Out of the Ages ~ Devereux Pryce

Out of the Ages by Devereux Pryce was published by Leonard Parsons in 1923, less than a year after the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun when the world had gone mad with Tut-mania.

We modern folks know, mainly due to all that Tut-mania, that there are certain rules pertaining to Egypt—in particular to its tombs and mummies—that, when followed without fail, aid in our safe journey through this life. One of them is... never remove things from the tombs of murdered Egyptian priestesses! 

Unfortunately for the characters in this novel, nobody told them about this.

I love a good mummy or cursed artefact story. I've been fascinated by ancient Egypt since I was knee-high to a grasshopper, and one of my favourite films when I was a tiddler was Hammer's The Mummy (1959), which starred Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee. So, I was chuffed to come across a copy of Out of the Ages.

So, what's the novel about? Well, for the first ten chapters (there are thirty-four in total) it concerns the relationship between three people: Thira Colquhoun, a rich and beautiful married woman who's used to getting what she wants; Jack Winthrop, the handsome fellow who Thira is determined to get her paws on; and Janet Baxter, the only woman whose paws Jack has any genuine interest in. Janet is innocent, Thira is manipulative, and Jack is often uncomfortable.

For reasons I won't go into, because it would give too much away, Jack ends up overseas, and Thira gets into something of a state. Her husband suggests a long cruise, and Thira's all for it—ostensibly for the sake of improving her health, though in truth as a means of following Jack—so off they go, with a group of friends for company. During their travels, the Colquhouns and their chums sail up the Nile and meet Professor Tremaine and his group, and the archaeologist invites them to visit a recently excavated tomb. As I mentioned above, nobody warned them about Egyptian mummies, curses, and all that wonderful stuff, so one of them does exactly what she should never have done... she removes an ancient cylinder as a keepsake.

Obviously, strange things happen... strange, bad things.

Thira is a thoroughly horrid creature. For the life of me, I can't understand what anyone would see in her. Why are chaps so darned thick where women are concerned? The novel is restrained, not at all sensational and full of blood—in fact, there isn't any really, just a few dribbles—but I found myself praying it would make an exception in her case. 

So, what did I think of it? Well, for a start, I found the pace to be just right. I also felt that the conjuring of oppressive atmosphere within the excavated tomb was excellent. As someone who's claustrophobic, that airless, lightless underground complex gave me the heebies (at the same time, oh, to be there when these tombs were first opened... seeing those 'wonderful things!'). Anyway, it all appealed to me. And if you're a fan of Hammer-type mummy doings, it will appeal to you too.

Unfortunately, it's an extremely rare book. When I stumbled across my copy, there wasn't another for sale online, and I couldn't find any record of one having been for sale recently. So, I can't say what the likely cost would be, but we'd be talking hundreds rather than ten of pounds/dollars.

The Master of Hullingham Manor ~ Bernard Wentworth

I am very pleased to announce that on 29 November Nezu Press will release a new hardback edition of the 'shilling shocker' The Master of Hullingham Manor by Bernard Wentworth, with an 18-page introductory essay by me. I'm always excited about working on a new book, but this one has been particularly exciting for me.

When I started researching 'Bernard Wentworth', I had only one tiny piece of information to work with (a seemingly unreliable one at that)... a mention of her in the gossip column of a Welsh newspaper. But, well, I like a challenge, and I love to research, so I ran with it. What did I find out?... That Bernard Wentworth's history (albeit lacking any murdering), was as shocking and tragic as that of the characters in her book. 

We could call her Mrs Bernard Wentworth... That was one of her aliases... But let's call her by her actual Christian name, Eleanor. Eleanor led an extremely troubled life. She wrote very little, but she put everything she had into what she did write... literally; The Master of Hullingham Manor was born from Eleanor's own experiences of marrying a wrong 'un. She was called 'devious' in court... She was laughed at and persecuted. If you want to know more, you'll have to buy the book!

So, what's the book about? Well, here's the blurb:

Carlos Hullingham is a handsome devil: physically perfect but morally bankrupt. He is society’s darling, ‘but behind the sensuous charm of exterior there lurks the spirit of a fiend, ruthless in its cruelty and malice.’ His first wife, Adelaide Hullingham, is dead… done to death… and now his second wife is proving troublesome.  Originally published in 1897, The Master of Hullingham Manor is a tale of wickedness, murder and revenge. With a cruel aristocrat, an imprisoned wife, a devious asylum owner, a fair bit of adultery, a vaulted room and a ‘Phantom Recital’ to boot. In the introductory essay to this new edition, Gina R. Collia reveals the true identity of Bernard Wentworth and paints a full and vivid picture of the authoress's extremely troubled life. (Publisher shop: Click here)

Nezu Press
978-1-7393921-6-1
Case laminate hardcover, 140 pages.

The Shadowy Third ~ Ellen Glasgow ~ New Edition

I am very pleased to announce that The Shadowy Third: And Other Stories by Ellen Glasgow, originally published one hundred years ago, in October 1923, is now available in a lovely new centenary edition, and it includes a seventeen-page biographical essay by me entitled 'Ellen Glasgow: The Lone Spirit’.

