Books of the Month April 2024
I am Legend Richard Matheson
The first book on this month’s list is a beautiful limited edition version of Richard Matheson’s book I am Legend. This book was first published in 1954 and is a post-apocalyptic horror novel. Many of you will have seen its recent cinematic adaptation starring Will Smith however did you realise that the zombies roaming the streets at night are vampires?
The story concerns Robert Neville possibly the last surviving man on earth as he struggles to survive in a world where after a pandemic destroyed the human race turning the remaining survivors into vampires. The story tracks his survival as he battles his own daemons while roaming the streets in the day looking for supplies and answers to the pandemic. At night he locks himself away and prays for dawn when the streets are again free from the swarms of blood thirsty vampires.
This copy comes with signed limited edition artwork by Dave McKean, the book is leather bound, individually numbered and comes in its own unique slipcase. This is truly a wonderful version of this chilling story of survival against all the odds.
The Midnight Folk John Masefield
The Second book we have to share is The Midnight Folk by John Mansfield. This book is a fantasy story about a young boys quest to discover a treasure that stolen from his family.
Young Kay Harker is visited by great grandfather Aston Tirrold Harker who one night steps out of his portrait to tell him about the treasure. He is told the treasure is also saught by a covenant of witches, one of which is his governess Sylvia Daisy Pouncer.
Can Kay Harker find the treasure before the witches? Along the way he is helped by the midnight folk: creatures like Nibbins the cat and Rollicum Bitem Lightfoot the fox, and even his lost toys, who will join him on his dangerous quest.
This fantastic story has all of the ingredience to ignite the imagination of its reader, it includes pirates, witches, lost treasure and talking animals. Although written in 1927 the book has all of the ingredience of a modern Disney story and perfectly captures a child’s perspective, yet there is also plenty of humour that adults will appreciate too.
The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories by Angela Carter
In this astonishing collection, first published in 1979, familiar stories become seductive, enchanting and terrifying. In this collection the author Angela Carter deals with issues of feminism and although each particular narrative deals with a different set of characters, the ‘oppressed female seeking liberation’ is a common theme and concept that is explored throughout the collection
In the title story, Bluebeard is a sado-masochist who lures his inexperienced bride to his castle on the coast of Brittany – but is defeated by a most unexpected adversary. Subversive twists abound: in ‘The Werewolf’, a retelling of ‘Little Red Riding Hood’, a girl hacks off a wolf’s paw, only to find it turning into a warty, withered old hand that she recognises as her grandmother’s. Carter’s women are more likely to outwit their attackers than fall prey to them – as the heroine of ‘The Company of Wolves’ puts it, ‘she knew she was nobody’s meat’.
In this particular book the artist Igor Karash won the second House of Illustration/Folio Society Illustration Award for his work.
