This book is phenomenal and just in time for Halloween. Its sheer size and its beautiful formatting make this book easy to navigate and read. It contains literally thousands of pages of more than 560 stories with hyperlinks not just for the contents page but for each of the individual stories where necessary. Indeed, phenomenal is an understatement.
If a story does not contain hyperlinks and only links to the main contents page it is because it is a ‘short story’ or a ‘novella’. Such is the case with Henry James’s tale: The Turn of the Screw. For these are stories that don’t need to be divided up internally with hyperlinks.
It may seem somewhat trivial going on about hyperlinks. But try reading a book of this size without them and you’ll quickly find that the content is irrelevant. For you can’t even get to a story or section of an ebook without a well-formatted text. Hyperlinks are necessary to such publications. I have had large books without them in the past and the books are utterly useless. Take my word for it.
This book, however, is without fault. Navigating its content is almost effortless.
In the book’s 560+ stories nearly every author and worthwhile story from the genre of the macabre is included. Whereas similar-type books either cover a selection of short stories or a collection of novels in the genre, this book seems to cover virtually all of them. There are four major sections. The first one covers Supernatural & Mystery Thrillers; the second covers The Essential Gothics; the third covers Ghosts, Monsters & Creatures; and the final, fourth section, covers Miscellaneous Tales.
There are a few authors and stories missed out. I found none of the short stories by H.G. Wells included (and there should have been); but his novel The Island of Doctor Moreau is included. Nor did I find David Lindsay’s A Voyage to Arcturus; but his ghostly tale The Haunted Woman is included. Nor could I find any tales by Algernon Blackwood, Oliver Onions (The Beckoning Fair One) and William Harvey (The Beast with Five Fingers). Though W.W. Jacobs’ classic The Monkey’s Paw is definitely included.
The greats are all here. Poe, Lovecraft, James, Benson, Bierce, Machen and Le Fanu (among many others). Not only that but I was also thrilled to see included Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights, Willie Collins’ The Woman in White and Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto. The classics of Shelley, Stoker, Wilde and Dickens are all included too. Indeed, such a volume wouldn’t be complete without them.
However, I do think that it would have been a good idea in a volume such as this to include all of the ghostly tales by M.R. James, E.F. Benson and Sheridan Le Fanu. For these I consider essential reading for any lover of the ghost story genre. At a rough guess I’d say only two-thirds of these authors’ works are included.
But this is only a minor issue. And tiny at that. For this book―for any lover of the macabre and creepy-ghostly genre of fiction like myself―is a wonderful compilation and a perfect companion and treat for Halloween. In short: The Horror Beyond Life’s Edge is probably the best purchase I’ve made in a long time.
Top marks to the publishers for this one. Five stars, without question.
I hope you find my review helpful.
[The image is from the film Night of the Demon based on M.R. James’s short story Casting the Runes included in this volume.]
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![The Horror Beyond Life's Edge: 560+ Macabre Classics, Supernatural Mysteries & Dark Tales: The Mark of the Beast, Shapes in the Fire, A Ghost, The Man-Wolf, ... Picture of Dorian Gray, The Ghost Pirates… by [Mary Shelley, H. P. Lovecraft, H. G. Wells, Edgar Allan Poe, Henry James, Hugh Walpole, M. R. James, Wilkie Collins, E. F. Benson, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ambrose Bierce, Arthur Machen, William Hope Hodgson, Arthur Conan Doyle, Grant Allen, Bram Stoker, Théophile Gautier, Richard Marsh, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, Thomas Hardy, Charles Dickens, Rudyard Kipling, Guy de Maupassant, Elizabeth Gaskell, Mark Twain, Daniel Defoe, Jerome K. Jerome, Fitz-James O'Brien, Catherine Crowe, Émile Erckmann, Alexandre Chatrian, Pedro De Alarçon, Amelia B. Edwards, Washington Irving, John Meade Falkner, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, Louisa M. Alcott, Edith Nesbit, Mary Louisa Molesworth, Francis Marion Crawford, John Kendrick Bangs, John Buchan, Sabine Baring-Gould, Cleveland Moffett, Louis Tracy, Nikolai Gogol, James Malcolm Rymer, Thomas Peckett Prest, Frederick Marryat, Oscar Wilde, Robert Louis Stevenson, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, W. W. Jacobs, H. H. Munro (Saki), Wilhelm Hauff, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Robert W. Chambers, Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Thomas De Quincey, William Makepeace Thackeray, E. T. A. Hoffmann, Robert E. Howard, David Lindsay, Marie Belloc Lowndes, Edward Bellamy, Jack London, Pliny the Younger, Helena Blavatsky, Fergus Hume, Florence Marryat, Villiers l'Isle de Adam, William Archer, William F. Harvey, Katherine Rickford, Ralph Adams Cram, Leopold Kompert, Brander Matthews, Vincent O'Sullivan, Ellis Parker Butler, A. T. Quiller-Couch, Fiona Macleod, Lafcadio Hearn, William T. Stead, Gambier Bolton, Andrew Jackson Davis, Nizida, Walter F. Prince, Chester Bailey Fernando, Leonard Kip, Frank R. Stockton, Bithia Mary Croker, Catherine L. Pirkis, Leonid Andreyev, Anatole France, Richard Le Gallienne, Lucy Maud Montgomery, Stanley G. Weinbaum, Horace Walpole, William Thomas Beckford, Matthew Gregory Lewis, Ann Radcliffe, Jane Austen, John William Polidori, Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë, Walter Hubbell, George W. M. Reynolds, M. P. Shiel, Adelbert von Chamisso, J. T. Bealby, Samuel Henley, Isabel F. Hapgood, C. J. Hogarth]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41sfsqmZanL._SY346_.jpg)
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Gazza
A HALLOWEEN TREAT
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 28 October 2018Verified Purchase
Gazza
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 28 October 2018
If a story does not contain hyperlinks and only links to the main contents page it is because it is a ‘short story’ or a ‘novella’. Such is the case with Henry James’s tale: The Turn of the Screw. For these are stories that don’t need to be divided up internally with hyperlinks.
It may seem somewhat trivial going on about hyperlinks. But try reading a book of this size without them and you’ll quickly find that the content is irrelevant. For you can’t even get to a story or section of an ebook without a well-formatted text. Hyperlinks are necessary to such publications. I have had large books without them in the past and the books are utterly useless. Take my word for it.
This book, however, is without fault. Navigating its content is almost effortless.
In the book’s 560+ stories nearly every author and worthwhile story from the genre of the macabre is included. Whereas similar-type books either cover a selection of short stories or a collection of novels in the genre, this book seems to cover virtually all of them. There are four major sections. The first one covers Supernatural & Mystery Thrillers; the second covers The Essential Gothics; the third covers Ghosts, Monsters & Creatures; and the final, fourth section, covers Miscellaneous Tales.
There are a few authors and stories missed out. I found none of the short stories by H.G. Wells included (and there should have been); but his novel The Island of Doctor Moreau is included. Nor did I find David Lindsay’s A Voyage to Arcturus; but his ghostly tale The Haunted Woman is included. Nor could I find any tales by Algernon Blackwood, Oliver Onions (The Beckoning Fair One) and William Harvey (The Beast with Five Fingers). Though W.W. Jacobs’ classic The Monkey’s Paw is definitely included.
The greats are all here. Poe, Lovecraft, James, Benson, Bierce, Machen and Le Fanu (among many others). Not only that but I was also thrilled to see included Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights, Willie Collins’ The Woman in White and Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto. The classics of Shelley, Stoker, Wilde and Dickens are all included too. Indeed, such a volume wouldn’t be complete without them.
However, I do think that it would have been a good idea in a volume such as this to include all of the ghostly tales by M.R. James, E.F. Benson and Sheridan Le Fanu. For these I consider essential reading for any lover of the ghost story genre. At a rough guess I’d say only two-thirds of these authors’ works are included.
But this is only a minor issue. And tiny at that. For this book―for any lover of the macabre and creepy-ghostly genre of fiction like myself―is a wonderful compilation and a perfect companion and treat for Halloween. In short: The Horror Beyond Life’s Edge is probably the best purchase I’ve made in a long time.
Top marks to the publishers for this one. Five stars, without question.
I hope you find my review helpful.
[The image is from the film Night of the Demon based on M.R. James’s short story Casting the Runes included in this volume.]
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Kindle Customer
takes me back
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 30 November 2018Verified Purchase
