The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories

From Lovecraft to Borges to Gaiman, a century of intrepid literary experimentation has created a corpus of dark and strange stories that transcend all known genre boundaries. Together these stories form The Weird, and its practitioners include some of the greatest names in twentieth and twenty-first century literature.

Exotic and esoteric, The Weird plunges you into dark domains and brings you face to face with surreal monstrosities. You won’t find any elves or wizards here…but you will find the biggest, boldest, and downright most peculiar stories from the last hundred years bound together in the biggest Weird collection ever assembled.



The Weird features 110 stories by an all-star cast, from literary legends to international bestsellers to Booker Prize winners: including William Gibson, George R. R. Martin, Stephen King, Angela Carter, Kelly Link, Franz Kafka, China Miéville, Clive Barker, Haruki Murakami, M. R. James, Neil Gaiman, Mervyn Peake, and Michael Chabon.



1. Foreweird by Michael Moorcock

2. Introduction by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer

3. Alfred Kubin, “The Other Side” (excerpt), 1908

4. F. Marion Crawford, “The Screaming Skull,” 1908

5. Algernon Blackwood, “The Willows,” 1907

6. Saki, “Sredni Vashtar,” 1910

7. M.R. James, “Casting the Runes,” 1911

8. Lord Dunsany, “How Nuth Would Have Practiced his Art,” 1912

9. Gustav Meyrink, “The Man in the Bottle,” 1912

10. Georg Heym, “The Dissection,” 1913

11. Hanns Heinz Ewers, “The Spider,” 1915

12. Rabindranath Tagore, “The Hungry Stones,” 1916

13. Luigi Ugolini, “The Vegetable Man,” 1917

14. A. Merritt, “The People of the Pit,” 1918

15. Ryunosuke Akutagawa, “The Hell Screen,” 1918

16. Francis Stevens, “Unseen–-Unfeared,” 1919

17. Franz Kafka, “In the Penal Colony,” 1919

18. Stefan Grabinski, “The White Weyrak,” 1921

19. H.F. Arnold, “The Night Wire,” 1926

20. H.P. Lovecraft, “The Dunwich Horror,” 1929

21. Margaret Irwin, “The Book,” 1930

22. Jean Ray, “The Mainz Psalter,” 1930

23. Jean Ray, “The Shadowy Street,” 1931

24. Clark Ashton Smith, “Genius Loci,” 1933

25. Hagiwara Sakutoro, “The Town of Cats,” 1935

26. Hugh Walpole, “The Tarn,” 1936

27. Bruno Schulz, “Sanatorium at the Sign of the Hourglass,” 1937

28. Robert Barbour Johnson, “Far Below,” 1939

29. Fritz Leiber, “Smoke Ghost,” 1941

30. Leonora Carrington, “White Rabbits,” 1941

31. Donald Wollheim, “Mimic,” 1942

32. Ray Bradbury, “The Crowd,” 1943

33. William Sansom, “The Long Sheet,” 1944

34. Jorge Luis Borges, “The Aleph,” 1945

35. Olympe Bhely-Quenum, “A Child in the Bush of Ghosts,” 1949

36. Shirley Jackson, “The Summer People,” 1950

37. Margaret St. Clair, “The Man Who Sold Rope to the Gnoles,” 1951

38. Robert Bloch, “The Hungry House,” 1951

39. Augusto Monterroso, “Mister Taylor,” 1952

40. Amos Tutuola, “The Complete Gentleman,” 1952

41. Jerome Bixby, “It's a Good Life,” 1953

42. Julio Cortazar, “Axolotl,” 1956

43. William Sansom, “A Woman Seldom Found,” 1956

44. Charles Beaumont, “The Howling Man,” 1959

45. Mervyn Peake, “Same Time, Same Place,” 1963

46. Dino Buzzati, “The Colomber,” 1966

