hb#5: The Cell and Other Transmorphic Tales, by David Case (ed.) Stephen Jones

9781943910069
Valancourt Books, 2015
258 pp

paperback


So now we're on to werewolves, because no Halloween would be complete without them.  While I'm not really a big reader of werewolf fiction, I made an exception with this book since I enjoy and appreciate David Case's writing, what little of it there is. In a pride-swallowing sort of way that acknowledges my prejudice against "monster" stories,  I have to admit that these stories were not only entertaining and frightening, but intelligently written to the point that it's nearly impossible not to miss the subtexts lying beneath the chills.  I always thought that werewolf stories would be same-old same-old, full-moon-turns-poor-victim-into-howling-wolf sort of thing but I have to bow my head here and stand corrected.

I might have guessed from the title alone that these stories would center on transformation -- going to a random dictionary site online to look up the word "transmorphic" brings up "the evolution of one thing from another, the transformation of one thing into another."    Each and every story in this collection carries that idea forward, while remaining unique in its own way.   For example, the title story in this collection, "The Cell," which is also my favorite here, is the story of a man who has his wife lock him up once a month in a cell in the basement.  Why? Well, that is the crux of the story, isn't it, which I'm not going to divulge.   He claims that he has a "disease" that "must be carried in the blood, or more likely, in the genes," one that makes him "become something different, something dangerous."   "Strange Roots," on the other hand, finds Anton, a "brilliant scientist" working on an "investigation into the effects of chemical and glandular imbalance in mental disorders." His theory is that  this "glandular malfunction" causes "symptoms of virilism and lycorexia" which appear simultaneously, which in turn gave rise to the "werewolf legend."  He does a series of experiments on dogs to try to isolate whatever it is that produces this condition, with terrifying results.  But once again, Case gets to the heart of the concept of "transformation" here when he lets us in on one of Anton's dreams, which makes the ending of this story even more chilling. "Among the Wolves" is mystery story, in which a series of bizarre murders lead to a startling conclusion, the answer revealed through an odd tale in which two men find themselves out in the wild, facing a pack of wolves.  Next  in this collection is "A Cross to Bear," where one missionary who understands his flock completely is replaced by another who does not, with terrible consequences. Finally, we come to "The Hunter" which is a work of art in itself. A series of baffling killings in rural England comes to the attention of John Wetherby, a retired hunter who is asked by the police to help him find the person responsible. Understanding that he sort of owes it to his past to help them out, he agrees.  They're looking for "Something that walks on two legs and runs on four," and while the press speculates about werewolves stalking the moors, the trail leads Wetherby and the police to an area near the home of another hunter, Byron, an old acquaintance of Wetherby's. The hunt is on, but it's not what you'd expect.

Michael Dirda briefly touches on this book in a Washington Post article of October 2015, and he sort of sums up the lot perfectly when he says that

"Case injects more overt psychosexual frissons into tales that deliberately confuse the humanly horrific -- serial murder, rape, -- with incursions of the supernatural." 

I'll add that aside from the transformation theme that runs through this book, there's also the age-old concept of man's beastly nature -- the beast within, so to speak --  that makes itself evident.  When there is an attempt to suppress this nature on the human side, it's as if the beast nature rebels, at which point the human part is put aside, allowing for the beast nature to take over.  In each of the stories in this book, we learn what it is that brings out this beast, what it is that triggers this transformation. In this sense, I'm reminded of Angela Carter's The Bloody Chamber, which delves deeply and delightfully  into the same sort of idea.

The Cell and Other Transmorphic Tales is not only a fun read  perfect for getting a reader into the Halloween spirit, but it's also worthwhile for Case's examination of the darker side of human nature. In short, it ticks my buttons both on the horror side of things and on the side of my own inquisitive nature that wants answers to the question of what it is that makes people do what they do. Personally I think horror fiction (or dark fiction) is a perfect vehicle for discovering the answers. The trick is in finding authors who share that fascination, and this book is a good place to start.

As an added bonus, Kim Newman muses on the movie Scream of the Wolf in an afterword section in this book.  It's an old movie from 1974, featured on the ABC Movie of the Week.  Directed by Dan Curtis, the script was written by Richard Matheson.  Newman says that

"We took films like Scream of the Wolf for granted when they were regularly airing on late-night TV, because they're tamer than the theatrically-released horrors of the era ... but they now have a concise, creepy appeal which shouldn't be overlooked."

Well, I don't know about that, but I will say that after I'd finished the book, I realized that the movie title was familiar but I didn't remember seeing the film. So I went through my dvd collection and discovered that I owned a 10-movie collection called Vault of Horror  (feel free to check it out -- it goes to Amazon but I get nada if you click the link), and sure enough, Scream of the Wolf was there.  So I watched it.  I didn't think it was at all frightening and while there are threads that carry from page to screen, the movie doesn't do its predecessor the justice it deserves.  In fact, I was actually thinking while watching this film that it would have been perfect for an MST3K riff.  Stick to the story -- it's so much better.

The book I'd recommend in a heartbeat.  Once again, it may not appeal so much to readers who like everything spelled out for them so they don't need to think about what they've just read, but if you're on on the flip side of that crowd, trying to figure out what's going on in each story makes for great thought time.

The Tarantulas' Parlor and Other Unkind Tales, by Léon Bloy

9781943813155

Snuggly Books, 2016

originally published as Histoires desobligeantes,

translated by Brian Stableford

218 pp

paperback

"There is always someone who is not, or might not be, the person one supposes."

                                                                                          -- 163

First, before I say anything else, I have to offer a huge thanks to Anna for my copy and for keeping me in Snuggly's book-release email loop. 

Simply put, this book is beyond excellent.  I'm still a relative newbie in the world of French fin-de-siècle  and decadent literature, and a name that has kept popping up is Léon Bloy.  So I was over the moon when Anna asked me if I wanted to read this book, a collection of 32 short stories which, in the words of Brian Stableford in the introduction to this volume,  reflect Bloy's 

"search for a particular naturalism of his own -- a naturalism which, not in spite of but because of its cruelty and its infusion with religious conviction, was markedly different in stripe from the Naturalism of Émile Zola."  (xxiii)

Erik Morse, writing  in The Paris Review also reveals that Bloy was not alone in seeking something different:  evidently by the 1870s, he

"had intimately acquainted himself with Beaudelaire, Villiers de L'Isle-Adam, Huysmans, and Barbey d'Aurevilly, in whose writings he discovered a kindred nostalgia for an aristocratic medievalism, which opposed the bourgeois materialism of the modern zeitgeist. These so-called decadents, accompanied by artists like Félicien Rops and Odilon Redon, transmuted the urban pessimism of Zola's naturalism into a preternatural landscape of demons and saints engaged in an eschatological battle for the soul of humanity." 

Let me just say that if it's realism he was striving for, it shows in these tales, not only in his choice of earthy language, but also his interest in the more marginalized elements of society.  The Tarantulas' Parlor and Other Unkind Tales is a delightful blend of dark fiction, dark humor, savage storytelling and outrageous observations;  a majority of these little gems turns on the idea of exposing, as the quotation with which I started this post says "someone who is not, or might not be, the person one supposes," an  idea which is carried throughout the book I will also say that some of these stories are wicked funny, subtle,  laugh-out-loud worthy, and actually bringing forth a belly laugh in one case,  "The Tarantula's Parlor."  I also appreciate the way Stableford translated these tales -- there are a few instances where he'll leave a phrase or a word that doesn't fully translate well from its French context into English, and in footnotes he explains why.  Personally, I find that a very smart way to handle translation issues that arise, and I do wish more translators would take the same sort of care in their work. And as an added bonus, each little tale begins with a dedication from Bloy to someone in his personal orbit, and Stableford gives the reader footnotes containing a brief background on the connection between the author and the person to whom the story is dedicated.  It is a superb collection that serious readers do not want to miss.

Feel free not to read on if you don't want even the slightest hint of the stories in this book, which is all I can put together in a timely manner here.  Let me just say that each story is quite worthy of lengthy discussion, but this is neither the time nor the place. Favorites are marked with *.

"The Tisane" - in which a young man overhears his mother's bizarre confession
" The Old Man of the House," where a prodigal father returns to his daughter with some startling consequences
"Monsieur Pleur's Religion," the story of a miser but even more so about the people who despise him
* "The Tarantula's Parlor," which is  an incredibly funny tale about an evening spent with a certain poet
"Plan for a Funeral Oration," the short tale of a literary figure to whom "literary genius had been given to him as a bonus, but that was the trifle of his torture."
"The Captives of Longjumeau" -- A married couple suffering from their own distractions are always on the edge of great adventures but ...
* "A Bad Idea" is the story of a young woman who discovers she has married not one, but four men at the same time.  One of my favorite lines also appears here:

"To have but one soul and one brain divided within four epidermises -- which is to say, in the final analysis, to renounce one's personality, to become a number, a quantity, a package, fractions of a collective being. What a conception of genius!" 

