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claire1044's review
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
internetspacegirl's review against another edition
3.0
a nice little collection of horror stories about london (some fiction, some non-fiction) that i read in about 4 hours - not sure whether that's slow, fast, or average but its fine - on my train to Manchester.
It's nothing revolutionary or especially scary but it was a nice read and something to pass the time :)
It's nothing revolutionary or especially scary but it was a nice read and something to pass the time :)
izzardus's review against another edition
mysterious
slow-paced
3.0
A mishmash of various excerpts which have that in common that they are set in London and have a mysterious air. I found that the excerpts varied a lot in style and content, which is to be expected when they're from such different time periods and authors, so it didn't always feel like there was much of an overall consistency. Keep in mind that I am probably biased by the fact that I am not actually a fan of horror stories, but I still found it an interesting read (they weren't very horror-like in the contemporarysense), but I probably wouldn't read it again. Though I will say that it certainly is a good way to get a taste of each author to see if you want to read more from them.
fruitkate's review against another edition
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.0
fictionfan's review against another edition
3.0
A question of expectations…
An anthology of horror stories on the theme of London Fog had my anticipation levels high. The introduction is interesting, so long as you can tolerate the lit-crit language, where words like “gender” and “other” are used as verbs. Dearnley discusses the “transgressive” nature of horror and how fog could be used either literally or metaphorically.
There are fourteen titles listed in the index, although it transpires that several aren’t stories, but essays or extracts from writers such as Sam Selvon, Virginia Woolf, et al. Also, several – both stories and essays – mention fog barely or not at all, and occasionally barely mention London either. It’s a question of expectations – when an anthology is subtitled “Eerie Tales from the Weird City” and titled “Into the London Fog”, then my pedantic mind expects fourteen eerie, weird tales with something to do with London fog. The result was that I found this collection disappointing, even although there are a few good stories in it.
Here’s a flavour of the entries I enjoyed most:
The Demon Lover by Elizabeth Bowen – this story about a woman returning to her closed-up London home during the Blitz is excellent – atmospheric, evocative and scary! I posted about it earlier in Tuesday Terror!
N by Arthur Machen – this lives up to the book’s subtitle, falling distinctly into the definition of weird. Three old men discuss a place in Stoke Newington called Canon’s Park. One tells of a man who saw it and described it as a place of great, almost impossible, beauty. But another of the old men remembers the place from his youth, and declares it to be nothing more than a district of streets and houses. The third man investigates, and finds the place is connected to strange and spooky events! Machen is a great writer, and here he gives some excellent depictions of old London and a tale that is odd, ambiguous and well told.
My Girl and the City by Sam Selvon – despite my annoyance at the inclusion of extracts and essays, I must admit I loved this piece. It’s a reflection on Selvon’s love of London, and the difficulty for a writer of finding a way to write about something that has already been experienced by so many and written about so often before. It is beautifully written – a love poem to his girl and to the city.
Overall, this one didn’t hit the mark for me because it didn’t meet my expectations of it. However, if the idea of a mix of horror and literary essays and extracts appeals to you, then it may work better for you.
NB This book was provided for review by the publisher, the British Library.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
An anthology of horror stories on the theme of London Fog had my anticipation levels high. The introduction is interesting, so long as you can tolerate the lit-crit language, where words like “gender” and “other” are used as verbs. Dearnley discusses the “transgressive” nature of horror and how fog could be used either literally or metaphorically.
There are fourteen titles listed in the index, although it transpires that several aren’t stories, but essays or extracts from writers such as Sam Selvon, Virginia Woolf, et al. Also, several – both stories and essays – mention fog barely or not at all, and occasionally barely mention London either. It’s a question of expectations – when an anthology is subtitled “Eerie Tales from the Weird City” and titled “Into the London Fog”, then my pedantic mind expects fourteen eerie, weird tales with something to do with London fog. The result was that I found this collection disappointing, even although there are a few good stories in it.
Here’s a flavour of the entries I enjoyed most:
The Demon Lover by Elizabeth Bowen – this story about a woman returning to her closed-up London home during the Blitz is excellent – atmospheric, evocative and scary! I posted about it earlier in Tuesday Terror!
N by Arthur Machen – this lives up to the book’s subtitle, falling distinctly into the definition of weird. Three old men discuss a place in Stoke Newington called Canon’s Park. One tells of a man who saw it and described it as a place of great, almost impossible, beauty. But another of the old men remembers the place from his youth, and declares it to be nothing more than a district of streets and houses. The third man investigates, and finds the place is connected to strange and spooky events! Machen is a great writer, and here he gives some excellent depictions of old London and a tale that is odd, ambiguous and well told.
My Girl and the City by Sam Selvon – despite my annoyance at the inclusion of extracts and essays, I must admit I loved this piece. It’s a reflection on Selvon’s love of London, and the difficulty for a writer of finding a way to write about something that has already been experienced by so many and written about so often before. It is beautifully written – a love poem to his girl and to the city.
Overall, this one didn’t hit the mark for me because it didn’t meet my expectations of it. However, if the idea of a mix of horror and literary essays and extracts appeals to you, then it may work better for you.
NB This book was provided for review by the publisher, the British Library.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
pinkalpaca's review
4.0
~The Telegram - Violet Hunt 3*
~In the Seance Room - Lettice Galbraith 4*
~The Demon Lover - Elizabeth Bowen 4*
~The Truth, the Whole Truth and Nothing But the Truth - Rhoda Broughton 2*
~War - Thomas Burke 5*
~Street Haunting - Virginia Woolf 5*
~Pugilist Vs. Poet - Claude McKay 4*
~N - Arthur Machen 3*
~The Lodger - Marie Belloc Lowndes 5*
~My Girl and the City - Sam Selvon 5*
~The Mystery of the Semi-Detached - Edith Nesbit 3*
~The Old House in Vauxhall Walk - Charlotte Riddell 4*
~The Chippendale Mirror - E.F. Benson 3*
~Spring-Heeled Jack - Anonymous 4*
~In the Seance Room - Lettice Galbraith 4*
~The Demon Lover - Elizabeth Bowen 4*
~The Truth, the Whole Truth and Nothing But the Truth - Rhoda Broughton 2*
~War - Thomas Burke 5*
~Street Haunting - Virginia Woolf 5*
~Pugilist Vs. Poet - Claude McKay 4*
~N - Arthur Machen 3*
~The Lodger - Marie Belloc Lowndes 5*
~My Girl and the City - Sam Selvon 5*
~The Mystery of the Semi-Detached - Edith Nesbit 3*
~The Old House in Vauxhall Walk - Charlotte Riddell 4*
~The Chippendale Mirror - E.F. Benson 3*
~Spring-Heeled Jack - Anonymous 4*
velocitygirl14's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.0
amalia1985's review
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
‘’Like London fog itself, the power of the weird tale lies in its potential to suddenly shift from benign to baleful as the light changes. The stories in this collection all invite you to make your way through the smoke to take a closer look at some of the more uncanny corners of the city, just out of sight - but all you need to do is turn into a sidestreet, or look up, or down.’’
‘’What dangers linger just outside the apparent safety of an ordinary London terrace, hidden by fog, darkness, or simply the anonymity of the city? And what happens when the safe and sinister sides of London meet?’’
Elizabeth Dearnley
Through the fog and the dim glow of the streetlamps, the full moon glimmering on Father Thames, London rises. The metropolis in all its haunting, haunted, eerie glory. Its history, its mythology, its folklore, its secrets. Yes, Jack the Ripper gets all the twisted glory but what about Spring-Heeled Jack, the haunted houses, the eerie gardens, the moments that are frozen in the past only to be experienced by unaware passers-by? In this mesmerizing collection, beautifully edited and introduced by Elizabeth Dearnley, London rises from the fog and the mist. Don’t be afraid to answer its call…
Temple
The Telegram (Violent Hunt): A charismatic socialite faces the world alone after the death of her mother. Fervently hostile to marriage yet attracted to flirting, she has a faithful admirer that refuses to give up. And then something changes…Bottom line? Don’t toy with people’s feelings.
Regent’s Park
In the Séance Room (Lettice Galbraith): A prominent doctor cannot escape the wrath of a revenant that exposes a cruel injustice. Séance stories always exert an eerie power on the reader and this one is no exception.
