Gothic Romance

[close] Austentacious Reading group is for Fans of Jane Austen and the Regency Era. This is a group so discussions can take place regarding Jane Austen's original books, and the variations of those works.

[close] This is a top-secret group for all of Sophie's special beta-reader ravens. What can you expect here? Excerpts, pictures, ARCS and whatever other bits of magic escape from the straight-jacket.

[close] A group hosted by Harlequin Shivers author Barbara J. Hancock to discuss her books and Gothic Romance

[close] Midnight Gothic Sancturary Gothic fiction is a genre of literature that combines elements of both horror and romance. As a genre, it is generally believed to have been invented by the English author Horace Walpole, with his 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto. The effect of Gothic fiction depends on a pleasing sort of terror, an extension of essentially Romantic literary pleasures that were relatively new at the time of Walpole's novel. Prominent features of Gothic fiction include terror (both psychological and physical), mystery, vampires, the supernatural, ghosts, haunted houses and Gothic architecture, castles, darkness, death, decay, doubles, madness, secrets and hereditary curses.