FFB: NOT AT NIGHT! edited by Herbert Asbury (Macy-Masius/The Vanguard Press 1928)

From ISFDB:

• Publication: Not at Night! 
• Editors: Herbert Asbury
• Year: 1928-00-00
• Publisher: Macy-Masius
• Price: $2.00
• Pages: 386

• 9 • Introduction (Not at Night!) • essay by Herbert Asbury
• 15 • The Purple Cincture • (1925) • shortstory by H. Thompson Rich
• 27 • The Horror at Red Hook • (1927) • novelette by H. P. Lovecraft
• 53 • A Hand from the Deep • (1924) • shortstory by Romeo Poole
• 67 • The Tortoise-Shell Cat • (1924) • shortstory by Greye La Spina
• 83 • The House of Horror • [Jules de Grandin] • (1926) • novelette by Seabury Quinn
• 108 • The Coffin of Lissa • (1926) • shortstory by August Derleth [as by August W. Derleth ]
• 113 • Swamp Horror • (1926) • shortstory by Will Smith and R. J. Robbins
• 125 • The Parasitic Hand • [Dr. Burnstrum] • (1926) • shortstory by R. Anthony
• 136 • The Death Crescents of Koti • (1926) • shortstory by Romeo Poole
• 156 • The Beast • (1926) • shortstory by Paul Benton
• 175 • His Wife • (1927) • shortstory by Zita Inez Ponder
• 189 • Laocoon • (1926) • shortstory by Bassett Morgan
• 203 • The Life Serum • (1926) • shortstory by Paul S. Powers
• 220 • The Girdle • (1927) • shortstory by Joseph McCord
• 228 • Bat's Belfry • (1926) • shortstory by August Derleth [as by August W. Derleth ]
• 238 • The Sea Thing • (1925) • shortstory by Frank Belknap Long [as by Frank Belknap Long, Jr. ]
• 250 • The Horror on the Links • [Jules de Grandin] • (1925) • novelette by Seabury Quinn
• 277 • The Experiment of Erich Weigert • (1926) • shortstory by Sewell Peaslee Wright
• 290 • The Hooded Death • (1926) • shortstory by Joel Martin Nichols, Jr.
• 305 • The Man Who Was Saved • (1926) • shortstory by B. W. Sliney
• 315 • The Plant-Thing • (1925) • shortstory by R. G. Macready (variant of The Plant Thing)
• 323 • Death-Waters • (1924) • shortstory by Frank Belknap Long [as by Frank Belknap Long, Jr. ]
• 336 • Monsters of the Pit • (1925) • shortstory by Paul S. Powers
• 352 • Four Wooden Stakes • (1925) • shortstory by Victor Rowan [as by Victor Roman ]
• 365 • The Devil Bed • (1925) • shortstory by Gerald Dean

Despite featuring two stories by Laurie Powers's favorite pulp writer, this anthology from Weird Tales magazine's early years is almost exclusively of historical interest (even given the paperback reprint of half a decade ago by Wildside Press)...and not inconsiderable historical interest, as the first compilation of stories from the magazine to be published in the US (and so clunkily sourced, apparently pirated, that it attributes its contents on the acknowledgements page to the Christine Campbell Thomson's British Not at Night anthologies, mischaracterized as Weird Tales as if that was the title of her books rather than of the US magazine that all these anthologies draw from). However, these should be added to the quick and dirty survey of Weird Tales anthologies that has been a running feature of this blog. The first two editors of WT, founder Edwin Baird and the first of the two legendary editors of the first inpulpation of the magazine, the eccentric Farnsworth Wright, are given a reasonable representation of their efforts in the first four years of the run, albeit with many of the best and best-known writers of Wright's era not represented (and some of them not yet contributing much, despite the presence of work from Seabury Quinn, Lovecraft, and Lovecraft buddies August Derleth and F.B. Long). I've just picked up a slightly battered copy of Not at Night US, for a rather inflation-ravaged $2 that it might've cost new (back when $2 felt more like $30 might today) (along with copies of issues 23 and 24 of the JDM Bibliophile, the venerable John D. MacDonald fanzine also at $2 each). I'm still reading Martha Foley's memoir, which becomes tangentially relevant in that Foley would read Weird Tales for stories for her volumes of Best American Short Stories, and that MacDonald's first short story was in Foley's magazine Story in 1946...but I'm glad to make mention of this one in this context.

For more of today's books, please see Patti Abbott's blog.