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Deathbell #1
Deathbell
No . 424971.
- GenresHorror
210 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1980
1 person is currently reading
133 people want to read
About the author
Guy N. Smith
175 books297 followersI was born on November 21, 1939, in the small village of Hopwas, near Tamworth, Staffordshire, England. My mother was a pre-war historical novelist (E. M. Weale) and she always encouraged me to write.
I was first published at the age of 12 in The Tettenhall Observer, a local weekly newspaper. Between 1952-57 I wrote 56 stories for them, many serialized. In 1990 I collated these into a book entitled Fifty Tales from the Fifties.
My father was a dedicated bank manager and I was destined for banking from birth. I accepted it but never found it very interesting. During the early years when I was working in Birmingham, I spent most of my lunch hours in the Birmingham gun quarter. I would have loved to have served an apprenticeship in the gun trade but my father would not hear of it.
Shooting (hunting) was my first love, and all my spare time was spent in this way. In 1961 I designed and made a 12-bore shotgun, intending to follow it up with six more, but I did not have the money to do this. I still use the Guy N. Smith short-barrelled magnum. During 1960-67 I operated a small shotgun cartridge loading business but this finished when my components suppliers closed down and I could no longer obtain components at competitive prices.
My writing in those days only concerned shooting. I wrote regularly for most of the sporting magazines, interspersed with fiction for such magazines as the legendary London Mystery Selection, a quarterly anthology for which I contributed 18 stories between 1972-82.
In 1972 I launched my second hand bookselling business which eventually became Black Hill Books. Originally my intention was to concentrate on this and maybe build it up to a full-time business which would enable me to leave banking. Although we still have this business, writing came along and this proved to be the vehicle which gave me my freedom.
I wrote a horror novel for the New English Library in 1974 entitled Werewolf by Moonlight. This was followed by a couple more, but it was Night of the Crabs in 1976 which really launched me as a writer. It was a bestseller, spawning five sequels, and was followed by another 60 or so horror novels through to the mid-1990's. Amicus bought the film rights to Crabs in 1976 and this gave me the chance to leave banking and by my own place, including my shoot, on the Black Hill.
The Guy N. Smith Fan Club was formed in 1990 and still has an active membership. We hold a convention every year at my home which is always well attended.
Around this time I became Poland's best-selling author. Phantom Press published two GNS books each month, mostly with print runs of around 100,000.
I have written much, much more than just horror; crime and mystery (as Gavin Newman), and children's animal novels (as Jonathan Guy). I have written a dozen or so shooting and countryside books, a book on Writing Horror Fiction (A. & C. Black). In 1997 my first full length western novel, The Pony Riders was published by Pinnacle in the States.
With 100-plus books to my credit, I was looking for new challenges. In 1999 I formed my own publishing company and began to publish my own books. They did rather well and gave me a lot of satisfaction. We plan to publish one or two every year.
Still regretting that I had not served an apprenticeship in the gun trade, the best job of my life dropped into my lap in 1999 when I was offered the post of Gun Editor of The Countryman's Weekly, a weekly magazine which covers all field sports. This entails my writing five illustrated feature articles a week on guns, cartridges, deer stalking, big game hunting etc.
Alongside this we have expanded our mail order second hand crime fiction business, still publish a few books, and I find as much time as possible for shooting.
Jean, my wife, helps with the business. Our four children, Rowan, Tara, Gavin and Angus have all moved away from home but they visit on a regular basis.
I would not want to live anywhere other than m
I was first published at the age of 12 in The Tettenhall Observer, a local weekly newspaper. Between 1952-57 I wrote 56 stories for them, many serialized. In 1990 I collated these into a book entitled Fifty Tales from the Fifties.
My father was a dedicated bank manager and I was destined for banking from birth. I accepted it but never found it very interesting. During the early years when I was working in Birmingham, I spent most of my lunch hours in the Birmingham gun quarter. I would have loved to have served an apprenticeship in the gun trade but my father would not hear of it.
