Helen Hoke is an unsung hero. A prolific editor, she put together a gigantic stack of collections on a wide array of subjects. Joke books, pets, dolls, but increasingly, over the years, horror stories. Her books, horror collections included, were marketed not for bookstores, but rather libraries, where they poisoned the minds of countless children. Children like me! The Kearny Public Library had a whole shelf of Hoke. I wish I had been paying attention when the withdrew them for sale, because boy, is it hard to find some of my favorites that are both in good condition and not expensive. And, sadly, because most of her work wound up in libraries and was inevitably weeded, she doesn’t get the credit she is due. Maybe this post (and tomorrow’s) will change that a bit.

This is Devils Devils Devils (1975), the UK version, which features a marginally better cover. Carol Barker’s art does a lot of work selling the horribleness of the stories here. There aren’t a lot of bangers here, to be quite honest — the real headliner is Stevenson’s “The Bottle Imp.” The various retellings of folktales are OK, though nothing you wouldn’t expect, same with Stephen Vincent Benet’s “The Devil and Daniel Webster.” A. E. Coppard’s “The Devil in the Churchyard” is pretty good though.

Why is this somewhat underwhelming anthology important to me? Because of the last story, “Witches’ Hollow,” credited to both H.P. Lovecraft and August Derleth (but that’s a lie of Derleth’s telling). Of his “posthumous collaborations” with HPL, though, this is probably one of the best, features some fantastically spooky rural atmosphere, a creeptastic kid and an awesome monster (Barker’s illustration is real good!). This story was Young Stu’s first encounter with Lovecraft and his mythos! It took a looooong time before I realized it wasn’t actually a Lovecraft story, ha!