All Entries Tagged With: "Michael Kelly"
Two New ARCANE WISDOM Titles Now Shipping!
Two New ARCANE WISDOM Titles Now Shipping!
In a small coastal town, an ancient force stirs, drawn by the cumulative power of life and death, grief and sorrow, and, ultimately, endless love.
Ouroboros — life out of death.
Tom Christiansen’s wife of 35-years, Dolly, is dead. His world suddenly shattered, Tom takes refuge in his house to grieve and reflect. Tom’s thin veil of reality and fantasy begins to crack and slip. He hears things: the rusty creak of the backyard swing; the tap of tiny feet from an upstairs room. And he sees things, as well: a small rubber ball bouncing slowly down the stairs; birds like silent sentinels on electrical wires; a strange little pig-tailed girl suddenly appearing in his yard. And what is that mysterious figure lying in the upstairs bed that he used to share with his beloved wife?
Ouroboros — a new cycle has begun.
Tom’s long-time neighbors, and dearest friends, Mick and Robbie Hamlin begun to glimpse strange behavior from grief-stricken Tom. They witness dinner place-settings for two. They hear hushed conversations from the old house, as if Tom is speaking to himself, as if he isn’t alone. There is a pale little girl in the backyard, swinging ceaselessly. And something is rustling in the bushes, peering out from the undergrowth with inquisitive eyes.
Ouroboros — the end is just the beginning.
Each one of the Arcane Wisdom titles will be half bound in exotic cloth and French marbled boards, custom end-papers, color frontis piece, sewn in ribbon marker and either signed by the scholar (on classic titles) who contributed to the edition or author that wrote the piece (if living). We plan on producing four titles a year with this imprint.
Here you will find the most significant contribution of Arthur Machen’s classic tales of dark fantasy and horror. With an introduction by S.T. Joshi who also contributes, notes and a complete Machen bibliography. This is a must have for the Machen enthusiast and Weird Tales collector.
The Great God Pan by Arthur Machen was widely criticized by the press as degenerate and horrific due to its profligate style and sexual content, although since his work has since garnered a reputation as a classic of modern horror.
In Supernatural Horror in Literature H. P. Lovecraft praised the novel, saying: “No one could begin to describe the cumulative suspense and ultimate horror with which every paragraph abounds”; he added that “the sensitive reader” reaches the end with “an appreciative shudder.” Lovecraft also noted, however, that “melodrama is undeniably present, and coincidence is stretched to a length which appears absurd upon analysis.”
Contents:
- Introduction by S. T. Joshi
- Forward by Caitlin R. Kiernan
- The Great God Pan
- The Three Impostors
- Prologue
- Adventure of the Gold Tiberius
- The Encounter of the Pavement
- Novel of the Dark Valley
- Adventure of the Missing Brother
- Novel of the Black Seal
- Incident of the Private Bar
- The Decorative Imagination
- Novel of the Iron Maid
- The Recluse of Bayswater
- Novel of the White Powder
- Strange Occurrence in Clerkenwell
- History of the Young Man with Spectacles
- Adventure of the Deserted Residence
- The Shining Pyramid
- The White People
- A Fragment of Life
- The Bowmen
- Appendix 1: Introduction to The Three Impostors (1923)
- Appendix 2: Introduction to The Angels of Mons (1915)
- Notes
- Bibliography
Two New Titles Announced From Dark Regions Press
UNDERTOW AND OTHER LAMENTS by Michael Kelly (Limited Edition Hardcover)
New short story collection by Michael Kelly!
“Michael Kelly’s characters are the lost, the misbegotten, the lonely and the damaged; and all are searching for a moment of redemption. Whether he intended it or not, the stories in this collection have been arranged not unlike the various movements in a symphony. While he references Vivaldi here, the symphony you’re about to “hear” has more in common with Gustav Mahler, as far as I’m concerned. Undertow and Other Laments left me feeling the same way I felt after first hearing Mahler’s overpowering 1st Symphony; it begins quietly, broodingly, with funereal sorrow, and continues through movements of anger, or triumph, of horror, of sadness, and, in the end, with the glorious title novella, combines all of its themes to produce a heartbreaking summation in the final passages, wherein final redemption may not have been achieved, but its presence is still nearby, somewhere, in the shadows of the human psyche and the undiscovered corners of the spirit.”
–Gary Braunbeck, from his introduction “Silent Sorrow in Empty Boats”
If you are interested in the Deluxe edition of this title click here: UNDERTOW AND OTHER LAMENTS by Michael Kelly (Deluxe Edition Hardcover)
THOUGHT FORMS follows the alternating stories of two cousins stalked by mysterious enemies bent on their destruction…
Ray is a lonely young worker in a leather goods factory, whose parents were murdered by unknown assailants when he was just a child. Now, years later, having moved into the same remote house in which the murders occurred, Ray becomes increasingly harassed by enigmatic robed figures who may be connected to that long ago night of carnage.
Meanwhile, Ray’s cousin Paul goes to his job in the plastics company where he works nights, unaware that soon he and a small crew of coworkers will become trapped inside and hunted by an inhuman entity against which they must desperately battle if they hope to survive until morning.
Building tension with the deliberate stealth of a big cat, by the time its bloody climax approaches THOUGHT FORMS will have gripped the reader’s throat in crushing jaws. Once again we’re reminded why F. Paul Wilson says, “Jeffrey Thomas’ imagination is as twisted as it is relentless.”