The 11th Fontana Book of Great Horror Stories

 

Perhaps in celebration of the fact The Eleventh Fontana Book of Great Horror Stories was the first in the series to exclusively feature new stories being published for the first time, Mary Danby wrote a short introduction to the volume, which I have reproduced below.

I do appreciate I may be infringing someone's copyright here, and will happily remove this if requested to.

"To the horror story fan, a new anthology is like a mouth-watering stew - a mixture of this and that, from here and there, specially chosen and blended for your enjoyment.

     The ingredients in this collection include such piquant morsels as witchcraft, zombies, spider-worship, reptilism - and even murder by knitting needle!  But the basic flavour is one of chilling originality and freshness, for, this time, the entire book is in the hands of modern writers.  So many fine new stories are queueing up to be included in anthologies, that it seems a shame and a waste to exclude them in favour of the good, old (but often over-exposed) faithfuls.

     There's horror on the menu, so ... welcome to the feast!"

                                                                                    MARY DANBY

BOBBY

by John Halkin

A chap called Brack is in hospital recovering, after having rolled his car on the motorway.  The patient tells the police he had a tyre blow-out, but they are sceptical and suggest he may have been attempting suicide.  The truth is he panicked after a "big, silly face, terrified" had suddenly appeared before him through the windscreen.

Brack, after release from hospital, does a bit of digging and learns another driver had recently been involved in a not dissimilar accident, and had claimed to have seen the same thing.

So, Brack digs deeper.

A moderately satisfying ghost story this one, with a couple of rather unique twists which I shall not reveal here.  My only gripe with the tale is the apparent ease with which Brack is able to track down the folks he needs to talk to, and their apparent willingness to spout the information he requires to allow him to figure out what the heck is going on.

But, I suppose, at just eleven-and-half pages the author had to propel things along swiftly, and could not afford to have his protagonist hang about. 

A QUESTION OF CONSCIENCE

by Catherine Gleason

Committed socialist (indeed, borderline communist) Miles has, he has just learned, on the occasion of his 21st birthday been made sole beneficiary of Uncle Roland's estate in his will.  And has been invited up to uncle's crumbling pile, so the two men can better get to know each other.

Miles' problem is that uncle is a reactionary "recividist whose ideals and pleasures were rooted in the culture of the eighteenth century", and is all he despises.

Still, the money would come in useful.

A fun tale, with potty old Uncle Roland painted as a delightful roistering blood-sport loving old letch.  A sort of pantomime Sir Henry Rawlinson lumbered with Wolfie Smith as his sole remaining relative.  The dialogue between the pair does not quite spark as the reader may have hoped it might, but it is an enjoyable read all the same.

And the moral of the yarn?  Perhaps, as Neitzsche suggested, “Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster".     

THE EYE OF THE MANDALA

by Rosemary Timperley

The life of beautiful but vain Della is turned upside down when she loses an eye in a car crash.  As part of her psychiatric recovery, her therapist suggests she draws a mandala.  Which Della undertakes with the same fervour and verve she once held for maintaining her appearance.

But her enthusiasm soon begins to drift into the realms of obsession.

So, I hear you ask, what is a mandala?  Well, it appears it is many things to many different eastern cultures.  But, at its most basic, it is a circular drawing or design which can apparently represent anything from an aid to meditation to, according to Jung, a reflection of "the mind's inner state at the moment of creation and...a kind of symbolic archetype in the collective unconscious".  Whatever the heck that means.

Within the context of this short story, I think it's drawing and increasingly complex content is intended to represent Della's descent into madness, as she struggles to cope with the loss of her "near-perfect" looks.  

The ambiguous ending though, I found made little sense.

SURPRISE! SURPRISE!

by Roger F. Dunkley

Dahlia Loom is more than a little surprised to find a corpse lying across her garden compost heap.  Ascertaining the chap had been murdered she resolves, in the best Agatha Christie tradition, the murderer must be caught and brought to justice..

But neither her husband, her sister nor the local constabulary appear much interested in the business, putting Dahlia's  story down to her "headaches".

Eventually a detective pitches up investigate, but he just annoys Dahlia with his incessant questions.  So, before long, there are two bodies on the compost heap.

Written in the same surreal, flippant style utilised by the likes of Martin Waddell and Conrad Hill in the Pan Horror collections, I rather enjoyed the author's deft touch here.  For example, we are introduced to a busy funeral director who has, in the words of his wife, been "undertaking too much recently".

However, the narrative sorta loses its way a touch towards the end I felt.  Or perhaps it was just this particular reader who got lost.

THE FROGWOOD ROUNDABOUT

by Roy Harrison

The funfair has arrived in Frogwood, and three children are entranced by the sounds, sights and smells of the fair.  They are particularly enthralled by the roundabout (carousel), with it's loud organ music, garishly painted wooden horses, and the barker's promise of "a ride to last you till Judgement Day".  But they have spent all their money.

Never mind, the barker promises, come back at nine o'clock and you can have a free ride.

I absolutely loved the opening paragraph to this one, as the author sets the scene with dazzling descriptive prose.  Redolent of Ray Bradbury's Dark and Cooger's travelling carnival in Something Wicked This Way Comes.  

