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12 Creepy Tales [Literature Classics Series]
"From the master of the psychological horror genre comes this brilliant collection 12 Creepy Tales by Edgar Allan Poe. It features some of his classics like The Tell-Tale Heart, The Black Cat and The Cask of Amontillado which are supreme examples of his craft.
The Black Cat is a truly horrifying story of a death-row confession of guilt by a serial killer. The much loved family cat becomes the agent of his destruction and inevitable descent into crime and madness. Another superb story is The Facts in the Case of M Valdemar. In this chilling tale, a mesmerist uses his skill to put a man into a trance at the exact moment of death. Poe wrote this story based on a newspaper report that he read about a New York doctor who was supposed to have conducted an operation after placing the patient under hypnosis. Such was Poe's talent that the story was mistaken for a genuine scientific report when it first came out! Writers and poets like Kipling and Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote personally to Poe, congratulating him on creating such a fantastic story.
For sheer suspense and Gothic horror, The Masque of the Red Death is unrivaled. Set in some unnamed country, in an unnamed time, it tells of Prince Prospero who retreats into a sealed fortress with his trusted friends to escape a scourge called the Red Death, a mysterious and fatal disease that is decimating the countryside. The images of death, blood and disease linger in the mind long after you put the book down.
A crumbling ruin steeped in an atmosphere of doom and decay... the last descendant of a noble family... an opium addict and his deluded fantasies&emdash;these form the elements of one of Poe's most atmospheric creepy tales The Fall of the House of Usher. It is also one of his most famous stories and is considered to depict Poe as being at the peak of his craftsmanship. The surreal feeling of this story has made it a perfect choice for adaptation on film and television.
Another truly scary tale is The Pit and The Pendulum, which describes the horrors of the Spanish Inquisition in medieval Spain in the sixteenth century. The collection also features Edgar Allan Poe's famous poem The Raven which is guaranteed to send a shiver down the spine of even the most skeptical of readers.
Whether you're a horror story fan or not, 12 Creepy Tales by Edgar Allan Poe is a great addition to your bookshelf."
The Black Cat is a truly horrifying story of a death-row confession of guilt by a serial killer. The much loved family cat becomes the agent of his destruction and inevitable descent into crime and madness. Another superb story is The Facts in the Case of M Valdemar. In this chilling tale, a mesmerist uses his skill to put a man into a trance at the exact moment of death. Poe wrote this story based on a newspaper report that he read about a New York doctor who was supposed to have conducted an operation after placing the patient under hypnosis. Such was Poe's talent that the story was mistaken for a genuine scientific report when it first came out! Writers and poets like Kipling and Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote personally to Poe, congratulating him on creating such a fantastic story.
For sheer suspense and Gothic horror, The Masque of the Red Death is unrivaled. Set in some unnamed country, in an unnamed time, it tells of Prince Prospero who retreats into a sealed fortress with his trusted friends to escape a scourge called the Red Death, a mysterious and fatal disease that is decimating the countryside. The images of death, blood and disease linger in the mind long after you put the book down.
A crumbling ruin steeped in an atmosphere of doom and decay... the last descendant of a noble family... an opium addict and his deluded fantasies&emdash;these form the elements of one of Poe's most atmospheric creepy tales The Fall of the House of Usher. It is also one of his most famous stories and is considered to depict Poe as being at the peak of his craftsmanship. The surreal feeling of this story has made it a perfect choice for adaptation on film and television.
Another truly scary tale is The Pit and The Pendulum, which describes the horrors of the Spanish Inquisition in medieval Spain in the sixteenth century. The collection also features Edgar Allan Poe's famous poem The Raven which is guaranteed to send a shiver down the spine of even the most skeptical of readers.
Whether you're a horror story fan or not, 12 Creepy Tales by Edgar Allan Poe is a great addition to your bookshelf."
282 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 24, 2012
15 people are currently reading
79 people want to read
About the author
Edgar Allan Poe
10k books28.9k followersThe name Poe brings to mind images of murderers and madmen, premature burials, and mysterious women who return from the dead. His works have been in print since 1827 and include such literary classics as The Tell-Tale Heart, The Raven, and The Fall of the House of Usher. This versatile writer’s oeuvre includes short stories, poetry, a novel, a textbook, a book of scientific theory, and hundreds of essays and book reviews. He is widely acknowledged as the inventor of the modern detective story and an innovator in the science fiction genre, but he made his living as America’s first great literary critic and theoretician. Poe’s reputation today rests primarily on his tales of terror as well as on his haunting lyric poetry.
Just as the bizarre characters in Poe’s stories have captured the public imagination so too has Poe himself. He is seen as a morbid, mysterious figure lurking in the shadows of moonlit cemeteries or crumbling castles. This is the Poe of legend. But much of what we know about Poe is wrong, the product of a biography written by one of his enemies in an attempt to defame the author’s name.
