From the Back Cover The second in a series of republished classic literature, The Ghost Stories of M. R. James collects the tales that best illustrate his quiet mastery of the ghost story form. Running through each of these stories is a slowly escalating sense of unease and dread, which ultimately shifts into the wildly uncanny. James characters exist in a world of ancient objects whose atrocious histories begin to repeat when they are disturbed, and the blinkered repression common to James' narratives only amplifies the shock of the spectral appearance. About the Author Montague Rhodes James (1862-1936) is best remembered for redefining the ghost story for a new century. James subverted the Gothic tradition, setting his stories in commonplace, contemporary settings.