And Harrison effortlessly taps into the subliminal suspicion I am sure we all hold: that those spinning rising-and-plunging horse carousels are creepy as hell.  Witness the climax to Hitchcock's movie Strangers on a Train.

The slightly clumsy layering on of the time-slip aspect to the children's final ride, I was less convinced with.  But, I am probably just being overly picky with what is a strong contribution to the volume.

DEAD AND ALIVE

by Marion Pitman

Three years previously, business partners Luke Connaught and Jackson Lafayette bought, in good faith, a chunk of Texas real estate.  Oil was subsequently discovered on the land, and the seller (Hatherton) believes he was in some way tricked, so is now out for revenge.

With zombies.

Told from the perspective of Kate, a companion/lover/sister of one or perhaps both protagonists, this is a remarkably silly and lazily plotted yarn.

Much of the later action has Kate frantically scampering around the streets between the Connaught and Lafayette; each of whom she has left in the company of a zombie with a grudge.  The resourceful lady saving the day, by the simple expedient of pushing Hatherton off his chair and onto the floor whereupon he (oh so) conveniently cracks his head on the floor.  

This act unplugging the pair of zombies from their controller, causing them to rapidly decompose.

As they generally do.

MARY

By Rog Pile

Paul and Helen, and their child Jennie who has mongolism (Down Syndrome, I assume) have rented a large holiday home out in the country.  With five bedrooms, a modern stainless steel kitchen, a small red summer house...and it's own ghost.

I really enjoyed this one, it being left deliberately vague whether the entity living in the summer house is the ghost of a long-dead child, or some other form of malevolent sprite.  Whatever the case, it appears it is only visible to Paul and Jennie, it being the girl who first befriends it.

There are other clues to a slightly turbulent family past scattered around: hints that Jennie had previously been abused by an adult, and Helen's never quite explained question to her husband: "This is the way it happened before, isn't it?"

Also Helen's odd reaction when she encounters Paul standing in the debris of his trashed study.  Had he a history of such behaviour?

There is clearly an extensive back story to this family, only tantalisingly hinted at by the author.  To fine effect, I feel.

FOR CHARITY'S SAKE

By Barbara Joan Eyre

Grace and Charity are sisters; the latter the younger and prettier of the two, and with a habit of stealing her big sister's boyfriends.  When Grace sees Sis is about to move in on Roger, her latest paramour, she decides Charity must end at home.

A disappointingly run-of-the mill yarn of revenge this one.  Particularly let down by the implausible ease with which Grace is able to steal some of the virulent mutated bacterium Charity and Roger (who are research colleagues) have accidentally concocted.  I worked in laboratories for over 45 years, and certainly encountered some sloppy practices from time to time.  But nothing near so cavalier as recorded here.

BUFFY

by Philip Welby

Buffy is the nickname of the worst of a group of teenage boys who take inordinate fun baiting the local reclusive eccentric, and reputed alchemist, Halliwell.  When Buffy goes just a little too far one day, Halliwell mutters something to another boy (the narrator) about "the black tincture" being required here.   

A very effective body horror revenge yarn, which reminded me at times of elements of Stephen King' short story Grey Matter.  Not that I am suggesting any form of plagiarism, for there are far more contrasts than similarities between the two tales.   

SOMEONE IN THE ROOM

by Elizabeth Fancett

"She" (we never learn the protagonist's name - perhaps Mary would be appropriate given the names of the other two characters) is spending her first night alone with her young son Peter, after husband Paul has left her.  In the middle of the night, she awakes in pitch darkness convinced there is, as the story's title attests, Someone in the Room with her.

An effective exploration of paranoia this one.  For there can be no other explanation why the protagonist immediately jumps to the conclusion of intruder, rather than plumping for the obvious candidate for who has just toddled into her bedroom.

NO-FACE

by Sydney J. Bounds

Alcoholic photo-journalist Jimmy Elliot has pretty much pissed his career up the wall.  His last chance at professional redemption lies in the hands of Diaz, a Mexican guide who claims to know of a "lost Idole in the jungle".

True to his word, Diaz does indeed lead Elliot to a large stone carving of a Mayan deity.

But the natives are restless.

A bit of the old Indiana Joneses going on here, but with this tequila-soaked version of Indy only interested in photographing artefacts, rather than nicking them.

Not that this ultimately saves him from the wrath of the indigenous Indians, who exact their revenge in a rather unique manner. 

I did enjoy the pacing of this one, as the action moves from Elliot's struggle to reach the place where the idol is situated, to his rising panic as he realises the locals are onto him as he tries to sneak back to get a few more pix.

BERT'S RESURRECTION

by Dorothy Kilmurry-Hall

Maud's dead hubby Bert comes back as a potato.

There is slightly more to this ten-pager than my one line precis, but not a whole lot.  The whole raison d'être for this story is as a vehicle for the author to make a number of little potato jokes:

Maud, at one point asks her newly returned resurrected hubby if he would like something to eat, to which he replies "get me a nice meat pie, or chips - No, not chips".

then: "Bert's eyes, hardly indistinguishable from his other thousands of eyes, stared back at her accusingly."

before Maud states in exasperation:  "Taters belong in the garden.  What will the neighbours think?"