47. Michel Bernanos, “The Other Side of the Mountain,” 1967

48. Merce Rodoreda, “The Salamander,” 1967

49. Claude Seignolle, “The Ghoulbird,” 1967

50. Gahan Wilson, “The Sea Was Wet As Wet Could Be,” 1967

51. Daphne Du Maurier, “Don't Look Now,” 1971

52. Robert Aickman, “The Hospice,” 1975

53. Dennis Etchison, “It Only Comes Out at Night,” 1976

54. James Tiptree Jr., “The Psychologist Who Wouldn't Do Terrible Things to Rats,” 1976

55. Eric Basso, “The Beak Doctor,” 1977

56. Jamaica Kincaid, “Mother,” 1978

57. George R.R. Martin, “Sandkings,” 1979

58. Bob Leman, “Window,” 1980

59. Ramsey Campbell, “The Brood,” 1980

60. Michael Shea, “The Autopsy,” 1980

61. William Gibson/John Shirley, “The Belonging Kind,” 1981

62. M. John Harrison, “Egnaro,” 1981

63. Joanna Russ, “The Little Dirty Girl,” 1982

64. M. John Harrison, “The New Rays,” 1982

65. Premendra Mitra, “The Discovery of Telenapota,” 1984

66. F. Paul Wilson, “Soft,” 1984

67. Octavia Butler, “Bloodchild,” 1984

68. Clive Barker, “In the Hills, the Cities,” 1984

69. Leena Krohn, “Tainaron,” 1985

70. Garry Kilworth, “Hogfoot Right and Bird-hands,” 1987

71. Lucius Shepard, “Shades,” 1987

72. Harlan Ellison, “The Function of Dream Sleep,” 1988

73. Ben Okri, “Worlds That Flourish,” 1988

74. Elizabeth Hand, “The Boy in the Tree,” 1989

75. Joyce Carol Oates, “Family,” 1989

76. Poppy Z Brite, “His Mouth Will Taste of Wormwood,” 1990

77. Michal Ajvaz, “The End of the Garden,” 1991

78. Karen Joy Fowler, “The Dark,” 1991

79. Kathe Koja, “Angels in Love,” 1991

80. Haruki Murakami, “The Ice Man,” 1991 (translation, Japan)

81. Lisa Tuttle, “Replacements,” 1992

82. Marc Laidlaw, “The Diane Arbus Suicide Portfolio,” 1993

83. Steven Utley, “The Country Doctor,” 1993

84. William Browning Spenser, “The Ocean and All Its Devices,” 1994

85. Jeffrey Ford, “The Delicate,” 1994

86. Martin Simpson, “Last Rites and Resurrections,” 1994

87. Stephen King, “The Man in the Black Suit,” 1994

88. Angela Carter, “The Snow Pavilion,” 1995

89. Craig Padawer, “The Meat Garden,” 1996

90. Stepan Chapman, “The Stiff and the Stile,” 1997

91. Tanith Lee, “Yellow and Red,” 1998

92. Kelly Link, “The Specialist's Hat,” 1998

93. Caitlin R. Kiernan, “A Redress for Andromeda,” 2000

94. Michael Chabon, “The God of Dark Laughter,” 2001

95. China Mieville, “Details,” 2002

96. Michael Cisco, “The Genius of Assassins,” 2002

97. Neil Gaiman, “Feeders and Eaters,” 2002

98. Jeff VanderMeer, “The Cage,” 2002

99. Jeffrey Ford, “The Beautiful Gelreesh,” 2003

100. Thomas Ligotti, “The Town Manager,” 2003

101. Brian Evenson, “The Brotherhood of Mutilation,” 2003

102. Mark Samuels, “The White Hands,” 2003

103. Daniel Abraham, “Flat Diana,” 2004

104. Margo Lanagan, “Singing My Sister Down,” 2005

105. T.M. Wright, “The People on the Island,” 2005

106. Laird Barron, “The Forest,” 2007

107. Liz Williams, “The Hide,” 2007

108. Reza Negarestani, “The Dust Enforcer,” 2008

109. Micaela Morrissette, “The Familiars,” 2009

110. Steve Duffy, “In the Lion's Den,” 2009

111. Stephen Graham Jones, “Little Lambs,” 2009

112. J. Robert Lennon, “The Portal,” 2010

113. K.J. Bishop, “Saving the Gleeful Horse,” 2010



Read By: Jack Fox