The Vampire Stories of ... (1997)
Mar 24, 2007 11:52:10 GMT -5
Post by Gloomy Sundae on Mar 24, 2007 11:52:10 GMT -5
The Vampire Stories of R. Chetwynd -Hayes ed., Stephen Jones (Fedogan & Bremer, 1997: as Looking For Something To Suck, Robert Hale, 1998)
Brian Lumley - Foreword: Never Had an Idea in His Life!
My Mother Married A Vampire
A Family Welcome
Rudolph
The Labyrinth
The Sad Vampire
Amelia
Acquiring a Family
The Buck
Keep the Gaslight Burning
Birth
Louis
Looking for Something to Suck
Great-Grandad Walks Again
The Fundemental Elemental
The Werewolf and the Vampire
Stephen Jones - Afterword: Never Beastly to Vampires
Blurb:
"R. Chetwynd-Hayes ranks as one of England's finest practitioners of the art of horror fiction... his prose displays a crisp sophistication and, often, a macabre sense of humour to prove that the author is a major stylist in his own right."
-Karl Edward Wagner.
The Vampire Stories of R. Chetwynd-Hayes collects together for the first time fifteen tales by the award-winning British author, including such classics as "My Mother Married a Vampire", "The Labyrinth", "Birth", "Looking for Something to Suck" and "The Werewolf and the Vampire", plus a brand-new tale written especially for this volume featuring Frances St. Clare, the World's only Practicing Psychic Detective, and his assistant Frederica Masters, better known as Fred.
With these stories, Ronald Chetwynd-Hayes masterfully blends horror and humour as he introduces the reader to a cleaning woman who discovers she is working for Dracula's son; a couple trapped in a house created by the mind of a centuries-old vampire;a young boy whose ancestor is depressed by his undead existence;a creature of darkness that sucks the life-force from its victims, and the unusual offspring of a werewolf and a vampire who is threatened by an obsessed clergyman.
With an original introduction by Brian Lumley, author of the bestselling Necroscope series, and an exclusive interview with the author about his vampire stories, fans fo the undead are in for a fang-tastic treat...
Warning: There are one or several spoilers in this post.
My Mother Married A Vampire:: Domestic bliss in the suburban household of the Count and Countess De Suc-Little and son Marvin is threatened by the unwelcome attentions of the blood squad, 'the Bleeney', led by an over-zealous Priest. Reverend Pickering nails his man, but the vampire Count has the last laugh. This one formed the basis for a 'comedy' episode in Milton Subotsky's The Monster Club, though it's from another RCH collection, 1978's "The Cradle Demon."
Looking For Something To Suck:: One of his scariest and best. A vampire shadow, vulnerable only to the light, enters the Wilton's house in search of it's feed. Despite the protests of his wife Jane, a psychic who senses something terrible is about to happen, Tony insists on turning out all the lights when they retire to bed. When he awakens and turns on the light, he wishes he hadn't ...
Great-Grandad Walks Again:: A vampire with false teeth, one of whose arms is permanently set in a gesture akin to a fascist salute. Oh, and he sleeps in a bath-tub full of whiskey.
Grandma refuses to bury her dead husband so, rather than risk disinheritance, the rest of the family decide to pickle him. He rampages around the house at night, looking for someone to suck, but he's been rendered helpless since his first attack when he left his dentures in Uncle George's neck and wasn't able to retrieve them. All ends happily when granddad lands the lead role in the movie I was a Nazi Vampire
"You'll notice the neighbours all look a bit anaemic, which is to be expected, and there was no dialogue worth mentioning. Also, the leading lady screams a lot. That's only to be expected, too."
Rudolph:: A bored 37 year old takes a well-paid position as a general factotum to the old Count who despises his condition and survives entirely on a diet of pigs blood. The girl finally seduces him and falls pregnant.
Things start getting very nasty from here ...
Keep The Gaslight Burning : "Matilda, we are lonely. Come down to us ... come ..". Young Maya enters service as personal companion to Mrs. Maxwell at a remote house on the Yorkshire moors. Her ladyship keeps a lamp burning throughout the night to fend off the ghosts of her husband and his lover, who are ever beckoning to her. What did she do to them? "Go to the window, part the curtains ever so slightly - and peer down into the garden." Mayo obeys, and what she sees is far from pleasant ...
Chetwynd-Hayes is as adept at this Upstairs, Downstairs melodrama as Rosemary Timperley and it helps that he plays this one straight and injects it with more suspense than the norm.
Amelia: Anthony Knight finds a man dying of malnutrition in a back alley who warns him: "I'm done for. But you ... you ... you get out of here before she comes." Anthony legs it, but his conscience gets the better of him - what if an ambulance crew could have saved him? He returns to the scene and Greta, an old woman in one of the plush houses invites him in at the request of her invalid charge, the beautiful young Amelia Roland. Anthony is astounded - she is the double of a woman he met once twenty-five years ago and has carried a torch for ever since. Despite falling madly in love with her, something warns him he's in terrible danger. This proves to be the case.
