The Strange Thing We Become and Other Dark Tales

The Strange Thing We Become and Other Dark Tales
Author: Eric Larocca
Publisher:
Total Pages: 128
Release: 2021-09
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9781737463313

The Strange Thing We Become and Other Dark Tales collects eight stories of literary dark fiction. Tense and terrifying, these masterful stories by Eric LaRocca explore the shadow side of love. You Follow Wherever They GoBodies Are for BurningThe Strange Thing We BecomeThe Trees Grew Because I Bled ThereYou're Not Supposed to Be HereWhere Flames Burned Emerald as GrassI'll Be Gone by ThenPlease Leave or I'm Going to Hurt You

Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke And Other Misfortunes

Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke And Other Misfortunes
Author: Eric LaRocca
Publisher: Titan Books (US, CA)
Total Pages: 256
Release: 2022-09-06
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1803361506

"Amongst the Top 50 Horror Books of All Time" - Cosmopolitan Three dark and disturbing horror stories from an astonishing new voice, including the viral-sensation tale of obsession, Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke. For fans of Kathe Koja, Clive Barker and Stephen Graham Jones. Winner of the Splatterpunk Award for Best Novella. A whirlpool of darkness churns at the heart of a macabre ballet between two lonely young women in an internet chat room in the early 2000s—a darkness that threatens to forever transform them once they finally succumb to their most horrific desires. A couple isolate themselves on a remote island in an attempt to recover from their teenage son’s death, when a mysterious young man knocks on their door during a storm… And a man confronts his neighbour when he discovers a strange object in his back yard, only to be drawn into an ever-more dangerous game. Three devastating, beautifully written horror stories from one of the genre’s most cutting-edge voices. What have you done today to deserve your eyes?

Things We Say in the Dark

Things We Say in the Dark
Author: Kirsty Logan
Publisher: Random House
Total Pages: 168
Release: 2019-10-03
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1473567947

'Gripping . . . You won't put it down' Sunday Telegraph A shocking collection of dark stories, ranging from chilling contemporary fairytales to disturbing supernatural fiction. Alone in a remote house in Iceland a woman is unnerved by her isolation; another can only find respite from the clinging ghost that follows her by submerging herself in an overgrown pool. Couples wrestle with a lack of connection to their children; a schoolgirl becomes obsessed with the female anatomical models in a museum; and a cheery account of child's day out is undercut by chilling footnotes. These dark tales explore women's fears with electrifying honesty and invention and speak to one another about female bodies, domestic claustrophobia, desire and violence. 'A brilliant collection of stories . . . All will burrow their way into your brain and not let go' Stylist 'Shimmers with menace . . . Fans of Angela Carter and Shirley Jackson take note' i Newspaper KIRSTY LOGAN WAS SELECTED AS ONE OF BRITAIN'S TEN MOST OUTSTANDING LGBTQ WRITERS by Val McDermid for the International Literature Showcase in 2019

We Can Never Leave This Place

We Can Never Leave This Place
Author: Eric LaRocca
Publisher: Trepidatio Publishing
Total Pages: 114
Release: 2022-06-24
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1685100244

“We Can Never Leave This Place is the apocalyptic 21st century Grimm's fairy tale you need in your life. Eric LaRocca plucks images directly from the muck and mire of our id and fashions them into something grotesquely beautiful.” ~ Paul Tremblay, author of The Cabin at the End of the World and The Pallbearers Club “We Can Never Leave This Place is a bleak and tender, monstrous and visceral fable of family and loss, and the courage it takes to confront them both.” ~ Kathe Koja, author of The Cipher “When you’re given a gift, something else gets taken away.” A precocious young girl with an unusual imagination is sent on an odyssey into the depths of depravity. After her father dies violently, young Mara is surprised to find her mother welcoming a new guest into their home, claiming that he will protect them from the world of devastation and destruction outside their door. A grotesque and thrilling dark fantasy, We Can Never Leave This Place is a harrowing portrait of inherited grief and familial trauma.

The Whisper Man

The Whisper Man
Author: Alex North
Publisher: Celadon Books
Total Pages: 284
Release: 2019-08-20
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1250317975

**THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER** "WORKS BEAUTIFULLY... If you like being terrified, The Whisper Man has your name on it." —The New York Times, Editor's Pick "SUPERB" —Publisher's Weekly, Starred Review "BRILLIANT... will satisfy readers of Thomas Harris and Stephen King." —Booklist, Starred Review "POIGNANT AND TERRIFYING" —Entertainment Weekly In this dark, suspenseful thriller, Alex North weaves a multi-generational tale of a father and son caught in the crosshairs of an investigation to catch a serial killer preying on a small town. After the sudden death of his wife, Tom Kennedy believes a fresh start will help him and his young son Jake heal. A new beginning, a new house, a new town. Featherbank. But the town has a dark past. Twenty years ago, a serial killer abducted and murdered five residents. Until Frank Carter was finally caught, he was nicknamed "The Whisper Man," for he would lure his victims out by whispering at their windows at night. Just as Tom and Jake settle into their new home, a young boy vanishes. His disappearance bears an unnerving resemblance to Frank Carter's crimes, reigniting old rumors that he preyed with an accomplice. Now, detectives Amanda Beck and Pete Willis must find the boy before it is too late, even if that means Pete has to revisit his great foe in prison: The Whisper Man. And then Jake begins acting strangely. He hears a whispering at his window...

