New and interesting items at Miskatonic Books

ARTHUR MACHEN: MASTERS OF THE WEIRD TALES (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

 

The largest collection of Arthur Machen stories ever collected in one volume, including original artwork by Matthew Jaffe, a new introduction by T.E.D. Klein, and a new afterword by Caitlín R. Kiernan. Contents include The Great God Pan, the complete Three Imposters, The White People, and many more. A complete PDF of the contents is available on request. Bound in cloth with a full cloth slipcase. The edition is limited t0 200 signed and numbered copies, and the book is signed by T.E.D. Klein, Matthew Jaffe, and Caitlín R. Kiernan.

One of only 200 signed and numbered hardcover copies in custom slipcase

 

APOCALYPTIC WITCHCRAFT by Peter Grey (Limited Edition Hardcover) Import

The spectre of witchcraft is haunting the West, the dead giving up their secrets. This is a ritual unveiling of these mysteries. It is a vision and a revelation of the mytho-poetic structure of the Art.

Apocalyptic Witchcraft is a bold project which does not seek to impose an orthodoxy on what is the heresy of heresies. Instead, it suggests a way forward.

Apocalyptic Witchcraft gives a compelling and profound account of the Sabbat and Wild Hunt as living experiences. These are the core of our ritual practice. Dream, lunar and, critically, menstrual magic are explored as a path to this knowledge. The wolf, the Devil, and the Goddess of witchcraft are then encountered in a landscape that ultimately reveals the witch to her or himself. These are not separate threads, but arise from a deep mythic structure and are woven together into a single unifying vision. Alternating between polemic, poetic and ecstatic prose, an harmonious course is revealed in a sequence of elegant stratagems. The book is threaded together with a cycle of hymns to Inanna, pearls on the tapestry of night. Seemingly disparate aspects are joined into a vision which is neither afraid of blessing nor curse. This is a daring undertaking, born from both urgency and need. It offers a renewed sense of purpose and meaning for a witchcraft that has seen many of its treasured ideas about itself destroyed. An apocalyptic age demands an Apocalyptic Witchcraft, and this is a book which is offered up to revolutionise the body of the craft, a way out of the dark impasse.

Tradition is not static, it flows, and this work pours forth a vision for the future. Founded in pilgrimage and ritual, encountered in dreams and gleaned from the conversations of both doves and crows, a remarkable narrative unfolds. Its wings span from pre-history, through the witch-panic and it emerges fully fledged into our present moment of crisis. It offers a witchcraft for our time. Apocalyptic Witchcraft is a controversial, luminous text. A shuddering paroxysm of eternal renewal beneath the serpent moon.

It is neither a how-to book, nor a history, rather it is a magical vision of the Art in its entirety.

Of the Doves edition is an octavo book of 200pp bound in rough black linen cloth. Limited to 1000 copies. The boards are stamped with white doves, whose hidden meaning is elucidated in the text. Lyrical typography and carefully chosen images communicate further understanding.

Contents

Exordium
Apocalyptic Witchcraft
A Manifesto of Apocalyptic Witchcraft
She is Without
The Cup, the Cross and the Cave
A Spell to Awaken England
The Scaffold of Lightning
The Children that are Hidden Away
A Wolf sent Forth to Snatch away a Lamb
Fifteen
Hic Rhodus, Hic Salta!

HERALD OF THE HIDDEN by Mark Valentine (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover) Import

This title is an advance order and is due in early April. Reserve your copy now.

What is the secret of the house of days? Who are the shadowy figures gathered along an old green road? What is the winged thing seen flitting from an ancient church?

Herald of the Hidden collects ten adventures of the occult detective Ralph Tyler, inspired by William Hope Hodgson’s Carnacki the Ghost-Finder, Algernon Blackwood’s John Silence, and Arthur Machen’s Mr Dyson of The Three Impostors.

But Ralph Tyler is different. He is without private means, or any special esoteric knowledge. Sometimes he doesn’t play fair with his clients or his friend, the narrator. He smokes foul cigarettes, slumps in his chair, and wears a threadbare jacket. And he’s from an obscure shire in the darkest heart of England . . .
Mark Valentine’s Ralph Tyler stories first appeared in hard-to-find small press publications. Three of the stories in this volume are previously unpublished, including two newly written for this collection. Along with six further supernatural tales, all the stories are previously uncollected in book form.

Herald of the Hidden is a sewn hardback of 230+ vii pages, printed lithographically, with silk ribbon marker, head and tailbands, and d/w.

Contents: ‘Introduction’. Ralph Tyler Stories: ‘St Michael & All Angels’, ‘The Folly’, ‘Madberry Hill’, ‘The Ash Track’, ‘The Grave of Anir’, ‘William Sorrell Requests’, ‘The Hermit’s House’, ‘Herald of the Hidden’, ‘Heritage of Fire’, ‘The Almanac’. Other Early Stories: ‘The Guardians of the Guest Room’, ‘Go to the West’, ‘Tree Worship’, ‘Twilight at Little Brydon Cricket Club’, ‘Woken by Candlelight’, ‘Their Special Glee’. ‘Acknowledgements.’

Signed, numbered edition limited to 400 copies.

STAR KITES by Mark Valentine (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover) Import

This title is an advance order and is due in early April. Reserve your copy now.

Mark Valentine’s first collection of poems draws on the sources that have inspired his acclaimed short stories—oneiric and otherworldly, and inexplicably beautiful. The poems evoke half-lit figures and images, seen in smoke, shadow, sun-haze and stone, and moments when the visible world does not quite cohere. Valentine writes of spells, oracles, myths and the fragility of memory.

Also offered are versions of poems by previously unheard European voices, including the Italian twilight poet Sergio Corazzini; the early mystical work of Ernst Stadler, a young, cosmopolitan poet killed in the Great war near Ypres; an Imagist homage to the Armenian poet and reformer Madame Sibyl; and a poem of Autumn by Ludmila Jevsejeva, exiled for her work in Esperanto.

