Author Montague Rhodes James, known as M.R. James, who lived from 1862–1936, was a most distinguished medievalist, biblical scholar and antiquarian who served as Provost of King’s College, Cambridge and of Eton College in England. Despite his formidable intellectual and administrative achievements, he is best known today, as he was in his lifetime, as the author of some 30 examples of the most frightening, learned and humorous ghost stories ever written. Lost Hearts tells the story of Stephen Elliott, an orphan aged 11 years and of an inquiring frame of mind, who is sent to stay with his much older cousin, the scholarly Mr. Abney, at a remote country mansion, Aswarby Hall, in Lincolnshire. Things get strange when Stephen is repeatedly troubled by visions of a young gypsy girl and a traveling Italian boy with their hearts missing. And then weirder upon discovering Mr. Abney is an alchemist obsessed with making himself immortal. The tale is read by Oscar nominated and Emmy Award Winning Special Makeup FX Artist Edward E. French.
