There is no introduction, but the book contains sixteen stories, all of them new save for two: one by A.L. Rowse dates from 1945; the other, by Brian Lumley, from 1978. The book is dedicated to the memory of Denys Val Baker, who's book Haunted Cornwall (1973) initiated a long line of ghost story collections and anthologies from William Kimber.
Cornwall has a significant presence in the book, with at least five stories set there, including those by J.C. Trewin, Meg Buxton, Rosalind Wade, A.L. Rowse, and Mary Williams.
The best stories are the more literary ones. "All Souls' Night" by A.L. Rowse tells of a young scholar coming to write the history of a Cornish family. In "Under the Shadow" by J.C. Trewin, a man returns to Cornwall with his wife, and a very odd silence descends upon the village, as had happened previously. Derek Stanford's "The Old Brighton Road" is written in direct relation to Richard Middleton's 1912 story "On the Brighton Road," bringing back its ghostly characters. Another story I especially liked was the final one in the book, "The Punch and Judy Man" by Lanyon Jones, in which the bustle of modernity encroaches upon a reclusive Punch and Judy Man during his off-season.
The lesser stories include Brian Lumley's "Vanessa's Voice," which seemed rather trite to me; and "The Ferret" by Mary Williams, in which a woman's dead husband reappears in rat-like form to eat her face. Rosemary Timperley's very short "The Ghost House" is more of a vignette with a punchline than a story.
Most of the other stories are nicely varied, from Rosalind Wade's "The Cat's Teaparty," in which a scene from decades earlier is re-enacted as a haunting. and Med Buxton's "The Marigold Cow," which begins with a cow that, just as the title suggests, eats marigolds, and gets stranger from there.
Overall a decent collection, well worth reading.
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