The chips joke is perhaps overcooked (ha ha) in the final scene, but this slice of hokum is an enjoyable, if hardly horrific, read.

THE PEOPLE OPPOSITE

by Sally Franklin

Whilst she is recuperating from minor injuries sustained in a train collision (two trains, I should add, she was not hit by one), new neighbours have moved in opposite Jane's house.

Specifically a couple in their late thirties, their pretty young daughter Betsy....and a sour-faced old woman who looks after the child during the day when Mummy and Daddy are at work.

One afternoon Jane encounters Betsy in her garden who informs her that not only has she had had no breakfast or lunch that day, but that her carer Miss Armitage is "not speaking to me".

Enraged, Jane sets off to give the old biddy a piece of her mind.

I have to own up to have been a touch wrong-footed by the author during reading, and to pen my apologies here.

For, as I worked my way through this story, I was sure it was going to be just another of the Child-offs-an-Adult scenarios which peppered the PBoHS volumes.  But the author seamlessly introduces a neat time slip element to proceedings late on in the form of a series of epistolary letters, which I rather feel elevates this yarn immeasurably.

As a consequence, this is very much a tale more rewarding upon second reading.

THE RAINBOW

by Maureen O'Hara

Someone has a bad time of it, after attending a rock concert.

As with many unreliable narrator internal monologues, it is challenging for the reader at times to divine just what is going on here.  There is clearly some anti-drugs message being peddled by the author, but the message is a touch muddy.

I think we basically have the befuddled stream of consciousness ramblings of a heroin addict, who has begun to relate just a touch too closely with the drug-ravaged guitarist of the band he has just witnessed perform.  Or perhaps the narrator is the guitarist.  I just dinnae ken.

Similarly, does the title refer to The Rainbow Theatre in Finsbury Park, a popular music venue during the Seventies when this tale was written?  Maybes aye, Maybes naw.

THE MOON WEB

by Adrian Cole

Tobias is the gardener for the wealthy Darlington family; generally content to tend to his shrubs and roses and keep himself to himself.  However, with the return of the beautiful and flighty Amelia Darlington to the manor, Tobias finds long dormant feelings of lust welling up within him.

Meanwhile, rumours of odd things going on up at the big house have reached the village pub, concerning Amelia.....and spiders.

This entry is closest we get to any sexual activity in this (pseudo-Pan) Fontana collection.  And even then, the whole business is chastely handled by the author, and by extension, the editor.

Tobias' hots for Amelia are recorded as "his emotional turbulence" and "his libido rising".  When the gardener decides he will rape Amelia, we get "decided he would ravish her" and, best of all, "would find some way of dishonouring the temptress".  We are almost in Mills and Boon territory here. 

The ending to the tale (and that of the hapless Tobias) is more than a touch ambiguous.  Clearly, given Amelia's ability to summon up a host of little spiders, the supernatural is at play here.  But the final scene?  Did the terrified fleeing Tobias really mistake a pylon and associated cables for a huge spider and web?  All rather unlikely.

But an eminently readable tale for all that, and perhaps the strongest in the Font11 collection.

THE SALESMAN

by Roger Malisson 

(a pseudonym for Catherine Gleason and Rita Morris)

Insurance salesman Donald Winterbottom is persuaded, against his better judgement, by his wife Dorothy that they should go check out the local coven.  It may, she suggests, not only raise their profile within the community, but may even prove beneficial to Donald's faltering career to mix with the local bigwigs.

Whilst attending, a sceptical Donald is introduced to the sinister Mr. Anneheg, who offers to make a deal with him to demonstrate "our God proves his existence by conferring material benefit to his faithful followers".

Donald really should have read Goethe before agreeing.

Urban witchcraft has a long history in literature, ranging from the sublime (Rosemary's Baby) to the ridiculous (Broomsticks Over Flaxborough).  This one certainly veers towards the latter camp as the author (or authors) play this one if not quite for laughs, then certainly for fun.  Witness Dorothy's persistent mis-pronunciation of Donald's boss' name.

Even although the mode of the fulfilment of Donald's first wish is lifted straight from W.W. Jacob's classic The Monkey's Paw, this is a tight and well-crafted be-careful-what-you-wish-for Faustian yarn.  Right down to that grin-inducing final-line joke.

NURSERY TEA

by Mary Danby

Middle-aged siblings Hugh and Olivia invite their 90-year old former nanny to a Boxing Day tea.  The pair have each never recovered from nanny's physical and emotional cruelty meted out by the woman when they were children.

Their scheme to give Nanny a taste of her own medicine does not quite go to plan.

Throughout the whole of this collection, I have felt this is volume came as close to the feel and tone of the Pan volumes as Fontana ever achieved.  Even though the sex and violence contained herein does not even come close to approaching the worst excesses of the PBoHS collection.

That being said, I feel this contribution by Mary Danby would have effortlessly found a home in one 0f Bertie's compilations, and not appeared out of place.   Even if the mode of Olivia's demise does stretch the reader's credulity more than a little.