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Audiobooks Narrated by Rayner Bourton
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"This first collection of tales by Rosalie Parker contains eight stories that explore the uncanny in the modern world. As Glen Cavaliero observes in his introduction, 'like all good stories of the preternatural, these in The Old Knowledge have a subversive effect.' In them, 'the world of logical, predictable reality is seen to be at risk from rejected modes of knowledge which can thwart the materialist and victimise those innocents who stumble into another order of reality.'
Contents: Chanctonbury Ring / In the Garden / Spirit Solutions / The Cook's Story / The Old Knowledge / The Picture / The Rain / The Supply Teacher."
"Three Ghost Stories is just that: a collection of three different stories that are true Gothic classics. The three stories, The Signal Man, The Haunted House and The Trial for Murder were sensational for their time and continue to hold up well, thanks to Charles Dickens' superb skills at storytelling. The Signal Man is the most well known of the three, chronicling the haunting of a railroad signal man who is visited by a ghost just before a tragic event is to happen on the railway. If you like Dickens and tales of spectres and the supernatural, you'll love Three Ghost Stories. Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded as the greatest novelist of the Victorian era. His works enjoyed unprecedented popularity during his lifetime, and by the twentieth century critics and scholars had recognised him as a literary genius. His novels and short stories enjoy lasting popularity."
"Mr. Britling Sees It Through is H.G. Wells's 'masterpiece of the wartime experience in south eastern England.' The novel was published in September 1916.
Mr. Britling Sees It Through tells the story of a renowned writer, Mr. Britling, a protagonist who is quite evidently an alter ego of the author. The garrulous, easy-going Mr. Britling lives with family and friends in the fictional village of Matching's Easy, located in the county of Essex, northeast of London. The novel is divided into three parts. Book the First, entitled 'Matching's Easy At Ease,' is set in June-July 1914 and is at first narrated from the point of view of an American, Mr. Direck, who visits Mr. Britling's establishment in Dower House and falls in love with Cissie, the sister of Mr. Britling's secretary's wife. Also in the company are Mr. Britling's son Hugh and a visiting German student, Herr Heinrich, who is forced to leave when war breaks out. Book the Second, 'Matching's Easy at War,' covers August 1914 to October 1915, when Mr. Britling's son Hugh is killed at the front. In Book the Third, 'The Testament of Matching's Easy,' Mr. Britling learns that Herr Heinrich has also been killed, and writes a long letter to the dead German soldier's parents."
"'In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.' Or is he? In H. G. Wells' acclaimed tale, a stranded mountaineer encounters an isolated society in which his apparent advantage, sight, since all the people are blind, proves less than valuable."
"'The Haunted House' is a story series published in 1859 for the weekly periodical All the Year Round. It was 'Conducted by Charles Dickens', with Charles Dickens writing the opening and closing stories, framing stories by Dickens himself and five other authors.
The story appeared in the Extra Christmas Number on 13 December 1859. Dickens began a tradition of Christmas publications with A Christmas Carol in 1843 and his Christmas stories soon became a national institution. The Haunted House was his 1859 offering.
In Dickens's opening story, The Mortals in the House, the narrator's ('John') health 'required a temporary residence in the country.' Knowing this, a friend of the narrator had chanced to drive by the house-situated close to a railroad stop mid-way between Northern England and London-and had written to the narrator suggesting he travel down from the North and look the place over. It was a large mid-eighteenth-century manor house on two square acres with a 'sadly neglected garden,' recently cheaply repaired, and 'much too closely and heavily shadowed by trees.' The house itself is 'stiff ... cold ... [and] formal' and 'in as bad taste, as could possibly be desired by the most loyal admirer of the whole quartet of [King] Georges.' It was 'ill-placed, ill-built, ill-planned, and ill-fitted.' It was 'damp ... not free from dry rot' and redolent with the 'flavour of rats.'"
"'The Signal-Man' is a first-person horror/mystery story by Charles Dickens, first published as part of the Mugby Junction collection in the 1866 Christmas edition of All the Year Round.
The railway signal-man of the title tells the narrator of an apparition that has been haunting him. Each spectral appearance precedes a tragic event on the railway on which the signalman works. The signalman's work is at a signal-box in a deep cutting near a tunnel entrance on a lonely stretch of the railway line, and he controls the movements of passing trains. When there is danger, his fellow signalmen alert him by telegraph and alarms. Three times, he receives phantom warnings of danger when his bell rings in a fashion that only he can hear. Each warning is followed by the appearance of the spectre, and then by a terrible accident."