‘’It was late August; it had been a steamy, showery day:At the moment the trees down the pavement glittered in an escape of humid yellow afternoon sun. Against the next batch of clouds, already piling up ink-dark, broken chimneys and parapets stood out. In her once familiar street, as in any unused channel, an unfamiliar queerness had silted up; a cat wove itself in and out of railings, but no human eye watched Mrs. Drover’s return.’’
Kensington
The Demon Lover (Elizabeth Bowen): A married woman receives a strange message. A return from the past, a jealous lover is about to find her. A meeting she has reasons to dread…An atmospheric, quintessentially British Gothic tale.
Mayfair
The Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing but the Truth (Rhoda Broughton): All Cecilia wanted was to find a Mayfair house. And she did find one. An opportunity too good to be true…
Soho
War - Extract from London in my Time (Thomas Burke): A problematic when viewed by today’s standards yet no less enticing account of Limehouse and its mysteries during the First World War blackouts.
‘’No one perhaps has ever felt passionately towards a lead pencil. But there are circumstances in which it can become supremely desirable to possess one; moments when we are set upon having an object, an excuse for walking half across London between tea and dinner.’’
‘’The hour should be the evening and the season winter, for in winter the champagne brightness of the air and the sociability of the streets are grateful. We are not then taunted as in the summer by the longing for shade and solitude and sweet airs from the hayfields. The evening hour, too, gives us the irresponsibility which darkness and lamplight bestow. We are no longer quite ourselves.’’
The Strand
Street Haunting (Virginia Woolf): The great writer composes an acute, haunting, even sad observation of the residents of the metropolis during the 1920s and an ode to the secret lives of readers. Where can the search for a pencil bring you? What secrets are lurking during the tender and mystical evening hour? London! Oh, London of mysteries!
Holborn
Pugilist Vs Poet - Extract from A Long Way from Home (Claude McKay): McKay narrates a moving account of the racism and cruelty within the bounds of the modern city.
Stoke Newington
N (Arthur Machen): An exciting story about a vanishing landscape, the visions created by a foggy winter’s night and the eerie phenomenon of spectral urban areas.
Whitechapel
The Lodger (Marie Belloc Lowndes): Well, it is Whitechapel, people. And what does come to mind when we stumble upon the word ‘’Whitechapel’’? Yes, exactly. Who is the Lodger of our story? How can you know the secrets your neighbour is harbouring most successfully?
Waterloo
My Girl and the City ( Sam Selvon): The relationship between two youths becomes a metaphor for the city that nurtures and deprives, the beehive that shelters and exposes.
‘’He was waiting for her; he had been waiting an hour and a half in a dusty suburban lane, with a row of big elms on one side and some eligible building sites on the other - and far away to the south-west the twinkling yellow lights of the Crystal Palace. It was not quiet like a country lane, for it had a pavement and lamp-posts, but it was not a bad place for a meeting all the same; and farther up, towards the cemetery, it was really quite rural, and almost pretty, especially in twilight. But twilight had long deepened into night, and still he waited.’’
Crystal Palace
The Mystery of the Semi-Detached (Edith Nesbit): The eerie Crystal Palace becomes the setting for mysterious omens and ominous visions that may or may not come to fruition…
Vauxhall
The Old House in Vauxhall Walk (Charlotte Riddell): A homeless young man finds refuge in a house which has an eerie reputation. His life will be altered in mysterious ways…
Putney & Bloomsbury
The Chippendale Manor (E.F.Benson): Bohemian Bloomsbury hides quite a lot of treasures. However, antiques can become dangerous and mirrors should always be approached with caution.
Peckham
Spring-Heeled Jack (Anonymous): In 1838, the first Victorian urban legend found its representation in the mysterious (and numerous) accounts of citizens who had witnessed the annoying (to put it mildly…) presence of Spring-Heeled Jack a.k.a. The Devil.
Others can keep their Rome and Paris. I’ll have my foggy, smoggy, eerie, haunting London and its mysticism until I die.
‘’One must have a thought - where buildings and the shadows of them encroach the railway tracks. Now the train crawls across the bridges, dark steel in the darkness: the thoughtful gloom of Waterloo: Charing Cross Bridge, Thames reflecting lights, and the silhouettes of the city buildings against the sky of the night.’’
My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.wordpress.com/
tierneyspence's review
dark
informative
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
4.0