Snoozecast Presents: Spooky Stories

Tonight, we’ll continue with The Petit Trianon, adapted from An Adventure by Charlotte Anne Moberly and Eleanor Jourdain, first published in 1911. This episode is part of our Spooky Sleep Story series, where we share classic tales of the strange and mysterious. In Part One, the two English academics described an uncanny afternoon walk through the gardens of Versailles in 1901—an experience they co...

Tonight, we’ll read the first half of The Petit Trianon, adapted from An Adventure by Charlotte Anne Moberly and Eleanor Jourdain, first published in 1911. This episode is part of Snoozecast’s 7th annual Spooky Sleep Story series, where we share true and imagined encounters with the strange and unexplained every October. The two English women, both Oxford academics, recorded their uncanny experien...

Tonight, for this month’s Snoozecast+ Deluxe bonus episode, and in the vein of our Spooky Sleep Stories series, we’ll read the opening to “Dead Souls”. It was written by Nikolai Gogol and first published in 1842. It is known as a ghost story with no ghosts—unless you count the living. The novel follows the mysterious Pavel Chichikov as he travels through provincial Russia buying the legal rights t...

Tonight, for the next in our October spooky sleep story series, we’ll read an excerpt from “The Castle of Otranto”, a novel by Horace Walpole. First published in 1764, it is generally regarded as the first gothic novel. Set in a haunted castle, the novel produced a new style that has endured ever since, and has shaped the modern-day aesthetic of the goth subculture. Walpole wrote it at Strawberry...

Tonight, as part of our annual Spooky Sleep Stories series, we’ll read the opening to the novella “The Willows”. It was written by Algernon Blackwood, and first published in 1907. Two friends drift down the Danube by canoe, threading a maze of shifting channels, sandbanks, and low islands crowded with willow scrub. The river’s moods—eddies, gusts, glittering sun—seem to lean in and watch them, and...

Tonight, for our next Spooky Sleep Story, we’ll read Phantasmagoria, a narrative poem by Lewis Carroll first published in 1869. A polite Ghost drops in after midnight and proceeds to instruct his puzzled host in the finer points of spectral etiquette. Each October we bring back Snoozecast’s Spooky Stories Series—now in its seventh year—our annual run of classics with a candlelit vibe: ghostly, atm...

Tonight, as part of Snoozecast's seventh annual spooky sleep story series, we’ll read “The Haunted Orchard” written by British author Richard Le Gallienne and published in 1912. Each October, our Spooky Stories Series features classic tales that are more atmosphere than fright, all candlelight and creaking floorboards. In this one, a quiet country house and its untended orchard hold a lingering pr...

Tonight, as we are beginning the month that ends with Halloween, we’ll read the first half of “The Diamond Lens”, a short story by Fitz James O’Brien first published in 1858. Every October, Snoozecast features our Spooky Stories Series—tales with a spectral or uncanny quality, meant to set a certain mood, without keeping you awake. This marks our seventh year of SSS, and we’re beginning with somet...

Tonight, as part of our 6th annual spooky sleep story series, we’ll rebroadcast the opening to “Carmilla”, an 1872 Gothic novella by Irish author Sheridan Le Fanu which first aired in October of 2022. Tune in every Wednesday this month for sleep stories of the darker variety- like classic horror literature and ghost stories. If you prefer to avoid the mildly macabre we hope you’ll enjoy one of our...

Tonight, to continue our 6th annual “Spooky Sleep Story Series”, we shall read the opening to The Phantom Coach by Amelia B. Edwards. Tune in every Wednesday this month for sleep stories of the darker variety- like classic horror literature and ghost stories. If you prefer to avoid the mildly macabre we hope you’ll enjoy one of our many other stories available wherever you listen to podcasts. Catc...

Tonight, to continue our 6th annual “Spooky Sleep Story Series”, we shall read the opening to “The War of the Worlds”, written by H.G. Wells and first published in 1898. Tune in every Wednesday this month for sleep stories of the darker variety- like classic horror literature and ghost stories. If you prefer to avoid the mildly macabre we hope you’ll enjoy one of our many other stories available w...

Tonight, to start off our 6th annual “Spooky Sleep Story Series”, we shall read the opening to “How He Left The Hotel”, written by Louisa Baldwin and first published in 1895. Tune in every Wednesday this month for sleep stories of the darker variety- like classic horror literature and ghost stories. If you prefer to avoid the mildly macabre we hope you’ll enjoy one of our many other stories availa...

