Herald of the Hidden and Other Stories by Mark Valentine, Tartarus Press

Ralph Tyler and I, whatever the content of this preview copy, were always likely to get along. The author's description of him as being 'from an obscure shire...without private means, or any special esoteric knowledge...he smokes foul cigarettes, slump(ed) in his chair...,' from a council-estate flat - 14, Bellchamber Tower - warmed me to the book's amateur 'detective' almost instantly. It also made me suspect an idealised portrait of the author himself in louche and world-weary student days.
  Here we find paranormal sleuthing manifesting mythic returns amongst the dusk-filled terminal lanes of an overlooked, north-easterly outpost. While intentionally traditional in form, the tales are set in the time they were written - between 1983 and today. (Predating David Renwick's 'Jonathan Creek' - of whom the character initially reminded me - by over a decade). But Valentine has significantly pared down the more rambling and pedantic tropes of the genre's earlier outings, minimising backstory and limiting character description, to speak more directly to today's general readership.  Though brief, they are also not undersold.
  Valentine never puts a foot wrong prioritising tightly-plotted adventure couched in encroaching, supernatural evocation.  He clearly draws upon myths based upon his own researches, rather than relying upon those all too lazily warmed over by others before him.  Greco-Roman demi-gods and Eastern bestial-guards of classical myth abound upon and between the unfrequented Northamptonshire gravel paths, somehow lending both a fresher and more authentic feel to proceedings.  This makes him, when he so desires, one of a select band of what might be termed nostalgic originators; writers too skilled in the literary form of former generations to be mere peddlars of cash-in pastiche. (Otherwise too numerous today).
  As in his 'Collected Connoisseur' (with John Howard, and also from Tartarus), Valentine admits to wearing his influences openly.  But, as well as those mentioned in the Intro., I also found a creditable de la Mare in 'Tree Worship,' (where nature's profound cycle clashes with shallow urban manners), a hint of Henry Whitehead voodoo in 'The Guardians of the Guest Room' and even Crowley (diabolism but with a pay-off too witty for Wheatley) in 'Go to the West'; one of six early, standalone tales completing the collection.
  Throughout the main body of ten Tyler tales, the narrative voice - Tyler's unnamed chronicler - is cool, almost dispassionate, with never a concession to comic-book hyperbole.  Yet neither are we ever too remote from the action when it arrives in small, convincing climaxes.  Although not strictly a companion volume to 'The Collected Connoisseur,' lovers of those tales will, I suspect, enjoy these easily as much.

The Man Who Walked Through Walls by Marcel Ayme, (translated from the French by Sophie Lewis) Pushkin Press

