100 Gothic Tales From the Last Four Centuries

It's rainy and dark outside as I write this. Last night, there were thunderstorms. That got me thinking about gothic literature. What pairs better than gloomy weather and a dark, gloomy tale of woe? It's such a vibe. Because that's what gothic stories are — dark tales steeped in vibes. I love that and if you love it too, then here are 100 gothic novels/novellas published over four centuries that are perfect for those stormy nights.

21st Century

The Black Tree Atop The Hill by Karla Yvette (CLASH Books, 2023)

Apparitions by Adam Pottle (Dark Hart Books, 2023)

The Stradivarius by Rae Knowles (Brigids Gate Press, 2023)

Boys in the Valley Philip Fracassi (Tor Nightfire, 2023)

The Briars by Stephanie Parent (Cemetery Gates Media, 2023)

Linghun by Ai Jiang (Dark Matter INK, 2023)

The Spite House by Johnny Compton (Tor Nightfire, 2023)

Orpheus Builds a Girl by Heather Parry (Gallic Books, 2022)

House of Hunger by Alexis Henderson (Ace, 2022)

Leech by Hiron Ennes (Tor, 2022)

The Daughter of Doctor Moreau by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (Del Rey, 2022)

What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher (Tor Nightfire, 2022)

Just Like Mother by Anne Heltzel (Tor Nightfire, 2022)

Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield (Picador, 2022)

The Hacienda by Isabel Cañas (Berkley, 2022)

Anatomy: A Love Story by Dana Schwartz (Wednesday Books, 2022)

Tell Me I’m Worthless by Alison Rumfitt (Cipher Press, 2021)

The Secret Skin by Wendy N. Wagner (Neon Hemlock Press, 2021)

Parting the Veil by Paulette Kennedy (Lake Union Publishing, 2021)

Sleep Training by Eluned Gramich (The Ghastling Press, 2021)

Yes, Daddy by Jonathan Parks-Ramage (Harper Perennial, 2021)

The Wife Upstairs by Rachel Hawkins (St. Martin's Press, 2021)

Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth with illustrations by Sara Lautman (WIlliam Morrow, 2020)

Sisters by Daisy Johnson (Riverhead Books, 2020)

Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (Del Rey, 2020)

The Boatman's Daughter by Andy Davidson (Titan Books, 2020)

The Widow of Rose House by Diana Biller (St. Martin's Griffin, 2019)

What Should Be Wild by Julia Fine (Harper Collins, 2018)

Little Eve by Catriona Ward (Tor Nightfire, 2018)

The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell (Penguin Books, 2018)

If We Were Villains by M. L. Rio (Flatiron Books, 2017)

The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry (Custom House, 2016)

Mr. Splitfoot by Samantha Hunt (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016)

Wylding Hall by Elizabeth Hand (PS Publishing, 2015)

The Girl from Rawblood by Catriona Ward (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2015)

Dark Matter: A Ghost Story by Michelle Paver (Orion 2010)

The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters (Virago Press, 2009)

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman with illustrations by Chris Riddell (Bloomsbury, 2008)

The Diving Pool by Yōko Ogawa with a translation by Stephen Snyder (Picador, 1990)

Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn (Shaye Areheart Books, 2006)

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield (Atria Books, 2006)

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova (Little, Brown and Company 2005)

Fingersmith by Sarah Waters (Virago Press, 2002)

The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón (Planeta, 2001)

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski (Pantheon Books, 2000)

20th Century

The Secret History by Donna Tartt (Alfred A. Knopf, 1992)

Beloved by Toni Morrison (Alfred A. Knopf, 1987)

The Hellbound Heart by Clive Barker (Dark Harvest, 1986)

When Darkness Loves Us by Elizabeth Engstrom ( William Morrow & Co, 1985)

The Woman in Black by Susan Hill (Hamish Hamilton 1983)

Familiar Spirit by Lisa Tuttle (Berkley, 1983)

The Elementals by Michael McDowell (Avon, 1981)

The Reaping by Bernard Taylor (Leisure Books, 1980)

Kindred by Octavia E. Butler (Doubleday, 1979)

The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter (Gollancz, 1979)

Flowers in the Attic by V.C. Andrews (Simon & Schuster, 1979)

The Shining by Stephen King ((Doubleday, 1977)

Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice (Knopf, 1976)

Julia by Peter Straub (Coward, McCann & Geoghegan 1975)

The Shivering Sands by Victoria Holt (Doubleday, 1969)

Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin (Random House, 1967)

Picnic At Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay (F. W. Cheshire, 1967)

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson (Viking Press, 1962)

Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury (Simon & Schuster, 1962)

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson (Viking, 1959)

Nine Coaches Waiting by Mary Stewart (Hodder & Stoughton, 1958)

Dragonwyck by Anya Seton (Houghton Mifflin Company, 1944)

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (Victor Gollancz Ltd, 1938)

A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner (The Forum, 1930)

The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux (Pierre Laie, 1909)

The Willows by Algernon Blackwood (Knopf, 1907)

The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle (George Newnes Ltd, 1902)

19th Century

The Turn of the Screw by Henry James (The Macmillan Company, 1898)

Dracula by Bram Stoker (Archibald Constable and Company, 1897)

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (The New England Magazine, 1892)

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde (Ward, Lock and Company, 1891)

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson (Longmans, Green & Co., 1886)

Carmilla by J. Sheridan Le Fanu (serialized in The Dark Blue, 1872)

The Room in the Dragon Volant by J. Sheridan Le Fanu (Richard Bentley & Son, 1872)

Behind a Mask, Or, a Woman's Power by Louisa May Alcott as A.M. Barnard (serialized in The Flag of Our Union, 1866)

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins (serialized in All the Year Round, 1859)

Wagner the Wehr-Wolf by George W.M. Reynolds (1857)

Bleak House by Charles Dickens (Bradbury & Evans, 1852)

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë as Ellis Bell (Thomas Cautley Newby, 1847)

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë as Currer Bell (Smith, Elder & Co., 1847)

The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe (Burton's Gentleman's Magazine, 1839)

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving (C. S. Van Winkle, 1820)

Melmoth the Wanderer by Charles Robert Maturin (Archibald Constable and Company, 1820)

The Vampyre: A Tale by John William Polidori (The New Monthly Magazine and Universal Register, 1819)

Frankenstein; or The Modern Prometheus by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley as Anonymous (Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor & Jones, 1818)

Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen (John Murray, 1817)

18th Century

The Midnight Bell by Francis Lathom as Anonymous (1798)

Clermont by Regina Maria Roche (Minerva Press, 1798)

The Monk by Matthew Gregory Lewis (J. Bell, 1796)

The Italian by Ann Radcliffe (T. Cadell Jun. And W. Davies, 1796)

The Necromancer, or The Tale of the Black Forest by Karl Friedrich Kahlert as Lawrence Flammenber (1794)

The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe (G. G. and J. Robinson, 1794)

Castle of Wolfenbach by Eliza Parsons (Minerva Press, 1793)

The Old English Baron by Clara Reeve (1778)

The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole under a pseudonym (1764)

What's your favorite gothic story? Share it in the comments!

[Image Credit: painting "The Nightmare" by Johann Heinrich Füssli via Wikimedia Commons]