Review:Ghost Stories

The Ghost Stories of Edith Wharton
304 pages

If you've been reading me for any length of time you already know what a huge fan of Edith Wharton I am. I find her writing to be so easy to rest in. What I mean is that I get so caught up in the story that I forget that I'm actually reading a book. It's not the vividness of the descriptions, though the descriptions are plentiful. It's something clear and unnoticeable about the writing that I find hard to describe. Her ghost stories are not all wonderful and not all in such a flowing and descriptive manner but they are all Wharton's own.

You can Google Wharton or Short Story Sunday to see some of the stories that I reviewed here. But the last few stories didn't get a place of their own; and I'm not likely to get around to them now that the book has been returned to the library. But I did want to tell a little bit about my favorite story.

Miss Mary Pask was a ghost story with a somewhat humorous twist. The protagonist visits the sister of a friend, then remembers that the sister had died. He ends up having a surreal conversation with Miss Pask where she makes comments such as, "I'm so lonely. No one ever visits me since I died." But that's not the twist. I highly recommend you read it for yourself.

Finishing this book marked the end of my RIP II Challenge books. I didn't finish on time but I did finish. Thank you, thank you Carl for all your encouragement and imagination, generosity and passion. It was a lot of fun.

I also get to count this as the second book completed for the Reading the Author Challenge. That's two birds with one stone. Yay for me!

Review:The Legend of Sleepy Hollow

The Legend of Sleep Hollow
By Washington Irving

Who doesn't remember watching the Disney cartoon version of this tale? It was great because of the ultra dorky Ichabod Crane and it's frightening image of The Headless Horseman at the end. It is another one of those cultural classics that everyone knows about but no one seems to have read. And like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, it is so short that there is really no excuse to have not read it.

It is the story of Ichabod Crane. The name just about says it all. He is the extremely tall and slender, red haired and freckled(hey, what's wrong with that?) school teacher to the country bumpkins of Sleepy Hollow, a town that is just a bit more superstitious than your average podunk town. As he is leaving a party "at the witching hour" he encounters the town's most legendary ghost, the Headless Horseman. Is it real or not?

When I first started reading this 45 page story I loved all the descriptions of the county and the people but it soon became much too tedious. Irving is one of those writers who uses twice as many words as are necessary to tell a good tale. What a phenomenal vocabulary! It gives one an extremely clear picture but in the process I lost interest in looking around. But it's only 45 pages, and I knew there was a good part at the end so I stuck with it and was rewarded. It is not a story to make the reader's heart pound but to make him smile at Crain's reactions. There is quite a bit of comical imagery not to be missed. And when all is said and done you can say you've read the story for yourself.

I have seen the Johnny Depp movie but it's been so long ago now that I remember very little except that it was corny and pretty stupid to boot. It was a completely different story from the one Washington Irving tells.

This is the story that I chose to replace Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell on my RIP II Challenge list. There is a significant difference between 830 pages and 45, but that was precisely the point. I want to complete the challenge while being reasonable in my expectations for myself. Besides, I already spent 2 weeks with that I could have read several other acceptable books for this challenge. Now I can concentrate on finishing the two short story collections I'm into before Halloween. I'm not breaking any rules. Carl said I could.

Short Story Sunday

Kerfol

by Edith Wharton

Kerfol is the name of an estate(a castle to be exact) that our nameless protagonist is looking to buy. On a visit to check it out he is greeted by an handful of dogs. They don't bark; they just watch. Upon returning to the village we are told the story of the mystery of the dogs on the estate. We are told about a young, lonely woman married only 3 years and of her overprotective and ultimately cruel husband and how he lashes out when the maiden makes friends with a neighbor. Then we hear of the apparent murder of her husband and her defense in court. It has everything to do with the dogs.

Unhappy women contemplating an affair or entertaining inappropriate male company and the disaster that follows is a common theme is Wharton's stories. Was she trying to convince society or herself? And some innocent coming along to protect the afore mentioned women is also common. Her women are never confirmed to have committed any sins but the husbands are always portrayed as deserving of their fate. Wharton's pain comes through in her tales. I wonder what her husband thought?

The Triumph of Night

by Edith Wharton

Mr. Faxon, a personal secretary traveling to his position, is forgotten at the train station on a snowy winter's night but is given shelter by the young Mr. Frank Rainer, a man threatened by a severe case of tuberculosis. Mr. Rainer is the ward of one of the richest men in the area. But as Faxon watches the interactions between Rainer and his uncle he is disturbed with the vision of a ghost that looks exactly like the uncle but the uncle's usual benevolent face is replaced on the ghost with one of the darkest hatred. When Faxon flees in the night he is followed by disaster.