"'The Trial for Murder' is a short story written by Charles Dickens. It was originally published under the title 'To Be Taken with a Grain of Salt' as a chapter in Dr. Marigold's Prescriptions in an extra Christmas volume of the weekly literary magazine, All the Year Round. It was later published in 1866 in a collection of ghost stories known as 'Three Ghost Stories', along with 'The Haunted House' and 'The Signal-Man'.
'The Trial for Murder' is a short story written by Charles Dickens. It was originally published under the title 'To Be Taken with a Grain of Salt' as a chapter in Dr. Marigold's Prescriptions in an extra Christmas volume of the weekly literary magazine, All the Year Round. It was later published in 1866 in a collection of ghost stories known as 'Three Ghost Stories', along with 'The Haunted House' and 'The Signal-Man'."
"Herbert George Wells (21 September 1866 - 13 August 1946) was an English writer. Prolific in many genres, he wrote dozens of novels, short stories, and works of social commentary, history, satire, biography and autobiography. His work also included two books on recreational war games. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is often called the 'father of science fiction', along with Jules Verne and the publisher Hugo Gernsback.
THE TESTAMENT OF MATCHING'S EASY: All over England now, where the livery of mourning had been a rare thing to see, women and children went about in the October sunshine in new black clothes. Everywhere one met these fresh griefs, mothers who had lost their sons, women who had lost their men, lives shattered and hopes destroyed."
"Rosalie Parker runs the independent UK publishing house Tartarus Press with R. B. Russell. Her previous collections include The Old Knowledge (Swan River Press 2010) and Damage (PS Publishing 2016). 'In the Garden' was selected for Best New Horror 21 (2010), and 'Random Flight' for Best British Horror 2015. Rosalie lives in Coverdale, North Yorkshire, the magnificent landscape of which inspires and sometimes provides the settings for her writing.
CHANCTONBURY RING: What you have to understand, before I begin, is that I am not a gullible person. I am a scientist of a sort, an archaeologist, trained in the empirical ethos of the British higher education system."
"Rosalie Parker runs the independent UK publishing house Tartarus Press with R. B. Russell. Her previous collections include The Old Knowledge (Swan River Press 2010) and Damage (PS Publishing 2016). 'In the Garden' was selected for Best New Horror 21 (2010), and 'Random Flight' for Best British Horror 2015. Rosalie lives in Coverdale, North Yorkshire, the magnificent landscape of which inspires and sometimes provides the settings for her writing.
IN THE GARDEN: It really is a lovely day. I'm not used to sitting in the garden, basking in the pleasant weather and enjoying the fruits of my labour. I spend most of my time here weeding and pruning, so I'm grateful for the opportu-nity to laze around for a change, watching the flower heads bob gently in the soft breeze, listening to the drowsy hum of the bees as they gorge on the comfrey blossoms."
"Rosalie Parker runs the independent UK publishing house Tartarus Press with R. B. Russell. Her previous collections include The Old Knowledge (Swan River Press 2010) and Damage (PS Publishing 2016). 'In the Garden' was selected for Best New Horror 21 (2010), and 'Random Flight' for Best British Horror 2015. Rosalie lives in Coverdale, North Yorkshire, the magnificent landscape of which inspires and sometimes provides the settings for her writing.
SPIRIT SOLUTIONS: It has been snowing all day the trees in the garden are hung with icicles, and Graham and Simon had to shovel off some of the thick white blanket that coated the drive so that Clive Mason could inch his car up to the house."
"Rosalie Parker runs the independent UK publishing house Tartarus Press with R. B. Russell. Her previous collections include The Old Knowledge (Swan River Press 2010) and Damage (PS Publishing 2016). 'In the Garden' was selected for Best New Horror 21 (2010), and 'Random Flight' for Best British Horror 2015. Rosalie lives in Coverdale, North Yorkshire, the magnificent landscape of which inspires and sometimes provides the settings for her writing.
THE COOK'S STORY: The taxi picked up speed as the post-industrial sprawl of Sheffield gave way to the open hills of the Peak District. Ellen could see the driver glancing at her from time to time in the rear view mirror. Weary after her long rail journey she was grateful for his silence, even though it might have been useful to hear stories of 'The Big House'."