"Two Phantoms" explores the friendship of "two incorrigible virgins," and has a great, funny twist.
* "The Terrible Punishment of a Dentist" -- is an Oh Dear God, dark sort of story in which "a happiness so dearly conquered" becomes "poisoned by the memory of death." Then it gets even worse.
* "Alain Chartier's Reawakening" is another story that, when all is said and done, made me laugh out loud. I can't really say anything about this one or I'll give away the show.
"The Obliging Stroker" A man finds his "Ideal" who doesn't want him, but he doesn't seem to get the message. Another laughworthy entry, for sure.
"The Monsieur's Past," takes us back into the sad,serious zone and into the life of a young "heroine," who wants to marry a "mediocrity among mediocrities."

Leon Bloy, from Paris Review

"Whatever You Want!" Not a peep from me about this one, but the end is a bit of a surprise.
* "The Last Firing" Now here is a good one that also works well for horror readers -- about a "whitener of sepulchers (sic) and his son. It's actually shiver producing.
* "The End of Don Juan" -- Admittedly, this one required a second reading and a lot of online reading in mythology to get to the heart of what's happening here, but once the "aha" lightbulb went on, it was like getting the punchline of a joke and it made me laugh. I can't spill this one either...the fun is in figuring it out.
"The Martyr" is not at all funny, but is a sadly tragic tale of misguided vengeance on the part of a woman known for her "sublime piety." Right.
"Suspicion" uncovers the story of a man "devoured" by unfounded jealousy and suspicion.
"Calypso's Telephone" is next, in which a divorcée makes an amazing discovery about the truth of marriage.
"Worn Out" -- a man beyond the point of down on his luck makes a new acquaintance who makes him an offer he can't really refuse.
* "A Failed Sacrilege" finds a woman used to having the world handed to her on a plate about to meet her match.
"There's Trouble Brewing!" A group of men described as "the canons of Infinity, the protonotories of the Absolute, the medical executioners of every probable opinion and every respected commonplace" meet together and swap strange tales to prove that "it's within the power of any audacious individual to transform himself into a thunderbolt and to circulate like the Gorgon in the midst of honorable crowds." But at the end...
"The Silver Mote" follows a man who "had the misfortune to be afflicted by clairvoyance in which a large number of honest men had died."

from AZ Quotes

"A Well-Nourished Man" comes next, in which the narrator reveals that he never misses an "opportunity to promote the value of my contemporaries, and that it is a need for me to spread over suffering hearts the balm of my adjectives." In this case, his subject is an illuminator, one of the "best-nourished men ever observed beneath the mountains of the moon."
* "The Bean" concerns a cheesemaker who finds out a lot about his wife once she's dead.  This one is dark and twisted, but with a darkly-humorous edge.
"Digestive Proposals"  --  Another darkly funny story taking place among a group aspiring "to the supreme Athenianism" where Apemantus the Cynic is a prized guest. Tonight's topic: putting an end to the poor.
"A Cry From the Depths" finds the young daughter of a whore who has resisted following in her mother's footsteps at the pinnacle of suffering.
"The Reading Room" follows next, in which an entire household must share one reading room, to the detriment of young Orthodoxie.
"No One's Perfect" is about a man who "felt like an apostle," desired "the happiness of the human species," and  "killed in order to live, because it was not a stupid trade."
In "Let's Be Reasonable" a pillar of society and "precious example of professional integrity"  "whose eloquence could have disentangled the very filaments of chaos and petrified the darkness"  refuses to explain to his daughter why he hasn't eaten for two days.
* "Jocasta on the Sidewalk" is another one where the contents will have to be left unspoken.
"Cain's Lucky Find" finds a group of friends together over dinner, talking about what sorts of things they'd discovered on the public highway.  One story wins hands down -- with a chilling ending.
"The Animal-Lover" rounds out this collection, and tells the story of a penitent who sees the gaze of someone he killed long ago on a bronze image of the Lamenting Virgin.

*****

My first excursion into the mind of Leon Bloy, and certainly not my last, The Tarantulas' Parlor and Other Unkind Tales is a book I can certainly and without any reservations whatsoever recommend to readers who find great joy in exploring this period in the history of literature, or to readers who, like myself, are absolutely fascinated by what moves people to do what they do.  It is absolutely, hands down an exquisite collection of stories.

hb#4: The Graveyard Apartment, by Mariko Koike

9781250060549
Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin's Press, 2016
originally published 1988
translated by Deborah Boliver Boehm
325 pp

hardcover

".... something isn't quite right about this idyllic tableau..."


