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Smee & Other Stories
Alfred McLelland Burrage was born in 1889. His father and uncle were both writers, primarily of boy’s fiction, and by age 16 AM Burrage had joined them and quickly became a master of the market publishing his stories regularly across a number of publications. By the start of the Great War Burrage was well established but in 1916 he was conscripted to fight on the Western Front, his experiences becoming the classic book War is War by Ex-Private X. For the remainder of his life Burrage was rarely printed in book form but continued to write and be published on a prodigious scale in magazines and newspapers. His supernatural stories are, by common consent, some of the best ever written. Succinct yet full of character each reveals a twist and a flavour that is unsettling…..sometimes menacing….always disturbing. In this volume we bring you – Smee, The Last of the Kerstons, Someone in the Room, The Shadowy Escort, The Garden in Glenister Square, The Affair at Paddock Cross, Auntie Kate, The Lady of The Elms, The Supernatural in Fiction & Un-Paying Guests
98 pages, Paperback
First published October 25, 2013
About the author
A.M. Burrage
137 books33 followersAlfred McLelland Burrage (1889-1956) was a British writer. He was noted in his time as an author of fiction for boys which he published under the pseudonym Frank Lelland, including a popular series called "Tufty". Burrage is now remembered mainly for his horror fiction.
Source: Wikipedia
Source: Wikipedia
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 24, 2019
Complaints concerning the layout of the book itself.....none of the pages were numbered, which was a little disconcerting....and i counted at least 6 typos in the text....I assume - but don't know, that this collection is POD.....I know amazon has at least 9 other volumes....
This slim volume consists of 8 supernatural tales, along with two non-fiction pieces: "The Supernantual in Fiction (not the Lovecraft essay) and Unpayiing Guests", with a brief biography of Burrage at the end.
Seven of the stories are commonplace, in my opinion. The centerpeice of the collection is "Smee", which occurs at a Christmas "house party", wherein a game similar to hide and seek is played, with the addition of another player who is no onger alive. Recommended for this story alone.
Jeff McIntosh
This slim volume consists of 8 supernatural tales, along with two non-fiction pieces: "The Supernantual in Fiction (not the Lovecraft essay) and Unpayiing Guests", with a brief biography of Burrage at the end.
Seven of the stories are commonplace, in my opinion. The centerpeice of the collection is "Smee", which occurs at a Christmas "house party", wherein a game similar to hide and seek is played, with the addition of another player who is no onger alive. Recommended for this story alone.
Jeff McIntosh
Want to Read
May 4, 2020PLACEHOLDER REVIEW:
"The Garden in Glenister Square" is an oddly sprawling "weird tale" (vaguely reminiscent of "The Playground" by Ray Bradbury) as an old man, nearing the end of his life, ends up residing in the titular (once ritzy, now seedy) housing complex he grew up in - which brings back memories of his old school chums, games, crushes and the "It" that supposedly lurked in the shrubbery. And now, reflecting on his past, he finds himself transported back there - but all is not as it seems or seemed at the time. Not bad, a bit familiar, but it has some moving moments and the strangely mercurial aspect of "It" was intriguing.
"The Affair At Paddock Cross" - following a deadly road accident, a man awakens to find himself guest of Lord Stevenbury, the other victim in the crash. But as he spends days in the drunken, gambling lifestyle of his Lordship, he finds himself attracted to the Lady Stevenbury, who puts up with such dissolution with fortitude, and eventually they fall in love and Stevenbury challenges our protagonist to a duel... Well, this is a bit of a familiar thing - a parallel time/reincarnation theme involving illicit affairs and lost loves, although I give it credit for it being an interesting variant of the idea.
"The Shadowy Escort" by A. M. Burrage - the attempt to discover a cipher system for his detective novels leads a man into contact with a spirit from his war past that desires vengeance. I liked this - it's in some way a typical "modern" British ghost story in the Benson/Fryer/Burrage mold, but the beginning is a nice bit of wrong-footing (great opening line), and the ending is concise.
"The Garden in Glenister Square" is an oddly sprawling "weird tale" (vaguely reminiscent of "The Playground" by Ray Bradbury) as an old man, nearing the end of his life, ends up residing in the titular (once ritzy, now seedy) housing complex he grew up in - which brings back memories of his old school chums, games, crushes and the "It" that supposedly lurked in the shrubbery. And now, reflecting on his past, he finds himself transported back there - but all is not as it seems or seemed at the time. Not bad, a bit familiar, but it has some moving moments and the strangely mercurial aspect of "It" was intriguing.
"The Affair At Paddock Cross" - following a deadly road accident, a man awakens to find himself guest of Lord Stevenbury, the other victim in the crash. But as he spends days in the drunken, gambling lifestyle of his Lordship, he finds himself attracted to the Lady Stevenbury, who puts up with such dissolution with fortitude, and eventually they fall in love and Stevenbury challenges our protagonist to a duel... Well, this is a bit of a familiar thing - a parallel time/reincarnation theme involving illicit affairs and lost loves, although I give it credit for it being an interesting variant of the idea.
"The Shadowy Escort" by A. M. Burrage - the attempt to discover a cipher system for his detective novels leads a man into contact with a spirit from his war past that desires vengeance. I liked this - it's in some way a typical "modern" British ghost story in the Benson/Fryer/Burrage mold, but the beginning is a nice bit of wrong-footing (great opening line), and the ending is concise.
November 3, 2015
Another entertaining volume of fantasy stories by Burrage. To tell the truth I have never felt the chill that came from M.R.James or E.F.Benson, from Burrage's stories. What important in these are the characters, soldiers, lawyers, poets, lost souls, reporters all these coming a British society long gone. There are,haunted house,curses,ghosts,menaces that fill the landscape.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews