Public-domain ebook
by Grant Allen
Language: en1,172 downloads on Project Gutenberg
Subjects
In: Short Stories·Crime, Thrillers and Mystery
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #38531.
The Beckoning Hand and Other Stories is a collection of short fiction that blends horror, suspense, and mystery, assembled by the prolific Victorian writer Grant Allen. The volume opens with a series of laudatory notices that promise a mix of “delightful ease” and “weird power of Poe,” and then launches into the title story, a theater‑set tale of a striking stranger whose uncanny presence draws the narrator’s uneasy fascination. From the first scene in the Ambiguities Theatre, Allen establishes a vivid, crowded setting that quickly turns chaotic when a fire erupts, thrusting ordinary patrons into a primal struggle for survival. The narrative’s focus on a single, enigmatic woman amid the panic underscores the collection’s recurring theme: ordinary life interrupted by a strange, often unsettling force.
Allen writes with the polished, conversational diction typical of late‑nineteenth‑century periodicals, employing crisp dialogue and detailed description to create both humor and dread. Readers who enjoy atmospheric Victorian storytelling, especially those who appreciate the subtle blend of social observation with eerie, uncanny moments, will find this anthology rewarding. Fans of classic gothic tales and writers such as Poe or Stevenson will recognize the familiar tension between the familiar and the fantastical that runs through these stories.
The opening · free to read
STORIES BY GRANT ALLEN.
STRANGE STORIES.
Crown 8vo, cloth extra, with a Frontispiece by George Du Maurier, 6_s_.; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2_s_.
"Mr. Grant Allen has fully established his claim to be heard henceforth as a story-teller."--ACADEMY.
"No one will be able to say that the stories are dull. The lighter stories can be read with pleasure by everybody, and the book can be dipped into anywhere without disappointment. One and all, the stories are told with a delightful ease and with an abundance of lively humour."--ATHENÆUM.
"Almost all the stories are good, coming nearer to the weird power of Poe than any that we remember to have seen."--PALL MALL GAZETTE.
"Perhaps the best fiction of the year is 'Strange Stories.' Mr. Grant Allen certainly took his friends by surprise when he burst forth as the author of the stories which had appeared under the signature of J. Arbuthnot Wilson. He was known to us all as one of the most able of the rising men of the evolution school, his contributions to modern science being of considerable value. Few suspected him of such levity as telling light stories. The volume is distinctly good."--COUNTY GENTLEMAN.
PHILISTIA.
Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 3_s_. 6_d_.; post 8vo, illustrated boards, 2_s_.
"A very clever, well-written novel, full of freshness and originality."--ST. JAMES'S GAZETTE.
"A book displaying considerable cleverness.... Very readable and clever."--ACADEMY.
"'Philistia' is distinctly clever, and much may be learned from its perusal."--MORNING POST.
BABYLON.
Crown 8vo, cloth extra, with twelve Illustrations by P. Macnab, 3_s_. 6_d_.
"The book justifies itself amply. It is fresh, entertaining, and pleasant from beginning to end. The author has kept in check his peculiar power of weird and fantastic realism, but he has proved himself equally at home in the observation of commonplace character, and the reproduction of everyday life."--PALL MALL GAZETTE.
"Very bright and very amusing.... That it stands far above the average of contemporary fiction goes without saying."--SPECTATOR.
FOR MAIMIE'S SAKE.
Crown 8vo, cloth extra, 6_s_.
"'For Maimie's Sake' is a book that every one who has made acquaintance with the stories signed by 'J. Arbuthnot Wilson' will naturally take up with pleasure. Pleasurable anticipation soon becomes interest, and this interest must rapidly grow into absorbed attention. The humour throughout the first part of Mr. Allen's story is delightful. The reader falls in love with laughing, lovely, unconventional Maimie."--ACADEMY.
"This is a very remarkable book. Maimie is essentially human, intensely womanly, and there is something so bewitching in her childish ignorance, something so innocent in her wickedness, that we can understand her friends' and her lovers' infatuation for her.... There is power of a very high order in writing which can so consistently, yet without the smallest effort, concentrate the reader's attention on the sinner as apart from the sin. There is not a character in the book which fails to interest us, and the writing is, of its kind, faultless."--TIME.
IN ALL SHADES.
3 vols, crown 8vo, cloth extra, 31_s_. 6_d_.
"Mr. Grant Allen could not write a dull story if he wished to do so.... The plot is capitally developed. There is one extremely fine character, Louis Delgado, who stirs up the negroes to revolt; and there is a scene where an attack is made by the negroes on a planter's home, which, for dramatic force, has rarely been equalled of late in fiction. The novel has, in addition to excellence of plot and situation, all the charm that comes of bright and easy dialogue and of character-drawing far above what is ordinarily found. In short, the novel is one to delight every one of good taste."--SCOTSMAN.
"Nora Dupuy is a true, brave, eminently lovable woman, and stands out in the pages of 'In all Shades' as an eminently charming as well as characteristic figure.... On the whole, this is a story of unusual excellence."--PALL MALL GAZETTE.
LONDON: CHATTO AND WINDUS, PICCADILLY.
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