With her daughters and grandchildren, Black Lena led a ring of consummate female criminals - women skilled in the art of cruelty.Only a few blocks away, amidst the elegant mansions and lily-white reputations of Gramercy Park and Washington Square lived Judge James Stallworth. He was determined to crush Lena's evil crew, and with icy indifference he ordered three deaths in her family.Then, one Sunday, all the Stallworths receive individual invitations - invitations to their own funerals. Black Lena has vowed a reign of revenge. Can even the Stallworth fortune and awesome power save them from her diabolical lust for revenge?

    Her killer is rich and powerful, beyond the grasp of earthly law.Now, in the murky depths of the local river, a shifting, almost human shape slowly takes form. Night after night it will pursue the murderer. It will watch him from the trees. And in the chill waters of the river, it will claim him in the ultimate embrace.The cold moon rises, the awful squishing sounds begin...

    Spanish court of King Philip IV, this is the story of lovely, spirited young Juana de Arrelanos. Taken against her will from her home and from Jaime de Nueva, the man she loves, she is brought to the massive, magnificent Castillo Benaventes, the home of Bartolomé, Duque de Valenzuela - the man to whom she must be wed. Within the castle's heavy walls the rebellious Juana finds an atmosphere of secrecy, almost of conspiracy, and a number of cunning, sinister figures, chief among whom is the sardonic Felipe Tristán, the Duque's protector and mercenary, behind whose scarred face lie memories of horror Juana can only guess at.But the greatest horror is reserved for Juana, and for Juana alone. For the young Duque she is forced to marry, she discovers, is a cruel caricature of a man, a person twisted in mind and body. His wealth and rank can supply Juana with undreamed-of luxury - but also with incredible suffering, for the perfumed silks of the master bedchamber conceal the depravity of an unbalanced mind. Juana's brave attempts to escape from the marriage are dealt with harshly, and, to her limitless despair, she finds herself irrevocably betrothed to the terrifying, unbalanced Duque.Yet, against all hope, there is a way out. Swift and brutal action by the arrogant Felipe can insure Juana's escape from the secrets and treachery of the Castillo Benaventes. But Felipe's protection, she fears, may be more dangerous than his enmity, and all too soon he begins to demand a humiliating payment....

    But how could the beautiful illegitimate child ever aspire to such a dream? The answer lay in a perilous deception. Her masquerade succeeded -- too well. Caught in a web of her own creation, Suewellyn found herself faced with a final, desperate choice between happiness and life itself . . .

    After her archaeologist father's death, she had returned from Egypt content to take a paid position as companion at Milverton Hall -- the great house that had brightened her childhood -- and eager to serve Caprice, the radiant, raven-hared beauty who had once ridden so gaily at Thorn Lytton's side. But Caprice was gone, vanished. And the woman Thorn had married instead, the frail, beautiful Elsa, was hovering on the edge of madness. What dark tragedy had befallen this once happy place? Only Thorn seemed to know, and he was locked in a bitterness that Carla longed to pierce -- for her girlish infatuation had become the deeper passion of a woman. And in some eerie way, she sensed that Caprice was guiding her, for in this mystery-shrouded house, Caprice seemed to live on...willing Carla to unravel the secrets and find the happiness she herself had lost.

    