Halloween just wouldn't be Halloween without a graveyard somewhere, and this one just happens to be in Tokyo.  And in the middle of this graveyard sits the Central Plaza Mansion, home to the Kanos, who have an apartment on the eighth floor.  It's a luxury space with everything a family could possibly want, including a storage space in the basement.  The one drawback is the view, the only thing that Misao Kano doesn't like:

"...nobody in their right mind would intentionally invest in a property surrounded on three sides by a cemetery, a temple where funerals were held, and a busy crematorium." 

However, since Misao had felt compelled to give up her job due to an unfortunate incident involving husband Teppei's first wife, the price was too perfect to pass up.

The Kano family's first day in the apartment is somewhat marred by the odd death of daughter Tamao's bird, who, the little girl claims,  comes back to talk to her at night to tell her that where he's at now is a place "full of bad monsters with big scary faces..." and that "when those monsters speak, a big wind starts to blow and everyone gets sucked into a giant hole."

Life goes on as the Kanos meet the few neighbors in their building, enroll Tamao at school, and Misao begins working from home.  Every so often they notice some peculiar things, for example,  Misao starts seeing feathers from the dead bird they'd buried, one day TV had  a "humanoid shadow" on a particular channel, and a drunken neighbor tells Teppei that she hates the "horrible hellhole" of the building's basement.  Misao isn't a big fan either, especially after little Tamao meets with an inexplicable accident down there and for some reason they can't access the basement to reach her until a neighbor who just happens to be a spirit medium is able to make the elevator work again.   But the clincher comes as one by one, the residents of Central Plaza Mansion begin to move out of the building until  ....

So far, this brief synopsis sounds like something right up my horror-reading alley, and it had potential to become a definite spine chiller had I not felt like I was reading a twisted Japanese version of the movie Poltergeist.  Not only was this book a "been there, done that" sort of thing for me, but it moved at a snail's pace -- while some weird things happened, they did so sort of piecemeal, with a lot of space in between which for me only deadened any sort of creep factor I was looking for. Acknowledging that it did have its moments, these were not enough to make the sense of horror at all sustainable over the course of the novel.   By the time the "last thirty pages" came along, which were supposed to have readers "holding your breath" according to the back cover blurb, I was just ready to be done and to leave the Kanos to their fate.  I'll also say that there was a major opportunity to make this a stronger horror novel that was missed and if anyone wants to talk about it after reading, let me know. It has to do with the so-called "dark secret" alluded to on the dustjacket blurb (which actually, everyone except the Kanos' neighbors knew about already so it wasn't actually a secret at all - who writes this stuff?) and a certain memorial tablet and shrine that somehow forgot to be taken care of...

Once again, I'm the little red fish swimming against the tide of blue, since this book seems to be making horror readers everywhere happy people.  I really, really wanted to like it, but the truth is that it just didn't wow me.  I had decided to read a more modern horror story to prove to myself that I wasn't a one-trick pony taking pleasure only in vintage chills, but it just wasn't the right one for me.  That doesn't mean it might not be someone else's cup of cha,  but in this case, it just wasn't mine.

hb#3: The Valancourt Book of Horror Stories, eds. James D. Jenkins and Ryan Cagle

9781943910526
Valancourt Books, 2016
277 pp

hardcover

"Still, the feeling remained -- a feeling of uneasiness, of dread, almost as if something was menacing them -- something unseen watching -- and waiting."   

As part of its "horror month" offerings,  that dynamic duo which is Valancourt has now given us Volume One of The Valancourt Book of Horror Stories, which, as the dustjacket blurb says, is a "new collection of tales spanning two centuries of horror," and is a mix of stories that range from "frightening to horrific to weird to darkly funny."  It is exactly as described, and given how much fun I had with this book,  I can just imagine the great time James and Ryan must have had in choosing the stories that went into it.

