Image may be NSFW. | Mammoth book of zombies! The zombie - a soulless corpse raised from the grave to do its master's bidding - may have had its factual basis in the voodoo ceremonies of the West Indies, but it is in fiction, movies, video games and comics that the walking dead have flourished. What makes a zombie? This Twentieth Anniversary Edition of one of the first and most influential zombie anthologies answers that question with 26 tales of rot and resurrection from classic authors such as Edgar Allan Poe, H. P. Lovecraft, M. R. James and J. Sheridan Le Fanu, along with modern masters of the macabre Clive Barker, Robert Bloch, Ramsey Campbell, Hugh B. Cave, Joe R. Lansdale, Brian Lumley, Graham Masterton, Kim Newman, Michael Marshall Smith, Lisa Tuttle, Karl Edward Wagner and many more.From Caribbean rituals to ancient magic, mesmerism to modern science, these terrifying tales depict a wide range of nefarious methods and questionable reasons for bringing the dead back to life again. |
Image may be NSFW. | People's will by Jaser Kent Turkmenistan 1881: Beneath the citadel of Geok Tepe sits a prisoner. He hasn''t moved from his chair for two years, hasn''t felt the sun on his face in more than fifty, but he is thankful for that. The city is besieged by Russian troops and soon falls. But one Russian officer has his own reason to be here. Colonel Otrepyev marches into the underground gaol. But for the prisoner it does not mean freedom, simply a new gaoler; an old friend, now an enemy. They return to Russia to meet an older enemy still. In Saint Petersburg, the great vampire Zmyeevich waits as he has always waited. He knows he will never wield power over Tsar Aleksandr II, but the tsarevich will be a different matter. When Otrepyev delivers the prisoner into his hands, Zmyeevich will have everything he needs. Then all that need happen is for the tsar to die. But it is not only the Otrepyev and his captive who have returned from Geok Tepe. Another soldier has followed them, one who cares nothing for the fate of the tsar, nor for Zmyeevich, nor for Otrepyev. He has only one thing on his mind -- revenge. And it''s not just Zmyeevich who seeks the death of the tsar. Aleksandr''s faltering steps towards liberty have only made the people hungry for more, and for some the final liberty will come only with the death of the dictator. They have tried and failed before, but the tsar''s luck must desert him one day. Soon he will fall victim to a group that has vowed to bring the Romanov dynasty to a violent end -- a group that calls itself The People's Will. |
Image may be NSFW. | Red moon by Benjamin Percy Every teenage girl thinks she's different. When government agents kick down Claire Forrester's front door and murder her parents, Claire realises just how different she is. Patrick Gamble was nothing special until the day he got on a plane and, hours later, stepped off it, the only passenger left alive. A hero. President Chase Williams has vowed to eradicate the menace. Unknown to the electorate, however, he is becoming the very thing he has sworn to destroy. Each of them is caught up in a war that so far has been controlled with laws and violence and drugs. But an uprising is about to leave them damaged, lost, and tied to one another for ever. The night of the red moon is coming, when an unrecognizable world will emerge, and the battle for humanity will begin. |
Image may be NSFW. | Orphan choir by Sophie Hannah It is so hard when your children go to school. A small part of you leaves with them. So when the Beeston’s son is accepted on a prestigious choral scholarship to a boarding school near their holiday home in the country it seems like the perfect time to get out of the city. Things have been bad with their neighbour for a while now anyway. Susannah has long been driven mad by the constant and thudding music coming from next door every weekend. And his latest taste in choral music seems like a taunting, especially as he always plays it when her husband Daniel is away. But their move to the country doesn’t offer the solace Susannah needs. Again she is plagued by the sounds of a children’'s choir. It follows her wherever she goes. So when the children turn up on her doorstep, she's ready to call the police. But this is no normal choir… |
Image may be NSFW. | Inexplicables by Cherie Priest Adventures await Rector "Wreck 'em" Sherman. About to turn eighteen, he's facing ejection from the orphanage that passed for home. He should also choose a trade, but work is scarce in steam-powered Seattle. And Rector has more unconventional plans. He's started dealing in sap, a yellow narcotic produced by rebels and outlaws within the city's toxic walled enclave. What's worse, he's been sampling his wares. Other problems include being haunted by an old friend with a grudge. The pressure builds until he sneaks behind the wall himself, seeking both (un)gainful employment and excitement. As rumoured, he finds a terrifying host of the hungry undead, and then there's the monster. Rector's certain that his attacker wasn't human, or undead. But he's going to need more proof than his own addled word to expose it. His new mission becomes a compulsion when others witness the creature's destructiveness, and give its kind a name. |
