Karalyn Skinner, in her analysis of the use of the word "horrid" in Northanger Abbey, suggests there is a dual meaning. The Oxford Dictionary defines it as causing “horror or aversion,” being formed through the sensory, emotional language used within the gothic genre. It also relates to the circumstances of the heroine, who is kidnapped, imprisoned, and abused, usually by male protectors. Karalyn makes the distinction between Catherine Moreland’s view of horrid gothic and Isabella, who uses the more colloquial term to signify something offensive, disagreeable, and objectionable.

Regina Maria Roche’s Clermont uses traditional Gothic devices, ruined castles, and hidden passages to add mystery and atmosphere, with fear stemming from physical threats. When Madeline and Agatha look for the Countess in the old chapel, they encounter two men, one at the entrance and one inside the chapel. Both flee at their approach. The two women discover the Countess is injured, and Madeline wants to go for help, but she is paralyzed with “an agony of fear,” causing her to cling to the pillar. She worries that if she leaves, the murderer may return and finish the job. Also, they may capture her as she leaves to obtain assistance. These are real and physical threats based on reason and logic, not superstition.

Unwanted attention and physical abduction are portrayed in Eliza Parsons's The Castle of Wolfenbach. Matilda suffers the unwanted attentions of a man whom she believes is her uncle and guardian. When he gives her a book of nude drawings, she is confused and offended. She speaks of modesty and delicacy as innate virtues, and her disgust is born out of naivety. His response is to label her a prude and claim the books are perfectly respectable in fashionable French circles. Later, Matilda overhears a conversation in the garden between her uncle and one of the servants about entering her room. She describes how she is barely able to walk due to the shock, and when she reaches the shrubbery, she throws herself on the ground in floods of tears. The corruption of innocence and female vulnerability would have struck a chord with the female readership, who would have feared the damage done due to loss of reputation.

In her other novel, The Mysterious Warning, Parsons again sets the action in Germany but this time focuses on the relationship between the characters. The Countess’s treatment of Caroline, hitting her so hard that it renders her unconscious, is shocking in its violence and emphasizes the disparity of power and its abuse by the aristocracy. Even more shocking is the imprisonment of Eugenia, her daughter, and Count M. Shackled in a dungeon, they are imprisoned and starved to the point that the young child dies. To prevent the discovery of his prisoners, the Baron also kills the servants, appearing to leave them in the cellars where they died. There appears to be no respect for the value of human life on the part of the villain, who is more concerned with revenge. The lack of compassion and man’s cruelty to each other is shocking, along with the lack of any kind of formal justice for the victims, which brings the fear that power is unrestrained.

The aristocratic theme is taken up by Eleanor Sleath in Orphan of the Rhine. It contrasts opulence and simplicity to provoke disgust in the main character and the reader. Madame Laronne lives in a fortified castle, the interior of which is described as “ostentatious magnificence” and is directly contrasted with the “unadorned and charming simplicity” that Julie is used to. Madame Laronne is therefore insulted when her niece finds nothing praiseworthy about her surroundings. Previously, the reader is given an insight into Madame Laronne’s psyche by being told that rank and ambition required her to demonstrate her wealth. This creates the fear of a loss of status should that wealth diminish. When her brother asks her for financial help, he believes it is within her power to assist. He then suffers grief and resentment upon her refusal. There is something selfish and disgusting in her attitude that causes the reader to sympathize with those in need.

Francis Lathorn’s The Midnight Bell shows how unfounded suspicion based on fear can have disastrous consequences. Alphonsus senior endeavors to entrap his wife by tempting her to adultery. This results in Anna stabbing her own husband, fearing he is an intruder intent on doing her physical harm. Equally, in the hermit's tale, he is suspected of robbing and murdering his host; the death sentence is commuted to a galley slave, only to find the victim later alive and a fellow prisoner. The fear that a miscarriage of justice could result from the slightest of evidence is deeply disturbing.

Karl Grosse’s Horrid Mysteries is set in Germany and explores the psychological darkness, where secret societies such as the Illuminati seek to undermine the church and state. Meetings are held in a cold, dank cave with black walls and mirrors adding to the sinister nature. The paranoia regarding the undermining of the state coincides with the anti-Catholic feelings of the time. In contrast with The Necromancer, the supernatural is not explained and is left as a fearful vision of bright light, fire, and power. The necromancer, despite his name, cannot raise the dead. It is all an illusion using tricks of the light, sulphur, and co-conspirators disguised as ghosts. For the reader, these images, real or supernatural, present a fear of the unknown, of a threat that can not be contained. Despite the male protagonists, both stories reveal a vulnerability to deception and fear of physical harm that would have resonated with female readers.

Why Jane Austen chose these particular novels as representative of Gothic fiction in the 1790s, we will never know. In terms of creating an atmosphere of fear and vulnerability, they do follow the convention of the persecuted heroine and dark, ruined castles. Like Radcliffe, they favor the explained supernatural but also demonstrate the brutality of man’s inhumanity to man. Through these conventions, they create an emotional reaction of fear and disgust that qualifies them as horrid novels.