Stephen Jones – författare

Black Country - Joel Lane"''Black Country'' is one of a sequence of weird crime stories set in the West Midlands that I''ve been working on for years," says Joel Lane. "A collection of them is forthcoming with the title Where Furnaces Burn. ''Black Country'' is also a sequel to my earlier story ''The Lost District'', which describes another narrator''s experience of Clayheath."I''d like to thank The Nightingales and Gul Y. Davis, whose words influenced this story. It was originally published as a chapbook by Nightjar Press, with an enigmatic cover illustration by Birmingham photographer Trav28."We All Fall Down - Kirstyn McDermott"I carried the bones of this story around for quite a few years before I finally stumbled upon its beating heart," explains the author. "In my head was the image of a doll house, huge and not quite right, and a woman searching desperately for something concealed inside. But I could never work a story around it that didn''t seem twee. Doll houses, you know?"But then Emma and Holly appeared - trapped within their own fractured, futile relationship - and everything just, well, fell together. Beautifully. Awfully. And now I have a doll house story. Of a kind."Telling - Steve Rasnic Tem"As for the following story," reveals Steve Rasnic Tem, "it began with a dreadful image at the end of a dream. I couldn''t remember the other details of that dream, but I was determined to find out where that image might have come from."A Revelation of Cormorants - Mark Valentine"''A Revelation of Cormorants'' first appeared in the excellent series of chapbooks published by Nicholas Royle''s Nightjar Press," explains Valentine, "and I first encountered the dark grace of the cormorant while visiting Galloway with Jo."Just Outside Our Windows, Deep Inside Our Walls - Brian Hodge"I hardly ever write extended fragments of things and then leave them indefinitely," Brian Hodge reveals, "but that''s how ''Just Outside Our Windows, Deep Inside Our Walls'' got started."I first wrote the part about the fantasised magic show, plus the earliest bit about Roni moving in, after rereading a Thomas Ligotti collection. It may not be apparent to anyone else, but some flavour of his lingered in me for a little while and wanted to come out, and the magic show was the result."Then it sat idle for three years or so before I knew what more to do with it. Maybe because I had to forget about how it had begun and get back to being myself again."

A lavishly illustrated collector''s edition containing all the supernatural tales ever written by M.R. James, the undisputed father of the modern ghost story.''James is clearly the best that''s ever been'' MARK GATISSM.R. James is one of the finest authors of supernatural fiction in the English language and revered as the father of the modern English ghost story. Many of his stories were originally written as Christmas entertainments and were read aloud by the author to selected gatherings of friends.''There are all sorts of writers of all sorts of nightmares, but M.R. James wrote the best ghost stories. He may well have created the ghost story in its current form. Nobody can do what he did as well as he could'' NEIL GAIMANAuthorised by the writer''s estate, Curious Warnings: The Complete Ghost Stories is the only volume that collects together all of James'' much-loved supernatural tales - including the classics, ''Oh, Whistle, and I''ll Come to You, My Lad'', ''A Warning to the Curious'' and ''Canon Alberic''s Scrapbook'' - together with his novel The Five Jars, story fragments, essays and poetry. Illustrated by award-winning artist Les Edwards and featuring an extensive historical Afterword by editor Stephen Jones, this is the ultimate collection for fans of M.R. James and the classic British ghost story.

Don''t turn out the lights . . . but open the cover, if you dare, and reveal the chilling delights that await you within the pages of A Book of Horrors. ''Stephen King, John Ajvide Linqvist, Lisa Tuttle and many more masters of the macabre issue a call to arms for the horror story in this collection of the very best in chiller fiction edited by Stephen Jones, one of the world''s premier anthologists'' - Crime TimeStephen Jones, Britain''s most acclaimed horror editor, has gathered together masters of the macabre from across the world in this cornucopia of classic chills and modern menaces. Within these pages you will discover the most successful and exciting writers of horror and dark fantasy today, with a spine-chilling selection of stories displaying the full diversity of the genre, from classic pulp style to more contemporary psychological tales, to cutting-edge terror fiction that will leave you uneasily looking over your shoulder, or in the wardrobe, or under the bed . . . An original anthology of all-new horror and dark fantasy fiction, in all of its many and magnificent guises, by those devoted to the dark side. Including stories by Ramsey Campbell, Peter Crowther, Dennis Etchison, Elizabeth Hand, Brian Hodge, Caitlin R. Kiernan, Stephen King, John Ajvide Lindqvist, Richard Christian Matheson, Reggie Oliver, Robert Shearman, Angela Slatter, Michael Marshall Smith and Lisa Tuttle.