Mark Valentine’s poems have appeared in Smoke, Sepia, Amoeba, The Fool, Mandragora and other journals and anthologies.

Star Kites is a sewn hardback of 64 pages, printed lithographically, with silk ribbon marker, head and tailbands, and d/w.

Signed, numbered edition limited to 250 copies.

The Place of Magic in the Intellectual History of Europe by Lynn Thorndike (Limited Edition Hardcover)

One of only 250 numbered hardcover copies. Book is in fine condition.

Originally published in 1905, this work, after a manner, is an outline for Lynn Thorndike’s later monumental magnum opus, the eight volume set of the History of Magic and Experimental Science.

I offer this work largely on the value of Lynn Thorndike’s gargantuan stature amongst scholars of Magick and original thinking. I’ve contributed the new typesetting and a fine leather binding of a limited ARS OBSCURA Press edition.

This work is first and foremost a historical primer. From the Classical to the Medieval eras, the history of Magick is explored through the works and the personages of these periods. Primary source material is laid clear that comprises the primary signposts of this lineage. These being the likes of Pliny and his Natural History, to Pythagoras, Aristotle, Cato, Boswell, Galen, Seneca and Cicero’s Dream of Scipio, to name a few. Mr. Thorndike provides a thorough groundwork. The eclipse of Magick by science and yet the ageless persistence of Magickal inclinations brings the gravity to the issues of the scientific questions of Magick’s evolution. In keeping with the scholar tradition there are copious Latin and Greek footnotes throughout.

 

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THE COMPLETE SYMPHONIES OF ADOLF HITLER & OTHER STRANGE STORIES by Reggie Oliver (Signed Trade Paperback) Import

A man buys a CD bearing the title The Complete Symphonies of Adolf Hitler and finds himself dogged by a mysterious stranger. . . . A nun in eighteenth-century France acquires an inconvenient gift of prophesy. . . . An amateur dramatics group turns out to be something far more sinister. . . . An aristocrat tries to exploit a haunted room at his country seat, but has the tables turned on him by a member of the royal family. . . .
The Complete Symphonies of Adolf Hitler is Reggie Oliver’s second collection of ‘strange stories’. It is now republished with new illustrations. Oliver’s characteristic wit, style, shrewd observation of humanity, and sense of place and time are all in evidence. He also has the simple gift of knowing how to tell a good story. As Glen Cavaliero says in his introduction ‘no one story is like another’, but they all point to the dark metaphysical currents that lurk beneath the surface of our daily lives.

Reggie Oliver is an English playwright, biographer and writer of ghost stories. His work has appeared in a number of anthologies, including the Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror and The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror.

The Complete Symphonies of Adolf Hitler & Other Strange Stories is a paperback of 338 + ix pages.

Reggie Oliver is an English playwright, biographer and writer of ghost stories. His work has appeared in a number of anthologies, including the Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror and The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror.

Contents:

• Introduction by Glen Cavaliero
• The Complete Symphonies of Adolf Hitler
• Lapland Nights
• The Garden of Strangers
• Among the Tombs
• The Skins
• The Sermons of Dr Hodnet
• Magus Zoroaster
• The Time of Blood
• Parma Violets
• Difficult People
• The Constant Rake
• The Blue Room
• A Nightmare Sang
• The Babe of the Abyss
• Bloody Bill
• A Christmas Card

Our copies come with the authors own signed bookplate tipped in. Book is in fine condition.

 

RUPETTA by Nike Sulway (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

Cover artwork by Timothy Parker Russell

Four hundred years ago, in a small town in rural France, a young woman creates the future in the shape of Rupetta. Part mechanical, part human, Rupetta’s consciousness is tied to the women who wind her. In the years that follow she is bought and sold, bor-rowed, forgotten and revered. By the twentieth century, the Rupettan four-fold law rules everyone’s lives, but Rupetta—the immortal being on whose existence and history those laws are based—is the keeper of a secret that will tear apart the world her followers have built in her name.
This stunning new novel by award-winning Australian writer Nike Sulway invokes the great tradition of European fantasy/horror fiction and moves it forward in a superbly imaginative, highly original fashion.

Rupetta is a sewn hardback of 352 pages, printed lithographically, with silk ribbon marker, head and tailbands, and d/w.

Our copies are signed by the author.

 

RUN FROM THE HUNTER by Charles Beaumont (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

It was a Festival for Death. In the midst of the hustle and bustle of Mardi Gras, murder lurked in masquerade, and a man — the wrong man — was being tracked like a tiger through every street and alley of the godforsaken town.

Written by Charles Beaumont and John Tomerlin in the mid-Fifties under the joint pseudonym of “Keith Grantland,” Run from the Hunter is a crime-suspense thriller.

Framed for the murder of Steffany Fontaine, the novel’s protagonist, Chris Adams is being taken to prison when he escapes, returns to the scene of the crime, and, while hunted by the police, searches for Steffany’s real killer. Every street and alley, however, will lead him to the place where the killers wait.

This hardcover edition, which features a new introduction by John Tomerlin, and new artwork by J.K. Potter, marks not only the novel’s first appearance since 1960, but also the first appearance of this important work under the byline of Beaumont and Tomerlin.

This book also includes the Beaumont-Tomerlin short story “Moon in Gemini,” which concerns a young expectant mother’s despairing journey into paranoia.

Limited to 200 copies

Each signed by John Tomerlin and J.K. Potter, with a facsimile signature by Charles Beaumont.
Full color wraparound dustjacket art by J.K. Potter.
Insightful introduction by John Tomerlin.
Bonus short story, “Moon in Gemini.”
Previous hardcover and paperback edition of Run from the Hunter, reprinted in color.
Ribbon marker, head and tail bands, sewn binding, and other extras.

 

THE INTRUDER by Charles Beaumont (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

 

Shortly after a 1954 U.S. Supreme Court ruling declared racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional, a stranger arrives in Caxton — a small southern town peacefully awaiting the integration of its all-white high school. Adam Cramer, a polite, threateningly smooth-talking young Northerner, has come to persuade this community to work against the new segregation laws. Within days, he stirs the white residents to violence in order to play his own personal power games. By the time he leaves town, mob action, riots, bombings, and attacks on integrationists had become commonplace, turning neighbor against neighbor, husband against wife, white against black.

