Ghost Fiction

Assembled and edited by Julian Hawthorne and first published in 1907, the Old Time English volume of The Lock and Key Library features ten classic mysteries and ghost stories by Charles Dickens, Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Thomas de Quincey, Charles Robert Maturin, Laurence Sterne, and William Makepeace Thackeray. This volume of The Lock and Key Library is sure to haunt and charm fans of ghost and detective mysteries alike.

Single mother Kate Reese is on the run. Determined to improve life for her and her son, Christopher, she flees an abusive relationship in the middle of the night with her child. Together, they find themselves drawn to the tight-knit community of Mill Grove, Pennsylvania. It's as far off the beaten track as they can get. Just one highway in, one highway out. At first, it seems like the perfect place to finally settle down. Then Christopher vanishes. For six awful days, no one can find him. Until Christopher emerges from the woods at the edge of town, unharmed but not unchanged.

On a small island in a remote corner of northwest Scotland lies Maundrell castle, owned by its wealthy namesake family for centuries—until now. Edwina Nunn is shocked to learn a relative she never heard of has bequeathed the castle and its land to her. What awaits Edie and her teenage daughter, Neve, is even more startling, for the castle is home to a multitude of ghosts. Yet there's a strange beauty in the austere architecture and the eerie, bloody waters of Loch na Scáthanna, the Lake of Shadows.

In 1906, a groundbreaking Rolls-Royce prototype known as the Gray Ghost vanishes from the streets of Manchester, England, and it is only the lucky intervention of an American detective named Isaac Bell that prevents it from being lost forever. Not even he can save the good name of Marcus Peyton, however, the man wrongly blamed for the theft, and more than 100 years later, it is his grandson who turns to Sam and Remi Fargo to help prove his grandfather's innocence. But there is even more at stake than any of them know.

Paul Auster's signature work, The New York Trilogy, consists of three interlocking novels: City of Glass, Ghosts, and The Locked Room - haunting and mysterious tales that move at the breathless pace of a thriller.

Karen thinks there's a ghost in her house! But she's never really seen the ghost of Old Ben Brewer—until now. Karen and her stepsister Kristy have found out that Ben Brewer and his spooky friends are going to have a birthday party in her attic on Halloween night! It used to be fun having a ghost around. But now Karen's not so sure!

After the loss of her mother, Chloe Kennedy starts seeing the ghosts that haunted her as a young girl again. Spending time at her grandmother's country estate in the south of England is her chance to get away from her grief and the spirits that haunt her. Until she meets a mysterious stranger.... Alexander Reade is 157 years dead, with secrets darker than the lake surrounding Grange Hall and a lifelike presence that draws Chloe more strongly than any ghost before. But the bond between them awakens the vengeful spirit of Alexander's past love, Isobel.

As the daughter of spiritualists, Mara's childhood was filled with séances and scam mediums. Now she's ready to start over with her fiancé, Neil, far away from the superstitions she's learned to loathe, but her past isn't willing to let her go so easily. And neither is Blackwood House. When Mara and Neil purchased the derelict property, they were warned that ever since the murder of its original owner, things had changed. Strange shadows stalk the halls. Doors creak open by themselves. Voices whisper in the night. And watchful eyes follow her every move.

Ivy believes that every life must have balance, and during the past year, she's found harmony living with the Weston pack. When an evil spirit from her past threatens her wolf, it sets off a chain reaction of events that alters the course of her destiny.

Ever since Cass almost drowned (okay, she did drown, but she doesn't like to think about it), she can pull back the Veil that separates the living from the dead...and enter the world of spirits. Her best friend is even a ghost. So things are already pretty strange. But they're about to get much stranger. When Cass's parents start hosting a TV show about the world's most haunted places, the family heads off to Edinburgh, Scotland. Here, graveyards, castles, and secret passageways teem with restless phantoms. And then Cass meets a girl who shares her "gift"....

Charley sees dead people. That's right, she sees dead people. And it's her job to convince them to "go into the light." But when these very dead people have died under less than ideal circumstances (i.e., murder), sometimes they want Charley to bring the bad guys to justice. Complicating matters are the intensely hot dreams she's been having about an Entity who has been following her all her life...and it turns out he might not be dead after all. In fact, he might be something else entirely.

JC, Happy, and Melody are investigating a haunting at the long-abandoned Haybarn Theater, which is being renovated. But work has been thrown off-schedule by some peculiar and unnatural activities and a homeless man who appears to have been scared to death. After the potentially world-altering recent events of their previous assignment at Chimera House, the team thinks that a haunted theater (aren't they all?) will be a walk in the park.

Odessa Hardwicke's life is derailed when she's forced to turn her gun on her partner, Walt Leppo, a decorated FBI agent who turns suddenly, inexplicably violent while apprehending a rampaging murderer. The shooting, justified by self-defense, shakes the young FBI agent to her core. Devastated, Odessa is placed on desk leave pending a full investigation. But what most troubles Odessa isn't the tragedy itself - it's the shadowy presence she thought she saw fleeing the deceased agent's body after his death.

I'd love to tell you how I got stuck in a house in the middle of Nowhereville, Illinois. Or how many years I've spent with no memory of the person I used to be. But I can't. Those details are locked down tight inside the chaos of my mind, and I don't have the key. The only thing I do know - I'm dead. Major bummer, right?

Spurred by the injustices that nearly destroyed their family, Jess and Hannah Ballard are preparing to win back a seat on the powerful Durupinen Council. The odds are stacked against them, but that's never stopped them before. But as Hannah faces the harsh realities of political intrigue, Jess must face a frightening new reality of her own.

Vick "The Reaper" Harwood is an esteemed sniper with a record kill count - 33 kills in 90 days - when he is knocked out under mortar attack in Afghanistan. He wakes up back in the United States with little memory of what happened, his spotter and gun both unrecovered from the battlefield. Harwood has resigned himself to slowly picking up the pieces of his life. But when a series of assassinations start occurring in the area, Harwood can't explain why he just happens to be nearby for each killing - or how a sniper rifle that matches the description of the one he lost seems to be involved.

Nine years ago, I killed my brother, and I’ve been running from my past ever since. I find a home in Darkwood, finally safe from those who hunt me. But no matter what I do, the darkness keeps pulling me in. I allow my shadow magic to edge closer to the surface to feel something, anything. But no matter how much I want to embrace the power, I can’t. My magic thirsts for violence but I won’t let it kill again. It remains dormant... until he shows up.

In Ghostly Japan collects 12 ghostly stories from Lafcadio Hearn, deathless images of ghosts and goblins, touches of folklore and superstition, salted with traditions of the nation. While some of these stories contain nightmare imagery worthy of a midnight creature feature, others are not ghostly or ghastly at all. "Bits of Poetry" offers an engaging study on verse, and "Japanese Buddhist Proverbs" explains the meaning of several aphorisms based on Japanese cultural references.

When a bizarre string of locked-room murders terrorize New York, the police have no leads, no suspects, and only one place to turn. Now private detective Alex Lockerby will need every magical trick in his book to catch a killer who can walk through walls and leaves no trace. Unfortunately Alex's magic hasn't been working very well. He can't even manage to track down several truckloads of stolen goods, including one belonging to New York's preeminent sorcerer, Andrew Barton.

In 1919, Kitty Weekes, pretty, resourceful, and on the run, falsifies her background to obtain a nursing position at Portis House, a remote hospital for soldiers left shell-shocked by the horrors of the Great War. Hiding the shame of their mental instability in what was once a magnificent private estate, the patients suffer from nervous attacks and tormenting dreams. But something more is going on at Portis House—its plaster is crumbling, its plumbing makes eerie noises, and strange breaths of cold waft through the empty rooms.