I wrote a post about the stories in this collection a little while back, and you can read it by clicking here.

You can order it directly from Nezu Press by clicking here. Or you can pre-order it from the usual online retailers (order buttons will begin to appear on sites a few days from now) or from your local bricks-and-mortar bookshop.

Anyway, here's the publisher blurb and all that: 

Ellen Glasgow wrote only thirteen short stories during her long career, seven of which appeared in The Shadowy Third. Published in 1923 by Doubleday, Page & Company, it was the only collection of short stories published during her lifetime. Of the seven tales it contains, only four are supernatural, but all have an eerie quality to them; in fact, ‘Jordan’s End’, a non-ghost story, is the most ghostly story that the author ever wrote. This new edition contains the seven stories included in the first edition and adds to those tales a seventeen-page biographical essay by Gina R. Collia, ‘Ellen Glasgow: The Solitary Spirit’. (Publisher website: Click here)

Nezu Press, 19 October 2023. 

ISBN-13: 978-1-7393921-5-4.  

Hardback with dust jacket, 230 pages.

A Seventh Child ~ John Strange Winter ~ New Edition

I am very pleased to announce that A Seventh Child: A Novel by John Strange Winter (aka Henrietta Eliza Vaughan Stannard), originally published in 1894, is now available in a lovely new edition, and it includes a long biographical essay by me entitled 'John Strange Winter: Author, Wife, Mother & Purveyor of Toilet Preparations’. 

It seemed very fitting that this should be the book I worked on after Through the Night: Tales of Shades and Shadows by Isabella Banks; Henrietta and Isabella were good friends. 

I wrote a blog post about this volume in 2020, and you can read it by clicking here.

You can pre-order it directly from Nezu Press by clicking here. Or you can pre-order it from the usual online retailers (for Amazon UK, click here) or from your local bricks-and-mortar bookshop.

Anyway, here's the publisher blurb and all that: 

Nancy Reynard is the youngest of seven children. She is the seventh child of a seventh child. In fact, as both of her parents are seventh children, she is a seventh child twice over. She is the daughter of Colonel Septimus Reynard and his wife Blanche, and she lives very happily with her family at the Warren in Minchester until she reaches the age of ten, when she discovers that she has the gift of second sight; unfortunately, it is more of a nuisance and inconvenience for poor Nancy. She starts ‘seeing’ things, in particular things about her sister Blanche's new fiancé, and blurting them out for all and sundry to hear, much to his annoyance. And so begins Nancy’s career as a reluctant psychic detective. And now, no liar, thief or murderer is safe when she is near… or thousands of miles away.

Nancy is one of the earliest fictional psychic detectives, and she is unusual in being female and, when her gift makes its first appearance at least, just a child. A Seventh Child was first published in 1894. John Strange Winter was the pen name of the Victorian writer Henrietta Eliza Vaughan Stannard. This new edition includes an introductory essay by Gina R. Collia: 'John Strange Winter: Author, Wife, Mother & Purveyor of Toilet Preparations’.. (Publisher website: Click here)

Nezu Press, 29 September 2023. 

ISBN-13: 978-1-7393921-4-7.  

Hardback with dust jacket, 246 pages.

The new Nezu Press edition of A Seventh Child alongside the original first edition. And a large photographic portrait of the author John Strange Winter (Henrietta Eliza Vaughan Stannard) by Herbert R. Barraud.

The Darling Fishes ~ Rick Ferreira

Last time I wrote about Rick Ferreira (click here to read that post), and today it's the turn of The Darling Fishes: And Other Tales of Fantasy, Horror and the Supernatural, his collection of stories published by William Kimber in 1977. It contains 17 tales of varying length, some quite short.

In the first story in the collection, 'The Darling Fishes', young Sally Brewster is a daddy's girl. She has a luxury flat, plenty of money in the bank and a mink coat. But she also has insomnia and a 'daddy' who she finds repulsive. While out for dinner with him, she is drawn to a large tank of tropical fish; watching them she feels relaxed and, for the first time in weeks, sleepy. She returns home determined to be rid of her 'daddy' and to have a tank of her own. She orders a six-foot aquarium full of darling fishes that will help her to sleep. Brightly-coloured, beautiful, exciting, mesmerising, darling fishes... at least one of every variety... even the hungry ones that definitely can't live together.

In 'Crusoe's Parrot', Robin Selkirk, who is mourning the death of his father, is on holiday with his mother on the island of Tobago. Robin’s in the shower when he sees the ghost of Crusoe’s parrot for the first time. The comical parrot is only visible to the lonely and unhappy, and when he leaves them they are lonely and unhappy no more.

In 'Pools of Darkness', Mrs Whirely wins one hundred thousand pounds on the Pools. But there’s a catch; she’s won it on the D-Plan… and D for Darkness.

In 'Helping Hand', rugby player Cliff Anderson has lost his right arm—it was amputated after a car accident—but he can still feel it, and it hurts… ‘it’s like a thin very cold knife thrust into the muscles… thrust in then turned.’ At least, it hurts until he begins to use it again.

