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Forthcoming titles

(Book titles are subject to change)

A Royal Engineer in the Low Countries

A Cavalry Surgeon at Waterloo

With the Third Guards during the Peninsular War

The First and Last Campaigns of the Great War

Supernatural and Weird Fiction of Vincent O'Sullivan

Supernatural and Weird Fiction of Algernon Blackwood

Narratives of the Anglo-Zulu War

and many others

The Collected Supernatural and Weird Fiction of Mary Elizabeth Braddon: Volume 1

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The Collected Supernatural and Weird Fiction of Mary Elizabeth Braddon: Volume 1
Leonaur Original
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Author(s): Mary Elizabeth Braddon
Date Published: 2010/01
Page Count: 500
Softcover ISBN-13: 978-0-85706-049-5
Hardcover ISBN-13: 978-0-85706-050-1

3 Novels, 5 Novelettes and 23 short stories in four volumes of ghost, mystery and horror tales

Lovers of the Victorian fiction of Wilkie Collins know that to discover his female counterpart they need look no further than the works of Mary Elizabeth Braddon. She was a prolific author of the kind of dark melodrama much loved by her contemporary audience and her most renowned work, ‘Lady Audley’s Secret,’ has been often dramatised, filmed and, indeed, has never been out of print from the time of its original publication. Never was the accolade, ‘The Queen of Sensation’ so well deserved as it was by her. It is not unusual that a writer who produced so much material—and much of that with a flavour of the Gothic—should also turn her talents to the genre of supernatural and strange fiction, since there was much precedent for it among her literary peers and much appetite for it among the reading public. So it is, perhaps, unsurprising that this Leonaur collection of Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s forays into the other worldly and bizarre runs to four substantial, satisfying volumes.
In volume one readers will discover an eerie novel, ‘The White Phantom,’ which has all the cliff-hangers, twists, turns, shocks and startling revelations any reader could wish for to keep them on the edge of their seats to the last turn of the page. Accompanying it here are three short stories of the strange, including ‘My Dream.’ ‘The Island of Old Faces’ and the flesh creeping ‘The Cold Embrace.’
This collection is available in soft cover and hardcover with dustjacket. 

She heard the outer door close behind him before she entered the ante-chamber. A strange, shuddering terror, which she was powerless to control, seemed to root her to the spot upon which she stood.<br>
Without knowing why, she dreaded crossing the narrow threshold which divided the opera-box from the chamber adjoining it.<br>
The silvery chime of a clock in the anteroom struck the quarter after midnight.<br>
Blanche Mortimer entered this chamber, and found herself alone with the stranger.<br>
He wore a simple evening costume. A black dress-coat, waistcoat, and trousers, and cravat of white cambric.
But, like the man who had led her to the box, he wore a mask.<br>
“You have some letters, once written by me, in your possession,” said the duchess.<br>
The man bowed, but did not speak.<br>
The graceful head of the duchess was half turned away from him. It seemed as if her contempt for him was too great to be concealed.<br>
“What is the price which you demand for the restoration of these letters?” she asked, haughtily.<br>
Still the man did not answer, but, lifting his hand, he slowly removed his mask.<br>
As he did so, the duchess, turning her head partially, looked across her shoulder at the man’s face.<br>
She uttered a loud and wailing cry, which vibrated through the small apartment, and mingled discordantly with the distant music of the orchestra.<br>
The face upon which she gazed with the stony glance of horror and despair was the face of the dead.<br>
It was the face of Hubert Monkton, line for line,—the face with whose every feature she was familiar.<br>
For one moment, a wild thrill of hope ran through her veins.<br>
What if Hubert Monkton were still alive? What if she had been deceived by Philip Howland, and the Indian, Gambia? What if no murder had been committed in the miserable chamber at the Raven?<br>
But, in another moment, that hope gave way to horror and despair.<br>
The face upon which the duchess looked was not the face of a living man. The features had the rigidity of marble, the complexion was of a sickly bluish-gray, the eyes had a hollow and glassy lustre.<br>
It was indeed the face of the dead.<br>
For a few brief moments Blanche Mortimer gazed wildly and fearfully upon this strange apparition. Then, with a terrible effort, she tottered forward, meaning to defy the ghastly terror; but at the first step she reeled and fell senseless to the ground.<br>
An hour afterwards, the duke and a couple of the officials of the opera-house entered this ante-chamber, after searching almost every part of the vast building, in their endeavours to find the Duchess of Arlington.<br>
What was the surprise and consternation of Gerald Mortimer, on beholding his beloved wife lying senseless on the ground, in the tenantless ante-chamber!<br>
He lifted her in his arms, while one of the officials fetched a glass of iced water.<br>
The duchess slowly revived, and languidly lifted her ivory eyelids, fixing her large blue eyes upon the duke.<br>
At the sight of his face she uttered a cry of delight.<br>
“Oh! thank Heaven!” she murmured; “it is you Gerald, only you.”<br>
“Who else should it be, dearest?” said the duke, tenderly. “Tell me, my darling, what has happened. How is it that I find you here?”<br>
“I lost myself amongst the crowd, Gerald,” answered the duchess, “and was driven this way by the throng. Fearful of being knocked down in the hurry and confusion, I entered the first empty box I saw, and I suppose must have fainted from exhaustion and fatigue.”<br>
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