Cecilia de Noel [by Mary Elizabeth Hawker]

Cecilia de Noel is an original and cleverly told ghost story, published in 1891. The story is told, Rashomon-like, from six different viewpoints.

Read by David Wales


link to the free audiobook
Cecilia de Noel [by Mary Elizabeth Hawker]

Varney the Vampyre Volume 1 [by Thomas Preskett Prest]

Originally published as a penny dreadful from 1845 until 1847, when it first appeared in book form, Varney the Vampyre is a forerunner to vampire stories such as Dracula, which it heavily influenced.


Flora Bannersworth is attacked in her own room in the middle of the night, and although her attacker is seemingly shot dead, the body is nowhere to be found. The discovery of two small bite marks on Flora’s neck leads Mr Marchdale, an old friend of the family, to the conclusion that she was bitten by a vampire. While Flora recovers, her brother Henry and Mr Marchdale begin their hunt for the vampire. Their suspicions soon fall on the mysterious Sir Francis Varney, who has just bought an old abbey near Bannersworth Hall, and who bears an uncanny resemblance to Marmaduke Bannersworth, a long-dead ancestor of the family.

link to the free audiobook

Varney the Vampyre Volume 1 [by Thomas Preskett Prest]

The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, Raven Edition, Volume 2 [by Edgar Allan Poe]

Monday, January 19, 2009 marked Edgar Allan Poe's 200th birthday. Though these tales need no introduction, the rationale for starting with volume two is threefold: many of the best-loved (and best) tales are included, the vast majority run from 15 to 30 minutes, and the other volumes can then be recorded without repetition, if there is interest in doing so.

link to the free audiobook

The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, Raven Edition, Volume 2 [by Edgar Allan Poe]

The Ghost Breaker [by Charles Goddard and Paul Dickey] [dramatic recording]

The Ghost Breaker is a drama and haunted house horror complete with heroes, villains, and a Princess. The Ghost Breaker was originally a screenplay and would later be made a drama film directed by Cecil B. DeMille. (Summary by Linette Geisel)

Cast:
Narrator: Linette Geisel
Warren; Ghost Breaker and Kentuckian hero: Bill Mosley
Maria Theresa, Princess of Aragon: Amanda Friday
Rusty Snow; Warren's servant man: Phil Chenevert
Carlos, Duke of Alva, cousin of Maria Theresa: Marty Kris
Colonel Jarvis of Meadow Green (older voice): Marty Kris
Mandy; Colonel Jarvis's servant woman: Jenny Lundak
Doctor: Chuck Williamson
Major Selby: Nathanial W.C. Higgins
Hotel Page: Marty Kris
Colonel Jim Marcum, wealthy and prominent Kentucky sportsman: Jerry James
Brazilian coffee merchant: Amy Gramour
Detective 1: David Olson
Detective 2 ToddHW
Nita; Chic young Spanish servant to Maria Theresa: Abigail Bartels
Ship's Porter: Lucy Perry
Ship's Steward: Chuck Williamson
Ship's Officer: Barry Eads
Ship's Captain: Kevin Soini
Scotland Yard Detective: Barry Eads
Senorita Deloris, daughter of Senor Vardos: Heather Hamtil
Senor Pedro, tavern keeper: ToddHW
Don Robledo: Nathanial W.C. Higgins
Human Battleship: Liberty Stump
Vardos, Prince's Retainer: ToddHW
Audio edited by: Linette Geisel

link to the free audiobook

The Ghost Breaker [by Charles Goddard and Paul Dickey] [dramatic recording]

Three Ghost Stories [by Charles Dickens]

As a gifted writer with a strong interest in supernatural phenomena, Charles Dickens produced a string of ghost stories with enduring charm. Three of them are presented here, of which The Signal Man is one of the best known. Though quite different from his most celebrated realistic and humorous critical novels, these ghost stories, Gothic and grotesque as they are, are of good portrayal, and worth a read/listen.

Read by Marian Brown and Muhammad Mussnoon.


link to the free audiobook
Three Ghost Stories [by Charles Dickens]

The Room in the Dragon Volant [by J. Sheridan LeFanu]

J. Sheridan LeFanu's Gothic mystery novel is narrated by Richard Beckett, a young Englishman abroad in Napoleonic-era France. He falls instantly in love with a mysterious and imperiled Countess, whom he glimpses momentarily behind her black veil. In order to be near her, he takes a room in the Dragon Volant (the Flying Dragon), a haunted inn that has been the site of mysterious disappearances.

