First Review of The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849 is Posted by Werewolves.com

Werewolves.com has just posted a fine review of The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849. It includes short descriptions of each scary tale in the werewolf anthology. Click werewolf book review to read it in its entirety.

List of the Best Scary Short Stories 1800-1849 that Have Been Counted Down to Date

Now that my book The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849: A Classic Werewolf Anthology is published, I am back to focus on the horror countdown. Below is a rundown of horror short stories 40 through 13 that I have posted so far in my countdown of the Top 40 scary short stories from 1800 to 1849. You will notice some familiar names and some that may be new. With so many fine scary short stories that have appeared on the countdown already, it is hard to believe that much better ones await. If you want to read any of these stories, simply scroll back through my blog archive.

40.     1839 Running the Gauntlet by Anonymous

39.     1823 The Mutiny by William Harrison Ainsworth

38.     1836 The Wedding Knell by Nathaniel Hawthorne

37.     1842 Ben Blower's Story; or How to Relish a Julep by Charles Feno Hoffman

36.     1827 The Bohemian by Anonymous

35.     1831 Singular Passage in the Life of the Late Henry Harris, Doctor in Divinity by Richard Harris Barham

34.     1830 Confessions of a Reformed Ribbonman by William Carleton

33.     1820 The Field of Terror by Baron Friedrich Heinrich Karl De la Motte Fouquâe

32.     1837 Cousin Mattie by James Hogg

31.     1844 Rappaccini’s Daughter by Nathaniel Hawthorne

30.     1821  The Man in the Bell by William Maginn

29.     1836 The Legend of the Bell Rock by Captain Frederick Marryat

28.     1849 Hop-Frog by Edgar Allan Poe

27.     1832 Gabriel Lindsay by William Mudford

26.     1835 The Fiery Vault by Reithra

25.     1837 The Involuntary Experimentalist by Samuel Ferguson

24.     1831 The Lonely Man of the Ocean by Anonymous

23.     1843 Ko-rea-ran-neh-neh; or, The Flying Head by Charles Feno Hoffman

22.     1846 The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe

21.     1837 Dr. Heidegger's Experiment by Nathaniel Hawthorne

20.     1823 A Scots Mummy by James Hogg

19.     1835 The Story of the Greek Slave by Captain Frederick Marryat

18.     1843 The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe

17.     1834 The Singular Trial of Francis Ormiston by George Sloane

16.     1842 The Masque of the Red Death by Edgar Allan Poe

15.     1827 Le Revenant by Henry Thomson

14.     1841 A Descent into the Maelstrom by Edgar Allan Poe

13.     1830 The Elixir of Life by Honore de Balzac

This is the list to date for my countdown of the best horror stories from 1800-1849. What horror tales will appear in the Top 12? I will soon be publishing all of them in my new book: The Best Horror Short Stories 1800-1849: A Classic Horror Anthology. In my next post I will show the cover!

Interview for The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849: A Classic Werewolf Anthology

"The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849" Interview With

Andrew Barger

Q1: Why did you decide to edit a book of the best werewolf short stories from 1800-1849?

A1: I have never seen one that addresses a 50 year time period, especially this time period. I try to fill in the gaps in the literature when I find them. This is when werewolf transformation stories were in their infancy, yet they are very good.

Q2: Were there many werewolf short stories written before 1800?

A2: I have been unable to find any. Shapeshifters in the literature go as far back as the ancient Romans and Greeks. They moved forward through poetry and jumped to the short story form in the early nineteenth century.

Q3: How do the werewolf short stories of 1800-1849 compare to today's werewolf stories?

A3: They are not as graphic and some of the stories lack deep character development. Since werewolf short stories were an entirely new form of writing in this period, this is to be expected.

Q4: Did you include any lycan stories that have not been collected in an anthology before?

A4: I did. "The Man Wolf" by Leitch Ritchie and "A Story of a Weir-Wolf" by Catherine Crowe.

Q5: Which of the lycan stories is your favorite?

A5: "The White Wolf of the Hartz Mountains" by Captain Frederick Marryat. The way the female werewolf is portrayed is haunting.

Q6: Can you give us a list of the stories contained in the book?

A6: Sure. "Hugues the Wer-Wolf: A Kentish Legend of the Middle Ages," "The Man-Wolf," "A Story of a Weir-Wolf," "The Wehr-Wolf: A Legend of the Limousin," and "The White Wolf of the Hartz Mountains."

Q7: Where can a person buy this book?

A7: The best place to start is follow this werewolf transformation stories path to my Website where I provide links to buy the book (or ebook) online. It can be purchased at all major online retailers including Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.

Q8: Edgar Allan Poe wrote his short stories during this time period and you edited Edgar Allan Poe Annotated and Illustrated Entire Stories and Poems. Did he write any werewolf short stories?

