What do you think?
Rate this book
The Fontana Book of Great Ghost Stories #14
The Fourteenth Fontana Book of Great Ghost Stories
Restless souls that walk by night ... in stories like THE THREE SISTERS. The door flew open with a crash, a cloaked figure entered. She saw with a horror past all expression the napkin-bound face of the dead Ursula smiling terribly at her. In her last extremity she raised her faded eyes above for succour, and then the figure noiselessly advanced and laid its cold hand upon her brow...
- GenresHorrorShort Stories
192 pages, Paperback
First published November 27, 1978
About the author
R. Chetwynd-Hayes
141 books59 followersRonald Henry Glynn Chetwynd-Hayes aka Angus Campbell.
Ronald Chetwynd-Hayes was an author, best known for his ghost stories. His first published work was the science fiction novel The Man From The Bomb in 1959. He went on to publish many collections and ten other novels including The Grange, The Haunted Grange, And Love Survived and The Curse of the Snake God. He also edited over 20 anthologies. Several of his short works were adapted into anthology style movies in the United Kingdom, including The Monster Club and From Beyond the Grave. Chetwynd-Hayes' book The Monster Club contains references to a film-maker called Vinke Rocnnor, an anagram of Kevin Connor, the director of From Beyond the Grave.
He won the Bram Stoker Award for Lifetime Achievement for 1988, and the British Fantasy Society Special Award in 1989.
Ronald Chetwynd-Hayes was an author, best known for his ghost stories. His first published work was the science fiction novel The Man From The Bomb in 1959. He went on to publish many collections and ten other novels including The Grange, The Haunted Grange, And Love Survived and The Curse of the Snake God. He also edited over 20 anthologies. Several of his short works were adapted into anthology style movies in the United Kingdom, including The Monster Club and From Beyond the Grave. Chetwynd-Hayes' book The Monster Club contains references to a film-maker called Vinke Rocnnor, an anagram of Kevin Connor, the director of From Beyond the Grave.
He won the Bram Stoker Award for Lifetime Achievement for 1988, and the British Fantasy Society Special Award in 1989.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
January 8, 2021
A rather average addition to this series of vintage ghost story collections. There are no lost classics here. My breakdown of the sixteen? Four goodish ones, seven passable ones, and five others which shouldn’t have bothered to clank their chains…
The four I liked are:-
A.M.Burrage’s ‘One Who Saw.’ A man partially sees a seated female figure at a hotel. The story is no great shakes, but Burrage is a fine and underrated writer in this genre, and his clear and skilful prose creates much in the moody atmosphere stakes.
Then there’s Terry Tapp’s ‘Never, Never Leave Me.’ A man dying a slow and agonising death is angered at his girlfriend’s attempts at trying to revive him, and so haunts her. Tapp’s telling is sharp and very immediate. It’s a change from the sometimes tired, traditional ghost story formula.
‘The Three Sisters’ by W.W. Jacobs is a very simple and atmospheric tale that tells of the death of one sister leading to horror and foreboding in the other two.
Lastly is Barbara Joan Eyre’s ‘Siren Song.’ This is the first one of this writer’s stories I have liked. An unhappy woman has more added to her woes after being told that the previous occupant of the caravan she and her family are staying in committed suicide. It’s finely told, and the air of ambiguity adds to the feeling of unease.
Though this series is overall on the patchy side, there’s nevertheless a warm feel-goody sense with these volumes – from their gruesomely atmospheric covers, to the list of familiar writers enclosed. This series, along with the likes of ‘The Fontana Books Of Great Horror Stories,’ ‘The Pan Books Of Horror Stories,’ and Fontana’s ‘Tales Of Terror’ series are great for making discoveries and assessing who you like, and don’t like in the genre. I have all these volumes (77 I think in total), and it’s a real pleasure – despite their inconsistencies - working my way through them.
The four I liked are:-
A.M.Burrage’s ‘One Who Saw.’ A man partially sees a seated female figure at a hotel. The story is no great shakes, but Burrage is a fine and underrated writer in this genre, and his clear and skilful prose creates much in the moody atmosphere stakes.
Then there’s Terry Tapp’s ‘Never, Never Leave Me.’ A man dying a slow and agonising death is angered at his girlfriend’s attempts at trying to revive him, and so haunts her. Tapp’s telling is sharp and very immediate. It’s a change from the sometimes tired, traditional ghost story formula.
‘The Three Sisters’ by W.W. Jacobs is a very simple and atmospheric tale that tells of the death of one sister leading to horror and foreboding in the other two.
Lastly is Barbara Joan Eyre’s ‘Siren Song.’ This is the first one of this writer’s stories I have liked. An unhappy woman has more added to her woes after being told that the previous occupant of the caravan she and her family are staying in committed suicide. It’s finely told, and the air of ambiguity adds to the feeling of unease.
Though this series is overall on the patchy side, there’s nevertheless a warm feel-goody sense with these volumes – from their gruesomely atmospheric covers, to the list of familiar writers enclosed. This series, along with the likes of ‘The Fontana Books Of Great Horror Stories,’ ‘The Pan Books Of Horror Stories,’ and Fontana’s ‘Tales Of Terror’ series are great for making discoveries and assessing who you like, and don’t like in the genre. I have all these volumes (77 I think in total), and it’s a real pleasure – despite their inconsistencies - working my way through them.
March 15, 2020
I liked it better as I got into it. A mixed bag as is often the case with these compilations. There is something to suit a variety of tastes. My favourite story was the one by Sheridan LeFanu. I thought the writing was uniformly of high quality even if I found some of the stories too unpleasant for my taste.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews