Some of our favorite crosswords, logic puzzles, and language challenges from the first year of AO Puzzles, with more to come!

From oomancy to human hematophagy, we got weird, wondrous, and wicked this year.

We go inside Denmark’s Recreational Fear Lab to learn why our brains crave a good scare.

Each Monday we're going to tease that brain of yours.

Our excerpts are great reads and invitations to new worlds.

We love the month of October, so we're giving you 31 days of stories that will get you in the Halloween spirit.

Finding Wonder is for explorers of places and ideas around the world and across history.

Atlas Obscura staff highlighted their must-sees for the coming year (and we'd love to see your lists, too).

Through the new year, Atlas Obscura will highlight our staff’s favorite places of the moment.

At least, not in this universe.

Then pipe its scent to a warm decoy.

This newly annotated edition of the classic novel shows that each age gets the monsters it deserves.

For all your writing and sketching needs, or when you just want to look cool in a coffee shop.

Your next chance is in 7 years.

And cast a shadow of its own.

Scientists learned just how much sleep a baby needs to tell a “Zuser” from a “Bofel.”

Balls of ice cause hundreds of millions of dollars in crop damage each year.

Dhan Gopal Mukerji was a prolific writer and an early cultural ambassador between East and West.

And yes, we should all feel terrible.

Scientists have recorded the "roar" of the unwanted reef predators.

Five telescopes were used to make a special new image, and only one of them is on Earth.

The find is the first of its kind.

It's yet another canary in the climate coal mine.

A brief history of lesbian sadomasochism, from the shadows to the front lines of the “Sex Wars.”