M R James’ Casting the Runes

A rambling research paper, written by the mysterious fringe occultist Karswell, is swiftly rejected by an esoteric society’s learned specialist, Edward Dunning, for being ‘perfectly hopeless’. But those who dismiss Karswell always pay a dear price – as Dunning quickly discovers when a curiously inscribed piece of paper suddenly appears in his possession. With an earlier critic found dead in troubling circumstances, is Dunning cursed to follow a similar fate?