The Cthulhu Mythos of the immortal H.P. Lovecraft provides inspiration for much of Lumley's work, including "Dagon's Bell" and "Big C," both included here. The explosive creation of a new volcanic island off Iceland in 1967 led to "Rising with Surtsey," a homage not just to Lovecraft but, to the great August Derleth. "David's Worm" -which takes an interesting view of "you are what you eat"-was published in a Year's Best Horror Stories and later adapted...

Rudyard Kipling, a major figure of English literature, used the full power and intensity of his imagination and his writing ability in his excursions into fantasy. Kipling is considered one of England's greatest writers, but was born in Bombay. He was educated in England, but returned to India in 1882, where he began writing fantasy and supernatural stories set in his native continent: "The Phantom Rickshaw," "The Strange Ride of Morrowbie Jukes,"...

With Orion Nebulius gone, Rachel finds herself facing the latest evil in Shadow Grove with little hope. This time, she and her cousin Dougal find a boneless body in the boiler room.

Stephen King hates to fly. Now he and co-editor Bev Vincent would like to share this fear of flying with you. Welcome to Flight or Fright, an anthology about all the things that can go horribly wrong when you're suspended six miles in the air, hurtling through space at more than 500 mph and sealed up in a metal tube (like gulp! a coffin) with hundreds of strangers. All the ways your trip into the friendly skies can turn into a nightmare, including...

The primal image of the black-caped vampire Dracula has become an indelible fixture of the modern imagination. It's recognition factor rivals, in its own perverse way, the familiarity of Santa Claus. Most of us can recite without prompting the salient characteristics of the vampire: sleeping by day in its coffin, rising at dusk to feed on the blood of the living; the ability to shapeshift into a bat, wolf, or mist; a mortal vulnerability to a wooden...

"A cemetery full of the restless dead. A town so wicked it has already burned twice, with the breath of the third fire looming. A rural, isolated bridge with a terrifying monster waiting for the completion of its summoning ritual. A lake that allows the drowned to return, though they have been changed by the claws of death. These are the shadowed, liminal spaces where the curses and monsters lurk, refusing to be forgotten." -- book jacket.