Alice, in 'Alice Through a Halo', is four years old and has been given a part in her kindergarten’s nativity play. She’s to be an angel, but artificial wings won’t do; she wants real wings—size number four— so she can fly away.

'The Royal Ones' are Princess Ti-SuSu and Majesty, her cat. Ti-SuSu is the wife of a king, but she shares him with a hundred other wives. She is determined, however, that his heir will be her son and no other’s, so the child born to Princess Bin-Sio must be killed. And Ti-SuSu makes Majesty, the killer, a promise: if he is caught and destroyed, he will live again and they will be reunited.

In 'The Sacrifice', David Thomas recounts a tale from his time as an Inspector of Police in Georgetown in the Crown Colony of British Guiana, now Guyana. He was called in to prevent old Icaro, a chief of one of the Arawak tribes who had volunteered himself as a human sacrifice, going over the Kaieteur Falls. The problem was that David had just shaved off his beard, and the Arawaks never listened to a beardless man, so a false beard had to do… Except it didn’t do, not one bit.

The 'Portrait of Rosana’ was owned by the Baroncelli family for almost four hundred years. Then it was sold, and the rich American who bought it in Rome was dead twenty-four hours later. Sally Shrimpton, a famous actress, buys the painting for her husband’s birthday… the portrait of a murderess long dead... dead but not quite finished with all that murdering.

'Gone Is the Ginger-Haired Negress' is the longest story in the collection. Norman Sulnick has let out the attic bedsitter in his house to James Fenmoore Braithwaite, a black chap from Guyana, much to the disgust of his elderly mother. While Norman indulges in sexual fantasies about his lodger, James Braithwaite is too busy trying to escape his dead wife, Mathilda, the black Queen of Obeah. She’s told him to stop writing about her in his journal, and she’s not about to let him get away with defying her.

In 'Neat Justice', Pam dumps Alexander because he is too neat. She likes her messy flat and wants rid of his need for everything to be tidy. Alexander's reaction proves that it is possible to be too neat for your own good.

In 'Twice to the Grave We Go!', Ruth Drayton receives a letter from Smithson, Frank and Foley, solicitors, requesting her presence at their offices on Friday 12 July at 3pm. Now happily married, she was once engaged to Charles Edward Granger, who left her standing at the altar and went on to become a property tycoon. Granger, dead for the past six months, left an unusual recording for her to listen to.

In 'Kaituk', five-year-old Timothy Leighton has a friend; Kaituk is a South American Indian boy from the forest country of Guyana, and he’s always stark naked. The boys meet on Hampstead Heath, and Timothy's mother is convinced that Kaituk is imaginary.

'The Last Course' is that of Charles and Sheila’s anniversary dinner. Charles, Sheila and their friend Geoffrey were supposed to spend the evening together to celebrate, but Geoffrey is unable to attend.

In 'When Did You Last See a Witch?', Alice, Gertrude and Florence are three elderly, retired, incredibly bored witches. Alice suggests opening a coffee bar, and The Witches’ Brew comes into being. But a nice new coffee bar needs pretty young waitresses, so they run it disguised as Diana Dors, Kim Novak and Hedy Lamarr. But the rushing about, the constant flood of admiring male customers, the whistles and the groping hands prove to be too much for them.

'Don't Stop the Snowing' details the doings of fifteen-year-old Joshua William Hartley, who wakes up during the ‘Great Freeze’ of 1962 to find that he's turned invisible.

'The Girl From Tamango' is Lily Carew, and she's missing. She never returned from her visit to Turk Island with the scriptwriter Sinclair... the island of dead coconuts, slimy green water and carrion crabs as large as turtles.

In 'Summer and Miss Swanson', Mr Fairley is looking for lodgings and goes to view an attic flat on Hampstead Heath. But the previous tenant, Miss Swanson, hasn’t actually moved out.

As I mentioned before, the tales are of varying length; 'Portrait of Rosana’ is just three and a half pages long. They're also quite different from one another, and some work better than others. 'When Did You Last See a Witch?' is quite funny, whereas 'Summer and Miss Swanson' is quite sad. The best, for me, were 'The Darling Fishes', 'The Sacrifice', 'Gone Is the Ginger-Haired Negress' and 'The Girl From Tamango'. 

There are comments made by characters within these stories that will make you pause.. comments about race. Don't forget, as I mentioned in my last post, the writer was a white West Indian who was aware of, and uncomfortable about, the advantage his skin colour gave him over fellow countrymen who were black. It's hard to imagine now that it was once quite normal to think that having a black lodger was scandalous. Mind you, when my mother was a teenager, having any sort of foreign boyfriend was likely to get nets twitching and eyebrows climbing up foreheads. My grandfather was Romani, and he was full of tales of vicars telling him to bugger off from their door if he didn't want the police called. Yes, times have changed... But they do still have a way to go.

