By Horror Haunted: Stories

by Celia Fremlin

Spine-chilling tales for dark nights from Celia Fremlin, 'Britain's Patricia Highsmith' (Sunday Times) who is 'Irresistible' (Val McDermid), 'brilliant' (Elly Griffiths), 'a master of suspense' (Janice Hallett), 'packs a punch' (Ian Rankin) and 'got me hooked' (Ruth Rendell)

He was smiling, and covered in blood - face, hands, pyjamas - everything and in his hands - thrust towards her like a birthday gift - was Julie's teddy-bear, soaked and dripping with blood.

This collection of spine-chilling Gothic miniatures from Celia Fremlin is a nightmarish showcase of macabre domesticity: controlling husbands rub shoulders with manipulative wives, parasitic visitors meet fatal accidents, there are nervous breakdowns, toxic relationships, sinister villagers and mob justice. With an unerring nail, Fremlin picks the scabs concealing domestic fault lines and chills our blood.

Genres: Short Stories, Horror, Fiction

208 pages, Paperback

First published April 18, 1974

About the author

Celia was born in Kingsbury, now part of London, England. She was the daughter of Heaver Fremlin and Margaret Addiscott. Her older brother, John H. Fremlin, later became a nuclear physicist. Celia studied at Somerville College, Oxford University. From 1942 to 2000 she lived in Hampstead, London. In 1942 she married Elia Goller, with whom she had three children; he died in 1968. In 1985, Celia married Leslie Minchin, who died in 1999. Her many crime novels and stories helped modernize the sensation novel tradition by introducing criminal and (rarely) supernatural elements into domestic settings. Her 1958 novel The Hours Before Dawn won the Edgar Award in 1960.

With Jeffrey Barnard, she was co-presenter of a BBC2 documentary “Night and Day” describing diurnal and nocturnal London, broadcast 23 January 1987.

Fremlin was an advocate of assisted suicide and euthanasia. In a newspaper interview she admitted to assisting four people to die.[1] In 1983 civil proceedings were brought against her as one of the five members of the EXIT Executive committee which had published “A Guide to Self Deliverance” , but the court refused to declare the booklet unlawful.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celia...]

Reviews

[Pam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another author unknown to me. I’m filling in gaps in my reading. This author was evidently fairly well known 1960s through 1990s and sometimes called England’s Patricia Highsmith. After reading this collection of short stories, I see the resemblance.

This isn’t “horror” although there is occasionally a touch of supernatural. The psychological tension is far more important. Her stories of women, children, men and families do often inspire dread and discomfort and sometimes a little warped humor such as in Ephemerida when an old discarded woman floats above it all as would a mayfly on its last day. More typical is Place in the Sun, again an old forgotten woman, revisiting her useful healthy days as a young mother.

I definitely recommend this forgotten author and intend to try one of her novels.

[Adrienne L · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an interesting collection of short stories by a writer who seems to have vanished into obscurity, which is too bad. Celia Fremlin was definitely a competent, distinct, and witty writer, and these stories are mostly gently macabre and enjoyable. Most of them are very short, and one of the complaints I have is that just when a story really started to get interesting, it would end abruptly. This happened in almost all cases. There is a similar tone in the POV of each story as well, although the protagonists range from teenage girls to young men to middle-aged women (which is the predominant POV here).

The collection started off stronger than it finished, and a couple of the stories were outright duds, but I'm glad I read it and I would be open to reading more by Fremlin.

[Andy Weston · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an uneven collection, both in terms of quality, and in genre. I say the latter, because probably half of them have nothing to do with horror at all. The thing that links them is that they are experimental, as if Fremlin is playing at ideas she may use in a full length novel.

I was attracted to it as I didn’t realise she had written any horror, and I found that if interest. With the exception of one story, I can’t recommend this, whereas I really enjoy her psychological mystery novels.

The notes below are for my own purposes, in terms of remembering them, so don’t expect them to make much sense. The number indicates a score out of 5.

