Nowadays, when people want get horrified, they turn on ghost games or watch horror movies. However, both games and movies have one origin.
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Vampires, ghosts, paranormal activities… in the beginning they were seen on the pages on numerous books.
Dracula by Bram Stoker, the works of Edgar Allan Poe or H.P. Lovecraft, are not the only must-reads for anyone who wants to bring some horror to an evening on a sofa.
Arthur Machen’s The Great God Pan, now a classic in horror genre, was at first denounced for its deeply decadent style and obscenity.
The House of the Vampire, written by George Sylvester Viereck, is one of the first horror novels to explore the psychic and emotional aspects of vampirism.
In The Lost Stradivarius (John Meade Falkner), the source of the evil is a single object – a found Stradivarius violin.
All the stories are available for free from Project Gutenberg. You can get them to your Kindle or other e-readers and apps, including iPad or iPhone, Kobo, and Nook.
You can use a one-click download to Dropbox or Google Drive, so getting multiple files is pretty easy.
A great thing about Project Gutenberg is that the site offers book collections. This list is based on Horror Bookshelf.
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35 classic horror stories, free to download
1. An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge
by Ambrose Bierce
Set during the American Civil War, it is the story of Peyton Farquhar, a Confederate sympathizer condemned to death by hanging from Owl Creek Bridge.
This is the most famous story by Ambrose Bierce, valued for its irregular time sequence and twist ending.
2. The Damned Thing
Ambrose Bierce
The story focuses on how the human race takes their views of nature for granted, and how there may be things in the natural world that the human eye cannot see or the human ear cannot hear.
3. The Damned
Algernon Blackwood
One of the short stories from Algernon Henry Blackwood, English novelist and one of the most prolific writers of ghost stories in the history of the genre.
4. Four Weird Tales
Algernon Blackwood
The collection contains four short stories: The Insanity of Jones, The Man Who Found Out, The Glamour of the Snow, and Sand.
5. The Wendigo
Algernon Blackwood
Probably one of the best-known stories by Blackwood. A group of men deep in the Northern wilderness are visited by a terrifying creature from Native American legend.
6. The Willows
Algernon Blackwood
H.P. Lovecraft considered this story to be the finest supernatural tale in English literature.
Two friends are on a canoe trip down the Danube. Their antagonist is the surrounding environment (river, sun, wind, and most importantly — the willows) which imbues them with a powerful and threatening character.
7. The King in Yellow
Robert W. Chambers
A collection of ten highly weird stories, described by S.T. Joshi as “a classic in the field of the supernatural.”
8. The Lost Stradivarius
John Meade Falkner
In this Gothic short story, aristocrat John Maltravers, discovers a Stradivarius violin, and becomes obsessed with the instrument.
The black magician’s history and this obsession eventually destroy him.
9. The House on the Borderland
William Hope Hodgson
A supernatural horror story being a hallucinatory account of a recluse’s stay at a remote house, and his experiences of supernatural creatures.
10. The Night Land
William Hope Hodgson
A classic horror novel, described by H.P. Lovecraft as “one of the most potent pieces of macabre imagination ever written”.
A gentleman, mourning the death of his beloved woman, is given a vision of a distant future where their souls will be reunited.
11. The Boats of the “Glen Carrig”
William Hope Hodgson
A story about the passengers who escaped in two lifeboats the wreck of a ship, which was lost at sea and struck a hidden rock.
12. The Turn of the Screw
Henry James
A gothic ghost story novella written by Henry James. It tells a story of how the young governess is hired by a man who has become responsible for his young nephew and niece after the death of their parents.
13. A Thin Ghost and Others
M. R. James
A collection of ghost stories includes, among others, The Residence at Whitminster, and The Story of a Disappearance and an Appearance.
14. Ghost Stories of an Antiquary
M. R. James
First collection of ghost stories by M. R. James. The stories rely “on a gentle, bucolic background to emphasize the awfulness of the otherworldly intrusions.”
15. Ghost Stories of an Antiquary – Part 2
M. R. James
The second part of M. R. James’ collection brings 15 more horror stories.
