Description
Kenneth Grant
Starfire Publishing Ltd, London, 2003. Hardcover. 158 pages. Brand New/Fine.
Sewn binding. Colour dust jacket by Steffi Grant. Colour frontispiece ‘Altar of Lam’ by Steffi Grant. This is the third volume in the novella series by Kenneth Grant, and again consists of two stories.
The first, Gamaliel: The Diary of a Vampire, presents the history of a woman, Vilma, who attempts to invoke unseen Intelligences but takes a wrong turn. She loses her way in the Gamaliel, the Qliphoth of Yesod, and eventually succumbs to vampiric possession. The story unfolds as extracts from her Magical Diary, the editor of which makes a horrifying discovery as the Diary closes.
The second, Dance, Doll, Dance!, is an account of Tantric Sorcery. It centres upon the fatal emanations of an idol, bequeathed to the narrator of the story. It becomes clear from a sinister pattern of events that the idol thrives on blood and sexual rites. The narrator is enmeshed in a nefarious web of intrigue and allure, and his energies are vampirised, culminating in a cataclysmic rite based on the Dakshina Kalika Yantra.
Like others in this series, these stories were written in the period when New Isis Lodge was in operation, in the 1950s and early 1960s.