Image may be NSFW. | String diaries by Stephen Lloyd Jones A jumble of entries, written in different hands, different languages, and different times. They tell of a rumour. A shadow. A killer. The only interest that Oxford Professor Charles Meredith has in the diaries is as a record of Hungarian folklore ... until he comes face to face with a myth. For Hannah Wilde, the diaries are a survival guide that taught her the three rules she lives by: verify everyone, trust no one, and if in any doubt, run. But Hannah knows that if her daughter is ever going to be safe, she will have to stop running and face the terror that has hunted her family for five generations. And nothing in the diaries can prepare her for that. |
Image may be NSFW. | This house is haunted by John Boyne 1866, London. As Charles Dickens takes to a London stage on a foggy Autumn night to read from his ghost stories, Eliza Caine and her father settle into their seats. A huge admirer of the novelist, Mr Caine has insisted on attending, despite his worsening cold. Returning home, a fever hits him and within 24 hours he is dead, leaving Eliza alone in the world.A teacher by trade, Eliza notices an advertisement for a governess position at Gaudlin Hall in Norfolk. Deciding that she needs to start over, she applies for and is offered the job. Arriving at Thorpe station she is almost pushed beneath a train but is saved by two villagers who, although initially friendly, become quiet and uneasy when she mentions the position she has accepted.Arriving at Gaudlin, Eliza meets the two children in her care, Isabella and Eustace. To her surprise, they appear to live there alone. There are no parents, no adults at all, and no one to represent her employer. The children, however, seem to expect her and show her to her room. From the night she arrives a series of disturbing incidents take place, each one of which threatens her life, and slowly Eliza begins to believe that this house is haunted.A solicitor in the village reveals some of the secrets of Gaudlin to her, others she must discover for herself. The action takes us from a London classroom to a Norfolk grand estate, and from a small Spanish town to a graveyeard in Great Yarmouth. Eliza refuses to be frightened away from her position; if she is to survive Gaudlin and save the children, then she must take on the ghost herself. |
Image may be NSFW. | Homecoming by Carsten Stroud From its explosive opening to its eerie climax, The Homecoming is a page-turning, labyrinthine thrill ride that returns to Niceville . . . where evil lives far longer than men do. When two plane crashes set off a spellbinding chain reaction of murder, inadvertent kidnapping, corporate corruption, and financial double-dealing, it's not enough that Niceville detective Nick Kavanaugh (ex-Special Forces) has to investigate. He and his wife, family lawyer Kate, have also just taken in brutally orphaned Rainey Teague. Something bothers Nick about Rainey--and it isn't just that the woman in charge of attendance at Rainey's prep school has disappeared. In fact, people have long been disappearing from seemingly placid Niceville, including, most disturbingly, Kate's father. Using his files, Kate and Nick start to unearth Niceville's blood stained history, but something (or is it Nothing ?) stands in their way. Once again, Carsten Stroud gives us unforgettable characters, including Coker, the steely, amoral police sniper, and Harvill Endicott, an urbanely manipulative psychopath, not to mention Warren Smoles, the most conniving lawyer you will ever meet. Stroud's unique storytelling gifts bring us into a world where protecting your family from the unknown becomes almost impossible but essential for survival. Anything is possible in The Homecoming. |
Image may be NSFW. | NOS-4R2: a novel by Joe Hill Victoria McQueen has a secret gift for finding things: a misplaced bracelet, a missing photography, answers to unanswerable questions. On her Raleigh Tuff Burner bike, she makes her way to a rickety covered bridge that, within moments, takes her wherever she needs to go, whether it's across Massachusetts or across the country. Charles Talent Manx has a way with children. He likes to take them for rides in his 1938 Rolls-Royce Wraith with the NOS4A2 vanity plate. With his old car, he can slip right out of the everyday world, and onto the hidden roads that transport them to an astonishing--and terrifying--playground of amusements he calls "Christmasland." Then, one day, Vic goes looking for trouble--and finds Manx. That was a lifetime ago. Now Vic, the only kid to ever escape Manx's unmitigated evil, is all grown up and desperate to forget. But Charlie Manx never stopped thinking about Victoria McQueen. He's on the road again and he's picked up a new passenger: Vic's own son. |
Image may be NSFW. | Apartment 16 by Adam Nevill (e-book) In Barrington House, an upmarket block in London, there is an empty apartment. No one goes in, no one comes out. And it's been that way for 50 years. Until the night watchman hears a disturbance after midnight and investigates. What he experiences is enough to change his life forever. A young American woman, Apryl, arrives at Barrington House. She's been left an apartment by her mysterious Great Aunt Lillian who died in strange circumstances. Rumours claim Lillian was mad. But her diary suggests she was implicated in a horrific and inexplicable event decades ago. Determined to learn something of this eccentric woman, Apryl begins to unravel the hidden story of Barrington House. She discovers that a transforming, evil force still inhabits the building. And the doorway to Apartment 16 is a gateway to something altogether more terrifying... |
