Ancient Sorceries (audiobook)

Algernon Blackwood's 'Ancient Sorceries' was first published in 'John Silence' the 1908 collection of five stories featuring Blackwood's titular occult detective.  The story revolves around the tale of meek and mousey Arthur Vezin who after impetuously disembarking from a train somewhere in France finds himself curiously disinclined to leave the sleepy little village of surreptitiously watchful people.  With Silence sidelined for the majority of the story we get is a fabulous, slowly unfolding story of a man entangled in history.

This adaptation was made for the BBC in 2005 and is, for the most part, beautifully read by Philip Madoc although his French accent has a distinct whiff of 'Allo 'Allo about it.

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The Last Laugh

First published in 1928 D.H. Lawrence's 'The Last Laugh' is the story of a manifestation of the God Pan in Hampstead on a winters night. 

Miss James and her friend Marchbanks, along with a young policeman they meet on their journey, are walking home through the snow when they experience the God's return, an event that impacts them all in profound ways.

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Smith: An Episode in a Lodging House

Read by Hugh Ross for 'Book at Bedtime' in 2006 this Algernon Blackwood short story concerns a Doctor (although not John Silence) and an occult communion gone array.

The vital and materialist young doctor is disturbed in his lodgings on several escalating occasions by his enigmatic downstairs neighbour, Smith, a source of mystery to the other residents, which culminates in a terrifying midnight rescue and, perhaps worst of all, an unreturned book.

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Playmates

A.M. Burrage was the author of numerous stories of the supernatural but, with the exception of a couple of well known tales that have often appeared in ghost story collections - 'Smee', 'The Waxwork', 'One Who Saw' and 'Playmates' - and having been chamioned by such ghost story luminaries as M.R. James and Richard Dalby he has remained outside the awareness of many readers.  Happily this seems to be changing with the British Library's recent Burrage collection, 'The Little Blue Flames', placing him in a series of releases that stands him shoulder to shoulder with the likes of James, Algernon Blackwood and Edgar Allan Poe.  

Benign but aloof historian Stephen Everton unexpectedly adopts, Monica, the daughter of a distant, and dissolute, artist aquaintance.  Everton's whim is to allow the child to essentially raise and educate herself by providing for her needs whilst allowing her free access to his extensive library.  Within this loveless environment Monica slowly matures exactly as one would expect until that is a relocation of the household to the countryside elicits a change in the girl as she discovers new playmates.

'Playmates' was first published in Burrage's 1927 collection 'Some Ghost Stories' and is a gentle and rather lovely story that only hints at a darker world beyond. It's primary concerns are far more earthly and it tells a story of the importance of love and companionship and it's long been my favourite ghostly tale.

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Doctor Who: The Scorched Earth

Taken from the 1975 Doctor Who annual and read by Geoffrey Beevers (The Master in 'The Keeper of Traken') this is a lovely little daft Third Doctor and Sarah-Jane Smith tale.  Here Doctor Who (as they call him here) and Sarah-Jane are held captive by farmers whose crops have died due to "fire from the sky".  Given only until nightfall to help make the ground fertile again the doctor does so in the most unscientific way possible.  

It's a story very much from another time and for another audience but you have to kinda love the charm of these old stories written to entertain a sugared out kid three quaters of their way through a selection box on Christmas Day evening while the parents sleep off their dinner.  

It's fun but rubbish, or perhaps that should be, it's rubbish but fun or possibly both, just take it with a pinch of salt.

Voices in the Valley (audio drama)

'Barrowbeck, in the north of England, has a reputation for strangeness. It is a place that brings out the sin in people. But despite the dark isolation, people have lived there for centuries until the river got the better of them.'

Andrew Michael Hurley ('The Loney', 'Devil's Day', 'Starve Acre') presents 10 Aickman-esque tales revolving around the Northern English village of Barrowbeck.  Made for the BBC the stories are read by Maxine Peake, Reece Shearsmith, Alexandra Hannant, David Schofield, Siobhan Finneran, Paul Hilton, Toby Jones, Tamsin Greig, David Hounslow and Jessica Raine and tell the story of the town and it's troublesome river in stories that touch on science fiction and folk horror and tell of fertility and fairs, divorce and drownings, hibernation and hauntings in perfectly formed - and performed - little vignettes.

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She Was Afraid of Upstairs

To mark what would have been her 99th birthday I thought I'd share with you a Joan Aiken story but unfortunately there are almost no professionally read stories that I can find with this one being the sole exception and to be entirely honest with you it's not one of her best but it does allow me the opportunity to jump on the Miriam Margolyes bandwagon.

It's a tiny little tale about young girl who was, well, I'm sure you can work that out for yourself and who finds herself ill and on the move to an unexpected destination.

