Thirty-one new writers make their debut in The Ghost-Eater and Other Stories, a collection compiled by Diane Awerbuck and edited by Louis Greenberg. Funny and sad and highly original, the stories in The Ghost-Eater and Other Stories are invested with the passion, truth and quirkiness of the newest New South Africa and gives readers a chance to gauge the newest authors writing in South Africa at the moment.
“A Gothic-punk graveyard tale about what haunts history and what haunts the human soul. An addicting read that draws you into its descent from the first page.”—Chuck Wendig, New York Times best-selling author of The Book of Accidents One of Vulture's Best Horror Novels of 2022, this terrifying supernatural page-turner will make you think twice about opening doors to the unknown. Erin hasn’t been able to set a single boundary with her charismatic but reckless college ex-boyfriend, Silas. When he asks her to bail him out of rehab—again—she knows she needs to cut him off. But days after he gets out, Silas turns up dead of an overdose in their hometown of Richmond, Virginia, and Erin’s world falls apart. Then a friend tells her about Ghost, a new drug that allows users to see the dead. Wanna get haunted? he asks. Grieving and desperate for closure with Silas, Erin agrees to a pill-popping “séance.” But the drug has unfathomable side effects—and once you take it, you can never go back.
There is a grand piano delivered to the wrong Sea Point address. There is Toby the dog whose casual disappearance leads to the discovery of a world as unlikely as a helpful man. There are Isabelle and Hester, both travelling on the same train, but moving in opposite directions. There are the school girls who smoke through Die Stem during a Republic Day Celebration. There is Adeela longing for OK Bazaars, Boxing Day, and groenboontjie bredie; Lilly who knows too little of her mother's past and Elizabeth who is desperate to shed hers. Who can say why Eleanor married the man she did, or why she took the long sea journey south? Who can say where Sue's been, or who the vark lilies are for? Who believes it when told, "It's for your own good"? Whether drawn from the distance of history or located in contemporary Cape Town, these eight stories create a tender and luminous account of just how extraordinary the everyday life of women can be.
Gracie has an unusual appetite for ghosts, which she has kept secret from everyone she knows, even her parents. Despite her hunger, she only feasts on ghosts that try to scare her as she lays in her bed at night. After Gracie's parents move to a new house located directly across the street from an old cemetery, her late-night eating habits spin so out of control that the ghosts have had enough. The infamously corrupt Ghost Council takes her by force to the underworld where she faces severe punishment for her crimes against the dead. The only chance she has to make it back to the land of the living is to complete three seemingly impossible tasks, which have been chosen by the ghosts, and they are not about to make things easy on her! Gracie must rely on all of her cunning and the help of a few unexpected friends to return home safely, learning along the way that she truly is stronger than she believes.
A riveting thriller, Ghost Eater marks the introduction of an intense new voice in seafaring adventure. Moored in a wintry Asian harbor at the turn of the twentieth century, Captain Ulysses Vanders experiences a revelation. A ferryman brings a mysterious gift--a wine at once rare and familiar that brings the sailor back to a moment in Sumatra thirty years before. "I closed my eyes, remembering where I had last tasted this liquor, remembering back across the years, remembering how steady the hand had been that held out the cup to me, and how desperate the circumstances. With a stab, her face rose before me--beautiful, tantalizing, terrible to behold." This haunting memory leads the sailor back to his first command and a desperate river journey to rescue missionaries along a remote jungle river. Captain of an aging steamboat, Vanders soon finds himself burdened with a set of unexpected, mysterious passengers, each traveling to the mission outpost known as "Light of the World" for reasons of his or her own. The island world Vanders discovers is a ghostly place, darkly lit with the flames of social upheaval, a world of superstition and strife, as age-old ways of life are swept away in the murderous rampage of a tribe gone mad. At the edge of civilization, the young American captain learns not only the challenge of command but the courage to confront his own illusions, beautiful and terrible to behold.
Hungry Ghosts is cooked up by the best selling author and veteran chef, Anthony Bourdain (Kitchen Confidential, Emmy-Award winning TV star of Parts Unknown) and acclaimed novelist Joel Rose (Kill, Kill, Faster, Faster) back again from their New York Times #1 best seller, Get Jiro!. Featuring real recipes cooked up by Bourdain himself, this horror anthology is sure to please--and scare! On a dark, haunted night, a Russian Oligarch dares a circle of international chefs to play the samurai game of 100 Candles--where each storyteller tells a terrifying tale of ghosts, demons and unspeakable beings--and prays to survive the challenge. Inspired by the Japanese Edo period game of Hyakumonogatari Kaidankai, Hungry Ghosts reimagines the classic stories of yokai, yorei, and obake, all tainted with the common thread of food. Including stellar artists Sebastian Cabrol, Vanesa Del Rey, Francesco Francavilla, Irene Koh, Leo Manco, Alberto Ponticelli, Paul Pope, and Mateus Santolouco as well as amazing color by Jose Villarrubia, a drop-dead cover by Paul Pope.
From The frightening Big Noise of the approaching caterpillars sent by government to build a new dam; to the thundering Other Noises of the caterpillars, again sent by government to destroy their shacks; and to the graduates playing soccer wearing full regalia in the streets of Harare, life for the average citizen has never been the same. Then the 93-year-old president, Robert Mugabe, was forced to announce his resignation, and Tonderai, one of his secret agents skips the country fearing for his life. Of course, that was after another big noise that saw armoured cars and many people filling the streets of the capital, rejoicing that the dictator had been deposed. Before that there were other noises that frightened people away from their homes, but this time the noises that frightened people were made by those who had silenced the big noise. A confusion reigned. Graduates were jobless. People fled the country to other countries to become political as well as economic refugees.
Consists of an introductory essay on the Appalachian setting & a choice selection of folk stories about ghosts, true experiences & tall tales. Ninth Printing 1995.
This anthology consists of academic essays, creative non-fiction, poetry and short stories on race and racism by black women from South Africa and Brazil. Through these different genres, the book engages with the complexities of race in social, political, economic, institutional and personal spaces. Concerned with social justice, human rights and freedom, these writings spotlight the amalgamation of racial, gender and class subjectivities and how these are marked, un-marked, re-marked and re-made on bodies. The book connects globally and locally to social and political phenomena in the modern-day world. The contributors interrogate their political and personal worlds, revealing layered, intersecting ways of being that were essentially centred by colonial histories but not defined in totality by coloniality and oppression. In speaking to the proximity of these experiences, they reflect and narrate the past, contemplate the present and imagine the future. This curated anthology asks questions centred around freedom. What does freedom mean? When do we have it, and when do we not? Most importantly, how do we get it? Print edition not for sale in Sub Saharan Africa.