2023 Reading Schedule Builder

Create your reading list to tackle the best classic books in the new year, setting aside just 20 minutes a day! More info & examples →
Your Schedule

Days Remaining: 365

No books selected yet

Reset

Unsaved lists will expire in 30 days

Most Popular Genres Collections

Genres › Gothic

Frankenstein
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
28 days •
ⓘ 1818 • Daring young scientist Victor Frankenstein creates life... and a monster. Death and the creature pursue him from Geneva to Scotland to the very edges of the known world.
The Yellow Wallpaper
Charlotte Perkins Gilman
2 days •
ⓘ 1892 • Witness a woman's descent into madness in this unsettling, important early work of American feminist literature.
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
Washington Irving
5 days •
ⓘ 1820 • In the dreamy town of Sleepy Hollow, ghosts haunt the woods, Native American bewitchments hang over the land, and a cloaked rider waits for Ichabod Crane.
Jane Eyre
Charlotte Bronte
72 days •
ⓘ 1847 • Follow the life of Jane Eyre as she navigates an abusive family, trying schooling, and the pitfalls of love. Charlotte Brontë has been called the "first historian of the private consciousness."
Wuthering Heights
Emily Bronte
43 days •
ⓘ 1847 • The classic Gothic tale of love, passion, and death that spans generations on the lonely moors of Thrushcross Grange and Wuthering Heights.
The Fall of the House of Usher
Edgar Allan Poe
3 days •
ⓘ 1839 • Roderick Usher's sister has died, leaving him alone in the eerie family home. His friend arrives to keep him company but still a sense of impending doom hangs over the House of Usher.
The King in Yellow
Robert W. Chambers
28 days •
ⓘ 1895 • A classic of weird and supernatural fiction, this collection of stories traces the mysterious forbidden play "The King in Yellow" and the trail of madness, despair, and death it leaves behind.
The Willows
Algernon Blackwood
8 days •
ⓘ 1907 • Along the banks of the Danube, on one of the shifting impermanent islands of sand, willows blow in the unceasing wind. And one can glimpse dangerous, unforgettable beings in the night.
Count Magnus
M.R. James
3 days •
ⓘ 1904 • A traveler in Sweden stumbles upon the history of a mysterious and ominous figure. Are you awake, Count Magnus?
The Great God Pan
Arthur Machen
9 days •
ⓘ 1894 • A diabolical experiment goes horribly wrong, but the ramifications follow our narrator through the years. And leave a growing number of bodies in its wake.
The House on the Borderland
William Hope Hodgson
24 days •
ⓘ 1908 • Supernatural pig-like creatures assault the narrator in a remote otherworldly house. This creepy, unsettling tale had a major influence on Lovecraft and Terry Pratchett.
The White People
Arthur Machen
7 days •
ⓘ 1904 • A mysterious diary unlocks the strange inner life of a young girl: secret folklore, ritual magic, and witchcraft leading to a terrible end.
Vathek
William Beckford
16 days •
ⓘ 1782 • The chronicle of Caliph Vathek, who seeks supernatural powers and stops at nothing to attain them.
The Vampyre
John William Polidori
4 days •
ⓘ 1819 • Tragedy follows Lord Ruthven like a shadow, and poor young Aubrey can’t seem to rid himself of the man. But after Ruthven is killed, a far darker secret is revealed.
The Mysteries of Udolpho
Ann Radcliffe
126 days •
ⓘ 1794 • Trapped in a medieval castle by a cruel uncle, orphan Emily is faced with fearful threats - both real and supernatural.
The Black Cat
Edgar Allan Poe
2 days •
ⓘ 1843 • The narrator's hatred and cruelty towards the titular cat become his undoing in this classic horror story.
The Turn of the Screw
Henry James
18 days •
ⓘ 1898 • A governess sees strange figures haunting the grounds of the manor where she works - but can she be trusted? A suspenseful ghost story.
The Monk
Matthew Lewis
58 days •
ⓘ 1796 • A struggle between personal ambition and religious vows leads to violence and darkness in this classic sinister Gothic novel.
Carmilla
J. Sheridan LeFanu
12 days •
ⓘ 1871 • A classic Victorian vampire novella, predating Dracula by more than 25 years.
The Castle of Otranto
Horace Walpole
15 days •
ⓘ 1764 • One of the first gothic novels, Walpole tells the tale of Manfred and his growing obsession with saving his family line by marrying the much younger Isabella.
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket
Edgar Allan Poe
29 days •
ⓘ 1838 • Stowaway Arthur Pym survives shipwrecks and cannibals on his epic - and increasingly strange - journey south, eventually approaching the South Pole.
The Messenger
Robert W. Chambers
5 days •
ⓘ 1897 • Thirty nine bodies are buried but centuries later, only 38 skulls are unearthed. The last, that of the Black Priest, is said to carry a terrible curse.
The Woman in White
Wilkie Collins
101 days •
ⓘ 1859 • After encountering a ghostly woman dressed all in white, escaped from an asylum, Walter Hartright plunges into the mystery of her identity and how she is connected to the woman he loves.
Wieland
Charles Brockden Brown
33 days •
ⓘ 1798 • An early work of American literature that spans Gothic, weird, and horror genres, the story follows the tragedy of the Wieland family through murder, spiritualism, and spontaneous combustion.
The Boats of the "Glen Carrig"
William Hope Hodgson
25 days •
ⓘ 1907 • Being an account of their Adventures in the Strange places of the Earth, after the foundering of the good ship "Glen Carrig" through striking upon a hidden rock in the unknown seas to the Southward.
