Hodgson, in the company of Algernon Blackwood, Bram Stoker, H.P. Lovecraft, M.R. James, Edgar Allan Poe, Arthur Machen, Arthur Conan Doyle and many other fine and distinguished authors of the late Victorian era, created the foundations of the modern short story, the weird, the dark and the delightful, the supernatural and the fantastic and the imaginative. This new collection of Hodgson's tales highlights his sinuous storytelling prowess, and range and depth of his wonderful work.

The Flame Tree Gothic Fantasy, Classic Stories and Epic Tales collections bring together the entire range of myth, folklore and modern short fiction. Highlighting the roots of suspense, supernatural, science fiction and mystery stories, the books in Flame Tree Collections series are beautifully presented, perfect as a gift and offer a lifetime of reading pleasure.

"Hodgson was an important figure in the fields of weird horror, sea-faring horror, and occult detective fiction, and this is fine introduction to his work" -- Concatenation

William Hope Hodgson (1877–1918) was born in the great Victorian era of classic horror writing. He lived in Essex, England but moved several times with his family, including a stint in County Galway in Ireland – a setting that would later inspire The House on the Borderland. Hodgson made several unsuccessful attempts to run away to sea, until his uncle secured him some work in the Merchant Marine. His association with the ocean would unfold later in his many sea stories. After some initial rejections of his writing work, Hodgson managed to become a full time writer of both novels and short stories, which form a fantastic legacy of adventure, mystery and horror fiction.

Jonathan Newell (Foreword) is an instructor at Langara College in Vancouver, Canada. A specialist in weird and Gothic fiction, his scholarship focuses on the links between affect and ontology in works of supernatural horror. His first book, A Century of Weird Fiction, 1832–1937: Disgust, Metaphysics, and the Aesthetics of Cosmic Horror from the University of Wales Press, traces the twisted entanglement of revulsion, ecstasy, mysticism, and ontological speculation through the works of authors like Algernon Blackwood, H.P. Lovecraft, and William Hope Hodgson.