THE ROVING PECKER PRESENTS: Another Spine-Tingling Christmastime Tale From Raincoaster!

Greetings, Manor Hors! Periodically, "The Roving Pecker" presents urgent missives from filthy esteemed guest writers. Today's blood-cirdling entry is from Raincoaster!

You won't thank me for this one.

If Tarnhelm was creepy, this seasonal story is next-level terrifying. Ready your night light; you'll need it.

A jarring mashup of an anticipated jolly holiday for a joyful young man, and a terrifying, yet morally understandable haunting by the most horrific of criminals, this tale shows the true mastery of the short story form by Anglo-Canadian author Algernon Blackwood. He wrote several seasonal stories, and his catalogue is rich, even if he never was.

Blackwood had the kind of resume to which modern writers can only aspire: dairy farmer, theosophical society founder, yellow press reporter, proto-pulp author who skillfully wove indigenous legends into contemporary fiction, whether the setting were the French marshes (The Willows) or the northern Canadian woodlands (The Wendigo). And a literary reputation to last centuries.

This, possibly his most effective short story, is set in prosaic London. A young law clerk is getting ready to depart for a festive, potentially romantic, holiday in the Swiss Alps; skiing, skating, aprez-ing with a variety of lovely young ladies. But it is not to be…because…well, because you'll see.

Full text here on Gutenberg is RIGHT HERE. 

And the YouTube podcast from Bite-Sized Audio Classics RIGHT HERE. 

Photo Credit: Black Swan Press