Some of my most prized possessions are classic anthologies of ghost and horror stories, and it was long an ambition of mine to add to this pantheon by editing a few of my own. Well, several years ago now, I took this leap and have been editing a series of folklore-themed horror anthologies called TERROR TALES ..., each volume set in a different geographical region of the UK (and maybe beyond, depending on how long the series lasts). The first 15 books are now available to buy - see below for full tables of contents, blurbs, snippets etc.
The idea behind this series is to combine my interest in the weird and strange with my fascination for localised mythology, folklore and history, and at the same time to present some fantastic new fiction from some of the top horror authors around, alongside one or two timely reprints.
I sincerely hope that more books will follow in this line, though they won't be in quickfire succession - these things take time and cost money, ya know. Those interested can keep checking the blog for updates.
The Mediterranean. Sun-bleached ruins, azure seas, foaming wine. But history’s cruellest tyrants reigned here, delighting in blood and torture. Myths tell of snake-haired harridans and one-eyed giants, of humans cooked on spits, of curses, scourges, and devious deities who played with men’s souls like pawns in chess …
The poison apples of Aegle
The human sacrifice on Crete
The beautiful predator of Palermo
The damned souls on Poveglia
The evil artefact at Koyuluk
The blood-drinking baron of Emporda
The demon attack in Vatican City
Includes terrifying tales by Jasper Bark, Simon Clark, Steve Duffy, Paul Finch, Sean Hogan, Carly Holmes, David J Howe, Maxim Jakubowski, Gary McMahon, Mark Morris, Reggie Oliver, Peter Shilston, Don Tumasonis and Aliya Whiteley.
CONTENTS
The Catacomb by Peter Shilston
Duo of Darkness
On Our Way to the Shore by Maxim Jakubowski
Belmez
Meet in the Middle by Aliya Whiteley
Island of the Damned
The Lovers by Steve Duffy
When Madmen Ruled the Earth
The Wretched Thicket of Thorn by Don Tumasonis
The Blue Room
This Haunted Heaven by Reggie Oliver
Born of Blood and Mystery
The Quiet Woman by Sean Hogan
Holy Terrors
The Teeth of the Hesperides by Jasper Bark
Cyclops
Reign of Hell by Paul Finch
In Human Guise
Mistral by Mark Morris
Ghosts of Malta
Mammone by Carly Holmes
Extinctor Draconis
Vromolimni by David J Howe
The Other Devils
Gerassimos Flamotas: A Day in the Life by Simon Clark
Lord of the Undead
Should Not Be by Gary McMahon
And while we’re at it, why don’t I try and tempt you with some juicy snippets:
There was a girl-child whose clothing looked at least two hundred years old, but who from her skin and hair might just have fallen asleep; but beyond her a man in priestly robes had lost his nose and his cheeks, and his eyes had decayed to blank milky globules; and further on the soldier in the chased steel breastplate, who was perhaps a mercenary from the Renaissance period, had lost his flesh entirely, and now grinned mindlessly with a naked skull …
The shirt ripped and the boy’s knees gave out, he crumpled, and the man still did not stop. He hunched over, arranged the boy, stretching out his arms and legs, then reached into the boy’s stomach. His hand was in the boy’s stomach, material was pulled out, something wet, it separated into strands. The man put the strands into his mouth and chewed, he put more into his mouth, he kept chewing …
The water bulged. Something vast was coming up from deep below, and the sound was that of a wellington boot being slowly lifted from a pool of thick, gelatinous mud. The lake sloshed around the edges as the thing heaved itself out, and when it fell back, the water level dropped by at least a foot. Sally took a step back, her eyes not quite comprehending what was in front of her. It was dark and seemed to suck the light into it. The redness from the lowering sun cast shadows over the creature, and it glistened as the water fell from it in sheets …
The poison apples of Aegle
The human sacrifice on Crete
The beautiful predator of Palermo
The damned souls on Poveglia
The evil artefact at Koyuluk
The blood-drinking baron of Emporda
The demon attack in Vatican City
Includes terrifying tales by Jasper Bark, Simon Clark, Steve Duffy, Paul Finch, Sean Hogan, Carly Holmes, David J Howe, Maxim Jakubowski, Gary McMahon, Mark Morris, Reggie Oliver, Peter Shilston, Don Tumasonis and Aliya Whiteley.
