Edgar Allan Poe’s Frightening Tale of a Demonic Cat and a Tormented Murderer in an Elegant Hardback Gift Edition

This macabre short story from the father of American horror fiction was first published in 1843 in the Saturday Evening Post. The classic narratives features a murderer tormented by guilt over his terrible deeds and a cat who may be out for revenge. The narrator’s admission that much of his bad behavior and deranged thinking is the result of alcohol is possibly autobiographical, as Poe himself struggled with alcoholism throughout his life.

This short work is part of Applewood’s “American Roots,” series, featuring tactile mementos of American passions by some of America’s most famous writers and thinkers. 

In these classic, fascinating, and often terrifying tales--Mardi Gras Indians, Baby Dolls, the Zulu King, Loup Garou, and the headless horseman of Natchitoches--all share the stage. Ghost stories from around Louisiana mingle with the true horrors of figures such as the infamous New Orleans Axeman. Learn stories of the Creoles and Cajuns, Southern church traditions, Voodoo rituals, hexes, and charms.  Gumbo Ya-Ya, everybody talks at once, expresses the tension between refinement and profanity, the sacred and the sensual--which defines Louisiana culture to this day. This 80th Anniversary Pelican Publishing unabridged edition's contents are wholly true to the 1945 original edition. First commissioned as a project of the Works Progress Administration Louisiana Writers' Program, it has stood the test of time and is a book beloved by historians, locals, and visitors.

Originally published in 1863, The Fortune Teller and Dreamer's Dictionary by Madame LeMarchand—a celebrated Parisian fortune teller—is a little gem of occult knowledge. Readers will learn to tell fortunes using dice or ordinary playing cards, read tea leaves and coffee grounds, interpret dreams, make charms, read palms, and much, much more. The contents include the Lady's Love Oracle, as well as the Art of discovering Truth from Falsehood, Augury of the Flower, Charms and Ceremonies, and How to tell fortunes by Moles. There are also instructions for telling a person's character by assigning numerical values to the letters in his or her name, adding the numbers, and referring to the number in the book's chart. Filled with diagrams and illustrations to supplement and clarify the written text, this is a reissue of a rare and unusual Civil War-era book.

In the ancient hills and misty hollows of Fayette County, Pennsylvania, generations of locals have passed down stories of a woman with mysterious magical powers. People came from near and far to seek healing and protection through her strange rituals. Some even believed she could fly. Named Moll Derry and nicknamed the Witch of the Monongahela, her legend has been documented by writers and folklorists for more than two hundred years. She is intertwined in many regional tales, such as the Lost Children of the Alleghenies and Polly Williams and the White Rocks. Author Thomas White separates fact from fiction in the many versions of Moll Derry and recounts Western Pennsylvania’s folk magic history along the way.

The history of infamous witch trials and witchcraft accusations is deeper than just those most often discussed at Salem. The Empire State has had numerous moments of pandemonium over the potential existence of witches.

From Native Americans viewing European colonists as witches in the Mohawk Valley to witchcraft hysteria among early Long Island colonial settlements, the history of New York state's witchcraft accusations encompases all regions and communities in the state.

Join author Scott R. Ferrara as he presents harrowing narratives of those who were accused of witchcraft, the feverish community dramas that resulted and the lives of those who faced their community as an outsider.