20th Century Ghosts - Softcover

Hill, Joe

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0061649457 ISBN 13: 9780061649455

Publisher: Harper Large Print, 2008

Synopsis

Imogene is young and beautiful. She kisses like a movie star and knows everything about every film ever made. She's also dead and waiting in the Rosebud Theater for Alec Sheldon on an afternoon in 1945 . . .

Arthur Roth is a lonely kid with big ideas and a gift for attracting abuse. It isn't easy to make friends when you're the only inflatable boy in town . . .

Francis is unhappy. Francis was human once, but that was then. Now he's an eight-foot-tall locust and everyone in Calliphora will tremble when they hear him sing . . .

John Finney is locked in a basement that's stained with the blood of half a dozen murdered children. In the cellar with him is an antique telephone, long since disconnected, but which rings at night with calls from the dead . . .

The past isn't dead. It isn't even past . . .

About this title

Review:

"This strong, award winning collection of stories by Stephen King's son drives a stake through any cattiness that his enjoyable 2007 horror novel Heart Shaped Box was just a lucky break. The refreshing horror collection you've been looking for, even if you didn't know it. My Father's Mask is perhaps the most unsettling thing this horror reviewer has ever read." (METRO)

"Joe Hill lays to rest any doubts about one hit wonder syndrome with this unmissable bounty of short stories, all but guaranteed to add chilled spice to horror fans' spare winter evenings once the curtains have been drawn. A beast of brilliance that will swallow you whole and spit you back out again wearing a big grin." (STARBURST)

"It's wildly imaginative stuff, yet always anchored in reality. There are at least five stories here which deserve to be included in Best Of anthologies for decades to come." (Dave Golder SFX)

"Hill's shorter works have the same ingenuity as his novel 'Heart-Shaped Box' and the same populist wisdom we find in the work of his father Stephen King. What he adds is a weird poetry that is all his own." (Rox Kaveney TIME OUT)

"Even the weakest story present is fired by fierce imagination and a deceptively simple style. Joe Hill's work, while undeniably reminiscent of his father's, holds a charge and voice that is unmistakably his own. 20th Century Ghosts demonstrates this perfectly and deserves to be read." (Jes Bickham DEATHRAY)

From the Publisher:

Dear Readers

Every once in a while, a book -- and, indeed, a writer -- comes along that takes the wind right out of your sails: and I mean that in the most pleasant way possible. 20TH CENTURY GHOSTS is that book, as fine a collection of ghost and horror stories as you could ever wish to read. And Joe Hill is that writer.

Although some of these stories have appeared elsewhere, in various (albeit obscure or very low circulation) magazines, Joe has appeared on the scene pretty much fully-formed. Every one of these tales could be mistaken for the output of a writer well into his or her career. But don't take my word for it -- evidence of his skill as as a storyteller is already there . . . with Joe being a past winner of the Ray Bradbury Fellowship and the A.E. Coppard Long Fiction Prize, as well as a nominee for the Pushcart Prize. And now he's got TWO stories in the five-story shortlist for this year's British Fantasy Awards. I suspect more nominations will follow. Don't say you weren't warned.

And we're putting our money where our mouth is on this one. We've got three editions instead of our usual two: a slipcased edition with extra material and signed by Joe and Introducer Chris Golden; a regular trade hardcover edition, signed by Joe and a trade paperback edition, unsigned.

Believe me, this one's a winner.. . new talents and household names alike, and from both sides of the Atlantic.

Happy reading!

Pete Crowther

About this edition

• Publisher: Harper Large Print
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0061649457
• ISBN 13: 9780061649455
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 528