The Sea Change and Other Stories: a review

As a more-or-less regular reader of genre magazines like “All Hallows”, “Supernatural Tales” and “Ghosts & Scholars” (in its latest incarnation), I have had the pleasure of getting acquainted with Helen Grant’s storytelling abilities. Surprisingly, books written by her which had been available before this collection came out, were Young Adult novels. Those novels had their strange mix of gentle humour, subtle menace, and an overpowering feeling of darkness, that had shocked me when I had read them (because in my naïve mind, I had never associated such darkness with YA novels). However, in her short stories that style had a chilling effect that was rendered more effective because of the brevity of the stories, and certain ambiguities which short stories revel in leaving. From this perspective, this collection is a feast indeed!

I would be literally spoiling the pleasure of reading if I summarise the stories while mentioning them. Yet, I feel like writing about them! Let me try to strike a balance, as under:

1.  Grauer Hans: this one was new for me, and I found the compact & smooth story to be positively menacing, esp. with the open ending! 
2. The Sea Change: an old friend, and one that invokes such scary thoughts in the readers’ mind that would make any Lovecraft-wannabes go green in envy. 
3. The Game of Bear: another old friend, and a positively fright-inducing completion of an unfinished draft left by MRJ. 
4. Self-Catering: a new story (for me) which I found to be absolutely brilliant in its narration, the characters (just read their names!), the deliberate infusion of humour into macabre, and its conclusion. Wonderful stuff! 
5. Nathair Dhubh: read it long ago, and yet remembered every event of the climb with a tingling sensation along the spine. Authentic stuff that brings some of the very best stories written by stalwarts like Benson & Wakefield to mind. 
6. Alberic de Mauleon: a delicious prequel to one of the most famous MRJ stories, and one which I had read recently in the “Ghosts & Scholars: Book of Shadows”. 
7. The Calvary at Banska Bystrica: the topper, undoubtedly! A grim story full of nuances and a darkness that intensified as we undertook the physical & spiritual journey with the narrator.

Swan River Press continues its journey in providing us with some of the finest (& amongst the best-looking as well) books of stories of supernatural. And I pray to the overlords of literary heaven that they keep providing Helen Grant with flashes which might provoke her into taking breaks from YA novels, and unleash stories like these! Recommended in the highest possible terms.