It's written in Aiken's typically light and chatty  manner with an ending that brings things to a crashing halt that's made all the more baffling when you realise that this was recorded in 1982 for 'Haunting Tales' a short series for children.

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The Hobbit (Jackanory)

Between the 1st and the 12th of October 1979 Jackanory -  a long running Children's BBC series where actors and authors would read a story directly to camera - the BBC undertook a 10 episode telling of J.R.R. Tolkien's 'The Hobbit'.

To do this director Roger Singleton-Turner turned to his most reliable reader, the man who had very much become the face of the show as well as being the voice of 'The Wombles', Bernard Cribbins here ably supported by the brilliant Maurice Denham, Jan Francis and David Wood.

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Dear John

Here we have a reading of a story by Rosalie Parker (co-publisher of Tartarus Press) of one of the stories from her terrific 2021 collection 'Through the Storm'.

From the video info...
"As executor of his old schoolfriend's estate, Justin is intrigued when he finds a series of letters among the dead man's belongings. Reading them, he uncovers a secret episode from his late friend's past."

The story here is read by Jasper L'Estrange for his EnCrypted Classic Horror channel where you'll find a host of stories both new and old by a cornucopia of Wyrd Britain faves such as M.R. James, Robert Hichens, A.E Coppard, A.M. Burrage, John Howard, Lord Dunsany, May Sinclair and more.

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If you enjoy what we do here on Wyrd Britain and would like to help us continue then we would very much welcome a donation towards keeping the blog going - paypal.me/wyrdbritain

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The Willows

Originally published in 1907 as part of his collection,  'The Listener and Other Stories',  Algernon Blackwood's 'The Willows' has long established itself as a masterpiece of supernatural stories.  It tells of a canoe trip down the Danube and two nights spent on a sandy island amidst the oppressive presence of the willows where the two travellers are subjected to a number of inexplicable experiences.

Famously 'The Willows' was a favourite of H.P. Lovecraft writing in 'Supernatural Horror in Literature', "Here art and restraint in narrative reach their very highest development, and an impression of lasting poignancy is produced without a single strained passage or a single false note".  

This reading was originally aired on BBC7 between 29th of March and the 1st of April 2005 and is read rather wonderfully by Roger Allam who I'm sure many will recognise from his appearences in 'Endeavour', 'V for Vendetta', 'Game of Thrones' and 'The Thick Of It'.

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If you enjoy what we do here on Wyrd Britain and would like to help us continue then we would very much welcome a donation towards keeping the blog going - paypal.me/wyrdbritain

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The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Audiobook

May 25th 
Happy Towel Day.

"More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitch hiker) discovers that a hitchhiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitch hiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitch hiker might accidentally have "lost." What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is, is clearly a man to be reckoned with."

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If you enjoy what we do here on Wyrd Britain and would like to help us continue then we would very much welcome a donation towards keeping the blog going - paypal.me/wyrdbritain

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The Audiobook of the Triffids

“When a day that you happen to know is Wednesday starts off by sounding like Sunday, there is something seriously wrong somewhere.”

No matter how many times I read it that opening line still gives me chills.  I first read Wyndham's masterpiece as a teen having watched and loved the 1981 TV show (US / US) and with little chance then of ever seeing it again.  It was love at first read. In fact, it was love at first sentence.

Over the intervening years (decades) I've read it more times than I care to mention and for some reason that I've never quite worked out but mostly I suspect because I can't walk past a copy I've amassed a collection of 25 different editions of the book including one in Dutch and in case you're wondering, no, not a word.

It's the story of Bill Masen and Josella Playton as they navigate a devastated world full of newly blinded people being occasionally preyed upon by genetically engineered and very murdery walking plants.  Written in the aftermath of the Second World War the book reflects Wyndham's wartime experiences watching over a London devastated by nightly bombings and muses over still depressingly relevant topics such as catastrophic civil breakdown, social change, genetic modification and even satellite warfare.

Buy the book here - UK / US.

Buy the audiobook here - UK - or listen below.



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Associate links are included here for your convenience and to help mitigate the running costs of the zine.
If you enjoy what we do here on Wyrd Britain and would like to help us continue then we would very much welcome a donation towards keeping the blog going - paypal.me/wyrdbritain

The Nightmare Stacks

Charles Stross
Orbit
Recorded Books

Alex Schwartz had a promising future - until he contracted an unfortunate bout of vampirism, and agreed (on pain of death) to join the Laundry, Britain's only counter-occult secret agency.
His first assignment is in Leeds - his old hometown. The thought of telling his parents that he's lost his old job, let alone them finding out about his 'condition', is causing Alex more anxiety than learning how to live as a vampire secret agent preparing to confront multiple apocalypses.His only saving grace is Cassie Brewer, a student appearing in the local Goth Festival, who flirts with him despite his awkward personality and massive amounts of sunblock.
But Cassie has secrets of her own - secrets that make Alex's night life seem positively normal .

