Uncertainties Volume II

4.4/5 ( ratings)

"Omnia exeunt in mysterium." — Arthur Machen

"We think we know the world we live in, but we don’t — we very much don’t — and stories of the supernatural and strange, of the weird and the uncanny serve as a reminder of that." – from the Foreword by Brian J. Showers

Uncertainties is an anthology of new writing—featuring contributions from Irish, British, and American authors — each exploring the idea of increasingly fragmented senses of reality. These types of short stories were termed "strange tales" by Robert Aickman, called "tales of the unexpected" by Roald Dahl, and known to Shakespeare’s ill-fated Prince Mamillius as ‘winter’s tales’. But these are no mere ghost stories. These tales of the uncanny grapple with existential epiphanies of the modern day, and when otherwise familiar landscapes become sinister and something decidedly less than certain . . .

Contents

"Foreword"
Brian J. Showers

"The Swing"
Peter Bell

"The Mighty Mr Godbolt"
R.B. Russell

"Then and Now"
John Howard

"The Ice Beneath Us"
Steve Duffy

"Closing Time"
Emma Darwin

"Homecraft"
Rosalie Parker

"Half-Light"
Steve Rasnic Tem

"Imago"
Mat Joiner

"The Edge of the World"
Helen Grant

"The Court of Midnight"
Mark Samuels

"What’s Out There?"
Gary McMahon

"Ruby"
Adam Golaski

"The Murky"
V.H. Leslie

"Love at Second Sight"
Reggie Oliver

"Biographical Notes"

"Acknowledgments"

Brian J. Showers has written short stories, articles, interviews, and reviews for magazines such as Rue Morgue, Supernatural Tales, Ghosts & Scholars, and Wormwood. His collection The Bleeding Horse won the Children of the Night Award in 2008. He is also the author of Literary Walking Tours of Gothic Dublin; and, with Gary W. Crawford and Jim Rockhill, he co-edited the Stoker Award-nominated Reflections in a Glass Darkly: Essays on J. Sheridan Le Fanu. The anthology Dreams of Shadow and Smoke, co-edited with Jim Rockhill, won the Ghost Story Award for best book in 2014. Showers also edits The Green Book, a journal devoted to Irish writers of the fantastic; and runs the Swan River Press, Ireland’s only publishing house dedicated to literature of the gothic, strange, and supernatural.