More Philip Allan: The non-anthology ‘Creeps’

More Philip Allan: The non-anthology ‘Creeps’

Apart from the famous anthologies, there were a number of novels and single author collections in the Creeps series. From Tales Of Fear (I’ve added the year of publication, when known)

THE FAMOUS “CREEPS” SERIES

To be successful, the gruesome story must not be too long. The most hardened of us can only take this kind of thing in small doses with a breathing space between each.

The sales of these volumes have gone into many thousands. Some have gone quite out of print; but new ones are being constantly added. Each volume has about a dozen stories of sheer, stark horror – and noone, whatever their nerve strength, should read them at night. Nervous people should not read them at all.

THE THREE FREAKS – TODD ROBBINS 1934
THE MASTER OF MURDER – TODD ROBBINS 1933
THE BUTTERFLY MURDER – CHARLTON ANDREW ????
DEVIL’S DRUMS – VIVIAN MEIK 1933
VEILS OF FEAR – VIVIAN MEIK 1934
THE STRANGE PAPERS OF DR. BLAYRE – CHRISTOPHER BLAYRE 1932
THE AIR DEVIL – BARRINGTON BEVERLEY 1934
MYSTERIES OF ASIA – SHEIK ABDULLAH 1934
TALES OF THE GROTESQUE – L. A. LEWIS 1934
VAMPIRES OVERHEAD – ALAN HYDER 1935
THE DEVIL OF THE DEPTHS – JACK McLAREN 1935

TO THE READER

If you have enjoyed the stories in this popular series – why not write one? It is very probable that other volumes will be added: and the publishers are always ready to consider the work of new, as well as established, authors.

Send MSS. to

Messrs. PHILIP ALLAN & CO., Ltd.
69, Great Russell Street, London, W.C.1

Mark envelopes ‘Creeps’

Three more books, also published by Philip Allan, which appeared too early to be considered legit Creeps were Mrs. Everett’s The Death Mask & Other Ghost Stories (1920), Tod Robbins’ Who Wants A Green Bottle? (1926) and H. R. Wakefield’s They Return At Evening (1928).

Come 1936 and the publisher seems to have veered off into a SF direction with Edmond Hamilton’s The Horror Of The Asteroid & Other Planetary Horrors and Barrington Beverley’s The Space Raiders, although that same year saw publication of Charle’s Birkin’s Devil Spawn, which collected all his contributions to the anthologies and is unquestionably a Creep!.

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Powers Of Darkness

Charles Lloyd (ed) – Powers Of Darkness (Phillip Allan,1934)

>Many thanks to Robert Weinberg for kindly granting me permission to use his cover scans.

INCLUDED in this volume of the “CREEPS” series are many famous names, and while stories of the supernatural will delight lovers of the psychic world, thrill seekers will find sensations in plenty.

Lord Dunsany gives the explanation of a horrible and baffling murder; Hastings Turner a grisly tale of retribution from an unexpected source; C. Fox Smith, the noted writer of the sea, a story of the fate of three mutineers under tropic skies; and other contributors of considerable merit and literary reputation.

Lord Dunsany – The Two Bottles Of Relish
A.E.D. Smith – The Coat
Charles Lloyd – Obsession
Kenneth Ingram – The Third Time
J.H. Turner – The Guillotine
Cicely Fox-Smith – The Mutineers
Russell Thorndike – November The Thirteenth
L.A. Westney – The Miniature In Black
E.R. Morrough – The Temple Servant
Maureen E. Shaw – A Nice Cup Of Tea

Lord Dunsany – The Two Bottles Of Relish: The police know that Steeger killed Nancy Elth but nobody can work out what he did with the body. And why did he cut down all those trees?
A ghoulish mystery, solved by a chance remark by Num Numo salesman Smithers to his genius flatmate Linley. Killer kiss off line.

Charles Lloyd – Obsession: Hartledean. Doris Carson and Henry Russell are to wed. Joe, the village idiot, has a massive crush on Doris as she’s the only person who has ever been kind to him. After she gently declines his offer of marriage, Joe takes to stalking both she and her burly fiancé. Henry beats him up.
Events reach their grim conclusion at the old quarry when, with a superhuman effort, Joe dislodges a huge boulder, intending for it to crush the life out of his rival. It takes a nasty deflection on the way down ..

A. E. D. Smith – The Coat: On a cycling holiday in France, the narrator stops off to mend a puncture at a deserted chateau near Vosges where he is seen off by an animated coat. He later learns that it belonged to a sadistic murderer in Napoleon’s army whose own daughter was obliged to shoot him in the back.