Urban Noir Fantasy

I'm Cisco Suarez: necromancer, shadow charmer, black magic outlaw. Sounds kinda cool, doesn't it? It was, right until I woke up half dead in a dumpster. Did I say half dead? Because I meant 100% dead. Full on. I don't do things halfway. So here I am, alive for some reason, just another sunny day in Miami. It's a perfect paradise, except I'm into something bad. Wanted by police, drenched in the stink of dark magic, nether creatures coming out of the woodwork, and don't get me started on the Haitian voodoo gang.

Former car thief Ray Lilly is now the expendable grunt of a sorcerer responsible for destroying extradimensional predators summoned to our world by power-hungry magicians. Luckily, Ray has some magic of his own, and so far it's kept him alive. But when a friend from his former gang calls him back to his old stomping grounds in Los Angeles, Ray may have to face a threat even he can't handle.

Years ago, while serving in the Borderland, Alexander Southerland watched helplessly as his friend was terrorized and murdered by the Sihuanaba, a mysterious avenging spirit known as the Woman in White. Now an established private investigator in the teeming metropolis of Yerba City, Southerland finds himself on a collision course with this specter from his past. As the detective tries to solve the riddle of a beautiful nightclub singer’s death, Southerland finds himself battling corruption, temptation, betrayal - and deadly horrors from his own nightmares!

From the pulpy pages of Black Mask Magazine in the 1920s and '30s, through the film noir era of the 1940s, to today, noir fiction has lured many a reader and movie-goer away from the light and into the dark underbelly of society. Names such as Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, and James M. Cain; titles like The Big Sleep, The Maltese Falcon, The Postman Always Rings Twice...these have inhabited our collective consciousness for decades. Humanity, it seems, loves the dark. And within the dark, one figure stands out: that of the femme fatale.

Can your name decide your fate? I was named after Gerwalta Faust, and if that means nothing to you, then you don't know the real story of Little Red Riding Hood. It is my birthright to lead the House of Red, my destiny to be the next Grand Matron of all hoods. But as the namesake of the Betrayer, am I also doomed to repeat her crimes?

I refused my legacy, but my destiny doesn't want to take no for an answer. The plan seemed simple. Run away from home. Go to college. Pretend I wasn't raised to control silver with magic, dance around a fire under a full moon, or guard the barriers between lupines and clueless humans. And for a while, it was that simple. Then, Tobias Somfield had to walk into that alley and into my life, with his English swagger and his sorrowful tale of woe. Sure, the lone werewolf may have come to my rescue, but that doesn't mean I owe him anything, right?

Alexander Southerland is hired to discover how a teenage boy is disappearing at night without passing through any doors or windows. Next thing Southerland knows, he’s shackled to an altar while a hungry spirit prepares to sacrifice him to “the toothless one who brings nothing but good.” Southerland soon finds himself negotiating a minefield of dream-hopping supernatural spirits, howler monkeys, a homicidal client, a shotgun-wielding spinster, and a whistling demon.

Au lendemain d'une rupture amoureuse, Olivia, jeune femme de 35 ans, se réfugie auprès de sa grand-mère, dans une grande maison du Luberon. Dans cette demeure en pleine campagne, quatre vieilles dames, drôles, parfois indignes, toujours surprenantes, partagent le quotidien de leur infirmière, du jardinier et d'un chauffeur de taxi en retraite. Durant son séjour, Olivia va plonger dans une autre réalité. Aidée de son amie Laure, informaticienne, Olivia comprendra au fil des expériences mystérieuses, que derrière les manies étranges et fantaisistes des vieilles dames se cache le combat de cinq anges contre les forces du Mal.

Ever since she could walk, Homicide Detective Deena Pilgrim followed in her father's footsteps. A man with a badge, Waldo Pilgrim surrounded himself with what Deena believed to be the cream of the crop when it came to serving and protecting. These days, Deena won't discuss her father or the life she left behind in Atlanta years ago, a life before she partnered with Christian Walker to investigate homicide cases in a city where perps and victims boast incredible, dangerous powers.