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Brian Lumley - Foreword: Never Had an Idea in His Life!
My Mother Married A Vampire
A Family Welcome
Rudolph
The Labyrinth
The Sad Vampire
Amelia
Acquiring a Family
The Buck
Keep the Gaslight Burning
Birth
Louis
Looking for Something to Suck
Great-Grandad Walks Again
The Fundemental Elemental
The Werewolf and the Vampire
Stephen Jones - Afterword: Never Beastly to Vampires
Blurb:
"R. Chetwynd-Hayes ranks as one of England's finest practitioners of the art of horror fiction... his prose displays a crisp sophistication and, often, a macabre sense of humour to prove that the author is a major stylist in his own right."
-Karl Edward Wagner.
The Vampire Stories of R. Chetwynd-Hayes collects together for the first time fifteen tales by the award-winning British author, including such classics as "My Mother Married a Vampire", "The Labyrinth", "Birth", "Looking for Something to Suck" and "The Werewolf and the Vampire", plus a brand-new tale written especially for this volume featuring Frances St. Clare, the World's only Practicing Psychic Detective, and his assistant Frederica Masters, better known as Fred.
With these stories, Ronald Chetwynd-Hayes masterfully blends horror and humour as he introduces the reader to a cleaning woman who discovers she is working for Dracula's son; a couple trapped in a house created by the mind of a centuries-old vampire;a young boy whose ancestor is depressed by his undead existence;a creature of darkness that sucks the life-force from its victims, and the unusual offspring of a werewolf and a vampire who is threatened by an obsessed clergyman.
With an original introduction by Brian Lumley, author of the bestselling Necroscope series, and an exclusive interview with the author about his vampire stories, fans fo the undead are in for a fang-tastic treat...
Warning: There are one or several spoilers in this post.
My Mother Married A Vampire:: Domestic bliss in the suburban household of the Count and Countess De Suc-Little and son Marvin is threatened by the unwelcome attentions of the blood squad, 'the Bleeney', led by an over-zealous Priest. Reverend Pickering nails his man, but the vampire Count has the last laugh. This one formed the basis for a 'comedy' episode in Milton Subotsky's The Monster Club, though it's from another RCH collection, 1978's "The Cradle Demon."
Looking For Something To Suck:: One of his scariest and best. A vampire shadow, vulnerable only to the light, enters the Wilton's house in search of it's feed. Despite the protests of his wife Jane, a psychic who senses something terrible is about to happen, Tony insists on turning out all the lights when they retire to bed. When he awakens and turns on the light, he wishes he hadn't ...
Great-Grandad Walks Again:: A vampire with false teeth, one of whose arms is permanently set in a gesture akin to a fascist salute. Oh, and he sleeps in a bath-tub full of whiskey.
Grandma refuses to bury her dead husband so, rather than risk disinheritance, the rest of the family decide to pickle him. He rampages around the house at night, looking for someone to suck, but he's been rendered helpless since his first attack when he left his dentures in Uncle George's neck and wasn't able to retrieve them. All ends happily when granddad lands the lead role in the movie I was a Nazi Vampire
"You'll notice the neighbours all look a bit anaemic, which is to be expected, and there was no dialogue worth mentioning. Also, the leading lady screams a lot. That's only to be expected, too."
Rudolph:: A bored 37 year old takes a well-paid position as a general factotum to the old Count who despises his condition and survives entirely on a diet of pigs blood. The girl finally seduces him and falls pregnant.
Things start getting very nasty from here ...
Keep The Gaslight Burning : "Matilda, we are lonely. Come down to us ... come ..". Young Maya enters service as personal companion to Mrs. Maxwell at a remote house on the Yorkshire moors. Her ladyship keeps a lamp burning throughout the night to fend off the ghosts of her husband and his lover, who are ever beckoning to her. What did she do to them? "Go to the window, part the curtains ever so slightly - and peer down into the garden." Mayo obeys, and what she sees is far from pleasant ...
Chetwynd-Hayes is as adept at this Upstairs, Downstairs melodrama as Rosemary Timperley and it helps that he plays this one straight and injects it with more suspense than the norm.
Amelia: Anthony Knight finds a man dying of malnutrition in a back alley who warns him: "I'm done for. But you ... you ... you get out of here before she comes." Anthony legs it, but his conscience gets the better of him - what if an ambulance crew could have saved him? He returns to the scene and Greta, an old woman in one of the plush houses invites him in at the request of her invalid charge, the beautiful young Amelia Roland. Anthony is astounded - she is the double of a woman he met once twenty-five years ago and has carried a torch for ever since. Despite falling madly in love with her, something warns him he's in terrible danger. This proves to be the case.