Haunted Waters: Tales of the Old Coast

by Dick Hammond

Book Overview

These stories of coastal life come from days when the hardworking settlers who fished, hunted, ranched, and logged the west coast had to make their own entertainment. Back then daily life was dramatic... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1550172093
• ISBN13: 9781550172096
• Release Date: January 1999
• Publisher: Harbour Publishing
• Length: 248 Pages
• Weight: 1.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Storytelling as it ought to be

I thought they didn't make them like this anymore. I very rarely buy short story anthologies because they so often do anything but tell a story. Dick Hammond is different, and every one of these stories was utterly enjoyable, and a view into a forgotten time and place. The last story, "The House by the Talking Falls" is unique, possibly the only example of West Coast Canadian Gothic in existence! It can stand proudly next to any Edgar Allan Poe or M.R. James.

One of the best short story collections I've ever read

I had been given a copy of this author's first book, Tales From Hidden Basin, in which Dick Hammond's father and uncle have many unusual boyhood adventures in the unexplored land of the west coast of Canada in the 1910s. In this, Hammond's second book (I believe), his father has grown up and leads a more or less solitary existence in his little boat, doing odd jobs and exploring more of this fascinating part of the world. The characters he finds on his travels, all of which actually existed, ought to go down in literary history. Each story in here is a gem. To describe them is to spoil them. Suffice it to say that 'The House by the Talking Falls' is perhaps the only example we're ever likely to have of Canadian West Coast Gothic, and you'll want to read it again and again. This collection is rather steeply priced because of the deluxe hardcover presentation, but it is a gem and one of the best short story collections by one author that you'll have the pleasure of reading.