The Wolves of God (Fantasy and Horror Classics)

By Algernon Blackwood

This classic ghost story is set on the isolated islands of Orkney as a man runs from the horrors he encountered in the North American wilderness.

Jim Peace returns to his brother, Tom, and their childhood home in the Orkneys after spending 30 years working in Canada. Despite the comforting familiarity of the islands, something has changed within Jim, and he attempts to conceal his deteriorating state of mind from his brother and friends. As a heavy storm hits, Jim becomes transfixed by a pack of wolves only he can see, and Tom grows increasingly concerned for his brother's health.

This classic short story by Algernon Blackwood was first published in his 1921 collection, The Wolves of God and Other Fey Stories, and is not to be missed by fans of classic horror literature.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Fantasy and Horror Classics
• Release date: Nov 22, 2023
• ISBN: 9781528799072

Algernon Blackwood

Algernon Blackwood (1869-1951) was an English journalist, novelist, and short story writer. Born in Shooter’s Hill, he developed an interest in Hinduism and Buddhism at a young age. After a youth spent travelling and taking odd jobs—Canadian dairy farmer, bartender, model, violin teacher—Blackwood returned to England and embarked on a career as a professional writer. Known for his connection to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, Blackwood gained a reputation as a master of occult storytelling, publishing such popular horror stories as “The Willows” and “The Wendigo.” He also wrote several novels, including Jimbo: A Fantasy (1909) and The Centaur (1911). Throughout his life, Blackwood was a passionate outdoorsman, spending much of his time skiing and mountain climbing. Recognized as a pioneering writer of ghost stories, Blackwood influenced such figures as J. R. R. Tolkien, H. P. Lovecraft, and Henry Miller.

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THE WOLVES OF GOD

By

ALGERNON BLACKWOOD

Fantasy and Horror Classics

Copyright © 2023 Fantasy and Horror Classics

This edition is published by Fantasy and Horror Classics,

an imprint of Read & Co.

This book is copyright and may not be reproduced or copied in any

way without the express permission of the publisher in writing.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available

from the British Library.

Read & Co. is part of Read Books Ltd.

For more information visit

www.readandcobooks.co.uk

Contents

Algernon Blackwood

THE WOLVES OF GOD

Algernon Blackwood

Algernon Henry Blackwood was born in Shooter’s Hill, South East England, in 1869. In his youth he trained as a doctor at Wellington College in Berkshire, and went on to pursue a number of careers, in areas as varied as milk farming, modelling, journalism and violin teaching. In his thirties, Blackwood returned to England from New York, where he had spent a number of years, and began to write stories of the supernatural.

Blackwood was extremely prolific, producing over the course of his life some ten original collections of short stories, fourteen novels, several children’s books, and a number of plays. Most of his work was concerned with the ghostly, mythical or occult—themes which Blackwood was attracted to his whole life—and he is regarded as one of the earlier practitioners of ‘weird fiction’. Amongst his best known short stories are ‘The Wendigo’, and ‘The Willows’—a work which H. P. Lovecraft called the finest weird story I have ever read. In 1914, he produced his short story collection Incredible Adventures, which leading literary critic S. T. Joshi has said may be the premier weird collection of this or any other century. Blackwood worked as an undercover agent for Britain during the First World War, and during the 1920s became famous for reading his ghost stories live on BBC radio and television.

After a number of strokes, Blackwood died in old age in Kent, England.

THE WOLVES OF GOD

First published in 1921

I

As the little steamer entered the bay of Kettletoft in the Orkneys the beach at Sanday appeared so low that the houses almost seemed to be standing in the water; and to the big, dark man leaning over the rail of the upper deck the sight of them came with a pang of mingled pain and pleasure. The scene, to his eyes, had not changed.