Champavert was the archetypal collection of the French "contes cruels," and the book still remains among the cruellest of them all. It is also one of the greatest collections of short stories ever published; the only reason that it has never been translated before is that the job was so challenging that only an insane person would tackle it. Pétrus Borel the Lycanthrope (as he called himself) declared himself dead before the book was published, but not many people believed him, even though he was the most honest man in Paris. Here are seven classic tales of horror, fantasy, and the twistings of fate, including the final story, "Champavert, the Lycanthrope," translated from the French for the very first time by the well-known fantastist and critic, Brian Stableford.