The Lady of the Barge

W. W. Jacobs assembled these dozen tales in 1902, and one of them, “The Monkey’s Paw,” became a permanent fixture of English horror. A retired couple is granted three wishes by a mummified talisman, and each granted wish arrives twisted into grief. The rest of the collection ranges widely: a drowned man’s ghost drawing a suitor toward a well, a burglar trapped in a dark library beside a corpse, and lighter comic pieces set among the sailors and night watchmen Jacobs knew from his London dockside childhood. He shifts between dry village humor and real menace without tipping his hand too early, which is why the frights still land. Free PDF and EPUB editions are available here.