The table of contents is as follows:

• "Aunty Green," by John Blackburn -- booyah! What a great way to open this collection. Every time I'd read the phrase "He must be wicked to deserve such pain," I cringed. 
• "Miss Mack," by Michael McDowell -- anything he writes is just gold, and this story is no exception.  This one has one of the creepiest and most unexpected endings ever.
• "School Crossing," by Francis King -- this one belongs to that category of stories where you know you're about to witness a train wreck but you can't tear your eyes away.  
• Richard Marsh's "A Psychological Experiment" I'd read before, but it still managed to bring a chill to my spine this time around. I love Richard Marsh's work, and I am ecstatic that he's featured in here. 
• Anyone who reads the next one, "The Progress of John Arthur Crabbe,"  doesn't even have to look at the author's name to know that it was written by Stephen Gregory.  Oh my god. Short, but so very good. 
• "The Frozen Man" is one of my favorite stories in this book, written by John Travena, aka Ernest G. Henham, author of The Feast of Bacchus (which I just loved) and Tenebrae, both Valancourt publications.  This story is making its first appearance since 1912 here, and it is definitely one of the highlights of the collection.  I saw a review that mentioned that it was "very Lovecraftian (Mountains of Madness)," but in my opinion, it has much more of an Algernon Blackwood feel to it.  Two men from the Hudson's Bay Company are sent out into the cold, isolated north to find some fur trappers who have been shooting animals in the Hudson's Bay Company's territory, and they are forced to take with them an unwanted companion.  All goes well until the "devil's lights" appear, and then ... Whoa. 
• Michael Blumlein's "California Burning" is, in a word, strange. This one is dark humor at its finest, beginning with a man's attempt to get his father's body cremated, only to discover that there's something strange going on with his father's bones which "don't want to burn." Another really good entry. 
• "Let Loose," by Mary Cholmondeley is also excellent, in which a young architect finds himself in a crypt studying a fresco. No one has been allowed in there for years, for good reason as our architect will soon realize. Yes yes yes. I loved this one. 
• Bernard Taylor is up next, with another darkly comical story called "Out of Sorts," which first appeared in Charles L. Grant's 1983 anthology Gallery of Horror. It took me a minute to get the punchline when it was all over, but this one made me laugh out loud.   It is funny, but it's not, all at the same time.
• And now for the strangest and most seriously horrifying story in the entire book, I give you Christopher Priest's "The Head and the Hand."  As grotesque as it is, no amount of money would have made me walk away from it while reading.  I think the word 'shocking' is right but a bit too light for this story. 
• Another personal favorite is "The Ghost of Charlotte Cray" by Florence Marryat, whose book (also published by Valancourt) The Blood of the Vampire was on my favorites list for 2015.  I was so impressed by "The Ghost of Charlotte Cray"  that I immediately bought Volume I of  her A Moment of Madness (1883) because now I have a craving for more of her work.  Here, when the man whom Charlotte Cray loves marries another woman, she refuses to leave him alone until she meets his wife.  Considering the title, well...
• We next have a prose poem by M.G. Lewis called "The Grim White Woman."  M.G. Lewis, of course, is Matthew Gregory Lewis, who wrote The Monk, and this poem (which so reminds me of the old ballads) is pretty horrific, with a terrible story at its heart. I'm not at all a huge fan of poetry (with a few exceptions), but I loved this one.  One stanza:
  
  "Her arms, and her feet, and her bosom were bare;
  A shroud wrapp'd her limbs, and a snake bound her hair.
  This spectre, the Grim White Woman was she,
  And the Grim White Woman was fearful to see!"
• Charles Birkin's "The Terror on Tobit" is another one that chilled me to the bone; if I could find more monster stories like this one, I might actually start reading them. Outstanding creepy tale if ever there was one. 
• As I was reading "Furnished Apartments" by Forrest Reid, I kept reminding myself that the guy was still alive to tell the tale, which was the only thing that kept the level of anxiety I was feeling at bay. Hint: "Houses are like sponges. They absorb."  
• "Something Happened," by Hugh Fleetwood is sort of a sad story, but one very much up my reading alley. Uncertainty looms in this tale as the reader must decide if the strange story is made up by a man "tipped permanently over the edge" or if what he witnessed actually occurred. 
• Next it's Hugh Walpole with "The Tarn," a story about what lengths someone will go to to get rid of an unwanted guest. Absolutely delightful. 
• "The Gentleman All in Black" by Gerald Kersh brings this wonderful book to a close with a different take on the Faust legend where we discover that time is indeed money. 

There is an added bonus as well --  at the beginning of each chapter, there are informative notes about each story, the author, and what Valancourt has published by each writer making an appearance in this book.  

This book is tailor made for someone like me who thrives on vintage chills. While I get that not everyone appreciates or shares my old-fashioned horror-reading sensibilities, and that horror is indeed in the eye of the beholder, for me this collection was just about perfect.  I'm a VERY picky reader, so that says a lot. 

