Occult Horror Mystery

Recently divorced Anna Fox decides to cheer herself up by retracing a journey her great grandmother Louisa made in the mid-19th century—a Nile cruise from Luxor to Aswan. Anna carries with her two of Louisa’s possessions: an ancient Egyptian scent bottle and an illustrated diary of the original cruise that has lain unread for over a hundred years. As she follows in Louisa’s footsteps, Anna discovers in the diary a wonderful Victorian love story—and the chilling secret of the little glass bottle.

While on routine patrol in the tinder-dry Topanga Canyon, environmental scientist Rafael Salazar expects to find animal poachers, not a dilapidated antique steamer trunk. Inside the peculiar case, he discovers a journal, written by the renowned Robert Louis Stevenson, which divulges ominous particulars about his creation of The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. It also promises to reveal a terrible secret - the identity of Jack the Ripper.

Aged Mother Jilo is wise in the ways of magic...but once upon a time, she was just a girl. 1950s Georgia: King Cotton has fallen. Savannah is known as the "beautiful woman with a dirty face," its stately elegance faded by neglect, its soul withering from racial injustice and political corruption. Young Jilo - fiercely independent, intelligent, and ambitious, but thwarted by Savannah's maddeningly genteel version of bigotry - finds herself forced to embrace a dark power that has pursued her family for generations, an ancient magic that may prove her salvation.

Ellen should have known that a gathering in America's last castle would entail a few uninvited guests. During a Christmas Eve wedding at the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina, Ellen and her friends are visited by multiple ghosts. The spirits have come to tell their stories, to right the wrongs that history has done to their memories. Each of them died in Asheville with their voices stifled.

When a redundant church is bought by a young pagan couple, the local fundamentalist minister reacts with fury. In an isolated community on the Welsh border, a modern witch hunt begins. Diocesan exorcist Merrily Watkins is expected to keep the lid on the cauldron...but what she finds out will seriously test her beliefs.

Kate Bennett, presenter of paranormal investigation cable TV show, Where the Dead Walk, isn't sure what she believes, other than she seems cursed to lose all those closest to her. After investigating a neglected cliff-top house, empty for a decade because it's "haunted", Kate is convinced a spirit within holds the answers to a childhood she can't remember and an unimaginable crime.

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.

Ellen and her two best friends share a mid-life crisis by hatching a plan to renovate an 1860s Greek revival in the nearby historic district of San Antonio. Although Ellen isn’t one to believe in ghosts, she comes face to face with something inexplicable in the attic.

Would you travel to the past to right a wrong? Solve a cold case? Perhaps, catch a killer? Meet one of the five witches who will. Animal mauling or were attack? Time witch Nuala Walsh is on the case. Ex-communicated from her coven at a young age, Nuala uses her powerful magic to solve cold-cases for the Agency of Paranormal Peculiarities. Only the cases become less cold and fresher as each assignment sends her back in time to work out the clues the mortal investigators can’t dig up on their own.

When detectives James Manning and Covina "Dewey" Duwai are called in to investigate a series of bizarre murders, they make a shocking discovery: the legend of the hidden righteous ones, the 36 who preserve the world from destruction, is no legend at all. They are real, and they are being murdered. As the bodies pile up and the world tilts into chaos, Manning and Dewey must protect the righteous ones from a ruthless killer able to beguile his victims and command them against their will.

Thrust into a new world full of magic and monsters, Layla has finally come to terms with her supernatural powers - and left her old life behind. But her enemies are relentless. Sixteen months after her life changed forever, Layla and her team are besieged during a rescue attempt gone awry and must fight their way through to freedom. It turns out that Avalon has only grown since their last encounter, adding fresh villains to its horde. Meanwhile, revelations abound as Layla confronts twists and betrayals in her own life, with each new detail adding to the shadow that looms over her.

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.

Still recovering from his recent tragedy, retired Marine Shane Ryan receives a call from James Moran, a well-known dealer of haunted items in New England. A robbery gone wrong has left Moran with a trail of dead bodies and a missing box of items from his inventory. And he wants Shane to track down the thief. There’s not much to go on, but Shane has an ace up his sleeve. He can communicate with the spirits of the dead, and their dark whispers guide him to a string of similar crimes.

When Katy Logan moves her troubled teen daughter Jett to the Appalachian community of Solom, she envisions a peaceful rural lifestyle on her new husband's farm. But there's more to Solom than she ever imagined. Gordon Smith's first wife Rebecca died under mysterious circumstances, and Katy believes her spirit is still in the house. Gordon's great-grandfather was a horseback preacher who vanished while on a mission one wintry night, and local lore holds that he returns from time to time seeking vengeance.

Years of brutal combat and a never-ending battle against supernatural evil have taken a heavy toll on Shane Ryan. Now, as he searches for the man responsible for the recent thefts of haunted objects in New England, he finds himself wondering if the world would be better off without him....

They came to the deserted island to compete on a popular reality television show. Each one hoped to be the last to leave. Now they're just hoping to stay alive, because the island isn't deserted after all. Contestants are disappearing, but they aren't being eliminated by the game. They're being taken by the monstrous, half-human creatures that live deep in the jungle. The men will be slaughtered. The women will be kept alive as captives. Night is falling, the creatures are coming, and rescue is so far away....

Retired Marine Corps sergeant Shane Ryan has seen his share of death and violence. And as far as he’s concerned, the best defense is a good offense. So, when he and his friends manage to head off a supernatural attack at a nearby orphanage, he is determined to hunt down whoever is responsible for the carnage. There’s just one problem. The evil behind all this is a hopelessly deranged young boy who has developed the ability to command the restless spirits of the dead.

After arriving in Plainfield, Connecticut to investigate a series of unusual events, Shane Ryan quickly uncovers a trail of mysterious deaths. And even stranger, for the first time in his life, his connection to the dead is silenced. For as long as he can remember, Shane has heard the whispered cries of spirits and ghosts. But a malignant force of evil holds Plainfield in an iron grip. Warren Thorne, the sinister spirit of a powerful man, controls the living and the dead alike. And he is determined to increase his power, no matter the cost....

The unifying factor of this collection is that, without exception, every author included here was in some way or another involved with or interested in the occult. In some cases, they were members of an occult organization, such as the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, the Theosophical Society, or similar such groups. Others simply had a strong personal interest in the subject matter or practiced some form of the esoteric sciences in private.

Evil is raging on the 20th floor of an apartment building on the West Side. In an open window, a hideous blind nun perpetually gazing...watching. A body, burned beyond recognition. Then two more murders...strangely connected. And the discoverer, a beautiful young woman, raped. Her innocent child exposed to horror. Her husband, furious, relentlessly set on revenge.