Haunted Bench Project

Sincere apologies if I got the wrong end of the stick. I was replying to initial post which seemed to suggest Americans were only victims.

Killing Iranians, American men & women to protect perverts.The world isn't just fucking America.

RIP Country Joe. Sad to think that six decades on 'Feel Like I'm Fixing To Die' is relevant as day it was written (see also the Mothers of Invention's 'Brown Shoes Don't Make It', 'Trouble Coming Every Day, 'Concentration Moon' ....).

Five original short stories. Is that the most for a single issue in the entire run from 1979?

Cover illo. Jim Pitts' imagines "what goes on in the playing fields after dark."

... and on the back, Daniel McGachey reveals 'Ghosts & Scolars' joint #1 fans.

Table of contents.

Out now. 'Ghosts & Scholars 50: The Final issue' (Haunted Library, March 2026). Ro Pardoe & Andy Sawyer co-edit, fiction by Dan McGachey, Helen Grant, Katherine Haynes, CJ Faraway & Josh Reynolds, parting poem by Tina Rath. Sad to say goodbye to this legendary, hugely influential 'zine.

Featuring (pre-Friends of) #Highgate_Cemetery at its most glamorous and gothic. 🖤

Cover depicts a seated Lord Probert fixing you with an evil smile from the television screen (TV is a proper one in a wooden cabinet, four legs, etc.

Blurb. Gist of it is you're in for a horrid time of it, and you'll love every minute or he'll know why!

Just this minute come squelching horribly through the letterbox. A new, 22-ghastly-story collection from the Right Hon. Lord @johnlprobert.bsky.social ! If that's not worth a 🖤, not to mention several scary 💀💀💀's, we don't know what is!

Hope to belatedly get stuck into this soon. Have had my non-fiction head on of recent months & struggling to get back into macabre/ supernatural/ horror. Chaos day will come.
- dem.

Read this in the NEL edition, having picked it up at Sunday market thinking 'that might be interesting.' Bloody well was, too!

Hello Magnus! Please inform his lorship we got a delivery update notification from a*m*zon informing us 'Made for the Dark' should now arrive on Friday!

Scene. Our place.
Me. Hey, the Bride. Come and have a look at this.
The Bride. I'm busy. What now? .... Awwwwwwwwwwwwww ... look at his little face! Awwwwwwwwwwwwww (goes on for several hours).

Have it on pre-order from the unspeakable a*az*n.uk, who reckon it will be delivered March 7. I'm relying on it/ you to get me back into reading this stuff. Been all 'non-fiction'/ non-fiction of late. PS Bride of Dem still wants to know what Magnus got for Christmas.

Always gets to me. 🖤

Front cover, 'Buried Passions: Maria Marten & the Red Barn Murder,' Neville Spearman, 1980. Woodcut Illustration depicts three men in hats exhuming the victim's body.

Back cover advertisement for James Dickie's #vampire anthology, 'The Undead' and Marc Alexander's 'To Anger the Devil' examining the work of Rev. Dr Donald Omand, exorcist.

Latest library loan from Watney Market #ideastore; an old friend first borrowed in the late 00s (the identical copy as I recognise my scrawl on the ticket). Thanks to lovely staff, as ever. #Peter_Haining #MariaMarten #MurderintheRedBarn

Cover of Murder in Red Barn Bedside Companion dominated by still of Tod Slaughter performing the dirty deed

Terror in the Bedroom: A Sweet Dreams Nightmare Reader. Cover illo depicts a young woman mithered by phantoms and felines.

Two recent #scrapbooksfromfanzineland Murder in Red Barn Bedside Companion and Terror in the Bedroom. You can download both from Vault if you get in sharpish.

vaultofevil.proboards.com/post/87444/t...

She's way too old for him.

Back cover: detail from the cover illustration plus blurb. "You'll love this book. It's instructive. It's fascinating!"

Glamorous young 1950s couple study a portrait of dancing sweethearts from centuries past.

... and another. E. S. 'Boys Will Be Boys' Turner's 'A History of Courting' (Pan 1958) with particularly cover art by #Cy_Webb

Book cover depicts Victorian / Edwardian (I think) lonely hears on a background of love hearts.

Back cover: a collage of advertisements and more hopeful ad-placers.

#Book_to_read_on_a_haunted_bench_on_ValentinesDay. Francesca Beauman, 'Shapely Ankle Preferr'd: A History of the Lonely Hearts Ad 1695-2010@ (Chatto & Windus, 2011). Devotes a chapter to William Corder, Maria Marten/Martin and the #Murder_in_the_Red_Barn.

Reminder: Should you be unaware, #TheGothicSociety, 'Britain's Purplest Literary Society' have returned from beyond the veil and we reckon you might enjoy a browse of their lovely archive at:
gothrevisit.uk

#Udolpho #JennieGray #mouldering_corpse #gargoyles #ghosts&ghouls #friendsofmyworld etc

Lovely.

Goth Soc ephemera. Heroine and her maid in peil!

A rotting head and a spindly grotesque.

Skull-faced Death tolls the bell.

The Gothic Society, 'Britain's Purplest Literary Society' are back! We recommend you visit their very lovely archive. There is even talk of New Stuff.
gothrevisit.uk

#GothSoc #Udolpho #JennieGray

... and it's #Harrow-on-the-Hill counterpart.

Maria Marten, or the Murder in the Red Barn (John Lane, the Bodley Head, 1943), introduced & edited by Montagu Slater. Charming cover illustration depicts the dastardly Corder shooting dead his lover.

Handwritten note from staff member reads: "Take care of this - it's from 1944!!!! Amazing!!!" Rest assured, I will.

Thank you staff at #ideastore, #watney_market, E1. Love the note. (please hurry up & open a bluesky account!)

Very much enjoyed 'Confessions ...' Loved it whenever a customer discreetly lingered in the erotica section for six hours before leaving without making a purchase.

This is what happens when you lose Dino's cafe.

It had quite an adventure getting here! Very pleased. Would appreciate if you say 'thank you' from me to the mystery lady involved.

Enigmatic Tales cover art by Iain Maynard depicting several horribly scrunged faces, and what appears to be a couple enjoying a 'torture! tor-ture! It pleasures me!' moment.

Arrived to day from @simongosden.bsky.social. L. H. Maynard & M. P. N. Sims 'Enigmatic Tales #5' summer 1999, inc. stories &/or illos by Paul Finch, Hugh Lamb, 'Dick Donovan,' Gerald Gaubert, Alan Hunter, Sarah Singleton, Colin Pink, Joan Board &c.

Terrible as it unquestionably is, I've a soft spot for this one, if only because it was partly filmed at the very wonderful #Grimsdyke, and there was a big drama in local rag about a fire breaking out during the shoot, so obviously, a curse!

That is such a beautiful message.

Cover of Mudflaps fanzine. Blurry illustration of a cyclist outpacing a ghost rider.

Autumn-Winter 1972 issue of #Mudflaps fanzine is a #supernatural special, no less. 24 pages of news reports & articles interspersed with pre-WWI non-spine chilling phantom cyclist fiction. #scrapbooksfromfanzineland #ghosts #terrifyingworldofhauntedbenchproject