In Search of Rick Ferreira

A few years back, I bought a copy of The Darling Fishes by Rick Ferreira, published by William Kimber in 1977. When the book arrived, it turned out to be much more interesting than I'd expected, and that was before I had even read it. The book had belonged to Rick Ferreira himself and had been sent by him to Peter Haining in 1980. It had a letter from the former to the latter folded up inside it, along with photocopies (made by Ferreira) of some reviews, and Ferreira had also pasted a single review of the collection inside the front of the book itself, along with his agent's details. Oh, and the book was signed.

Curious, I had a quick look online for information about Rick Ferreira, and I found next to nothing; he was the author of Are You Stone-Cold, Santa-Claus?, a collection of stories and poems, the title tale of which was made into a TV/radio play, and that was all I found. I intended to look again, but I got carried away with other research... The years passed... And last week I finally got around to it.

According to the jacket of the book, Ferreira was 44 years old in 1977 and had been a Londoner for half of his life. He had grown up on the island of Tobago, the son of Portugese parents. According to the jacket of A Chill to the Sunlight, an anthology he edited in 1978 (also published by Kimber), Ferreira intended to return to Tobago once he wrote a bestseller. He dedicated that book to 'Daphne'.

So, here's what I had to work with: Rick Ferreira grew up on Tobago and came to the UK around 1955. He was of Portugese descent. He was 44 years old in 1977, so he must have been born around 1933 (The Supernatural Index has his year of birth down as 1928). His letter to Haining gave me his address in 1980 (he was living in Hampstead, NW3). And he may have been married to a lady called Daphne. 

Off I went in search of Rick Ferreira. And I found out that in June 1961 he won second prize in the short fiction section of the Hampstead Festival literature competition. Some of his short fiction was read on the radio; 'Guest for the Weekend' was read on Radio 4 in July 1975, and 'Out in the Midday Sun' was read on the same station in August 1979. He also wrote poetry; a poem of his (unnamed in the TV papers) was read by the actor Rudolph Walker on London Weekend Television in May 1978. As I mentioned above, his short story 'Are you Stone-Cold, Santa-Claus?' was made into an ITV play; that aired on 24 December 1977 and starred Cheryl Branker.

But I could find nothing more... There was no record of a Rick Ferreira having lived here in England. So, I tried the records for Trinidad and Tobago... Nothing. No birth record, no death record... Nothing.

That would be because Rick Ferreira never existed, not here in England and not on Tobago. No wonder I couldn't find him! Albert Stanislous Ferreira, on the other hand, certainly did exist, but he didn't come from Tobago, and he wasn't born in 1933.

Albert Stanislous Ferreira was born in Georgetown, Guyana (300 miles or so from Trinidad and Tobago) on 3 July 1922. He was of Portuguese descent. He wrote in 'Rocking Is So Right', one of the 'Personal Pieces' from Are You Stone-Cold, Santa-Claus?, that his grandmother came from Madeira in Portugal. His paternal grandmother did indeed come from Madeira, and she emigrated to Guyana, which is where Albert's father, Manoel Aloysius Ferreira, was born. 

According to Who's who in British Guiana 1945-1948, Albert was educated at St. Mary's Roman Catholic School in Georgetown before going on to work as a pawnbroker's clerk. By the end of the 1940s, he had already begun writing plays and had had three short stories published in the Chronicle Christmas Annual. At some point before leaving Guyana, Albert married Daphne Helena De Abreu.

Albert left Guyana and travelled from Georgetown to Plymouth in 1953, arriving on 21 October. In another of his personal pieces, 'Did You Say—Dad?', he claimed that he came to England on a six-month trip and didn't intend to stay; however, according to the incoming passenger lists, he arrived intending to remain in England permanently. Albert also claimed that he left his wife and son behind and that Daphne later divorced him (that she sued him for desertion). It's certainly true that Daphne didn't travel with him to England in 1953. She did eventually come to the UK, but she and Alfred lived apart. Despite that fact, he did dedicate A Chill to the Sunlight to her in 1978.

Are You Stone-Cold, Santa-Claus?, which is a small paperback volume, was published by Fitzwilliam in 1973. The Darling Fishes followed in 1977, and these two collections appear to be the only two he had published. He was still hoping for a bestseller in 1978. In his letter to Peter Haining, written on 13 January 1980, he wrote, 'I would like nothing better than to have one of my stories selected for inclusion in any forthcoming Anthology of yours'. Whilst his stories did make it into anthologies edited by Mary Danby, R. Chetwynd-Hayes and Peter C. Smith, to the best of my knowledge none appeared in a Haining anthology.

In 'The Lucky Londoner', another from Are You Stone-Cold, Santa-Claus?, Albert confessed to feeling guilty that, when he arrived in England, as a man with white skin he was accepted as a first class citizen, while fellow countrymen who were black were considered second class citizens. He also confessed to feeling ashamed of his 'tiny, sun-drenched and poverty-stricken home'. Of course, Tobago wasn't his home, but the mainland Caribbean region was. And, in writing at least, he doesn't appear to have hidden his West Indian roots; quite the opposite in fact.

For some reason, Albert stopped writing—or he simply couldn't get anyone to publish his work—and I have found no mention of him after 1985, when his short story 'The Girl from Tomango' was included in the 1985 edition of Mary Danby's anthology 65 Great Spine Chillers, published by Octopus.

