L'école belge de l'étrange

[david]

Mark, I recently read Tartarus' Maupassant work followed by House of Oracles. I loved both though for House of Oracles, the story length became somewhat repetitive to me. I'd be interested to get your take though.

Well, the story I have enjoyed most thus far is "The Passenger" which is a marvellous piece of work. "Two of A Kind" has its own merits as well.

But as you say, David, the length of the tales is very uniform. I suspect they were all written to the roughly specific word count required for the magazines in which they first appeared? I could be wrong of course. Another thing is the very short paragraphs. They seem too punchy to me, but that's only a matter of personal taste.

More to follow, I hope.

Mark S.

[MTC]

Shadow Publishing recently issued a collection (the first ever I believe) of the Belgian horror writer Eddy C. Bertin's short stories in English. Cover art by Harry O. Morris. Looks very interesting, I have it here on my desk, still unread I'm afraid, so many books to read.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Whispering-Horror-Eddy-Bertin/dp/0953903273/ref=pd_sim_b_46?ie=UTF8&refRID=04K0HM8SP0V2HPB96CEH

 

http://www.amazon.com/The-Whispering-Horror-Eddy-Bertin/dp/0953903273/ref=pd_sim_b_46?ie=UTF8&refRID=04K0HM8SP0V2HPB96CEH

I can't claim to have read more than a handful of tales by Eddy C. Bertin, though I will say that three of the four I've read were uniformly excellent; "Like Two White Spiders", "I Wonder What He Wanted" and "A Pentagram for Cenaide". The fourth "To Save The World!" is ... but I'll gloss over that one! These are mostly scattered throughout some 70s paperback anthologies, so that collected volume of his tales is something I must be sure to obtain eventually...

I understand Shadow Publishing have also brought back into print L.A. Lewis's collection Tales of the Grotesque. An excellent volume of weird tales and worth obtaining for his magisterial tale "The Tower of Moab" alone.

No further in with The House of Oracles as yet.

Mark S.

[MTC]

Quote Originally Posted by mark_samuels

I understand Shadow Publishing have also brought back into print L.A. Lewis's collection Tales of the Grotesque. An excellent volume of weird tales and worth obtaining for his magisterial tale "The Tower of Moab" alone.

I agree. Tales of the Grotesque is the best I've read in years.

[david]

Quote Originally Posted by MTC

I agree. Tales of the Grotesque is the best I've read in years.

Me three. The cover on the other hand...

I see what you mean

Shadow Publishing - horror and weird fiction

I suppose it's part of the publisher's house-style, though there are better examples of covers for other books. Certainly the Harry Morris cover for the Bertin is much more to my taste.

I hadn't realised they'd quoted me as recommending the L.A. Lewis book! I wonder where I said that? I'd guess it was probably over at the Vault of Evil website a few years back. I somehow got quoted, to my surprise, with a blurb on one of the Library of Wales editions of a Machen book, too. Strange the help one provides without knowing of it. Gives me a warm glow.

Back to the Thomas Owen. I've finished the book. The paragraph issue I had doesn't seem to persist across all the tales but I have to admit to deflation. Transpose the settings from Europe to U.S.A. and you have a dead-average writer of the Weird Tales pulp school who could turn out one or two memorable high-spots whereas the rest routinely fade from the mind. Well, they did from my mind at least.

So, as it is with Jean Ray so it is with Owen -- there are gems, but digging through the dust is hard work. A single volume of either author's tales containing "The Best of...", and about half the length of The Horrifying Presence or The House of Oracles would have suited me much better.

Mark S.

Re: L.A. Lewis

You may have already seen this (I know it was posted here previously) but here's the link to the Wormwoodiana entry by Mark Valentine on Lewis's Tower of Moab.

Wormwoodiana: L A Lewis

Mark S.

[Druidic]

It’s always fun to discover a ‘forgotten’ writer like L. A. Lewis. His book has just arrived and I haven’t had time to decide for myself whether he’s a first-rate talent or not but it will be an adventure. My reading has been slowed down appreciably by my present circumstances.

This thread has reminded me that many writers of the macabre, including some of the very best, have created bodies of work that are wildly uneven in quality and inspiration. I suppose that’s just inevitable. Lovecraft, for me at least, was a great exception. You look at the stories published under his own name during his lifetime and you find almost all tend to fall into the categories of ‘major’ or ‘minor’ classics. M. R. James was also remarkably consistent; Aickman, too, and I’d probably add Ligotti to the list. But Jean Ray, a writer I’m rather fond of, is all over the place. (The Mainz Psalter is really a wonderful tale with its touches of Lovecraft and Hodgson).

I don’t think a certain unevenness of quality in a total output necessarily counts against a writer but it can be a real deterrent for readers if collections aren’t put together with the most meticulous care.

[david]

I'm reading Horrifying Presence and Other Tales and I am enjoying it but some of the language seems a bit "awkward" for lack of a better word. Did anyone else notice that? Is it because of the translation or did Ray just write like that? I don't remember his stories in The Weird as being so.