Ghosts from the Library

Tony Medawar brings together an anthology of previously unpublished or little-known works from crime fiction’s Golden Age, together with concise biographies of each author, some as prominent as Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie and Daphne du Maurier and others such as Q Patrick, HC Bailey and Christianna Brand who might well be new to much of today’s audience. Ghosts from the Library contains 16 short stories, all with a deliciously creepy feel, where darkness slithers just at the edge of your vision, often disappearing if looked at directly, only to reappear when you least expect it.

This trip into the unexplained starts with an essay on Ghost Stories by GK Chesterton who appears to have had firm views on how – if at all – ghost stories and crime fiction should be brought together. Chesterton did not approve of ghosts breaking the barrier between this world and the next to assist in solving crimes, including their own murders. To him, this was simply ‘not playing the game’ and I suspect he would have pursed his lips in disapproval at writers such as AK Turner and Adam Simcox in whose hands the dead definitely speak and often do a lot more than that!

After each story, Medawar includes a concise biography of the writer and a brief overview of the work, ending with a note on the publication history of each story. I read these with as much interest as the stories themselves; all are short enough to be informative without bogging down the flow of the collection. I never felt the urge to simply skip over them to get to the next story, and the biographies added to rather than in any detracted from my enjoyment as I settled down in the library to be both entertained and chilled. So, wrap up warm, keep the lights on and step into the Golden Age …

The collection begins on a deceptively light-hearted note with Deborah by Josephine Tey, the story of a haunted cottage where the ghost does nothing more sinister than dust, then the next story veers abruptly sideways almost into the realms of science fiction with Q Patrick’s disturbing tale The Red Balloon before moving into Terror, which showcases Daphne du Maurier’s descriptive prowess in a young girl’s nightmares and left me anxiously wondering what happened next in the darkness of her bedroom.

The Green Dress by Anthony Berkley tells the story of a man’s most successful artwork, a painting of a model wearing a striking dress found in a chest in a borrowed studio. Berkley provides a textbook example of how to pack a painful punch into the final line. A particular favourite of mine was Agatha Christie’s Personal Call, written for the BBC’s Light Programme in 1954. This translates well to the page, the sharp urgency aided by sparse lines of italic text to bring the sound effects to life as the story builds to a tense climax guaranteed to send a shiver up an unsuspecting spine.

Accompanying these highlights are a haunted manor, a Welsh witch, a house with an oppressive atmosphere, a forbidden marriage, a man who reads his own death notice, a jealous wife who receives some unexpected help, the terrifying consequences of some historical research, an accident that leads to glimpses of both the future and the past, and a tale of past injustice.

The collection is full to the brim with elegant and subtle writing, clever character studies and some masterclass-level misdirection. Whether GK Chesterton would consider that all these authors played fair with their audience I don’t know, but even if there are elements he might have disapproved of, I encountered nothing to dim my enjoyment of an excellent anthology. I’ll happily return to this collection whenever I want to lose myself in some spooky Golden Age greats, perfect for a long winter’s night.