CONTENTS
The Catacomb by Peter Shilston
Duo of Darkness
On Our Way to the Shore by Maxim Jakubowski
Belmez
Meet in the Middle by Aliya Whiteley
Island of the Damned
The Lovers by Steve Duffy
When Madmen Ruled the Earth
The Wretched Thicket of Thorn by Don Tumasonis
The Blue Room
This Haunted Heaven by Reggie Oliver
Born of Blood and Mystery
The Quiet Woman by Sean Hogan
Holy Terrors
The Teeth of the Hesperides by Jasper Bark
Cyclops
Reign of Hell by Paul Finch
In Human Guise
Mistral by Mark Morris
Ghosts of Malta
Mammone by Carly Holmes
Extinctor Draconis
Vromolimni by David J Howe
The Other Devils
Gerassimos Flamotas: A Day in the Life by Simon Clark
Lord of the Undead
Should Not Be by Gary McMahon
And while we’re at it, why don’t I try and tempt you with some juicy snippets:
There was a girl-child whose clothing looked at least two hundred years old, but who from her skin and hair might just have fallen asleep; but beyond her a man in priestly robes had lost his nose and his cheeks, and his eyes had decayed to blank milky globules; and further on the soldier in the chased steel breastplate, who was perhaps a mercenary from the Renaissance period, had lost his flesh entirely, and now grinned mindlessly with a naked skull …
Peter Shilston – The Catacomb
The shirt ripped and the boy’s knees gave out, he crumpled, and the man still did not stop. He hunched over, arranged the boy, stretching out his arms and legs, then reached into the boy’s stomach. His hand was in the boy’s stomach, material was pulled out, something wet, it separated into strands. The man put the strands into his mouth and chewed, he put more into his mouth, he kept chewing …
Aliya Whiteley – Meet in the Middle
The water bulged. Something vast was coming up from deep below, and the sound was that of a wellington boot being slowly lifted from a pool of thick, gelatinous mud. The lake sloshed around the edges as the thing heaved itself out, and when it fell back, the water level dropped by at least a foot. Sally took a step back, her eyes not quite comprehending what was in front of her. It was dark and seemed to suck the light into it. The redness from the lowering sun cast shadows over the creature, and it glistened as the water fell from it in sheets …
David J Howe – Vromolimni
The West Country. England’s mystical heart. Hill-forts, ancient circles. Blessed by age-old powers, sanctified in blood. Where woods and pools stir to whispered summonings, forbidden names are carved in rock, and rebels died en masse, hanged and butchered, their gore-dabbled ghosts wandering vengeful in the rural night …
The drumming demon of Tedworth
The ocean predator at Ilfracombe
The sleeping bones at Wilcot
The creep-about killer on Burgh Island
The hateful entity in Cheddar Gorge
The flesh-rotting curse at Blackdown
The stalking spectres on Dartmoor
Includes terrifying stories by AK Benedict, Andy Briggs, Mike Chinn, Adrian Cole, Dan Coxon, Steve Duffy, Paul Finch, Lizzy Fry, John Linwood Grant, SL Howe, Thana Niveau, John Llewellyn Probert, Sarah Singleton, Lisa Tuttle and Stephen Volk.
CONTENTS
The Darkness Below by Dan Coxon
Unto These Ancient Stones
Objects in Dreams May Be Closer Than They Appear by Lisa Tuttle
The Horror at Littlecote
The Woden Jug by John Lindwood Grant
And Then There Was One
Chalk and Flint by Sarah Singleton
When Evil Walked Among Them
Epiphyte by Thana Niveau
The Hangman’s Pleasure
In the Land of Thunder by Adrian Cole
The Thing in the Water
Unrecovered by Stephen Volk
Priests of Good and Evil
Gwen by SL Howe
The Pixie’s Curse
Watcher of the Skies by Mike Chinn
Vixiana
Bullbeggar Walk by Paul Finch
The Tedworth Drummer
The Pale Man by Andy Briggs
By the Axe, He Lived
Little Down Barton by Lizzie Fry
Hounds of Hell
Certain Death for a Known Person by Steve Duffy
The Blood Price
Knyfesmyths’ Steps by AK Benedict
Lonesome Roads
Soon, the Darkness by John Llewellyn Probert
And if that didn’t wet your whistles sufficiently, here are several uber-discomforting excerpts.
The old moss woman stepped out from the side of the lane and stood in front of her. Still in threadbare wintery apparel, she was all rotten wood bones beneath the lush moss cloak. Her hair was long and white, bedraggled strands of last year’s grass around a face of dark, yawning gaps and hollows …
‘What are you getting at?’ For the first time since my arrival at High Thornhays I was on the defensive. Old habits born of inadequacy coming to the fore; truculence, sullenness … and just the beginnings of fear. The man with no face there in the armchair: I was already afraid of him. Not nearly as afraid as I ought to have been, not yet. But soon; very soon.
Holes had been poked for eye sockets. The blackened lumps of something moist that had been pushed deep within the ragged cavities now regarded him soullessly. It was the kind of weird nonsensical thing that under normal circumstances would be funny but here, in this desolate place, with the chill and the damp worming their way between the folds of his clothes, the idea of some mutant horse-thing hobbling across the landscape on its hind legs wasn’t remotely amusing.
The drumming demon of Tedworth
The ocean predator at Ilfracombe
The sleeping bones at Wilcot
The creep-about killer on Burgh Island
The hateful entity in Cheddar Gorge
The flesh-rotting curse at Blackdown
The stalking spectres on Dartmoor
Includes terrifying stories by AK Benedict, Andy Briggs, Mike Chinn, Adrian Cole, Dan Coxon, Steve Duffy, Paul Finch, Lizzy Fry, John Linwood Grant, SL Howe, Thana Niveau, John Llewellyn Probert, Sarah Singleton, Lisa Tuttle and Stephen Volk.
CONTENTS
The Darkness Below by Dan Coxon
Unto These Ancient Stones
Objects in Dreams May Be Closer Than They Appear by Lisa Tuttle
The Horror at Littlecote
The Woden Jug by John Lindwood Grant
And Then There Was One
Chalk and Flint by Sarah Singleton
When Evil Walked Among Them
Epiphyte by Thana Niveau
The Hangman’s Pleasure
In the Land of Thunder by Adrian Cole
The Thing in the Water
Unrecovered by Stephen Volk
Priests of Good and Evil
Gwen by SL Howe
The Pixie’s Curse
Watcher of the Skies by Mike Chinn
Vixiana
Bullbeggar Walk by Paul Finch
The Tedworth Drummer
The Pale Man by Andy Briggs
By the Axe, He Lived
Little Down Barton by Lizzie Fry
Hounds of Hell
Certain Death for a Known Person by Steve Duffy
The Blood Price
Knyfesmyths’ Steps by AK Benedict
Lonesome Roads
Soon, the Darkness by John Llewellyn Probert
And if that didn’t wet your whistles sufficiently, here are several uber-discomforting excerpts.
