Moon Mausoleum
An online magazine about the paranormal, haunted and macabre. We collect the ghost stories from all around the world as well as review horror and gothic media.
Who said that ghost stories only happen around Halloween? Summer horror can be just as chilling. Here is a list of horror short stories found in the public domain that are free to read, perfect for a hot summer day.
The Rival Ghosts by Brander Matthews was written in 1884 and published in the collection Mystic-Humorous Stories. It tells the story about a group of passengers crossing the transatlantic by ship and debating if Europe or the States have the best ghost stories. They gather around one that has tales about both with a humorous twist.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman‘s short story The Giant Wistaria from 1891 is less known than her iconic story The Yellow Wallpaper, a feminist classic. “Wistaria” like with “Wallpaper” deals with patriarchal values and the repression of women’s sexuality and motherhood. It starts off with a story about an unwed girl with a child and the family discussing what to do with her. The father wants to marry her to her cousin and leave the child behind when they leave the country. Years later, a young couple rents the house and starts to joke around with it being haunted. And perhaps they are right.
“The Wood of the Dead” is a story written by Algernon Blackwood. It appeared in his first collection, The Empty House and Other Ghost Stories, in 1906. The story is set during a summer where a person is making a solo summer walking tour of England’s west country and has stopped for a meal at a village inn. A local man tells the traveler to meet him at midnight in “The Wood of the Dead”. According to local lore when a person entered the nearby wood singing, he knew that person would soon die. Instead of continuing on his journey, the traveler decides to have a closer look at The Woods of the Dead.
“The Dead Valley” by Ralph Adams Cram from 1895 is a chilling tale that unfolds amidst the haunting landscape of rural New England. Set in the secluded valley of a decaying village, the story follows a young traveler who stumbles upon the eerie remnants of a once-thriving community. As he delves deeper into the desolate surroundings, he uncovers dark secrets and encounters malevolent forces that lurk in the shadows. Through vivid imagery and evocative prose, “The Dead Valley” explores themes of isolation, decay, and the supernatural, leaving readers captivated by its unsettling portrayal of a world teetering on the brink of madness.
“Mr Humphreys and His Inheritance” is a ghost story by British writer M. R. James first published when he included it in his 1911 collection More Ghost Stories of an Antiquary. The story is set in the late summer in England, when Mr Humphreys, arrives in Wilsthorpe. He has recently inherited an estate from his uncle, who died a mysterious death and the history of the strange maze and temple next to his new home.
“The Room in the Tower” by E.F. Benson is a chilling ghost story that centers around a recurring nightmare experienced by the narrator. In his dream, he visits a friend’s house and is always assigned to sleep in a foreboding tower room, accompanied by an overwhelming sense of dread. One summer, he finds himself invited to a real-life version of the house from his dreams. Despite his apprehensions, he is given the very room he fears. As night falls, the nightmare becomes a reality when he encounters the ghost of a previous occupant, revealing a dark and terrifying past. The story masterfully blends psychological tension with supernatural horror, leaving a lasting impression of unease and fear.
The Sand-Walker is a short story written by Fergus Hume. It was first published in the collection: The Dancer in Red, and Other Stories in 1906. It’s about a man coming to the beaches in England one summer where he is warned: Whatever you do, don’t go on to the beaches at dusk, or the Sand-Walker will come to your window at night.
“The Horla” by Guy de Maupassant is a psychological horror story that delves into the mind of an unnamed narrator who becomes convinced he is being haunted by an invisible entity. Set in the oppressive heat of a French summer, the narrator’s initially peaceful life is disrupted by a series of unsettling events, leading him to believe that a supernatural being, the Horla, is draining his life force and controlling his actions. As his paranoia deepens, he struggles to discern reality from delusion, culminating in a descent into madness. The story explores themes of mental illness, the supernatural, and the fragility of human sanity.
“The Upper Berth” is a short story written by F. Marion Crawford, first published in 1886. The story takes place aboard a transatlantic ocean liner in June. A passenger named Brisbane travels this distance frequently. When the steward behaves oddly while taking his luggage to his stateroom, number 105, he thinks it’s odd, but continues his travels. In the middle of the first night his roommate suddenly leaps down from the upper berth and runs out of the cabin. The morning after he finds out that his roommate has gone overboard. According to the rumors, he was the fourth person staying at that very upper berth to have done the same.
“The Phantom Rickshaw” by Rudyard Kipling is a haunting tale set in colonial India at the end of the monsoon season, where British officer Jack Pansay is tormented by the ghost of his former lover, Agnes Keith-Wessington, whom he had callously abandoned. Following her death, Pansay begins to see her spectral figure riding in a rickshaw, relentlessly haunting him. His repeated encounters with the ghost drive him to the brink of madness, as his fiancée and friends dismiss his experiences as delusions. The story explores themes of guilt, psychological torment, and the supernatural, blending an eerie atmosphere with the complexities of colonial society.
“A View from a Hill” is a short ghost story by M.R. James, first published in 1925. In June, an academic named Fanshawe travels to the English countryside to spend his summer vacation at the home of his friend Squire Henry Richards.
Fanshawe finds a couple of binoculars, made by a man who died in mysterious circumstances some years earlier. Through the binoculars, Fanshawe is able to see objects which no longer exist.
The short story One Summer Night by Ambrose Bierce tells the story about a man realizing how he has been buried alive and how he has to deal with it and accept his fate. The story was first published in Cosmopolitan in 1906, and written by a writer who disappeared and was as mysterious as his stories.
“The Haunted Orchard” by Richard Le Gallienne is a ghost story that takes place in the countryside during the summer. The story follows a man who rents a country house in order to get some rest and inspiration for his work. The house has an old orchard that immediately captures his interest due to its neglected state and the eerie beauty of the overgrown apple trees. He begins to notice a mysterious presence in the orchard. One night, he encounters the ghostly figure of a beautiful young woman among the apple trees. She seems to be searching for something or someone and is clearly tied to the orchard in some tragic way. The story delves into the themes of lost love and lingering sorrow, as the man becomes more involved in uncovering the story behind the haunting and the tragic past of the ghostly figure.
The Open Door tells the story about a man coming to a manor house in the summer, having been warned about the door opening in the house. It seems like that the room the door leads into is haunted. It was written by Charlotte Riddell in 1882, who wrote many of her horror stories under the pseudonym, Mrs. J. H. Riddell.
This short story was first published in 1913 in The Wind in the Rosebush and Other Stories of the Supernatural. Her books dealt with Puritanism, and she was one of the first women in America to be elected to the National Institute for Arts and Letters. She was distantly related to another American writer, Nathaniel Hawthorne. Set during the late summer, this story involves a about a spinster Rebecca Flint who has come to Ford Village to take her elder sister’s daughter with her back to Michigan. But something about the village is strange and she encounters strange and ghostly things surrounding a rose-bush in the garden.