Oxford Book of Twentieth-century Ghost Stories

"In 1944 the critic Edmund Wilson expressed surprise that the ghost story was still alive and well in the age of the electric light. But why should he have been surprised? Ghost stories, as a literary genre ... have always maintained an adaptable relationship with the contemporary world." These 33 stories (17 by female authors) include the delicious ambiguities of Robert Aickman and Walter de la Mare; the family/relationship horrors of Ellen Glasgow, May Sinclair, Fay Weldon, and A. S. Byatt; a wicked tale with a twist ending by Graham Greene; Fritz Leiber's brilliant, postindustrial "Smoke Ghost"; and others that range from the poignant to the humorous to the terrifying. As Peter Cannon writes in Necrofile (the premiere journal of horror criticism), "Readers can expect both quality and good taste.... For those of us who prefer the old-fashioned literary virtues, The Oxford Book of Twentieth-Century Ghost Stories is the goods."