The old moss woman stepped out from the side of the lane and stood in front of her. Still in threadbare wintery apparel, she was all rotten wood bones beneath the lush moss cloak. Her hair was long and white, bedraggled strands of last year’s grass around a face of dark, yawning gaps and hollows …
Sarah Singleton – Chalk and Flint
‘What are you getting at?’ For the first time since my arrival at High Thornhays I was on the defensive. Old habits born of inadequacy coming to the fore; truculence, sullenness … and just the beginnings of fear. The man with no face there in the armchair: I was already afraid of him. Not nearly as afraid as I ought to have been, not yet. But soon; very soon.
Steve Duffy – Certain Death for a Known Person
Holes had been poked for eye sockets. The blackened lumps of something moist that had been pushed deep within the ragged cavities now regarded him soullessly. It was the kind of weird nonsensical thing that under normal circumstances would be funny but here, in this desolate place, with the chill and the damp worming their way between the folds of his clothes, the idea of some mutant horse-thing hobbling across the landscape on its hind legs wasn’t remotely amusing.
John Llewellyn Probert – Soon, the Darkness
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The Scottish Lowlands. Gentle hills, dreamy woods, romantic ballads, heroic songs. But dark castles tell tales of torture and woe, of reiver cruelty and the madness of kings. While the shades of slain armies still battle in the mist, witch-hunters ride and the bone-fires blaze ...
CONTENTS
The Moss-Trooper by MW Craven
Bastions of Dread
The Strathantine Imps by Steve Duffy
Spirits of Palace and Tomb
Gie Me Something ta Eat Afore I Dee by John Alfred Taylor
Glasgow’s Dancing Corpse
Land of the Foreigner by Tracy Fahey
The Bloodiest of Ends
Proud Lady in a Cage by Fred Urquhart
The Ghost Road
Drumglass Chapel by Reggie Oliver
The Devil in the Dark City
Two Shakes of a Dead Lamb’s Tail by Anna Taborksa
I’ll Be in Scotland Before You
The Ringlet Stones by Charlotte Bond
The Real Mr Hyde
Coulter’s Candy by Johnny Mains
Dishes Served Cold
Echoes from the Past by Graham Smith
The Murder Dolls
Herders by Willie Meikle
The Vampire of Annandale
Birds of Prey by SJI Holliday
The Selkirk Undead
The Clearance by Paul M. Feeney
The Overtoun Bridge Mystery
The Fourth Presence by SA Rennie
The dancing corpse of Glasgow
The masked imps of Strathantine
The murder dolls of Holyrood Park
The skeletal bride of Allanton
The profane chapel at Drumglass
The dark rituals in the West Bow
He
held competitions and gave gold to the brigand who came up with the cruellest,
most novel way of killing. And without exception this brought out the most
brutal, base urges of men who had forsaken their God many winters ago. They
poured liquid iron down their victim’s throats; they fed them to starving pigs.
They let them be mounted by stallions until their insides were bloody and torn.
A dozen more methods I won’t say out loud ...
The Moss-Trooper by MW Craven
Isabella shuddered and closed her eyes,
trying to block out the three awesome faces. On one side of the witch was her
grandson, the red-haired warlock. On Mistress Cessford’s other side was another
warlock, a tall man wearing a tall black hat. Amber eyes with a reddish glow
burned into her under the frown of his thick black brows.
“’Tis the Master
himself come to visit ye, prood leddy,” the witch said.
Proud Lady in a Cage by Fred Urquhart
Drumglass Chapel by Reggie Oliver
The gardens and orchards of the Home Counties. Quintessential England. Cottages, sleepy lanes. But also alchemy, devil cults and village curses. Where country house murders happen for real, evil landlords slaughter their guests, and Hellfire Clubs celebrate the powers of darkness ...
The horned huntsman of Windsor
The hideous apparition at Ravensden
The unholy church at Thundridge
The hammer slayings at Denham
The death omen at Naphill
The forlorn phantom of Shere
The brutish horror at Buckland
CONTENTS
In the English Rain by Steve Duffy
Devils in the Countryside
Monkey’s by Reggie Oliver
The Ostrich Inn
The Old, Cold Clay by Gail-Nina Anderson
The Buckland Shag
Between by Sam Dawson
Three More for the Hangman
My Somnambulant Heart – Andrew Hook
The Horned Huntsman
The Gravedigger of Witchfield by Steven J Dines
The Naphill Death Omen
Where are they Now? by Tina Rath
Land of Dark Arts
The Doom by Paul Finch
Lord Stanhope’s Homonculi
Summer Holiday by John Llewellyn Probert
The Coldest Christmas of All
Chesham by Helen Grant
The Raven
Love Leaves Last by Mick Sims
The Thing by the Roadside
The Topsy Turvy Ones by Tom Johnstone
Knocking Knoll
Taking Tusk Mountain by Allen Ashley
The Drowned
Moses by David J Howe
Eerie in Oil
The Old Man in Apartment Ninety by Jason Gould
And for your further delectation, here are a few short clips, just to whet your appetites further:
A man lay on a king-sized bed with his hands behind his neck. He wore a full black-devil mask with gold paint around the eyes and running down either side of the face like tears. The horns and lips were painted red. Like everyone else at the party, he was naked except for the mask he wore. His body was muscular and hairy …
The Gravedigger of Witchfield by Steven J Dines
She would never have got into a car with a perfect stranger, on a sunny day, when she knew a bus would be along in a few minutes. It’s not as if it was pouring with rain … I mean, she wasn’t an idiot. Sharp as a tack … and they never found anything. Not a trace of her or her belongings. Her bank card’s never been used, her phone wasn’t recycled … Nothing.