Shooting (hunting) was my first love, and all my spare time was spent in this way. In 1961 I designed and made a 12-bore shotgun, intending to follow it up with six more, but I did not have the money to do this. I still use the Guy N. Smith short-barrelled magnum. During 1960-67 I operated a small shotgun cartridge loading business but this finished when my components suppliers closed down and I could no longer obtain components at competitive prices.
My writing in those days only concerned shooting. I wrote regularly for most of the sporting magazines, interspersed with fiction for such magazines as the legendary London Mystery Selection, a quarterly anthology for which I contributed 18 stories between 1972-82.
In 1972 I launched my second hand bookselling business which eventually became Black Hill Books. Originally my intention was to concentrate on this and maybe build it up to a full-time business which would enable me to leave banking. Although we still have this business, writing came along and this proved to be the vehicle which gave me my freedom.
I wrote a horror novel for the New English Library in 1974 entitled Werewolf by Moonlight. This was followed by a couple more, but it was Night of the Crabs in 1976 which really launched me as a writer. It was a bestseller, spawning five sequels, and was followed by another 60 or so horror novels through to the mid-1990's. Amicus bought the film rights to Crabs in 1976 and this gave me the chance to leave banking and by my own place, including my shoot, on the Black Hill.
The Guy N. Smith Fan Club was formed in 1990 and still has an active membership. We hold a convention every year at my home which is always well attended.
Around this time I became Poland's best-selling author. Phantom Press published two GNS books each month, mostly with print runs of around 100,000.
I have written much, much more than just horror; crime and mystery (as Gavin Newman), and children's animal novels (as Jonathan Guy). I have written a dozen or so shooting and countryside books, a book on Writing Horror Fiction (A. & C. Black). In 1997 my first full length western novel, The Pony Riders was published by Pinnacle in the States.
With 100-plus books to my credit, I was looking for new challenges. In 1999 I formed my own publishing company and began to publish my own books. They did rather well and gave me a lot of satisfaction. We plan to publish one or two every year.
Still regretting that I had not served an apprenticeship in the gun trade, the best job of my life dropped into my lap in 1999 when I was offered the post of Gun Editor of The Countryman's Weekly, a weekly magazine which covers all field sports. This entails my writing five illustrated feature articles a week on guns, cartridges, deer stalking, big game hunting etc.
Alongside this we have expanded our mail order second hand crime fiction business, still publish a few books, and I find as much time as possible for shooting.
Jean, my wife, helps with the business. Our four children, Rowan, Tara, Gavin and Angus have all moved away from home but they visit on a regular basis.
I would not want to live anywhere other than m
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
June 19, 2012
This was a fun pulp-horror read, just as one should expect from Guy Smith. A small town is sent into occasional fits of murderous horror when some mysterious folks move into an old church and ring their ancient Tibetan ritual-bell. I thought the set up was pretty good, the small town atmosphere was well-done with an English country touch, which is a nice change from my usual American fare. Best of all, the idea was original, and execution was pretty good, too. Gore and violence met the expected mark, and I even found myself rooting for a couple of the characters, reading quickly to the end to discover the meaning of it all. The book came to a mostly satisfactory conclusion and was a lot of fun. Recommended for those looking for popcorn-entertainment pulp horror.
July 8, 2015
The tolling of a mysterious bell causes madness and murder in a small English village.
Guy Smith sure knows how to crank out a fun little horror story. The clever plot moves along nicely, the overbaked prose suits the B-movie story, and the gore is genuinely imaginative and shocking. If you’ve got the hankering for one of those horror paperbacks from the 80s, you could do a lot worse than this.
Guy Smith sure knows how to crank out a fun little horror story. The clever plot moves along nicely, the overbaked prose suits the B-movie story, and the gore is genuinely imaginative and shocking. If you’ve got the hankering for one of those horror paperbacks from the 80s, you could do a lot worse than this.