The foremost strength of this ten-tale collection is one so rarely achieved in the literary past.  Most fiction evoking an experience lived within a great historical event is retrospective; if only by a half-decade or two, when real-time events fade just long enough to be satirised or, in some way, symbolically realised.  What makes Ayme's collection extraordinary is this form having been utilised in the midst of the events themselves; and with a cynical, madcap, symbolic relevance we can instantly recognise today.
  First published in 1943, Pushkin's reissue is more timely than its mere seventieth anniversary.  We - with Ayme - are in Paris in the midst of the Nazi occupation, each tale presenting us with characters of mundane, credible reality yet with the oddest kinks and abilities.  There is clear reasoning behind this on Ayme's part; if not openly stated then at least invitingly inferred.
  In one way, the book is a hymn to the people of Paris and its outlying towns, each protagonist essentially good; not all of them pleasant, not all of them in the 'right,'  but, basically, good. (Ayme himself appears, first-person narrating the fourth tale, 'The Problem of Summertime').  The title tale concerns a 'lowly clerk in the Ministry of Records' who takes justifiable revenge against his almost psychotically pedantic boss with the help of the new skill he's stumbled upon, only to then unwittingly commit a fatal error of his own making.
  'Sabine Women' will surely resonate today as the Sabine of the title uses, then abuses, her singular ability; ubiquity.  An early case of a woman having it all - until she discovers the limits to having none whatsoever.  However, she is no fool and never drawn as such.
  'Tickets On Time' - disappointing at least as a title - rings far greater resonance in our time of highly questionable austerity. Written in diary form, occupation-sympathiser Jules Flegmon supports the authorities new restrictions 'for the community's good.'  "In order to better anticipate shortages and to guarantee improved productivity in the working portion of the population,..." it is decreed that pensioners, those with private income and the unemployed shall be put to death - at least for a few days per month to save costs.  That is until Jules discovers that, as a writer, he is included among the intended victims.
  There are other archetypes ripe for targeting.  In 'The Wife Collector' a delusional tax collector's spouse who wilfully overspends for the attentions of an admirer becomes his physical rebate and a prospective Government policy. But again, we never feel contempt for the man. It is too parodic for that. More a sad amusement for what the predicament of Occupation might have driven him to.  In 'The Bailiff' St. Peter and God Himself are depicted, arguing over whether the bailiff of the title should be allowed access considering those whose lives he's wrecked. He is temporarily released back on Earth to show he can make amends.  This he does but not for the reason he - or we - might have foreseen.
  This collection is anarchically funny and evergreen, by a journalist-writer confident in the wake of a successful novel ('The Green Mare' 1933) giving a two-fingered salute to those who'd claim themselves his new masters.  I earlier mentioned a clear reasoning inferred by Ayme's sympathetic depictions of his otherwise mundane characters.  It is of open defiance and brazen dissent.


                                                  Albertine's Wooers

The Green Book, Writings On Irish Gothic, Supernatural and Fantastic Literature, Swan River Press, Issue One

It is often the case that the best writers' to purvey a country's literary past to a new generation are their contemporaries who've arrived from outside to live there.  This is surely the case of Brian J. Showers; the Canadian, Dublin-based writer-publisher of Swan River Press.  The task he's set himself here, to uncover a possible "lineage of tradition" in fantastical Irish literature is admirable, and clear he is at least - with or without this long, backtracking journey in bi-annual form - in it for the long haul.
  The contents of this inaugural issue are broad in scope and approach; from the first part of a highly informed if densely-penned academic treatise by Albert Power ('Towards an Irish Gothic') as opener, to an absorbing David Longhorn piece on Conor McPherson's 'supernatural theatre,' folklorist Jacqueline Simpson on 'Le Fanu's Use of Oral Tradition,' and a revelatory interview-review of Ciaran Foy's recent urban horror flick, 'Citadel.'  The sympathetic pro-journalist Michael Dirda contributes a brief, but telling overview on his own favoured fantasists - those who use what he terms 'elegant blarney.'
  My favourite piece here is Dan Studer's 'Adventures of a Dream Child...,' profiling Forrest Reid through a study of his quietly strange, semi-autobiographical Tom Barber trilogy. While, ending the final 'Reviews' section, Bertrand Lucat may finally have turned me on to, at least, some of the novels of John Connolly.  There is always room for growth and focus - as ever thus with first issues' - but The Green Book, in content alone, has already justified future numbers.

Letter From An Unknown Woman and Other Stories (translated from the German by Anthea Bell) by Stefan Zweig, Pushkin Press

