The Shadow in The Corner & Other Classic Ghost Stories

by Marcus Clapham (editor)

Ghost stories reached the height of popularity in the late nineteenthh century and this collection offers a fine selection of ghostly tales from that time. Many of the contributors are amongst the most famous writers in the English language led by the master of the genre, M. R. James. What all the stories have in common is that they give the reader a delicious sense of terror but in different ways. Rudyard Kipling in ‘The Phantom Rickshaw’ and Charles Dickens in ‘The Signalman’ expertly twist their protagonists’ emotions, creating fear and dread. Mary Elizabeth Braddon and E. Nesbit aim for downright terror in their tales ‘The Shadow in the Corner’ and ‘Man-Size in Marble’ and there’s even room for some spooky humour with Saki’s tale, ‘Laura’.With tales of revenge, supernatural malevolence and ghostly goings on, this anthology is full of expertly crafted and terrifying ghost stories.

Genres: Horror

384 pages, Paperback

Published October 8, 2024

Reviews

[Ayelén · Rating 3 out of 5]

Unas good old stories de fantasmitas 🙏

[Katherine]

First spooky read of the season. Old-fashioned, but very nice.

[lia · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF 05/01/26

Usually I find it difficult to rate a story collection anything aside from 3 stars, due to the fact I usually find a healthy balance of stories I enjoyed and disliked within its pages. However, in this case I was very disappointed.

Although many of the stories are great on their own, some seemed to be a poor choice to include in this particular collection. This was mainly due to the lengths of some compared to others. Certain stories would have been better published as singular novellas, and it made the experience of getting through the book feel dragged out. It made for a less than enjoyable experience, which is a shame because there really are some classics in here. However, I found myself skimming a lot of the stories by the end of it, and have to count this as a DNF due to this fact. Others may enjoy this collection; it just wasn’t for me.