The Gold-Bug Audiobook By Edgar Allan Poe cover art

The Gold-Bug

 Preview
LIMITED TIME OFFER

3 months free
Try for $0.00
Offer ends July 31, 2025 at 11:59PM PT.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Premium Plus auto-renews for $14.95/mo after 3 months. Cancel anytime.

The Gold-Bug

By: Edgar Allan Poe
Narrated by: Chris Lutkin
Try for $0.00

$0.00/mo. after 3 months. Offer ends July 31, 2025 at 11:59PM PT. Cancel anytime.

Buy for $7.79

Buy for $7.79

Confirm purchase
Pay using card ending in
Switch payment method
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use, License, and Amazon's Privacy Notice. Taxes where applicable.
Cancel

The grand-prize winner of a writing contest sponsored by the Philadelphia Dollar Newspaper, "The Gold-Bug" was one of Poe's most popular stories during his lifetime. Similar to his ratiocination tales - early versions of what we now call detective fiction - "The Gold-Bug" is full of mystery and adventure and includes a cryptogram, invisible ink, a scarab-like bug, and pirate treasure.

Public Domain (P)2017 Dreamscape Media, LLC Anthologies Anthologies & Short Stories Classics Mystery Fiction Short Story
All stars
Most relevant  
what an imagination ! I want to write with cryptography now. A lot of detail and some prejudices from a hundred years ago are relevant, if you can look past that it's a great short story

Poe

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Quick gothic mystery. It’s a shame this story is often overlooked due to dated language. At the time of its publication, it was one of the most widely read of his stories.

Poe never disappoints.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
What a fun story teller that saves the best for last. Narration brought the story to .life.this

Another follow Poe title

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The narration was a bit lackluster IMO. The narrator sounds wooden and noncommittal to me. Fun to hear it again though, I haven’t read this story in many years.

It’s a great story

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
3.75 of 5 stars.

With the 19th century prose one expects from Poe, "The Gold-Bug" (1843) is an earlier example of Poe's writing which seems suited for a weekly publication. Centered around a treasure hunt using a cryptogram, "The Gold-Bug" one can see an earlier version of Poe's detective fiction (though not technically).

The narration is appropriate for Poe's dense prose and makes the story easier for the modern listener to follow.

Classic Poe

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
No getting around the racist tones and dialect. It’s a rough listen on that front. I loved the words, phrases, and mystery of the story. Poe’s description of cabins, forests, and insanity is just mind-blowing. Such word choices that you can’t help but say some of them out loud and wonder “what in the name of all things does THAT mean?” But then Poe gives such powerful context that you get close to knowing, unless you’re already that smart…ahem. Nice little cruel payoff at the end.

Beautiful, engaging, and rough

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I found this hard to follow, the old English, and sub-par narration had me hanging on every word. people must have had a lot more brain power to follow that mystery.

Interesting

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.