Where Are They Now? by Tina Rath
The Spanish director José Larraz had filmed his extremely low budget ‘Vampyres’ at Oakley Court. While there was no specific death scene that one could identify with that film, Aunt Agatha certainly liked her wine (there is a prolonged segment featuring wine tasting in the movie) and she was thin enough that her veins would be easily accessible for a neat and hopefully fuss-free exsanguination …
Summer Holiday by John Llewellyn Probert
TERROR TALES OF NORTHWEST ENGLAND
England’s majestic Northwest, land of rain-washed skies, dark forests and brooding, windswept hills. Famous too for its industrial blight and brutal persecutions; a realm where skulls scream and witches wail, gallows creak and grave-robbers prowl the long, black nights …
The hideous scarecrows of Lune
The heathen rite at Knowsley
The revenge killings in Preston
The elegant ghost of Combermere
The berserk boggart of Moston
The malformed brute on Mann
The walking dead at Haigh Hall
And many more chilling tales by Ramsey Campbell, Stephen Gallagher, Sam Stone, Simon Kurt Unsworth, Cate Gardner, and other award-winning masters and mistresses of the macabre.
Table of Contents
Normal Bones by Jason Gould
The Lost Lads of Rivington
The Mute Swan by Cate Gardner
The Resurrection Men
Factory Rook by Simon Kurt Unsworth
Night Falls Over Pendle
Tights and Straw and Wire Mesh by John Travis
The Lancashire Boggarts
A Weekend Break by Edward Pearce
Lord Combermere’s Ghost
Writer’s Cramp by David A Riley
Screaming Skulls
Wet Jenny by Christopher Harman
Land of Monsters
The Drain by Stephen Gallagher
Chingle Hell
Only Sleeping by Peter Bell
Of Gods and Ghosts
Peeling the Layers by Sam Stone
The Borgias of the Slums
Root Cause by Ramsey Campbell
The Horror at the Gatehouse
Formby Point by Anna Taborska
Hill of Mysteries
Below by Simon Bestwick
The Vengeance of Bannister Doll
Old Huey by Solomon Strange
A Vision of His Own Destruction
The Upper Tier by Paul Finch
A part of my rational brain tried to tell me that it must be a man – the farmer playing a trick, standing up there all day dressed as a scarecrow waiting for somebody to frighten – but God help me I knew that it wasn’t. With nowhere to hide I ran down the track …
Tights and Straw and Wire Mesh
John Travis
A crooked figure moved with a see-saw motion over the road from the church; twisting with repulsive gait up the garden steps; a wan grinning face tilting up towards the window; an awkward yet deliberate plodding down the long dark corridor, its abominable approach slow but inexorable …
Robert turned his eyes to the door …
Only Sleeping
Peter Bell
I got one other brief impression, of the beast that was bearing down on him from the deeper shadows and it was everything we’d feared it might be; the Hydra, the Gorgon, the Big Bad Wolf, a tunnelful of viciousness thundering toward Spike with the momentum of a train, eyes like baleful headlamps and teeth like knives …
The Drain
Stephen Gallagher
Cornwall, England’s most scenic county: windswept
moors, rugged cliffs and wild, foaming seas. But smugglers and wreckers once
haunted its hidden coves, mermaid myths abound, pixie lore lingers, henges signal
a pagan past, and fanged beasts stalk the ancient, overgrown lanes …
The serpent woman of Pengersick
The screaming demon of Land’s End
The nightmare masquerade at Padstow
The feathered horror of Mawnan
The terrible voice at St Agnes
The ritual slaughter at Crantock
The hoof-footed fetch of Bodmin Moor
And many more chilling tales by Mark Morris, Ray
Cluley, Reggie Oliver, Sarah Singleton, Mark Samuels, Thana Niveau and other
award-winning masters and mistresses of the macabre.
We Who Sing Beneath the Ground – Mark Morris
Golden Days of Terror
In the Light of St Ives – Ray Cluley
Morgawr Rising
Trouble at Botathan – Reggie Oliver
From the Lady Downs
‘Mebyon versus Suna’ – John Whitbourn
The Serpent of Pengersick
The Unseen – Paul Edwards
Finned Angels, Fish-Tailed Devils
Dragon Path – Jacqueline Simpson
Jamaica Inn
The Old Traditions Are Best – Paul Finch
Guardians of the Castle
The Uncertainty of All Earthly Things – Mark Valentine
The Hooper
His Anger Was Kindled – Kate Farrell
The Bodmin Fetch
Four Windows and a Door – DP Watt
Owlman
Claws – Steve Jordan
The Cursing Psalm
A Beast by Any Other Name – Adrian Cole
Of the Demon, Tregeagle
Moon Blood-Red, Tiding Turning – Mark Samuels
Slaughter at Penryn
The Memory of Stone – Sarah Singleton
Queen of the Wind
Shelter from the Storm – Ian Hunter
The Voice in the Tunnels
Losing its Identity – Thana Niveau
No more than two metres away was a circular pit that,
as far as she could tell, stretched from one wall of the barn to another. She thought
of animal traps, in the bottom of which might be sharpened stakes designed to
pierce the animal’s body as it fell. Oh God, oh God. Was that what this was?
She tilted her phone down, shining it into the hole.
It wasn’t black down there, as she had expected. It
was red.
Blood red.
And she could see something moving. Something huge and
glistening and slug-like ...
We Who Sing Beneath the Ground
Mark Morris
She heard quiet murmurs all around, like voices –
chanting.
Sonia halted and turned to face the darkness, as the
machines and lights dimmed around her. Sam and Billy were gone. She was alone,
as the chanting stopped. She screamed their names. No answers came. The only
sound as the rain and Sonia’s heavy breathing. She took the torch from her
pocket and turned it towards the darkness.
Small, fast shapes circles her, ducking and diving
between the machines.
‘Come out!’ she called.
And they did. There were so many of them, humourless
grins on their stained fur faces and pupil-less black eyes ...
Claws
Steve Jordan
There was only the voice of the sea, which was rising
to a deafening scream. The shoreline was so far away.
The sky was bleached white and the icy wind stung her
face. It was like trying to run through a blizzard. The lighthouse stood like a
lone survivor on the cliff, a thin, pale guardian. Miranda kept her eyes fixed
on it as she pushed herself onwards. Behind her, she could hear the wave gathering,
the waters swarming together into a monstrous shape ...