Far be it from me - an interested but total amateur on classic European literature - to consider himself qualified to sum-up the virtues, or otherwise, of this greatly renowned, if rarely read, author.
All I know is, by the end of the fourth and final tale, I was smiling; not one, however, of ribald humour; not when that final tale's last line describes one fading with that of the protagonist's dreams.
  I've long harboured a belief that what makes an uncanny tale truly successful is the ease with which its author holds back, or even disguises, the likely motive behind enfolding events. So that, by the end, one feels a rising awareness that we've read only the afterglow of a larger back-story and that there was rather more to say. If, after challenging our expectation, that author has rung real emotion from the reader by never cynically descending to overt romanticism or false pathos, they are one of an elite.
  The title story concerns 'a famous novelist' and the sole multi-page letter he receives from a woman he claims to know nothing about. She, however, claims him as a former lover who left her with child, accusing him of never acknowledging her existence through subsequent meetings she 'knows' has taken place and the love for him she must continue to feel.  Is her loyalty justified?  Is she madly obsessed? Or is he a truly a bed-hopping shit? By the end our former allegiance will be challenged. 'A Story Told in Twilight' describes a nostalgic reverie about a spoiled pubescent youth, the mistaken identity over a ghostly lover, and the fate this missed opportunity for love in one so young delivered.
  'The Debt Paid Late' is the one tale lacking the usual half-glimpsed truths, rolling out a more open, conventional plot.  There is, again, a girlhood obsession, but one unexpectedly and satisfyingly returned during a much-needed break in a mountain-side rural inn.  Perhaps the least fascinating of the tales, still it communicates an authenticity and warmth that equally draws you in. The male visitor to a former love in 'Forgotten Dreams,' the shortest tale, might be Zweig himself.  At its centre resides a discussion on youthful idealism; how one lover's view can seemingly, gradually, run counter to that once presumed mutually held so causing ultimate estrangement.  It is testament to Zweig's genius how such a convincing encounter can run to a mere eight pages.
  'Letter...' is the most recent re-issue of the Zweig ouevre, with the collected tales mouth-wateringly awaiting hardback release at a modest price later this year.

The Complete Symphonies of Adolf Hitler & Other Strange Stories by Reggie Oliver, Tartarus Press

First published in hardback in 2005, this boldly-titled collection is now re-released with detailed illustrations by the author himself.
  The prose throughout reads as conventional first-person reportage, Oliver's (MR) James-ian knowledge reflected in several ecclesiastical settings.  What elevates it above most such referential nods are the ironic, post-colon reflections of cynical wit informing how seriously - or otherwise - a tale should be taken.
  For a single collection, this is quite a hefty tome; sixteen tales running to 338 pages. Oliver's fascination with all aspects of English history are here; from present-day researching of late 17th century correspondence ('The Sermons of Doctor Hodnet') to that of a contemporary play-script ('The Constant Rake') to an 'am dram' company in an indeterminate period post-War. ('The Skins').
  The title tale concerns the narrator claiming to have found a CD box-set bearing this name in a Magnum record store, its possibly credible contents, and the ubiquitous figure subsequently stalking him, who'll go to suicidal lengths to get it returned.  The tale is surreal and quietly mad, to say the least, positing questions it has no intentions of answering.
  The narrative voice is akin to wry, articulate bar-room anecdotage.  Occasionally, its very matter-of-factness can - where a climactic murder takes place - rob a tale of rising tension. Where it occurs out-of-the-blue, it's with little pre-emptive build that something extraordinary is about to occur.  'A Nightmare Sang' - a black comedy-horror reminiscent of an installment from those overwrought budget filmed anthologies of the 60s' and 70s' - suffers this, and is, consequently, the least successful entry.
  Oliver's strength are those tales in which such killings do not play out.  On the ending that is simply downbeat he is very good. 'The Skins,' 'Difficult People' and 'The Babe of the Abyss' each culminate in a sombre twist, which satisfyingly belies expectation.
  The best tales in this regard are hard to fault and deserving of future anthology.  'The Garden of Strangers' features the aged reflection of a once ambitious American journalist in the Paris of 1900, arrived to interview the ailing Oscar Wilde.  It is one of two meditations on the nature of suicide ('A Christmas Card' being the second) and, perhaps, the most life-affirming as Oliver's Wilde recalls the spirit-visitants he encountered whose respective fate helped inform his own decision.
  'Difficult People' is set in the late Sixties, appearing as a comment on the period and the shallowness of a generation who, through their own belief-system, could so easily be led to a self-destructive fate. Disguising this is a tale of possession by a work of art with a life of its own.
   The Aickman-esque 'Bloody Bill' works superbly as each anecdote presented harbours a mystery that demands, but barely obtains, resolution.  William Hexham - a former Eton housemaster and the 'Bill' of the title - is painted by the younger fellows as a figure to be feared, even hated, for his once physical prowess and quick, overbearing temper.  But is he the man he once was? Has age withered him?  Oliver is cunning in never actually showing what formed this reputation, suggesting Hexham is something other, while intimating what he truly is may be merely dormant - or a harboured sadness of non-achievement.  But the real achievement is in Oliver making us - the reader - fear him.
  The broad sweep of English social history alone, displayed here, should galvanise those new to this author into seeking out his other collections.
 