But The Intruder is more than just the story of one man and the trouble he brings. It is a fascinating portrait of a southern town in the mid-1950s, an exciting novel dramatizing the problems of sociological change, civil rights, and, ultimately, the changing face of America.

This edition of The Intruder marks the novel’s first appearance since 1962, and features a new introduction by Beaumont biographer Roger Anker, who presents an insightful look into the history behind the novel and its subsequent film. Also included is a new, illustrated afterward by Beaumont associate William F. Nolan (co-author of Logan’s Run), who recalls his role in the film, in which he plays a small town bigot.

Limited to 200 copies

Each signed by editor Roger Anker, William F. Nolan, and cover artist J.K. Potter.
Comprehensive introduction by Roger Anker.
Insightful afterword by William F. Nolan, illustrated with Nolan’s own photographs.
Previous hardcover and paperback edition of The Intruder, reprinted in color.
Ribbon marker, head and tail bands, sewn binding, rounded back, and other extras.

 

25% off all in stock items!

Miskatonic Books Holiday Sale!

25% off all in stock items at Miskatonic Books. Many of our items are rare and we only have one in stock, items will go on a first come first serve basis.

You will need to use coupon code “DEC8” at checkout to receive your discount.

Advance order items and the Cthulhu Christmas Ornament are restricted from this sale.

 

New and interesting items:

The History of the Inquisitions Including the Secret Transactions of Those Horrific Tribunals by J. J. Stockdale (Hardcover 1810)

 

The History of the Inquisitions; Including the Secret Transactions of those Horrific Tribunals. London: Printed for J.J. Stockdale, 1810. Quarto, mid-20th century bound in half calf with marbled boards, ribbed spine, marbled endpapers and foredges.

First edition of Stockdale’s influential (and vehemently anti-Catholic) account of the Inquisition, with 12 engraved plates depicting its locations, activities and standards, handsomely bound by Weitz.

Publisher Stockdale issued this anti-Catholic history of the Inquisition—which he deems “the most tremendous and execrable tribunal that ever cursed ill-fated nations”—in response to contemporary controversy surrounding the royal prerogative of veto over appointments to Catholic bishoprics.

Some light foxing and tone due to age, shelf wear to the edges, gently bumped corners. Binding is tight and all pages are intact. Overall a great copy of this rare edition.

 

LEAVE YOUR SLEEP by R. B. Russell (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover) Import

One of only 100 signed and numbered hardcover copies.

If only we would take the time to look a little closer, delve a little deeeper, when ordinary life goes awry, we might find the world more strange and unexpected than we ever could have imagined…

 

Following on from Literary Remains, R.B. Russell’s previous collection for PS?Publishing, the twelve stories of Leave Your Sleep concern sex and death, love and loss. Russell allows his characters to disappear, slip into alternate realities, or re-write their own histories. They find they are able to do the most extraordinary things, even though they may not immediately realise it.?And who is in control of their actions, or those around them?

 

In ‘An Unconventional Exorcism’, why is a young woman who claims to talk to the dead so shocked when her aunt comes back to haunt her? In ‘The Red Rose and the Cross of Gold’, when an engineer in a crumbling city stumbles upon a messy murder, who cleans up afterwards? And in ‘Mathilde’, what do lovers do when everyone is against their relationship? These and other questions are explored in Russell’s beautifully evocative prose.

 

Contents:

• “An Unconventional Exorcism”
• “The Red Rose and the Cross of Gold”
• “Leave Your Sleep”
• “The Restaurant San Martín”
• “Another Perspective”
• “The Dress”
• “A Woman of the Party”
• “Mathilde”
• “A False Impression”
• “Gala Gladkov’s Exquisite Process”
• “Reunion”
• “The Beautiful Room”

 

WORLDS OF CTHULHU edited by Robert M. Price (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

One of only 100 signed and numbered copies in custom slipcase. These are signed by all contributors.
Book is in new condition in like slipcase.

Wolds of Cthulhu is a collection of new stories in a Lovecraftian vein. Editor R.M. Price has selected these sequels, “prequels” and interstitial tales, some of which are “Mythos” tales, and some not. Price introduces the book as a whole, as well as each story.

Stories include:

• “There Are Kings” by Richard Lupoff
• “Envy, the Gardens of Ynath, and the Sin of Cain” by Darrell Schweitze
• “The Arcade” by Will Murray
• “The Chaos Blade” by Adrian Cole
• “Evacuation Day” by Will Murray
• “The Statement of Frank Elwood,” by Pete Rawlik
• “The Testament of Alexander Fletcher” by K.M. Tonso
• “The Serpents of Tenoka,” by Ron Shiflet
• “The Journal of Thomas Gedney,” by Pete Rawlik
• “The Tower of Mormoroth” by Gary Myers
• “The Signal Tower” by Rafe McGregor.
• Dust jacket illustration by Gahan Wilson; endpaper illustrations by Tim Kirk.

 

 

THE CITADEL OF THE AUTARCH by Gene Wolfe (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

Advance order item 

In the fourth volume of The Book of the New Sun, Severian completes the tale of how he rose from an apprentice torturer to Autarch, ruler of the Commonwealth. After fighting in the war against the Ascians, he encounters the dying Autarch, who urges Severian to eat his brains and thereby gain his memories. Severian then returns to the Citadel and ascends to the throne, discovering the secret that may save Urth from destruction. Contains full color, full page illustrations. Each copy is signed by Gene Wolfe.

Limited to 100 copies, each signed by Gene Wolfe.
Gorgeous full-page, full-color artwork by German artist Alexander Preuss.
Slipcase, ribbon marker, head and tail bands, three-piece cloth construction.

This weeks, new, rare and interesting items!

We will be receiving our copies of THE DEAD VALLEY AND OTHERS: H. P. Lovecraft’s Favorite Horror Stories Volume 2 edited by S. T. Joshi (Signed Limited Hardcover)  on Monday and will begin packing and numbering them as soon as they arrive.

 

Limited to only 150 signed and numbered hardcover copies.  Each story is hand picked by Lovecraftian scholar S. T. Joshi, with introduction.

H. P. Lovecraft was a voracious reader of supernatural and fantastic fiction, and he was continually on the hunt for powerful and stimulating works in these genres. Many of the stories he read directly influenced his own writings

Here is the second volume in the very popular Lovecraft’s Favorite series.

Contents

• Introduction by S. T. Joshi
• The Diamond Lens by Fitz-James O’Brien
• The Horla by Guy de Maupassant
• The Moon Pool by A. Merritt
• Count Magnus by M. R. James
• The Damned Thing by Ambrose Bierce
• The Dead Valley by Ralph Adams Cram
• The Bad Lands by John Metcalfe
• Ooze by Anthony M. Rud
• Fishhead by Irvin S. Cobb
• The Harbor-Master by Robert W. Chambers
• Ancient Sorceries by Algernon Blackwood
• Cassius by Henry S. Whitehead
• The Spider by Hanns Heinz Ewers
• Blind Man’s Buff by H. Russell Wakefield

 

NIGHT AND THE CITY by Gerald Kersh (Limited Edition Hardcover)

 

 

Night and the City: One of the greatest noir novels ever published, Gerald Kersh’s stark and unrelenting Night and the City is as bleak an experience as you will ever encounter. The protagonist of the novel is the morally empty Harry Fabian, who is determined to become the top wrestling promoter in London. During the course of the novel Fabian is embroiled in various unscrupulous money-making ventures. All those around him are treated as a means to an end without exception. However, while his acts of pimping, blackmail and deception are successful, the proceeds of crime soon slip from his hands. The novel has a printed cloth front board with a design by Frank Chigas, an interior photograph by Jeff Hersch, and a lengthy biographical introduction by renowned editor Paul Duncan.

Limited to 200 copies.
Introduction by Paul Duncan.
Old hardcover editions and movie posters of Night and the City reprinted in color.
Ribbon marker, head and tail bands and printed cloth panel.

 

THE FANTASTIC ART OF FRANK FRAZETTA by Frank Frazetta (Oversized Art Book)

1st printing. Introduction by Betty Ballantine. Featuring images and scenes from the mind of the master of sci/fi, horror, and fantasy illustration – Frank Frazetta. Includes Conan, Death Dealer, Dracula, and more. Hardcover, 9 1/2-in. x 10 1/2-in., 96 pages

Book is in near fine condition with a tiny bump to the back top corner else fine. The Dust Jacket is in near fine condition with some light rubbing else fine.

 

THE NECROMANTIC GRIMOIRE OF AUGUSTUS RUPP (Hardcover Limited Edition)

THE NECROMANTIC GRIMOIRE OF AUGUSTUS RUPP is the complete text of the transliteration and translation by Carter Stockdale. This edition also has prefatory notes by Anthony Raven and published by Bob Lyn.

This is a limited edition of 500 copies this being 110. This edition has the original owner who purchased directly from the publisher’s name written on the signature page which was done with all copies shipped directly from the publisher.

Book is in near fine condition with no noticeable defect other than some slight toning due to age.

 

INTRUSIONS by Robert Aickman with Introduction by Reggie Oliver (Limited Edition Hardcover) Import

In his Introduction to this new edition of Intrusions, Reggie Oliver writes that Robert Aickman (1914-1981) ‘was one of the most original and interesting short story writers of the late twentieth century . . . I wonder if the adjective “inconclusive”, so often applied to Aickman, is quite the mot juste. His stories all have a beginning, a middle and an end. They conclude, but the conclusion is not absolute: puzzles remain. How like life! Aickman is both a realist and a surrealist: or, to put it another way, his surrealism is real.’
Intrusions is the last collection of Aickman’s tales to be published in his lifetime. It includes: ‘Hand in Glove’, ‘No Time Is Passing’, ‘The Fetch’, ‘The Breakthrough’, ‘The Next Glade’, ‘Letters to the Postman’.

Intrusions is a sewn hardback of 278+ xi pages, printed lithographically, with silk ribbon marker, head and tailbands, and d/w.

Limited to 350 copies.

 

THE 2012 LIMITED EDITION CTHULHU CHRISTMAS ORNAMENT by Alex McVey (Signed Limited Edition Resin Sculpture)

What can no H. P. Lovecraft fan be without during the holiday season?  A 2012 limited edition Cthulhu Christmas Ornament!

Miskatonic Books has commissioned renowned artist Alex McVey to create a unique, signed, limited edition Christmas ornament specially designed for the H. P. Lovecraft enthusiast.

This ornament is limited to only 250 signed and numbered sculptures. Each ornament is hand-cast, hand painted, and hand numbered by the artist. Each year we will be creating a new holiday sculpture and those purchasing this years ornament will have first chance at getting matching numbers on next years Lovecraft Christmas ornament.

• Limited edition resin sculpture ornament of only 250
• Hand-cast
• Hand painted
• Signed by the artist
• Comes with golden tie string.
• Approximately 4 inches tall and nearly an inch thick.

For a more detailed picture click on the “image” tab above.

Please allow 10 to 14 days for delivery as each of these are handmade to order.

 

THE WEIRD TALES STORY edited by Robert Weinberg (First Edition Hardcover)

Book is in near fine condition with some light shelf wear else fine. Dust Jacket is in near fine condition with some rubbing and some very small light creases to corners and edges else fine.

