Any Ghosd Story fans out there?

If you also spend hours trolling through used bookstores trying to find a ghost story you haven't read yet, stop on by! ((M R James)) is the acme of the genre - for me at least. This naturally leads me to favor the classic ghost story collection like (Ghost Stories of an Anitquary) and the like.
But any story from any year can fit in - so who's the best modern writer using the classic style?

Please pretend the second word reads "Ghost" ;)

Have you read any Ramsey Campbell? Very good writer of ghosd (!) and horror stories - probably my favourite of all modern writers of the genre.

Yes, I've read The Overnight, and really loved it. It's like the worst inventory you could ever imagine - and I've gone through plenty! I was just shocked that he got the idea for this book because he'd worked at a Borders.
I liked all of the characters, or at least found them interesting; so I'm looking for other things from him to read.

My favourite ghost story writer at the moment is William Fryer Harvey, who is most famous for his story The Beast With Five Fingers.

Every story of his I have read I have really enjoyed. He writes so well, with just the right mix of the supernatural and humour (the combination is very rare).

Stories of his you may want to look up are: August Heat, Across the Moors, Double Demon, The Ankardyne Pew.

Hi im marie im new to this group and site i love reading ghost stories i always look around for books with anything paranormal in it and sometimes i read stories online i dont have a favourite ghost story author but stephen king is my favourite horror author i love his books especially the shining and then misery and salems' lot in another one of my favourites

New here too - used to love a good ghost story but haven't read any in ages. I intend to start again soon :)

The only contemporary writer I can think of who´s really managed to get to grips with a classic ghost story is Susan Hill. She´s actually quite good, so try "The woman in black", "The mist in the mirror" or "The man in the picture". I think you´ll like them if you prefer that feeling of creeping horror rather than the gore and blood stories of other modern authors.

I love classic gothic horror and I kind of wrote one recently!

There are many current authors who write creepy horror rather than gory horror, actually, but most of them are hard to find on a typical bookstore shelf. Often they are published by the small press, including Ash-Tree Press, Tartarus Press, and various others. Authors to look for include Reggie Oliver, Barbara Roden, Frances Oliver, Steve Duffy, Ramsey Campbell, Glen Hirshberg, Richard Gavin, Simon Strantzas, Paul Finch, Gary McMahon....there are quite a few, who deserve to be better known. Some of them are only available in hardcovers that run $40 US or more, but these small press books are vastly better made than run of the mill hardbacks that cost $25+. And Barbara Roden's outstanding collection NORTHWEST PASSAGES for example is available as a trade paperback. Nothing against her books, but Susan Hill unfortunately went around claiming to have single-handedly resurrected the classic ghost story, and this is nonsense, but a lot of people took it as truth and stopped looking (not to suggest that petine fell into this trap). Looking back a few years, one finds Jonathan Aycliffe, John Whitbourne, David Rowlands, Robert Westall, Charles Grant, many others. If I had the time I could list dozens worth trying.

Ash-Tree's EXOTIC GOTHIC series brings together new stories in the gothic tradition but often with unexpected settings and sources. Ash-Tree also brings out an anthology like AT EASE WITH THE DEAD and SHADES OF DARKNESS every year, and Tartarus has its STRANGE TALES series; these often contain the very best new ghostly tales.

Folks looking to learn more might want to poke around at the web sites of the ghost fiction publishers, or at the Ghost Story Society (www.ash-tree.bc.ca/gss.html) or look into one of the Yahoo discussion groups having to do with ghost fiction. These have extensive archives with all sorts of discussion about various books and authors. In addition to GSS's ALL HALLOWS periodical, which is 300 pages long and most of that is fiction, SUPERNATURAL TALES from David Longhorn is also full of good creepy stories, and comes out several times a year. Google around and have fun. One find will lead to another.

I must confess I´d never heard of any of these authors rtttt01! The problem with me is that the stories I read are usually about 70+ years old and I´m a bit suspicious when it comes to modern ghost or horror stories. I´m not at all fond of all these Steven Kings out there. Not because the books are badly written, they´re not, but because I simply don´t like it. A ghost story doesn´t have to be about a ruined castle, it´s not that. Try polish author Stefan Grabinski, or german Hanns Heinz Ewers. They managed to turn classic horror contemporary (well, for their time at least). But for all this vampire love or chainsaw massacre stuff. Sorry, it´s just not to my taste.

Petine, we are cut from the same cloth! I feel the same about King, that he is a good writer but doesn't really grab me for the most part, and I have no taste for chop-em-up serial killer stuff or supernatural romance. I do find Grabinski and Ewers interesting, and so do the weird small presses I mentioned. For example, Ash-Tree has a Grabinski collection, The Motion Demon, and Side Real Press has come out with an Ewers collection, Nachtmahr. I'm guessing you would enjoy at least some of the writers I mentioned. You are not alone in never running into them before. The sad thing is that they are very hard to stumble on. You kind of have to be told to go look for them, because they aren't in most book stores and they aren't reviewed in most places. I hope you do pursue some of them and let us know what you think when you've read them.

(I cannot get the Nachtmahr touchstone to work. Here's the link:
http://www.librarything.com/work/408660/58114976 )

>11 rtttt01:,hmm that ash-tree link didn't work,shame that. I suppose I could google Ghost Story Society tho.

sf_addict, how can you 'kind of' write gothic ghost story ;)

Tell us more...

sf_addict, sorry about that. I left the last letter off: it should be

www.ash-tree.bc.ca/GSS.html

thanks rtttt01.
So would anyone like to read my story?

I'd love to read it :)

>18 Moomin_Mama: there you go:
http://www.goodreads.com/story/show/62535-i-don-t-have-a-wooden-heart

(Ignore the Chapter 1 heading-there are no chapters as its only short but I didnt know how to get round that)

rtttt01! I´ll definitely try some of the authors you tipped me about. As I said; I love ghost stories and ghastly tales in general. It´s just that the proper stuff is so hard to get.

petine: It is, but the effort is worth it in many cases. Some of these books do turn up at Amazon.com, if you are comfortable buying there. Crossing my fingers that you will find some more stories to love.

There are quite a few decent and obscure supernatural items on Internet Archive, including books by Algernon Blackwood and other more obscure 19th century writers. Some are listed in my online text collection under the tag "supernatural".

Sorry sf_addict for the late reply - I didn't read it immediately because I wanted to wait for a quiet evening (the only way to read these stories), and then I forgot to reply. I enjoyed it, and I'm just off to post you a reply.

It's so hard to find commercial publishers and magazines that will take ghost stories any more. Woman's Weekly and co take cosy ones, but the few places I've tried subbing with scary ones have been no go. Horror magazines aren't usually taken by them - it's not so much a matter of gore or shock as just being genuinely different genres. The problem with such a small pool of markets is there's no leeway - either you write what they want or you don't. Drollerie Press is bringing out a ghost story anthology this summer (which I've subbed to, but I'll buy regardless).

Recent non-fiction collections I've enjoyed were Ghosts: Spooky Stories and Eerie Encounters from the National Trust and Ghoul Britannia, but for fiction I think my most recent pleasures are Edwardian at best. I've got everything tagged under Supernatural.

>24 MinaKelly:, you tried Black Static?