Albert Stanislous Ferreira died in London in May 1995 at the age of 73. He never did get that bestseller.

Update, 1 August 2023:

I didn't quite give up looking for information about Albert after I finished writing the above post, and today I found out a little bit more about him. Rick Ferreira wasn't his only pseudonym; he also wrote as Stan Xavier. In 1978, his novel Cold Calypso was published by United Writers Publications. It is the story of one winter's day in the 1950s, when eighteen-year-old Ricky Stone (from Hamilton, Bermuda, British West Indies) awaits his first snowfall.

Interestingly—though not really that surprising—Stan Xavier had a different back story to Rick Ferreira. According to the publisher's note inside the book, Stan was from Bermuda, and he arrived in England in the winter of 1958/9 (five years after his actual arrival here). The photograph on the right was the one in his passport when he made that long journey. Apparently, he wrote Cold Calypso in 1959, then put it away for years until, in the late 70s, he sent it to United Writers Publications (insisting that he would not update it). According to the publisher, the novel is 'slightly naughty, wistfully nostalgic—and great fun'. The back flap of the book claims that Stan was married and a grandfather when the book was published (though, of course, by this time Albert was divorced). So, at this point, after finding all that out, I can't help wondering if Albert went by any other name... I am holding out hope.

Through the Night: Tales of Shades and Shadows ~ Mrs G. Linnaeus Banks

I am extremely pleased to announce that Through the Night: Tales of Shades and Shadows by Mrs G. Linnæus Banks, originally published in 1882, is now available in a lovely new edition. And this edition includes a long (18 page) introductory essay by me entitled 'Mrs G. Linnæus Banks: The Lancashire Antiquarian'. 

I particularly enjoyed putting this one together. In particular, translating a large amount of old Scots dialogue into English was fascinating and fun. Isabella Banks was an antiquarian—she loved history—and she was so interested in the details of everything. She was also, from the sound of her obituaries and various other things written about her during her lifetime, an extremely nice person.

You can order the book directly from Nezu Press (click here to go to the website). Or you can order it from the usual online retailers or from your local bricks-and-mortar bookshop.

Anyway, here's the publisher blurb and all that:

First published in 1882, Through the Night: Tales of Shades and Shadows contains fourteen traditional Victorian supernatural stories. There are tales of vengeful ghosts, wraiths, premonitions, voodoo, curses, folklore and fairies. Isabella Banks, best remembered for her novel The Manchester Man, was known for her historical accuracy and meticulous attention to detail, and the appendix from the first edition, which outlines the historical background for the stories, is included in this current edition. Also included in this edition is an introductory essay by Gina R. Collia, 'Mrs G. Linnæus Banks: The Lancashire Antiquarian'. (Publisher website: Click here)

Nezu Press, 28 August 2023. 

ISBN-13: 978-1-7393921-3-0.  

Hardback with dust jacket, 464 pages.

Mistress Bridget and Other Tales

I am very pleased to announce that Mistress Bridget and Other Tales by E. Yolland, with an introductory essay by me, will be published on 15 July. It contains the novel Mistress Bridget and all seven of the author's extremely rare short stories. But in all likelihood, you've never heard of E. Yolland or the novel/stories, so I am going to tell you a little bit about this project to encourage you to rush off and buy the book.

First of all, who was E. Yolland? Well, until now nobody knew. When I began looking for information, there wasn't a single bit of it out there. There was no clue to the writer’s full name or sex, let alone anything more substantial. So, I started digging about—I went down the rabbit hole I'm always getting stuck in—and what I found out went into writing the fifteen page introduction to this new book. For obvious reasons, I'm not going to tell you a thing about E. Yolland here, but I can tell that this forgotten Victorian author has been fully identified.

So, what about the stories? Well, the novel Mistress Bridget was originally published in 1898 by F. V. White & Co.; it was the author's second book. It is set in seventeenth century England, a country divided in the aftermath of the English Civil War, where paranoia and superstition are rife throughout the land. In the village of Rithycombe in Somerset, Bridget Conyngham, the squire’s beautiful young daughter, is abandoned to the mercy of lawless soldiers and paranoid villagers. Matthew Hopkins, Witchfinder General, is going about the country torturing anyone he doesn’t like the look of, and the villagers of Rithycombe, suspicious of Bridget’s healing abilities, are determined to save Hopkins the trouble of burning their witch. The supernatural element in the novel comes in the form of the ghosts of 'Madam' and a captain of the Parliamentary Army, who both haunt the manor where most of the action takes place.

E. Yolland's short stories appeared in two illustrated periodicals: Belgravia and Heart and Hand, the latter being a Church of England penny newspaper. The stories are: ‘The Miser’s Secret’, ‘Only a Smudge!’, ‘Impostors?’, ‘The Secret of the Dead’, ‘Autumn Clouds’, ‘On the Spur of the Moment’, and ‘In the Days of the Cagots’.  Of the seven tales, 'The Miser's Secret', ‘Only a Smudge!’ and 'The Secret of the Dead' have supernatural elements; the latter includes an apparition in an old church:

‘The kneeling lady rose swiftly from beside the coffer, and fell almost prostrate at my feet with thin hands raised in piteous prayer, and heavy tears trickling down the saddest face I ever saw. I rubbed my eyes to clear my vision, and with a start jumped up from what I suppose you will call a doze. I think otherwise, but that matters not.’

