The Ghastling

A collection of eight stories of the macabre, psychological horror, ghost stories and the oh-so-strange. Including Tom Johnstone's 'Creeping Forth Upon Their Hands' intricately weaves the events of the first English mass plantation in Ireland, at Munster, enforced under order of Queen Elizabeth 1st. This is a chilling contemporary ghost story masterfully told. In Kieron Hazel's story 'Devil in My Eye', a wanderer of the Black Country finds an abandoned farm to sleep on a snowy night. Surely he should be comforted by the old tramp markings he sees there? This is a literary take on the 'slasher' and is a rare and delightful find for us. Barry Charman's 'Doom Warnings' is a great piece of dystopian horror for our time. A couple begin noticing 'May Contain Traces of Doom' signs on the packaging of their food. They avoid eating the food but soon they realise the rest of the people in their town are beginning to change ... Victoria Day's tale 'Mr Price's Bed' is a brilliant reimagining of the strange events surrounding Mr James Price's deathbed in 1658. What was it that possessed him and how could he have possibly predicted his own death? Bess Lovejoy's unsettling story 'The Nondescript' tells of a junior museum worker who finds an odd artefact in a drawer and shows it to each of the museum's experts - all of whom offer a different explanation. The last one she shows it to asks her to leave it with him. But what is it that she sees through the window? Damien B. Raphael's story 'Firstborn' is a wonderfully atmospheric tale about belief, witchcraft and the ritual protection marks and concoctions that are supposed to keep evil out ... Kristy Kerruish's 'Night-Treaders' is a creepy tale about a couple who renovate an old seventeenth century lodge, a cautionary tale warning that some things found are better left where they are. Beware what blows in on the wind ... In Lucy Ashe's story 'Where the Waters Meet' an anxious mother-to-be awaits the arrival of her twin babies. This is a sad and haunting story exploring the places we go to for comfort when we seek those we grieve for.