Read by Elizabeth Klett.


link to the free audiobook
The Room in the Dragon Volant [by J. Sheridan LeFanu]

Humorous Ghost Stories [introduction by Dorothy Scarborough]

Includes: An introduction by Dorothy Scarborough -- The Canterville ghost / by Oscar Wilde -- The ghost-extinguisher / by Gelett Burgess -- "Dey ain't no ghosts" / by Ellis Parker Butler -- The transferred ghost / by Frank R. Stockton -- The mummy's foot / Théophile Gautier -- The rival ghosts / Brander Matthews -- The water ghost of Harrowby Hall / by John Kendrick Bangs -- Back from that bourne / Anonymous -- The ghost-ship / by Richard Middleton -- The transplanted ghost / by Wallace Irwin -- The last ghost in Harmony / by Nelson LLoyd -- The ghost of Miser Brimpson / by Eden Phillpotts -- The haunted photograph / by Ruth McEnery Stuart -- The ghost that got the button / by Will Adams -- The specter bridegroom / by Washington Irving -- The specter of Tappington / compiled by Richard Barham -- In the barn / by Burges Johnson -- A shady plot / by Elsie Brown -- The lady and the ghost / by Rose Cecil O'Neill.

Read by Madam Fickle; Kevin W. Davidson; ElleyKat; Barry Eads; GlassMask; Alan Winterrowd; RLC; Jackie Drown; geoffbl; Ric F; JamesMcAndrew; Mike Pelton; Rusty Dancer; Jon Smith; Michelle Goode; Chuck Williamson

link to the free audiobook

Humorous Ghost Stories [introduction by Dorothy Scarborough]

Frankenstein [by Mary Shelley]

Frankenstein begins in epistolary form, documenting the correspondence between Captain Robert Walton and his sister, Margaret Walton Saville. Walton sets out to explore the North Pole and expand his scientific knowledge in hopes of achieving fame and friendship. The ship becomes trapped in ice, and, one day, the crew sees a dog sled in the distance, on which there is the figure of a giant man. Hours later, the crew finds a frozen and emaciated man, Victor Frankenstein, in desperate need of sustenance. Frankenstein had been in pursuit of the gigantic man observed by Walton's crew when all but one of his dogs died. He had broken apart his dog sled to make oars and rowed an ice-raft toward the vessel. Frankenstein starts to recover from his exertion and recounts his story to Walton. Before beginning his story, Frankenstein warns Walton of the wretched effects of allowing ambition to push one to aim beyond what one is capable of achieving. In telling his story to the captain, Frankenstein finds peace within himself. (Introduction by Wikipedia)

Read by Caden Vaughn Clegg.

link to the free audiobook

Frankenstein [by Mary Shelley]

Dracula's Gift and other Weird Tales [by Bram Stoker]

LibriVox recording of Dracula's Gift and other Weird Tales, by Bram Stoker.

Nine Gothic Horror Tales by the author of Dracula

link to the free audiobook
Dracula's Gift and other Weird Tales [by Bram Stoker]

Frankenstein [by Mary Shelley] [(dramatic reading]

Mary Shelley's 1818 classic horror novel presents the Faustian story of a man who aspires to createlife out of death, with disastrous results. The novel is constructed as a series of first-person narratives, delivered by Captain Robert Walton, Victor Frankenstein, and his Creature, which makes it perfect for a dramatic reading. This is a LibriVox full cast recording edited by Elizabeth Klett.


Cast
Robert Walton: Chuck Williamson,
Victor Frankenstein: Bob Neufeld
Lieutenant: KerrieRae Clarke,
Caroline Frankenstein: Arielle Lipshaw
Alphonse Frankenstein: Todd,
M. Krempe: Anthony, 
M. Waldman: Martin Geeson,
Henry Clerval: Grace Garrett, 
Elizabeth Lavenza/Master/Irishman: Elizabeth Klett
Ernest Frankenstein: Ernest Pattynama, 
Justine Moritz: Availle,
Officer: Ken Garrett
The Creature: John Trevithick,
Felix: Tiffany Halla Colonna
De Lacey: Steve W. Thompson,
Landlord: April Gonzales
William Frankenstein: Miss Avarice,
Old Woman: Caprisha Page
Mr. Kirwan: EMStach,
Magistrate: Max Korlinge

link to the free audiobook

Frankenstein [by Mary Shelley]

Can Such Things Be? [by Ambrose Bierce]

24 short stories in fairly typical Bierce fashion - ghostly, spooky, to be read (or listened to) in the dark, perhaps with a light crackling fire burning dimly in the background. Stories of ghosts, apparitions, and strange, inexplicable occurrences are prevalent in these tales, some of which occur on or near Civil War fields of battle, some in country cottages, and some within urban areas. Can Such Things Be? implies and relates that anything is possible, at any time. 