The real Poe was born to traveling actors in Boston on January 19, 1809. Edgar was the second of three children. His other brother William Henry Leonard Poe would also become a poet before his early death, and Poe’s sister Rosalie Poe would grow up to teach penmanship at a Richmond girls’ school. Within three years of Poe’s birth both of his parents had died, and he was taken in by the wealthy tobacco merchant John Allan and his wife Frances Valentine Allan in Richmond, Virginia while Poe’s siblings went to live with other families. Mr. Allan would rear Poe to be a businessman and a Virginia gentleman, but Poe had dreams of being a writer in emulation of his childhood hero the British poet Lord Byron. Early poetic verses found written in a young Poe’s handwriting on the backs of Allan’s ledger sheets reveal how little interest Poe had in the tobacco business.
For more information, please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_al...
Just as the bizarre characters in Poe’s stories have captured the public imagination so too has Poe himself. He is seen as a morbid, mysterious figure lurking in the shadows of moonlit cemeteries or crumbling castles. This is the Poe of legend. But much of what we know about Poe is wrong, the product of a biography written by one of his enemies in an attempt to defame the author’s name.
The real Poe was born to traveling actors in Boston on January 19, 1809. Edgar was the second of three children. His other brother William Henry Leonard Poe would also become a poet before his early death, and Poe’s sister Rosalie Poe would grow up to teach penmanship at a Richmond girls’ school. Within three years of Poe’s birth both of his parents had died, and he was taken in by the wealthy tobacco merchant John Allan and his wife Frances Valentine Allan in Richmond, Virginia while Poe’s siblings went to live with other families. Mr. Allan would rear Poe to be a businessman and a Virginia gentleman, but Poe had dreams of being a writer in emulation of his childhood hero the British poet Lord Byron. Early poetic verses found written in a young Poe’s handwriting on the backs of Allan’s ledger sheets reveal how little interest Poe had in the tobacco business.
For more information, please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_al...
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
July 2, 2018
Creepy, but not enough.
June 6, 2018
Listened to this one as a Libervox book. Some of the Readings where so bad that I had to Chase them Down on YouTube to listen to (Christopher Lees Readings are brilliant on the other hand). One of the Libervox People must have been an Young woman that tried to read as an old man, another on read like the worst parody of William Shatner. That almost shaved of another star on this review.
The tales themself are mostly quite good, some a lot better then others. But when I re-read these in the future, I will read them myself. Im quite sure thats a better way to do it.
The tales themself are mostly quite good, some a lot better then others. But when I re-read these in the future, I will read them myself. Im quite sure thats a better way to do it.
July 19, 2017
The first time I had read some of the stories were from 'সেবা প্রকাশনী' translation in class V. 'The Pit and the Pendulum' had left an everlasting impression on me.
Poe had the ability to describe a simple feeling or emotion with erry details, covering several pages. The twelve creepy tales all mention one emotion or one weak minded thought or feeling or sickness with vigorous enthusiasm for half or 2/3 rd of the stories and then finally bring down the blow of the climax.
On re-reading, I felt some of the stories repetitive in expressing these emotions. Most are about feable minded thoughts on death and the fear of dying. The best story this time, was the first one, 'The Tell-Tale Heart'.
I started the LibriVox audiobook last year, put away half way through, started again and finished this year. The narrations were of mixed quality. Some not that good.
The LibriVox audiobook narrated by different people is also available on YouTube - https://youtu.be/Oqj6euurBAk
Poe had the ability to describe a simple feeling or emotion with erry details, covering several pages. The twelve creepy tales all mention one emotion or one weak minded thought or feeling or sickness with vigorous enthusiasm for half or 2/3 rd of the stories and then finally bring down the blow of the climax.
On re-reading, I felt some of the stories repetitive in expressing these emotions. Most are about feable minded thoughts on death and the fear of dying. The best story this time, was the first one, 'The Tell-Tale Heart'.
I started the LibriVox audiobook last year, put away half way through, started again and finished this year. The narrations were of mixed quality. Some not that good.
The LibriVox audiobook narrated by different people is also available on YouTube - https://youtu.be/Oqj6euurBAk
November 28, 2017
J'avais un bon souvenir de ces nouvelles, enfin, surtout de certaines et cela m'a fait plaisir de les écouter, ça change de format. Par contre, il y a des voix plus agréables que d'autres et surtout certaines avec un accent un peu particulier qui m'a posé quelques difficultés de compréhension. Ma seule vraie déception : la lecture de The Raven qui est la nouvelle / poème que je préfère et qui n'était pas tellement mise en valeur par la voix trop monocorde et pas assez rythmée pour lui rendre hommage.
En bref : à découvrir pour les amateurs de chair de poule !
En bref : à découvrir pour les amateurs de chair de poule !
August 23, 2024
I completely enjoyed all but one of these 12 scary stories, my favorite by far is the poetic rhyme of The Raven, my least the worky droning of Legeia. This is a great collection of the Scariest short stories written by EAP. I know there is much much more of Poe's work to discover.
