Richard Barnham Middleton's "The Ghost Ship" is one of the best-loved ghost stories in English literature, about which Arthur Machen wrote, "I declare I would not exchange this short, crazy, enchanting fantasy for a whole wilderness of seemly novels." Middleton himself (1882-1911) was a tragic figure, a young man impatient for success, who managed to live the archetypal life of the Romantic Bohemian poet, complete with poverty, unrequited love for an impossible woman (a prostitute), despair, and an early suicide. While he published many pieces in the best magazines of the day, volumes of his work were published in his lifetime, as soon as he was dead, he was "discovered." Four volumes of his collected works were in print within eighteen months. Three more followed in the next two decades. His poetry was acclaimed in the press as a new Keats, both for the brilliance of his work and the brevity of his life. He is remembered today for a handful of superbly crafted, eerie fantasies, such as "The Coffin Merchant," "On the Brighton Road," and "The Conjurer," which only hint at the richness of the larger body of his work, and suggest what kind of a literary artist he would have become if he had lived. The Pantomime Man presents an unexpected treasure-trove of Middleton's writings. It was originally published a generation after the author's death, when it had been thought that the store of Middleton material had been exhausted.

Of all the theatrical genres most prized by the Victorians, pantomime is the only one to have survived continuously into the twenty-first century. It remains as true today as it was in the 1830s, that a visit to the pantomime constitutes the first theatrical experience of most children and now, as then, a successful pantomime season is the key to the financial health of most theatres. Everyone went to the pantomime, from Queen Victoria and the royal family to the humblest of her subjects. It appealed equally to West End and East End, to London and the provinces, to both sexes and all ages. Many Victorian luminaries were devotees of the pantomime, notably among them John Ruskin, Charles Dickens, Lewis Carroll and W.E. Gladstone. In this vivid and evocative account of the Victorian pantomime, Jeffrey Richards examines the potent combination of slapstick, spectacle and subversion that ensured the enduring popularity of the form. The secret of its success, he argues, was its continual evolution. It acted as an accurate cultural barometer of its times, directly reflecting current attitudes, beliefs and preoccupations, and it kept up a flow of instantly recognisable topical allusions to political rows, fashion fads, technological triumphs, wars and revolutions, and society scandals. Richards assesses throughout the contribution of writers, producers, designers and stars to the success of the pantomime in its golden age. This book is a treat as rich and appetizing as turkey, mince pies and plum pudding.

A summer trip to Paris in 1976…the toss of a strange challenge coin…and the offer to join a clandestine government program…that’s what led Isobelle Wylie on an unforgettable journey into the dangerous world of espionage, love, and betrayal. Even her family never knew about the secret life she lived. She was covertly trained to shadow national security threats as a member of the CIA’s Pantomime Team. Their main target? The KGB’s Eighth Chief Directorate, whose illegals used dirty tricks and coercion to gain access to America’s highly sensitive, very classified communications, equipment, and technology. Forty-five years later, she is attacked in a park in Maryland, savagely beaten and left for dead. Was it just a random encounter with a brutal assailant, or something far more sinister? Something to do with the current state of national security? Her nephew, Will Redfern, is quickly drawn into the intrigue when he opens the professional safe in her condo. As he reads her journals and manuscript, he realizes that the enemy she’s been fighting for decades is still actively hunting for the Pantomime Team. Why is Moscow so worried about what Belle and her fellow shadows know about those old spy cells? Desperate for answers, Will tracks down a man his aunt calls “MacGuyver”. As the two men search for Belle’s assailant, they uncover a heinous plot that has its roots deep inside Moscow and the old KGB First Directorate, where President Vladimir Putin served as a KGB officer. Did Putin reactivate the old terror networks once handled by the KGB in order to get inside America’s present day national security?