14 DAY TRIAL // There have been slightly fewer Google doodles for the past month or so, outside of the odd national day celebration in various countries, but the search engine is coming back in force with a Frankenstein-themed doodle to celebrate the 213th birthday of British author Mary Shelley.
Shelley is known for her novel Frankenstein, one of the earliest science fiction novels, which went on to become a popular culture icon.
Frankenstein's monster is still one of the most recognizable 'monsters' around and has been re-imagined countless times in movies, TV, books and so on.
The doodle keeps with the spooky Gothic theme and depicts the dark corridor of what appears to be an old mansion. Towards the right side of the corridor, replacing the 'l' in Google, there's staircase and the shadow of a man, or perhaps the monster himself.
The paintings on the wall somewhat resemble the Google letters, though you'd have to be pretty imaginative to see them. Google usually includes the company name in the doodle on the site, in some form or another, but this looks like one of the most obfuscated doodles to date.
The doodle only shows up in selected countries, mainly in Europe, but is not available on the main site, Google.com. The doodle leads to a web search for "Mary Shelley."
Mary Shelley was born in 1797 and was the daughter of political philosopher William Godwin and the philosopher and feminist Mary Wollstonecraft. While she authored several novels, short stories, plays and other works, she is mostly known for "Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus" one of the most popular Gothic novels.
It is not the first time Google has celebrated a popular science fiction writer, the search engine run a series of mysterious doodles last year to mark the birthday of British author H. G. Wells.