Gothic Ghosts

In the narrowing field of horror fiction, increasingly dominated by more visceral menaces, this book of delicate but disturbing hauntings provides welcome variety. Both accomplished anthologists, Webb (editor of the Phobias anthology series) and Grant (editor of the World Fantasy Award-winning Shadows series) present 19 pieces by such writers as Rick Hautala, Kathryn Ptacek, Robert E. Vardeman, Nancy Holder, Jessica Amanda Salmonson and others. The writing is atmospheric but not obscure. Some stories--notably Esther Friesner's ""Won't You Take Me Dancing?""--feature surprise inversions of ghost story traditions. Readers will appreciate these new additions to an ageless genre, in which modern settings and sensibilities mesh with the time-honored appeal to our dread of death--and our guilty hope that the dead stay put. (Oct.)