Please bring out a Volume Two! I loved this book!!!!!!

an earlier read, but Halloweenworthy for sure: The Dark Domain, by Stefan Grabinski

Stefan Grabinski

Since Stefan Grabinski (1887-1936)  isn't exactly a household name, I think a brief bit of  background is relevant here.   While you can get some info about him from Wikipedia and from The Stefan Grabinski Website, thanks to a post at Writers No One Reads, I discovered a bit more from Gilbert Alter-Gilbert, who wrote a piece about Grabinski and The Dark Domain in the Asylum Annual of 1995 (Asylum Arts Publishing):

"While a child, he contracted tuberculosis. His health remained fragile throughout his life, and this condition no doubt played a part in the formation of his personality, which was gloomy and introspective.  By the time he had finished his education and embarked on a career as a teacher, observers describe him as already pale and gaunt, always dressed in black, a man apart in his own inner realm, and regarding his surroundings obliquely. 

His literary aspirations announced themselves early, and from the first his work was marked by metaphysical speculation and a concern with the mystery of existence. By 1909, Grabinski had self-published a slim volume of stories, all trace of which has disappeared, but with which his course was set; these first macabre compositions already demonstrating his preoccupation with issues of philosophical conjecture." (143)

Grabinski went on to write On the Hill of Roses (1918) - which I own but haven't read yet; later The Motion Demon came out in 1919 followed by 1920's  The Deranged Pilgrim, The Book of Fire and An Uncanny Tale in 1922. By 1926, his writing turned more toward novels and plays rather than just short stories.  He apparently "idolized" Poe, was a recluse, and was, as is very articulately revealed in his stories,

"thoroughly absorbed with what he perceived as the dark, hidden forces which permeate and propel human life and seem to deny the implied orderliness of our hyper-rationalistic, overly-explained, neatly categorized and patly-understood world."  (142)

 Grabinski was "opposed to any notion of mechanism or pre-determined order at work in the universe," and, according to Alter-Gilbert, his "fiction is a swirling cauldron of fetishes and obsessions, a heady brew of mania, hysteria, and dementia."  In short, he writes exactly the sort of stuff I've become addicted to reading, and I've become a total fangirl now.

So now without any more information that probably no one but me cares about, we come to

The Dark Domain

9781909232044

Dedalus, 2013

originally published 1918

translated and edited by Miroslaw Lipinski

153 pp

paperback

"And if, indeed, there is nothing beyond the corner? Who can affirm if beyond so-called 'reality' anything exists at all?"

There are eleven stories in this book, along with an introduction by the editor & translator Miroslaw Lipinski as well as an afterword by Madeleine Johnson. In a word, it is excellent; there is not one bad story in this entire book.  In Grabinski, I've found another writer whose work is just plain genius.  

Perhaps the best way to describe what's in this book is by quoting Brian Stableford, who in his News of the Black Feast and Other Reviews notes that Grabinski's

"... characters are prone to haunting themselves, unwittingly dislodging fragments of themselves that become independently incarnate." (79-80)

While that's not exactly the case in every story here, it's still an observation that absolutely hits the nail on the head.  

It would a shame to spoil anyone's first-time enjoyment of these stories, so as usual, I'm not going to reveal much about any of them, so here's the usual stripped-down version. The truth is though that I could spend hours and hours talking about this book. 

"Fumes" begins this collection,  with a young engineer who is lost in the middle of a blinding snowstorm, having been separated from his colleagues. He comes to an old inn, where he shares a space with the innkeeper, his daughter, and an old woman who, strangely enough,  tend to make separate appearances but aren't seen together at the same time  ... Yow. This one is amazing. Someone could write a thesis on this story alone.    "The Motion Demon" appears in both The Dark Domain and Grabinski's book of the same title. Here a man makes several train trips,  "unusual journeys under the influence of cosmic and elemental forces," meeting up with a strange train conductor.  "The Area" is one of my favorite stories in the book, about a writer who has lost his ability to write over the last twelve years, and so "removes himself from the public eye." As he has found, he needs "greater artistic material" with which to express himself since "Already the written word was not enough for him."  Isolated in a "solitary residence," he starts paying attention to the abandoned villa across the street for hours at a time, when one day someone starts paying attention to him. Oh my god. What a great story. And I do mean great. 

