The White Hands and Other Weird Tales
This is the first collection of strange stories by contemporary writer Mark Samuels. The themes that thread through these nine accomplished stories are drawn from the great tradition of the twentieth-century weird tale, and they are suffused with a distinctly cosmopolitan, European feel. Mark Samuels writes about the fundamental fears of modern life, especially the effects of isolation and the dislocation that city dwellers can experience in their inhospitable, man-made environment. H. P. Lovecraft wrote about entities beyond human comprehension that might be summoned from beyond the stars, but did he ever consider that they would feel quite at home in the sodium glare of some run-down inner-city? When one of Samuel’s characters stands alone looking up at the vast, illimitable darkness of space, the reader is forced to wonder if there is much difference between the hopeless emptiness of eternity and the bleak interstices between the concrete and steel of their daily life?
The White Hands was shortlisted for the British Fantasy Awards this year in the best Collection category. The title story of The White Hands was also on their shortlist for the best Short Story category.
Contents:
- The White Hands
- The Grandmaster's Final Game
- Mannequins in Aspects of Terror
- Apartment 205
- The Impasse
- Colony
- Vrolyck
- The Search for Kruptos
- Black as Darkness
Mark Samuels
Mark Samuels is a London-based writer of horror and fantastic fiction in the tradition of Arthur Machen and H. P. Lovecraft. Born in 1967 in Clapham, South London, he was first published in 1988, and his short stories often focus on detailing a shadowy modern London in which the protagonists gradually discover a dark and terrifying reality behind the mundane urban world. His works have been praised by Thomas Ligotti and John Pelan amongst others. His debut collection was shortlisted for the British Fantasy Award and his work has appeared several times in the annual anthology The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror.