Houses of the Dead – Chris Priestley’s The Dead of Winter
Chris Priestley‘s The Dead of Winter is a haunting and deeply disturbing ghost story. His previous series, the three volumes of the the ‘Tales of Terror’, were haunting when the protagonist turned out...
View ArticleSmall ghostly hands – The Small Hand by Susan Hill
I like ghost stories and have been waiting for the new Susan Hill ghost novella, The Small Hand. Hill is the doyenne of British ghost stories and her The Woman In Black rates as one of the classics of...
View ArticleA cosy blanket – Helen Dunmore’s The Greatcoat
The Greatcoat is Helen Dunmore’s first ghost story and I find myself in two minds about it. In part, I find I want ghost stories to unsettle me in the vein of Henry James or Susan Hill and this did …...
View ArticleOn the stoke of the Witching Hour – Helen Oyeyemi’s White is for Witching
White is for Witching takes Horace Walpole’s vision of the Gothic to its heart and extends it, expressing the idea of the New Gothic in a less abstract form. It mixes low culture with high and also the...
View ArticleChristmas Ghost Stories from the Guardian
Christmas comes but once a year and it seems like a good time to send a shiver down one’s spine. The Guardian and its Sunday sister paper, the Observer, have joined in with the BBC in giving us some...
View ArticleThe ghosts of Slade House
David Mitchell’s Slade House is a ghost novella, at first glance. Every 9 years, the owner of Slade House appear to capture another victim to continue their reign. Mitchell develops a sense of...
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