Modern Ghost Stories

By: Richard Dalby

Book Overview

The twenty-seven women writers included here have certainly done their jobs well. You are sure to shiver while reading these well-told tales. A. S. Byatt, A. L. Barker, Richmal Crompton, Celia Fremlin, Penelope Lively, Daphne du Maurier, Ruth Rendell, and Jean Rhys are among the writers whose stories reveal the extraordinary range and development of a genre that has thrilled readers for over two hundred years. Ghosts usually take us by surprise as in Antonia Fraser's "Who's Been Sitting in My Car?" A single mother finds her car's ashtray full of cigarette butts and the gas tank empty, but there's no explanation. She soon learns of the nocturnal wanderings of her car and of the man who haunts it. In Edith Wharton's classic story, "Afterward", a young couple moves into a primitive country retreat, hoping to see the resident ghost. But they come to find out that it is not until afterward that you realize you've seen this ghost. Here lost loves, past enmities, and unwanted memories mingle with the inexplicable as unquiet souls return to repay kindnesses, settle scores, and haunt the imagination. Featuring some of the finest writers of the twentieth century, this is an absorbing, unsettling, and irresistible read. Dim the lights and open your mind to the possibilities.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0881848646
• ISBN13: 9780881848649
• Release Date: February 1993
• Publisher: Running Press
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 0.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.5" x 1.3" x 6.5"