Read by Roger Melin.


link to the free audiobook
Can Such Things Be? [by Ambrose Bierce]

The Ghost Ship [by John C. Hutcheson]

This book intentionally veers in and out of the supernatural, as the title implies. The officers get more and more bewildered as they work out their position, and yet again encounter the same vessel going in an impossible direction.

Having warned you of this, I must say that it is a well-written book about life aboard an ocean-going steamer at about the end of the nineteenth century. 


link to the free audiobook
The Ghost Ship [by John C. Hutcheson]

Widdershins [by Oliver Onions]

Onions wrote several collections of ghost stories, of which the best known is Widdershins (1911). It includes the novella The Beckoning Fair One, widely regarded as one of the best in the genre of horror fiction, especially psychological horror. On the surface, this is a conventional haunted house story: an unsuccessful writer moves into rooms in an otherwise empty house, in the hope that isolation will help his failing creativity. His sensitivity and imagination are enhanced by his seclusion, but his art, his only friend and his sanity are all destroyed in the process. The story can be read as narrating the gradual possession of the protagonist by a mysterious and possessive feminine spirit, or as a realistic description of a psychotic outbreak culminating in catatonia and murder, told from the sufferer's point of view. The precise description of the slow disintegration of the protagonist's mind is terrifying in either case. Another theme, shared with others of Onions' stories, is a connection between creativity and insanity; in this view, the artist is in danger of withdrawing from the world altogether and losing himself in his creation. (Introduction from Wikipedia)

Read by Don W. Jenkins.


link to the free audiobook
Widdershins [by Oliver Onions]

The Haunted Hotel, A Mystery of Modern Venice [by Wilkie Collins]

A kind, good-hearted genteel young woman jilted, a suspicious death or two that only a few think could be murder, strange apparitions appearing in an hotel all combine to create a horrifying conundrum. Who was the culprit and will finding out finally put an end to the mystery?


link to the free audiobook
The Haunted Hotel, A Mystery of Modern Venice [by Wilkie Collins]

The Angel of Terror [by Edgar Wallace]

Beautiful Jean Briggerland is the epitome of evilness in this twisting and turning thriller. She plots many different ways to steal her new victim's riches including lies and murder. Only Jack Glover the lawyer of Jean's most recent victim, is aware of her true nature. Can he stop her crime spree and bring her to justice before she murders her way to wealth and happiness? Don't count on it! Page after page offers action, new twists, and unexpected surprises that will keep the reader listening for more!

Read by Allyson Hester.


link to the free audiobook
The Angel of Terror [by Edgar Wallace]

Present at a Hanging and Other Ghost Stories (by Ambrose Bierce)

Ambrose Bierce, satirist, critic, poet, short story writer and journalist. His fiction showed a clean economical style often sprinkled with subtle cynical comments on human behaviour. Nothing is known of his death, as he went missing while an observer with Pancho Villa's army in 1913/14.

link to the free audiobook

Present at a Hanging and Other Ghost Stories (by Ambrose Bierce)

The House by the Lock [by Mrs. C.N. Williamson]

What secrets lay within the walls of the house by the lock? What secrets, if any, are held by the man who owns that mysterious house?  A body is found in a backwater creek not far from the house by the lock, but what leads Noel Stanton on a quest to determine who the killer might be is more than merely the disappearance of his American friend Harvey Farnham. He has reason to believe that the wealthy and influential owner of the house, Carson Wildred, might somehow be implicated in the coincidental disappearance and murder. But as Stanton's search progresses, he learns that his friend is safe and sound back in the U.S. and he therefore must learn more about the house itself with its peculiar construction, it's hidden passageways, and the peculiar smoke occasionally seen rising from its inaccessible areas. But everything is accounted for by the police, the servants, and Mr. Wildred during his investigation, leaving a most strange mystery left for Stanton to unravel.

Read by Roger Melin. 


link to the free audiobook
The House by the Lock [by Mrs. C.N. Williamson]

The Beckoning Fair One [by Oliver Onions]

A classic ghost story of a haunted house, and the haunted man who lives in it.


Read by Morgan Scorpion.

link to the free audiobook

The Beckoning Fair One [by Oliver Onions]

The Grey Woman [by Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell]

A horror story in which a young woman marries a man whom she discovers has killed his previous wives and is trying to kill her as well.