I really enjoyed this story. First of all, there were no unfaithful wives and abusive husbands. Secondly, it was well-written and well presented to hold on to its mystery to the end. It was long enough to be engaging but easy to get through in a sitting. And no confusing endings.

Short Story Sunday

I got my three selections from the Dover Thrift Editions Great Ghost Stories collection. Not all of them are scary but they do all contain ghosts.

The Phantom Coach
by Amelia Edwards
James Murray loses his way in the middle of a storm and takes shelter is the house of a recluse who hasn't seen a visitor in 4 years. After a long conversation about science and the skepticism of man Murray heads back out into the snow to catch a ride home to his new bride in the mail coach. What he gets is more than he bargained for.

This tale wasn't really scary but it was predictable. Well, first it was slow, then it was a little misleading but then it was easy to figure out what was going on. Not a bad story but not a great one either.

The Judge's House
by Bram Stoker
A young student rents a rundown "haunted" house to study in peace. The last occupant was a ruthless judge who kept the hangman's noose as the rope of an alarm bell in his sitting room. As the young man talks with the neighbors about the rats in the walls and the midnight visit from one particularly large rat, they believe him to be studying a little too hard. But can they save him?

This one was the scariest of the 3 tales I read today. All the rat can really gross a person out. And the twist with the picture was unexpected. While I didn't really care for Dracula(sorry, I thought it seemed a bit too corny), there is no denying that Stoker is a fantastic writer. This one's worth a read.

Bone to His Bone
by E.G. Swain
Mr. Batchel lives at the vicarage that the late William Whitehead left his beloved book collection to. He loves the book collection "as a father loves his children." One midnight Mr. Batchel makes a startling discovery in the old library.

The supernatural tendencies of this story contain no malice like the ones in the Stoker tale. The writing is clear and the story is not bad but not really scary either.

Short Story Sunday on Monday (again)

Where Their Fire is not Quenched
by May Sinclair

Eva's review had me reading this story. I once held the fear that hell would be to put me back into the worst situation in my life and then to replay it for eternity. Now I know it was not an original idea. Ms. Sinclair puts an interesting spin on the unquenchable fires of hell. In this short story we quickly follow the disappointing love life of Harriet Leigh til her death where the story continues to explain her afterlife experience. And what a chilling thought it is.

I had not heard of May Sinclair before but according to Wikipedia she was a popular and prolific writer. She coined the phrase "stream-of-consciousness writing" in regards to Dorothy Richardson who preferred to think of the technique as interior monologues. I like that phrase better myself.

Afterward
by Edith Wharton

"Oh, there is one, of course, but you'll never know it." This is the opening line in regards to the ghost who inhabits an old house that Mary and Ned Boyne will be buying. They are told that the ghost is not discovered to be a ghost til some time afterward. And that is the case in this story. There is a playful guessing about who the ghost is but once all the facts are known it is without a doubt.

I always find it amusing when a short story has chapter breaks. That tells you it is a longer short story. This one is about 40 pages in length. This allows dimension instead of just simple two-dimensional storytelling. And finally, a Wharton tale that doesn't leave you confused at the end. It is all clearly laid out.

Short Story Sunday

The Yellow Wall Paper
by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

A woman suffering from "temporary nervous depression" is moved into an old, long unoccupied manor house by her physician husband "to get plenty of air." She spends all her days in the top floor nursery that is covered in a horrendous yellow wall paper. Slowly but surely the wall paper drives her insane and the reader comes along for the ride as we read her secret diary.

I was intrigued by Eva's review of this short story two weeks ago. I totally agree with her that it was fascinating and creepy. I loved that a disease that was originally thought to be all in her head becomes more "all in her head" the more her husband insists that she's improving. And the final diary entry is the icing on the cake. Highly recommend!

The Striding Place
by Gertrude Atherton

A man wonders in his woods contemplating the strange disappearance of his closest friend just a few days before. As he comes to a "Strid" in a stream, a narrow passage between precipitous rocks or banks, which looks as if it might be crossed at a stride but is often dangerous, he makes an anxious discovery.