Losing Its Identity
Thana Niveau
TERROR TALES OF THE OCEANThe rolling blue ocean. Timeless, vast, ancient, mysterious. Where eerie voices call through the lightless deeps, monstrous shapes skim beneath the waves, and legends tell of sunken cities, fiendish fogs, ships steered only by dead men, and forgotten isles where abominations lurk ...
The multi-limbed horror in the Ross Sea
The hideous curse of Palmyra Atoll
The murderous duo of the Messina Strait
The doomed crew of the Flying Dutchman
The devil fish of the South Pacific
The alien creatures in the English Channel
The giant predator of the Mariana Trench
And many more chilling tales by Peter James, Adam Nevill, Stephen Laws, Lynda E. Rucker, Conrad Williams, Robert Shearman and other award-winning masters and mistresses of the macabre.
Stuka Juice - Terry Grimwood
Ship of the Dead
The End of the Pier - Stephen Laws
The Swirling Sea
Lie Still, Sleep Becalmed - Steve Duffy
Meg
The Seventh Wave - Lynda E. Rucker
The Palmyra Curse
Hippocampus - Adam Nevill
Gelatinous
The Offing - Conrad Williams
Blood and Oil
Sun Over the Yard Arm - Peter James
Echoes of an Eldritch Past
First Miranda - Simon Strantzas
Sharkbait
The Derelict of Death - Simon Clark and John B. Ford
Horrific Beasts
The Decks Below - Jan Edwards
The Flying Dutchman
Hell in the Cathedral - Paul Finch
From the Hadean Deep
Hushed Will Be All Murmurs - Adam Golaski
Mer-Killers
And This Is Where We Falter - Robert Shearman
It is William Bates who is at the stern and spies something strange in the seas behind us. What is that? he says. I say I do not know, it looks like a black spot upon the surface of the water. I am sure that we will lose sight of it soon, fast as we are now speeding, but an hour later we think to look back, and there it still is - it is larger, if anything, it is ganing on us. It is in pursuit. How it bobs about on the waves.
Before sunset it is close enough that we can identify it, and it is a coffin ...
And This Is Where We Falter
Robert Shearman
Cold water arced across her face like a slap, returning her to her senses; and to a roughly humanoid shape framed in the doorway.
Its arms seemed too long, with webbed hands clutching the hatch edge. Its legs were bowed and short. A ridge of bone rose across its skull, which was narrow, with eyes set more to the sides than was human. The mouth was wide, with a pronounced peak to a thin upper lip, giving a beak-like appearance ...
The Decks Below
Jan Edwards
Feeling lighter now as the buoyancy supported the weight of the suit, I made a half-turn on my platform so I could see the keel of the ship and maybe discern what held her in place. I waited for a gush of bubbles to pass so I could get the whole picutre. But what I then saw sent sheets of ice through me. I pushed my face forward against the glass plate, my eyes bulging, my heart thudding.
Gripping the bottom of the ship like a massive sucker was an amorphous piece of flesh, Pulpy and white, it was; almost the shape of a wine glass, its wide mouth clamped onto the keel as if the creature sucked at the timbers. Beneath that, it became fluted, growing narrower and narrower until a stem little thicker than my own waist ran down into the deeps ...
The Derelict of Death
Simon Clark and John B. Ford
TERROR TALES OF THE SCOTTISH HIGHLANDS
The Scottish Highlands, picturesque home to grand mountains and plunging glens. But also a land of bitterness, betrayal and blood-feud, where phantom pipers lament callous slaughters, evil spirits haunt crag and loch, and ancient monsters roam the fogbound moors …
The Black Wolf of Badenoch
The deformed horror at Glamis
The witch coven of Auldearn
The faceless giant of Ben Macdui
The shrieking voices on Skye
The feathered fiend of Glen Etive
The headless killer at Arisaig
And many more chilling tales by William Meikle, Helen Grant, Barbara Roden, Carole Johnstone, DP Watt and other award-winning masters and mistresses of the macabre.
Skye’s Skary Places – Ian Hunter
Phantoms in the Mist
The Dove – Helen Grant
Prey of the Fin-Folk
Strone House - Barbara Roden
The Well of Heads
Face Down In The Earth – Tom Johnstone
The Vanishing
The Dreaming God Is Singing Where She Lies - William Meikle
The Curse of Scotland
The Housekeeper – Rosie Seymour
From Out The Hollow Hills
The Executioner - Peter Bell
Saurians of the Deep
You Must Be Cold - John Whitbourn
Glamis Castle
The Fellow Travellers – Sheila Hodgson
Daemonologie
Shelleycoat – Graeme Hurry
Evil Monsters
The Other House, The Other Voice – Craig Herbertson
The Mull Plane Mystery
Myself/Thyself - DP Watt
The Bauchan
Broken Spectres - Carl Barker
The Big Grey Man
Jack Knife – Gary Fry
Tristicloke the Wolf
The Foul Mass At Tongue House - Johnny Mains
The Drummer of Cortachy
There You’ll Be – Carole Johnstone
A person must be a brute if he can sit of an evening warming his hands over the fire and know that under the stone upon which his buckled shoe rests is the mouldering body of his own child. How could he stand the evil scent that must have seeped from under it, rising on the warm air?
The Dove
Helen Grant
“Oh, there are all sorts of vague tales about weird voices, climbers’ ghosts, and so on – the winds make peculiar sounds howling round the crags. But the only creature linked specifically with the Cuillin is the Uraisg. There’s a corrie and a pass named after it. It’s supposed to look like a goat in a man’s shape, all shaggy, with sharp teeth and claws. Very frightening to behold.”
