Ghost Horror

How much fear can one man take? Marcus Holt thought his worst memories were behind him. A veteran of the Vietnam War, the tough old soldier is haunted by nightmares of brutal conflict. But he’s about to discover that his battle for survival has only just begun. Professor Abel Worthe is brilliant, wealthy, and utterly immoral. He is an expert in a very particular field: the study of fear and death. Using his vast resources, Worthe has purchased a collection of haunted houses and paranormal sites, hidden across the world.

A Heian-era mansion stands abandoned, its foundations resting on the bones of a bride and its walls packed with the remains of the girls sacrificed to keep her company. It’s the perfect venue for a group of thrill-seeking friends, brought back together to celebrate a wedding. A night of food, drinks, and games quickly spirals into a nightmare as secrets get dragged out and relationships are tested. But the house has secrets too. Lurking in the shadows is the ghost bride with a black smile and a hungry heart.

The Hull family has owned the Gallows Hill Winery for generations. Their wine wins awards. Their business prospers. Their family thrives. People whisper that the curse has awakened once more. The sprawling old house has long been perched on top of a hill overlooking the nearby town, jealously guarding the estate's secrets.

The Fae entity known as Veda has taken possession of Doc Holliday, and neither of them will ever be the same. Her offer of power holds no appeal to Doc, but no matter how badly he wants her out of him, he can't release such a powerful being on the world. It’s a battle of wills for ultimate control. But as the war rages on, one thing is becoming very clear... Doc Holliday must win. But how can any man, even an immortal one, hope to compete with a god?

For more than 30 years, Ellen Datlow has been at the center of horror. Bringing you the most frightening and terrifying stories, Datlow always has her finger on the pulse of what horror fans crave. Now, with the 11th volume of the series, Daltow's back again to bring you the stories that will keep you up at night. With each passing year, science, technology, and the march of time shine light into the craggy corners of the universe, making the fears of an earlier generation seem quaint. This light creates its own shadows. The Best Horror of the Year chronicles these shifting shadows.

These are stories that explore the scarred outposts of desperation and desire, sickness and death, sex and decay. Within this audiobook, you will also find the acclaimed novella Nearly People (nominated for awards by the International Horror Guild and the British Fantasy Society), in which a woman's search for food in a nightmarish city brings her attention from an enigmatic man known as The Dancer, and a host of terrible epiphanies.

Shane Ryan is no stranger to violence. He still carries the scars left by his battles against supernatural evil. But when a new enemy targets the people Shane served with in the Corps, the retired Marine finds himself trapped in a deadly game of cat and mouse. With only his young friend Tom Daniels to watch his back, Shane travels across America. Every move he makes is monitored. Everything he says or does is watched. And if he fails to follow this mysterious villain’s instructions, his fellow Marines will die.

Lucia and her sisters grew up on the edge of Mockbeggar Woods. They knew it well—its danger, but also its beauty. As a lonely teenager, Kate was drawn to these sisters, who were unlike anyone she’d ever met. But when they brought her into the woods, something dark was awakened, and Kate has never been able to escape the terrible truth of what happened there. Now, Kate is returning home for the first time in years—for Sam and Chloe’s wedding. But the woods are stirring again, and Kate must reconnect with Lucia, her first love, to protect Chloe, the village, and herself.

Sixteen-year-old Jake Livingston sees dead people everywhere. But he can't decide what's worse: being a medium forced to watch the dead play out their last moments on a loop or being at the mercy of racist teachers as one of the few Black students at St. Clair Prep. Both are a living nightmare he wishes he could wake up from. But things at St. Clair start looking up with the arrival of another Black student - the handsome Allister - and for the first time, romance is on the horizon for Jake. Unfortunately, life as a medium is getting worse.

As Keira struggles to uncover the tangled histories of some of the graveyard's oldest denizens, danger seeps from the darkest edges of the forest. A vicious serial killer was interred among the trees decades before, his spirit twisted by his violent nature. He's furious. Ravenous. And when Keira unwittingly answers his call, she may just seal her fate as his final intended victim.

FBI agent Jordan Wallace is close to cracking the human trafficking case she’s been working, when she does the one thing she should never do: let her guard down. The botched undercover mission is semisalvaged by the last-minute appearance of criminal psychologist Patrick Law, but Jordan can’t imagine making a worse first impression. Especially when she’s partnered with Patrick moving forward.

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.

Kari James, Urban Native, is a fan of heavy metal, ripped jeans, Stephen King novels, and dive bars. She spends most of her time at her favorite spot in Denver, the White Horse. When her cousin Debby finds an old family bracelet that once belonged to Kari’s mother, it inadvertently calls up both her mother’s ghost and a monstrous entity, and her willful ignorance about her past is no longer sustainable. Haunted by visions of her mother and hunted by this mysterious creature, Kari must search for what happened to her mother all those years ago.

“Come home.” Vera’s mother called and Vera obeyed. In spite of their long estrangement, in spite of the memories — she's come back to the home of a serial killer. Back to face the love she had for her father and the bodies he buried there, beneath the house he'd built for his family.

When paramedic, Michael Perry, loses his father, he finds himself in a downward spiral. His depression threatens to end him and so does his addiction. In an attempt to quit smoking with hypnotherapy, he is left with disturbing side effects. How far must he go to kill this disease?

In the land of moss, magnolias, and bayous, ghost stories suffuse the landscape like mist on a moonlit swamp. Swamp ghosts, hot-tempered villains and tricksters once lived there, and live on today in such blood-chilling stories as the six in this collection.

Hollywood descends on Marlow House in preproduction for the movie adaptation of Walt's best-selling novel, Moon Runners. Hoping for inspiration, they found death instead. There's a murderer loose, and as the body count increases, secrets are revealed - and it starts to get a little crowded with all these new ghosts hanging around.

When Guy finds the deed to a house in his mother's attic, it seems like an incredible stroke of luck. Sure, it hasn't been inhabited in years, and vines strangle the age-stained walls, but Guy's convinced he can clean the building up and sell it. He'd be crazy to turn down free money. Right? Rookward House may be hours away from its nearest neighbor, but he can't escape the feeling that he's being watched. Still, he doesn't believe in ghost stories and decides to camp in the crumbling old mansion while he does repairs. Surely nothing too bad can happen in the space of a week.

When Raina Hamish tries on a dress in a Miami boutique, she has a terrifyingly accurate vision of a murdered corpse in the murky shadows of the Everglades. She wants to help, but who would believe her when she can hardly believe herself?

Melanie is only going through the motions of living since refusing Jack Trenholm’s marriage proposal. When she is roused one night by the sound of a ghostly infant crying, she chooses to ignore it. She simply does not have the energy to deal with one more crisis. That is, until the remains of a newborn buried in an old christening gown are found hidden in the foundation of her house. As the hauntings on Tradd Street slowly become more violent, Melanie decides to find out what caused the baby’s untimely death.