When I began my research, I had nothing to go on. I was determined but not terribly hopeful; after all, E. Yolland had been dead more than a hundred years, and even contemporary readers didn't know who the author was. As it is, I am extremely excited to have discovered so much, and I'm even more excited to be able to share my findings. 

Finally, here are the details of the book:

Published: Nezu Press, 15 July 2023.
ISBN-13: 978-1-7393921-2-3
.
Hardback with dust jacket, 314 pages.
Price: £25.00

You can order the book directly from Nezu Press (click here to go to the website). Or you can order it from the usual online retailers or from your local bricks-and-mortar bookshop.

Above: The first edition of Mistress Bridget, 1898, and the 1896 volume of Hand and Heart (in which the short story ‘On the Spur of the Moment’ was published).

Above: The full dust jacket for Mistress Bridget and Other Tales.

F. M. Mayor and Batman's Butler

The actor Alan Napier, best remembered for portraying Bruce Wayne's butler in the 1960s Batman series, was a student at Clifton College, Bristol, from 1916 to 1921. ‘What has that got to do with the price of eggs?’ I hear you say. Well, in January 1916, Henry Mayor—brother of Flora Macdonald Mayor, writer of supernatural short stories—was made Housemaster of Watson’s House, Clifton College, and, as he was unmarried (and also hopeless as a hotel-keeper), Flora and her twin sister, Alice, had to take it in turns standing in as Housemaster’s wife. That’s how Flora met Alan Napier.

There were entertainments at Watson’s House every Saturday evening, and at the end of one term someone suggested that the boys should celebrate with a theatrical performance. Flora directed the resulting play and cast Napier, who was a tall, thin sixteen-year-old at the time, as a lovesick housemaid. Flora recognised Napier’s potential, she coached him and gave him the encouragement he needed to perform well, and on the night he stole the show. It was in acting that Alan Napier found himself. And who knows, if it hadn’t been for Flora’s encouragement, we may never have had the pleasure of seeing him play Alfred Pennyworth.

You can read more about F. M. Mayor's life in my introduction to The Room Opposite: And Other Tales of Mystery and Imagination.

Nezu Press, 1 April 2023. ISBN-13: 978-1739392109. Hardback with dust jacket, 406 pages. Available at:

Amazon UK | Waterstones UK | Amazon US | Amazon CA | Amazon FR | Barnes & Noble US

The Devil Snar'd ~ George R. Preedy ~ New Edition Available

I'm very pleased to announce that The Devil Snar'd by George R. Preedy, the author best known as Marjorie Bowen, is available in a new edition, and it includes a long introduction written by me. It was originally published as a small paperback ‘ninepenny novel’ by Ernest Benn Ltd. in June 1932. It appeared again a year later, this time published by Cassell, in Dr. Chaos and The Devil Snar’d. But it's been out of print and largely forgotten since then, which is a terrible shame as it's a superbly unsettling story.

Nezu Press, 1 April 2023. 

ISBN-13: 978-1-7393921-1-6. 

Case laminate hardback, 164 pp.

You can order the hardback directly from Nezu Press (click here to go to the website). Or you can order it from the usual online retailers or from your local bricks-and-mortar bookshop.

Here's the publisher blurb:

George R. Preedy is one of the pen names of Margaret Gabrielle Vere Campbell, the writer best known as Marjorie Bowen. First published in 1932, The Devil Snar’d is an eerie tale of supernatural influence; it was described by the Daily Herald as a ‘ghost story fit to stand beside The Turn of the Screw.’ Grace Fielding and her unfaithful husband, Philip, have taken Medlar's Farm, in a remote spot in Northumberland, to get away from London and repair their broken marriage. Philip, a well-known author, intends to use the dark history of Medlar’s Farm—a tale of adultery, jealousy and murder—to write his next book, but Grace, already unwell due to the strain caused by her husband's affair, begins to see parallels between her own story and that of the murdered woman, who she believes is guiding her actions. As Philip works on his manuscript, his behaviour becomes more and more suspicious, and as Grace’s mental state deteriorates, a tale of adultery and marital discord soon becomes one of jealousy, obsession and murderous revenge. This edition includes an introduction by Gina R. Collia: 'The Many Masks of Margaret Campbell'. (Publisher website: click here)

Above: the new edition alongside the 1932 first edition.

The Room Opposite ~ F. M. Mayor ~ New Edition Available

I am very pleased to announce that The Room Opposite: And Other Tales of Mystery and Imagination by Flora Macdonald Mayor, originally published in 1935, never republished and out of print for numerous decades, is now available in a new edition. And this edition has a long essay about the author, written by me. It also includes a long article that Flora wrote in 1905 about life with a touring theatre company. I'm biased, but I think the book turned out really well. I do hope that Flora would be pleased!

