Edward Frederick Benson (1867-1940) was the son of an Archbishop of Canterbury. He wrote over a hundred books during his lifetime, including the delightful intrigues, eventually televised, of the Mapp and Lucia novels. But it was his ghost stories for which he was best known in his day, and which represent much of his best writing.

United by a chilling atmosphere and elegant literary style, these tales range from the horror of vampires, homicidal ghosts and monstrous spectral worms and slugs (appearing in the classic Negotium Perambulans and "And No Bird Sings") to the gentle satires on charlatan mediums and fake seances (Spinach and Mr. Tilly's Seance).

This new edition of his collected stories is one book that no fan of Benson or of good storytelling can afford to miss.

Contents:

• Forward by Joan Aiken
• Introduction by Richard Dalby
• The Room in the Tower
• The Dust-Cloud
• Gavon's Eve
• The Confession of Charles Linkworth
• At Abdul Ali's Grave
• The Shootings of Achnaleish
• How Fear Departed From the Long Gallery
• Caterpillars
• The Cat
• The Bus-Conductor
• The Man Who Went Too Far
• Between the Lights
• Outside the Door
• The Terror by Night
• The Other Bed
• The Thing in the Hall
• The House With the Brick-Kiln
• "And the Dead Spake-"
• The Outcast
• The Horror-Horn
• Machaon
• Negotium Perambulans
• At the Farmhouse
• Inscrutable Decrees
• The Gardener
• Mr. Tilly's Seance
• Mrs. Amworth
• In the Tube
• Roderick's Story
• Reconciliation
• The Face
• Spinach
• Bagnell Terrace
• A Tale of an Empty House
• Naboth's Vineyard
• Expiation
• Home Sweet Home
• "And No Bird Sings"
• The Corner House
• Corstophine
• The Temple
• The Step
• The Bed by the Window
• James Lamp
• The Dance
• The Hanging of Alfred Wadham
• Pirates
• The Wishing-Well
• The Bath-Chair
• Monkeys
• Christopher Comes Back
• The Sanctuary
• Thursday Evenings
• The Psychical Mallards
• The Clonmel Witch Burning (essay)