This story is apparently known for it's final sentence. I hadn't heard of it before, nor had I heard of it's author. I found the story a bit disjointed; certainly not the smooth reading that The Yellow Wall Paper was. But the last sentence was what makes it a spooky tale. I was left stunned.

Review:Phantom of the Opera

The Phantom of the Opera
by Gaston Leroux
322 pages
First Sentence:

The Opera ghost really existed.

I wish I could have found a bigger picture of that cover because as I was reading The Eyes that cover haunted me. And the picture is on the spine and the back too so I couldn't just turn it over, I had to cover it up completely.

I don't remember where I got the book from but after loving the recent movie and listening frequently to the soundtrack I was extremely curious about the book. It was not disappointing though it was different in so many ways.

First of all this novel is written as an investigation giving the facts and private information from those who came in contact with the Opera Ghost. The bulk of the book is the pieced together story as it unfolds but every so often the investigator interjects to explain that some bit of info. is unknown and maybe to speculate about what could have happened. The focus is on the sudden disappearance of Christine Daae specifically and the life of the Opera Ghost is general. One thing is for sure, the Phantom does not cut as romantic a figure as Gerard Butler. He is unconscionable.

Remembering my disturbed emotions from a few days ago I was rolling my eyes and moaning as I read one scene in particular, where Raoul de Chagny thinks he sees eyes staring at him in his dark room. Talk about synergism!

I really liked this book. The suspense is built to a tantalizing level and the ending is perfect. It makes me want to watch the movies and see the play again with a fuller appreciation of the storyline.

This was my second book for the RIP II Challenge. Except for the Short Story Sunday, I will be putting the scary stories aside for a little while to catch my breath. I need a little time with a love story that doesn't involve a monster.

Review: The Eyes

When I was in 5th grade, my friends conspired to scare the living tar out of me by telling me Bloody Mary stories. If you haven't had the benefit of hearing these tales you can consider yourself very fortunate because they had the effect of scarring me for life. To this day I cannot look at a reflective surface at night, whether it be mirror or the glass in a picture frame, even the chrome faucet in the sink. As a child I would crawl past the mirror between my light switch and the bed. I had nightmares for years about ghosts trying to possess my body, or those of my family. I slept with a nightlight until I was in high school when I realized that the light created more shadows that just scared me more. I even slept with my head under my blanket until I was an adult. These stories indeed left a deep scar.


So you can imagine my fright as I was reading Edith Wharton's short ghost story The Eyes about a man haunted by ghostly eyes glaring at him at night. He cannot figure out why they appear when they do except that they seem to be connected in some way with a choice he has made earlier in the day. All he knows for sure is that they leave him unable to sleep, for days sometimes, until they finally go away.


The night I read the story I went to bed laughing at myself for being such a baby but really my heart was pounding ferociously in my chest during the long, dark walk to my room. Once in bed I felt compelled to look down the long hallway which is lit halfway by a mild green light, then pitch black. "Don't look!" I scolded myself. So I glued my eyes shut and attempted to sleep. The few times I succeeded in falling asleep I was plagued with disturbing dreams that I couldn't remember upon awakening but I would look again toward the black hole down the hall and start the process all over again. It was of course a horrendous way to spend a night, remembering all the anxiety and insecurity of my youth and realizing again that I still had not outgrown this irrational fear.


The Eyes was a creepy story to be sure but in typical Wharton style there is left a huge question mark at the end. "What just happened?" The ending was thoroughly confusing. After several readings of the same section I gave up. I'm beginning to see a pattern in Wharton's ghost stories. Ghosts and apparitions she can deal with. It is the old fear of the unknown or of that which cannot be understood that really chills her blood. Me? I'm just afraid of the ghost.

Short Story Sunday

A Ghost Story
by Jerome K. Jerome

Suppose a man died with the dearest wish of his heart unfulfilled, do you believe that his spirit might have power to return to earth and complete the interrupted work?

What follows is the short tale of a plan for revenge unfulfilled and the aftermath. This was the shortest story I've read yet but the creepiest. I liked the writing style. Very easy to understand and paints a picture before your eyes. I will have to read more of Jerome's work.

He is best known for his novel Three Men in a Boat. His stories are included in a number of anthologies of ghost stories and comic collections. My library system has the following scary story titles that include his works:

• The Dracula Book of Great Horror Stories
• The Haunted Dolls
• Fun Phantoms
• Ghosts and Ghastlies
• The Monster Makers
• Famous Monster Tales
• Horror Stories
• The Best Ghost Stories Ever

That's a lot of ghost story books. I'll have to keep them in mind for RIP III in 2008.