Read by Jane Greensmith. 

link to the free audiobook

The Grey Woman [by Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell]

Douglas Duane [by Edgar Fawcett]

An introverted, kind-hearted book collector befriends a mad scientist, who isn’t exactly a good friend. When the scientist falls in love with the book collector’s fiancée, he concocts an evil plot to have her for his own. What transpires goes in a direction that even Douglas Duane didn't see coming. Edgar Fawcett was a prolific author of standard fiction. With Douglas Duane he stepped out of his genre and created a memorable work of mad scientist horror.


link to the free audiobook
Douglas Duane [by Edgar Fawcett]

The Turn of the Screw is a novella written by Henry James. It is a ghost story that was originally published in 1898. A nameless governess reports the events of two ghosts who stalk the young children she has charge over. Is she reliable, or an imaginative neurotic?

A Librivox recording read by: Nikolle Doolin

link to the free audiobook
The Turn of the Screw [by Henry James]

The Two Destinies [by Wilkie Collins]

Mary Dermody is destined to be together with George Germaine one day, or so at least her grandmother prophesizes. Destiny at first doesn't seem to adhere to this plan, and the pair is separated and lose sight of each other. But when George saves a young woman from drowning, a strong connection seems to develop between them, which seems to be almost supernatural.

link to the free audiobook
The Two Destinies [by Wilkie Collins]

The Undying Monster [A Rare Werewolf Classic] [1942]

Movie Night Presentation

The Undying Monster [1942] [Running Time 63 mins]

A werewolf prowls around at night but only kills certain members of one family. It seems like just a coincidence but the investigating Inspector soon finds out that this tradition has gone on for generations and tries to find a link between the werewolf and the family, leading to a frightening conclusion

Afterward [by Edith Wharton]

Mary and Ned Boyne have fled their dreary life in Wisconsin for a home in rustic Dorsetshire. But you can only run so far, and some things - some secret things - may follow you. A creepy and tragic ghost story from one of the masters.

Read by Charlie Blakemore.

link to the free audiobook

Afterward [by Edith Wharton]

The Willows [by Algernon Blackwood]

The Willows is one of Algernon Blackwood's best known and creepiest stories. Many say it is his best and scariest. American horror author H.P. Lovecraft considered it to be the finest supernatural tale in English literature. Here art and restraint in narrative reach their very highest development, and an impression of lasting poignancy is produced without a single strained passage or a single false note. The Willows is an example of early modern horror and is connected within the literary tradition of weird fiction.

link to the free audiobook
The Willows [by Algernon Blackwood]

The Beast With Five Fingers [by W. F. Harvey]

A well off English bachelor receives a legacy from his uncle. This includes the uncle's very large library and a box containing something that used to belong to his uncle. The box has air holes in it. It is not a rat or other small mammal for his collection, but it is something still alive; something very malevolent and something very evil.

LibriVox recording read by Phil Chenevert.

link to the free audiobook

The Beast With Five Fingers [by W. F. Harvey]

Trilby [by George du Maurier]

Trilby, published in 1894, fits into the gothic horror genre which was undergoing a revival during the Fin de siècle and is one of the most popular novels of its time, perhaps the second best selling novel of the Fin de siècle period after Bram Stoker's Dracula.  The story of the poor artist's model Trilby O'Ferrall, transformed into a diva under the spell of the evil musical genius Svengali, created a sensation. Soap, songs, dances, toothpaste, and Trilby, Florida were all named for the heroine, and a variety of soft felt hat with an indented crown (worn in the London stage production of a dramatization of the novel) came to be called a trilby.  The plot inspired Gaston Leroux's 1910 potboiler Phantom of the Opera and the innumerable works derived from it, and introduced the phrase "in the altogether" (meaning "completely unclothed") to the English language. (Summary from Wikipedia)

Read by Librivox volunteers.

link to the free audiobook

Trilby [by George du Maurier]

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow [by Washington Irving]

The quiet Dutch community of Sleepy Hollow lay in the Adirondack mountains on the western shore of the mighty Hudson River in America's colonial period. The solitude of the woods was breathtaking, and not even a schoolmaster was immune from the eerie miasma which everyone knew permeated the dense forest. Written in 1820, Washington Irving's The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow has become a classic of American literature, and has been retold in many different ways. Here is the original, from Irving's own hand.

link to the free audiobook
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow [by Washington Irving]

Dracula BBC Audio Drama [by Bram Stoker] [Audiobook]

The novel tells the story of Dracula's attempt to move from Transylvania to England so he may find new blood and spread the undead curse, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor Abraham Van Helsing.


Performance by Robert Powell; directed by David Hitchinson; adapted by Dickon Reed; produced by the BBC.

link to the free audiobook
Dracula BBC Audio Drama [by Bram Stoker] [Audiobook]