Dark Feasts: The World of Ramsey Campbell

A collection of short stories by one of the greats of supernatural and horror fiction, demonstrating his skill with the short form, and spanning the period from the start of his career until 1986 just before this collection was published. His fiction is always unsettling, and this does not disappoint, although the cumulative effect of so many stories did make some seem a little repetitive in theme and denoument. But there are some very disturbing tales here, and most have the characteristic build up of half-seen threat without gore. The exception is 'Again' which is a grand guignol tale and not the type of story expected from Campbell, though it starts in the usual way as a man, lost after taking a shortcut in the countryside, show more approaches a house to seek directions.

A lot of the stories have the theme of guilt and retribution for past crimes, but not all the protagonists or their friends have done anything to deserve what happens to them, making the stories all the more unsettling.

My personal favourites were a few of those which departed the normal setting of rundown inner cities. 'The Voice of the Beach' captures the uneasiness of Algernon Blackwood's story 'The Willows', where a vast and numinous presence, totally inimical to humanity, is intruding into our dimension from beyond. 'The End of a Summer's Day' is the horrific and cruel switch played on a young bride, while 'The Fit', set in the Lake District, deals partly with the awakening sexuality of a boy growing into adolescence and his reaction to his attractive aunt with whom he is spending another holiday, combined with the disturbing notion of a mad old woman who lives in a derelict cottage and weaves garments from her hair which she then presses on the locals who are too afraid not to accept them.

A good introduction to Campbell's fiction for anyone who has not read him before and a 4-star read, only lacking a full rating because of the above mentioned repetitiveness of some of the tales. show less

Absolutely essential collection by one of the contemporary masters. The stories get better as you go since they are in roughly chronological order and there is a tendency for sameness in the middle section, but the last third of the stories redeem the lot.

Caveat: this edition is the worst example of electronic character recognition and electronic typesetting I have ever seen. Usually you can read through typos but here you often cannot even puzzle out what the intended word was leaving the author's meaning unfathomable. There are typos, stray marks, missing words, missing letters, transposed letters, incorrect words, repeated sentences, nearly every error conceivable. A veritable museum piece of what not to do in proofreading and show more printing a book. If you come across this edition save the world and burn it. show less