When a bad harvest on the Canadian prairie means no Christmas for her cousins, a young woman does the only thing she can to rescue their holiday.

Can an almost perfectly planned crime be solved? That question is answered in this classic mystery by one of the early 20th Century's most popular, fictional medical detectives, Dr. Thorndyke.

Sandwiched between the Sherlock Holmes mysteries of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and the whodunnits of Agatha Christie are R. Austin Freeman's "whocatchums." Freeman pioneered the concept of the inverted detective story, in which the whole crime is explained before the investigation.

When does the end justify the means and who gets to decide? One person's definition of morality may not be shared by others.

Unlike Christmas stories Thanksgiving stories are sparse. To celebrate the season, here is the tale of a proper New England celebration combined with a classic love story.

The 19th century novels and stories of Edward Payson Roe were very popular in their day. Being a Presbyterian minister, his works had a religious and moral foundation. One of his greatest criticism were the sermonly characteristics of his stories which may explain their wide acceptance during the Victorian age.

Somewhere there’s a great story for almost every holiday, even the decidedly American tradition of Thanksgiving and who better to tell such a story than one of America’s finest authors, O. Henry.

James Joyce’s “Araby” is ranked among the pantheon of greatest short stories ever written. In this timeless coming of age tale an adolescent boy, blinded by a hormonal fog, falls for a neighbor girl.

Now considered one of the classics of literature, the 1914 collection of short stories, Dubliners, of which “Araby” was an early part was an initial failure selling less than 400 copies. Of those almost a third were purchased Joyce himself.

A sick young woman is saved by a final kind gesture.

While Halloween is the season for scary stories, their popularity is timeless. That is why this dark tale of revenge still send chills down listeners spines after almost two centuries.

The Cask of Amontillado was first published in the November 1946 issue “Godey’s Lady’s Book” which demonstrates the universal fascination with scary stories. Poe understood humanity’s greatest fears and exploited them masterfully, making him the all-time master of the horror genre.

Rather than your typical October horror story, This chilling tale is a unique variation on your run-of-the-mill ghost story with a wicked twist at the end from the master of narrative misdirection, O. Henry.

O. Henry, whose real name was William Sydney Porter, is considered one of the all-time masters of the short story. Known for his inventive twists, his work spanned many genres from comedy to horror. His short variegated life as draftsman, banker, and even federal convict, gave him a trove of experiences to weave into his tales.

As Halloween approaches we begin a time for scarier stories. For this short tale with a chilling twist we turn to prolific 19th century stories Ambrose Bierce for "A Wireless Message."

Ambrose Bierce is considered one of the 19th Century finest authors of shockingly realistic short stories. His most famous tale “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” is one of our favorites and can be heard at Litreading.