Great manga version of the most famous of Poe’s tales.

This volume of Edgar Allen Poe tales includes The Raven, The Tell Tale Heart, The Cask of Amontillado, The Fall of the House of Usher and The Mask of the Red Death. All are famous as Poe’s best work. The adaptation of The Raven holds up the best as it is included in its entirety. Even though I have previously read this work many times and saw it as an adaptation on The Simpsons, I believe this is the best version that I have ever encountered. The Mask of the Red Death explains the plot much better than the original story or the silent movie with Lon Chaney. All of the stories still have a feeling of increasing dread as you read them.

If you have a young adult that can’t get through the old fashioned language used in the original stories, this would be the perfect gift. The pictures explain words that I just skimmed over when I originally read the stories in high school and college. In addition, the adapter’s notes for each story explain items even further. For example, I had no idea about the story behind the beetles in The Tell Tale Heart.

The artwork acts like manga (read back to front and right to left) and the characters look like manga characters while staying true to clothing styles from the 1840s when these stories were written. The artwork sets the mood for the psychological horror ambiance of the tales. 4 stars!

Thanks to the publisher, Udon Entertainment, and NetGalley for an advanced review copy.

Edgar Allan Poe. The mention of his name brings up images of horror and ghost stories. Things that go bump in the night and scare the heck out of you. In the new Manga Classics collection of Poe stories, you will find plenty of chilling tales to read on a dark and stormy night!

This collection includes The Raven, The Tell-Tale Heart, The Masque of the Red Death, The Cask of Amontillado, and The Fall of the House of Usher.

Books in the Manga Classics series are all graphic novels that adapt classic tales into this format so that a new audience can enjoy them. Manga is read in the Japanese tradition from right to left and from the back of the book toward the front. Don’t worry; it’s very easy to get the hang of it!

The illustrations in this volume are superb. You can see the emotions on the characters’ faces and sense the atmosphere of the story by the settings in which the characters are drawn. The scenes are dramatic and haunting, such as the dark room in The Tell-Tale Heart, or the damp caves in The Cask of Amontillado. The masks worn by the characters are sufficiently creepy to give you the chills! The House of Usher is dark and creepy and an atmosphere that would not exactly be a welcoming place for a vacation. All this is conveyed by the artists’ touch in the richly-illustrated pages here.

The stories are told in their original language and the illustrations will help you understand the settings. It’s never been easy to picture the rooms in The Masque of the Red Death, but this graphic version really helped me see what Poe was describing. If you’ve ever read The Cask of Amontillado and wondered what one of those caves looked like, well now you can see for yourself.

Poe’s stories are perfect for anyone who loves to read scary stuff late at night. Grab a copy of this Manga version and start reading!

I thank NetGalley and the publisher for an advance reader copy in exchange for my honest review.

Great illustrations and a must add to any libraries Graphic Novel collection.

*thank you to NetGalley and Udon Entertainment for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review*

3 stars.
I really liked this version of "The Stories of Edgar Allen Poe". I have his books in paperback, but if you are anything like me, his books are a bit hard to read. So that is why I find this manga version a real gem. The illustrations make the stories easier to follow and understand and therefore, entertaining and enjoyable. This also really works as a manga. Id imagine there are some books that dont, but this does. The stories are still pretty creepy and they do capture what Edgar Allen Poe was saying in his storytelling. Definitely recommend this for manga lover, Edgar Allan poe fans and those who like me, want to read the main classic stories but need a bit of help to do so.

I loved this so much. I didn't expect it, actually. I mean, I always love these Manga Classics but I never thought I would actually be interested in these Edgar Allan Poe stories, I don't know why, cause I love getting to know these classics.

They were so amazing. Seriously. I loved The Tell Tale Heart, didn't care much about The Cask of Amontillado, loved The Fall of the House of Usher. The Mask of the red Death, was okay, I liked it, didn't love it. The Raven. THE RAVEN. Loved this one so so SO much. My favorite out of all these stories.

Also, can I once again say how insanely gorgeous the art in these Mangas are. Bloody hell.

I love Manga and was excited to see Edgar Allan Poe's work in manga form. The illustrations are beautiful and fit the stories perfectly. This is a great way to get younger readers to read more classics and they might be able to understand his work better as well. I look forward to reading more classics in this format.

Really the only reason this got 4 stars instead of 5 for me is because I haaate the Fall of the House of Usher. I get that it's one of Poe's famous works and I totally understand the decision to include it in this volume but it's just so much longer than the other stories and I feel like there's a ton of unnecessary rambling in it that makes my eyes glaze over. I would have rather seen the Pit and the Pendulum but that's just my personal preference. Other than that I really enjoyed this. The art was great and I love reading graphic novel adaptations of Poe's works. The stories themselves are so descriptive and it's always interesting to see an artist interpret that and bring it to life. Also it's been awhile since I read the originals but it seems like most of the text has been faithfully reproduced so that's always good.

As a big fan of both Poe’s short stories and graphic novels, this book did not disappoint. The adaptation of the writing was done very well, using Poe’s own words, and does not read as though it were just thrown together with bits and pieces of sentences like shorter adaptations from other publishers often do. The illustrations were in classic manga style, and were clearly drawn by talented artists. I definitely recommend this book and the others in the Manga Classics series.

Gothic, eerie, and beautiful. I liked this Manga version of Poe's classics a lot. I haven't read all these stories in their original version but the dark atmosphere from them seems to have been well translated into this format. The art was overall well done and the classic stories dark and eerie depth strengthened it.

My favorite stories were The Cask of Amontillado, The Raven and The Mask of the Red Death.

4.5 stars

Once again, I never read the original book and to be honest I don't really know what to think of it. The manga is divided into 5 short stories. And some of them are really tiny! I have no idea how they are in the original classic but in this one, although some are a bit difficult to understand since there's not much of a context, they are fascinatingly terrifying!

Also, I have to mention that all the short stories are drawn by a different artist, which I thought to be really interesting. Not only because we can see different styles but because it makes it easier to separate the stories...

I will talk about them briefly in separate:

The Tell-Tale Heart - This one was quite short and not the easiest to understand but it was just so dark and fascinating! I'm not sure I understood it at all because in manga format it's really a bit too tiny but it seems to be about guilt? Basically, it's about a guy that is trying to show that he is sane. In his brain, for him to commit such a calculated murder he has to be sane... The victim was an old man with a "vulture-eye" and he explains how everything happened. It's quite macabre.


The Cask of Amontillado - Okay after reading this one, I think this manga is better enjoyed if you've read the original stories or if you at least have heard of them, otherwise it will probably get confusing. This one is basically about revenge. And if you are wondering, Amontillado is the name of a wine, that was used by Montresor to lure Fortunato to his end. It's quite a messed-up story and not the easiest to have the whole idea in manga...


The Raven - I really liked this one, it's the only one I fully knew before reading the manga and I'm impressed. It's amazing how they managed to still maintain the poem aspect! I was literally reading it as a poem. This seems to be about grief. The main character is suffering the loss of his love, Lenore. And the poem shows him falling into madness. I really love this poem and it was quite unique to see it in a manga format, this is for sure a first and I think it was really well done.


The Masque of the Red Death - This one was scary and unsettling... I was holding my breath for the whole story even tho I was expecting the end due to the title... What an intense story! This one is about the plague and our main character is a prince. He is trying to escape the plague by staying in an abbey. He does an incredibly big party but... There are no boundaries for death... This is one of the tense ones in the book, it's incredible and for sure my favorite!


The Fall of the House Usher - This story is the weirdest of them all. Such an unsettling story! In this story, we have a character clearly suffering from some mental disease (make it plural!) not yet discovered at the time. This one has a bit more of a dark setting (even darker than the last ones, if that's possible) and the art was perfectly paired with the story. I think it's the most different in the book and first I wasn't really sure about it but it really fits well. The story talks about two friends, one is the narrator and he tries to help his friend feeling better - although it seems to be quite impossible to do so and he starts to be scared himself. I think this one is best understood if you've read the original classic, although it has a lot of detail and story in the manga, it's quite a complex story.


I actually enjoyed all the stories and the art. They are all really different from each other, the only thing in common being how dark they are. I surprisingly loved this manga and for sure I need to read more Edgar Allan Poe! Totally recommended if you are into dark or unsettling stories!

When I saw this book I needed to read it , I am a huge fan of manga and Edgar Allan Poe's works so this book was a must read for me .
The artwork was very nice and fitted well with the stories . The black and white added to the creepiness of the different tales . I only had one issue with this manga and that was that it didn't read well on the app ( Adobe Digital Editions ) that I had to read this on . It was back to front ! I had to scroll all the way to the end to begin the first story and then of course the panels were awkward to read . Anyone reading this for the first time who hadn't read any manga before would have been incredibly confused by the layout . Luckily , however I have been reading manga for many years so it wasn't too much of an issue for me .
Despite this issue I really enjoyed this manga .

I received an advanced copy of Manga Classics: The Stories of Edgar Allen Poe from NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

Edgar Allen Poe’s stories have been transformed into almost every media possible, so it should come as no surprise that he’s finally made his way into manga form. Five of his most famous works are included in this novel, The Tell-Tale Heart, The Cask of Amontillado, The Masque of the Red Death, The Raven, and the Fall of the House of Usher. This book is releasing at the perfect time of year, being out and available on the shelves by Halloween.
The Tell-Tale Heart is the story of a man going mad and murdering an older gentleman he lives with. This story is truly creepy and eerie and is really enhanced by the imagery accompanying it. The face of the man shows his emotions (and lack of sanity) in such a way that it brings the story to a whole new level.
The Cask of Amontillado is probably my favorite of Poe’s works, and is about a man driven by the concept of getting revenge on a man who has slighted him. There’s a lot of play of words going on in this story (for example the two characters in the story have vastly different ideas of what a mason is). The story is both beautiful and disturbing, as is the artwork that accompanies it.
The Raven is possibly Poe’s best known work, and is a poem about a man descending into madness at the loss of his lover. It’s a poem that has almost a musical quality to it, and which artwork compliments perfectly.
The Masque of the Red Death is about a Prince’s desperate attempts to stave off mortality (represented as the plague called the Red Death) by shutting himself and his court into a lavish and isolated abbey. This story is very much an allegory about death and its inevitability, and flows very well with the help of artwork to tell the story.
The Fall of the House of Umber is a perfect example of Poe’s totality (where every detail and event is connected to the rest), it’s the tale of a man who rushes to the aid of his side friend, only to discover that things are worse than he believed. Events descend into madness as the emotional state of the characters takes its toll. This story translates superbly into manga form, and flows very smoothly with the details being translated into a more visual sense.
This novel would be perfect for both people who are new to Poe’s works, as well as for long-time fans of his. Stacy King flawlessly translated Poe’s works into manga, making as few changes to the stories (usually just trimming them down) as possible. The effect enhances the stories being told, blending his spine-tingling tales with visual evocative images. I’ll confess I was only able to read one story a night, as I found them so intense and so beautiful I couldn’t continue to the second right away.

I was so pleased with this Manga version of Edgar Allen Poes works! it's beautifully illustrated and follows the poems and short stories so well. It's one of my new favorite classic manga editions!

Not the best Manga transposition I read by now, but if you haven't read E.A.Poe's most famous short stories, this could be a good introduction.

Non la migliore trasposizione manga che abbia letto fino ad ora, ma se vi serve una piccola introduzione alle migliori storie brevi scritte da Edgar Allan Poe, questo fumetto potrebbe fare al caso vostro.

THANKS NETGALLEY FOR THE PREVIEW!

Had beautiful artwork. I so enjoy seeing these amazing classics with illustrations. The darkness to the illustrations was definitely a plus.

I've loved the match between the manga and the Poe's poetry. The drawing's atmosphere is creepy just enough to scare the reader added to the text.

I love the way its written, the drawings and the creepy stories that I was expecting because is Poe. Love it.

The artwork on the cover initially attracted me to my first Manga Classic, The Stories of Edgar Allan Poe, but I was completely blown away by the detail in every illustration. The interpretation of each story was impressive. You can tell a lot of research went into this retelling. The book also adds little-known facts about Poe, his writing and his life, which is a nice touch. I look forward to reading more Manga Classics.

This is an illustrated collection of stories and poems by Edgar Allan Poe. The drawings were all in black and white, which made the stories that much creepier, in my opinion. I thought the collection was well done but it was also felt a little mismatched due to their being a different art style for each story/poem. Because each story/poem was drawn by a different person, I am going to review each one separately.

The Tell-Tale Heart
This story is about a man who kills an elderly gentleman and buries his corpse beneath his floorboards. The story was quite creepy, what with the killer trying to explain how he wasn’t really crazy because he went about the killing in a calm and rational manner, and a crazy person wouldn’t have been able to do that. You could definitely tell that the man was crazy, though, what with him going on about how he didn’t mind the elderly gentleman; what made him want to kill him was “his evil eye.” Oh yeah, and the fact that he killed the elderly man.
As for the drawing, the backgrounds in the story were scratchy and not filled in completely. I felt that this style of artwork helped set the stage for the killer’s descent into madness. It made me think of tortured minds and encroaching insanity. If the artist had filled in the pages completely, with rounded edges and shading rather than using hatching, I think the story would have had a completely different tone/feel to it.

The Cask of Amontillado
The Cask of Amontillado is about a man who takes revenge on his former friend by walling him up in the crypt under his house. In this story, we get the last name of the main character, unlike in The Tell-Tale Heart, which never gave a name to anyone in the story. This helps the reader connect more with the main character, although we never connect enough to understand Mr. Montresor’s motives as to why he wants revenge on his friend Fortunato. The closest we get is the following quote: “The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as best I could, but when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge.” (Pg. 55) I feel like this just adds to the creepiness factor of this story, though.
The art style in The Cask of Amontillado has a lot of checkered patterns in it. Maybe this is a way of showing the checkered past between the main character and his friend? This story also has a lot more grays in it than there were in the Tell-Tale Heart. I think the previous story had no reason to use grays as much because it was clear that the main character was insane. In this story, however, it is unclear whether Mr. Montresor is crazy or if he does what he does in a twisted sense of justice for the wrongs Fortunato wrought against him.

The Raven
The Raven is a poem, one of Poe’s most famous works. It is a bit of a tricky poem to understand, so here is what I think happened. In the poem, the main character hears something knocking at his window, and when he opens it, a raven flies inside. The raven can only say the word “nevermore.” Due to this, the main character believes the raven is mocking him and telling him he will never see his beloved Lenore again. From what I gathered, I believe Lenore is the main character’s wife who has recently passed away. I thought it was quite interesting to see the poem illustrated. It helped me understand what was happening in it a little better than if I had just been reading the poem itself. It helped me become more invested in the poem, as well. One thing that occurred to me while I was reading The Raven was the difficulty of illustrating a poem that wasn’t telling a story. If the poem was talking more about the writer’s feelings or something like that, it would be very hard to draw accompanying artwork for it. I think this is why The Raven was chosen for this collection, because it told a story, and was therefore easier to illustrate.
The artwork of the previous stories was more in the style of a cartoon, whereas this poem was drawn in a manga-like style. The main character has the large eyes, beautiful features, and pointed chin of a regular manga character, whereas the previous ones had more of a realistic feel to them. I thought it was interesting that all the stories weren’t drawn in a manga style, since this collection is called Manga Classics: The Stories of Edgar Allan Poe.

The Masque of the Red Death
This story is about a plague called “The Red Death.” A prince decides to lock up himself and a thousand of his courtiers inside an abbey. The abbey has seven rooms in it, and each room is decorated in a different color. The courtiers and the prince have a wonderful time and don’t worry about a thing…until a guest shows up dressed as a corpse who died from the Red Death. Then people start dropping like flies. Obviously, the “person” who dressed as a corpse was the personification of the Red Death.
The artwork in this story was quite elaborate. It depicted all the lavish clothing and rich scenery that Poe described in the story in great detail. I almost wanted this story in color just to be able to see the different chambers and pretty clothing. But of course, that would have been weird to have just one story in color. The people were depicted in the manga style, rather than the cartoon style. I think this was a smart choice because when you think of courtiers and princes, you think of them as beautiful and elegant, which is what the manga style of drawing looks like to me.

The Fall of the House of Usher
The Fall of the House of Usher follows a man who goes to comfort his friend, Roderick Usher, while he is feeling ill. Once the friend arrives, he finds out that Roderick’s sister has been ill as well, and the doctors don’t know what’s wrong with her. She eventually dies and Roderick decides to put her in a coffin in the crypt. Over the next few days, however, he comes to believe that they put her in the coffin while she was still alive and that he and his friend need to get her out of the coffin.
The artwork in this story was done in the cartoon style. I feel that this was a necessary choice, since there are some scenes where the characters are shown to be less than beautiful. As I’ve said before, everyone looks beautiful in a manga, so I don’t think that style would have worked for this story. There are a lot of cool illustrations that wouldn’t have been possible has the author chose to use the manga style, as well. For example, on page 221, there is an image of Roderick Usher with a clock face superimposed on his face. I thought this was a really cool image, and it wouldn’t have been as easily done had the style been manga.

These stories and poems were really brought to life by the illustrations in this book. I was a little put off at first by the different styles of art, but after thinking about it and writing this review, I understand why it was done this way. All in all, I enjoyed this collection and would recommend it to anyone who likes graphic novels and/or manga, as well as anyone interested in Poe’s works.