"You must be mad to enjoy this, am I?"

Nugget about the author:

What else can be said about Edgar Allan Poe? (Other than the fact that finding him smiling in a picture would be creepy as hell!) So instead of the usual short bio, here are a few strange things about the Godfather of Gothic.

• He intentionally got himself court- martialed to get out of West Point Military Academy.
• In his overlooked sci-fi writings, he proposed the Big Bang Theory about 80 years before it was called the Big Bang Theory.
• It is said that he invented the word "tintinnabulation". A word describing the sound emitted by the ringing of bells.
• He is credited to be the first writer to use the term "short story", and to popularize the detective genre. Poe is also known as America's first-ever successful writer, that is, the first to make a living from just writing prose and poetry. (for those days, it still means he struggled financially and personally)
• He got a license to marry his 13 year old cousin, Virginia Clemm. Apparently this was something they did back in the day, that is, get a license to marry... and marry underaged cousins. She died about 11 years later of tuberculosis. Her death, it is said, affected much of his darker work. As did his alcoholism.
• The night before his death, he was found to be wearing another person's clothes and shouting the name "Reynolds! Reynolds! Reynolds!" No one knows to whom he was referring to.
• No one knows for sure how (or if) he died that night. All medical records have disappeared.
• Poe's Death Certificate too had been lost. To be found, never more.

Look for more Edgar Allan Poe wherever great books are found.

Narrator's Note:

What is more frightening? That ghosts are real? Or being laughed at for believing that ghosts are real?

A nugget about Amelia Ann Blanford Edwards:

Novelist. Journalist. Illustrator. Poet. Traveller. Egyptologist. This section might be too small for the life that was Amelia Edwards. She wrote about her travels across Europe and the Nile, often accompanied by a female companion. It is said that she was more emotionally attached to women more than men, though there are no documents that firmly affirms the intimate nature of those relationships. She authored and illustrated works which spanned fiction and non-fiction, and was even honored with the title of "Godmother of Egyptology" for her contributions to the field. But as her gothic horror stories (which are rich in human insight) are almost always included in compilations, it'd be safe to call her one of the many Godmothers of Gothic Horror.

Let's not forget the life and works of one of the most remarkable women writers in history.

Look for the works, fiction and non-fiction, of Amelia B. Edwards wherever great books are available.