    It's an ambitious attempt to redefine the word gothic so that it encompasses most of fantastic fiction and film for the past 200 years under a unifying theme: a preoccupation with fear. This is, of course, an extremely broad definition, so don't be surprised if you find yourself taking the theoretical sections of the book with a grain of salt. Also, since the book was first written in the late 1970s, much of the discussion of language and symbol relies on rather outdated Marxist and Freudian theories. Punter apologizes for the latter in the preface to the second edition, saying that rather than doing a massive revision, he decided to "leave it largely as an 'unrestored' period piece, with its own characteristic style, silhouette, and mood"--while adding additional material on the contemporary gothic. Those caveats aside, however, The Literature of Terror is mostly successful as a comprehensive study. And it's an enormously useful reference for anyone with a more than passing interest in horror literature. Plus, it benefits from being the work of a single author: Punter is an extremely well-read scholar who perceives fascinating connections between a wide variety of books and films, and he explains his ideas lucidly enough that you can judge for yourself how far you agree with them. Some of the high points are Punter's overview of what the word gothic means in other fields (such as architecture); his summaries of the roles of graveyard poetry, the sentimental novel, and the theory of the sublime in the development of the gothic concept; and his inclusion (as gothic and even horror writers) of such notables as Isak Dinesen, William S. Burroughs, Thomas Pynchon, J.G. Ballard, Angela Carter, Thomas Hawkes, and Robert Coover. If that's not enough to tempt you, the footnotes and bibliography alone offer ample yet well-chosen pointers to authors whose entertaining fiction you may not have discovered yet. Best of all, The Literature of Terror is written in English--that is, not loaded down with annoying words such as transgressive and trope that mar so much of postmodern criticism. You can browse for information about specific authors or dip into it at your leisure without losing the thread. And for an academic work, it's darn fun to read. (Be sure to get both Volume 1 and Volume 2.) --Fiona Webster

    

    The novel appeared first in serial installments a year before publication, ultimately grew into several movie versions, and later became an Tony Award-winning Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. Leroux was born in Paris in 1868. The only child of financially well-off parents, he moved easily into a clerk job in a law office. While working there, he wrote essays and short stories, many of which were accepted by publishers. This fired his enthusiasm, and he became a full-time reporter/writer in 1890. Law experience covering famous cases and theater reviews fueled his writing career, but it was his news reporter job that took him around the world at the turn of the century, providing details for his novels. Leroux wrote several mystery and fantasy novels, including the well-received The Mystery of the Yellow Room (1907) and The Man Who Came Back from the Dead (1912). Leroux also helped pioneer the character of the amateur detective who solves crime, so commonly seen today in movies and television. Gaston Leroux continued to write until his death on April 16, 1927.

    Inside its regal walls a volcano of intrigue and violent emotion has begun to erupt, and not one of the Logans is safe.Especially not Sharon Hollis Logan, the lovely young bride of patriarch Ross Logan. For reasons unknown to Sharon, Ross seems to be hated by Gretchen, his daughter from a previous marriage, by her ne'er-do-well husband, Vasily, and by Ross's strange mother, Allegra -- and all their hostility is readily transferred to Sharon.But as she tries to find out why, Sharon uncovers a devastating secret about her own relationship with her husband -- a secret that, in the end, will test the limits of her courage as well as her ability to love ....

    A mystery.

    This Movement and some of its chief exponents are examined against a background of German literature, philosophy and music.

    But Donna’s stay will prove to be anything but relaxing. She arrives to find her hostess unconscious after a mysterious fall from her bedroom window. But did Ellie really fall…or was she pushed? And is Donna destined to become the next victim?

    

    Though empty now, she could imagine its warm hearths glowing, its great halls filled with people. With two handsome men vying for her attentions, she set busily and happily to work readying the inn.But something was wrong. Very wrong. First, the old servant Roscoe was murdered after whispering a mysterious message to her. Then, amid rumors of hidden gold, Sarah began to suspect that her grandfather's death was no accident - a suspicion that grew stronger each day as the murderer began to pursue Sarah herself.In a town of strangers, herself the mistress of a secret cache of gold, whom could she turn to, whom could she trust under...THE SIGN OF THE GOLDEN GOOSE

    Right... Claire, the actress, who traded her hopes of glory for the truth about herself...Sarah, the artist, chained in suburbia, drifting from one sordid affair to another...Vanessa, the beauty, who had everything--plus pills, alcohol, and despair...Julie, the southern belle, living with her black lover and their child...Ann, the nice girl, buried under mounds of fat, paying heavily for trapping her husband with pregnancy... Donna, rigid and frigid, a prisoner of her narrow, restrictive religious background.This is their story, as they traveled through love and sex, marriage and divorce, motherhood and making it... through so many different kinds of trips and so many different kinds of men... through breaking down and growing up....GOING ALL THE WAYA novel of what happened to an entire generation of women--for better and for worse.

    It is also an experiment in critical method, an exploration of the myth-making process by way of what may come to be known as literary iconology.