Visible and Invisible

Benson's second collection of ghost stories contains three powerful tales featuring the type of "spectres" that Benson seems to have been most haunted by: large ("Junonian," as he might say), attractive, cheerful, outgoing, middle-aged women. In "The Outcast" she is a reincarnation of Judas, in "Inscrutable Decrees" she is an emotional sadist and a murderer by omission, and in "Mrs. Amworth"--one of the best supernatural tales ever written--she is a conventional but nevertheless terrifying vampire. There are other good tales here too, particularly "Negotium Perambulans" (featuring a giant slug acting as an instrument of divine vengeance) and "Roderick's Story," that rare tale about a benign haunting that still produces a shiver and the consciousness of a world beyond. (Bill Kerwin)