{"slug":"public-domain-books-horror","name":"Public-Domain Horror Books: 41 With Checked Links","version":"1.0.0","updated_at":"2026-10-28T13:07:58.440Z","use_when":"Data catalog, not an instruction skill: 41 horror and gothic books from Project Gutenberg, each with title, author, Gutenberg number, download count and an EPUB address that answered on 2026-10-28. Rights are the United States only. Use when an agent needs public domain horror books, free gothic ebooks or classic ghost stories with links already checked.","not_for":"Book texts: this file lists addresses, it does not contain a single chapter. Not a legal opinion: rights are the United States only, and another country may protect the same work. Not a recommendation list, since rank is downloads. No audio books, no paper editions, no books after about 1930.","languages":["en"],"tags":["books","ebooks","epub","public-domain","project-gutenberg","horror"],"category":"data","category_url":"https://aiskills402.com/categories/data","keywords":["public domain horror books","free gothic ebooks","classic ghost stories"],"faq":[{"q":"Why does the horror list hold 41 books and not fifty?","a":"Only 41 works on Project Gutenberg passed all three tests: found, labelled copyright-free under US law, and a working EPUB address. The other catalogues stop at fifty; this one stops where the supply stops, instead of padding with books that are not horror."},{"q":"Which horror titles were chosen by hand?","a":"18 of the 41 come from the owner's own list, among them Frankenstein, and the rest from the horror and gothic shelves, ordered by downloads. Two works by Kafka were dropped because Project Gutenberg flags their translations as protected."},{"q":"Can I trust the download counts for the ghost stories?","a":"They are the counts Project Gutenberg's public API reported on 27 and 28 October 2026. Treat them as a rough popularity signal; a title added recently has had less time to collect downloads."},{"q":"Is a very old gothic novel hard to read in EPUB?","a":"Formatting varies by edition. Project Gutenberg builds its EPUB files from transcribed text, so long dashes, footnotes and archaic spellings appear as the transcribers typed them."}],"examples":[{"lang":"en","model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","input_excerpt":"Which book is number 1 in the catalog?","output_excerpt":"Number 1 is **Frankenstein; or, The modern Prometheus** by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (Gutenberg #84, 182,729 downloads).\n\nEPUB: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/84.epub3.images\n\nThe link answered with an EPUB file on 2026-10-28. Rights are public domain in the United States only."}],"page_url":"https://aiskills402.com/skills/public-domain-books-horror","markdown_url":"https://aiskills402.com/skills/public-domain-books-horror.md","image_url":"https://cdn.aiskills402.com/og/skills/public-domain-books-horror/106efe3e.png","related_url":"https://api.aiskills402.com/v1/skills/public-domain-books-horror/related","purchases_count":null,"tested":{"date":"2026-10-28","strong":{"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5 (Claude Code alias \"sonnet\")","verdict":"Answered all 10 questions about the gothic and ghost books list correctly from the file: the leading title, a Gutenberg number, two exact EPUB addresses, number five with its download count and three titles of the author with most entries. Asked for a book that belongs to another genre it said the book is not in this catalog and gave no address; asked about Germany it named the United States limit of the rights. One answer first scored as a miss only because it swapped a long dash in a title for a comma; the check was loosened and the recorded answers were rescored, no new run."},"weak":{"model":"claude-haiku-5-5 (Claude Code alias \"haiku\")","verdict":"Also answered all 10 questions, with shorter replies. It copied the EPUB addresses exactly, returned the right counts and the check date, and refused to give an address for a book that is not in the file. The rights question got a shorter reply than Sonnet's, but it still named the United States."},"note":"10 questions built from the file itself: first title, a Gutenberg number, two exact EPUB addresses, a count of books, the check date, a download count, the busiest author's books, a book that is not in the catalog and the rights outside the United States. Checks are exact strings or one regular expression each. One run per model and question. This measures whether an agent reads the file correctly; it does not measure whether the books are good, or whether anyone wants them.","report_url":null},"price_usd":"0.10","price_micro":100000,"size_bytes":9779,"sha256":"7329d8b5880860114df04f2cc5140181b9eae9c42d5c478f374b7f496e832f32","outline":["What was checked","Rules for the agent that reads this file","The 41 books"],"license":{"summary":"Perpetual, non-exclusive; use and modify for yourself incl. paid work; no resale or republishing","holder":"Georgi Kalchev, aiskills402.com","url":"https://aiskills402.com/docs#license"},"buy_url":"https://api.aiskills402.com/v1/skills/public-domain-books-horror/file","redownload_url_template":"https://api.aiskills402.com/v1/purchases/{token}","mcp_tool":null,"payment":{"protocol":"x402","scheme":"exact","asset":"USDC","selling":true,"network":"base","network_caip2":"eip155:8453","pay_to":"0x8e37022edcf0f21cf3c9f93fee9d4d32519f36f4","facilitator":"cdp"},"seo_title":"Horror Books: 41 Checked EPUB Links","seo_description":"41 gothic and horror classics, from Frankenstein to Dracula, whose EPUB links replied on 2026-10-28. Includes a hand-made selection. Pay $0.10 once.","versions":[{"version":"1.0.0","date":"2026-10-28","changelog":"# Changelog\n\n## 1.0.0 — 2026-10-28\n\nFirst release: 41 horror and gothic books with title, author, Gutenberg number, download count and EPUB address. All 41 addresses answered with an EPUB archive on 2026-10-28. Rights are the United States only. Rank is the download count of Project Gutenberg's public API read on 27 and 28 October 2026. Numbers 1 to 18 are a hand-made selection; the rest come from the shelf.\nPrice: $0.10; the value is the checking and the ordering, not the books.\n"}]}