, 2008). Recently bereaved of his wife following a cruelly protracted illness, Edwin Ferguson takes to a hotel rather than brood at home by himself. His arrival coincides with a Sword & Sorcery Convention on the same premises. The increasingly spiteful mocking of unseen person or persons in the neighbouring room causes the widower to register a complaint, though the manager assures him suite 339 is unoccupied.
TBC ....
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Post by dem bones on Dec 21, 2023 11:11:28 GMT
The Unbeheld: (Anthony Sapienza [ed] The Spook #11, July 2002). Leonard Bailey, lollipop man and busybody, takes a keen interest in Polly, seven, the new girl at school. We're really not sure he should be around children. Another of RC's protagonists who you sense require only the slightest nudge to spark a psychotic episode. Doesn't help that his apartment is seemingly crammed with the corpses of long-dead pets.
Respects: (Christopher Golden, Tim Lebbon & James A. Moore [eds.] British Invasion 2009). When a teenage joyrider is killed in a car smash, his mother, Charmaine Bullough, imposes upon the widow next door to testify against the police officers who'd been pursuing him at the time. When Dorothy refuses to swear to something she didn't see, one of Ms. Bullough's grotty offspring takes to desecrating her husband's grave, strewing the dead flowers about her house. But which of them is responsible? She prays hard it's not the one she suspects.
Laid Down : (Cemetery Dance #50, 2004). An infant beast in the cellar short-short, recalling author's EC horror incarnation.
Particularly "enjoyed" Respects, One Copy Owner and The Winner — got a bit lost at times during The Unbeheld, are we sympathising with a paedo or is Len just pathetically awkward around little girls and ... people in general? As ever, the story notes makes for essential reading. "I don't propose to stop writing until I'm dead, if then."
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Post by dem bones on Dec 23, 2023 11:03:19 GMT
Direct Line: (Peter Crowther [ed.] Postscripts #1, Spring 2004). Kenneth Sharp, Maths master, picks up a mobile phone under the railway bridge. He calls after the young woman who dropped it but she hurries away before he can return it. Eventually she calls him at the school insisting he "give it back" without leaving any indication how and where he's supposed to do so. The owner, it transpires, was a teenager whose latest overdose proved fatal.
Safe Words: (Just Behind You, PS 2009) "People who like to think they're normal wouldn't think we are." Another lonesome school teacher, Charlie Masters discovers too late that he and Miss Nancy Hamilton, the attractive young music tutor, have been talking at cross purposes and she most definitely is not, after all, a fellow spanking enthusiast. Outed in the local press, Masters' vice costs him his career, home and reputation. An excruciating read at times - feels like you are prying. Ultimately a plea for tolerance. It's not like we get to choose our kink. Why are some consensual sex practices considered more acceptable than others?
The Announcement: (Jeff Gelb & Del Howison [eds.], Dark Delicacies, 2005). Fear and loathing at a literary festival. Author Joseph Bradley's obsessive dislike of best-selling rival Bill Rigg — he of The Koran Encryption repute — erupts in a paranoid frenzy which sets him chasing a van through the night, convinced Rigg is using a loudhailer to raise a mob to "Please do Brady, lads. Be physical, Nail him."
A bit of a grower. Bradley and Rigg are cut from the same cloth as One Copy Only's Clarence Colman Hope, so can't say I was much bothered what happened to them, just so long as it was something deeply unpleasant. A day on, and I can't shake the damn think from my mind.
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Post by Jojo Lapin X on Dec 24, 2023 21:01:58 GMT
An excruciating read at times - feels like you are prying. He seems to be quite open about it. Merry Christmas! |
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Post by ramseycampbell on Dec 25, 2023 10:02:54 GMT
An excruciating read at times - feels like you are prying. Alas! I thought it was a dark comedy. It was based on one of the ideas I had for a novel I abandoned when I found our friend Nikki Flynn had dealt with the themes in her memoir. |
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Post by dem bones on Dec 25, 2023 14:34:26 GMT
An excruciating read at times - feels like you are prying. Alas! I thought it was a dark comedy. It was based on one of the ideas I had for a novel I abandoned when I found our friend Nikki Flynn had dealt with the themes in her memoir. Yes, I do get that side of it, but still found it incredibly sad. The Winner brings back multiple horrible memories. Happy Christmas, JoJo and Ramsey. |
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