Short Stories Occult

From astronauts in deep space to the ghosts of the Civil War, New York Times best-selling author Alethea Kontis creates worlds of wonder and delight, of weirdness and despair, of whimsy and darkness. Here are 20 stories and poems that will transport you to the magical dangerous worlds you've always known should exist, but have never quite been able to find.

The Doll Maker tells the tale of Clare Lydgate, a young woman studying at boarding school for her Oxford scholarship examinations. In the evenings she escapes the school grounds by climbing over the wall of Brackenbine Hall. It is here that she encounters the charismatic and mysterious Niall Sterne, the Doll Maker. This is a subtle, intelligent, and compelling tale of horror.

Jessica Niemi is put on leave after a violent altercation between her and a belligerent man makes headlines. To escape the unwanted scrutiny, Jessica travels to a remote island in the Åland archipelago and rents a room at a small seaside inn. She is hoping to be left alone as she faces the possibility that she is losing what is left of her sanity but three elderly visitors have arrived at the inn for their yearly sojourn.

From the Artic to Egypt to Australia, Doyle tells thrilling tales of crime, suspense, mysterious secrets, and humor.

An anthology of short stories based upon/inspired by, and in loving homage to all of those great gore-fest movies and books of the 1980s (not necessarily based in that era, although some do ride that wave of nostalgia), the golden age when horror well and truly came kicking, screaming, and spraying blood, gore, and body parts out from the shadows.

When a brothel madame is murdered, it looks as if a centuries old witch’s curse on the land has claimed another victim. But as DCI Mike Saxby and his team investigate the background history of the building, other, more sinister, motives emerge. Then a local journalist who had been investigating that same unhappy history is the next to meet a grisly end, and a further discovery by police results in a race against time to prevent a national disaster.

What happens when that paradise suddenly becomes a purgatory of pain? What will you do when the beaches fill with bodies and the waters run red with blood? When creatures crawl the coastline and the jungle teems with terror. How will you survive when a tropical respite becomes an arena of peril? Slice of Paradise is an all-original anthology featuring 15 shocking stories of beach vacation horror.

Imagine, if you will, you’re traveling through the unknown, hellbound, with no road map or stars to guide you. The light fades as you descend into a shadow realm where supernatural terrors make their lair and evil lurks at every turn. Here, dead things don’t always stay dead, for this is a world where things that shouldn’t be...are, and things that should be are not. In this world, we pay a visit to the smallest, but terrifyingly necessary, room, and stories are written precisely to chill the bones as you wait for nature to make its call.

A beer run becomes an interdimensional excursion. Two men settle their differences after discovering an extraordinary secret in the wilderness. A woman faces the bureaucracy of a digital afterlife. A grieving man seeks to know where his wife was reincarnated. Strange lights in the sky transform the lives of a small town. God and the devil play billiards for people's souls. A teenage deity's science project sprouts a startling discovery. These and more dream-like detours into the surreal, interstitial, and inexplicable await within. Chock full of gooey, mind-bending goodness.

Survivors trapped in a sunken vessel find themselves hunted through the depths by a deadly adversary. A skeptical journalist discovers the sinister inhabitants of a fake haunted house are all too real. And a husband commits murder to protect his wife, only to learn he has created something even more dangerous....

Venture into new realms of terror with Scare Street’s latest bone-chilling collection. This spine-tingling volume contains 15 ghastly tales of horror and the paranormal - more than enough to while away the hours as you lose yourself in the shadows of the night. The deeper you plunge into this realm of terror, the farther away the real world seems. But don’t worry...resist pausing, and stay a bit longer.

She only wants me for my body. I just wish she hadn't used it that way. I found where the Devil keeps his pets, and now I have one of my own. Every morning I wake up screaming, knowing I'll be killed each day. The wolves were disappearing from the Alaskan wilderness, and I discovered what they were being turned into. Have you met the only demon in heaven?

A businessman discovers he has a ghostly twin whose presence may be far more ominous than he had thought.... Mischievous children learn that supernatural forces are nothing to toy with, after a Halloween prank goes wrong. And holiday festivities set the backdrop to a terrified teen’s worst fears, when his grandmother’s corpse comes looking for revenge....

In Turn Up the Sun, Hazard, the eccentric drug dealer from Criterium, is horrified to discover he has a doppelganger who appears at the scene of a grisly murder. In Stridor, a pediatrician is not only haunted by her mistakes, but stalked by them. In Sidewinder, a young musician receives a custom, otherworldly guitar pedal.

A monster demands candy on Halloween night. “Falconers” train ghosts to harvest bits of human souls. A father stretches the boundaries of reality to bring his son back from the dead. A pious man is tormented by a demon he guards.

Terrifying secrets from the past are revealed when a ghost hunter discovers a letter from his deceased mother. A lost young couple learns all is not what it seems when an elderly woman welcomes them into her remote outback home. And a guilt-ridden carpenter takes a journey into another dimension but is shocked by what follows him home.... Scare Street is proud to present a diabolical new collection of 17 ghastly stories. Each spine-tingling tale is a portal to a new world, the beginning of a seemingly endless voyage into fear and dread.

Evil is unleashed in Scare Street’s latest bone-chilling collection of supernatural horror. Fourteen tales of terror lurk within this new volume - more than enough to give even the bravest soul a reason to fear the night. As your eyes flutter open, you can still see dark images in your mind.... Horrifying monsters, demons, and ghouls with a hunger for human flesh.

Scare Street delves into the darkness to bring you a new collection of spine-tingling terror. This diabolical tome is bursting with 13 sinister stories of supernatural horror, featuring ghastly ghosts, cold-blooded killers, and fiendish visions torn from your worst fears. Just be careful you don’t lose track of time as you meander through this shadowy landscape of dreams and nightmares. Because, once the sun sets, something waits for you in the darkness of night.

There is evil in the woods and it wants you dead. They warned us not to enter, but we didn't listen. The call too strong to ignore. And now there is no one left to save us. Beware, these things within the forest will rip out your heart and devour your soul. You will tremble as they revel in your madness, taking everything from you and leaving you with nothing. Delve inside this anthology of what truly lurks within the shadows of the trees.

Welcome to the fourth volume of our best-selling horror anthology, featuring tales of terror and dark, slithering things to chill the marrow and keep even the most resolute of horror fans awake in the small hours of the night. This is the time when the inherently evil and deliciously malevolent come out to explore our earthly realm. Another superlative gathering of the dark and disturbing from some of the best independent authors writing today.