Archive · 30 Aug 2026
Mary Shelley Wrote Beyond Frankenstein, Including Pandemic Fiction
Mary Shelley is best known for writing Frankenstein.
But that was not her only book.
She wrote five more novels after it.
One of them was called The Last Man.
It was published in 1826.
The story imagined a future harmed by a pandemic.
Shelley also wrote travel books, biographies, short stories, essays and poems.
These works show that her imagination extended far beyond Frankenstein.
Mary Shelley became famous for Frankenstein but wrote much more than one novel.
She wrote five additional novels, including The Last Man.
Her work also included travel writing, biographies, short stories, essays and poetry.
The Last Man was published in 1826.
The novel imagines a future devastated by a pandemic, highlighting Shelley’s broad imagination.
- Who
- Mary Shelley.
- What
- She wrote five additional novels, including The Last Man, along with travel writing, biographies, short stories, essays and poetry.
- When
- The Last Man was published in 1826; the article discusses Shelley’s later work after Frankenstein.
- Why
- Her broader body of work demonstrates that she was more than the author of Frankenstein and had an expansive imagination.
- Best-known work
- Frankenstein
- Additional novels
- Five, including The Last Man
- The Last Man publication
- 1826
- The Last Man premise
- A future devastated by a pandemic
- Other writing
- Travel writing, biographies, short stories, essays and poetry
- Central theme
- Mary Shelley’s imagination extended beyond Frankenstein