Psychological Horror

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The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

And Other Tales of Terror

By Robert Louis Stevenson , Robert Mighall

Robert Louis Stevenson's 1886 novella follows a London lawyer, Gabriel Utterson, as he tries to understand why his respectable friend Dr Henry Jekyll has tied his fortune and household to Edward Hyde. Hyde is a small, repellent man who provokes instant revulsion and is linked to an act of savage violence. A neighbourhood puzzle becomes an inquiry into how one person can split public virtue from private appetite, and what that split costs. This Penguin Classics edition, edited by Robert Mighall, pairs the story with other Stevenson tales and scholarly apparatus. Short, tightly plotted and endlessly echoed in popular culture, it is one of the classic books of Victorian Gothic fiction, and its two title characters have become shorthand for the divided self.

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The Shining

By Stephen King

Jack Torrance takes a winter caretaking job at the isolated Overlook Hotel, hoping the quiet will help him rebuild his career and repair his damaged family. His wife, Wendy, wants to believe in that recovery, while their young son, Danny, senses what the adults cannot: the hotel retains the psychic traces of its violent past. Danny’s extraordinary gift—the “shining”—makes him especially valuable to the forces gathering around the family. As snow seals the hotel off from the outside world, the Overlook exploits Jack’s alcoholism, resentment, and fear of failure. King combines a haunted-building story with an intimate examination of addiction, domestic abuse, inherited trauma, and a child’s divided love for a dangerous parent.