Enter the haunted world of Ancient Japan in this spine-tingling collection of ghostly tales told and retold across the centuries. From Goblin infested caves and haunted Tombs, to vengeful spirits and strange, sinister happenings, Ancient Japan was a country and culture that lived with between realms: the world of everyday and the world of supernatural. The Snow Ghost and Other Tales brings together some of the best and scariest tales that endured across centuries of folklore, transporting readers to a time of magic and mystery. For readers of Haruki Murakami, David Mitchell and Shirley Jackson
FOOTSTEPS IN THE SNOW explores the concept of whether Ghosts really do exist? The four stories are all quite different but each deals with the apparent physical manifestation of a being from 'another place'. Ghosts? Maybe? * Jeff is out walking his dog in the snow through some woods when he meets a young girl. Who is she? Why is she there? * Russell takes a career break from his job to write a book but he meets Alice and after a passionate affair their final meeting is bizarre. * Matt and Sarah have renovated an old cottage to create their dream home and all is well until one day out riding he meets a strange man by an old oak tree. * Greg enrols at a Business Management College to attend a four week programme but he soon finds all is not as it seems in the old house. So do ghosts exist and if so can you talk to them? Can they talk to you? Of course I don't know the answer and I doubt whether anyone does, or ever will - but I definitely wouldn't say that they don't exist! So read (and hopefully enjoy) the four stories in this book and then perhaps it will help you to make up your own mind on this interesting question of whether ghosts really exist? And if you get goosebumps or your hair stands on end as you come to the end of each of the tales, well then maybe you might just believe that ghosts do exist. After all you never know do you - they might!!
Enter the haunted world of Ancient Japan in this spine-tingling collection of ghostly tales told and retold across the centuries. From Goblin infested caves and haunted Tombs, to vengeful spirits and strange, sinister happenings, Ancient Japan was a country and culture that lived with between realms: the world of everyday and the world of supernatural. It was a time and place where men could be brought down by karmic forces or lured into deadly danger by ghostly apparitions, and where the land held sorrowful secrets or stories that long-awaited an opportunity to reveal them and seek reparation. The Snow Ghost and Other Tales brings together some of the best and scariest tales that endured across centuries of folk lore in one new beautiful hardback collection. Finally commited to writing during the turn of the twenieth cenutry by a unique set of folklorists, the ghost stories presented in this new anthology will transport readers to a time of magic and mystery, and let them relish in the spine-tingling traditions of Japanese culture largely lost now to modernity. For readers of Haruki Murakami, David Mitchell and Shirley Jackson
While staying with their aunt in an ancient English house, three children discover a strange snowstorm paperweight which takes them back in time, bringing them face-to-face with ancestors who help them find a long lost treasure trove.
A collection of firsthand accounts from truckers who have driven all over the United States and have encountered strange and unusual phenomenons which can only be described as paranormal.
On the precipice of a serious illness, Sylvie wakes up to find a snow angel who tells her he will protect her, and when she finally recovers, she purposefully puts herself in precarious situations to try and meet him again.
"My last secretary was thirty-five," old M. said gloomily, "and no more sense than a child of ten. Or else she wasn't all there. You all there?" he asked suddenly, giving Maud a searching look. "No banging your head on the table? No throwing the china at me? Hey?" Young Maud has made her escape from an overbearing stepmother and come to stay with her cousin Alice and Alice's companion Miss Conway in the countryside. Alice and "Con" have arranged a job for her as secretary to Mr Feniston, an eccentric and intimidating neighbor who seems to have driven his previous secretary to a nervous breakdown. In between cataloguing Mr Feniston's library, dodging his temper, and encounters, awkward and intriguing in turn, with his son and an alienated nephew, Maud finds herself involved with local eccentricities and dramas, including a "secret" romance which has everyone talking. She may never be the same after this winter away! Furrowed Middlebrow is delighted to make available, for the first time in over half a century, all six of Elizabeth Fair's irresistible comedies of domestic life. These new editions all feature an introduction by Elizabeth Crawford. "Miss Fair's understanding is deeper than Mrs. Thirkell's and her humour is untouched by snobbishness; she is much nearer to Trollope, grand master in these matters."--Stevie Smith "Miss Fair makes writing look very easy, and that is the measure of her creative ability."--Compton Mackenzie
"I lived in a haunted apartment." Zack Davisson opens this definitive work on Japan's ghosts, or yurei, with a personal tale about the spirit world. Eerie red marks on the apartment's ceiling kept Zack and his wife on edge. The landlord warned them not to open a door in the apartment that led to nowhere. "Our Japanese visitors had no problem putting a name to it . . . they would sense the vibes of the place, look around a bit and inevitably say 'Ahhh . . . yurei ga deteru.' There is a yurei here." Combining his lifelong interest in Japanese tradition and his personal experiences with these vengeful spirits, Davisson launches an investigation into the origin, popularization, and continued existence of yurei in Japan. Juxtaposing historical documents and legends against contemporary yurei-based horror films such as The Ring, Davisson explores the persistence of this paranormal phenomenon in modern day Japan and its continued spread throughout the West. Zack Davisson is a translator, writer, and scholar of Japanese folklore and ghosts. He is the translator of Mizuki Shigeru's Showa 1926–1939: A History of Japan and a translator and contributor to Kitaro. He also worked as a researcher and on-screen talent for National Geographic's TV special Japan: Lost Souls of Okinawa. He writes extensively about Japanese ghost stories at his website, hyakumonogatari.com.
Resisting the various forms of realism popular during the Meiji "enlightenment," Izumi Kyoka (1873-1939) was among the most popular writers who continued to work in the old-fashioned genres of fantasy, mystery, and romance. Gothic Tales makes available for the first time a collection of stories by this highly influential writer, whose decadent romanticism led him to envision an idiosyncratic world--a fictive purgatory --precious and bizarre though always genuine despite its melodramatic formality. The four stories presented here are among Kyoka's best-known works. They are drawn from four stages of the author's development, from the "conceptual novels" of 1895 to the fragmented romanticism of his mature work. In the way of introduction, Inouye presents a clear analysis of Kyoka's problematic stature as a "great gothic writer" and emphasizes the importance of Kyoka's work to the present reevaluation of literary history in general and modern Japanese literature in particular. The extensive notes that follow the translation serve as an intelligent guide for the reader, supplying details about each of the stories and how they fit into the pattern of mythic development that allowed Kyoka to deal with his fears in a way that sustained his life and, as Mishima Yukio put it, pushed the Japanese language to its highest potential.
