Mal ,'Shindig'
There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."
Yep - nightgowns and ominous houses. I think several of Jane Aiken Hodge's books are available in Kindle. A bunch of the titles on Amazon sound familiar, but I can't remember which were gothic-y and which were more romantic suspense.
The Mary Stewart that was gothic-y was "Nine Coaches Waiting". I remember it fondly but not in detail. My favorites were "Ivy Tree", "This Rough Magic", and "Madam Will You Talk". But they were all good.
My favorite is Airs Above the Ground
I have to finish a library book and then I can start re-reading them all.
Mind you, I have them all in hardback, I just prefer to do my bedtime reading on the Kindle where I can crank up the font size rather than wear my glasses.
You people made me just buy several Mary Stewart books. Damn you.
Toasters for all!
I think Nine Coaches Waiting was my first foray out of kids' chapter books. I've been fond of Stewart ever since. There was a line in one of her books--I've forgotten which--that described a swift mountain stream as Alpine green water. A foreign concept, since in the southern US, most moving water is brown. I was somewhere in the Bavarian Alps when I looked down from a road's edge and saw a swift moving stream that was, in fact, Alpine green.
I got one since I've never read any of her stuff.
I just got two of my old favorites - This rough Magic and Moon spinners
So I just read The Left Hand of Darkness for the first time, and... does the book know what a sexist ass Genly Ai is? I wasn't sure.
I think so, but it's a long time since I read it. I did recently read some short stories in the same world where Ursula (since my sister corresponded with her over email about her interpretation of Taoism and Ms. LeGuin signed all of hers with a friendly "Ursula" we figure the whole family is on a first name basis although I would probably not indulge that if I were to actually talk to her directly. But I digress) explicitly addresses the heteronormative bias apparent in it. In case that clarifies anything for you.
ETA I don't remember that coming up in the Lit class I read it for in college. Male teacher, mostly male students, though. Apparently at some point a student refused to read it because it was "too gay" so our prof was at some pains to tell us it was not gay at all.