Ghost Thriller

While gathering a collection of vintage book cover paintings for a special event in her quaint Rhode Island bookshop, Penelope discovers a spooky portrait of a beautiful woman, one who supposedly went mad, according to town gossip. Seymour, the local mailman, falls in love with the haunting image and buys the picture, refusing to part with it, even as fatal accidents befall those around it. Is the canvas cursed? Or is something more sinister at work?

The first phone call shocks a family. The second tracks two missing couples. A third from beyond the grave? How are these events connected? And what is searching for its prey out on the ice. The Prey is a horror novel guaranteed to surprise and chill, for fans of Catriona Ward, CJ Tudor and Stephen King.

Vincent Banecroft, the irascible editor of The Stranger Times, has never believed his wife died despite emphatic evidence to the contrary. Now, against all odds, it seems he may actually be proved right; but what lengths will he go to in an attempt to rescue her?

Who killed Helena Henry? The shorter list may be who didn’t want her dead. Psychic Raissa Bordeaux thought she’d left her former life behind, hidden away in her eclectic shop in the French Quarter. But when a child is kidnapped and Helena Henry appears, Raissa risks her true identity by offering the police help with the case. New Orleans Detective Zach Blanchard doesn’t believe in psychic hooey and is certain Raissa didn’t get her facts about the case from a crystal ball.

As the age of the photograph dawns in Victorian Bath, silhouette artist Agnes is struggling to keep her business afloat. Still recovering from a serious illness herself, making enough money to support her elderly mother and her orphaned nephew Cedric has never been easy, but then one of her clients is murdered shortly after sitting for Agnes, and then another, and another. Why is the killer seemingly targeting her business?

There is a small town in Oregon called Middle Falls. When people die there, one of three things happens to them: They pass on to what is next. They are recycled to an earlier point in their life. They become spirits who are tethered to the spot where they died. This is the story of a tethered spirit.

When Branson, Missouri, is hit with a death wave - four unsolved murders - it doesn't take an expert to realize that all is not well. But luckily for the locals, Anita Blake is an expert in the kinds of preternatural goings-on that have everyone spooked. And she's got an "in" with the creature that can make sense of the slayings - the sexy master vampire known as Jean-Claude.

Vitus Adamson has a second chance at life now that he's no longer a zombie. But after killing his brother, Jamie, Vitus lands in prison on murder charges. Jamie's death exposes secret government projects so deep in the black they cannot be seen - without Vitus, that is. Sprung from jail, the government hires Vitus to clean up Jamie's messes, but tracking down his brother's homemade monsters gone rogue is easier said than done. The first of them is a convicted killer assumed to be safely behind bars.

Every object has a ghost. There is a small yellow backpack - half unzipped, mouth yawning to the pavement, contents strewn around it (a banana, an exercise book, a pair of scissors) - abandoned on a suburban footpath. Ten feet away, the rubber stamp of tyres, resisting clamped brakes, mount the curb and cut across the path. The tracks come to an end at a crippled stop sign. The street, a tree-lined suburban road dappled in late-afternoon sunlight, is calm. But anyone walking past can feel the ghosts: the prickle on the back of their necks that tells them something happened here.

Linx Maxwell is on the verge of greatness. She's finally graduated from street fairs and hopping chain link to making art that pays the bills. Her family life is...not dull. And it looks like her van might just be able to exist on hope and duct tape. If only she could get rid of the ghost who's plagued her since the eighth grade.

In German-occupied East Africa during World War I, British forces have arrived. In defiance of his orders, German military commander Paul von Lettow enlists soldiers, civilians, and African rebels to fight against the British, forming the first modern guerrilla uprising of the time. Amid his political battles, Lettow is embroiled in a romantic relationship with an American woman who loves him, but who objects to his war.

Jadyn St. James is excited to start her job as game warden in Mudbug, Louisiana, and hopes it is the beginning of a new and improved life. She expected to run across any number of odd occurrences in the small bayou town, but she never thought her life would be in danger within a matter of days. And that’s not even the worst thing. Helena Henry was hell on wheels - both alive and dead - when she resided in Mudbug, and a year in heaven hasn’t improved her one bit. Now, she’s back and has brought trouble with her.

All book editor Megan Law wants is to bury the memory of her brutal kidnapping and move on with her life. So when her publisher asks her to spin her hellish experience into the next bestseller, Megan agrees only because it might help keep other women safe. Then a mysterious, gruesome package arrives in the mail—a reminder that the nightmare isn’t over just yet.

Rebekah Daniels is just your ordinary spunky 9 year old girl living in the small town of Curtis Bay...EXCEPT she is determined NOT to be ordinary at all! Her small town is filled with mysteries and Rebekah is sure that she, along with her best friend Mouse, will be able to solve every last one of them. Rebekah does not believe in ghosts, but one night after watching a scary movie with Mouse, she begins to see and hear things that seem to only point in one scary direction.

Simon Inescort is no longer bodily present in his marriage. It's been several months since he keeled over the rail of a Nova Scotia-bound ferry, a massive heart attack to blame. Simon's widow, Lorca Pell, has sold their farmhouse to newlyweds Zachary and Muriel. He spends time replaying his marriage in his own mind, while also engaging in occasionally intimate observation of the new homeowners. But soon the crisis of a missing child, a local 11-year-old, threatens the tenuous domestic equilibrium, as the weight of the case falls to Zachary, a rookie private detective.

Now living in Los Angeles with former Navy SEAL Nick Reno, artist Perry Foster comes to the rescue of elderly and eccentric Horace Daly, the legendary film star of such horror classics as Why Won’t You Die, My Darling? Horace owns the famous but now run-down Hollywood hotel Angels Rest, rumored to be haunted. But as far as Perry can tell, the scariest thing about Angels Rest is the cast of crazy tenants - one of whom seems determined to bring down the final curtain on Horace and anyone else who gets in the way.

When social worker Jax receives nine missed calls from her older sister, Lexie, she assumes that it’s just another one of her sister’s episodes. Manic and increasingly out of touch with reality, Lexie’s mental state has pushed Jax away for over a year. But the next day, Lexie is dead: drowned in the pool at their grandmother’s estate. When Jax returns to the house, she learns that Lexie was researching their family’s and the house’s history. And as Jax dives deeper into that research, she discovers that the land holds a far darker history than she could have ever imagined.

After several chaotic months, Bax has finally come to terms with his clairvoyant abilities. But fate takes a turn no psychic could have predicted when the teenage daughter of a prominent politician disappears under mysterious circumstances.

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.

Holly Miller doesn't believe in spirits, but the Sugar Maple Inn is filled with guests who do. The TV series in development, Apparition Apprehenders, has descended on Wagtail's annual Halloween festivities to investigate supernatural local legends, and Holly has her hands full showing the ghost hunters a scary-fun time. But the frights turn real when Holly's Jack Russell, Trixie, and kitten, Twinkletoes, find a young woman drowned in the Wagtail Springs Hotel's bathhouse.