Christopher Priest

Gerald Kersh

Michael McDowell

Michael Blumlein

Florence Marryat

Hugh Walpole

Richard Marsh

Stephen Gregory

Bernard Taylor

John Blackburn

Francis King

Mary Cholmondeley

Charles Birkin

John Trevena

M. G. Lewis

Forrest Reid

Hugh Fleetwood

In this volume, you will encounter tales of ghosts, haunted houses, witchcraft, vampirism, lycanthropy, and sea monsters. Stories of cruelty and vengeance, of a body that refuses to be cremated, a deranged performer with one last shocking show, a frozen corpse that may not be dead. With stories ranging from frightening to horrific to weird to darkly funny, by a lineup of authors that includes both masters of horror fiction and award-winning literary greats, this is a horror anthology like no other. Spanning two hundred years of horror, this new collection features seventeen macabre gems, including two original tales and many others that have never or seldom been reprinted, by: Charles Birkin • John Blackburn • Michael Blumlein • Mary Cholmondeley • Hugh Fleetwood • Stephen Gregory • Gerald Kersh • Francis King • M. G. Lewis • Florence Marryat • Richard Marsh • Michael McDowell • Christopher Priest • Forrest Reid • Bernard Taylor • Hugh Walpole 'The things were there and they were hiding in the slime; waiting ... waiting to clutch and claw and savage’ - AUNTY GREEN by John Blackburn ‘The sound that came from her throat, a small, pleading cry of terror, was cut off before she’d hardly had a chance to utter it’ - OUT OF SORTS by Bernard Taylor ‘The words filled her with an indescribable fear, and she turned to run; but her way was blocked by a figure, gigantic in stature​ – and its monstrous shape moved towards her, and she knew it was the incarnation of evil itself ’ - THE TERROR ON TOBIT by Charles Birkin

The Valancourt Book of Horror Stories: Volume One

Spawn of Satan

An important, though neglected, figure in twentieth-century British horror fiction, Sir Charles Birkin (1907-1985) began his literary career as editor of the popular - and now highly collectible - "Creeps" series of horror anthologies in the 1930s, which featured tales by well-known writers such as H.R. Wakefield, Lord Dunsany and Russell Thorndike, as well as contributions by Birkin himself. A master of the "conte cruel," often with a Grand Guignol finish, Birkin found true horror not in ghosts or the supernatural but in man's inhumanity to man. Never before reprinted and extremely scarce, "Devils' Spawn" (1936) collects sixteen of Birkin's stories, many of them first published in the "Creeps" volumes, including the horror gems "The Terror on Tobit" and "The Harlem Horror." Birkin's collection "The Smell of Evil" (1965) is also available from Valancourt Books. "Not for the squeamish. Be warned, if you are at all sensitive, leave him well alone." - Hugh Lamb "More than a definite touch of the great master, Edgar Allan Poe." - Dennis Wheatley "Few writers of horror today approach the standards of Birkin." - "Ulster Star"

Devils' Spawn

John Llewellyn Probert

These thirteen stories reveals Sir Charles Birkin at his diabolical best. He induces chills by describing the sufferings of ordinary, decent people who encounter inexplicable cruelty and evil in their everyday lives.

The Smell of Evil

Charles Birkin

About

Books

Join the club