Tuesday, April 12, 2022

Asian Ghost Short Stories Compiled by Lee Murray

 

This was a great compilation of Asian Ghost Stories and folktales involving all things spooky! I thoroughly enjoyed it even though I've read several of them throughout the years. The thing about reading stories from other countries is translations can be drastically different from one person to the next or one era to the next so sometimes it's like reading a whole new story. 


Murray seems to have chosen her stories based on the cultural impact they would have left at the time they were written (reading the introduction is an absolute must here as he discusses the social impact these stories were written for in the intro.) so I found it important to remember that in many cases these stories are at least a century old if not older. Judging them based on today's morals, values, and social norms will almost guarantee you won't like them. Or your own culture's morals, values, and social norms. 


My one complaint would have to be that I would have liked the author to have titled this differently as they definitely are not all "ghost" stories. I know that's super picky but something along the lines of Supernatural folktales would have been more fitting. 


Other than that I'd recommend this to anyone who likes spooky tales!

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