Short Horror

If you enjoy your horror dipped in buckets of blood and sprinkled with generous amounts of blasphemy, then you've come to the right place!

A woman metamorphoses into a giant slug; another quite literally eats her heart out; a wasp falls in love with an orchid; and hair starts sprouting from the walls. These stories slip and slide between genres - from video games to fan fiction, body horror to choose-your-own-adventure - as characters cycle through giddying changes in gender, physiology, species, and identity. Collapsing boundaries between bodies and forms, these fictions interrogate the visceral, gross, and absurd.

This cross-genre anthology written by superstar YA authors from across the Latin American diaspora offers bold new thrills for every monster fan. In these fifteen original short stories, bloodthirsty vampires are hunted by a quick-witted slayer; children are taken from their beds by “el Viejo de la Bolsa” while a military dictator steals their parents; and anyone you love might be a monster waiting to strike. The sinister worlds of these narratives are also magical ones, where supernatural beings can be avatars for justice, vengeance, sisterhood, and empowerment.

We’ve recorded some 400+ stories since 2015 here at HorrorBabble. This collection comprises some of our very favorites. From Blackwood's evocative "The Transfer", through to Smith's terrifying visit to the vaults of Yoh-Vombis, there’s something here to strike fear into the heart of any horror enthusiast....

Welcome to Leeds, Massachusetts, where the drowned walk, where winged leeches blast angry static, where black magic casts a shadow over a cringing populace. You've tuned in to WXXT. The fracture in the stanchion. The drop of blood in your morning milk. The viper in the veins of the Pioneer Valley.

The 15 stories in After the People Lights Have Gone Off, by Stephen Graham Jones, explore the horrors and fears of the supernatural and the everyday. Included are two original stories, several rarities and out-of-print narratives, as well as a few "best of the year" inclusions.

His name is a byword for unspeakable horror and dread. Across ten stories this dark master holds a fascinating lure for all of us. Word by word, line by line we are drip-fed stomach-churning terror of a mesmerizing kind…

A giant redneck in Fairyland, what could possibly go wrong? Everything. Absolutely everything. Monsters, Magic, & Mayhem collects four novella chronicling Bubba the Monster Hunter's trip through the lands of the Fae in search of his kidnapped sister.

Goblin seems like any other ordinary small town. But with the master storyteller Josh Malerman as your tour guide, you’ll discover the secrets that hide behind its closed doors. These six novellas tell the story of a place where the rain is always falling, nighttime is always near, and your darkest fears and desires await. Welcome to Goblin....

The time is the early '80s. The characters go to the same schools and eat at the same restaurants. Their voices enfold us as seamlessly as those of DJs heard over a car radio. They have sex with the same boys and girls and buy from the same dealers. In short, they are connected in the only way people can be in that city.

Remember when you used to worry there was a monster in the basement that would chase you up the stairs? What if you were right all along? What if instead of killing you, the monster made you a strange offer that revealed a dark family secret?

Prepare for another unforgettable journey into the shadows in Haunted Secrets: Tales of Eloise Vol. 5. Eloise, the restless ghost of the Anderson house, continues to explore the chilling secrets of the house she haunts. With each passing day, the veil between life and death grows thinner, and Eloise is drawn deeper into the eerie mysteries that define her afterlife.

Now a Lifetime original movie, Stephen King's haunting story about an author of a series of mystery novels who tries to reconcile her old life with her life after a horrific attack and the one thing that can save her: Revenge.

Welcome to the Nightside. It's the secret heart of London, beating to its own rhythm, pumping lifeblood through the veins of its streets and alleys hidden in eternal darkness, where creatures of the night congregate, and where the sun is afraid to shine. Tales from the Nightside presents ten macabre mysteries that shine a dim beam into the neighborhood's darkest corners to reveal things that should never come to light. Take a walk with such deadly and dangerous denizens as Razor Eddie, Dead Boy, and Larry Oblivion as they encounter things far more inhuman and inhumane than them.

Twenty short horror stories, one nightmarish collection. Includes all the stories from Karma, The Place Between Worlds, and Home. A collection terrifying stories, with tales of vengeance, the occult, a deadly competition, a weekend trip that turns violent, witchcraft, and things that go bump in the night. These short stories pack a punch, with endings that will haunt your dreams. Supernatural powers, possession, vicious serial killers, creature features, and more come together in this varied collection of disturbing and strange tales.

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.

The most terrifying thing that you can possibly imagine is your own body in the hands of a monster. Or worse, in the hands of another human being. In this definitive anthology of body horror selected by a World Horror Grandmaster, you'll find the unthinkable and the shocking: a couture designer preparing for an exquisitely grotesque runway show; a vengeful son seeking the parent who bred him as plasma donor; a celebrity-kink brothel that inflicts plastic surgery on sex workers; and organ-harvesting doctors who dissect a living man without anesthetic.

Medusa's Ankles celebrates the very best of A. S. Byatt's short fiction, carefully selected from a lifetime of writing. Peopled by artists, poets, and fabulous creatures, the stories blaze with creativity and color. From ancient myth to a British candy factory, from a Chinese restaurant to a Mediterranean swimming pool, from a Turkish bazaar to a fairy-tale palace, Byatt transports her listeners beyond the veneer of the ordinary - even beyond the gloss of the fantastical - to places rich and strange and wholly unforgettable.

Waking the Dead by breakout author Bryan Asbury features eight short stories that will take you by the hand and lead you down a dark, shadowy path where terror and retribution reign supreme. Asbury, the product of far too many 80’s and 90’s cinematic thrillers, knows what horror fans want, and he knows how to deliver! Lock the doors and sit back, because this is a collection that you will appreciate—at least until it’s time to shut off the lights...

Acclaimed in her own time for her short story “The Lottery” and her novel The Haunting of Hill House - classics ranking with the work of Edgar Allan Poe - Shirley Jackson blazed a path for contemporary writers with her explorations of evil, madness, and cruelty. Soon after her untimely death in 1965, Jackson’s children discovered a treasure trove of previously unpublished and uncollected stories, many of which are brought together in this remarkable collection.