Heart-Shaped Box


Joe Hill - 2007
    -- so when his assistant tells him about a ghost for sale on an online auction site, he immediately puts in a bid and purchases it. The black, heart-shaped box that Coyne receives in the mail not only contains the suit of a dead man but also his vengeance-obsessed spirit. The ghost, it turns out, is the stepfather of a young groupie who committed suicide after the 54-year-old Coyne callously used her up and threw her away. Now, determined to kill Coyne and anyone who aids him, the merciless ghost of Craddock McDermott begins his assault on the rocker's sanity.

The Ghost in the Electric Blue Suit


Graham Joyce - 2013
    This is against the wishes of his family because it was at this resort that David's biological father disappeared fifteen years earlier--but something undeniable has called David there.Something different is happening in this town. David is haunted by eerie visions of a mysterious man carrying a rope, walking hand-in-hand with a small child, and the resort is under siege by a plague of ladybugs. When David gets embroiled in a fiercely torrid love triangle, the stakes turn more and more menacing, and through it all, David feels as though he is getting closer to the secrets of his own past.

The Last to See Me


M. Dressler - 2017
    Now, no one remembers her hardworking life and her grand dreams--but she remembers. She remembers everything. Emma Rose still walks the coves and cliffs of her village, one hundred years after her death . . . and she doesn't plan on leaving.But when a determined hunter arrives with instructions to "clean" Emma Rose out of her haunt, the stately Lambry mansion, death suddenly isn't the worst fate imaginable. Emma Rose refuses to be hounded from the only place she's ever found peace, even if it means waging a war on the living . . . and the dead.Lyrical and haunting, this spellbinding American ghost story alternates between Emma Rose's life and afterlife as the past and present become entwined in a compelling tale of love, loss, and tenacity over a century in the making.

The Boy in the Burgundy Hood


Steve Griffin - 2019
    Mired in debt, the elderly owners have transferred their beloved Bramley to a heritage trust. Alice must prepare it for opening to the public in the spring. But when the ghosts start appearing - the woman with the wounded hand and the boy in the burgundy hood - Alice realises why her predecessor might have left the isolated house so quickly. As she peels back the layers of the mystery, the secrets Alice uncovers haunting Bramley's heart will be dark - darker than she could ever have imagined...

Things Half in Shadow


Alan Finn - 2014
    The year is 1869, and the Civil War haunts the city of Philadelphia like a stubborn ghost. Mothers in black continue to mourn their lost sons. Photographs of the dead adorn dim sitting rooms. Maimed and broken men roam the streets. One of those men is Edward Clark, who is still tormented by what he saw during the war. Also constantly in his thoughts is another, more distant tragedy--the murder of his mother at the hands of his father, the famed magician Magellan Holmes...a crime that Edward witnessed when he was only ten. Now a crime reporter for one of the city's largest newspapers, Edward is asked to use his knowledge of illusions and visual trickery to expose the influx of mediums that descended on Philadelphia in the wake of the war. His first target is Mrs. Lucy Collins, a young widow who uses old-fashioned sleight of hand to prey on grieving families. Soon, Edward and Lucy become entwined in the murder of Lenora Grimes Pastor, the city's most highly regarded--and by all accounts, legitimate--medium, who dies mid-seance. With their reputations and livelihoods at risk, Edward and Lucy set out to find the real killer, and in the process unearth a terrifying hive of secrets that reaches well beyond Mrs. Pastor. Blending historical detail with flights of fancy, Things Half in Shadow is a riveting thriller where Medium and The Sixth Sense meet The Alienist--and where nothing is quite as it seems...

Liv, Forever


Amy Talkington - 2014
    Liv isn’t sure what to make of the school’s weird traditions and rituals, but she couldn’t be happier. For the first time ever, she has her own studio, her own supply of paints. Everything she could want. Then she meets Malcolm Astor, a legacy student, a fellow artist, and the one person who’s ever been able to melt her defenses. Liv’s only friend at Wickham, fellow scholarship kid Gabe Nichols, warns her not to get involved, but life is finally going Liv’s way, and all she wants to do is enjoy the ride. But Liv’s bliss is doomed. Weeks after arriving, she is viciously murdered and, in death, she discovers that she’s the latest victim of a dark conspiracy that has claimed many lives. Cursed with the ability to see the many ghosts on Wickham’s campus, Gabe is now Liv’s only link to the world of the living. To Malcolm. Together, Liv, Gabe, and Malcolm fight to expose the terrible truth that haunts the halls of Wickham. But Liv must fight alone to come to grips with the ultimate star-crossed love.

The Bell Witch


John F.D. Taff - 2013
     It's 1817, and Tennessee is on the western frontier as America expands into the unknown. In idyllic Adams County, home of the Bell family, there exists a collection of tight-knit rural communities with deeply held beliefs. And even more deeply buried secrets. Jack and Lucy Bell operate a prosperous family farm northwest of Nashville where life with their many children is peaceful. Simple country life. That is until those secrets take on a life of their own and refuse to remain unspoken. Much has been written about the legend of the Bell Witch of Tennessee, but the details of the Bell family's terrifying experience with the supernatural have never been told in quite the way that Bram Stoker Award-nominated horror author John F.D. Taff has conceived. In his novel, for the first time, the Witch has her own say. And what she reveals about the incident and the dark motivations behind her appearance reaches way beyond a traditional haunting. Forget what you've read about this wholly American legend. What you believe you know about the mysterious occurrences on the Bell farm are wrong. Uncover the long-hidden reality that's far more horrifying than any ghost story you've ever heard.

