The Best of his Macabre Tales – Edgar Allan Poe
Crows Nest Allen & Unwin, 2009
652 pages
RRP: AU$29.99
ISBN: 978-1-74175-850-4

Reviewed by Russell B. Farr

It should have been an easy, quick review. Get in, talk about how great it is to have a big, hefty, fine looking volume of Poe, collecting so many fine stories, including all the big ones. Talk about how great it is to have them all in one place, complete and unabridged (I always wonder how much of my childhood was abridged). If I felt like putting myself into the review, I could throw something in about the merits of reviewing the work of someone who has been in the ground for 160 years, after all, it’s not like he’ll really care what I say.

What else is there to say about Edgar Allan Poe that doesn’t involve an academic essay? He wrote some of the best stories, long before anyone else, stories so timeless they ring true today. An easy, quick, painless review — having read all the work before, I didn’t even need to open the book to say all that was needed.

Then I opened the book. I felt its 652 pages calling to me. The lure of The Gold Bug. Few can resist the pull of pirate treasure. The pages turned, their words dancing in my eyes, drawing me in. The murder began, the body count mounting by the minute. Murder most foul revealed by a black feline. The house of Usher — gone! The horror of being buried alive. The beating of that heart! That heart! Page after page of unspeakable horror, yet I could not avert my eyes until the very last page.

It was some time after reading the final “nevermore” before my hands stopped their shaking long enough for me to pen these few words. They shake still as I light candles, flick light switches, do all that I can to keep the darkness at bay.