Saturday, October 31, 2009

Four Great Ghost Stories for a Rainy Halloween

It's a chilly, rainy day here in the knobs. A good read is in order, since it's fit weather mainly for ducks. The four stories that follow are good reads. (Just click on the titles between quotation marks to link to the story.)

"Man-Size in Marble" by E. Nesbit. The British author Edith Nesbit did most of her best work in the genre in the Gay Nineties, but there are no decadent touches in this little shocker about two tomb effigies that get up and walk--with castrophic results.

"Count Magnus" by M. R. James. This piece, set in Sweden, is generally ranked as James's best. I love that bit where the priest frets about people who "should be sleeping, not walking." The Count, a nasty bit of goods dead or alive, scares the hell out of Anne Rice--and me too, for that matter.

"The Lady's Maid's Bell" by Edith Wharton. A very prim and Victorian story with subplots of hidden passions, domestic abuse, and a protective (though dead) lady's maid is among Wharton's best in the genre.

"The Water Ghost of Harrowby Hall" by John Kendrick Bangs. It's set at Christmas, and it's funny, not frightening, but it's one of my favorites, and has been since I first read it as a preteen in a collection called, I think, THIRTEEN GHOSTS. The master of the house manages to lay the ancestral ghost (who haunts mainly from pique) using the latest technologies. I always found it roll-on-the-floor funny.

Happy reading--

2 comments:

  1. Wonderful..more great stories and another new blog. I'll be by later to read and get acquainted. In the meantime, I'm catching up over at Blogstream and since today is Halloween, these stories are a must read. Later Fair ;-)

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  2. These are some of my favorites for Halloween (or just about anytime, actually)--thanks for stopping by, Laura! <3

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