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The Fall of the House of Usher
The Fall of the House of Usher
The Fall of the House of Usher
Ebook122 pages2 hours

The Fall of the House of Usher

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Gloom, dread and fear possess the House of Usher and its inhabitants. But Edward sees nothing but light and love in the fair Madeline. Can he save her from the deadly illness that has plagued the Usher family for centuries—before it is too late?

Invited to the gloomy, decaying House of Usher by a boyhood chum, Edward is perplexed by his friend's mysterious affliction. Roderick tells him that it is a curse on his family, and that all of the Ushers must eventually succumb. Upon briefly viewing Roderick's sister—the lovely Madeline—Edward determines to save both her and Roderick from their awful fate.

But there are strange twists and turns that Edward encounters in his quest to discover the truth of the puzzling illness. Is the valet Henry up to no good? Does the house itself hold some unnatural sway over its residents? Or is there an even more sinister explanation? When Edward finally chances to meet the Lady Madeline secretly, he has no doubt that only his love and resolve can save her.

One night, it appears that he hasn't acted soon enough. Is there still hope that he can rescue sweet Madeline from the clutches of the evil House of Usher?

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LanguageEnglish
Release dateDec 27, 2013
ISBN9781781848845
Author

Morticia Knight

Morticia Knight spends most of her nights writing about men loving men forever after. If there happens to be some friendly bondage or floggings involved, she doesn’t begrudge her characters whatever their filthy little heart’s desire. Even though she’s been crafting her naughty tales for more years than she’d like to share – her adventures as a published author began in 2011. Once upon a time she was the lead singer in an indie rock band that toured the West Coast and charted on U.S. college radio. She currently resides on the northern Oregon coast and when she’s not fantasizing about hot men she takes walks along the ocean and annoys the local Karaoke bar patrons.

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Rating: 3.9502163718614716 out of 5 stars
4/5

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  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I'd never read Poe before when I bought this book. I usually hate florid writing (basically, anything before the late 19th century) and a quick glance at the prose made me a little worried about whether I would even be able to make sense of it. However, I persevered and now I've finished all the stories and am sad cause I know there's no more to read.Poe understands horror and suspense to perfection. He also understands a lot of other things which nobody seems to appreciate anymore, IMO. Some of the more surreal stories in this collection reminded me strongly of Gogol. I'm not really a fan of surreal writing, but many of the other stories - especially the 'futuristic technology' ones - reminded me of some of Conan Doyle's stories, which is some of the highest praise I could give an author.In particular, I'm indebted to Poe for inspiring Conan Doyles's Sherlock Holmes, one of my favorite literary protagonists of all time. I actually think the Sherlock Holmes stories are better developed than Poe's detective tales, but one can forgive him since he pioneered the detective genre.My favorite story, by far, was 'Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym'. I love a good adventure story, and this was an epic that just went on and on and oooon....in a very good way. It also showed how incredibly educated the author was on everything from the breedings habits of sea-birds to handling a ship. I learnt so much about random subjects from this story.I was going to try to list some of my other favorites, but there are just too many so I'm leaving it at this.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    I've read two stories from this collection for the 1001 books to read before you die list. The first one "The Purloined Letter" sucked. I DNF because it was so boring and really too much information to get through just to find out how he got his hands on the letter. However, the second story "The Fall of the House of Usher" was more of the Poe writing that I enjoy. It's about a haunted house with a poor man who is going crazy inside it. Ending was strange and left it to the reader's imagination what happened to Usher.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Edgar Allan Poe was the inventor of the thriller and made an very chilling work of his story "The Fall of the House of Usher". Being my favorite work of his besides "The Raven", I would recommend it to anyone. However, his stories all together are a bit too grim and gruesome for my taste.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    My first collection of the maestro's work. Inexorably moody.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    The Balloon-Hoax - Wow. That was really boring.Ms. Found in a Bottle - Good suspense, but the ending confused me.A Descent into the Maelstrom - Not too memorable.The Murders in the Rue Morgue - A rather silly Holmes-esque mystery tale.The Purloined Letter - Not bad, but far too wordy.The Black Cat - Deliciously disturbing.The Fall of the House of Usher - Not as interesting as his others, but good atmosphere.The Pit and the Pendulum - A delightful tale of suspense.The Masque of the Red Death - Meh. Weird for no reason and kind of boring.The Cask of Amontillado - I think makes Poe so memorable is his vivid first-person accounts from the point of view of a killer.The Assignation - I couldn't follow this one. What did the drowning child and the art aficionado have to do with one another?The Tell-Tale Heart - Funnier than I'd remembered. One of my all-time favorites.Diddling - A random essay on swindling.The Man That was Used Up - Silly, amusing, but ends a bit too abruptly.Narrative of A. Gordon Pym - Some good bits, but I think I just don't like maritime fiction.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is very thrilling story.I was interested in his book because Japanese famous writer Ranpo Edogawa is made by changing Edgar Allan Poe.The story is nice.But a little dreadful
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    “Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.”Edgar Allan Poe was a very interesting if somewhat controversial person and this book features varied pieces of works including poems, essays and reviews alongside his short stories. Firstly I should admit that I'm not really a fan of poetry whilst the essays and reviews had only limited interest to me so consequently simply skimmed over most of these. It was the short stories that I concentrated on.When it comes to collections of short stories every reader will have their own particular favourites; I liked 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue' and 'The Purloined Letter' with their undertones of Sherlock Holmes, 'The Pit and the Pendulum' and 'Hop-Frog' but I'm sure that others will choose differently. By modern standards the tales feel rather pedestrian but on the whole I felt they were well written and wonderfully paced for maximum creepiness, and its easy to see how Poe had such an influence on many other authors who followed in his wake. Despite their age many of these stories have survived the passage of time and have been cinematically adapted. I can just imagine them featuring on the 'Hammer House of Horrors' series that I hid behind the sofa from as a child but secretly loved. Overall I found this a challenging but fascinating read and my rating reflects the book as a whole rather than any individual story or section but would almost certainly been higher if it had contained the 'tales' alone.

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The Fall of the House of Usher - Morticia Knight

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