Calling all lovers of the mythical and macabre!
Are you interested in taking a closer look at some of the most iconic legends in history – both real and fictional? Do you lose hours scrolling Wikipedia to learn about your favorite oddities and cryptic pop-culture obsessions? Are you someone who believes spooky season isn't a time of year, but a way of life?
Well you're in luck, because here at Penguin Classics we have a series of arcane anthologies sure to satisfy even the most obscure obsessions. So whether you're interested in learning about real-life exorcisms, medieval witches, or ghostly visitations, there's a Penguin Book of... for you!
The Penguin Book of Demons
Scott G. Bruce
For millennia, societies have told tales of their fears incarnate—otherworldly couriers of plague, death, temptation, and moral decline. The Penguin Book of Demons summons these supernatural creatures—and the humans who have hunted and been haunted by them—across cultures and continents. From demonic possession to black magic, these accounts give life to a spellbinding, skin-crawling history of the paranormal.
The Penguin Book of Pirates
Katherine Howe
Real-life accounts of the world’s most notorious pirates—both men and women, from the Golden Age of Piracy and beyond—compiled by the New York Times bestselling author of A True Account: Hannah Masury’s Sojourn Amongst the Pyrates, Written by Herself.
Spanning three centuries and eight thousand nautical miles, and compiled by a direct descendant of a sailor who waged war with pirates in the early nineteenth century, The Penguin Book of Pirates takes us behind the eye patches, the peg legs, and the skull and crossbones of the Jolly Roger and into the no-man’s-land of piracy that is rife with paradoxes and plot twists.
The Penguin Book of Murder Mysteries
Michael Sims
For classic murder mystery readers, a scintillating anthology of lost treasures to read alongside Edgar Allan Poe and Sherlock Holmes
For The Penguin Book of Murder Mysteries, writer and anthologist Michael Sims did not summon the usual suspects. He sought the unfamiliar, the unjustly forgotten, and little-known gems by writers from outside the genre. This historical tour of one of our most popular literary categories includes stories never before reprinted, features rebellious early “lady detectives," and spotlights former stars of the crime field—Austrian novelist Auguste Groner and prolific American Geraldine Bonner among them. For twenty-first century connoisseurs of crime, The Penguin Book of Murder Mysteries celebrates how the nineteenth century added a fierce modern twist to the ancient theme of bloody murder.
The Penguin Book of Dragons
Scott G. Bruce
Two thousand years of legend and lore about the menace and majesty of dragons, which have breathed fire into our imaginations from ancient Rome to Game of Thrones
The most popular mythological creature in the human imagination, dragons have provoked fear and fascination for their lethal venom and crushing coils, and as avatars of the Antichrist, servants of Satan, couriers of the damned to Hell, portents of disaster, and harbingers of the last days.
The Penguin Book of Exorcisms
Joseph P. Laycock
Haunting accounts of real-life exorcisms through the centuries and around the world, from ancient Egypt and the biblical Middle East to colonial America and twentieth-century South Africa
Levitation. Feats of superhuman strength. Speaking in tongues. A hateful, glowing stare. The signs of spirit possession have been documented for thousands of years and across religions and cultures, even into our time: In 2019 the Vatican convened 250 priests from 50 countries for a weeklong seminar on exorcism.
The Penguin Book of Mermaids
Cristina Bacchilega, Marie Alohalani Brown
Dive into centuries of mermaid lore with these captivating tales from around the world.
Among the oldest and most popular mythical beings, mermaids and other merfolk have captured the imagination since long before Ariel sold her voice to a sea witch in the beloved Disney film adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen's "The Little Mermaid." As far back as the eighth century B.C., sailors in Homer's Odyssey stuffed wax in their ears to resist the Sirens, who lured men to their watery deaths with song. More than two thousand years later, the gullible New York public lined up to witness a mummified "mermaid" specimen that the enterprising showman P. T. Barnum swore was real.
The Penguin Book of Hell
Scott G. Bruce
"From the Bible through Dante and up to Treblinka and Guantánamo Bay, here is a rich source for nightmares." —The New York Times Book Review
From the Hebrew Bible's shadowy realm of Sheol to twenty-first-century visions of Hell on earth, The Penguin Book of Hell takes us through three thousand years of eternal damnation. Drawing upon religious poetry, epics, theological treatises, stories of miracles, and accounts of saints' lives, this fascinating volume of hellscapes illuminates how Hell has long haunted us, in both life and death.
The Penguin Book of the Undead
Scott G. Bruce
The walking dead from 15 centuries haunt this compendium of ghostly visitations through the ages, exploring the history of our fascination with zombies and other restless souls.
Since ancient times, accounts of supernatural activity have mystified us. Ghost stories as we know them did not develop until the late nineteenth century, but the restless dead haunted the premodern imagination in many forms, as recorded in historical narratives, theological texts, and personal letters.
The Penguin Book of Witches
Katherine Howe
Chilling real-life accounts of witches, from medieval Europe through colonial America, compiled by the New York Times bestselling author of The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane and The Daughters of Temperance Hobbs
From a manual for witch hunters written by King James himself in 1597, to court documents from the Salem witch trials of 1692, to newspaper coverage of a woman stoned to death on the streets of Philadelphia while the Continental Congress met, The Penguin Book of Witches is a treasury of historical accounts of accused witches that sheds light on the reality behind the legends.
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