Doorway to Dilemma Bewildering Tales of Dark Fantasy

Tales from H. G. Wells, Frank R. Stockton, Lord Dunsany and more

“The events which I purpose detailing are of so extraordinary a character that I am quite prepared to meet with an unusual amount of incredulity and scorn…” '

Between horror and fantasy lies a world in which the inexplicable remains unsolved and the rational mind is assailed by impossible questions.

Welcome to the realm of Dark Fantasy, where the weird prevails and accounts of unanswerable dilemma find their home.

Gathered within these pages are twisted yarns, encounters with logic-defying creatures and nightmarish fables certain to perplex and beguile.

So join us as we journey across the threshold, deep into the Library’s vaults where nineteen deliciously dark and totally dumbfounding stories await. These tales, plucked from long-lost literary magazines and anthologies spring to life again to embody this most mesmerizing of genres.

Mike Ashley is an internationally renowned expert on popular fiction of the 19th and 20th century and the editor of two previous anthologies in this series: Glimpses of the Unknown: Lost Ghost Stories and From the Depths and Other Strange Tales of the Sea.

Introduction, Mike Ashley
What Was It?, Fitz-James O’Brien
The Anticipator, Morley Roberts
The First Dilemma: The Lady or the Tiger? and The Discourager of Hesitancy, Frank R. Stockton
The White People, Arthur Machen
The Prism, Mary E. Wilkins
The Second Dilemma: The Mysterious Card, and The Mysterious Card Unveiled, Cleveland Moffett
A Moonlight Fable, H. G. Wells
Fear, Catherine Wells
The Third Dilemma: The Little Room, and The Sequel to the Little Room, Madeline Yale Wynne
The Thing in the Cellar, David H. Keller Johnson
Looked Back, Thomas Burke
The Fourth Dilemma: The Woman in Red, and Unmasked, Muriel Campbell Dyar
The New Mother, Lucy Clifford
The Hoard of the Gibbelins, Lord Dunsany
The Final Dilemma: The Three Marked Pennies, Mary E. Counselman