Each week we have a book group on Mondays and Tuesdays. There are two slots: 10 am Tuesday and 7 pm Monday (BST) and you’re very welcome to either, wherever you are in the world and however much you’d like to participate. To sign up get in touch with @RomGothSam on twitter or send an email to sam@romancingthegothic.com
From April, meetings will be held at 7pm on Mondays and then 10am on Tuesdays (all times British time)
SIGN UP for individual author visits here
23rd/24th March
This week’s theme is Evolutionary Biology and horror. One film that’s come up multiple times when talking about biology and horror on film is Alien so… this week, we’re going to watch it and dive in! Face-huggers, ahoy!
30th/31st March
This week’s talk is going to be discussing folklore and horror in different cultures. We’re going to be the Caribbean special edition of Strange Horizons edited by Suzan Palumbo and Marika Bailey. A mix of short fiction, essays and poetry.
You can find it here
6th/7th April
This week’s talk will be looking at folklore, wells and spooky tales. The talk is focusing on three tales in particular so I thought we’d read them for book group!
‘The White Flag’ by Sabine-Baring Gould – Read it here
‘The Wailing Well’ by M R James – Read it here
‘The Wishing Well’ by E F Benson – Read it here
13th/14th April
This week, we’re doing a Romancing the Gothic first! Music! The talk is on British and Irish Ballads and I’ve picked out some of the ones the speaker will be talking about.
Each of the links below takes you to a page showing different versions of each ballad. I also recommend looking up and listening to different versions. I’ve made a playlist here but feel free to share recommendations for other versions!
The Unquiet Grave – read here
Tam Lin – read here (there are A LOT of versions, you don’t have to read them all!)
The Selkie of Sule Skerry – read here
The Cruel Sister – read here
Polly Vaughan – read it here (you have to scroll far down to get to the different versions)
20th/21st April
The undiscovered, occasionally almost uninhabited remote areas of the old European land of Croatia hold secrets only the bravest of women can find. The only question is, will they survive the discovery or be taken into darkness as the land demands?
Jela lives in complete, self-imposed isolation, but when a malevolent curse falls down on the neighbouring town of Lepoglava, she needs to—quite simply—follow the geese.
Bura lives in a remote village, hidden in the Velebit mountain range in the late 1950s, when she gets lost in the woods, which have suddenly gone unrecognizable.
Four friends visiting the Istrakon sci-fi convention in Pazin get into magical trouble when they drink something they shouldn’t have touched.
Luka and Kate believed they had a perfect plan to trick strict village rules. Years later, Ema and Laura go on a perfect vacation in Dalmatia… except that the powers lurking in the depths of the sea have other plans for them, and so does the village itself.
Augusta is caught in a fairy tale in the worst possible way—as a maiden sacrifice to the river dragon for the safety of her postapocalyptic village. But Lian, as it turns out, isn’t really a dragon and Augusta has something else to bargain with, other than her life—something much, much more dangerous.
27th/28th April
We’re starting off May with a talk on Shirley Jackson so we’re preparing by reading our first Shirley Jackson on the course! We’ve had a few lectures but never read anything except one or two stories in the ‘Scare a Day’ challenge. No more! It’s finally time.
Alone in the world, Eleanor is delighted to take up Dr Montague’s invitation to spend a summer in the mysterious Hill House. Joining them are Theodora, an artistic ‘sensitive’, and Luke, heir to the house. But what begins as a light-hearted experiment is swiftly proven to be a trip into their darkest nightmares, and an investigation that one of their number may not survive.
Romancing the Gothic 