Doubledipping some UK spooks for this evening’s reading. The Pale Illuminations, a fine sold-out dream of phantasms from Sarob Press (hi Robert Morgan! I found one!!), and the latest Fortean efforts from ye Fortean Times. Some really good articles this issue including one on William Hope Hodgson, and the Usbourne “World of the Unknown” series — right up my alley. 😍 #ghostseason #forteantimes #sarobpress #supernatural #paranormal (at Portland, Maine) https://www.instagram.com/p/B4gZafzgSz_/?igshid=1xpst7168ajo1

Ancient rituals, hidden histories and encounters with the genius loci; a crumbling Scottish castle and an unhappy young woman whose relationship with a ghost bears strange and unexpected fruit; shades of Edgar Allan Poe and Clark Ashton Smith in the wilds of Derbyshire's Peak District; a private island off the coast of Sicily, owned by a mad folly-building aesthete duke, where layers of illusion are successively peeled away until the very nature of reality itself becomes the question (the fantastically abstract dustjacket by Donald Green is the icing on the cake of this hypnotic, discombobulating extravaganza). Just a few of my recent literary escapes as the days grow colder and darker... #thepaleilluminations #sarobpress #peterbell #markvalentine #reggieoliver #derekjohn #ferelith #victoralexandersereldhay #lordkilmarnock #nodensbooks #rmurraygilchrist #wordswortheditions #angusheriot #cassell #donaldgreen #firstedition #dustjacketart #modernfirsteditions #smallpress #mystery #supernatural #ghoststories #horror #folklore #thehiddenplaces #books #bookstagram #bibliophilia #autumnevenings #recentreading https://www.instagram.com/p/B3-JF6nnE8K/?igshid=1b7nw8bs17p65

As the nights draw in and autumn's chill fills the air, it's the perfect time to curl up with something Jamesian and unsettling. This beautiful volume of folk horror tales, edited by the estimable Rosemary Pardoe and published by Sarob Press, contains a wealth of stories selected from the Ghosts & Scholars journal and newsletter, as well as new tales written especially for this volume. The latter includes my story, Out of the Water, Out of the Ground, in which, as Rosemary describes in her introduction, "while the setting is Scotland, the Folk Horror comes terrifyingly from pre-war Germany"... 🍂💀 #mrjames #ghostsandscholars #rosemarypardoe #sarobpress #folkhorror #ghoststories #shortfiction #autumn #books #bookstagram #bibliophilia https://www.instagram.com/p/BoWWZF2lyd7/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=1lsexx2h3clew

On the days when I can't go outside, the outside comes to me. A gift blown in through open balcony doors in the days before rain, when all was still heat and dust (and is so again, though we're promised rain again soon). That, and some stationary travelling: to strange houses in Oxford back streets, the stark bleak immensity of Hebridean hills and shorelines, overgrown gardens harbouring strange statues, out-of-the-way places of old cults and old religions, all bathed in penumbral shadows to snare the lonely traveller. There's something too in these tales of those wonderful old travelogues and walking tours by gentleman antiquarians and collectors of folklore, albeit from a modern, Aickmanesque perspective - all evocative, some genuinely unsettling. Really enjoyed this. #peterbell #revenantsandmaledictions #sarobpress #paullowe #weirdtales #shortstories #supernaturalfiction #scotland #hebrides #oxford #isleofman #folklore #geniusloci #books #bookstagram #bibliophilia #summer #dogdaysofaugust

Lovely gift from my beloved of the Sarob Press reissue of Ron Weighell's The White Road. Having completed our customary Yuletide rewatch of The Box of Delights (the recent stage play was excellent but nothing comes close to the BBC production), it's time to relax, break out the MR James box set, and enjoy a rare period of quiet. Wishing you all peace and happiness during this festive period and a safe refuge from the turmoil that's beset us all this year. And whatever your chosen path, creed or belief... keep the faith. #merrychristmas #yule #sarobpress #ronweighell #thewhiteroad #ghoststories #supernatural #occult #shortfiction #weirdliterature #christmastree #festivity #hope #peace #books #bookstagram #bibliophilia #winter2017