Books like “The Beetle”

What to read after “The Beetle” by Richard Marsh: a list matched by tropes, mood and atmosphere. Under each book you will see what it has in common.

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1
We Have Always Lived in the Castle
Shirley Jackson · 1962
Similar atmosphere: “Creeping Dread”
- Gothic
- Creeping Dread
Eighteen-year-old Merricat lives with her sister and uncle in a large house outside a village that despises them, after the rest of the family died years earlier from poison. When a cousin arrives hoping to claim the estate, the careful order of Merricat's world is broken.
2
Melmoth the Wanderer
Charles Robert Maturin · 1820
Similar atmosphere: “Creeping Dread”
- Gothic
- Creeping Dread
A scholar finds a manuscript telling of Melmoth, a man who centuries earlier traded his soul for knowledge and an unnaturally long life. Doomed to wander the earth, he appears to people in their worst moments and offers them the chance to take on his burden.
3
Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
Robert Louis Stevenson · 1886
Similar atmosphere: “Creeping Dread”
A respected London doctor is oddly close to a violent, mysterious man named Hyde. When a friend investigates the link between them, he uncovers a scientific experiment that set loose a darker self.
4
Dracula
Bram Stoker · 1897
Similar atmosphere: “Creeping Dread”
A young solicitor journeys to a remote castle in the Carpathians to settle a client's estate, only to find his host is no ordinary nobleman. As the count travels to England, letters and diaries record a creeping sickness spreading from Whitby to London.
5
The Mysteries of Udolpho
Ann Radcliffe · 1794
Similar atmosphere: “Creeping Dread”
- Gothic
- Creeping Dread
After her parents die, Emily St. Aubert is left to the care of an aunt who marries an Italian nobleman. Taken to the gloomy castle of Udolpho, she is surrounded by unexplained sounds, sealed rooms and sinister men, while she tries to keep her love and her safety.
6
Uncle Silas
J. Sheridan Le Fanu · 1864
Similar atmosphere: “Creeping Dread”
- Gothic
- Creeping Dread
Orphaned heiress Maud Ruthyn is sent to Bartram-Haugh, the remote house of her uncle Silas, a man once suspected of murder. Isolated there with him, his strange son and a governess, she slowly realises the household is closing in on her.
7
The War of the Worlds
H. G. Wells · 1898
Similar atmosphere: “Creeping Dread”
- Victorian London Atmosphere
- Creeping Dread
Cylinders fall from Mars onto the English countryside, and the machines inside prove ruthlessly hostile. A student watches the invasion spread toward London as orderly Victorian society collapses around him.
8
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Oscar Wilde · 1890
From the same world: “Gothic”
- Gothic
- Victorian London Atmosphere
A beautiful young man surrenders to his vanity when his portrait begins to age and wither in place of his body. Sheltered by a cynical friend, Dorian chases pleasure without consequence until the hidden painting becomes a record of his cruelty.
9
The Turn of the Screw
Henry James · 1898
Similar atmosphere: “Creeping Dread”
- Gothic
- Creeping Dread
A young governess takes charge of two children at a remote country house and soon notices figures watching from the grounds and the tower. She becomes convinced the children are being influenced by something from beyond the grave, though no one else confirms what she sees.
10
Rebecca
Daphne du Maurier · 1938
Similar atmosphere: “Creeping Dread”
- Gothic
- Creeping Dread
A shy young woman marries the widowed Maxim de Winter and arrives at Manderley, his grand estate by the sea. There she is measured against his first wife, the beautiful Rebecca, whose presence lingers in every room, in the servants' loyalty and in a secret nobody will speak.
11
The Ghost Stories of Edith Wharton
Edith Wharton · 1973
Similar atmosphere: “Creeping Dread”
- Gothic
- Creeping Dread
A collection of Edith Wharton's ghost stories, written across her career and gathered in one volume. Old houses, railway carriages and country estates hold grudges, apparitions return with unfinished business, and the supernatural creeps into the lives of people who insist they do not believe in it.
12
The Monk
Matthew Gregory Lewis · 1796
From the same world: “Gothic”
- Gothic
Ambrosio, a celebrated monk in Madrid, is admired for his apparent virtue until a novice leads him into pride, desire and crime. Around him runs the legend of a sorcerer, and the story follows the abbot's fall from purity into a bargain he cannot undo.