The Sound of His Horn

In 1943, an English officer, Alan Quedilyon, flees from a Nazi concentration camp. Lost among the endless forests of Eastern Germany, he is transported to a strange world—a parallel reality, where he once again finds himself a prisoner. This time—in a vast estate owned by a mysterious, terrifying Count, the Reich’s chief forester, known for his passion for hunting by moonlight. Only he hunts not with dogs—he pursues something that isn’t animals…

The novel "The Sound of His Horn," one of the benchmarks of horror literature, has been included in the 100 best books of the genre ("Horror: 100 Best Books" by Kim Newman and Steven Jones). Its author is the English writer and diplomat John William Wall, who remained in the golden canon of "dark" prose under the pseudonym Sarban. Thanks to Sarban’s elegant style and the mythological quality of his imagery, he is often compared to H. P. Lovecraft and Jorge Luis Borges, Arthur Machen, and Walter de la Mare. That said, this writer has his own unique voice and has long held a place of honor on the world literary Olympus, even though in Russia he is almost unknown. This volume is intended to correct that regrettable misunderstanding.

The collection includes a variety of Sarban’s works: "The Sound of His Horn," "Sea Creatures," "The House by the Road," "Calmahan," and others, in which, as writer Kingsley Amis puts it, "dreams and night terrors are combined," and the laws of nature give way to the bizarre chaos of imagination…