November Books
The Room in the Dragon Volant – Sheridan Le Fanu (1872):
A short novel about a young Englishman vacationing in France who falls in love with a countess and finds himself caught up in an adventure. Things aren’t all that they seem, and the story proceeds through strange turns involving stupefying narcotics, haunted hotel rooms, and premature burial. A fun read. Sort of a Gothic proto-spy novel.
Monsieur Maurice – Amelia B. Edwards (1873):
A novelette told from the POV of an old woman remembering a strange occurrence from her youth when her father served as the jailor for a mysterious prisoner. There’s a ghost in it, but its aspect is minor. More of the story involves the prisoner and the mystery surrounding his incarceration. Edwards also had a career as a travel writer most particularly of her trips to Egypt and down the Nile.
Acceptance – Jeff VanderMeer (2014):
The third novel in the Southern Reach trilogy and a satisfying conclusion to the series even if some mysteries remain unexplained. One thing I noticed, and I’ve noticed this in a few books now, is that there’s been this twist to the Hero’s Journey. So instead of there being a broken world and the hero going on a quest to fix it, the shift is there’s a broken world and the hero goes on a quest to learn the skills or gain the knowledge necessary to live in it. It’s not a major shift, but a noticeable one.
Sunshine Patriots – Bill Campbell (2004):
A subversive anti-war, Mil SF novel that reads like the Warhammer 40K novel you always wished Ishmael Reed had written. Set in a universe where corporations own star systems, SP tells the story of one Aaron “the Berber” Barber and his platoon of Screaming Ospreys as they attempt to put down an insurrection on the planet Elysia. This book is flat out nuts. It’s grisly and bitter, and sometimes a mess of oblique plotting, but it’s a fun ride for all that. You have to laugh when cyborgs in the middle of a firefight get marketing calls from internet service providers.
Cave & Julia – M. John Harrison (2014):
A journalist gets involved with a former actress whose brother disappeared in a tragic accident amid the ruins of a nonhuman civilization. Fans of Ballard’s Vermillion Sands will likely enjoy this.
The 4th Domain – M. John Harrison (2014):
A rather feckless young man, Shaw, gets embroiled in a struggle between cultists in modern day London. Recalls Machen and Aickman in its approach to the weird in the everyday, and anyone who has ever spent more than twenty minutes cornered by a conspiracy theorist unloading their memes will feel some kinship to Shaw as he learns about the 4th Domain.
Yesterweird 
Every one of these sounds interesting, and I like the way you write about them (“a conspiracy theorist unloading their memes” made me laugh), but I’m especially curious about the first two. How did you find them (did someone recommend them? was it part of research for some other project? chance?)
The Le Fanu was actually a reread, although I’d forgotten most of it! He’s famous for his vampire novella “Camilla” and not _that_ obscure. You can find recent editions of his collections easy enough.
Edwards on the other hand I had never heard of, but found in a Dover reprint collection I bought off a guy when he was leaving town. It’s called “Five Victorian Ghost Novels” and Monsieur Maurice had the best opening paragraph of the bunch. So yeah, a completely random read.