Today, September 12, is the birthday of Charles L. Grant (1942-2006). He passed away on September 15, just three days after sixty-fourth birthday.

I never got the chance to meet him, but he is to my mind one of the central figures of the second half of the Twentieth Century.

Grant left a legacy to the fields of dark fantasy and suspense in two ways. With his writing and with his editing.

Let’s take a look at both, shall we?

We’ll start with the writing first.

Grant was probably the foremost practitioner of what has become known as “quiet horror”. That means he didn’t include a great deal of graphic violence and sex. Not to say that those elements were never present. Just that the horror didn’t come from them.

The horror grant wrote about wasn’t quite psychological, although that was certainly an aspect of it. Instead it grew out of the situations his characters found themselves in. Things would be subtlly wrong. And then get worse.

Charles Grant was adept at  both short stories and novels, as well as intermediate lengths. In my opinion, he was one of the best short story writers the field of horror and dark fantasy ever produced. I am still pissed off that his volume in the Masters of the Weird Tale series from Centipede Press sold out within ten minutes of going on sale. I was driving, and didn’t get my order in until fifteen minutes. I expected the book to sell out by the end of the day, just not so soon.

That is a sign of a writer who is highly regarded. Many writers can only dream of their titles selling out, especially when they see their books in the remainder bin.

Much of Grant’s fiction is set in the town of Oxrun Station.

Grant also wrote fantasy under the pen name of Lionell Fenn. I am not familair with any of these books. If anyone is, please post your thoughts in the comments.

The other area where Grant casts a long shadow is in original anthologies.

He edited a few standalone anthologies, but his most successful and influential anthology series was Shadows.

The series started in 1978 and  continued annually until with both hardover and paperback editions until 1987, with Shadows 10. This one never had a paperback reprinting. I only became aware of this one a few years ago. Final Shadows was published in 1991.

The Shadows series rode the tail end of the original anthology trend that had begun in the late sixities and early seventies. It hung on long after the other anthology series died. The term origiinal anthology means there wasn’t a particular theme to the  stories, such as Vampire Cats From Space or Zombie Nurse Romances. There has been no lack of themed anthologies, some good, some bad.

But I digress.

I remember checking out one of the series from the public library when I was in (I think) eighth grade in Paris, Texas. It was Shadows 3, and the lead story, “The Brown Recluse” by Davis Grubb, is one I remember to this day. I kept an eye out for the others.

People have tried to revive original anthologies series since, but none have lasted more than a few volumes.

I wish that weren’t the case.  Original anthologies are a great way for readers to find new writers. It also gives writers a chance to sell a story that might not fit another market.

At least we still have the volulmes of Shadows that were published.