The Lair of the White Worm
Bram Stoker
24 days •
ⓘ 1911 • Adam Salton arrives in England from Australia to find strange horrors and mysteries: mesmeric attacks, giant kites, murder, and all the while a great evil slithers beneath the ground.
Casting the Runes
M.R. James
4 days •
ⓘ 1911 • Edward Dunning rejects a paper on alchemy and enrages the mysterious author, Karswell. When another critic winds up dead, Dunning begins to fear Karswell's curse.
Villette
Charlotte Bronte
76 days •
ⓘ 1853 • Fleeing an unhappy life in England, Lucy Snowe starts anew in the cosmopolitan French city of Villette. Her desire for independence soon faces two tests in the form of a worldly doctor and autocratic schoolmaster.
The House of the Seven Gables
Nathaniel Hawthorne
41 days •
ⓘ 1851 • Witchcraft, suspicious events, and sudden death infest a gloomy New England mansion. The current inhabitants uncover more and more of the house's dark history.
Les Fleurs du mal
Charles Baudelaire
10 days •
ⓘ 1857 • Declared by Victor Hugo to have created "un nouveau frisson" (a new shudder, a new thrill) in literature, this volume of poetry and its themes of decadence and eroticism is a critical work of the symbolist and modernist movements.
The Body Snatcher
Robert Louis Stevenson
3 days •
ⓘ 1884 • A chilling short story of medical students driven to horrifying acts in a need for bodies for dissection.
The Romance of the Forest
Ann Radcliffe
53 days •
ⓘ 1791 • Placed under the protection of a family fleeing paris, Adeline finds herself in a sinister ruined abbey filled with horrors of the past. A suspenseful Gothic novel.
The Room in the Dragon Volant
J. Sheridan LeFanu
17 days •
ⓘ 1872 • Wealthy young Englishman Richard Beckett stumbles into a mystery when he unknowingly checks into the very room that gives a haunted French hotel its sinister reputation.
The Three Impostors
Arthur Machen
22 days •
ⓘ 1895 • An episodic novel of weird and horror tales, culminating in a deadly horror. Linking each story is a secretive pagan society who weave a web of deception through London.
Zofloya
Charlotte Dacre
38 days •
ⓘ 1806 • A gothic tale of lust and murder set in 15th century Venice, chronicling Victoria's descent from spoiled aristocrat to criminal. It shocked contemporary readers with its transgressions against then-taboos of race and class.
The Lost Stradivarius
J. Meade Falkner
18 days •
ⓘ 1895 • John Maltravers, a young aristocrat, happens upon a rare Stradivarius violin. The instrument's dark history captivates John.
Ghost Stories of an Antiquary
M.R. James
17 days •
ⓘ 1904 • In quiet rural settings, dark and unsettling supernatural forces are at work. A collection of spooky ghost stories.
The Inmost Light
Arthur Machen
4 days •
ⓘ 1894 • A scientist's dangerous experiments entangle his wife and put her very soul at risk.
The Mummy!
Jane Webb
56 days •
ⓘ 1827 • In the futuristic world of the year 2126, an ancient Egyptian mummy is brought back to life.
A Lady Of Quality
Frances Hodgson Burnett
29 days •
ⓘ 1896 • A dark, melodramatic historical romance following Clorinda's tumultuous upbringing and challenging life.
The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories
Gertrude Atherton
20 days •
ⓘ 1905 • A collection of Atherton's stories including The Dead and the Countess, Death and the Woman, and the "far too gruesome" story The Striding Place.
The Lurking Fear
H.P. Lovecraft
3 days •
ⓘ 1923 • Something is brutally slaughtering the locals at Tempest Mountain, drawing the attention of a reporter and monster hunter. Dark secrets and death await as storms rage overhead.
Uncanny Stories
May Sinclair
18 days •
ⓘ 1923 • Strange and chilling stories that mix traditional ghost stories with modern concepts.
The Wind in the Rosebush
Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
13 days •
ⓘ 1903 • A collection of New England ghost stories with a mix of humor and chills.
Hauntings
Vernon Lee
16 days •
ⓘ 1890 • British author Violet Paget's atmospheric supernatural stories of passion, possession, and psychological terror.
The House of the Vampire
George Sylvester Viereck
9 days •
ⓘ 1907 • A classic Victorian gothic horror story, one of the first to include vampires that do more than feed off blood.
William Wilson
Edgar Allan Poe
3 days •
ⓘ 1839 • The story of a mysterious doppelgänger who tails William through his life.
The Terror
Arthur Machen
14 days •
ⓘ 1917 • Villagers in a small Welsh town are dying in unspeakable ways. Dr Lewis investigates what may be the cause, uncovering deep secrets.
The Beetle
Richard Marsh
42 days •
ⓘ 1897 • A shape-shifting horror from ancient Egypt stalks Victorian England, entangling a group of Londoners in a plot of cults, hypnosis, and revenge.
The Shining Pyramid
Arthur Machen
4 days •
ⓘ 1895 • When strange stones appear in alarming patterns around his home, Vaughan enlists his friend's aid in deciphering the mystery before it's too late.
Lady Audley's Secret
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
49 days •
ⓘ 1862 • The "most sensationally successful of all the sensation novels" spanning insanity, accidental bigamy, lies, and murder all packed into one over-the-top drama.
A Sicilian Romance
Ann Radcliffe
21 days •
ⓘ 1790 • Murder, secret tunnels, haunted castles, and miraculous discoveries await Julia as she tries to escape an unwanted marriage in this Gothic classic.
La Grande Bretèche
Honoré de Balzac
3 days •
ⓘ 1831 • A curious neglected country estate hides a sordid and tragic history.
Mastodon Mastodon