134 Pages. Blue cloth with silver spine lettering. Endpapeer art by Nino and Jundis. Here for the first time, is a history of the magazine, from its first struggling days; the first Anniversary issue which was almost its last; the glory days of Howard, Smith, and Lovecraft; the last years when competition was finally making its mark. Here are biographies of Edwin Baird, the first editor of weird Tales and Farnsworth Wright, the man who almost single-handedly made the magazine successful. Included is E. Hoffmann Price’s famous biographical sketch of wright, a fitting tribute to the greatest all fantasy magazine editors. There is a huge chapter, itself the size of a small book, on the great stories published in Weird Tales, from the first issue on. Included in this section are dozens of biographical sketches of famous Weird Tales authors from the famous to the forgotten. Lovecraft is included, but so are Anthony Rud, Nictzin Dyalhis, and many many others. Also in this giant volume are personal recollections by many of the greats who wrote for Weird Tales, including Frank Belknap Long, Edmond Hamilton, Wallace West, Robert E. Howard, Robert Barbour Johnson, H. Warner Munn, Robert Block and more! Margaret Brundage, whose name stands for Weird Tales cover excellence, is interviewed, for the first time, in depth. Here, as never before, is the complete story of her years with Weird Tales. There is much, much more including nearly 200 reproductions of covers, interior artwork, and photos of contributors. The interior is futher enhanced with the brilliant artwork of fantasy art’s star, Alex Nino. This book has been designed for a collector and no effort has been spared to make it one that will be cherished for years to come. Contents in Eleven Chapters: Publishing History, Farnsworth Wright, Why Weird Tales, The Stories, Recollections of Weird Tales, Cover Art, Interior Art, Beginnings and Ends, Out of the Eyrie, Competition, and A Brief Resurrection.

New, Rare and Notable

In stock and shipping:

HIS NAME WAS DEATH by Fredric Brown (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

This is an advanced order.

Any lucky amateur can do away with family. But it takes a professional to kill an almost perfect stranger. Fiendishly convoluted, His Name Was Death is a tale of geometrically multiplying homicides and a foolproof murder whose repercussions keep spreading to consume victim after victim.
Wickedly funny, His Name Was Death is widely considered to be one of Fredric Brown’s best suspense novels. This edition features a new introduction by Ed Gorman, a color cover by Gwabryel, and is signed by Gorman and Gwabryel.
Full color dustjacket on Mohawk Carnival Felt with black Brillianta cloth, ribbon marker, and a return of our full color illustration inlay on the front board. Each signature page has a drawing by Gwabryel.

Limited to 200 copies, each signed by Ed Gorman and illustrator Gwabryel.
Introduction by Ed Gorman.
Includes two bonus short stories.
Gwabryel has drawn a remarque on each of the signature pages.
Ribbon marker, color dustjacket, head and tail bands, rayon cloth construction and a full-color image inlay on the front board

 

The Dreams of Cardinal Vittorini and Other Strange Stories by Reggie Oliver (Signed Trade Paperback)

Variety and originality of setting, strength of characterisation, stylistic elegance and narrative power are qualities for which Reggie Oliver has become well-known in his five volumes of ‘strange stories’. All are present in this groundbreaking debut volume, first published in 2003. It was a nominee for best collection of 2003 in the International Horror Guild Awards.
A doomed relationship in a seaside town that persists after death. . . . A convent in which there is always the unacknowledged presence of an extra nun. . . . A balding actor who acquires a mysterious wig after his rival goes missing. . . . A brilliant inventor who becomes trapped inside his own sinister computer game. . . . A sixteenth-century cardinal who is tormented by dreams of the sect he has persecuted.

Reggie Oliver is an English playwright, biographer and writer of ghost stories. His work has appeared in a number of anthologies, including the Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror and The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror.
The Dreams of Cardinal Vittorini and Other Strange Stories contains: “Author’s Note”, “Beside the Shrill Sea”, “Feng Shui”, “In Arcadia”, “Evil Eye”, “Miss Marchant’s Cause”, “Tiger in the Snow”, “Garden Gods”, “The Black Cathedral” ,”The Boy in Green Velvet”, “The Golden Basilica”, “Death Mask”, “The Seventeenth Sister”, “The Copper Wig”, “The Dreams of Cardinal Vittorini”.

The Dreams of Cardinal Vittorini and Other Strange Stories is a paperback of 333 pages, printed lithographically.

 

Some Edward Lee Rarities!

MASKS by Edward Lee and Jack Ketchum (Signed Deluxe Lettered Edition)

A beautiful and very rare copy of the Lettered Edition of MASKS by Edward Lee and Jack Ketchum.

This is a very rare “PC” copy of the hardcover lettered edition of MASKS. This edition is also inscribed on the title page by Jack Ketchum and signed “Dallas” his real name rather than his pseudonym Jack Ketchum. This edition is also signed by Edward Lee, and illustrator Erik Wilson.

Book is in fine unread condition.

OF PIGS & SPIDERS by Edward Lee, John Pelan, David Niall Wilson, Brett Savory (Signed Deluxe Lettered Edition)

One of only 52 signed lettered edition hardcover copies. This is letter “II” of 52. This copy is signed by all contributors. Book is in fine unread condition.

For Mature Audiences Only. These two tales take an untraditional look at cute and cuddly barnyard animals. Wilson and Savory’s “That’s Some Pig” combines a dysfunctional family, stuffed animals, disembowelment and green jello. Lee and Pelan’s “Charlie’s Web” poignantly deals with Chaldean sorcery, alternative sex practices, and a plumber’s nightmare in a white trash hell. Not for the squeamish. Barf bag not included.

 

KILL THE ENEMY and BOMB by Edward Lee (2 volume slipcased hardcover edition)

Hardcover set consists of two separate chapbooks, “Bomb” and “Kill the Enemy”, with the extra story “Driving”, housed in a custom slipcase and limited to 75 copies.

Both books are numbered 15 of 75 and are housed in a custom slipcase.