Nezu Press, 1 April 2023. 

ISBN-13: 978-1739392109.  

Hardback with dust jacket, 406 pages. 

I wrote a post about the stories in this collection back in 2016, and you can read it by clicking here.

You can order the book directly from Nezu Press (click here to go to the website). Or you can order it from the usual online retailers or from your local bricks-and-mortar bookshop.

Here's the publisher blurb:

In 1935, Longmans, Green and Co. Ltd. published The Room Opposite: And Other Tales of Mystery and Imagination by F. M. Mayor, a collection of sixteen tales that had been left unpublished at the author's death. It was issued with a recommendation from no less eminent a critic of ghost stories than M. R. James, who wrote, 'The stories in this volume which introduce the supernatural commend themselves to me very strongly.' Secondhand copies of the first edition are incredibly hard to come by, and the book has never been republished... until now. This new edition contains all sixteen stories, along with a long article which originally appeared in The Queen newspaper in 1905 entitled 'Life in a Touring Company'. This edition also includes an introduction by Gina R. Collia: 'F. M. Mayor: Author, Actress & Champion of the Superfluous Woman'. (Publisher website: click here)

Above: the new edition alongside the 1935 first edition.

Literary Hauntings Is Now Available as a Paperback!

Last December, Literary Hauntings: A Gazetteer of Literary Ghost Stories from Britain and Ireland was published as a hardback by the ever wonderful Tartarus Press. You may remember that I was a contributor to it (I may have mentioned this... a few times... all over the place). It sold out at the publisher in just ten days. Now, Tartarus has published a jacketed paperback edition, and it looks amazing (what do you expect from Tartarus? Their books are always beautiful). Anyway, without further ado, here it is... wearing its lovely jacket, then undressed to reveal the beautiful cover design beneath...

To learn more about this jacketed paperback edition, and to order a copy for yourself, click here.

There is actually a second paperback edition available, this time print-on-demand (from Amazon), and that may be of interest to overseas readers, with the international post being so slow at the moment. Of course, there's also the ebook version, which you can buy direct from the publisher (click here).

Shameless plug over. As you were. 

Update (27/2/2023):

Literary Hauntings has been reviewed by Dejan Ognjanovic in Rue Morgue, issue no. 211:

'Bound and designed up to the recognizably high Tartarus Press standards, this lovely book is useful both as a reminder of half-forgotten classics and a grimoire of British horror’s hidden lore. Even the most seasoned readers, who may not be willing to embark on a real and expensive roadtrip, will certainly be guided by these expert editors into discovering dozens of ghostly gems that are screaming to be revisited.'

The Devil’s Hoofprints

Tonight marks the anniversary of strange events that took place here in Devonshire one hundred and sixty-eight years ago. On the night of 8 February 1855, during a particularly severe winter, there was heavy snowfall around Exeter and South Devon. The following morning, the inhabitants of several towns awoke to find in the snow, and in the most unaccountable of places, including ‘on the tops of houses’, a ‘vast number of foot-tracks of a most strange and mysterious description’.¹ The culprit left its footmarks all over Teignmouth, Dawlish, Starcross, Exmouth, Littleham, Lympstone, Woodbury and Topsham. It entered ‘gardens with walls 12 feet high’ in Dawlish, apparently having jumped over the walls, and left prints all over the churchyard,² and hardly a garden in Lympstone was left untouched. Given the number of places visited, the culprit - if there was just one - must have travelled up to one hundred miles in a single night.³ And, not content with its nighttime wanderings on the 8th, in the few days that followed it left its mark in Newton Abbot and, on St. Valentine’s Eve, paid a visit to the church at Topsham, going right up ‘to the very door of the vestibule’.⁴ 

The prints, which appeared to have been made by a biped, resembled those made by a donkey’s shoe, measured up to four inches in length and up to two and three-quarter inches in width, and were ‘generally eight inches in advance of each other’,⁵ alternating like the steps of a man.⁶ The footprints travelled across open fields and through the woods at Luscombe, through enclosed gardens, over rooftops, high walls and haystacks, and beyond locked gates. They travelled up to the front doors of houses without leaving any sign of their subsequent retreat.⁷ And each print ‘removed the snow, wherever it appeared, clear, as if cut with a diamond or branded with a hot iron’.⁸ As to the speed of the mysterious hoofmark-maker, in 1929 Rupert Gould concluded that, even if the overall distance travelled was reduced to forty miles, and if we allowed fourteen hours of darkness for that distance to be covered, for a single creature to make a 40-mile line of hoofmarks, with each mark being 8 inches apart, it would have had to travel at a pace of more than six steps per second from start to finish.⁹ 

