Psychological Horror

After a fire rips through her loft, destroying the seven billboard-size paintings meant for her first major exhibition, a young painter is left with an impossible task: recreate the lost artworks in just three months without getting caught - or ruin her fledgling career. Homeless and desperate, she begs her way into Pine City, an exclusive retreat in upstate New York notorious for three things: outrageous revelries, glamorous artists, and the sparkling black lake where brilliant prodigy Carey Logan drowned herself.

The American South is rife with stories of a haunted past - especially its houses. In this eclectic and impressive collection, 13 novelists were asked to build their tales around the photo of a dilapidated mansion. They were given two requirements - the house must appear in the story, and it should be a Southern Gothic tale. And they delivered. From childish demons to a mad novelist, from the Mississippi Delta to the Appalachians, this collection from emerging voices and New York Times best-selling authors explores what happens when secrets that lie beneath the dust are disturbed....

Blackwood mansion looms, surrounded by nightmare pines, atop the hill over the small town of New Haven. Ben Bookman, bestselling novelist and heir to the Blackwood estate, spent a weekend at the ancestral home to finish writing his latest horror novel, The Scarecrow. Now, on the eve of the book’s release, the terrible story within begins to unfold in real life.

Joanna Flynn was lucky to be alive. But when the doctors told her she would suffer no lasting effects from the near-fatal accident, they were wrong. For that night the nightmares about Caroline began. As the dreams become more torturous, Joanna sets out to investigate this mysterious woman - a journey that takes her 3,000 miles from home to a picturesque town where everybody seems to have a conflicting opinion of the woman who haunts her dreams.

In a small town along the Mississippi River, separate but nearly identical attacks have left two married couples brutally murdered in their homes. A young boy—the lone survivor of the killings—now lies comatose in the hospital. And the police’s only lead is the boy’s terrified description of the assailant: a “monster."

Hal Kapernaum brings his son to the company town of Seco, Arizona, where he hopes a new plant manager job will provide a fresh start, but the small Arizona town shares Hal’s same fear: SILENCE. The town is convinced the SILENCE is killing people. Nine have died in the last few weeks. Speakers of all models, shapes and sizes dot the roofs of the downtown buildings like nervous gargoyles. Because this fear is affecting production at the plant, Hal’s boss wants him to investigate and stop it, but soon Hal must face his biggest fear.

It was supposed to be a pleasant evening out; a break from the stress of the hard-working week they had both endured. A bite to eat in one of their favorite restaurants and then, if there was time, a movie at the cinema opposite. It had been - her husband - Sam's choice; an impromptu date. Yet his day had been one cock-up after another. Meetings had gone on longer than they should have, his phone had run out of battery, and every single traffic light seemed to be working against him.

On a blistering summer day in 1968, nine-year-old Tommy vanishes without a trace from Coram House, an orphanage on the shores of Lake Champlain. Some say a nun drowned him, others say he ran away. Or maybe he never existed. Fifty years later, his disappearance is still unsolved. Struggling true crime writer Alex Kelley needs a fresh start. When she’s asked to ghostwrite a book about the orphanage—and the abuses that occurred there—she packs up her belongings and moves to wintry Burlington, Vermont.

‘The Bath-Chair’ tells the story of the Faraday siblings. Edmund is a shrewd businessman, priding himself on his impeccable health. His spinster sister, Alice, lives with him performing all domestic duties and despises him. When Edmund starts seeing a lame figure who looks startlingly like himself and his own health starts mysteriously declining, Alice revels in plotting his downfall.

This spooky anthology by Eli Taff, Jr. is a collection of 10 flash-fiction stories packed with cosmic horror and unbelievable terror that will keep you on the edge of your seat and have you sleeping with the lights on. The evil clown that steps out of a childhood memory and kills with a touch; the terrified mother who finds a monster in her daughter's bedroom; the unfaithful businessman who gets off the subway at the wrong stop; and a gangster who gets more than he bargained for when he robs the wrong old lady on the wrong night.