The Doll: Short Stories by Daphne Du Maurier, Virago Press

The long-harboured snobbery of the literary establishment over genre fiction has, I must admit, been matched only by my own misconceptions.  The greatest being that Du Maurier was a writer for women only, whose tastes resided in a form of melodramatic romance.  How wrong I was.  The recent reissue of her back catalogue - in the light of Jane Dunn's new biography ('Daphne Du Maurier and Her Sisters,' Harper Press) - reveals a writer with tastes both uncanny and, by contrast, purposefully comedic; highlighted in her shorter fiction. (Other collections in the series, such as 'The Birds,' 'Don't Look Now' and 'The Breaking Point' each harbour tales with these moods).
  Couched within are themes showing her as sceptical of her fellow woman's motives in relationships as she is with men's; while emotions are things that might be subjectively interpreted in a multitude of ways. Here in each case, (bar one), the protagonist is unaware, and so unskilled, in his or her ability to handle the situation they find themselves in.  
  Written between 1926 -32, with Du Maurier only in her early twenties, she treats her subject matter as if her puberty had felt more like an open wound to grit one's teeth against and challenge than a stage in life from which to project.  Each scenario depicts the fatal consequences of perceived betrayal in sexual mores; be it on a long-isolated isle suddenly and fatally exposed to an unforeseen landing. ('East Wind'); or an unstable narrator delusionally in love with a woman who may - or may not - be as disturbed as himself and who already harbours a partner - a silent and still mechanical mannequin.  Or not...? This title tale is, for lovers of the uncanny, a masterpiece of ambiguity, where we are left to question, but never solve, the narrator's true perception.
  In 'Tame Cat,' a girl (most likely Du Maurier herself, as you feel is so often the case) receives the key-to-the-door with excitement and anticipation for the future that also suddenly, cruelly, condemns her.
The girl's ultimate contempt for the man who's perceived her in the way he has is undoubtedly the author's own, and yet also sounded is a certain pity.  That both are victims of circumstance; their natural programming.  Another sub-theme through the tales.
  'Maizie' parallels the previous tale with the girl - now, one of the streets - wishing to escape from the strictures circumstance has forced upon her, only to discover she is, almost literally, upon the bed she's already made. Episodes of sleeping sickness act as precursor to a premonition in 'The Happy Valley'; another tale in Du Maurier's canon of the uncanny.
  Of the 'comedies,' 'The Limpet' is the supreme example.  A narration by one who sees herself the wronged and innocent party through each life we witness her at the same time destroying.  A more wry, telling portrait of a gold-digger even Dorothy Parker would've been hard=pressed to match.  'Frustration,' a lesser and lighter tale, is no less blackly comic.  A couple engaged for seven years finally agree to get hitched. What subsequently plays out in their attempt to so do is the domino-effect scenario where everything that can go wrong - does.
  If you've purposely been avoiding Du Maurier merely for her fame, I'd advise a serious re-think on her shorter fiction.  Her clear-sighted understanding of male/female relationships, a healthy cynicism underlying, easily bridges the gap of the passed eight decades.

