Dark Horror

At the heart of these stories, as with all the best of Lovecraft’s work, is the belief that the Earth was once inhabited by powerful and evil gods, just waiting for the chance to recolonise their planet. Cthulhu is one such god, lurking deep beneath the sea until called into being by cult followers who – like all humans – know not what they do.

I’ve been dual enrolled in both the Celestial and Infernal Academies for a few weeks. Things are going as you might expect: lots of training, lots of learning, lots of late night sessions in my subspace with my girls. But this brief period of normalcy couldn’t last long.

After the initial series of summer blizzards, the snowfall has decreased, but the temperatures continue to drop, the icy wind still blows, and with each passing day, the darkness lasts longer and longer. It is in the darkness the monsters thrive. Confined to the lake house and having no communication with the outside world, Grady and the others live every day in fear, questioning what the future holds. Will the snow melt? Will the sun ever rise? Can the wraiths be defeated? But as the days turn to weeks, no answers come.

The American empire emerged from the shadows of World War II. As the nation's influence swept the globe with near impunity, a host of evil forces followed—from racism, exploitation, and military invasion to killer clowns, flying saucers, and monsters borne of a fear of the other. By viewing American imperial history through the prism of the horror genre, Dark Carnivals lays bare how the genre shaped us, distracted us, and gave form to a violence as American as apple pie.

What would you do if you were the most powerful dungeon deity in the world and the bindings keeping you trapped within your dungeon were broken? Would you escape? Would you acquire a party of beautiful female minions? Would you use your new minions to conquer other dungeon deities, consume their magic, and grow even more powerful? Would you take over the world? Would you then take over the heavens and destroy the gods? Yes, you would do all of the above.

Charles Thomas Tester hustles to put food on the table, keep the roof over his father's head, from Harlem to Flushing Meadows to Red Hook. He knows what magic a suit can cast, the invisibility a guitar case can provide, and the curse written on his black skin that attracts the eye of wealthy white folks and their trained cops. But when he delivers an occult page to a reclusive sorceress in the heart of Queens, Tom opens a door to a deeper realm of magic.

In this gloriously over-the-top tale, Aoyama, a widower who has lived alone with his son ever since his wife died seven years before, finally decides it is time to remarry. Since Aoyama is a bit rusty when it comes to dating, a filmmaker friend proposes that, in order to attract the perfect wife, they do a casting call for a movie they don't intend to produce. As the resumes pile up, only one of the applicants catches Aoyama's attention - Yamasaki Asami - a striking young former ballerina with a mysterious past. But she is a far cry from the innocent young woman he imagines her to be.

Warning: Prepare to be gripped by terror! Are you ready to dive into the chilling abyss of fear? Welcome to "Dark Horror Anthology", where every story is a spine-tingling journey into the realm of nightmares!

Welcome to the cursed town of Sparrow...where, two centuries ago, three sisters were sentenced to death for witchery. Stones were tied to their ankles, and they were drowned in the deep waters surrounding the town. Now, for a brief time each summer, the sisters return, stealing the bodies of three weak-hearted girls so that they may seek their revenge, luring boys into the harbor and pulling them under.

Who are the Sawkill Girls? Marion: The newbie. Awkward and plain, steady and dependable. Zoey: The pariah. Luckless and lonely, hurting but hiding it. Aching with grief and dreaming of vanished girls. Val: The queen bee. Their stories come together on the island of Sawkill Rock, where gleaming horses graze in rolling pastures and cold waves crash against black cliffs. Where kids whisper the legend of an insidious monster at parties and around campfires. Where girls have been disappearing for decades, stolen away by a ravenous evil no one has dared to fight…until now.

Two families have come to the California mountains expecting a fun weekend camping trip. What they will find instead is terror in the form of a violent psychopath and his mother, a powerful witch.

A cemetery full of the restless dead. A town so wicked it has already burned twice, with the breath of the third fire looming. A rural, isolated bridge with a terrifying monster waiting for the completion of its summoning ritual. A lake that allows the drowned to return, though they have been changed by the claws of death. These are the shadowed, liminal spaces where the curses and monsters lurk, refusing to be forgotten.

On the wind-battered isle of Altnaharra, off the wildest coast of Scotland, a clan prepares to bring about the end of the world and its imminent rebirth. The Adder is coming and one of their number will inherit its powers. They all want the honor, but young Eve is willing to do anything for the distinction. A reckoning beyond Eve’s imagination begins when Chief Inspector Black arrives to investigate a brutal murder and their sacred ceremony goes terribly wrong. And soon all the secrets of Altnaharra will be uncovered.

It’s Halloween night, and out-of-work writer Goldie Monroe’s trip to the drugstore scares up more than the fake blood she’s looking for. It leads to the man of her naughtiest dreams. And in spite of her costume, sparks fly from the moment they meet. Noah Adler, aspiring sneaker designer, is impossibly gorgeous—like a tatted-up version of Goldie’s favorite blue-eyed vampire. He’s there for candy, but it’s Goldie he can’t resist. When she invites him to her sister’s F/X company bash, he’s all in without a second thought.

Alone in a strange world and torn by grief, a vampire accepts the hospitality of the local lord. But can the vampire trust him once he discovers the land’s dark connection to his own quest for revenge?

For more than ten years, Diablo has been one of PC gaming’s iconic and blockbuster franchises, with millions of players experiencing to this day all the adventure and terror in the world of Sanctuary. Now, to tie-in with the long-awaited release of Blizzard Entertainment’s all-new game, Diablo III, the original novel Deckard Cain will bridge the untold story of one of Diablo’s most popular characters.

Since they were lured to the festival at Carousel, Riley (the Film Buff), Antoine (the Athlete), Camden (the Scholar), Anna (the Final Girl), and Kimberly (the Eye Candy) have lived through entire horror movie plots. So far, Riley's survival strategy is working. He's high on his Moxie, Hustle, and Savvy stats. But his Mettle and Grit have dropped dangerously low, leaving him vulnerable. If he gets caught by a killer, he's done for.

There are angels, and they are not beneficent or loving. But they do watch over us. They watch our lives unfold, analyzing us for repeating patterns and redundancies. When they find them, the angels simplify those patterns and remove the redundancies, and the problem that is "you" gets solved.

In the aftermath of a family tragedy, an aspiring author is torn between love for her childhood friend and the temptation of a mysterious outsider. Trying to escape the ghosts of her past, she is swept away to a house that breathes, bleeds...and remembers.

Kagen Vale—disgraced former palace guard, damned by his own gods, on the run from bounty hunters and assassins—discovers that no matter where you try to hide, evil can find you. In this standalone short story, Kagen the Damned squares off against a clan of ferocious supernatural predators in service to the Witch-king.