Being a teen witch is no sitcom with canned laugh tracks. It's especially hard when your crush's family is old school burn the witches at the stake type. Leah decides not to mention her membership in the black hat society if it will score her points with Dylan. If only life was that easy. Best friend Stella pulls her in to a tolerance project that tests Leah's beliefs by sending her hurtling through time where people really do burn witches. If that isn't enough, everyone back in times old and smelly recognize her as the local mean girl.

No magician has ever escaped Coldwater Prison. But that is exactly where Amanda Coleman, heist artist and Abra-killer, must go. Somewhere in London, a mysterious blackmailer has enough evidence to put Amanda’s head in a noose and ensure her only remaining daughter, Michaela, is right alongside her when it happens. To save Michaela, Amanda must assassinate one of Coldwater’s most infamous residents. But the only way in is as an inmate. But a notorious Abra-killer like Amanda can expect a few old enemies in a prison full of mages, and they have their own plans.

The magical tattoos etched into Erin’s flesh give her strength, speed, and the ability to survive damage that would kill any normal person. But they come at a price. Wearing them is painful, and the deeper Erin buries herself in her work, the steeper the toll they take on her body and mind. Her friends tell her to rest, but how can she when the demonic Long Man is dangling another carrot in front of her, another clue to her brother’s disappearance? She’s so close. Erin has no choice but to do as the demon asks, power through the pain, and uncover the truth.

Human private detective Anna Caill isn’t keen on the prohibition of magic enacted by the 18th Amendment, but she won’t deny it’s good for business. The coppers couldn’t care less about the witches’ problems, giving her any number of clients to choose from. When mysterious witch Jesse Hunt saunters into her office, he and his case will test her limits. While a killer stalks the magical underworld, Anna is hired to find Jesse’s friend, the high priest of an ancient coven.

It was a typical February night in 1951 when she stepped into one of Nashville’s many dives and into my life. The blonde asked for my story, wanting to know what had me drinking. She had no idea it was the same thing that had me working at nights, hunting down the monsters that stalk the back alleys of my city. Back in ’31, the job was just supposed to be another bank heist - in, then out, then we'd be rich. But along with the money, we found that cursed ruby, and nothing was the same again.

Jon Gilligan is the only man with a pulse in a city of the undead. It's his job to maintain order between the factions of walking corpses and disembodied spirits. The workload has been driving him a little insane, leading him to take on the persona of a noir detective. He narrates his adventures, casting himself as a hero to all those under his watch.

Nicknamed Dewey Decimal for his obsessive attempts to bring order to the New York Public Library in the wake of disastrous events in the city, the hero of this series earns his keep as a bagman and enforcer for unscrupulous politicians and underworld figures. Now, he’s stumbled upon information concerning the gruesome murder of a prostitute that involves a prominent US senator - and finds himself chasing ghosts and fighting for his life, pursued by private military contractors and the ever-present specter of his own past.... 

Joe Dylan ventures into the Bangkok City bars. The detective follows a trail leading to Demon Dreams, a Bangkok S&M joint run by a beautiful transsexual and her mentally deranged brother. Joe discovers a world of bizarre nocturnal acts and black magic rituals. It's a seedy Bangkok underworld that picks-up fallen women from the streets and throws them into an evil world of torture and murder.

Crawford the were-rat checks into a shady hotel and promptly stumbles over a dead man. A mysterious troll is obsessed with finding the dagger that killed him—a dagger possessed by a demon! The demon denies that he is a demon and is obsessed with regaining his freedom. Meanwhile, the hotel’s night clerk is obsessed with the hooker on the third floor. Crawford is obsessed with what’s in the hooker’s room: a solid gold statuette of a demon-slaying goddess! Crawford has checked in, but when obsessions collide, does he have any hope of checking out?

He woke up in a cave with no memory and smelling of sulfur. All he knows is that his name is Christopher and that he can see monsters. Now he's caught between humanity and the creatures of the night while he tries to find answers to the mysteries of his own past.

Lucius Anoraq is getting paid to follow the mysterious and lovely canary, Sheila De Havilland. And wherever the canary goes, trouble seems to follow. Anoraq’s happy to do as he’s told, all in the name of chivalry. But one dead body later, and what started out as a lazy afternoon’s snooping soon becomes a deadly cocktail of blackmail, lies, mistaken identity, and murder.