Bomb -and- Kill the Enemy by Edward Lee
Cover Art by Glenn Chadbourne

The next chapbooks in our chapbook line…..
The first, “Bomb” is Ed Lee’s first, last and only Love Story!
The second chapbook, “Kill the Enemy”, a wonderful never-before-published story about the horrors of war. The second chapbook also includes an extra story only available in the hardcover edition entitled “Driving”

 

In Short Supply and Two New Awesome Preorders

We are down to our last three copies of MEDUSA’S COIL AND OTHERS Volume II by H. P. Lovecraft edited by S. T. Joshi (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

Some of H. P. Lovecraft’s most fascinating work came from a time in his life that he was forced, by economic survival, to ghostwrite, collaborate and revise the work of others in the field. Here Lovecraft Scholar S. T. Joshi collects the best of these revisions and collaborations in a two volume set to be published this year from Arcane Wisdom Press. Medusa’s Coil and Others is the second of these two volumes. This edition is painstakingly annotated, and includes an introduction and bibliography by S. T. Joshi. The book is a must for the Lovecraft enthusiast and scholar alike. This limited edition hardcover will be strictly limited to only 150 hardcover copies. They will be signed by Lovecraftian scholar S. T. Joshi and will be hand numbered on a custom signature sheet, featuring artwork by Zach McCain.

 

Only one left in stock! THE GOLEM by Gustav Meyrink (Signed Limited Edition)

In the 1970s, the German psychedelic artist Helmut Wenske completed a cycle of twelve paintings based on Gustav Meyrink’s mystical classic, The Golem. For the first time these paintings are being published with the novel that served as their inspiration. Critic John Clute has written an introduction to the book, which uses Madge Pemberton’s hallucinogenic translation. Includes a photograph of Meyrink and other extras, including a bonus story.
In an oversize 8—12 format with printed silk panels on both the front and rear boards, head and tail bands, ribbon marker, and a two-color cloth slipcase. Each book is signed by John Clute and Helmut Wenske. Limited to 200 copies

•     Limited to 200 copies, each signed by John Clute and Helmut Wenske.
•     Introduction by John Clute.
•     Full color artwork.
•     Film stills and movie poster artwork.
•     Two bonus short stories.
•     Ribbon marker, head and tail bands, three-piece cloth construction.

 

Coming Soon, reserve your copies now.

 

TALES OF LOVE AND DEATH by Robert Aickman (Limited Edition) Import

Robert Aickman (1914-1981) is considered by many to be one of the finest exponents of the modern ghost story. Aickman himself referred to his tales as ‘strange stories’, for they are often open to more complex interpretations. His writing is subtle and poetic, presenting us with psychological and more material terrors.Tales of Love and Death (first published in 1977) is a collection of seven mature tales by this craftsman of the uncanny.

“Along with Walter de la Mare, Elizabeth Bowen and a few others, Robert Aickman belongs to the Chekhov school of the weird tale. Such writers recognise that stories don’t require pat endings. They don’t need to close with the snap of an O. Henry trapdoor, or the ironic twist of a Maupassant. A short story can actually convey a more haunting depiction of the human predicament by avoiding any kind of artificial conclusiveness. Life is messy, not neat; most problems are never clearly resolved, but only lived with; people act unreasonably for no apparent reason.” Michael Dirda, from the Introduction to Tales of Love and Death.

Contents: ‘Growing Boys’, ‘Marriage’, ‘Le Miroir’, ‘Compulsory Games’, ‘Raising the Wind’, ‘Residents Only’ and ‘Wood’.

Tales of Love and Death is a sewn hardback of 243+ xiii pages, printed lithographically, with silk ribbon marker, head and tailbands, and d/w.

Publication 28th May 2012
Cover artwork by Stephen J Clark of The Singing Garden.
ISBN 978-1-905784-45-5
Limited to 350 copies.

HANNES BOK: A Life In Illustrations (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

With over 450 pages, and a large, 8 × 12 size, this collection covers the entire artistic career of Hannes Bok. Painstakingly edited by Joseph Wrzos, with essays and memoirs on Bok by Ray Bradbury, Stephen Fabian, and many others, this book features over 600 illustrations. Many come from the pulps and pulp covers. Our color section features all of Bok’s known dustjackets and the largest collection of Bok paintings ever published, including many works that have never before been printed. Key works also feature detail views. Printed on heavy paper, with printed cloth panels, ribbon markers, and a printed cloth slipcase, the edition is limited to 200 copies for sale and is signed by most contributors. The book is printed using stochastic screening with five inks, resulting in unparalleled clarity and color reproduction.
This page is for the signed and slipcased edition, which is limited to just 200 copies for sale, and which will be shipping in August 2012. It is signed by Joseph Wrzos, Stephen Fabian, Bob Eggleton, Jill Bauman, Jason Eckhardt and Stephen Hickman. There are also signatures by Ray Bradbury and Hannes Bok, but these are facsimile, or printed, signatures. It is nice to have a Bok signature, and you will understand that due to his age and health, Mr Bradbury was just not able to sign and we felt it rude to even ask.

 

MEDUSA’S COIL Shipping Update and More

MEDUSA’S COIL AND OTHERS Volume II by  H. P. Lovecraft edited by S. T. Joshi (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

 

We have received the tracking number from the printer and we should be receiving MEDUSA’S COIL and Others on the 11th of April. We will begin shipping them out as soon as they arrive.

ONLY 5 COPIES LEFT!!!

Some of H. P. Lovecraft’s most fascinating work came from a time in his life that he was forced, by economic survival, to ghostwrite, collaborate and revise the work of others in the field. Here Lovecraft Scholar S. T. Joshi collects the best of these revisions and collaborations in a two volume set to be published this year from Arcane Wisdom Press. Medusa’s Coil and Others is the second of these two volumes. This edition is painstakingly annotated, and includes an introduction and bibliography by S. T. Joshi. The book is a must for the Lovecraft enthusiast and scholar alike. This limited edition hardcover will be strictly limited to only 150 hardcover copies. They will be signed by Lovecraftian scholar S. T. Joshi and will be hand numbered on a custom signature sheet, featuring artwork by Zach McCain. We expect to be shipping these in late January reserve your copy now of this unique collection.

 

Coming soon from TARTARUS PRESS is THE KING IN THE GOLDEN MASK and Other Stories by Marcel Schwab (Limited Edition Hardcover) Import

We are expecting these in late April early May.

