Authors: Kiran Millwood Hargrave, Laura Shepherd-Robinson, Andrew Michael Hurley, Imogen Hermes Gowar, Natasha Pulley, Elizabeth Macneal, Bridget Collins, Stuart Turton, Jess Kidd, Catriona Ward, Susan Stokes-Chapman, Laura Purcell
Published by Sphere, 2023, 464 pages.

Twelve gifts for the twelve days of Christmas as the song goes, but there are no pipers piping, ladies dancing or a partridge in a pear tree here. These gifts are part of another Christmas tradition: the telling of ghost stories, and these twelve tales from contemporary writers are guaranteed to send shivers down your spine.

“The Gargoyle” by Bridget Collins reminds me of the stories of M.R. James and E.F. Benson. A woman is facing a writer’s block after a very successful first novel, so her publisher rents her a house in the Old Town of Lye, a house that overlooks the church, in the hope that she can focus on finishing her next book. But what is that scratching sound she hears at night? And is the gargoyle she sees in the churchyard, holding “an age-eaten quill in its stone claws”, just a block of stone or something more sinister?

Stuart Turton’s “The Master of the House” is a little different in tone. A widower lives with his eight-year-old son, Thomas, whom he provides for materially but is unable, and unwilling, to give him the attention he craves. One night, Thomas awakes wailing from a nightmare, and the father is not particularly sympathetic. At breakfast the next morning, the child tells the father that the “Master of the House says he’ll take me from you in two weeks”. The father dismisses it, but there is much more to Thomas’s nightmare than he could possibly imagine.

Ada Lark in Jess Kidd’s eponymous story is a small thin child, whose job is to fold herself into a hidden compartment in the pedestal of a Psychical Table built for a fake medium, Madame Bellerose. Once inside the child manipulates levers, hammers and a magnet to give the clients “messages” from their dear departed. But when Madame Bellerose is invited to the home of a wealthy widow to make contact with her dead daughter, she gets more than she has bargained for.

“Banished” by Elizabeth Macneal is based on a true story that took place in Scotland in 1732. Lord Grange is a widower, whose wife, according to him, was drunk, violent and insane. Her “ferocious, vengeful” spirit has been tormenting him and making his life impossible, so he summons a medium to help him get rid of the spirit. When the medium tries to find out more about the dead wife, she is told stories about how unbalanced she was. But the medium is determined to get to the truth, and the result is not quite what Lord Grange had been hoping for.

There are many more stories here. An old play has a ghastly new re-enactment; grieving parents are prepared to do anything to get their dead daughter back; an arrogant woman is made to pay for mistreating her dressmaker; and an island harbours a terrible secret. A man on the run lies low in an idyllic Tuscan house but finds it is not what it seems; a woman has an invisible companion who draws strength from the lies she tells; a governess invokes what she thinks is an imaginary demon from a story; and a maker of fans is working on a singular creation.

These are the dozen tales, and they are enjoyable and very distinct from each other, although they are all set around Christmas. I tend to read a lot of ghost stories, and compilations often overlap, so I was delighted to find this completely new set, including from Stuart Turton, an author whose books I’ve enjoyed. And I’ve discovered many writers whose books I haven’t read!

To get their full effect, read these stories late at night, after everyone has gone to sleep. It should make for a great holiday read. Enjoy!

Read the Talking About Interview with Stuart Turton, and the reviews of The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle and The Devil and the Dark Water.

Read the reviews of the stories of M.R. James and E.F. Benson and of Sphere’s 2021 collection, The Haunting Season—Ghostly Tales for Long Winter Nights.