A8: Not one, but he did have a furry cat named Caterina. (Laughs)

Book Trailer for The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849: A Classic Werewolf Anthology

I hope you enjoyed the book trailer for The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849: A Classic Werewolf Anthology. Here is a bit about it: Werewolf transformation in the literature made its greatest strides in the first half of the 19th century when the monster leaped from poetry to the short story. It happened when this shorter form of literature, this shapeshifter, was morphing into darker forms thanks in no small part to Edgar Allan Poe, Honoré de Balzac, E. T. A. Hoffmann, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Prosper Mérimée, James Hogg, and so many others in Europe and the United States.The fifty year period between 1800 and 1849 is truly the cradle of all lycan and werewolf short stories. For the first time in one werewolf anthology, I have compiled the best lycan stories from this fifty year period. The stories are "Hugues the Wer-Wolf: A Kentish Legend of the Middle Ages," "The Man-Wolf," "A Story of a Weir-Wolf," "The Wehr-Wolf: A Legend of the Limousin," and "The White Wolf of the Hartz Mountains." It is believed that two of these scary short stories have never been republished in over one hundred and fifty years since their original printing. Read "The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849" tonight by the light of a full moon!

Website: Andrew Barger.com
Blog: scary-short-stories.blogspot.com

Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849 Table of Contents

This week I let everyone who follows my blog know about the new werewolf book I edited and have recently published. The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849: A Classic Werewolf Anthology contains the finest werewolf transformation stories from this the first half of the nineteenth century. This is the list of lycan stories contained in the book.

 

1. Hugues the Wer-Wolf: A Kentish Legend of the Middle Ages
2. The Man-Wolf
3. A Story of a Weir-Wolf
4. The Wehr-Wolf: A Legend of the Limousin
5. The White Wolf of the Hartz Mountains

I hope you werewolf fans out there enjoy it!

Website: Andrew Barger.com
Blog: scary-short-stories.blogspot.com

Cover for The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849: A Classic Werewolf Anthology

Here is the cover for my new book of scary short stories and a bit about it. Call them lycans or lycanthropes or shapeshifters, werewolf transformation stories made their greatest strides in the 19th century when the werewolf legend jumped from poetry to the short story. It happened when this shorter form of literature was morphing into darker shapes thanks in no small part to Edgar Allan Poe, Honoré de Balzac, E. T. A. Hoffmann, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Prosper Mérimée, James Hogg, and so many others in Europe and the United States.The fifty year period between 1800 and 1849 is truly the cradle of all werewolf short stories.

For the first time in one anthology, I have compiled the best werewolf tales from this period in my new book The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849. It is believed that two of these werewolf stories have never been republished in over one hundred and fifty years since their original printing. The book also contains story backgrounds and annotations. Read "The Best Werewolf Short Stories 1800-1849" tonight, just make sure it is not by the light of a full moon!" Buy the book: Bottletree Books and follow Andrew Barger on his blog: scary-short-stories.blogspot.com

Edgar Allan Poe's Annotated Short Stories Book Trailer Video

Edited by Andrew Barger,  Edgar Allan Poe's Annotated Short Stories provides background information for Edgar Allan Poe's short stories, annotations, foreign word translations, illustrations, and photographs of individuals Poe wrote about. Consider this sampling of the great tales included: The Black Cat, [The Bloodhounds], The Cask of Amontillado, A Descent into the Maelstrom, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Gold-Bug, The Masque of the Red Death, Morning on the Wissahiccon, MS. Found in a Bottle, The Murders in the Rue Morgue, The Oblong Box, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Premature Burial, The Purloined Letter, [The Rats of Park Theatre], Some Secrets of the Magazine Prison House, Some Words with a Mummy, The Swiss Bell-Ringers, The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether, The Tell-Tale Heart, and Thou Art the Man. Edgar Allan Poe's Annotated Short Stories also contains a foreword by Andrew Barger. Join the Poe revolution today and read his scary stories for the first or tenth time!

Review of "The Elixir of Life" Scary Story by Honore de Balzac

“L'Elixir de Longue Vie” was first published in the Revue de Paris for October 1830. It is, of course, better known today in America as the scary story called The Elixir of Life. In it Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) gives us an excellent story that melds religious and supernatural elements into a horrific concoction sure to induce nightmares. Surely the ending will be remembered the next time any reader steps foot in their place of worship. In the horror story Balzac subjects his readers to a Gothic setting at the deathbed scene:

Before long Don Juan had crossed the lofty, chilly suite of rooms in which his father lived; the penetrating influences of the damp close air, the mustiness diffused by old tapestries and presses thickly covered with dust had passed into him, and now he stood in the old man's antiquated room, in the repulsive presence of the deathbed, beside a dying fire. A flickering lamp on a Gothic table sent broad uncertain shafts of light, fainter or brighter, across the bed, so that the dying man's face seemed to wear a different look at every moment. The bitter wind whistled through the crannies of the ill-fitting casements; there was a smothered sound of snow lashing the windows. The harsh contrast of these sights and sounds with the scenes which Don Juan had just quitted was se sudden that he could not help shuddering. He turned cold as he came towards the bed; the lamp flared in a sudden vehement gust of wind and lighted up his father's face; the features were wasted and distorted; the skin that cleaved to their bony outlines had taken wan livid hues, all the more ghastly by force of contrast with the white pillows on which he lay. The muscles about the toothless mouth had contracted with pain and drawn apart the lips; the moans that issued between them with appalling energy found an accompaniment in the howling of the storm without.

