Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (August 30, 1797 – February 1, 1851) edited and promoted the works of her husband, the Romantic poet and philosopher Percy Bysshe Shelley. She created this story on a rainy afternoon in 1816 in Geneva, where she was staying with her husband and their friends. The group, stuck indoors by the inclement weather, passed the time telling and writing ghost stories. This is considered the earliest form of science fiction and the most famous "gothic novel" of all time.