Let me start by saying Gideon Emery has ruined these books.  I tried reading one recently and just couldn't do it without my internal monologue defaulting to a piss poor imitation of his voice and so I had to give up and revert back to the fantastic audio versions that he reads.

'The Nightmare Stacks' is another Bob-less Laundry book and one that's going to blow the whole secret open as Britain is invaded by magical elfy types from another dimension.

The story follows Alex Schwartz one of the newly recruited 'Phangs' (vampires) - left over from a previous novel - as he scouts a new Laundry headquarters in Leeds.  The book is very much in the tradition of the series - lots of policy wonking - and tapping into a particular literary trope - in this case the fantasy novel - but like the superhero one that preceded it things have gone really overt as the endgame comes slowly into sight.  I'm not entirely in favour of this as I do prefer the more covert side of things and I think this and it's predecessor have been by far the weakest books in the series but Stross is an eminently readable (Damn you Emery!) listenable writer and this series is pretty much always a delight to read / hear.

Buy it here - The Nightmare Stacks: A Laundry Files novel

The Fenstanton Witch

I  recently stumbled upon this M. R. James story in an anthology called 'Tales of Witchcraft' edited by the late, great Richard Dalby which was the first time the story had appeared in print in a book.  Subsequent collected editions of James' stories have included the story but as mine predates 'Tales of Witchcraft' this came as a very nice surprise indeed.

The story tells of the efforts of two teachers at King's College, Cambridge and their attempt to harness the powers of a recently killed witch for their own nefarious ends.

The recording is taken from 'The Complete Ghost Stories of M. R. James: Volume 2' (Buy it here) and is read here by David Collings who some of you may know as 'Silver' in 'Sapphire and Steel' and also as the English language voice of the titular character in 'Monkey', the theme tune to which I'm sure has just earwormed it's way into your head (it's in the link back there if you want to hear it).  He is an excellent reader and his many years of experience with companies such as the National Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company means his delivery is spot on and he gives the story (and the others in the set) just the right level of gravitas.

Enjoy.

The Rhesus Chart

Charles Stross
Orbit Books
Audible

London can drain the life out of you...
Bob Howard is an intelligence agent working his way through the ranks of the top secret government agency known as 'the Laundry'. When occult powers threaten the realm, they'll be there to clean up the mess - and deal with the witnesses.
There's one kind of threat that the Laundry has never come across in its many decades, and that's vampires. Mention them to a seasoned agent and you'll be laughed out of the room.
But when a small team of investment bankers at one of Canary Wharf's most distinguished financial institutions discovers an arcane algorithm that leaves them fearing daylight and craving O positive, someone doesn't want the Laundry to know. And Bob gets caught right in the middle.
The Rhesus Chart is a brand new supernatural thriller from Charles Stross, and sees hacker-turned-spy Bob Howard take on the (literal) bloodsuckers running London's financial district.

Charles Stross

Now here's one I've been waiting for.  I've absolutely loved these Laundry books from Stross but with the exception of one short story about unicorns I've never read one.  Instead I'm utterly besotted by the audiobook versions as read by Gideon Emery.

This time out Bob finds his newly promoted self hunting for vampires and finding a figure from his past just as his present starts to fracture alarmingly.

As ever with this series much of the time is spent exploring the bureaucracy of the Laundry and, in this case, the feasibility of vampirism.  In both cases it is inordinate amounts of geeky fun.

Gideon Emery

The story as a whole is perhaps less expansive and absorbing than some of it's predecessors and the identity of the big bad is perhaps a tad obvious but as a romp it is romptous indeed particularly during the game changing finale.

As ever I'm leaving one of these Laundry books desperately craving more but this time in the sad knowledge that one of my favourite modes of address will likely be absent from here on - although I sincerely hope not.

Buy it here - The Rhesus Chart: A Laundry Files novel

NB - My write-up of the rest of the series can be found here.

Christopher Lee reads 'The Black Cat'

27th May 2015, the day after what would have been Peter Cushing's 102nd birthday is Christopher Lee's 93rd birthday.

The mischievous part of me thought to just repost yesterday's Dracula blog but instead I thought I'd make something more of it and take the opportunity to share with you his reading of Edgar Allan Poe's 'The Black Cat'.

Lee was born in Belgravia, London in 1922 took up acting after the war and appeared as a supporting actor in some 30 films before landing the part that would in many ways define his career, as the creature in Hammer's 'The Curse of Frankenstein' alongside Peter Cushing's Baron.

