I finally managed to obtain a copy of the horror anthology for which I supplied the introduction (9,000 words), which was issued in October for Halloween. It seems the publisher is angling for some sort of national award for Kitschiest Binding of the Year, right down to the little stamped bats and glittery, scowling willow tree.

However, the endpapers are actually somewhat appealing (that may be the residue of my heavy metal past). Couldn’t they have used that image for the cover?

In any case, look out for these in your big box stores and even some real bookstores. The introduction is a serious attempt to define and explain the genre for which I feel a great affinity and genuine affection.

Purchase online from Amazon , Amazon Canada, Amazon Spain, Amazon UK, Advanced Book Exchange, Walmart, Valore Books, Overstock, Kinokuniya Books (China), Book Depository, Alibris, and Barnes & Noble. Hey, makes a good Christmas present.

The paragraph the publisher cut from my introduction for what I realize are sound business reasons:

This collection, voluminous as it may be, is but the merest peek through a crack in the doorway. Many other worthy authors could have been included in these pages, including Joseph Sheridan LeFanu, Elizabeth Gaskell, Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Amelia Edwards, Margaret Oliphant, Sutherland Menzies, Lafcadio Hearn, Mary Austin, Mary Wilkins Freeman, and Robert Aickman. Likewise, many chilling novels fall outside the purview of this anthology due to their sheer size, such as Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, H. Rider Haggard’s She, Arthur Machen’s The Great God Pan, and even Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey, which satirizes the faddishness of Gothic novels. All of these are worth seeking out, and one would be commended for continuing to explore these authors and helping to restore old stories that have unjustly fallen out of taste.