                                                        *     *     *     *     *

                                             ALBERTINE'S WOOERS


An occasional, covert glance at other enticing items...Pushkin Press have made a welcome reissue of Stefan Zweig's back catalogue in paperback, with his short fiction to be collected in a hardback volume this autumn....Dadelus have republished Stefan Grabinski's first collection - 'The Dark Domain' - as an e-book...the ever productive Mark Valentine has a new collection 'Herald of the Hidden', out on Tartarus, as are his main poetical, mystical contributions to 'Star Kites'....finally, for now, Swan River Press have just made available the first issue of 'The Green Book'; a quality bi-annual overview of Irish supernatural literature.... 

The Sea Change & Other Stories by Helen Grant, Swan River Press

With the current vogue of European influence in much independent
fiction, it is not surprising how most of novelist Helen Grant's first
short story collection should be inspired primarily by her former
abodes in southern and eastern Europe.
  Fantasised from these landscapes are the strong echoes of its
traditonal voices.  'Grauer Hans' convinces as a Grimm tale tinged
with Hoffmann.  Her narrator recalls her childhood fear.  After her
mother insisted upon sending her off to sleep to her croon of a
warning lullaby, an aged, seemingly benevolent, goblin subsequently
'appears,' scratching at her window for access.  We already know he
cannot truly be as he seems, but Grant well maintains the narrator's
retrospective naivete, allowing space and time for us to share in the
build-up of its horrific revelation.
  The title tale holds the collection's greatest scare as an aging, mono-
syllabic but experienced diver becomes increasingly obsessed by an
unaccountable wreck.  So obssessed that his capacity for underwater
exploration takes an impossible turn, leading to a nightmarish
encounter. The retrospective horror here is in something much more
subtle than in 'Grauer Hans.'  The reader's realisation that "one of the
most laid-back people I have ever met" on the first page and the "dark
shape in the fading light" at the end are minimally rendered through-
out as one and the same. 
  'The Game of Bear' is an incomplete MR James tale previously
turned by Grant into a competition winner in Ghosts & Scholars,
wherein an actual nightmare ambiguously manifests as an out-of-body
possession.
  'Self Catering' is the prankster in the pack.  A man intent on a change
from his usual holiday destination stumbles across a high street travel
agency - with a major difference; one offering "spiritual journeys"
with "a range of unique supernatural experiences" by its exotically-
named and slightly sinister proprietor. (Think an occult 'Mr. Benn').
Its one-joke pay-off the reader may well have seen coming but it's no
less enjoyable for that.
  'Nathair Dhubh' Grant later cites as her first published tale. 
Redolent of 1920s' / 30s' Buchan, it atmospherically paints that world
of rock-climbing derring-do and how some aspect of nature always has
this nasty habit of claiming he who oversteps its mark. 
Grant's effortlessly simple prose style is already set in this otherwise
well-trodden, haunted path of loss and guilt.
  It is these topics of loss, guilt, possession and nightmare which
combine in 'Alberic de Mauleon'; what Grant calls a 'prequel' to
James's 'Canon Alberic's Scrapbook.'  A very unexpected type of
brotherly retribution is played out from a devil's bargain in this 17th
century period piece that leads neatly to the door of its subsequent
source.
  In 'The Calvary at Banska Bystrica' we're back in the present, in
Slovakia, where the atoning search for a hateful brother is replayed.
Only there is a greater mystery here as to the brother's true raison 
d'etre, his fate only part-revealed at the end of an ascending path in
some grotesque, physical sublimation.  It is perhaps the most
sophisticated tale in the collection, yet as simply rendered as the rest.
A mix that often makes re-reading a repeatable pleasure.


Coming soon . . . 

ALBERTINE'S WOOERS

PAN'S RETURN!

Greetings Pan-readers,

This is just to confirm that Pan will return in time for the Spring on FRIDAY 15th MARCH.

Pan Himself willing...

Mark