Dark Horror

Twelve tales of terror stemming from a single word. Trapped. What would you do if you were trapped, alone, and afraid, with no one to help, no way out? How far would you go to survive? What could you endure? The authors in this anthology pulled no punches, and the stories in this audio will leave a mark on you long after the tales are told. You may even find yourself trapped, held hostage, until every horrific word has been consumed.

Ed Vesser feels trapped by his life - literally. He’s being held prisoner by a would-be world conqueror. All he wants is to escape back to his fiancé, assuming she doesn’t dump his ass when she finds out he’s a vampire. Serena Taylor’s a witch with a knack for technomancy - using her magic to help deliver unreal profit margins. Too bad she’ll need to put in some overtime thanks to long-lost dryads and undead goons breathing down her neck.

Jaunty the Clown just wants to entertain families with lighthearted slapstick antics, but people think of clowns as terrifying, nightmarish creatures who hide in closets or under beds. When Jaunty, along with his fellow performers, are fired from the circus, they're told that the world just doesn't like clowns anymore. Still, clowns have to eat. And since these clowns don't eat children, to make ends meet they're eventually forced to take a job in a popular haunted attraction, the Mountain of Terror. But millions of oversized spiders are about to invade....

Nobody likes getting bullied, and Donny has had enough. Deciding to take matters into his own hands, he solicits the help of the old Asian man at the end of his street to teach him Karate. During a grueling two days of training, Donny earns belt after belt, until he finally becomes a Karate Master.

Harmony Black is much more than your average FBI special agent. In addition to being a practicing witch, she's also an operative for Vigilant Lock, an off-the-books program created to battle occult threats - by any means necessary. Despite her dedication to fighting the monsters threatening society, Harmony has become deeply conflicted about her job. Her last investigation resulted in a pile of dead bodies, and she suspects the wrong people are being punished for it.

In The Dinosaur Tourist, Caitlín R. Kiernan’s 15th collection of short fiction, 19 tales of the unexpected and the uncanny explore that treacherous gulf between what we suppose the world to be and what might actually be waiting out beyond the edges of our day-to-day experience. A mirror may be a window into another time. A cat may be our salvation. Your lover may be a fabulous being. And a hitchhiker may turn out to be anyone at all.

When Michael Crawford discovers his bride brutally murdered in their wedding bed, he is forced to flee not only to prove his innocence but to avoid the deadly embrace of a vampire who has claimed him as her true bridegroom. Joining forces with Byron, Keats, and Shelley in a desperate journey that crisscrosses Europe, Crawford desperately seeks his freedom from this vengeful lover who haunts his dreams and will not rest until she destroys all that he cherishes.

A woman, returning to her roots. A town, built on sacred land. A secret, cloaked in tradition and lore. Welcome to White Pines. Don't get too comfortable. The new cosmic-folk-Celtic-cult-fantasy-horror novel from Gemma Amor, the Bram Stoker Award-nominated author of Dear Laura and Cruel Works of Nature, is available now.

The holiday season isn’t all fun and games. From dark and disturbing to morbid humor or guts and gore, these stories have it all.

In the fourth installment of The Black Knight Chronicles, Jimmy Black is having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day and a darned fine pity party, serving the finest alcohol, when a call from his not-quite-girlfriend-cop forces him to sober up and stare at jawbones. "Cold case" takes on a whole new meaning when vampire detectives risk life and limbs (literally) to connect a series of decades-old kidnappings in Charlotte with current missing persons cases. All clues lead through the veil of Faerieland to the legendary Goblin's Market, a magical bazaar where anything is available--for a price. The boys can barely stay out of trouble in Charlotte. As fresh meat at The Market, they'll be lucky to survive the day.

Birmingham, Alabama, is infested with malevolence. Prejudice and hatred have consumed the minds and hearts of its populace. A murderer, unimaginatively named "Harry the Hacker" by the press, has been carving up citizens with a hatchet. And from the church known as Chapelwood, an unholy gospel is being spread by a sect that worships dark gods from beyond the heavens.

After years of struggle, Layla Cassidy has finally mastered the dark powers that threatened to control her and turned them to good. She’s ready to fight, but the next battle will be her greatest test yet. The forces of Avalon are growing ever stronger, reinforcing their dominance with almighty displays of brutality. When Abaddon comes close to crushing Layla and her friends, it’s clear that the thunder of war is about to give way to lightning—and that they have no chance of surviving it alone. The final battle against Abaddon is drawing closer.

Fiona managed to save her town from demons. Now there’s a bounty on her head. When Fiona consumed the demon king’s aether, she half expected that it would kill her. Now she’s stuck with Lord Balor’s dark energy ravaging her soul. Gabriel has left Mountain Shadow, and the town has been invaded by ghost hunters and the crew of a hit reality-TV show. To make matters worse, Fiona’s fight at Busk Fest attracted the attention of the most powerful hunters in the Brotherhood. They’ve put a bounty on Fiona’s head, making her a target for freelance hunters.

Jane is haunted. Since she was a child, she has carried a ghost girl that feeds on the secrets and fears of everyone around her, whispering to Jane what they are thinking and feeling, even when she doesn't want to know. Henry, Jane's brother, is ridden by a genius ghost that forces him to build strange and dangerous machines. Their mother is possessed by a lonely spirit that burns anyone she touches. In Swine Hill, a place of defeat and depletion, there are more dead than living.

The room is watching. But Mira and Layla don't know this yet. When the two best friends are stranded on their spring break college tour road trip, they find themselves at the Wildwood Motel, located in the middle of nowhere, Indiana. Mira can't shake the feeling that there is something wrong and rotten about their room. Inside, she's haunted by nightmares of her dead brother. When she wakes up, he's still there.

Yancy Lazarus is having a bad day: there's a bullet lodged in his butt cheek, his face looks like the site of a demolition derby, and he's been saran-wrapped to a banquet table. He never should have answered the phone. Stupid bleeding heart - helping others in his circles is a good way to die - just ask the gang members ripped to pieces by some kind of demonic nightmare in LA.

While desperately searching for Lance, Leah finds her newfound psychic abilities pulling her toward the home of an eccentric painter who thinks Leah is the only person who can help find her missing son. It's a detour Leah feels she doesn't have time for, but also one that seems to carry a great importance she can't ignore even if she doesn't understand it. Lance, while being held captive at a long since abandoned amusement park by the Reverend and the Surfer and the mysterious thing called Patrick Cain, also meets someone new.

Between her regular job in Afterlife Arrivals, training for her second job with IA, her community service on The Bus of Death, GA meetings, taking care of her housemates, and every other ghostly commitment in between, Bridget Sway is already stretched pretty thin. Then, her best friend, Sabrina, drops a bombshell. Sabrina thinks she was murdered. And, in the afterlife, murdered dead people usually turn into homicidal maniac dead people. Despite that, Sabrina thinks if they can work out who killed her, then she might be able to get the closure she needs.

Take a seat in the darkest corner of the library and devour these short haunting tales. Welcome to the Dark Corner Universe. Here, there are tales of ghosts, serial killers, demons, wraiths, pirates and more. There is also a twist or two for the keenest listener amongst you.

In the enchanted kingdom of Brooklyn, the fashionable people put on cute shoes, go to parties in warehouses, drink on rooftops at sunset, and tell themselves they've arrived. A whole lot of Brooklyn is like that now - but not Vassa's working-class neighborhood. In Vassa's neighborhood, where she lives with her stepmother and bickering stepsisters, one might stumble onto magic, but stumbling out again could become an issue.