Roles as Dracula, both Sherlock & Mycroft Holmes, Duc de Richleau, Fu Manchu, The Mummy, Lord Summerisle and many more followed including major roles in some of the key movie franchises of recent years as Bond villain Scaramanga in the 'The Man with the Golden Gun', Saruman in both 'The Lord of the Rings' and 'The Hobbit' trilogies and as Count Dooku in Star Wars episodes 2 and 3.

Seemingly never one to take time off Lee has also provided his uniquely distinctive voice to documentaries, animations, games, a series of heavy metal albums and happily for us here a selection of literary readings.

Sir Christopher Lee we at Wyrd Britain raise a glass to you and wish you the happiest of birthdays.

The House on the Borderland (audiobook)

William Hope Hodgson

A manuscript is found: filled with small, precise writing and smelling of pit-water, it tells the story of an old recluse and his strange home - and its even stranger, jade-green double, seen by the recluse on an otherworldly plain where gigantic gods and monsters roam.
Soon his more earthly home is no less terrible than his bizarre vision, as swine-like creatures boil from a cavern beneath the ground and besiege it. But a still greater horror will face the recluse - more inexorable, merciless and awful than any creature that can be fought or killed.

'The House on the Borderland'  tells of two men on a fishing holiday in Ireland who discover, in the ruins of a house near a great lake, a book which they take home and read. The book tells of the experiences of the, un-named, owner of, what must be assumed to be, the ruined house, his housekeeper sister, Mary and his dog Pepper. Over the course of the narrative several odd and, for the most part, deeply unpleasant events befall him such as his journey to 'the plain of silence' with it's surrounding mountains and their giant statues of gods, beasts and demons, his bedevilment on several occasions by swine creatures (similar to the one featured in the later Carnacki story, 'The Hog') and his witnessing of the end of the world.

It's beautifully imagined and you can feel the impact that the story had on the fiction to follow particularly on authors such as Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith.  Throughout the novel Hodgson deft storytelling keeps you unsure as to whether the reclusive houseowner is having a truly horrendous time at the mercy of the supernatural or if he is utterly insane and having delusional psychotic episodes.  The joy is that whichever way you decide the story is going it remains equally enjoyable.

Thomas Carnacki: The Gateway of the Monster

William Hope Hodgson

This is an audio version of one of my favourite of Hodgon's 9 Carnacki stories, read by Ian Hodgson (of Moon Wiring Club) with (fabulous) music by Jon Brooks (of The Advisory Circle) and can be heard and downloaded - for free - as part of the Weird Tales for Winter series curated by Jonny Mugwump.

Carnacki was an Edwardian era supernatural investigator who appeasred in 9 short stories in the early 20th century.  This particular story concerns a haunted room which Carnacki is engaged to investigate.  He unwisely spends two nights in the room. On both occasions being attacked by a giant spectral hand from which he only narrowly escapes.

For those unfamiliar with the joys of Carnacki this will be a fun first encounter and for those in the know this will provide an enjoyable re-acquaintance.

Above and beyond the words though is the frankly astounding incidental music from Jon Brooks.  Here he has produced a set of steampunk radiophonics utilising contemporary instruments such as the harpsichord to produce music that is both utterly at home in the story and deliciously and decidedly creepy.

part 1
part 2
the music

The Ocean at the End of the Lane

Neil Gaiman

(Headline)

(HarperAudio)

Every now and again it's fun to dip into Gaiman's worlds and see what he's been up to. This one is fairly safe ground for him telling - in flashback - the story of the time when he and the family of 3 ladies who lived down the end of the lane accidentally brought a grey thing into the world and then sent it away again.

In a lot of ways it felt like a kids book but with some decidedly adult scenes dotted throughout. The version I got was the audiobook as read by the author and it was, as you'd expect, nicely done and it very much lent an extra autobiographical feel to the proceedings in support of the first person narrative.

It was an enjoyable trip, not for me on a par with his best but still bags of fun.

Unearthing

Alan Moore
Top Shelf Productions and Knockabout

This was an utterly astounding audiobook read by the man himself with music from a variety of experimental musicians including Justin Broadrick, Stuart Braithwaite & Mike Patton.

The story or let's say narrative concerns the biography of friend and fellow comic writer Steve Moore. It is an examination of both man and place and the very personal forms of magick that these things conjure up.

Steve Moore it transpires has lived in the same house his entire life. The house is situated on Shooters Hill in London and in typical Alan Moore fashion this location becomes as central to the narrative as Steve Moore is.

Steve Moore (R.I.P.)

As a biography it's a tale of a life defined by a series of obsessions - sci-fi, arcana, writing - that would, in lesser hands, be a fairly tedious read. In Alan Moore's hands however (and with the beautifully subtle background music) it becomes a lyrical and evocative dance through passion and loss, obsession and loneliness, creativity and magick.

Absolutely superb.