The Executioner
Peter Bell
The collectivised farms were famine factories. It wasn’t just sheepdogs who worked seven days a week all their short lives. In the hamlets there were scaffolds: they sagged with examples bearing placards strung round stretched necks. From Lochgilphead I heard the crackle of a distant firing squad.
You Must Be Cold
John Whitbourn
TERROR TALES OF YORKSHIRE
Yorkshire – a rolling landscape of verdant dales and quaint country towns. But
where industrial fires left hideous scars, forlorn ruins echo the shrieks of
forgotten wars, and depraved killers evoke nightmare tales of ogres, trolls and
wild moorland boggarts...
The stalking devil
of Boroughbridge
The murder machine
at Halifax
The hooded horror
of Pontefract
The bloody meadow
at Towton
The black tunnel
of Renfield
The evil trickster
of Spaldington
The shadow forms
at Silverwood
In October We Buried The Monsters by Simon Avery
The Decapitation Device
The Coat Off His Back by Keris McDonald
Haunting Memories Of The Past
They Walk As Men by Mark Morris
The Yorkshire Witches
On Ilkley Moor by Alison Littlewood
The Black Monk Of Pontefract
The Crawl by Stephen Laws
The Woman In The Rain
Ragged by Gary McMahon
The Hobman
A True Yorkshireman by Christopher Harman
The Town Where Darkness Was Born
All Things Considered, I'd Rather Be In Hell by Mark Chadbourn
A Feast For Crows
The Demon Of Flowers by Chico Kidd
The City Of The Dead
The Summer Of Bradbury by Stephen Bacon
Radiant Beings
Random Flight by Rosalie Parker
Death In The Harrying
The Rhubarb Festival by Simon Clark
The Alien
The Crack by Gary Fry
The Boggart Of Bunting Nook
A Story From When We Had Nothing by Jason Gould
There was nothing hurried in his approach. It was a steady methodical pace, holding that scythe casually down at his side. His idiot, grinning scarecrow's face was fixed on me as he moved. There was no doubt in my mind as he came on.
He meant to kill me.
The Crawl
Stephen Laws
As I went, the old tune became the background to my steps, the refrain to my thoughts. I remembered us singing it, the story of comic cannibalism where the man caught his deeath o' cowd, was buried and eaten by worms, which were eaten by ducks, which were eaten by the people. I never knew who the 'we' in the song was supposed to be, the singers or someone else, and now I wondered.
On Ilkley Moor
Alison Littlewood
The figures were so thin that they could not possibly be alive. There was a suggestion of clothes hanging on narrow frames, flesh drooping on bone, eyeless sockets beneath the mourning rags. Air hissed dryly through grizzled throats. Rotten feet shuffled on the soft ground.
Ragged
Gary McMahon
TERROR TALES OF WALES
Wales – ‘Land of my Fathers’, cradle of poetry, song and mythic rural
splendour. But also a scene of oppression and tragedy, where angry spirits
stalk castle and coal mine alike, death-knells sound amid fogbound peaks, and dragons
stir in bottomless pools …
The headless
spectre of Kidwelly
The sea terror off
Anglesey
The soul stealer of Porthcawl
The blood rites at Abergavenny
The fatal fruit of
Criccieth
The dark serpent
of Bodalog
The Christmas
slaughter at Llanfabon
And many more chilling
tales by Stephen Volk, Tim Lebbon, Simon Clark, Priya Sharma, John Llewellyn
Probert and other award-winning masters and mistresses of the macabre.
Under The Windings Of The Sea by Ray Cluley
Legions of Ghosts
Old As The Hills by Steve Duffy
The Beast of Bodalog
The Druid's Rest by Reggie Oliver
Night Of The Bloody Ape
Swallowing A Dirty Seed by Simon Clark
The Devil Made Him Do It
The Face by Thana Niveau
Hoof-Beats In The Mist
Don't Leave Me Down Here by Steve Lockley
The Werewolf Of Clwyd
Matilda Of The Night by Stephen Volk
The Goblin Stone
The Sound Of The Sea by Paul Lewis
A Quick Pint And A Slow Hanging
The Flow by Tim Lebbon
Doppelganger
The Offspring by Steve Jordan
Prophecy Of Fire
Dialled by Bryn Fortey
The Dark Heart Of Magnificence
The Rising Tide by Priya Sharma
The Hag Lands
Apple Of Their Eyes - Gary Fry
Beneath The Sea Of Wrecks
Learning The Language by John Llewellyn Probert
Some went on two legs, some went on four: there were dozens of them, and they seemed to come from everywhere at once, above, below, and all around. The whole chapel was alive with pattering and scuffling and soft thuds, and everywhere a kind of hissing, panting sound, horribly wet somehow ...
Old As The Hills
Steve Duffy
Learning The Language
John Llewellyn Probert
Matilda Of The Night
Stephen Volk
TERROR TALES OF THE SEASIDE
The British Seaside – golden sands, toffee rock, amusement arcades. But also the ghosts of better days: phantom performers who if they can’t get laughs will get screams; derelict fun-parks where maniacs lurk; hideous things washed in on bitter tides …
The death ships of Goodwin
The killer clowns of Bognor
The devil fish of Guernsey
The Night Caller of St. Derfyn
The Black Mass at North Berwick
The grisly revenge at Brighton
The tortured souls of Westingsea
Holiday From Hell by Reggie Oliver
The Eerie Events At Castel Mare
The Causeway by Stephen Laws
The Kraken Wakes
The Magician Kelso Dennett by Stephen Volk
Forces Of Evil
A Prayer For The Morning by Joseph Freeman
Hotel Of Horror
The Jealous Sea by Sam Stone
The Ghosts Of Goodwin Sands
The Entertainment by Ramsey Campbell
The Horse And The Hag
The Poor Weather Crossings Company by Simon Kurt Unsworth
The Devil Dog Of Peel
Brighthelmstone by R.B. Russell
The Ghouls Of Bannane Head
Men With False Faces by Robert Spalding
This Beautiful, Terrible Place
GG LUVS PA by Gary Fry
In The Deep Dark Winter
The Incident At North Shore by Paul Finch
The Walking Dead
Shells by Paul Kane
Hellmouth
The Sands Are Magic by Kate Farrell
Wild Men Of The Sea
Broken Summer by Christopher Harman.