The peculiar genius of Monsieur Schwob lies in a species of tremendously complex simplicity; that is to say that, by the arrangement and the harmony of an infinity of telling and precise details, his stories present the sensation of a unique detail.’
Rémy de Gourmont,
Le deuxième Livre des Masques
Revered in the French-speaking world, Marcel Schwob (1867-1905) deserves to be much better known among English-speaking aficionados of Decadent fiction. This new collection of fifty-one stories, including eight newly-translated pieces, aims to address that discrepancy. It brings back into print Iain White’s poetic translations of Schwob’s better-known tales, such as the title story ‘The King in the Golden Mask’, and adds newly-translated gems such as the astonishingly beautiful and haunting ‘The Wooden Star’.

Schwob was a one-off, but he was greatly influenced by English and American writers. He discovered Edgar Allan Poe whilst still a child, and he translated Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Dynamiter into French. He crammed a great variety of literary endeavour into his all-too-short life, and was much admired by contemporaries such as Paul Valéry and Guillaume Apollinaire.

The King in the Golden Mask contains:

Translator’s introduction
Acknowledgements
From Cœur double: ‘The Strigae’, ‘The Sabot’, ‘Train 081′, ‘Arachné’, ‘The Veiled Man’, ‘Beatrice’, ‘Lilith’, ‘A Skeleton’, ‘The Fat Man’, ‘The Dom’, ‘The Amber-trader’, ‘Mérigot Marchès’, ‘The “Papier Rouge” ‘, ‘The Firebrands’.
From Le Roi au masque d’or: ‘The King in the Golden Mask’, ‘The Death of Odjigh’, ‘The Embalming-women’, ‘The Plague’, ‘The Milesian Virgins’, ‘The Sabbat at Mofflaines’, ‘Blanche the Bloody’, ‘The Flute’, ‘The Sleeping City’.
From Vies imaginaires: ‘Introduction’, ‘Empedocles, Reputed God’, ‘Herostratos, Incendiary’, ‘Crates, Cynic’, ‘Septima, Enchantress’, ‘Lucretius, Poet’, ‘Clodia, Shameless Matron’, ‘Petronius, Novelist’, ‘Sufrah, Geomancer’, ‘Frate Dolcino, Heretic’, ‘Cecco Angiolieri, Malevolent Poet’, ‘Paolo Uccello, Painter’, ‘Nicholas Oyseleur, Judge’, ‘Katherine la Dentellière, Whore’, ‘Alain le Gentil, Soldier’, ‘Gabriel Spenser, Actor’, ‘Cyril Tourneur, Tragic Poet’, ‘Major Stede Bonnet, Pirate by Vagary’, ‘Burke and Hare, Murderers’.
La croisade des enfants: ‘The Goliard’s Narrative’, ‘The Leper’s Narrative’, ‘The Narrative of Pope Innocent III’, ‘Narrative of Three Little Children’, ‘Narrative of François Longuejoue, Clerk’, ‘The Kalandar’s Narrative’, ‘Little Allys’ Narrative’, ‘The Narrative of Pope Gregory IX’.
‘The Wooden Star’

Cover illustration by Santiago Caruso

CTHULHU CULT: A Novel of Obsession by Rick Dakan (#1 in the Modern Mythos Library)

Down to only a handful of copies left!!

This is #1 in our new Modern Mythos Series. Each title is hand picked and edited by Lovecrafian Scholar S. T. Joshi and award winning publisher Larry L. Roberts. These titles will be the best modern fiction in the Lovecraftian Mythos and will undoubtedly become one of the most collected series in the genre.

Synopsis:

Having fled town under a cloud of salacious scandal, Shelby Tyree has returned, a mysterious woman at his side and a strange new devotion to horror writer H.P. Lovecraft in his head. His childhood friends Rick and Conrad scarcely recognize Shelby, who has been transformed from a rakish dilettante into a zealous guru devoted to his own pseudo-religion. They take it upon themselves to discover what Shelby is really up to. Why has he founded his own church, devoted to a presumably fictional demonic alien? Is it possible Shelby’s lost his grip on reality or is somehow under the spell of this mysterious woman? Or is it possible that Shelby has uncovered some secret truths that man was not meant to know? “The Cthulhu Cult is a brilliant and scintillating novel of Lovecraftian terror. It grips the reader from the first page and develops a tremendous cumulative power.

Anyone who has the least interest in H. P. Lovecraft’s work will find The Cthulhu Cult a must-read.” –S. T. Joshi

One of only 150 signed and numbered hardcover copies.

BLACK HORSE AND OTHER STRANGE STORIES by Jason A Wyckoff (Limited Edition Hardcover)

Just announce from Tartarus Press, BLACK HORSE AND OTHER STRANGE STORIES by Jason A Wyckoff (Limited Edition Hardcover) Import

This new collection of sixteen tales uncovers the strangeness within everyday America, the fable in the familiar. ‘The Highwall Horror’ sees an office worker discover the portal to an alien cathedral in a cubicle wall; in ‘Panorama’ an artist’s agent examines his client’s deserted masterpiece; a young man follows a forgotten song to the haunted town that spawned it in ‘The Bells, Then the Birds’; a young mother escapes her wastrel husband only to become lost in a perilous swell of freedom in ‘The Mauve Blot’; and in ‘Black Horse’ an inherited steed brings uneasiness and worse to its new owner.

Black Horse and Other Strange Stories is Jason A. Wyckoff’s first venture into print. He explores the surreal and supernatural in an original, authentic, and always insightful new voice. Wyckoff was born in Columbus, Ohio, USA, where he still lives with his wife and their pets. He was awarded a Bachelor of Music Composition degree from The Ohio State University and then played indie-rock in dive bars for a decade or so.

You can reserve your copy by clicking on the cover art above or you can look at all our Tartarus Press titles in stock by clicking here:

We Are for the Dark by Robert Aickman & Elizabeth Jane Howard

New title announced by Tartarus Press.