Orange World and Other Stories

Orange World and Other Stories
Author: Karen Russell
Publisher: Vintage
Total Pages: 289
Release: 2019-05-14
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0525656146

From the Pulitzer Finalist and universally beloved author of the New York Times best sellers Swamplandia! and Vampires in the Lemon Grove, a stunning new collection of short fiction that showcases Karen Russell’s extraordinary, irresistible gifts of language and imagination. Karen Russell’s comedic genius and mesmerizing talent for creating outlandish predicaments that uncannily mirror our inner in lives is on full display in these eight exuberant, arrestingly vivid, unforgettable stories. In“Bog Girl”, a revelatory story about first love, a young man falls in love with a two thousand year old girl that he’s extracted from a mass of peat in a Northern European bog. In “The Prospectors,” two opportunistic young women fleeing the depression strike out for new territory, and find themselves fighting for their lives. In the brilliant, hilarious title story, a new mother desperate to ensure her infant’s safety strikes a diabolical deal, agreeing to breastfeed the devil in exchange for his protection. The landscape in which these stories unfold is a feral, slippery, purgatorial space, bracketed by the void—yet within it Russell captures the exquisite beauty and tenderness of ordinary life. Orange World is a miracle of storytelling from a true modern master.

Through the Woods

Through the Woods
Author: Emily Carroll
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 212
Release: 2014-07-15
Genre: Young Adult Fiction
ISBN: 1442465972

Discover a terrifying world in the woods in this collection of five hauntingly beautiful graphic stories that includes the online webcomic sensation “His Face All Red,” in print for the first time. Journey through the woods in this sinister, compellingly spooky collection that features four brand-new stories and one phenomenally popular tale in print for the first time. These are fairy tales gone seriously wrong, where you can travel to “Our Neighbor’s House”—though coming back might be a problem. Or find yourself a young bride in a house that holds a terrible secret in “A Lady’s Hands Are Cold.” You might try to figure out what is haunting “My Friend Janna,” or discover that your brother’s fiancée may not be what she seems in “The Nesting Place.” And of course you must revisit the horror of “His Face All Red,” the breakout webcomic hit that has been gorgeously translated to the printed page. Already revered for her work online, award-winning comic creator Emily Carroll’s stunning visual style and impeccable pacing is on grand display in this entrancing anthology, her print debut.

Revenge

Revenge
Author: Yoko Ogawa
Publisher: Picador
Total Pages: 174
Release: 2013-01-29
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1250016177

"It's not just Murakami but also the shadow of Borges that hovers over this mesmerizing book... [and] one may detect a slight bow to the American macabre of E.A. Poe. Ogawa stands on the shoulders of giants, as another saying goes. But this collection may linger in your mind -- it does in mine -- as a delicious, perplexing, absorbing and somehow singular experience." -- Alan Cheuse, NPR Sinister forces collide---and unite a host of desperate characters---in this eerie cycle of interwoven tales from Yoko Ogawa, the critically acclaimed author of The Housekeeper and the Professor. An aspiring writer moves into a new apartment and discovers that her landlady has murdered her husband. Elsewhere, an accomplished surgeon is approached by a cabaret singer, whose beautiful appearance belies the grotesque condition of her heart. And while the surgeon's jealous lover vows to kill him, a violent envy also stirs in the soul of a lonely craftsman. Desire meets with impulse and erupts, attracting the attention of the surgeon's neighbor---who is drawn to a decaying residence that is now home to instruments of human torture. Murderers and mourners, mothers and children, lovers and innocent bystanders---their fates converge in an ominous and darkly beautiful web. Yoko Ogawa's Revenge is a master class in the macabre that will haunt you to the last page. An NPR Best Book of 2013

Before We Were Strangers

Before We Were Strangers
Author: Renée Carlino
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 320
Release: 2015-08-18
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1501105787

From the USA TODAY bestselling author of Sweet Thing and Nowhere But Here comes a love story about a Craigslist “missed connection” post that gives two people a second chance at love fifteen years after they were separated in New York City. To the Green-eyed Lovebird: We met fifteen years ago, almost to the day, when I moved my stuff into the NYU dorm room next to yours at Senior House. You called us fast friends. I like to think it was more. We lived on nothing but the excitement of finding ourselves through music (you were obsessed with Jeff Buckley), photography (I couldn’t stop taking pictures of you), hanging out in Washington Square Park, and all the weird things we did to make money. I learned more about myself that year than any other. Yet, somehow, it all fell apart. We lost touch the summer after graduation when I went to South America to work for National Geographic. When I came back, you were gone. A part of me still wonders if I pushed you too hard after the wedding… I didn’t see you again until a month ago. It was a Wednesday. You were rocking back on your heels, balancing on that thick yellow line that runs along the subway platform, waiting for the F train. I didn’t know it was you until it was too late, and then you were gone. Again. You said my name; I saw it on your lips. I tried to will the train to stop, just so I could say hello. After seeing you, all of the youthful feelings and memories came flooding back to me, and now I’ve spent the better part of a month wondering what your life is like. I might be totally out of my mind, but would you like to get a drink with me and catch up on the last decade and a half? M

Dark Tales

Dark Tales
Author: Shirley Jackson
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 208
Release: 2017-10-10
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 052550379X

For the first time in one volume, a collection of Shirley Jackson’s scariest stories, with a foreword by PEN/Hemingway Award winner Ottessa Moshfegh After the publication of her short story “The Lottery” in the New Yorker in 1948 received an unprecedented amount of attention, Shirley Jackson was quickly established as a master horror storyteller. This collection of classic and newly reprinted stories provides readers with more of her unsettling, dark tales, including the “The Possibility of Evil” and “The Summer People.” In these deliciously dark stories, the daily commute turns into a nightmarish game of hide and seek, the loving wife hides homicidal thoughts and the concerned citizen might just be an infamous serial killer. In the haunting world of Shirley Jackson, nothing is as it seems and nowhere is safe, from the city streets to the crumbling country pile, and from the small-town apartment to the dark, dark woods. There’s something sinister in suburbia. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.