Review:Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
by Robert Louis Stevenson
86 pgs.
First Sentence:

Mr. Utterson the lawyer was a man of a rugged countenance that was never lighted by a smile; cold, scanty and embarrassed in discourse; backward in
sentiment; lean, long, dusty, dreary and yet somehow lovable.

Who hasn't heard the story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde? It is a cultural icon of sorts. I remember Bugs Bunny and other cartoons making references to it. So there is hardly anything new I could add to the tale except my own perception.

I had not realised it was such a small novella or I might have tackled it long ago. My B&N copy is 269 pages long. I hadn't noticed until I sat down to read it that under the title it says "and Other Stories." In fact, there are 6 stories and a myriad of other reference tools that are very helpful to understanding the story and the author.

An interesting bit of trivia that I hadn't known before is that the book and subsequent plays were extremely popular until Jack the Ripper started terrorizing the streets of London. One particularly powerful actor, Richard Mansfield, did such a magnificent job in the stage role of Jekyll and Hyde that he was accused of being the Ripper himself.

The book was also the public introduction of the idea of a serial killer who lived among the elite by day and killed by night. There were a flood of copycat stories printed immediately after it's publication.

The story itself was easy to follow. It is told by Mr. Utterson, a close friend to Dr. Jekyll. We learn of the intimate details as he investigates this strange Mr. Hyde and his hold on the financially secure(and then some) doctor of science. The last chapter is a letter written to Mr. Utterson by Dr. Jekyll in explanation of the identity of Mr. Hyde. It is quite an effective way of writing, or it would have been if I hadn't already known the secret.

This was my first selection for the RIP II Challenge. A long with all the scary short stories I am off to an eerie but satisfying start. The Phantom of the Opera sits waiting by my reading spot to be read next. It's sitting next to another book that I picked up last weekend called Poems Bewitched and Haunted put out by Everyman's Library Pocket Poets. As I find selections that are appropriate I will post them, so stay tuned.

Short Story Sunday(on Monday)

So my first Short Story Sunday is on a Monday. Late by one day; the story of my life. But to make up for being tardy I will review 2 ghost stories for ya.

The Lady's Maid's Bell
by Edith Wharton

That title feels awkward to my mind. Is that just me? Anyway. It is the tale of Miss Hartley, a lady's maid in a new position for Mrs. Brympton. While there are a few peculiarities, Miss Hartley is satisfied in her new position until she hears that no maid has stayed on at the Brymptons' for more than a couple of weeks. Later that night she is to learn why; the ghost of a former and beloved lady's maid that appears when the bell is wrung. What happens in the end may leave you a bit dumbfounded.

There is a climax at the end of the story but it can leave some in a state of confusion as to what exactly took place. I was not confused but neither was I scared. What I was was enthralled by the writing. If you've been reading this blog for any length of time you will know my unending love for Edith Wharton. She might be classed as my favorite author. If not favorite then at least in the Top 3. She gives just enough detail to capture your imagination without causing a lull in the storytelling. You feel like you have enough information to draw the correct conclusions about a character's personality. Of course, her characters in her shorter stories will not have as much depth as in her novels but that is to be expected. It didn't interfere with this story. It may not be for everyone but I was satisfied.

To Be Taken with a Grain of Salt
by Charles Dickens

I like to visit the local Salvation Army about once a week to scour the book aisle. I rarely come home empty handed. This week's visit proved productive as usual. I picked up a copy of Great Ghost Stories, a thin Dover Thrift Edition with a variety of authors. Dickens being another of my favorites, and the only name I recognized, I started with his story first.

The protagonist is telling the story of the trial of a murderer that he(said protagonist) is the Foreman on the jury for(talk about awkward!). He is not telling about the trial as much as explaining the mysterious ghostly appearances that lead to the verdict.

I was glad this story was short because the details would have been overwhelming in a longer format. He gives a piece of useful(or unuseful) information and then qualifies it. He does this for just about every bit of information he shares. It makes it a bit tedious. But in the end there is a shiver-down-the-spine moment that makes it worth the 10 minutes it takes to get to the end.

This is a fun addition to the regular challenge for the RIP II Challenge. I do like short stories, though I don't read them all that often. They are great for reading while the children are up and running around as I don't need too much time to get through them. And this also works on fulfilling a read for the Reading the Author Challenge, Edith Wharton being my author of choice. So far, so good!