Coming up to "A Tale of the Gravedigger," we move more firmly into the horror zone. The story begins with the discovery that there may be something very wrong with the grave monuments created by Giovanni Tossati of Foscara, who also doubles as gravedigger and wears a gypsum mask which "adhered so hermetically to his face, that it wasn't noticed it all"-- until it was. "Szamota's Mistress," about which I'm not saying a thing, since the ending is a bit of a shocker when you actually stop and consider what's going on here. It's also one of the most eerie stories in the book, even creepier after a second read.  Next up is "The Wandering Train."  Railwaymen have a "strange and puzzling" problem involving a train, "an intruder without patent or sanction," that turns up everywhere out of nowhere.  It's been a secret kept from the public until one day ...  

 "Strabismus" captures the plight of a man who is locked in a strange battle with his "living antithesis," while "Vengeance of the Elementals" finds a fire chief whose "long-term study of fires and their circumstances" gives way to a "more personal" battle with a "spiteful destructive essence that had to be reckoned with."  Up next is another excellent story, "In the Compartment," where a "timid dreamer" changes into someone "unrecognizable" the minute he steps into a train, as his newlywed traveling companions will soon discover. 

"Saturnin Sektor" finds the author of a manuscript that he's never shown another living soul being dogged by someone who "knows it by heart, inside and out," while the last story, "The Glance,"finds  a doctor who comes to the conclusion that  "everything he looked at and perceived was a creation of his mind."  But is it a case of "hallucination caused by overwork," or does everything he thinks about actually become a physical reality?  

While I latched on to Grabinski purely by accident, from now on any new translations of his work are going to find a permanent home on my shelves.  He's that good.  Anyone who is serious about dark fiction, literary horror and keen insight into human nature and the darkness of the human mind should not miss this book.  Again, I wonder how many other books by authors like this are out there, just waiting for me to find them.  

*Conjure Wife, by Fritz Lieber -- hb#2

9780765324061
Orb Books, 2009
originally published 1943
224 pp

paperback

I'm trying to maintain calm and do normal things right now, so before Matthew knocks on our door and while we still have power I figured I'd post about this book.  I did a flip-flop on this one, and watched the movie prior to reading the novel, but I can tell you that the movie follows the book pretty closely.

Norman Saylor is a professor of sociology who finds himself caught up in supernatural forces that he's built a career denying. Norman teaches sociology at a small university, more specifically, his work centers on the "parallelisms of primitive superstition and modern neurosis," even coming up with a book about it. He believes that magic is just a product of superstition -- in short he doesn't believe in it.  However, his wife Tansy does, and has been, unknown to Norman,  putting up protective magical shields to keep Norman safe from a trio of women who see him as a threat to their own interests. When Norman discovers that Tansy's been doing this, he makes her get rid of everything, and that's when all of the trouble begins.  Suddenly things start taking a turn for the worse, but level-headed Norman tries to rationalize every weird occurrence -- until he can no longer afford to do so.

As author Robert Dunbar writes in his very informative book Vortex, Conjure Wife "remains a masterpiece of understated horror," which I must say is an accurate assessment.  There are moments in this tale that had me on the edge of my chair, and the last part of the book is just downright frightening, pages being flipped at a frantic rate.    But aside from the horror aspect, there's so much happening here.  I'm back to Vortex to summarize, since I can't say it any better than this:

"Leiber had instincts enough to realize that the atmosphere at a small college, removed from what most would deem reality and claustrophobically rife with faculty jealousy, provided a perfect setting for the practice of the dark arts..." (160). 

I'd also add that all of the seemingly benign bridge parties and get-togethers with the same group of people time and again are perfect environments for hiding backbiting and resentment, and that comes out in this novel as well.

However, here, the major focus is on the women, and with good reason. First, no matter how much he denies it, Norman gradually comes face to face with the notion that witchcraft exists, and more importantly, that it's a force that all women possess.  Most use it for protection, but there are those women who, longing for power and social status, use it for their own ends, turning to a darker side of the craft.  Second, the men in this book are absolutely oblivious to the fact that it's the women who actually (but secretly) run the world, all the while hiding behind men's views of them as the weaker sex.  There's much more, but that should be enough to whet anyone's appetite. Considering when this novel was written, it's still surprisingly relevant right now.

Peter Wyngarde as Norman Saylor

The movie (1962), which due to not doing my homework I thought was based on Merritt's book of the same name (only to find out while watching that it was not), is also very well done, a true nail-biter  and manages to capture the same creeping horror of  the novel without having to resort to crappy gimmicks or effects. Reviews of this movie abound online so I won't go into it, but it's well worth finding a copy to watch after reading the book.

Again, superlatives all around for both book and film.  Very highly recommended.

