Mr Justice Harbottle

Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu gave life to the modern ghost story style and inspired the genre's most famous contributor, M. R. James. Gathered together for the first time are Le Fanu's complete ghost stories in 30 extraordinary recordings. In the journals of Doctor Hesselius is an account set in the London of the 18th Century. The Honourable Elijah Harbottle, Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas, bloated and pitiless administrator of the hangman's noose, overreaches himself in condemning to death his mistress's former husband and, in doing so, sets himself against the sinister forces of The High Court of Appeal, a court that "sits day and night and never rises", in "the Kingdom of Life and Death". The recording is accompanied by an eBook essay, reflecting on the story's influences and legacy, written by Le Fanu authority, Jim Rockhill. "