Big Ideas Book Club: Dostoevsky, Camus, Tolstoy + More

In a forgotten provincial hospital, Doctor Andrey Ragin discovers the unsettling truths of his own life while overseeing a grim psychiatric ward. As he debates philosophy with a patient deemed insane, the line between sanity and madness begins to blur. Chekhov’s haunting tale is both a critique of indifference and a meditation on the fragility of reason, forcing readers to confront the boundaries of freedom, suffering, and the human soul.

Antarctica. It is a place of frozen wastes, desolation and things best left forgotten. Presented here is the tale of William Dyer, a professor from Miskatonic University and the leader of an ill-fated expedition to that remote and forlorn continent. Recorded in a series of letters, Dyers tells a scarcely believable tale full of anomalous and often horrific events.

Dreadful secrets lie beneath the ice, waiting to be discovered. Strange, cyclopean structures squat amidst the mountains towering in the distance, promising only madness to those who dare to explore their alien architecture. The Dyer Expedition ventures further than any other before them, and ultimately pays the price for it.

Obsessed with the secret of creation, Swiss scientist Dr. Victor Frankenstein cobbles together a body he’s determined to bring to life. And one fateful night, he does. When the creature opens his eyes, the doctor is repulsed: his vision of perfection is, in fact, a hideous monster. Dr. Frankenstein abandons his creation, but the monster won’t be ignored, setting in motion a chain of violence and terror.