Showing results by narrator "Cathy Dobson" in All Categories

Lady Bessie Kyffin-Taylor was an English writer famous for her outstanding supernatural stories which were published in a single volume in 1920, just two years before her death. Room Number Ten tells the story of Peter Maxton, a literary gentleman invited to join a house party at a remote house in Scotland. The driver taking him to the house from the station comments that the house is full, and they may have to use room number 10, and he pities whoever has to sleep there.

William Wymark Jacobs (1863 - 1943) was an English author of short stories and novels. His most popular works in the early part of the last century were his humorous tales set around the docks of Wapping and in the tap-room of the infamous Cauliflower tavern. Many of his stories were written in a Cockney vernacular and were keenly observant of character. His most famous horror stories are "The Monkey's Paw" and "His Brother's Keeper" both of which have been included in numerous anthologies.

A gripping collection of classic stories in which the central figures are highly dangerous female characters - ranging from the creepy and unsettling to the utterly terrifying.

'Gambler's Luck' tells the story of a young German baron who is enjoying a streak of beginner's luck at the gambling tables. As his winnings mount up, the young man is gradually becoming sucked into the addictive habit of gambling. One night a stranger appears at the gambling table and watches the baron intently. The stranger appears night after night, until the baron is infuriated and challenges the man. A later chance meeting between the two results in the stranger relating a most unusual and gripping tale....

'Mustapha' is a ghost story set in Egypt during Victorian times. Mustapha has taken a solemn vow to avoid alcohol. A British tourist trying to make a fool of the locals tricks him into drinking brandy. What seems to the Englishman a trivial prank has terrible consequences for Mustapha...and his ghost is determined to exact its revenge....

'Number Fifty-Six' is a humorous tale of a Chinese laundryman who gets to know his clients through their laundry habits. He is able to infer much from the state of the various shirts, handkerchiefs, waistcoats which are delivered to him for washing. Of all his clients he is most fascinated by number 56...a man with strangely fluctuating shirt habits. And then one fateful day, a dreadful set of laundry is delivered to him....

'The Magic H's' is a humorous tale of a young, rich, eligible and attractive young aristocrat: Harald Hipperholme. Tragically, the young man suffers a speech impediment - he is unable to pronounce the letter H - which in polite London society amounts to social death. The young earl sounds more like a Cockney without his H's. He resorts in the first place to elocution lessons but with no success. Then he tries black magic and conjures up a demon who agrees to help him. But of course there is a terrible catch to the deal....

'The Brazen Serpent' is an unusual crime story in that it is told from the perspective of the criminal. Danby, a young engineer and hobby metalsmith has just escaped from prison and is in search of a way to make a living while on the run. His friend Parmenter, a collector of antiquities and owner of a rare and valuable medallion which is his most prized possession, offers him a position running an antiques business he has just acquired.

Thirty little gems by some of the world's great classic short story writers, including: 'The Flying Man' by H. G. Wells, 'Between Rounds' by O. Henry, 'A School Story' by M. R. James, 'A Pair of Silk Stockings' by Kate Chopin, 'A Deal in Ostriches' by H. G. Wells, 'The Piano Next Door' by Elia W. Peattie, 'Royal Visitors' by E. F. Benson, 'The Stolen Bacillus' by H. G. Wells, 'The Story of Chugoro' by Lafcadio Hearn, 'One Law for the Rich' by Stacy Aumonier, 'My Enemy and Myself' by Vincent O'Sullivan and more.

A Keen Sense of Rumour is a tongue-in-cheek love story with strong elements of a bedroom farce. Kenneth Harvey, a notorious philanderer and proficient golfer is on holiday with a group of friends. His roving eye is drawn to a pretty girl who is staying at the same hotel. After a day of golf, Kenneth leaves the billiard room to have an early night - though his friends think it more likely that this is a pretext for some amorous adventure and take it upon themselves to catch him out.

Arthur Jermyn is the story of a baronet with an interest in anthropology who sets out to solve the mystery of what his great, great, great grandfather discovered in the Congo many years earlier. The family stories were very peculiar and the old ancestor had gone mad and been locked up in an asylum...but when on an expedition to the Congo Arthur Jermyn finally met someone claiming to be able to solve the mystery, he anticipated great things.

The Yellow Drawing Room is a story told through the eyes of an archetypical Victorian gentleman. He has met and fallen under the spell of the beautiful Vanora Haydon. Vanora has been given permission to decorate and furnish a drawing room and has chosen to do so in brilliant yellow. She has created her own room, reflective of her own personality and individuality - something which the conservative narrator cannot cope with.

Ten classic short stories from the quills of great bird-loving authors.

Sir Henry Rider Haggard (1856 - 1925), known as H. Rider Haggard, was an English writer of adventure stories, often set in exotic locations, especially Africa, and a pioneer of the Lost World literary genre. Only a Dream is a ghost story about the strange experience of a widower about to remarry, who is visited on the eve of his wedding by the ghastly apparition of his dead first wife.

Lady Bessie Kyffin-Taylor was an English writer famous for her outstanding supernatural stories, which were published in a single volume in 1920, just two years before her death. The Twins is one of Kyffin-Taylor's most famous novelettes. It tells the bizarre tale of identical twin brothers. One brother is hell-bent on evil and constantly contrives to ensure his twin is blamed for his ill-doing.

Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton (1857-1946) was a prominent and prolific American author of novels, short stories, essays, and articles for magazines and newspapers on such issues as feminism, politics and war.

Mary Cholmondeley (1859-1925) was an English novelist and short story writer. 'Let Loose' is a supernatural ghost story where a young architect wishes to research a unique fresco in the crypt of a remote and ancient parish church in Yorkshire. The parish clergyman is remarkably reluctant to hand over the keys to the crypt and sets some odd conditions to their use. On the subsequent days after the young architect has opened the crypt, terrible and mysterious deaths begin to plague the village.

Elia Wilkinson Peattie (1862-1935) was a prolific American author, journalist and critic. Although she left school at 14, she was enormously talented, and by her 20s she was well established as a writer of short stories. 'A Child of the Rain' is an eerie, poignant, supernatural tale about a strange, destitute child who appears spectrally on a late-night streetcar.

Nikolai Gogol (1809-1852) was a preeminent Ukrainian-born story writer. He is particularly famous for those stories which veer in the direction of surrealism and the grotesque. The Cloak is one such tale. Akaky Akakiyevich is a reclusive and widely ridiculed lower official whose job is to copy letters. He lives a hand-to-mouth existence with his elderly landlady and has little money. But the harsh weather in St. Petersburg necessitates the purchase of a new cloak.

Edward Frederic Benson (1867 - 1940) was an English novelist, biographer, memoirist, archaeologist and short story writer, best known as the true master of the gothic occult story. Gavon's Eve is a terrifying story of mysterious occult devil worship and witchcraft which pervades a remote rural district in Great Britain.