CANON ALBERIC’S SCRAPBOOK – Written by Montague Rhodes James, and I’m shocked that I still encounter people today who are not familiar with him and his works. Anyway, that made me decide to examine his first supernatural horror story.
Canon Alberic’s Scrapbook was originally written by James and was read aloud by him in October 1893 to his friends in the ChitChat Society at King’s College, Cambridge. It was published in 1895.
The story features Dennistoun, a Cambridge Scholar who takes a vacation on the Continent so he can tour, photograph and sketch old cathedrals in France. Dennistoun bicycles to the town of St.-Bertrand-de-Comminges near Toulouse to cover its cathedral.
A very nervous old Verger is assigned to accompany him and while Dennistoun contentedly whiles away the day lost in the ancient appeal of the cathedral he becomes increasingly aware of the Verger’s discomfort. The older man refuses to leave our main character alone in the building, even when sinister, hollow tittering is heard throughout the cathedral. Continue reading
RABID GRANNIES (1988) – This review of Rabid Grannies applies ONLY to the original uncut edition, NOT the edited version distributed by the Troma Team. The uncut version is well worth watching but the cut version is awful.
ABSOLUTE EVIL (1918) – This longish short story was written by Julian Hawthorne, son of Nathaniel. The tale features Julian’s tragically overlooked supernatural adventuress Martha Klemm. 
THE VIDEO DEAD (1987) – This gory low-budget zombie movie plays like an unused segment of Creepshow expanded to feature length. Long before The Ring, this production presented creepy zombies from an old black & white horror flick climbing out of a tv set and slaughtering anyone and everyone.
COLMA, CALIFORNIA – It’s called the City of the Dead, the City that Always Sleeps, etc. There are roughly one point five million people buried in the many cemeteries which make up Colma. 
Colma is near San Francisco. Fresh graves in San Francisco cemeteries in the 1800s expanded those graveyards so much that around the turn of the century the city banned any additional cemetery space. The overflow began filling what is now Colma. 
As Halloween Month rolls along, I will take a movie-by-movie look at the opening season of Elvira’s show Movie Macabre (1981-1986). Her massive success kicked off an even greater proliferation of Movie Hosts and Hostesses in the 1980s. I covered 
GRAVE OF THE VAMPIRE (1972) – Psychotronic icons Michael Pataki and William Smith starred in this twisted flick about a vampire (Pataki) who rapes a woman (Lyn Peters) who subsequently gives birth to an abnormal infant. The baby will drink only blood and grows up to be James Eastman (Smith). James goes on a quest to kill his father for the pain he brought into his mother’s life. Ultimately he does, but becomes a full vampire himself. (Just go with it.) Aired Sep 26th, 1981.
THE ROOM IN THE TOWER (1912) – This story was written by E.F. Benson. The British narrator has a recurring nightmare in which he visits his friend John Clinton at his family manor. The other family members, including his mother Mrs. Stone, are cold and grim toward him. 
STRANGE HARVEST (2025) – Halloween Month continues with this review of a movie which got previewed in 2024 before its official release in August 2025. Because Balladeer’s Blog covers everything from mild Silent-Era horror films to extreme horror from recent decades I will post my courtesy warning for Strange Harvest:
However, his murders seemed unrelated until detective work recently found the obscure link connecting them. I will go into details about the grotesque murders below. Oddly, despite the grisly nature of the slayings, Strange Harvest otherwise starts out with a slow burn approach reminiscent of Rosemary’s Baby, The Exorcist and other films. 
