To have logic, to reason things out, to have a sense of what is and isn’t and what can and can’t is one of the traits we identify with being human.Sad to say that sometimes there are some amongst us who lose touch with this function, are unable to bring order and control to their world. That is not only a tragedy for themselves but can also have horrific consequences on those around them.Our wordsmiths in this volume, including Leo Tolstoy, Anatole France, Charlotte Perkins...

A glance at the roll-call of authors in this volume brings a chill to the blood. Their plentiful talents conjure up the most diabolical of plots, the most evil of characters and the dread knowing that it will unfold its horrors into our fearful souls.1 - The Top Ten - American Horror2 - The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe3 - The Boarded Window by Ambrose Bierce4 - The Color Out of Space by H P Lovecraft5 - The Repairer of Reputations by Robert...

Montague Rhodes James is cited as perhaps the greatest English writer of ghost stories, an opinion few would disagree with.James was born on 1st August 1862 at Goodnestone Parsonage in Kent, where his father was Curate but at age 3 the family went to live at Livermere, near Bury St Edmunds in East Anglia.From early childhood he had a passion for mediaeval books and antiques. He was educated initially as a boarder at Temple Grove School in East Sheen, west London, before gai...

Edgar Poe was born in Boston Massachusetts on 19th January 1809. His father abandoned his family the following year and within a year his mother had died leaving him an orphan.He was taken in by the Allan family but never formally adopted although he now referred to himself as Edgar Allan Poe. His father alternatively spoiled or chastised him and tension was frequent over gambling debts and monies for his education. His university years to study ancient and modern languages was cut...

First appearing around 1400, The Alliterative Morte Arthur, or The Death of King Arthur, is one of the most widely beloved and spectacularly alliterative poems ever penned in Middle English. Now, from the internationally acclaimed translator of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, comes this magisterial new presentation of the Arthurian tale, rendered in unflinching and gory detail. Following Arthur's bloody conquests across the cities and fields of Europe, all the w...

Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart. A few pages can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere.In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens’ across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author?The theme ...

The famous Middle English poem by an anonymous English poet is beautifully translated by fellow poet Simon Armitage in this edition. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight narrates in crystalline verse the strange tale of a green knight who rudely interrupts the Round Table festivities one Yuletide, casting a pall of unease over the company and challenging one of their number to a wager. The virtuous Gawain accepts and decapitates the intruder with his own ax. Gushing blood, the knight r...

Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart. A few pages can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere.In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens’ across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author?The theme ...

What we have in front of us here in this volume is a simple premise but an author’s words may say one thing and mean another. With talents such as E T A Hoffman, Katherine Mansfield, Willa Cather, Mikhail Bulgakov and many others our minds are under almost permanent assault with words, characters and narratives that pursue us to the end.1 - Psychological Stories - An Introduction2 - The Dream of a Ridiculous Man by Fyodor Dostovesky3 - Psychology by Katherine Mansfi...

Edgar Poe was born in Boston Massachusetts on 19th January 1809. His father abandoned his family the following year and within a year his mother had died leaving him an orphan.He was taken in by the Allan family but never formally adopted although he now referred to himself as Edgar Allan Poe. His father alternatively spoiled or chastised him and tension was frequent over gambling debts and monies for his education. His university years to study ancient and modern languages was cut...

G K Chesterton (29 May 1874 – 14 June 1936) was a poet, novelist, playwright, literary commentator, editor, biographer, journalist, orator and theologian. He was often dubbed as the “prince of paradox” for his light whimsical style that often addressed serious issues such as politics and religion. The latter was as a member and defender of the Christian faith and the former was shaped by a distrust of concentrated wealth and power. He advocated Distributionism and said that every man shoul...

There is something about the number 3.The Ancient Greeks believed 3 was the perfect number, and in China 3 has always been a lucky number, and they know a thing or two.Most religions also have 3 this and 3 that and, of course, in these more modern times, three’s a crowd may be too many, except when it’s a ménage à trois. It seems good things usually come in threes.Whatever history and culture says WE think 3, a hat-trick of stories, is a great number to explore them...