This book contains tales by Edgar Allan Poe that became innovate literature discoveries at the time and extremely popular in its genre: The Murders in the Rue Morgue, The Fall of the House Usher, The Black Cat, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Cask of Amontilliado, The Masque of the Red Death, The Tell-Tale Heart. Edgar Poe was one of the first American writers who wrote mostly novellas. Within twenty years Edgar Poe created two short novels, two poems, one play, about seventy stories, fifty poems and ten essays that were published in magazines and almanacs and then gathered in collection books.

Edgar Poe was highly valued by Jules Verne, Arthur Conan Doyle and Howard Phillips Lovecraft who admitted his pioneer role in the genres they were popularizing.