Women Horror

Set against the stark background of the Southwestern desert, Lena Valencia’s Mystery Lights glows with the promise—and fear—of the world we know and the worlds we don’t, following women and girls as they navigate dangers both supernatural and existential. From the all-too-real horror of a sexual predator on a college campus to a lost sister transformed by cave-dwelling creatures, Mystery Lights grapples with terrors both familiar and fantastic.

Connie Goodwin is an expert on America’s fractured past with witchcraft. A young, tenure-track professor in Boston, she’s earned career success by studying the history of magic in colonial America - especially women’s home recipes and medicines - and by exposing society's threats against women fluent in those skills. But beyond her studies, Connie harbors a secret: She is the direct descendant of a woman tried as a witch in Salem, an ancestor whose abilities were far more magical than the historical record shows.

Ivory’s life changes irrevocably when she discovers the body of Cabrina Brite on the sands of Cape Morning, along with a mysterious poem. How did she die, and why does it seem she was trying to swim to Ghost Cat Island, the center of so many local mysteries? Desperate to uncover the answers surrounding Cabrina’s death, and haunted by her discovery, Ivory begins to see the pale ghost of Cabrina, only to shake it off as a mere hallucination. But Ivory is not alone.

Young widow Penelope Thornton-McClure and her old Aunt Sadie are making ends meet by managing a mystery book shop - a quaint Rhode Island landmark rumored to be haunted. Pen may not believe in ghosts, but she does believe in good publicity - like nabbing Timothy Brennan for a book signing. But soon after the bestselling thriller writer reveals a secret about the store's link to a 1940s murder, he keels over dead - and right in the middle of the store's new community events space. Who gives Mrs. McClure the first clue that it was murder?

Josephine Thomas has heard every conceivable theory about her mother's disappearance. That she was kidnapped. Murdered. That she took on a new identity to start a new family. That she was a witch. This is the most worrying charge because in a world where witches are real, peculiar behavior raises suspicions and a woman—especially a Black woman—can find herself on trial for witchcraft.

All Susannah Simon wants is to make a good impression at her first job since graduating from college (and since becoming engaged to Dr. Jesse de Silva). But when she's hired as a guidance counselor at her alma mater, she stumbles across a decade-old murder, and soon ancient history isn't all that's coming back to haunt her. Old ghosts as well as new ones are coming out of the woodwork, some to test her, some to vex her, and it isn't only because she's a mediator gifted with second sight.

What evil lurks in the depths of the Dark Mountain? In the West Highlands of Scotland, few years after the end of World War One, Brenda and her friends are preparing for an expedition of a lifetime: Climbing An Cailleach, also known as The Witch. But even before they reach the base of the mountain, they realize that something is wrong. Strange apparitions, even stranger locals and ancient superstitions are all signs that they are on a dangerous path. When things take a turn for the worse, will friendship be more important than survival?

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.

Crossover sensation Melissa de la Cruz created an instant New York Times best seller with the inventive Witches of East End. In this follow-up, everything is going smoothly in North Hampton now that Joanna and her daughters, Ingrid and Freya, are allowed to perform magic again. But chaos erupts with the arrival of Freya’s twin brother, Freddie, who’s finally escaped from Limbo. And Freddie’s convinced that Freya’s fiancé, Killian Gardiner, is the one who landed him there in the first place.

When ghost hunter and medium M.J. Holliday appears on a television show called Haunted Possessions, she encounters an evil knife that releases a demon. Now all hell has broken loose in the haunted hotel where M.J. is staying and its up to her to give the uninvited guest an early checkout.

Once the thriving attraction of rural Vermont, the Tower Motel now stands in disrepair, alive only in the memories of Amy, Piper, and Piper's kid sister, Margot. The three played there as girls until the day their games uncovered something dark and twisted in the motel's past, something that ruined their friendship forever.

Amy Foster considers herself lucky. After she left the city and went full minivan, she found her place quickly with neighbors Liz, Jess, and Melissa, together snarking the “Mom Mafia” from the outskirts of the PTA mom crowd. So, one night during their monthly wine get-together, the newfound crew concocts a plan for a clubhouse She Shed in Liz’s backyard—the perfect space for just them, no spouses or kids allowed.

At their newly founded school, Samuel Hood and his daughter, Caroline, promise a groundbreaking education for young women. But Caroline has grave misgivings. After all, her own unconventional education has left her unmarriageable and isolated, unsuited to the narrow roles afforded women in 19th-century New England. When a mysterious flock of red birds descends on the town, Caroline alone seems to find them unsettling. But it's not long before the assembled students begin to manifest bizarre symptoms: Rashes, seizures, headaches, verbal tics, night wanderings. One by one, they sicken.

When Eleanor Harper becomes the director of a renowned artists' retreat, she knows nothing of Cliffside Manor's dark past as a tuberculosis sanatorium, a "waiting room for death". After years of covering murder and violence as a crime reporter, Eleanor hopes that being around artists and writers in this new job will be a peaceful retreat for her as much as for them.

In Metsan Valo, her family home on Lake Superior, Anni Halla’s beloved grandmother has died. Among her fond memories, what Anni remembers most vividly is her grandmother’s eerie yet enchanting storytelling. By firelight she spun tall tales of spirits in the nearby forest and waters who could heal - or harm - on a whim. But of course those were only stories.

Hamming it up with equal parts history and histrionics, Phillip leads an archaeological dig of the farm's original dump site - until one student stops the show by uncovering some human bones. When a full skeleton is later excavated, Kath can't help but wonder if it's somehow connected to Geneva, the ghost who haunts her shop, and whom she met at this very site. After Phillip is found dead, it's up to Kath to thread the clues together before someone else becomes history.

The Movie Town Theater is holding its first ever Film Noir Festival, with Pen handling book sales for the guest speakers, including screen actress Hedda Geist. The legendary femme fatale has been out of the spotlight for decades. Unfortunately, the moment she steps back into it, she's nearly killed. Then other guests start to die, and Penelope wants to know why her little town's Film Noir weekend has taken a truly dark turn.

When a redundant church is bought by a young pagan couple, the local fundamentalist minister reacts with fury. In an isolated community on the Welsh border, a modern witch hunt begins. Diocesan exorcist Merrily Watkins is expected to keep the lid on the cauldron...but what she finds out will seriously test her beliefs.

During the course of her neglected and abusive childhood, Wendy dreamed of a warm and bright haven of peace, far removed from her dreary, often painful surroundings. Even as she lived through the domestic violence and indifference of her parents and then fell victim to a sexual predator, she held on to her vision of happiness, love, and fulfilment. Slowly, as she grew into womanhood, she set about turning her vision into reality. This is the story of how she overcame a dysfunctional family, the nightmare of emotional and sexual abuse, loneliness and destructive relationships.

Eleanor lives with prosopagnosia, the inability to recognize a familiar person's face. It causes stress. Acute anxiety. It can make you question what you think you know. When Eleanor walked in on the scene of her capriciously cruel grandmother, Vivianne’s, murder, she came face to face with the killer—a maddening expression that means nothing to someone like her. With each passing day, the horror of having come so close to a murderer—and not knowing if they’d be back—overtakes both her dreams and her waking moments, thwarting her perception of reality.