Book picks similar to
Dead Sea by Tim Curran


horror
fiction
favorites
science-fiction

Ancient Enemy


Mark Lukens - 2013
    It wants things ... and you have to give it what it wants ...Seven hundred years ago the Anasazi people built massive cities in what is now the southwestern United States ... and then they vanished.Stella, an archaeologist specializing in Anasazi culture, and David, a mysterious Navajo boy, are on the run from something terrifying. As they flee up into the snowy mountains of Colorado they are carjacked by criminals escaping a botched bank robbery. Caught in a blizzard, they must take refuge in what they believe is an abandoned cabin. It's at this cabin that they will face horrors beyond their imagination.Contains: strong language, graphic violence, gore

And the Trees Crept In


Dawn Kurtagich - 2016
    The endless creaking of the house at night and the eerie stillness of the woods surrounding them would be enough of a sign, but there are secrets too—questions that Silla can’t ignore: Why does it seem that, ever since they arrived, the trees have been creeping closer? Who is the beautiful boy who’s appeared from the woods? And who is the tall man with no eyes who Nori plays with in the basement at night… a man no one else can see?

The Twenty Days of Turin


Giorgio De Maria - 1977
    As the city of Turin suffers a twenty-day "phenomenon of collective psychosis" culminating in nightly massacres that hundreds of witnesses cannot explain, the Library is shut down and erased from history. That is, until a lonely salaryman decides to investigate these mysterious events, which the citizenry of Turin fear to mention. Inevitably drawn into the city’s occult netherworld, he unearths the stuff of modern nightmares: what’s shared can never be unshared.An allegory inspired by the grisly neo-fascist campaigns of its day, The Twenty Days of Turin has enjoyed a fervent cult following in Italy for forty years. Now, in a fretful new age of "lone-wolf" terrorism fueled by social media, we can find uncanny resonances in Giorgio De Maria’s vision of mass fear: a mute, palpitating dread that seeps into every moment of daily existence. With its stunning anticipation of the Internet—and the apocalyptic repercussions of oversharing—this bleak, prescient story is more disturbingly pertinent than ever.Brilliantly translated into English for the first time by Ramon Glazov, The Twenty Days of Turin establishes De Maria’s place among the literary ranks of Italo Calvino and beside classic horror masters such as Edgar Allan Poe and H. P. Lovecraft. Hauntingly imaginative, with visceral prose that chills to the marrow, the novel is an eerily clairvoyant magnum opus, long overdue but ever timely.

The Keep


F. Paul Wilson - 1981
    And when an elite SS extermination squad is dispatched to solve the problem, the men find a something that's both powerful and terrifying. Invisible and silent, the enemy selects one victim per night, leaving the bloodless and mutilated corpses behind to terrify its future victims.Panicked, the Nazis bring in a local expert on folklore―who just happens to be Jewish―to shed some light on the mysterious happenings. And unbeknownst to anyone, there is another visitor on his way―a man who awoke from a nightmare and immediately set out to meet his destiny.The battle has begun: On one side, the ultimate evil created by man, and on the other...the unthinkable, unstoppable, unknowing terror that man has inevitably awakened.

The Howling


Gary Brandner - 1977
    On the surface Drago appeared to be like most small rural towns.But it was not.The village had a most unsavory history. Unexplained disappearances, sudden deaths.People just vanished, never to be found.

The Secret of Ventriloquism


Jon Padgett - 2016
    With themes reminiscent of Shirley Jackson, Thomas Ligotti, and Bruno Schulz, but with a strikingly unique vision, Padgett's work explores the mystery of human suffering, the agony of personal existence, and the ghastly means by which someone might achieve salvation from both. A bullied child seeks vengeance within a bed's hollow box spring. A lucid dreamer is haunted by an impossible house. A dummy reveals its own anatomy in 20 simple steps. A stuttering librarian holds the key to a mill town's unspeakable secrets. A commuter's worldview is shattered by two words printed on a cardboard sign. An aspiring ventriloquist spends a little too much time looking at himself in a mirror. And a presence speaks through them all. Contents: Introduction by Matt Cardin The Mindfulness of Horror Practice Murmurs of a Voice Foreknown The Indoor Swamp Origami Dreams 20 Simple Steps to Ventriloquism Infusorium Organ Void The Secret of VentriloquismEscape to Thin Mountain

The Between


Tananarive Due - 1995
    Now, thirty years later, Hilton begins to think his borrowed time is running out. His wife, the only elected African–American judge in Dade County, Florida, has begun receiving racist hate mail from a man she once prosecuted, and Hilton's sleep is plagued by nightmares more horrible than any he has ever experienced.As he battles both the psychotic stalking of his family and the unseen enemy that haunts his sleep, Hilton's sense of reality is slipping away.

Beneath the Rising


Premee Mohamed - 2020
    When Johnny invents a clean reactor that could eliminate fossil fuels and change the world, she awakens primal, evil Ancient Ones set on subjugating humanity.From the oldest library in the world to the ruins of Nineveh, hunted at every turn, they will need to trust each other completely to surviveAll the Birds in the Sky meets Lovecraft Country in this whimsical coming-of-age story about two kids in the middle of a war of eldritch horrors from outside spacetime.

Charnel House


Graham Masterton - 1978
    . . . But Seymour Willis insisted his house was breathing and that he heard someone's - or something's - heartbeat pounding within the walls. So the disbelievers investigated, doubting the existence of ghosts or demons - until their reason was shattered by the shrieking unseen creature who threatened to claim their lives. By then it was too late to stop the fiendish force from wreaking vengeance upon those denying its very existence. One by one, they must die - in exchange for its eternally evil soul.