Title: Stories for Winter and Nights by the Fire Writer: Various, edited by Simon Thomas Publishing House: British Library Publishing Date of Publication: October 26, 2023 Rating: 5 stars ‘’When the sun goes down, it is very cold and then I easily start crying because the winter moon presses my heart. The winter moon is…
Tag: Classics
Who Killed Father Christmas and Other Seasonal Mysteries
Title: Who Killed Father Christmas and Other Seasonal Mysteries Writer: Various, edited by Martin Edwards Publishing House: British Library Crime Classics Date of Publication: October 11, 2023 Rating: 5 stars ‘’The night was cold and frosty with a frozen moon like a bulkhead light set in a bowl of steel. The broken arch of the…
The White Priory Murders – A Mystery for Christmas
Title: The White Priory Murders: A Mystery for Christmas Writer: John Dickson Carr Publishing House: British Library Crime Classics Date of Publication: October 10, 2022 (January 1, 1934) Rating: 3 stars ‘’H.M.’s room, spacious in decayed finery, is in the most ancient part of the damp old rabbit-warren, once a part of Whitehall Palace: it looks…
The Platform Edge: Uncanny Tales of the Railways
Title: The Platform Edge: Uncanny Tales of the Railways Writer: Various, edited by Mike Ashley Publishing House: British Library Publishing Date of Publication: January 18th 2019 Rating: 5 stars ‘’Our love affair with trains – especially steam trains – is matched by our fear of them. Who amongst us has not, at one time or…
Haunters at the Hearth: Eerie Tales For Christmas Nights
Title: Haunters at the Hearth: Eerie Tales for Christmas Nights Writer: Various edited by Tanya Kirk Publishing House: British Library (Tales of the Weird) Date of Publication: October 2022 Rating: 5 stars ”There was a little snow on the ground, and the church clock had just struck midnight. Hampstead in the night of winter for…
Ghosts of Christmas Past
Title: Ghosts of Christmas Past Writer: Various edited by Tim Martin Publishing House: John Murray Date of Publication: October 19th 2017 Rating: 5 stars ”And what a long night it is, out there beyond the warm rooms and the firelight. Don’t worry about the noises. Ignore the moving shapes. It’s time to step out. Turn…
Stories for Christmas and the Festive Season
Τitle: Stories for Christmas and the Festive Season Writer: Various Publishing House: British Library Publishing Date of Publication: October 13th 2022 Rating: 4 stars ”To me, it’s the one time you are really a child at heart, however old you may be. It’s a time of lovely, darling surprises, of, for once, reaping the benefit…
Spectral Sounds
Title: Spectral Sounds: Unquiet Tales of Acoustic Weird Writer: Various edited by Manon Burz-Labrande Publishing House: British Library Publishing Date of Publication: September 22nd 2022 Rating: 5 stars ‘’Don’t you want to hear me speak my piece?’’ The Invisible Tenants of Rushmere (Florence Marryat): The young couple who rented Rushmere thought they had found the…
The Lottery and Other Stories
Title: The Lottery and Other Stories Writer: Shirley Jackson Publishing House: Penguin Modern Classics Date of Publication: October 2009 Rating: 5 stars ”The only town lights were the street lights, the lights in the all-night lunchstand across the street, and the one remaining counter lamp in the bus station where the girl sat in the…
Mortal Echoes: Encounters With the End
Title: Mortal Echoes: Encounters with the End Writer: Various, edited by Greg Buzwell Publishing House: British Library Publishing Date of Publication: August 1st 2019 Rating: 5 stars ” ‘ You’re not really dying, are you?’ ” asked Amanda. ” ‘I have the doctor’s permission to live till Tuesday,” said Laura. ” Strange Even in the…
The Doll: Short Stories
Title: The Doll: Short Stories Writer: Daphne du Maurier Publishing House: Virago Modern Classics Date of Publication: 2011 Rating: 5 stars ”There was only the island. Beyond it lay the ghostly, the intangible; the truth was in the seared rock, in the touch of the soil, in the sound of the waves breaking against the…
Checkmate to Murder
Title: Checkmate to Murder Writer: E.C.R.Lorac Publishing House: British Library Crime Classics Date of Publication: August 10th 2020 (first published 1944) Rating: 5 stars As London descends into the familiar darkness of war, a man of questionable morality is murdered. The fog cannot hide the frightened young man who is arrested for the murder of his…
Murder of a Lady
Title: Murder of a Lady Writer: Anthony Wynne Publishing House: British Library Crime Classics Date of Publication: January 4th 2016 (first published 1931) Rating: 5 stars ”Autumn was dressing herself in her scarlets and saffrons; already the air held that magical quality of light which belongs only to diminishing days and which seems to be…
Death of a Bookseller
Title: Death of a Bookseller Writer: Bernard J. Farmer Publishing House: British Library Crime Classics Date of Publication: March 17th 2022 (first published 1931) Rating: 5 stars A book collector is found murdered in his study, surrounded by valuable volumes. His friend, Sergeant Wigan, helps in arresting the alleged murderer. But what if the wrong…
The Dovekeepers
Title: The Dovekeepers Writer: Alice Hoffman Publishing House: Simon and Schuster Date of Publication: October 4th 2011 Rating: 5 stars ”We came like doves across the desert. In a time when there was nothing but death, we were grateful for anything, and most grateful of all when we awoke to another day.” Yael. A woman…
Black Narcissus
Title: Black Narcissus Writer: Rumer Godden Publishing House: Virago Press (UK) Date of Publication: February 1st 2013 (first published 1939) Ratings: 5 stars ‘’Look at the eagles,’ he said. In the gulf eagles were flying, circling round one small spot in the air. Higher and higher they flew, but still they could not reach the…
Serpents in Eden : Countryside Crimes
Title: Serpents in Eden Writer: Various, edited by Martin Edwards Publishing House: British Library Crime Classics Date of Publication: March 1st 2016 Rating: 5 stars ‘’It was a day of cloud, and the very air over the moors was grey, and the long waves of heather were dark as the black earth, the distant woodland…
Weird Woods: Tales from the Haunted Forests of Britain
Title: Weird Woods: Tales from the Haunted Forests of Britain Writer: Various edited by John Miller Publishing House: British Library Publishing Date of Publication: August 27th 2020 Rating: 5 stars ‘’These are the aspects of our experience of nature that cannot be offset; the history of a place cannot be traded off against the history…
Offshore
Title: Offshore Writer: Penelope Fitzgerald Publishing House: Fourth Estate Date of Publication: March 28th 2013 (first published 1979) Rating: 5 stars ‘’I can’t do the things that women can’t do,’ she said. ‘I can’t turn over The Times so that the pages lie flat, I can’t fold up a map in the right creases, I…
Ιnto the London Fog: Eerie Tales from the Weird City
Title: Into the London Fog: Eerie Tales from the Weird City Writer: Various, edited by Elizabeth Dearnley Publishing House: British Library Publishing Date of Publication: August 20th 2020 Rating: 5 stars ‘’Like London fog itself, the power of the weird tale lies in its potential to suddenly shift from benign to baleful as the light…
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