{"product_id":"2940013750753","title":"Madam Crowl's Ghost and Other Tales of Mystery","description":"Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, who died just fifty years ago, was in his own\u003cbr\u003eparticular vein one of the best story-tellers of the nineteenth\u003cbr\u003ecentury; and the present volume contains a collection of forgotten\u003cbr\u003etales by him, and of tales not previously known to be his.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThere have always been readers and lovers of Le Fanu's works, though\u003cbr\u003enot so many as those writings deserve. To these I know that the\u003cbr\u003eaddition which I bring to their stock will be welcome. But the larger\u003cbr\u003epublic, which knows not this Joseph, may be glad to be told what they\u003cbr\u003eare to expect in his stories.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe stands absolutely in the first rank as a writer of ghost stories.\u003cbr\u003eThat is my deliberate verdict, after reading all the supernatural\u003cbr\u003etales I have been able to get hold of. Nobody sets the scene better\u003cbr\u003ethan he, nobody touches in the effective detail more deftly. I do not\u003cbr\u003ethink it is merely the fact of my being past middle age that leads me\u003cbr\u003eto regard the leisureliness of his style as a merit; for I am by no\u003cbr\u003emeans inappreciative of the more modern efforts in this branch of\u003cbr\u003efiction. No, it has to be recognized, I am sure, that the ghost-story\u003cbr\u003eis in itself a slightly old-fashioned form; it needs some\u003cbr\u003edeliberateness in the telling: we listen to it the more readily if the\u003cbr\u003enarrator poses as elderly, or throws back his experience to \"some\u003cbr\u003ethirty years ago.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI digress. Ghost stories and tales of mystery are what this volume\u003cbr\u003econtains, and, in order to lure the reader on, I have placed the most\u003cbr\u003estriking and sensational of them at the beginning of it. These are\u003cbr\u003ealso the most recent in date; for, as was natural, Le Fanu made\u003cbr\u003eimprovements in the proportions and in the conception of his short\u003cbr\u003estories as time went on. If the reader likes _Squire Toby's Will and\u003cbr\u003eMadam Crowl's Ghost_, as I think he must, he will go on to the earlier\u003cbr\u003estories and find in them the same excellent qualities, only slightly\u003cbr\u003eoverlaid by the mannerisms of the forties and fifties.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI hope he will then inquire what other work of Le Fanu's is\u003cbr\u003eaccessible. To aid him in his search, I have put together in an\u003cbr\u003eepilogue or appendix what I know of the order and character of Le\u003cbr\u003eFanu's novels and tales.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI need only add that the stories in this volume have been gleaned from\u003cbr\u003eextinct periodicals. They are the result of a fairly long\u003cbr\u003einvestigation, but I am sure that some anonymous tales by my author\u003cbr\u003emust have eluded me, and I shall be very grateful to any one who will\u003cbr\u003enotify me of any that he is fortunate enough to find.","brand":"WDS Publishing","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47157667299568,"sku":"2940013750753","price":2.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013750753_p0.jpg?v=1763589763","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013750753","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}