So great was the excitement caused by the appearance of the hoofmarks that a party of Dawlish tradesmen, armed with guns and bludgeons, spent the best part of the day attempting to follow a set of tracks to locate and identify the culprit. The group searched from the local churchyard to Luscombe, then Dawlishwater and on to Oaklands (a distance of about five miles), returning home none the wiser for all their efforts.¹⁰ Due to the strangeness of the hoofmarks, some of which were cloven, a number of locals concluded quite quickly that they were the work of ‘no less person than His Satanic Majesty’.¹¹ Finding no possible natural explanation for the appearance of the marks, many locals would not go out after sunset, ‘or go half a mile into lanes or byways, as they were convinced that this was the devil’s walk and no other, and that it was wicked to trifle with such a manifest proof of the Great Enemy’s immediate presence.’¹²

Others, upon reading the various newspaper reports, suggested several possible human or animal culprits, including badgers, rats, birds, donkeys, a monkey, Anglicans, the ghost of St. Wencelas and - from the Lympstone Church pulpit of the Rev. G. M. Musgrave - an escaped kangaroo.¹³ One correspondent, W. W., suggested that a swan had been responsible for the strange marks. Apparently, on 13 February 1855, five days after the hoofmarks appeared in South Devon, an exhausted swan belonging to the domain of Prince Hohenlohe of Germany had appeared in St. Denis in France. Based on this, W. W. put forward the theory that the poor bird’s exhaustion was due to it having ‘travelled many miles by day and night’ over to Devon and then across to France. The prints left in the snow, he concluded, which were decidedly not swan-feet-shaped, were made by the bird’s footwear, which had been padded ‘in the shape of donkey’s hoofs’ in order to ‘prevent mischief’ in its owner’s garden.¹⁴

As interest in the strange hoofmarks spread far and wide, suggestions from beyond England’s shores appeared in the press. One correspondent from Heidelberg suggested in a letter to the Illustrated London News that the Devonshire marks matched those that appeared each year around a hill on the borders of Gallicia, in Russian Poland; those marks being ‘universally attributed by the inhabitants to supernatural influence’.¹⁵ 

Though witnesses did remark on the similarity of the hoofmarks to those left by a donkey, it’s hard to imagine how any member of the equine family could have climbed up onto rooftops or tall walls, and the same can be said of Anglicans and badgers. A solitary monkey, though capable of climbing up walls, could not have been responsible for so great a number of marks; it would have needed the help of friends, and there is no record of a single monkey having escaped from a travelling menagerie to carry out the deed, let alone a whole troupe of monkeys. Though there were two living in Exmouth at the time, kangaroos do not leave single-file hoofmarks in the snow when they move about. In any case, The good Rev. Musgrave wrote to the Illustrated London News a short while after the event to explain that he had little faith in his own suggestion, having put it forward only to reassure his congregation that the Devil had not been wandering through their gardens at night.¹⁶ 

Though rats and birds do hop forward and are capable of leaving single-file imprints in snow, it would have been impossible for a solitary rat or bird to have produced so many prints alone, and it’s hard to imagine either one banding together strategically with their comrades to produce so many hoofmarks in one night. Of course, not enough is known about the attributes and motivations of the ghost of St. Wencelas to determine whether or not he was responsible.

To this day, there is no solid explanation for the events of 8 February 1855 and the days that followed. We are as ignorant of the truth today as those Devonians who woke to discover the mysterious hoofmarks in 1855. So, tonight, on the anniversary of those strange events, in case we have heavy snowfall overnight, you might want to keep your camera handy.

______________

¹ The Times, 16 February 1855.

² The Western Luminary & Family Newspaper for Devon, Cornwall, Somerset & Dorset, 13 February 1855.

³ Illustrated London News, 24 February 1855.

⁴ Western Times, 24 February 1855.

⁵ The Times, 16 February 1855.

⁶ Woolmer’s Exeter & Plymouth Gazette, 17 February 1855.

⁷ Illustrated London News, 24 February 1855.

⁸ Ibid.

⁹ Gould, Rupert T. (1929), Oddities: A Book of Unexplained Facts. London, Geoffrey Bles. Gould felt that this proved no single creature could be responsible for all of the marks.

¹⁰ Woolmer’s Exeter & Plymouth Gazette, 17 February 1855.

¹¹ Western Times, 17 February.

¹² Western Morning News, 5 October 1928. Reminiscences in an interview with R. T. Gould about his book Oddities.

¹³ Badgers: Illustrated London News, 3 March 1855. Rats and birds: Illustrated London News, 10 March 1855. Donkeys and Anglicans: Devon & Cornwall Notes and Queries, Vol. 12, 1922, pp. 265-7. A monkey: The Western Luminary & Family Newspaper for Devon, Cornwall, Somerset & Dorset, 13 February 1855. The ghost of St Wenceslas: Trewman’s Exeter Flying Post, 1 March 1855. A kangaroo: The Times, 16 February 1855.

¹⁴ Wells Journal, 3 March 1855.

¹⁵ Illustrated London News, 17 March 1855.

¹⁶ Illustrated London News, 3 March 1855

Illustrations:

1 - Edited version of an illustration by F.A. Lydon, taken from Gems from the Poets, published in 1860.

2 - Illustrated London News, 24 February 1855. Drawing of the prints included with a letter from ‘South Devon’.

3 - Illustrated London News, 3 March 1855. Drawn by G. M. M. of Withecombe.