Scary Stories For Adults

Reed Monroe chose Salem University for one reason: the opportunity to study with Victoria McCoy, writer-in-residence and best-selling author of horror fiction. When she learns that a lingering illness is preventing McCoy from teaching any classes, Reed starts a fan club for other McCoy obsessives. Although it only attracts a few members, the club is her passion until she hears about the opportunity of a lifetime: Victoria McCoy is hiring a new assistant. It’s a job that any horror fan would kill for.

For 15-year-old Rachel Bryant, summer vacation promises to be fun. Her 17-year-old cousin Julia will be coming to Albuquerque, New Mexico to live with the Bryants, following her parents’ deaths. With two brothers, Rachel is looking forward to finally having a sister. From the moment Julia arrives, everyone is enchanted with the orphaned teenager. But Rachel finds her strangely disturbing. Soon an evil poison seems to seep into every corner of her life. Can she discover what Julia is trying to do before it’s too late?

The second volume in the Guys Read Library of Great Reading is chock-full of mystery, intrigue, and nefarious activity. Featuring some of the best writers around, and compiled by certified guy Jon Scieszka, Guys Read: Thriller is a pulse-pounding collection of brand-new short stories, each one guaranteed to keep you riveted until the final page.

When Daisy Fitzjohn's mother leaves their crumbling Gothic home early one morning and doesn't return, Daisy, with no one to help her but her imaginary friends, must fight to save her home and her life from a dangerous and mysterious stranger.

It all started as stories - playground tales handed down for generations, stories of plague graves, vanished children and hidden steps leading to a festering underworld. A world so real you could almost smell it.... But when another child goes missing, Fraser wonders if there's some truth in the tales.

Max’s village is absolutely normal in every single way and on every single day—except Wednesday. Most of the townsfolk shutter their windows and lock their doors to hide away from the many peculiar things that happen—things like cats getting stuck in the vacuum cleaner and birthday cakes meeting fiery and horrific ends. But Max is too curious for that, and so, breaking every rule in the village, he searches out the cause of all the Wednesday weirdness.

Working at the mall is supposed to be fun. Trish’s job at Muffin-Mania is hardly intellectually challenging and her boss is a piece of work, but it’s worth it to have a job in the same building as her two best friends, the Hanson twins. And the hot guys who hang out there are an added bonus. But something isn’t right about this mall. It’s the oldest mall in the state, remodeled over a dozen times without rhyme or reason, and there are many strange nooks and secret passages behind the bright gleaming storefronts. Someone has been stealing housewares, furniture, and food, and now a mysterious man with ash-gray hair and a whisper-soft voice has started harassing Trish on the phone.

Teenager Murray Keifer just doesn't fit in at school. And it doesn't help that his mother is too busy entertaining male friends to be involved in his life. His only friends are "Dearly" and "Beloved": dead people buried in the local cemetery. That's right, Murray talks to the dead. But Murray's peaceful and unusual world is torn asunder when he hears the voice of missing teen Nikki Parker, buried in someone else's grave.

Josh is by far the best zombie Torcher around - at least, he is in his virtual-reality zombie-hunting game. Josh has quickly risen through the player ranks, relying on the skill, cunning, and agility of a real Torcher. Charlie is the top-ranked player in the game. Since all the players are shrouded in anonymity, Josh never expects Charlie to be a girl - and he never expects the offer she makes him: to join the underground gaming league that takes the virtual-reality game off the screen and into the streets.

The Capulets and the Montagues have some deep and essential differences. Blood differences. Of course, the Capulets can escape their vampire fate, and the Montagues can try not to kill their undead enemies. But at the end of the day, their blood feud is unstoppable. So it's really quite a problem when Juliet, a vampire-to-be, and Romeo, the human who should be hunting her, fall desperately in love. What they don't realize is how deadly their love will turn out to be - or what it will mean for their afterlives....

