
The Big Book of Spooky Tales - Horror Classics Anthology
Classic Gothic Ghost Stories, Haunted Mysteries, and Psychological Tales of the UnseenBy Edgar Allan Poe, Guy de Maupassant, William Archer, Brander Matthews, Lafcadio Hearn, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Wilkie Collins, M. R. James, Margaret Oliphant, W. F. Harvey, Fitz-James O'Brien, Katherine Rickford, Pliny the Younger, Villiers Adam, C. Moffett, F. Marryat, Théopile Gautier, C. B. Fernando, R. L. Stevenson, Joseph L. FrenchLength41h 26m
About this audiobook
The Big Book of Spooky Tales gathers a capacious canon of horror classicism, tracing fear from antique marvel and Gothic inheritance to Victorian sensation, fin-de-siècle decadence, and early modern weird fiction. Its stories range from spectral visitations and cursed houses to psychological unease, uncanny doubles, and the terror of the ordinary. Particularly vivid episodes of haunting, inherited guilt, and supernatural ambiguity reveal how the anthology's varied forms—tale, confession, antiquarian ghost story, and atmospheric sketch—made horror a durable literary mode. The contributors form an unusually broad, transnational constellation: American, British, French, and other European writers whose careers intersect with Romanticism, realism, Gothic revival, imperial encounter, and the emergence of popular magazine fiction. Alongside a classical voice, the volume situates later supernatural writing within a long history of testimony, folklore, and moral speculation. Collectively, these authors demonstrate horror's capacity to register cultural anxieties concerning modernity, domesticity, death, colonial contact, and the limits of rational explanation. This anthology is especially rewarding for readers seeking both an introduction to horror's major traditions and a rich comparative field for study. Its single volume invites sustained attention to changing narrative techniques and recurrent fears, while the juxtaposition of distinctive voices fosters a lively dialogue between the Gothic past and the modern imagination.
Audiobook details
Rating★★★★ 3.8 (93)
Includes Goodreads, Amazon
GenreHorror, General Fiction
Length41 hrs 26 mins
Narrated byListen with 1,000+ voices
FormateBook with Audio
Publish dateDec 21, 2023
LanguageEnglish
Table of contents
1King Arthur: 10 Books of Tales & Myths about the Legendary King of Camelot
2The Big Book of Spooky Tales - Horror Classics Anthology
3Ghost Stories
4Thrawn Janet (Robert Louis Stevenson)
5The Horla (Guy de Maupassant)
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6To Sura: A Letter (Pliny the Younger)
7The Beast with Five Fingers (William F. Harvey)
8I
9II
10III
11IV
12Number 13 (Montague Rhodes James)
13Joseph: A Story (Katherine Rickford)
14Sister Maddelena (Ralph Adams Cram)
15The Man Who Went Too Far (E.F. Benson)
16The Phantom Rickshaw (Rudyard Kipling)
17The Apparition of Mrs. Veal (Daniel Defoe)
18THE PREFACE
19A RELATION OF THE APPARITION OF MRS. VEAL
20TO THE READER
21Canon Alberic's Scrap-Book (M. R. James)
22The Haunted and the Haunters (Lord Edward Bulwer-Lytton)
23The Silent Woman (Leopold Kompert)
24The Rival Ghosts (Brander Matthews)
25The Damned Thing (Ambrose Bierce)
26I ONE DOES NOT ALWAYS EAT WHAT IS ON THE TABLE
27II WHAT MAY HAPPEN IN A FIELD OF WILD OATS
28III A MAN THOUGH NAKED MAY BE IN RAGS
29IV AN EXPLANATION FROM THE TOMB
30The Interval (Vincent O'Sullivan)
31Dey Ain't No Ghosts (Ellis Parker Butler)
32The Banshees of Ireland
33THE GIANT GHOST
34SOME FAMOUS GHOSTS OF THE NATIONAL CAPITOL
35A GENUINE GHOST
36THE BAGGAGEMAN'S GHOST
37DRUMMERS SEE A SPECTER
38DR. FUNK SEES THE SPIRIT OF BEECHER
39MYSTERY OF THE COINS
40MR. BEECHER APPEASED
41MARYLAND GHOSTS
42THE GHOST OF PEG ALLEY'S POINT
43AN APPARITION AND DEATH
44AN IDIOT GHOST WITH BRASS BUTTONS
45A MODEL GHOST STORY
46A GHOST THAT WILL NOT DOWN
47TOM CYPHER'S PHANTOM ENGINE
48GHOSTS IN CONNECTICUT
49THE SPOOK OF DIAMOND ISLAND
50THE GHOST'S FULL HOUSE