Tonight, for the final in our 5th annual Spooky Sleep Story Series, we’ll read a Snoozecast original story about a fictional New England town and the brother and sister who go out on a trick or treating adventure within it. While this is the end of this years spooky sleep stories, be sure to check out our freely available – called “Snoozecast Presents: Spooky Stories” or go to snoozecast.com/serie...

Tonight, as part of our Spooky Sleep Story Series, we’ll read our own lightly adapted version of Algernon Blackwood’s “A Haunted Island” from “The Empty House and Other Ghost Stories” published in 1906. In this story, our narrator is left alone for a few weeks at an island lodge in the middle of a lake in Canada, where he thinks he will focus on his studies, but soon begins to see and hear strange...

Tonight, for the next in our 5th annual “Spooky Sleep Story Series”, we shall read the narrative poem "The Raven" by Edgar Allan Poe, published in 1845. The poem is often noted for its musicality, stylized language, and supernatural atmosphere. It tells of a distraught lover who is paid a mysterious visit by a talking raven. The lover, often identified as a student,[1][2] is lamenting the loss of...

Tonight, to start off our 5th annual “Spooky Sleep Story Series”, we shall read the opening to “The Metamorphosis”, written by Franz Kafka and first published in 1915. Tune in every Wednesday this month for sleep stories of the darker variety- like classic horror literature and ghost stories, read in a way to evoke a mood of spookiness without actually causing a fright. Catch up on previous years...

Tonight, for our final episode of this year’s spooky sleep story series, we’ll read “The Haunted Orchard” written by British author Richard Le Gallienne and published in 1912. Born Richard Thomas Gallienne, the author changed his last name to “Le Gallienne” after college when he began working in an accountant’s office. Soon after he attended a lecture by Oscar Wilde, Le Gallienne abandoned his job...

Tonight, for our 600th episode, and the next in our October spooky sleep story series, we’ll read an excerpt from “The Castle of Otranto”, a novel by Horace Walpole. First published in 1764, it is generally regarded as the first gothic novel. Set in a haunted castle, the novel produced a new style that has endured ever since, and has shaped the modern-day aesthetic of the goth subculture. Although...

Tonight, as part of this month’s spooky sleep story series, we’ll read from “Mysterious Psychic Forces” written by Camille Flammarion and published in 1907. Nicolas Camille Flammarion was a French astronomer, mystic and prolific author, including popular science works about astronomy, several notable early science fiction novels, and works on psychical research. He has been described as being obse...

Tonight, as part of our fourth annual spooky sleep story series, we’ll read the opening to “Carmilla”, an 1872 Gothic novella by Irish author Sheridan Le Fanu. Our series will run every Monday of October. This is one of the early works of vampire fiction, predating Bram Stoker's Dracula by 26 years Le Fanu presents the story as part of the casebook of Dr. Hesselius, whose departures from medical o...

Tonight, to kick off our fourth annual Spooky Sleep Stories series, we’ll read the opening to the novella “The Willows” written by Algernon Blackwood and first published in 1907. This year’s series of classic horror stories will air every Monday this October. In this story, two friends are midway on a canoe trip down the River Danube. The natural environment, for example the river, sun and wind— i...

Tonight, for the final episode of our third annual Classic Horror Sleep Story Series this October, we will read the Edgar Allan Poe tale “Ligeia”. The story follows an unnamed narrator and his wife Ligeia, a beautiful and intelligent raven-haired woman. She falls ill and dies- but not for long.  ​​It may or may not have all been a hallucination of the narrator, and the story may or may not have be...

Tonight, as part of our third annual October classic horror sleep story series, we’ll read an excerpt from “Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus,” an 1818 novel written by English author Mary Shelley. “Frankenstein” tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, and this excerpt is from his point of view. He is a young scientist who creates a human-like creature in an unorthodox scientific experiment....

***Dear Listeners, we regret this episode was not available at it's regularly scheduled time but are happy to announce that 'V' just welcomed the next little snoozer 'X' into this world on 10/13/21, please accept our apologies for the delay and we hope you enjoy this next episode in our October horror series*** Tonight, as part of our third annual October classic horror sleep story series, airing...

Tonight, for the start of our third annual Classic Horror sleep story series, we’ll read the opening to “The Phantom of the Opera” written by Gaston Leroux, published in 1909. Be sure to catch our other snoozy, and a bit creepy, sleep stories every Wednesday this October. This novel is partly inspired by historical events at the Paris Opera during the nineteenth century, and partly by an apocrypha...