Fifty years of The Night Ghouls and Other Grisly Tales

The Night Ghouls and Other Grisly Tales (1975) by R. Chetwynd-Hayes

Readers unfamiliar with The Night Ghouls and Other Grisly Tales may wish to read my notes only after reading the collection.

“The Ghouls” places respectable householder Mr. Goldsmith in the crosshairs of an unsuspected government bureaucracy.

‘Do you know how many living people there are in Britain today?’

‘Ah - ah …’ Mr Goldsmith began.

‘Precisely,’ His Nibs sat back, ‘Sixty-two million, take or lose a million. Sixty-two million actual or potential voters. Sixty-two million consumers, government destroyers and trade unionists. Now, what about the others?’

‘Others,’ echoed Mr Goldsmith.

‘Ah, you’ve got the point. The dead. The wastage, the unused. One person in two thousand dies every twenty-four hours. That makes 30,000 bucket-kickers a day, 3,000,000 a year. One man, and one man only, saw the potential. Sitting there in his terrace house, drinking his cocoa and watching television, it came to him in a flash. Why not use the dead?’

‘Use the dead,’ Mr Goldsmith agreed.

‘Taking u…