16. Metamorphosis
Franz Kafka
A famous short novel by Franz Kafka, which begins with a traveling salesman, Gregor Samsa, waking to find himself transformed into a large, monstrous insect.
16. The Trial
Franz Kafka
One of Kafka’s best-known works, it tells the story of a man arrested and prosecuted by a remote, inaccessible authority, with the nature of his crime revealed neither to him nor the reader.
17. Carmilla
Sheridan Le Fanu
This Gothic novella tells the story of a young woman’s susceptibility to the attentions of a female vampire named Carmilla.
18. The Shunned House
H.P. Lovecraft
One of H.P. Lovecraft’s best short novels. The protagonist and his uncle, Dr. Elihu Whipple, have been tracking the mysterious, yet apparently coincidental sickness and death of many who have lived in the house on Benefit Street.
19. The Great God Pan
Arthur Machen
A classic horror novella by Arthur Machen was widely considered as degenerate and horrific because of a decadent style and sexual content.
20. The House of Souls (collection)
Arthur Machen
Most notable works by a Welsh author and mystic Arthur Machen. Besides The Great God Pan, you’ll find here also A Fragment of Life, The White People, and The Inmost Light.
21. Animal Ghosts Or, Animal Hauntings and the Hereafter
Elliott O’Donnell
First of three books by Elliot O’Donnell, digitized by Project Gutenberg. The author was known primarily for his books about ghosts.
22. Scottish Ghost Stories
Elliott O’Donnell
A collection of seventeen ghost stories located in Scotland.
22. The Sorcery Club
Elliott O’Donnell
This occult fantasy novel is one of the most popular works of Elliott O’Donnell.
Three people make a pact with the “Unknown” to obtain occult powers. Unfortunately, they didn’t realize with whom they made the pact.
23. Widdershins
Oliver Onions
One of the best ghost story collections by a British writer Oliver Onions. It includes The Beckoning Fair One, widely regarded as a classic of the horror genre.
24. The Works of Edgar Allan Poe: Volume 1
Edgar Allan Poe
First of the five-volume set of digitized works of Edgar Allan Poe, includes The Gold-Bug, The Murders in the Rue Morgue, and The Oval Portrait.
25. The Works of Edgar Allan Poe: Volume 2
Edgar Allan Poe
The volume includes: The Purloined Letter, The Black Cat, The Fall of the House of Usher, and The Masque of the Red Death.
27. The Works of Edgar Allan Poe: Volume 3
Edgar Allan Poe
In this volume, you’ll find The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, the only complete novel written by Poe.
This is a story of the young Arthur Gordon Pym, who stows away aboard a whaling ship called the Grampus.
29. The Works of Edgar Allan Poe: Volume 4
Edgar Allan Poe
Among the included works: The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether, Mellonta Tauta, and The Devil in the Belfry.
30. The Works of Edgar Allan Poe: Volume 5
Edgar Allan Poe
The last part of the collected works of Poe, includes among others, a short story Hop-Frog. The title character, a dwarf taken from his homeland, becomes the jester of a king particularly fond of practical jokes.
31. The Vampyre; a Tale
John William Polidori
A horror short story by John William Polidori, is often viewed as the progenitor of the romantic vampire genre of fantasy fiction.
It tells a story of Aubrey, a young Englishman, who meets Lord Ruthven, a man of mysterious origins who has entered London society.
32. Varney the Vampire: Or the Feast of Blood
Thomas Preskett Prest
It’s a Victorian era serialized gothic horror story by Thomas Preskett Prest. Altogether it totals over 666,000 words, and has been described as the worst book of the 19th century.
33. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Robert Louis Stevenson
A famous novella by a Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson, focuses on a London lawyer named Gabriel John Utterson who investigates strange occurrences between his old friend, Dr. Henry Jekyll, and the evil Edward Hyde.
34. Dracula
Bram Stoker
A classic Gothic horror novel by Irish author Bram Stoker tells the story of Dracula’s attempt to move from Transylvania to England so he may find new blood and spread undead curse.
35. The House of the Vampire
George Sylvester Viereck
One of the first horror novels to delve into the psychic and emotional aspects of vampirism, lending a measure of psychological suspense to the story.
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