Sunday, July 31, 2011

Weird Tales Books-Dracula's Guest and Other Stories

Dracula's Guest and Other Stories edited by Victor Ghidalia

I was at PulpFest in Columbus, Ohio, this weekend and picked up a few books, though not as many as I would have liked. One is called Dracula's Guest and Other Stories, another collection from Xerox, edited by Vic Ghidalia and dedicated to Donald A. Reed, founder of The Count Dracula Society. There are six tales here. Half are in the public domain. Two--the title story and "Bat's Belfry" by August Derleth--were printed in Weird Tales. Derleth's story is noteworthy, for it was his first for "The Unique Magazine," written when he was fifteen in imitation of Bram Stoker's novel, Dracula, right down to the epistolary form. The cover artist is anonymous, but the editor is not. His picture and a biographical sketch appear on the back cover. Ghidalia's introductions appear in the front of the book and at the beginning of each story.

Dracula's Guest and Other Stories edited by Victor Ghidalia
(Xerox Education Publications, 1972, 125 pp.)
"Introduction"
"The Dark Castle" by Marion Brandon (Strange Tales of Mystery and Terror, Sept. 1931)
"The Cloak" by Robert Bloch (Unknown, May 1939)
"The Hunt" by Joseph Paine Brennan (Nine Horrors and a Dream, 1962)
"Dracula's Guest" by Bram Stoker (Dracula's Guest and Other Weird Stories, 1914; Weird Tales, Dec. 1927)
"Bat's Belfry" by August Derleth (Weird Tales, May 1926, reprinted Spring 1981)
"For the Blood Is the Life" by Francis Marion Crawford (Collier's, Dec. 16, 1905)

Dracula's Guest and Other Stories edited by Vic Ghidalia (1972).
A biography and photograph of editor and anthologist Vic Ghidalia, the first I have found in my search for tellers of weird tales.

Text and captions copyright 2011, 2023 Terence E. Hanley

2 comments:

  1. I have this book. I ordered it in 6th grade from Weekly Reader. Good book

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thank you for posting Dracula's Guest and appreciate your informative site.

    ReplyDelete