No one knows your darkness like your own Shadow. Nothing has been normal for Teddy, not since discovering the harsh identity of the monster he had been living with his whole life - his own father. Teddy and his mother leave that behind to start over in a small Indiana township. But as Teddy begins to learn of humanity's monsters, he unveils an otherworldly evil he calls "The Shadow". The Shadow tests Teddy's vulnerability and growing sense of isolation, poisoning his mind and conjuring a vile killer-in-the-making.

From the incomparable master of horror and suspense comes an electrifying collection of contemporary literary horror, with stories from 25 writers representing today’s most talented voices in the genre. Horror writing is usually associated with formulaic gore, but New Wave horror writers have more in common with the wildly inventive, evocative spookiness of Edgar Allan Poe than with the sometimes-predictable hallmarks of their peers. Showcasing this cutting-edge talent, Poe’s Children now brings the best of the genre’s stories to a wider audience.

Pru Dunning has everything she ever wanted: a successful boyfriend, a thriving nursing career, and a truly comfortable life. But then the strange voicemails start. Scarletta, the woman calls herself. She seems to know Pru, although Pru certainly doesn't know that name, nor does she recognize the glamorous voice leaving her poisonous messages. Pru begins to carefully investigate. But when she suddenly becomes a person of interest in a murder case, it feels like Scarletta’s toxic voice, lashing out from the shadows, will silence all beauty in Pru’s perfect life, once and for all.

In a Mexican temple, archaeologists uncover the remains of a half-human hybrid. They believe it is related to the creature in Antarctica, a dark thing of legend that is still alive-and still evolving. They believe it needs a new host to feed, to mutate, to multiply. They're right. And they're next. And the human race might just be headed for extinction.

NYPD criminalist Lincoln Rhyme joins his beautiful protégé, Amelia Sachs, in the hunt for the Coffin Dancer - an ingenious killer who changes appearance even faster than he adds to his trail of victims. They have only one clue: the madman has a tattoo of the Grim Reaper waltzing with a woman. Rhyme must rely on his wits and intuition to track the elusive murderer through New York City - knowing they have only 48 hours before the Coffin Dancer strikes again.

Four students travel to Ravencliffe, an eerie abandoned hotel perched on steep cliffs on the Welsh coast. After a series of unexplained accidents, only three of them leave. The fourth, Leo, disappears, and is never seen again. A decade on, the friends have lost contact. Oscar is fame-hungry, making public appearances and selling his story. Richard sank into alcoholism and is only just recovering. Bex just wants to forget – until one last opportunity to go back offers the chance to find out what really happened to Leo.

Silent Witness begins in 1967, in a small Midwestern town. Seventeen-year-old Tony Lord, Lake City's star athlete, seems destined for great things. His driving ambition is precisely what attracts Alison Taylor, the daughter of the town's leading family, and it is what sets Tony apart from his two closest friends: Sam Robb and Sam's girl, Sue Cash. Suddenly, everything changes. Alison Taylor is brutally murdered, and Tony is the number one suspect. The town turns against him. His friendship with Sam is destroyed. And Tony leaves Lake City, vowing never to return.

One summer night, a boy and his beautiful cousin plunge naked into the moonlit waters of a rural quarry. Twenty years later, the boy, now grown, flees the wreckage of his life and returns to Arden, Wisconsin, in search of everything he has lost. But for Miles Teagarden, the landscape he knew so well has turned eerie and threatening. And the love he shared has become very, very deadly....

In the morning, Bram finds the bones of a murdered child. At noon, the murdered child begs for his help. And by nightfall, they have killed a man together and set off into the afterlife, where nothing is what it was, and death is only the beginning of punishment. An eerie story about the nature of death and the self, Midnight Picnic inhabits an American landscape made strange and unfamiliar.

It’s December in a small seaside town, and Ruby Harper spends her nights looking into her neighbor's apartment. Unable to sleep due to insomnia and the heartache of a family she has run away from, she fantasizes that the mystery man could be the answer to her loneliness. But one night Ruby sees something unexpected: The man is not alone; a woman and a child are sharing the apartment - and they never go outside. Why are they kept hidden? Then the man is found half-drowned in the bathtub, a pile of women’s clothes is left on the beach, and a little girl is discovered, abandoned.