May 29, 2009
First published back in 1980, Guy N Smith’s pulp horror novel ‘Deathbell’ was one of four horror novels to be released that year by this prolific writer.
The story is set in the quaint village of Turbury, where the arrival of the Hamilton’s is the gossip of the village. Martyn Hamilton, his wife, their Chinese servant-girl and their ferocious pet dog have recently purchased Caelogy Hall that had previously been left deserted for a number of years.
Curiosity stirs in the local community as the Hamilton’s begin making alterations to their new property, namely a large oriental bell that Martyn Hamilton commissions the local tradesmen to have installed within the property’s old belfry.
No expense is spared on the installation of this gigantic bell, with such a great importance put on this new addition to the property that it attracts the attention of the entire community. But there’s much more to this ancient bell than what first appears.
With the bell now fully operational, the residents of Turbury are increasingly subjected to its haunting tones as the bell rings out on the village. With the chiming still ringing in the ears of the community, madness starts taking over those who hear the deathbell and with it blood is shed throughout the town.
From the very outset of the tale, an underlying feeling of unease throbs throughout the book, causing an unnerving eeriness to the progressing storyline. Suggestions of an occultist nature are made to the reader from early on, with a strong direction towards this gigantic bell Hamilton is erecting.
The subtle characterization is portrayed in a surprisingly creepy way, with an unspoken understanding that the Hamilton’s are hiding some dark secret.
The pace of the novel gradually picks up, increasing the tension within the storyline, as the deathbell’s chimes become more and more frequent. The consequential madness that overwhelms the community brings with it pages of graphic blood splattered gory violence.
Smith delivers a well thought out twist to the tale which you won’t see coming. The novel concludes well, with a satisfying grand finale that wraps up the story with an imaginative and inspired explanation to the deathbells curse.
The novel runs for a total of 200 pages and was later followed up with the 1987 sequel entitled ‘Demons’.
The story is set in the quaint village of Turbury, where the arrival of the Hamilton’s is the gossip of the village. Martyn Hamilton, his wife, their Chinese servant-girl and their ferocious pet dog have recently purchased Caelogy Hall that had previously been left deserted for a number of years.
Curiosity stirs in the local community as the Hamilton’s begin making alterations to their new property, namely a large oriental bell that Martyn Hamilton commissions the local tradesmen to have installed within the property’s old belfry.
No expense is spared on the installation of this gigantic bell, with such a great importance put on this new addition to the property that it attracts the attention of the entire community. But there’s much more to this ancient bell than what first appears.
With the bell now fully operational, the residents of Turbury are increasingly subjected to its haunting tones as the bell rings out on the village. With the chiming still ringing in the ears of the community, madness starts taking over those who hear the deathbell and with it blood is shed throughout the town.
From the very outset of the tale, an underlying feeling of unease throbs throughout the book, causing an unnerving eeriness to the progressing storyline. Suggestions of an occultist nature are made to the reader from early on, with a strong direction towards this gigantic bell Hamilton is erecting.
The subtle characterization is portrayed in a surprisingly creepy way, with an unspoken understanding that the Hamilton’s are hiding some dark secret.
The pace of the novel gradually picks up, increasing the tension within the storyline, as the deathbell’s chimes become more and more frequent. The consequential madness that overwhelms the community brings with it pages of graphic blood splattered gory violence.
Smith delivers a well thought out twist to the tale which you won’t see coming. The novel concludes well, with a satisfying grand finale that wraps up the story with an imaginative and inspired explanation to the deathbells curse.
The novel runs for a total of 200 pages and was later followed up with the 1987 sequel entitled ‘Demons’.
August 31, 2024
Trashy horror about a Tibetan bell, installed in the private chapel at a run-down estate deep in the English countryside, the chimes of which drive the denizens of a nearby village to frenzies of murder, madness and mock-dramatic dialogue. In its most entertaining moments, the novel achieves a wannabe-James-Herbert level of visceral nastiness. Elsewhere, it’s amateur hour plotting and purple prose a-go- go. I loved it!