As he tugged the frayed cord to kindle the bare bulb, he heard a muffled giggle from the region of the bath. He threw his bag onto the hook on the door and yanked the shower curtains apart. A naked woman so scrawny he could see not just her ribs but the shape of bones inside her buttocks was crouching on all fours in the bath. She peered wide-eyed over one splayed knobbly hand at him ...
The Entertainment
Ramsey Campbell
... they were now hip deep in the water. Getting deeper with each stride: chest-height, then shoulders. Was it Aaron's imagination or did he see his mum and dad's heads turn a little, just before they sank underneath the waves. Before they vanished completely.
In over their heads ...
Shells
Paul Kane
At first it looked to me like a part of a doll. I reached for it, slowly, tentatively, uncertain whether Pluto might not make a savage bid for its recovery but he just stood there staring at me with his glassily malignant eyes. I picked it up and almost instantly dropped it. It was soft and cold, a real dead thing. It was a severed child's hand.
Holiday From Hell
Reggie Oliver
TERROR TALES OF LONDON
The city of London – whose gold-paved streets are lost in choking fog and echo to the trundling of the plague-carts, whose twisting back alleys ring with cries of ‘Murder!’, whose awful Tower is stained with the blood of princes and paupers alike …
The night stalker of Hammersmith
The brutal butchery in Holborn
The depraved spirit of Sydenham
The fallen angel of Dalston
The murder den at Notting Hill
The haunted sewers of Bermondsey
The red-eyed ghoul of Highgate
And many more chilling tales by Adam Nevill, Mark Morris, Christopher Fowler, Nina Allan, Nicholas Royle and other award-winning masters and mistresses of the macabre.
The Tiger by Nina Allan
London After Midnight
The Soldier by Roger Johnson
Queen Rat
Train, Night by Nicholas Royle
The Horror At Berkeley Square
The Angels Of London by Adam Nevill
Boudicca’s Bane
Capital Growth by Gary Fry
The Black Dog Of Newgate
The Thames – Rosalie Parker
The Other Murderers
The Red Door by Mark Morris
The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street
Undesirable Residence by Barbara Roden
Nosferatu In Highgate
The Horror Writer by Jonathan Oliver
Butchery In Bleeding-Heart Yard
Perry In Seraglio by Christopher Fowler
The Monster Of Hammersmith
Someone To Watch Over You by Marie O’Regan
The Black Death Returns
The Outcast Dead by David J. Howe
What Stirs Below?
The Bloody Tower by Anna Taborska
A row of figures, standing silently across the tunnel, with more jostling behind them, as if seeking the best vantage point. They were all dressed - if you can call it that - in sheets, and they all had that same look of gleaming white about the face and hands. There was also that same look of insane glee about their mouths, inasmuch as fleshless, toothless openings can be called mouths.
Undesirable Residence
Barbara Roden
As the wheezing, threadbare creature stumbled towards him, Simon's screams were much the same as they had been on that rainy day all those years ago. Sawdust trickled from Rupert's empty eyes as it pawed weakly at his legs, the red stitches of its makeshift smile snapping open as it attempted to talk.
The Horror Writer
Jonathan Oliver
... having a day job at the Tower of London, Mr. Skeffington would have had ample opportunity to observe both instruments in practice. While the rack stretched people until their limbs were dislocated and then torn from their sockets, the Scavenger's Daughter compressed them - in a foetal position - until they bled from their orifices and their bones broke.
The Bloody Tower
Anna Taborska
TERROR TALES OF EAST ANGLIA
East Anglia – a drear, flat land of fens and broads, lone gibbets and isolated cottages, where demon dogs howl in the night, witches and warlocks lurk at every crossroads, and corpse-candles burn in the marshland mist …
The giggling horror of Dagworth
The wandering torso of Happisburgh
The vile apparitions at Wicken
The slavering beast of Rendlesham
The faceless evil on Wallasea
The killer hounds of Southery
The dark guardian of Wandlebury
And many more chilling tales by Alison Littlewood, Reggie Oliver, Roger Johnson, Steve Duffy and other award-winning masters and mistresses of the macabre.
Loose by Paul Meloy & Gary Greenwood
The Most Haunted House in England
Deep Water by Christopher Harman
Murder in the Red Barn
The Watchman by Roger Johnson
The Woman in Brown
Shuck by Simon Bestwick
The Witchfinder-General
The Marsh Warden by Steve Duffy
Beware the Lantern Man!
The Fall of the King of Babylon by Mark Valentine
The Weird in the Wood
Double Space by Gary Fry
The Dagworth Mystery
Wicken Fen by Paul Finch
Boiled Alive
Wolferton Hall by James Doig
The Wandering Torso
Aldeburgh by Johnny Mains
The Killer Hounds of Southery
Like Suffolk, Like Holidays by Alison Littlewood
The Demon of Wallasea Island
The Little Wooden Box by Edward Pearce
The Dark Guardian of Wandlebury
The Spooks of Shellborough by Reggie Oliver
He could feel the pull of the wolf strap, so imbued with its power had he once been, and its proximity, its calling, aroused the latent beast within him. He could hear voices, could smell his brother's sick sweat. His mouth flooded with saliva and he spat out a thick rope of drool onto the grass between his feet.