I'm glad I have a nicely bound version of this book. It is a requirement for anyone's library and for us, it will be delightful to bring out in the fall near Halloweentime; or any time really, to be read over and over again.
5+ stars
I'm glad I have a nicely bound version of this book. It is a requirement for anyone's library and for us, it will be delightful to bring out in the fall near Halloweentime; or any time really, to be read over and over again.
5+ stars
September 1, 2022
Macabre stories by Edgar Allen Poe, most of which I’d heard of but only a few of which I’ve read. Among these famous short stories were:
"The Tell-Tale Heart", “ The Fall of the House of Usher”, "The Pit and the Pendulum", “The Raven”, and "Premature Burial".
I can’t for the life of me say why I picked up this book other than I remember my brothers talking about them when I was young.
Yes, they are quite odd, and now I’m done and probably won’t read another.
"The Tell-Tale Heart", “ The Fall of the House of Usher”, "The Pit and the Pendulum", “The Raven”, and "Premature Burial".
I can’t for the life of me say why I picked up this book other than I remember my brothers talking about them when I was young.
Yes, they are quite odd, and now I’m done and probably won’t read another.
March 8, 2024
Great series of short stories! I specifically did audio book for this and I have to say, I loved it! If you’re someone who finds your brain has trouble focusing on the phrasing and wording of older written books, please try listening! Some of these books I remember reading in high school and not being fond of them, but listening made better! I give this a 4.5/5! Was not a big fan of the pit and the pendulum story!
February 21, 2026
Most of us were treated to "The Telltale Heart" some time in high school. It, and "The Raven," are probably Poe's best-known, and best-written, pieces. Of the others in this collection, a few I found to be variations on TTH, all were kind of depressing. A few were eminently forgettable--although some of this might have been because I "read" this as a series of LibriVox recordings, and the wide range of narration ability by the volunteers certainly colored my experience.
October 21, 2021
About half of the stories were good and half were not. The writing is solid, but I have never seen the greatness in Poe’s writing that others have. Moreover I struggle reading Poe’s work because every time I do, I think to myself, “This guy was a very disturbed individual!” He had a mental issue I am sure! That thought really makes reading his work difficult for me.
December 16, 2019
Listened to the librivox recording, which adds a whole new layer of horror to the stories. I already read some of the stories before, and do find Poe brillant as a pioneer horror writer, but these recordings did not do any good at all...
March 3, 2018
Not my style of book, too outdated.
September 3, 2021
Goddamn what a sick mind!
October 5, 2021
The tales were decent, but the narrators made it seem like I was listening to a bedtime story rather than a creepy tale. I may have to read a hard copy, at some point.
April 21, 2022
I'm pretty sure that if I had actually read this book instead of listening to the audio book I would have given it more stars. My first audio book and it wasn't a very GREAT experience.
November 28, 2022
I'm more moved by the fact that goodreads thinks this collection has 5 pages than the collection itself.
June 18, 2024
I listened to this on audio before going to the Edgar Allan Poe Speakeasy event. I have always loved Poe, and this is such a good collection of stories. I highly recommend anything this man has written.
November 10, 2023
While the collection of stories in Twelve Creepy Tales by Edgar Allan Poe was fantastic and I loved the writing style, I must admit that I found some of the narration monotonous or hard on the ear. As a listener, I felt that the narration took away from my overall enjoyment of the audiobook, which was unfortunate.
Despite this, the audiobook still provides a great way to experience Poe's classic tales, and I was able to appreciate his excellent writing. Each story was unique and kept me on edge, and for most of the stories, the production value was impressive, with sound effects and voice actors bringing the stories to life.
Overall, while the narration didn't entirely meet my personal preferences, I would still recommend Twelve Creepy Tales by Edgar Allan Poe to those who enjoy the horror genre or are fans of Poe's work.
Despite this, the audiobook still provides a great way to experience Poe's classic tales, and I was able to appreciate his excellent writing. Each story was unique and kept me on edge, and for most of the stories, the production value was impressive, with sound effects and voice actors bringing the stories to life.
Overall, while the narration didn't entirely meet my personal preferences, I would still recommend Twelve Creepy Tales by Edgar Allan Poe to those who enjoy the horror genre or are fans of Poe's work.
May 9, 2020
A nice variety of works, including a few favourites, as well as some lesser known stories amongst the popular and famous ones. I loved them all. Berenice, which was new to me, was surprisingly creepy, indeed!
July 21, 2015
When I read these tales in school they seemed much more frightening. Maybe it is all the gore and horror movies and TV shows nowadays. But I still love the way Poe paints a picture with words.
October 26, 2016
3.5 stars.
March 9, 2020
Netflix crime doc series meets 1800's mysticism
May 23, 2017
Free audiobook on Librivox.
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews