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The Repeater Book of the Occult

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Member Reviews

The Repeater Book of the Occult is definitely for those horror buffs who are looking to re-read some of their favorites. While you could probably look up any of these stories, it is nice to have them all in a single collection. The stories themselves are classics and very re-readable, I think where my issue lies is with the introductions.

Except for an exempt few, I was hoping the introductions to the stories would be a little bit more conversational. I already know these stories are dark, masterful, and spine-tingling - I wanted to know more about the symbolism or things I might've missed.

Definitely a read to take in at a slower pace, I did have some fun revisiting a story once per night.

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I was looking forward to discovering some forgotten gem short stories, however this was completely ruined by the introductions to the stories. The language was almost academic in its tone and it was off putting. For little known stories, it would have been better to put the critique/discussions after the story.

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The Repeater Book of the Occult is a collection of older short horror stories that each have an introduction (or in some cases an academic-like essay) to accompany each tale. My first thought was that I wished the introductions would have been done after the story, maybe even a section by themselves in the back of the book. I had never actually read the first story in the collection and was unaware that the introduction would actually contain spoilers to the story itself. That was immediately a disappointment. Overall, the best stories were stories that I had read many years ago. My first horror story was Edgar Allan Poe’s The Black Cat and that did start my love of horror, so it was a pleasure to read that take again. My favorite story was The Willows because I had never read it and it was unsettling.

The short stories include:
Squire Toby’s Will by Sheridan Le Fanu
The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
On Ghosts by Mary Shelley
Par Avion by Marlene Dotard
The Monkey’s Paw by WW Jacobs
A Haunted House by Virginia Woolf
Green Tea by Sheridan Le Fanu
Punch, Brothers, Punch by Mark Twain
Unseen- Unfeared by Francis Stevens
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe
The Willows by Algernon Blackwood

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Didn’t enjoy much of this book. Some of the introductions were way too lengthy and only 2-3 of the stories were enjoyable. A rather laborious read.

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Anthologies where authors select the stories are usually more varied than those where one editor chooses all the stories, and such is the case in "The Repeater Book of the Occult," with stories chosen by the authors of the Repeater Books publishing house.

There are a number of well-known stories, such Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper," Jacobs' "The Monkey's Paw," and two LeFanu stories. Mark Twain and Virginia Woolf were a pleasant surprise, and I had not previously heard of Francis Stevens.

Dotard's "Par Avion" was a miss for me. It didn't feel like it belonged with the others, even as loose as the theme of the anthology was.

The authors provide introductions to each story, some of which were longer than a couple of the stories, and more likely essays. While there was a lot of good information in some of them, they detracted from the stories themselves.

I would encourage the authors to choose lesser-known works that haven't had the readership of some of the selections in this book, but the choices were good, and this is recommended.

I received an advance copy from NetGalley and Repeater Books in exchange for my honest review.

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I’m not sure how to classify this. It’s not exactly a DNF, because I’ve read all of the stories (years ago) - but I simply couldn’t get through the excessively verbose, academic-style introductions.

This book demonstrated a love of horror in its choices, while also trying to raise up what is often regarded as a ‘lesser’ genre. Horror contains the oldest tales - it doesn’t need legitimising or apologists. Can the stories not demonstrate that for themselves?

Ultimately, each tale is available free online. I didn’t feel the additional discourse added much, sadly.

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