Her Number On It - atmospheric set in London in the Underground 4
Tuesday’s Child - a crime mystery rather than horror 3
Don’t Tell Cissie - squabbling old ladies go on a ghost hunt - humorous 4
Sunday Outing - the lengths a husband will go to in order for a quiet Sunday 3.5
Lilac Time - gardening.. 5
The Blood on the Innocents - how not to raise children 3
The Savage Heart - pet care 3
Place in the Sun - last days 1
The End of the Road - 2 this has the last, two stories about suicide
Gate of Death - fear of flying - 3 certainly not a horror story
The Combined Operation - something of a ghost story 3
An Unsuspected Talent - aspiring to a better position in the workplace 3
Ephemerida - housebound 3
The Intruder - a young burgling couple 3
Barry Findlater - imaginary adolescent friends 3 Kitty of the Lower Fourth

[Alex Sarll]

That title seems self-explanatory, doesn't it? And the only thing here I'd read before, Don't Tell Cissie, is absolutely a ghost story, albeit a very unusual one, about a female friendship group, and one of those people "Friendly, good-hearted, and desperately anxious to be in on everything, and yet with this mysterious knack of ruining things". And there are other supernatural stories here, timeslips, suburban voodoo, and another ghost or two. But more often we get what I suppose you'd call tales of unease; the postwar consensus can look idyllic as seen from the apocalyptic present, but story after story homes in on someone living in that classic sitcom set-up, husband and wife and 2.4 children, and shows the desperate lengths to which it's driven them. In The Sunday Outing, Pamela always insists the family should go to the beach at the first sign of sun, when James would much rather rest in the garden, and of course he can't do anything as outlandish as explain how he feels, but just once he thinks he's got a foolproof way to get out of it... Had they lived a few decades later, the husband in An Unsuspected Talent could have stayed home with the kids as he clearly prefers, and his wife been ambitious on her own behalf instead of vicariously, but coming when they did, they drive each other up the wall, and that's before the fateful day of his interview for a promotion. And even the people trying not to perpetuate the straitjacket, like the progressive mum in Barry Findlater, only create new ones. But just when you're wondering if the real horror was the conformity we met along the way, you realise how many stories seem locked on for an utterly despairing ending, only to manage last minute swerves (of varying degrees of plausibility) to salvation. An odd, claustrophobic little book, but never a dull one.

[Jorge García · Rating 4 out of 5]

Celia Fremlin (1914-2009) es una autora británica que escribió novelas y relatos de misterio desde finales de los años 50, y que fue especialmente productiva en los años 60 y 70 (en España se llegaron a editar algunos -pocos- libros de bolsillo).

Su popularidad se apagó y Celia Fremlin se convirtió en una vieja excéntrica que daba de comer a los gatos callejeros y de vez en cuando envenenaba a sus vecinos con deliciosos bizcochos de cianuro o beleño.

Esta parte me la acabo de inventar aunque supongo que a Celia Fremlin no le importarán estos apuntes negros en su biografía.

Por este motivo, la editorial Faber ha recuperado en su serie Finds los cuentos de esta dama del misterio. En mi opinión, se trata de cuentos estupendos, escritos con absoluta maldad y mala leche (con sabor a cianuro), por lo que creo que es una autora que merecería más atención. Por citar a otras autoras próximas en 'negritud' y 'humor negro' (sí, sé que es una manía muy masculina) diría que haría buen equipo con Patricia Highsmith o Shirley Jackson ("oiga, señoras, ¿no les parece que este bizcocho huele demasiado a almendras amargas?").

Es cierto que algunos relatos tienen un tono muy cruel (joder, Celia, ¿no te estás pasando un poco?) pero siempre hay un último giro o contranota que da la vuelta a la 'humorada'.

Ella es así, y así hay que quererla.

[Royce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant story collection from the writer, Celia Fremlin, who I learned about in the NYTimes book review. Recently, Faber published a handful of her books, so I’m eager to dig into Celia’s oeuvre. Her stories focus on ordinary family relationships and situations, twisting them with hints of the macabre, a small sprinkle of dark humor, to create the most engrossing and quite entertaining stories. Each story is original and the narrators’ voices are quite unique. The clever titles of each story seem to portend what will happen in the story. In the story, Her Number on It, the narrator cannot stop shoplifting dresses, until she does. In The End of the Road, a man who recently became blind as a result of a car accident, cannot see until he decides to take his own life. In another story, The Combined Operation, the narrator is about to undergo major surgery, so why does he see the police officer he killed twenty years earlier? Although the stories are short in length, they are rich with details that carry so much more weight, they feel longer, lingering in one’s mind, long after one has finished reading them.

On the title page, Faber states they kept the language used at the time of her writing, which was the 1960’s-1970’s, to “maintain that historical period. “ In my humble opinion, the stories hold up to the test of time, and are fascinating to a reader in 2026. Please stay tuned for future reviews of Celia Fremlin’s work. Highly recommended.

[Alice · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars. I can't explain what it is about Fremlin's writing that just Get's Me, she just simply Get's Me, you know?

[Coral Davies · Rating 4 out of 5]

Less a collection nightmarish horror tales (as the book's blurb so claims!) and more an assembly of clever, self-aware vignettes portraying domestic life, with subtle touches of ghostly surrealism.

Fremlin's writing feels both nostalgic and fresh, gothic and modern. A cross between Susan Hill, Shirley Jackson and Muriel Spark. Many of the stories are witty, unashamed and fun.

As with all collections, some ideas work better than others, some stories executed with more finess and panache. Overall though, I really enjoyed this murder of crows.

[Lauren Molyneux · Rating 2 out of 5]

Overall not my favourite story collection but some stories did stick out for me and gave me Stephen King vibes. It’s like not out right horror but it’s enough to make you double take or for you to get a sudden rush of goosebumps once you get to the end.

Standouts for me
- Her Number On It
- Tuesday’s Child
- The Sunday Outing
- The Savage Heat
- An Unsuspected Talent

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I adored this set of short stores by Celia Fremlin. They are separate stories but they are connected by their total despair about human need and misplaced desire. Each story is short but powerful, usually concentrating on how need may backfire, leaving the protagonist devastated. Yes, they are dark but there is almost a bizarre humor to the method in which each plan backfires. I can’t wait to read more from this exceptional author.

[Amber · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 - not a short story person usually, but enjoyed this overall. some were...not my favorite. not bad, just kind of nothing. but quite a few were very good! and I enjoyed her writing style regardless.

[Pamela · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very uneven collection.

[Austen to Zafón · Rating 2 out of 5]

I would not say that any of these stories qualifies as horror by today's standards. More like suspense and some claustrophobia. Some stories were good, but most were not as good as Fremlin's novels.

[Katt Mudd · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you like ‘Of The Flesh’ and ‘She’s Always Hungry’ I feel you’d enjoy this 1970s short stories lil spooky romp

[Vika Rion · Rating 4 out of 5]

Horrifying side of the mundane. Really good collection of short stories

[Carys Morley · Rating 3 out of 5]

3. Some ok. Some good. Few great.

[Boris Cesnik · Rating 5 out of 5]

Confounding stories that invite you, plead you, beg you and force you to keep reading until you don't have a choice but face the un-ending.
The horror is in simple gestures, petty words and silly thoughts that put together reveal the only way to appreciate the narrative - be haunted. There is no other way.
You do feel the horror but don't know where it is or where it comes from. It's there in each line and between, underneath, above and beyond the language, the scenes, the actions, the characters, their lives, their psychology, their intentions, their destiny.
You better start worrying about your everyday life.
Humanly haunting, simply horrifying.

[Bea Alden · Rating 4 out of 5]

As well as being a master of the domestic mystery genre, Celia Fremlin is also an excellent writer of short stories. Each one is carefully crafted, the scene set with believable characters, and each has an ingenious denouement. Many of the stories in this book also include strong elements of fantasy.