June 16, 2013
Didn't personally think it was up there with Guy's best books, but it got to its best towards the end which makes me think the sequel just might take off from there. Will read it soon - it's on the list :)
August 16, 2016
Lots of gruesome bits. Easy to read. Ended a bit abruptly I thought.
April 21, 2024
My first read of Guy N. Smith, a legendary writer of horror paperback nasties and the alleged inspiration for Garth Marenghi. Wow! This is exactly the drug you are looking for when digging through so much 80s paperback trash. It gave me precisely the controlled high and enjoyable reading experience so many other works fail to deliver.
The book is a mix of gothic revival horror (old creepy house, expatriates returning to a small village with a dark secret, mournful women in windows, etc) and 80s pulp nastiness. The plot is, frankly, ludicrous. It features...a demonic bell! When rung, it throws the residents into all kinds of insane behavior, including scenes of gory murder, necrophilia, and lusty sexual encounters. Meanwhile, Julian Dane--the neuroscientist back from the big city determined to reveal the cause of his mother's murder--is set up to investigate and uncover the truth. After roughly 200 pages of steadily increasing chaos, everything resolves neatly in all of about 5 pages.
Smith is an efficient writer with a devious imagination. Those wary of murder and mayhem as entertainment won't find anything redeeming in this book. But if you like gory and slightly cheesy horror novels of the 1980s, this is a prime cut.
The book is a mix of gothic revival horror (old creepy house, expatriates returning to a small village with a dark secret, mournful women in windows, etc) and 80s pulp nastiness. The plot is, frankly, ludicrous. It features...a demonic bell! When rung, it throws the residents into all kinds of insane behavior, including scenes of gory murder, necrophilia, and lusty sexual encounters. Meanwhile, Julian Dane--the neuroscientist back from the big city determined to reveal the cause of his mother's murder--is set up to investigate and uncover the truth. After roughly 200 pages of steadily increasing chaos, everything resolves neatly in all of about 5 pages.
Smith is an efficient writer with a devious imagination. Those wary of murder and mayhem as entertainment won't find anything redeeming in this book. But if you like gory and slightly cheesy horror novels of the 1980s, this is a prime cut.
April 1, 2021
Great read! Found this book at a used book store and thought it sounded like a good plot. I mean who wouldn’t want to read a story about a family moving into a house that had been abandoned for quite some time and has a bell installed in the tower. The thing is the bell causes madness, pain, and yes even death. Why does the family ring this horrible bell? You have to read this fun book til the end to find out! Highly recommend this. Might have to check out some more of his work.
January 7, 2021
Worst case of “these new noisy neighbours are driving me crazy!” ever. Unfortunately we never even have a vague hint of what the stupid bell is even for until the very last pages and even then it doesn’t satisfy. Two guys get their dicks torn off for no real reason so that’s 2 stars
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 18, 2023
The sound that can kill. Workman-like prose. Mildly interesting plot with no interesting characters to latch onto. What keeps one hanging on is the possibility of how the tolling of the Death Bell kills. I enjoyed the idea of a dead body hanging from inside the bell.
February 20, 2021
Brilliant. Classic, brutal horror. 🖤
July 31, 2021
Strange, arrogant, rich fellow moves into old estate and brings an ancient Tibetan bell. As the bell tolls the villagers brains will throb maddeningly and blood will ooze from their ears. The ringing will cause some of the villagers to go on murderous rampages. A hideous scarred face muscular creature with amputated ears gets summoned by the ringing. Great isolated village setting.
April 23, 2010
A ta książka bardzo mi się podobała. Paraliżujący wszystkich dzwon, faajne :] Chociaż ten pisarz może nie jest najlepszy, ale ta książka mu się udała i nawet teraz ją pamiętam (choć daawno czytałem) i mogę powiedzieć, że bardzo ją lubię.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews