Novels and stories : The lottery, The haunting of Hill House, We have always lived in the castle, other stories and sketches / Shirley Jackson.

Contents selected by Joyce Carol Oates.

Includes bibliographical references.

The lottery; or, The adventures of James Harris -- The haunting of Hill House -- We have always lived in the castle -- Other stories and sketches: Uncollected: Janice -- A cauliflower in her hair -- Behold the child among his newborn blisses -- It isn't the money I mind -- The third baby's the easiest -- The summer people -- Island -- The night we all had grippe -- A visit; or, The lovely house -- This is the life; or, Journey with a lady -- One ordinary day, with peanuts -- Louisa, please come home -- The little house -- The bus -- The possibility of evil -- Unpublished: Portrait -- The mouse -- I know who I love -- The beautiful stranger -- The rock -- The honeymoon of Mrs. Smith -- Biography of a story.

"In just two decades--she died in 1965, at the age of 48--Shirley Jackson created a weird and distinctive world of fiction, one in which a grinning death's head lies just behind the smiling mask of so-called everyday life. She first displayed her genius for conjuring daylight demons in The Lottery, the classic collection whose world-famous title story is an allegory of bloodlust and blind obedience to tradition. She perfected it in two great Gothic novels: The Haunting of Hill House, the tale of an achingly empathetic young woman chosen by a haunted house to be its new tenant, and We Have Always Lived in the castle, the unrepentant confessions of Miss Merricat Blackwood, a cunning adolescent who has gone to quite unusual lengths to preserve her ideal of family happiness. All three books are here, together with 21 other stories and sketchest--two of them previously uncollected--that present the author in all her many modes: unrivalled mistress of the macabre, groundbreaking domestic humorist, and subtle social satirist." --BOOK JACKET.