Loose
Paul Meloy & Gary Greenwood
When the body suddenly came loose, it turned over with such natural motion that Trevor thought the man might still be alive. But then he saw that where there'd once been a face there was now a jagged crimson cavity. The same was true of the chest. The guy had been hollowed out, gutted, reduced to a grisly shell by parasitic devils that had simply burrowed their way into him ...
Wicken Fen
Paul Finch
Then I heard it - a quiet, furtive movement, magnified by the heavy silence. Something was dragging itself across the stone floor of the mausoleum.
Terror seized me. My heart went quiet. My throat clicked dryly when I tried to swallow. There it was again, a faint rasping sound, something pulling itself over the flagged floor - something hard - like wood, or bone.
Wolferton Hall
James Doig
TERROR TALES OF THE COTSWOLDS The Cotswolds – land of green fields, manor houses and thatched-roof villages, where the screams of ancient massacres linger in the leafy woods, faeries weave sadistic spells, and pagan gods stir beneath the moonlit hills …
The flesh-eating fiend of St. John’s
The vengeful spirit of Little Lawford
The satanic murders at Meon Hill
The ghastly mutilation at Wychavon
The demon dancers of Warwick
The cannibal feast at Alvington
The twisted revenant of Stratford-upon-Avon
And many more chilling tales by Ramsey Campbell, Simon Clark, Alison Littlewood, Reggie Oliver, Joel Lane and other award-winning masters and mistresses of the macabre.
In the Dark And In the Quiet by Alison Littlewood
Fury From Beyond
Straw Babies by Gary McMahon
A Bizarre And Terrible Event
Charm by Reggie Oliver
The Grimmest Castle In England
Hoxlip And After by Christopher Harman
The Undead Who Wander The Wye
The Shakespeare Curse by Simon Clark
Oxford’s Black Assize
The Scouring by Thana Niveau
The Cannibal Feast
Wassailing by Steve Lockley
Bloodbath Under A Spectral Sun
The Silent Dance by Joel Lane
What Walks In Ettington Park?
Waiting For Nicky by Antonia James
The Satanic Slayings at Meon Hill
The Horror Under Warrendown by Ramsey Campbell
Worcester’s Most Odious Relic
The Lurker by Gary Fry
The Beast Of St John’s
The Cotswold Olimpicks by Simon Kurt Unsworth
God’s Dire Warning
A Taste of Honey, A Horror Of Stone by John Llewellyn Probert
Lovell’s Long Wait
Bog Man by Paul Finch
A couple of the younger men stepped forward from the gathering and lifted Carmichael up into the lower boughs of the tree, as he giggled uncontrollably. While he was held suspended in the tree, the men began to wind rope and ribbon around him, binding him to the tree, pulling the ropes tighter and tighter with each turn, until the two who had been supporting him could step away, leaving his legs thrashing ...
Wassailing
Steve Lockley
Hoxlip And After
Christopher Harman
Heads were bouncing across the floor. Sprays of blood splashed the walls. Other grisly images showed the hunchback drowning priests in the river, or burning thatched inns full of weeping townsfolk, or crushing what appeared to be soldiers between two huge circular millstones.
"Our Mr Hunchie broke out," Clive declared. "He got his revenge on Stratford."
The Shakespeare Curse
Simon Clark
TERROR TALES OF THE LAKE DISTRICTThe Lake District – land of mountains and megaliths, night-black lakes and fathomless woods filled with spectral mist …
The eerie entity on Striding Edge
The living corpse of Croglin
The demented clown of Muncaster
The winged horror of Langdale
The drowned bride of Windermere
The hairy brute of Beetham
The nightmares on Burnmoor
And many more chilling tales by Ramsey Campbell, Adam Nevill, Simon Clark, Peter Crowther, Reggie Oliver, Gary McMahon and other award-winning masters and mistresses of the macabre.
Little Mag’s Barrow by Adam L.G. Nevill
The Mad Clown of Muncaster
The Coniston Star Mystery by Simon Clark
The Croglin Vampire
Devils of Lakeland by Paul Finch
The Mumps Hall Murders
The Moraine by Simon Bestwick
The Tawny Boy
The Claife Crier by Carole Johnstone
The Monster of Renwick
Jewels in the Dust by Peter Crowther
The Devil’s Hole
Above the World by Ramsey Campbell
Nightmares of Burnmoor
The Jilted Bride of Windermere by Gary Fry
The Horror at Carlisle Castle
Walk the Last Mile by Steven Savile
The Poltergeist of Walla Crag
Framed by Peter Bell
Fiend’s Fell
Night of the Crone by Anna Taborska
The Tortured Souls of Lord’s Rake
Along Life’s Trail by Gary McMahon
The Black Hound of Shap
Striding Edge by Reggie Oliver
... even though the limbs had the appearance of having been removed from another doll, or even a disabled child to add an unwelcome realism where they poked out from the stained and ragged christening gown that fell to its knees, it still wasn't the limbs that repelled her. No, the most unsettling facet of the doll was its hair. The heavy chestnut curls, reminiscent of Charles I's luxuriant wig, were undoubtedly cut from a real human head.
Little Mag's Barrow
Adam Nevill
The sound rent the breathless space wide. Not a cry this time, but a scream. A furious, joyous, malignant scream. Something reared out of the forest and onto the path. A fast scuttling horror on hands and knees. Black hidden flanks and pointed hood. The trees moaned, the path trembled, and It went on screaming. Scuttling forward and back, forward and back. Undecided.
The Claife Crier
Carole Johnstone
The lamb let out a single terrified bleat and tried to turn away, but it never stood a chance. The humped shape under the scree hurtled towards it, loose stone rattling like dice in a shaken cup, and then rocks sprayed upwards like so much kicked sand where the lamb stood. Its bleat became a horrible squealing noise - I'd no idea sheep could make sounds like that.
The Moraine
Simon Bestwick