What could be more pleasant than taking an extended vacation in Switzerland in the middle of the summer?  This may have been what Mary Shelley and her compatriots were thinking when they headed out to Lake Geneva together.  The weather was found to be unexpectedly sour.  Rain was relentlessly falling, and the ground was freezing overnight.  Seeking reprieve, the company gathered inside to tell ghost stories, and, in doing so, inadvertently defined an entire genre of literature.  Book lovers around the world would never sleep soundly again.