HB#1: nothing says Halloween like a haunted house: *The Uninvited, by Dorothy Macardle

0892440686
Queens House, 1977
reprint of  Doubleday 1942 ed.
342 pp

hardcover

Just a brief note about this book.  My edition was published in 1977 and is a reprint of the original 1942 edition.   It was a bit pricey, although as it turns out, worth every damn cent, but the good news is that anyone looking for a reasonably-priced edition will find it in the new (September) edition put out by  Tramp Press. If you're an Amazon shopper, then you're in luck -- it's also available there.

On a weekend in Devon, writer Roderick (Roddy) Fitzgerald and his sister Pamela, are driving around looking for house to buy. Both of them want to get out of London and feel that they need a  "complete break with town, a life with air, space and growth in it." This is, as it turns out, their fifth weekend of looking.  They actuallly find the perfect spot, but the house itself turned out to be a "drab barrack" not even facing the sea.  Turning the car back toward London, and feeling like their "hopes had been preposterous," Pamela sees a lane she'd like to explore, convinced that there "must be a grand view from the top." It is then that they set eyes on Cliff End, fall in love with it, and ultimately buy it from Commander Brooke, whose granddaughter Stella actually owns the house. After the offer is made, Brooke reveals something that he feels obliged to mention without going into much detail:   it seems that some six years earlier, Cliff End had been occupied for some months, but the people who'd lived there had "experienced disturbances" and had left. Roddy shrugs it off -- and the two siblings begin to fix the house to begin their idyllic country life.

Not long afterward, the two learn about the  "local legend" attached to Cliff End, regarding the death of its former mistress, Mary Meredith. Mary was the daughter of  Commander Brooke, and was married to artist Llewellyn Meredith.  It seems that one very windy and stormy night, Llewellyn's model Carmel took off running toward the edge of a cliff, Mary following behind.  Carmel got pushed into a tree, while Mary went off the cliff.  It wasn't too much later that Carmel died from a resulting case of pneumonia. Left motherless was three year-old Stella, who was then taken to live with her grandfather.

Happy now that they are "at home," it doesn't take long before they start noticing a few strange occurrences, which only intensify as time goes on.  When their first houseguests arrive, things get even stranger; the horror becomes gradually worse to the point where the Fitzgeralds realize that the smart thing would be to leave Cliff End. Ultimately, though, they realize that everything they're experiencing seems to center directly on Stella.  Neither of them really want to leave, so Pamela tries to come up with a number of theories as to what's happening to them in order to find some sort of solution to be able to face down the menace that is currently in control of their lives.

Cliff End, from the movie

The Uninvited is a wonderful story, but reading carefully, it's not difficult at all to see that there's  more going on in this book than just ghosts and a haunting.

 While I'm not going to go into any detail at all in the way of what I think is going on here besides all of the supernatural events, I will say that I saw different undercurrents at work here, including repression and marginalization, a reluctance to dig up past history even when it's the only hope for the future, and most importantly perhaps, motherhood under the microscope.

I have this deep and abiding love of good haunted house stories, and I have to say that I was very, very happy with The Uninvited on many levels. On the other hand, the novel was slow to start, but it wasn't too long before I was completely absorbed.  I also figured out the surprises in this story long before they were revealed; then again, that may be due to my many eons of reading crime fiction and learning to put two and two together as the clues unfold.   Bottom line: it's a fine, creepy novel that is fun to read on its surface with much deeper strains running underneath all of the ghostly activity.

And now to the film. I had great fun watching this movie.   The first thing I noticed is that the beginning of the movie belies what's coming later on with its sort happy-go-lucky kind of opening.  Here, Rick (known as Roddy in the novel) and Pam arrive at the house with little dog in tow. There's this kind of silly fun sort of scene where the dog chases a squirrel into an open window at the house, followed by Rick and Pam where they take a tour of the place and decide that it's perfect.   We see Pam and her brother in a sort of carefree, happy mode that not too much later dissolves as the first of the strange happenings gets their attention. It's an awesome movie, and the acting, especially that of Gail Russell who plays Stella, is quite good.  I also loved how the director played with shadows here, which in some instances reminded me of classic noir film scenes. Side by side, though, the book for me was much better -- much darker than the movie, for sure.    Contentwise, the book goes much deeper into the whole mystery behind the hauntings, whereas  it gets sort of a muddled reveal toward the end in the film retelling.  And the seance scene in the novel is beyond brilliant as compared to the one in the movie.

Once again, both book and movie are yesses, and true fans of the supernatural should miss neither. Highly recommended, although both may seem tame to modern readers.  Not to me, though -- I was sucked into both and stayed suspended there until the end.