Popular with readers and critics alike (P.G. Wodehouse hailed him as a master writer), Jacobs was a prolific writer who published 19 volumes between 1896 and 1926. He wrote short stories, novels, and plays, although critics agree that he was most accomplished at the short story form. Despite the fact that most of his stories were humorous tales of life on the English waterfront at the turn of the century, his most famous story is "The Monkey's Paw," which James Harding in The Reference Guide to Short Fiction called "a little masterpiece of horror by an unusually gifted writer."

Jacobs is known for his deft, economical scene-setting and his neat, logical plots, two characteristics which are easily visible in "The Monkey's Paw." His stories show a gradation in humor. Many of them could be considered comedies, but Jacobs also began to experiment with what later became known as...