Thruppence and Tim don't know what to expect when they ring the bell at the house with dusty windows. The Ministry of Ghosts has been given three months to prove the existence of ghosts! As it seems that children are particularly magnetic to ghosts, Thruppence and Tim are added to their ghost-catching team. And although neither of them are scared by talk of ghosts or monsters, they could never have imagined what happens next....

When 13-year-old Eric Parrish comes across glowing mushrooms in the woods behind his house, he's sure there's a scientific explanation. But when they start encroaching on the town - covering the football field and popping up from beneath the floorboards - Eric knows something's seriously wrong. Not that much else is going right.... Then a runaway girl from a nearby boarding school warns Eric that the fungus could portend doom.

To protect those she loves from herself, Jax will leave them all behind. She'll risk everything in a desperate search for answers. Jax Pherson fled the darkest of covens and from her own father's evil. For a brief moment, her courage was rewarded. She found everything she'd ever wanted. A normal life. An amazing boyfriend. An envy-worthy best friend. But her past put them all in danger, forcing a confrontation with the dark covens. In a life-and-death battle to save those she loved from the covens, Jax gained staggering power.

Quincie Morris has never felt more alone. Her parents are dead, and her hybrid-werewolf first love is threatening to embark on a rite of passage that will separate them forever. Then, as she and her uncle are about to unveil their hot vampire-themed restaurant, a brutal murder leaves them scrambling for a chef. Can Quincie transform their new hire into a culinary Dark Lord before opening night?

Jack is spending the summer on a private island far from modern conveniences. No Wi-Fi, no cell service, no one else on the island but a housekeeper and the two very peculiar children in his care. The first time Jack sees the huge black mansion atop a windswept hill, he senses something cold, something more sinister than even the dark house itself. Soon, he feels terribly isolated and alone. Yet he is not alone. The house has visitors - peering in the windows, staring from across the shore. But why doesn't anyone else see them...? And what do they want?

Never say their name! If you do, they will find you! If they find you, they will eat you! Thirteen-year-old Oz Griffin knows it's his fault that the Takers are eating everyone in sight. He also knows that a comic book written by a neighborhood boy is the key to defeating them. But every time he and his band of survivors try to read the comic book, the Takers draw closer. Can they get to the end of the story before the Takers devour them?

It's just another long, hot summer - until Derek Cliver and his friends join an exciting new mail-order club. The Terror Club allows Derek and his friends to create their own monsters. And it gives them the opportunity to "dispose" of those they despise most. But the game turns terrifyingly real when the monsters they create come to life - and actually murder their rivals. Now, as the body count rises, Derek and his friends must somehow undo what they've done ... before they become the next victims!

In Ghostgirl: Homecoming, Hurley continues the story of Charlotte Usher, who finds herself dead but unable to rest in peace…yet. Before she can cross over, Charlotte must help other teens through problems of their own. When Petula, a popular cheerleader, and her sister, Scarlet, end up in comas, Charlotte aims to save them—but her helping hand may do more harm than good.

Three years after her father was killed, 16-year-old Peyton Delaney; her mother, Melody; and her new stepfather, Vance McIntyre, relocate to Shadow Bay, Minnesota, and move into an old Victorian. They are unaware of the house's dark history: 50 years ago, a jealous husband snapped, murdering his wife, her lover, and 16-year-old daughter, before killing himself. But when Peyton begins to have nightmares about the crime and is haunted by a ghostly girl named Caitlyn, she begins to investigate.

Though Carolyn’s mother never expected to inherit Glanton House from long-lost Aunt Hazel, she wants to make the most of the opportunity. Planning to turn the creaky waterfront mansion into a hotel, she moves Carolyn down to the seashore. But this house has a nightmarish history. As the story goes, Captain Glanton spent so long at sea that his wife, believing him dead, took a new lover. When her husband finally returned, her new love - a mysterious drifter - brutally murdered him, and she went mad with grief.