Embrace the darkness

Read by Eve Karpf, Mark Rice-Oxley, Richard Mitchley(Unabridged: 06hrs 53mins)

Featuring stories by J Y Ackerman, Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Fernan Caballeron, Wilkie Collins & many more

An author’s talents may seem obvious and indisputable as they move words and ideas into gathered phrases and stories.

But where do these ideas and stories come from? A lonely thought that suddenly gathers form? An inspiration from a Muse? A suggestion from an everyday event?

Perhaps in the case of their darker, more malevolent stories, other forces are at work. They help to nourish single words into sentences and paragraphs that ease themselves from the shadows and are suddenly upon us in twisted revelation that may thrill, may disturb, but will always engage and help us explore the edge of darkness where some of the very best literature patiently lurks …. waiting …. for the likes of me and you.

1 - Stories from the Shadows - The 1850's - An Introduction

2 - The Miniature by J Y Ackerman

3 - The Haunted and the Haunters; or, The House and the Brain - Part 1 by Edward Bulwer-Lytton

4 - The Haunted and the Haunters; or, The House and the Brain - Part 2 by Edward Bulwer-Lytton

5 - The Devil's Mother-in-Law by Fernan Caballeron

6 - The Dead Hand by Wilkie Collins

7 - The Last House in C Street by Mrs Craik

8 - The Lifted Veil - Part 1 by George Eliot

9 - The Lifted Veil - Part 2 by George Eliot

10 - Snap-Dragon by James Hain Friswell

11 - The Old Nurse's Story by Elizabeth Gaskell

12 - The Ghost in the Clock Room by Hesba Stretton