Synopsis:

We Are for the Dark is a remarkable collection, and one that can be said to have kick-started the ‘Aickmanesque’ short story. Credit for the genesis of this sub-genre of the ghost story should be given jointly to Robert Aickman and his collaborator in We Are for the Dark, Elizabeth Jane Howard. Contributing three tales each, the authors were not identified with their own stories when the book was first published in 1951.

We Are for the Dark contains six stories: ‘The Trains’, ‘The View’ and ‘The Insuffi-cient Answer’ are by Robert Aickman, while ‘Three Miles Up’, ‘Left Luggage’ and ‘Perfect Love’ are by Elizabeth Jane Howard.

R.B. Russell’s new Introduction is based on his interview with the surviving author, Elizabeth Jane Howard.
We Are for the Dark is a sewn hardback of 258+xii pages, printed lithographically, with head and tailbands, and d/w.
Limited to 350 copies.

Thomas Ligotti and Reggie Oliver Almost Sold Out and a New Titles Announced by Tartarus Press

We wanted to bring your attention to two important titles that are already sold out at the publisher and we are down to only a couple copies remaining.  If you haven’t reserved your copies do so soon.  You can always use the “bill me” at check out on all advance orders so you don’t have to pay until the book is read to ship, each order gets 5% back in points and only $5 shipping no matter what size the order.

THE AGONIZING RESURRECTION OF VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN by Thomas Ligotti limited edition hardcover.

This new edition of Thomas Ligotti’s brilliant vignettes is a cause for celebration. Not only has the text been substantially revised by Thomas Ligotti, but artist Harry O. Morris has created eleven new artworks for the book. The text is gorgeously set and designed. Each copy is signed by Thomas Ligotti and Harry O. Morris.
The book also has a new introduction by Ligotti. It comes bound in printed cloth with a back panel velvet cloth, two ribbon markers, and is housed in a handsome slipcase.
The edition is limited to 500 copies for sale.

• Limited to 500 copies, each signed by Thomas Ligotti and Harry O. Morris.
• New introduction by Thomas Ligotti.
• Substantially revised texts.
• New artwork, all printed in full color.
• Ribbon marker, head and tail bands, three-piece cloth construction.
• Two-color cloth slipcase.

 

MRS MIDNIGHT AND OTHER STORIES by Reggie Oliver (Limited Edition Hardcover)

A TV reality show host helps to restore an East End music hall and uncovers the dreadful secret of Mrs Midnight and her Animal Comedians. . . . A historian travels to Switzerland to ghost the autobiography of an exiled Balkan king and encounters a sinister cult. . . . The Master of an Oxford college tries to introduce a dubious piece of modern sculpture into his college chapel with dire consequences. . . . A strange meeting takes place on a playing field between an officer on leave from the trenches and his former headmaster. . . .
The settings and characters in Reggie Oliver’s fifth collection of ‘strange’ stories are as varied and unusual as ever, though, as in previous volumes, the theatre forms the milieu of a number of his tales. But the theatres are not just English ones, in the provinces and the West End: one is on the Black Sea; another in post-colonial Kenya. Themes are equally varied, but underlying all is a deep sense of the spiritual under-currents just below the surface of everyday existence, and the precariousness of ‘normality’.
‘…by miles, the best living exponent of the spooky yarn,’ Barry Humphries.

Reggie Oliver is an English playwright, biographer and writer of ghost stories. His work has appeared in a number of anthologies, including the Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror and The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror.

Mrs Midnight and Other Stories contains:

• “Mrs Midnight”
• “Countess Otho”
• “Meeting with Mike”
• “The Dancer in the Dark”
• “Mr Pigsny”
• “The Brighton Redemption”
• “You Have Nothing to Fear”
• “The Philosophy of the Damned”
• “The Mortlake Manuscript”
• “The Look”
• “The Giacometti Crucifixion”
• “A Piece of Elsewhere”
• “Minos or Rhadamanthus”

Mrs Midnight and Other Stories is a sewn hardback of 381 pages, printed lithographically, with head and tailbands, and d/w.
Limited to 400 copies.

 

Newly announced from Tartarus Press CLARIMONDE AND OTHER STORIES by Theophile Gautier (Limited Edition Hardcover)

If you appreciate supernatural French Decadence, then you need look no further than Clarimonde and Other Stories by Théophile Gautier. A pioneer of the genre, Gautier (1811-1872) garnered his initial enthusiasm for supernatural literature from the stories of E.TA. Hoffman, adding an erotic effusiveness all his own. Gautier’s trail-blazing manifesto for Romanticism was taken up by numerous other writers, most notably by Charles Baudelaire, who in 1857 dedicated Les Fleurs du mal to him.

The twelve stories in this volume repre-sent the best of Gautier’s fantastic tales and deal with a wide range of supernatural phenomena, including identity exchange (in ‘Avatar’), vampirism, time travel, the evil eye, and the decadence of ancient Egypt (in ‘One of Cleopatra’s Nights’). Most of the translations are by the Irish-American writer Lafcadio Hearn, and retain the ardent extravagance of Gautier’s original French style.

As Brian Stableford says in his new Introduction, ‘Gautier remains . . . a key writer in the evolution of fantastic fiction from its Gothic roots to its psychological sophistication, whose importance in the middle part of the nineteenth century . . . deserves to be ranked second [only to Poe].’

Clarimonde and Other Stories contains:

• ‘Introduction’ by Brian Stableford,
• ‘Onuphrius’
• ‘Two Actors for One Part’
• ‘Omphale’, ‘Clarimonde’
• ‘One of Cleopatra’s Nights’
• ‘The Opium Pipe’
• ‘The Duplicated Knight’
• ,‘The Mummy’s Foot’
• ‘King Candaules’
• ‘Arria Marcella’
• ‘Jettatura’
• ‘Avatar’, and various addenda.

Clarimonde and Other Stories is a sewn hardback of 366+xiii pages, printed lithographically, with head and tailbands, and d/w.
Limited to 300 copies.
Publication 21st October 2011