When the father passes away, the son grabs a "mysterious phial." He tries a dab of the liquid on her father's eye and it comes back to life. Unlike Nathaniel Hawthorne's Doctor Heidegger's Experiment, Balzac's elixir of life is not ingested, but rather spread on the body. This opens the door to the body only being partly animated and the terrifying results if the elixir is spilled part way through the process of reanimation. When the son is near death, he gets the elixir and has his own son spread it on his face and rest of his body. But when the face and first arm was covered, the following horrific event happens.

By the soft moonlight that lit strange gleams across the country without, Felipe could dimly see his father's body, a vague white thing among the shadows. The dutiful son moistened a linen cloth with the liquid, and, absorbed in prayer, he anointed the revered face. A deep silence reigned. Felipe heard faint, indescribable rustlings; it was the breeze in the tree-tops, he thought. But when he had moistened the right arm, he felt himself caught by the throat, a young strong hand held him in a tight grip—it was his father's hand! He shrieked aloud; the flask dropped from his hand and broke in pieces. The liquid evaporated; the whole household hurried into the room, holding torches aloft. That shriek had startled them, and filled.them with as much terror as if the Trumpet of the Angel sounding on the Last Day had rung through earth and sky. The room was full of people, and a horror-stricken crowd beheld the fainting Felipe upheld by the strong arm of his father, who clutched him by the throat. They saw another thing, an unearthly spectacle—Don Juan's face grown young and beautiful as Antinoiis, with its dark hair and brilliant eyes and red lips, a head that made horrible efforts, but could not move the dead, wasted body.

 The partially animated corpse is taken to church and Balzac gives his readers a unique terror that will not be forgotten.

Te Deum laudamus! cried the many voices.

"Go to the devil, brute beasts that you are! Dios! Dios! Garajos demonios! Idiots! What fools you are with your dotard God!" and a torrent of imprecations poured forth like a stream of red-hot lava from the mouth of Vesuvius.

"Deus Sabaoth! . . . Sabaoth!" cried the believers.

"You are insulting the majesty of Hell," shouted Don Juan, gnashing his teeth. In another moment the living arm struggled out of the reliquary, and was brandished over the assembly in mockery and despair.

"The saint is blessing us," cried the old women, children, lovers, and the credulous among the crowd.

And note how often we are deceived in the homage we pay; the great man scoffs at those who praise him, and pays compliments now and again to those whom he laughs at in the depths of his heart.

Just as the Abbot, prostrate before the altar, was chanting "Sancte Johannes, ora pro nobis!" he heard a voice exclaim sufficiently distinctly: "0 coglione!"

"What can be going on up there?" cried the Sub-prior, ar he saw the reliquary move.

"The saint is playing the devil," replied the Abbot.

Even as he spoke the living head tore itself away from the lifeless body, and dropped upon the sallow cranium of the officiating priest.

"Remember Dona Elvira!" cried the thing, with its teeth set fast in the Abbot's head.

The Abbot's horror-stricken shriek disturbed the ceremony; all the ecclesiastics hurried up and crowded about their chief.

"Idiot, tell us now if there is a God!" the voice cried, as the Abbot, bitten through the brain, drew his last breath.

In the introduction Balzac refers to a “stray fancy of the brain” by German author E. T. A. Hoffmann (1776-1822) for the general idea of the story. He is referring to “The Devil’s Elixirs” (Die Elixire de Teufels) by Hoffmann that was first published in 1814. While Balzac is quick to give Hoffmann his due, he is being too humble. As with many Honoré de Balzac stories, “The Elixir of Life” has areas of slowness. Yet one can always rest assured that they are in good hands with Honoré de Balzac who forged new ground in the scary short story genre. Balzac's unique blending of religious and supernatural elements, along with an ending that rivals anything penned by Edgar Allan Poe, make this story one of the foremost elixir of life stories ever written.

Buy Andrew Barger's books at his Website: www.AndrewBarger.com

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The 13th Best Scary Story 1800-1849 is The Elixir of Life by Honore de Balzac

For the 13th best scary short story from 1800-1849 I pick The Elixir of Life by Honore de Balzac. It is a "long" short story. Please enjoy it and I will comment on it in my next post. Thanks!

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Author of the 13 Best Scary Short Story 1800-1849 is Honore de Balzac

Honore de Balzac (1799-1850), that rotund French author of romances and scary stories, appears next on my countdown of the best horror tales from 1800-1849. I will post a link to his scary story tomorrow. It is one of the longest stories on the countdown and draws some parallels to Edgar Allan Poe's The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar as well as Nathaniel Hawthorne's Dr. Heidegger's Experiment.

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