Ghostly: A Collection of Ghost Stories Paperback – October 3, 2023

This is a lovely, well thought out collection of stories. I very much enjoyed reading. The cover is BEAUTIFUL and looks amazing on my shelves. Just spooky enough to make you gasp here and there. I highly recommend this book.

If you enjoy ghost stories, you will very much appreciate this collection. Audrey Niffenegger compiled this treasury, and each story contains an illustration and introduction by her, which is enough to make me love the book right there. However, it's also a wonderful collection of ghost stories from a wide variety of authors, some more modern and some quite old. Favorites include Niffenegger's own story, "A Secret Life with Cats," the classic Edgar Allen Pie tale "The Black Cat," and the delightful and whimsical "Honeysuckle Cottage" by P.G. Wodehouse (so fun!). If you are familiar with Niffenegger's love of the macabre and personal tastes, you will be prepared for a few selections that are REALLY out there, and this collection contains them, and a few of them and others are stories I could do without. Overall, though, this is a really great collection and a beautiful book in general. I love it and am so glad to have it to add to my Niffenegger collection.

Book arrived in great condition and, unexpectedly, in a public library book jacket. The book has a good mix of classic vs. contemporary, disturbing vs. romantic and scary vs. funny. I enjoyed ms. Ninnenger's commentaries bf each story as well as the pen and ink illustrations.

I felt that this compilation of stories was good, but it had the potential to be much better than this. Niffenegger was off to a good start with her Edgar Allen Poe story she included. I think the Black Cat is one of Poe's more brief and to the point stories. Plus, it's downright creepy. Though there were some stories that were just too obscure and I simply couldn't get into them. I won't get into all the stories in the book, but I'll list my two most and least favorites.Favorites:The Mezzotint - A critic and collector of museum art pieces comes across a picture that seems to be completely uninteresting and unidentifiable. It is listed at a very high price and the collector finds this very curious. He saves it for later to get some extra opinions from friends on why the picture seems to be so significant to the creator. Each friend that he asks about the picture sees something different and it takes the collector and his friends quite a while to figure out that the picture is moving, and it's trying to tell them something horrible.Tiny Ghosts - When I first started reading this story, I thought I would hate it and I actually considered just skipping it altogether. It's not scary and it's not a traditional ghost story. As I continued reading, I realized that I actually enjoyed the author's writing style and I found myself chuckling at many points. It's about a couple who find a tiny doorway that appears in random places in their house with a series of about 7-8 sarcastic and dominating tiny ghosts that insist that they are taking over. The couple is dejected and can't find a way to get rid of these pests. They try rat poison, mouse traps, and all the other methods that you would use on typical household pests. It isn't until one day that they become so fed up that they find that there's actually a quite interesting and hilarious way to get rid of them.Least Favorites:Honeysuckle Cottage - This, too, was not really a scary story nor was it a ghost story. In fact, it had maybe only one or two references to any types of spiritual matter at all. The story is about a horror/mystery writer who inherits his aunt's (who was a romance writer) cottage where she wrote all her famous stories in. The aunt does not particularly like the nephew, but writes in her will that she will bequeath him the beautiful house if he can manage to stay in it for a certain period of time. The mystery writer finds himself being softened by the energy of the house to the point where it is turning his scary novels into romance novels just like his aunt's. He even starts to fall in love. The reason why I didn't like this story is because aside from the lovely "aura" residing in the house, there was nothing at all really supernatural about it. I also found the main character to be a disagreeable person. His choices (which I will not mention so I don't give away any spoilers) were self-serving and unwise.Pomegranate Seed - Overall, this story was actually not terrible. I just didn't like the ending because it wasn't very clear to me. I actually had to go on my computer and do some research on this story just to figure out exactly what had happened at the end. The story is about a man who is recently re-married after being widowed. After the honeymoon, he begins to receive strange gray letters with illegible handwriting. His current wife becomes suspicious and when she finally gets her hands on a letter to see what's going on, she can't read the writing. This was the part of the story that really lost me.Overall, it is not a bad compilation and it is definitely worth reading. However, don't expect to get your pants scared off.

Good compilation of both new and old authors. Liked it very much and have passed it on to others who say the same.

This collection contains stories old and new, with a mix of styles. Many are humorous; some dark. Few are actually scary. The stories are mostly low-key. I found the collection enjoyable on the whole, though my reactions to particular stories varied. A bonus of the collection is that it contains not only well-known authors, but also some people I'd never heard of, some of whose work I will look for in the future.

It was a great selection of stories, until it disappeared from my bookshelf.

It's refreshing to read an old fashioned ghost story. As I read this book it took me back to my childhood when my dad would spin tales of spooks. I loved it!

A collection of nice horror short stories with creepy, uncanny atmosphere but definitely not for people who are into intense horror stories. All stories hv a common creepy character/s - cat/s. Some stories are too much predictable to be a good short story.

I like the different collection of stories. Some are by writers that are not well known. But these are rivetingreading. I have only just started on the book, and you can tell that it is compiled to get you thinking about the what the next story will contain. Not a run-of-the-mill collection, content varied and entertaining.

Me compre este libro en tapa dura por 3.5€ porque lo rebajaron la semana anterior. Impresionante haberlo conseguido a ese precio. Edición cuidada, se hace sencillo de leer, volvería a comprarlo sin duda.

Anthologies are a dime a dozen.. and common stories spill-over across most. In this rather juvenile collection, the story by Audrey Niffenegger herself, is one of the best. At least something new and exciting in a childish-sort of way. But how does it classify as a vintage classic? AM Burrage needs no introduction. His two, oft repeated stories, add gravity to this compilation. PG Wodehouse is a waste, though. Other authors come across fleetingly; their creations have no re-read value. Modern writers, definitely not vintage. In the Pink House (2014), the author describes her own story as "overlong, and unsatisfying." Kudos to Rebecca Curtis for being so honest.I got this book as a bargain, so OK with me. But if the regular price is charged for this book, it maybe somewhat of a waste.

A very good collection of Ghost stories