A Sudden Light


Garth Stein - 2014
    Built from the spoils of a massive timber fortune, the legendary family mansion is constructed of giant, whole trees, and is set on a huge estate overlooking Puget Sound. Trevor’s bankrupt parents have begun a trial separation, and his father, Jones Riddell, has brought Trevor to Riddell House with a goal: to join forces with his sister, Serena, dispatch Grandpa Samuel—who is flickering in and out of dementia—to a graduated living facility, sell off the house and property for development into “tract housing for millionaires,” divide up the profits, and live happily ever after.But Trevor soon discovers there’s someone else living in Riddell House: a ghost with an agenda of his own. For while the land holds tremendous value, it is also burdened by the final wishes of the family patriarch, Elijah, who mandated it be allowed to return to untamed forestland as a penance for the millions of trees harvested over the decades by the Riddell Timber company. The ghost will not rest until Elijah’s wish is fulfilled, and Trevor’s willingness to face the past holds the key to his family’s future.A Sudden Light is a rich, atmospheric work that is at once a multigenerational family saga, a historical novel, a ghost story, and the story of a contemporary family’s struggle to connect with each other. A tribute to the natural beauty of the Pacific Northwest, it reflects Garth Stein’s outsized capacity for empathy and keen understanding of human motivation, and his rare ability to see the unseen: the universal threads that connect us all

Half-Minute Horrors


Susan RichMelissa Marr - 2009
    Stine, Holly Black, Brett Helquist, and many more. You’ll never look at your closest door, your cat, your sock drawer, or even yourself in the mirror the same way again.

The White Devil


Justin Evans - 2011
    When seventeen-year-old Andrew Taylor is transplanted from his American high school to a British boarding school—a high-profile academy for the sons of England’s finest—his father hopes that the boy’s dark past will not follow him from across the Atlantic. But blood, suspense, and intrigue quickly surround Andrew once again as he finds himself struggling with a deadly mystery left unsolved by a student from Harrow School’s past—the enigmatic poet Lord Byron.

The Saturday Night Ghost Club


Craig Davidson - 2018
    The summer Jake turns twelve, he befriends a pair of siblings new to town, and so Calvin decides to initiate them all into the "Saturday Night Ghost Club." But as the summer goes on, what begins as a seemingly lighthearted project may ultimately uncover more than any of its members had imagined. With the alternating warmth and sadness of the best coming-of-age stories, The Saturday Night Ghost Club examines the haunting mutability of memory and storytelling, as well as the experiences that form the people we become.

Ghost at Dusk


Kevan Dale - 2019
    One psychotic demon. And only one will win.Tim died on Halloween, 1981. Last year, he haunted his elderly father from the house. But he’s still a captive, tormented—and more determined than ever to slip free from the chains of the past.The only thing standing in his way is the demon who killed him.Determined and alone, Tim readies his plan to leave behind the joys, the tragedies, and the memories of the only home he’s ever known. But before he can make his escape, another family moves in. One of the new family members is Alyssa, a teenage girl who becomes obsessed with finding out what happened in 1981. Within weeks of their moving in, Tim devises a way to communicate with her.When their connection leads them to realize he’s not the demon’s only prisoner, they discover a dark secret—one the demon will do anything to defend.What really happened on Halloween in 1981? What kept Tim from reaching the other prisoners? And how far will the demon go to stop him now?From the bestselling author of The Books of Conjury comes this darkly funny, chilling novel of contemporary horror.

The Lonely Dead


April Henry - 2019
    But in this genre-bending YA thriller, she must first manage to avoid becoming a target herself.For Adele, the dead aren’t really dead. She can see them and even talk to them. But she’s spent years denying her gift. When she encounters her ex best friend Tori in a shallow grave in the woods and realizes that Tori is actually dead -- that gift turns into a curse. Without an alibi, Adele becomes the prime suspect in Tori’s murder. She must work with Tori’s ghost to find the real killer. But what if the killer finds Adele first?Master mystery-write April Henry adds a chilling paranormal twist to this incredibly suspenseful young adult novel.

The Voodoo Killings


Kristi Charish - 2016
    Kristi Charish's The Voodoo Killings introduces Kincaid Strange, not your average voodoo practitioner... For starters, she's only 27. Then there's the fact that she lives in rain-soaked Seattle, which is not exactly Haiti. And she's broke. With raising zombies outlawed throughout the continental USA, Kincaid has to eke out a living running seances for university students with more money than brains who are desperate for guitar lessons with the ghost of a Seattle grunge rocker--who happens to be Kincaid's on-again, off-again roommate. Then a stray zombie turns up outside her neighbourhood bar: Cameron Wight, an up-and-coming visual artist with no recollection of how he died or who raised him. Not only is it dangerous for Kincaid to be caught with an unauthorized zombie, she soon realizes he's tied to a spate of murders: someone is targeting the zombies and voodoo practitioners in Seattle's infamous Underground City, a paranormal hub. When the police refuse to investigate, the City's oldest and foremost zombie asks Kincaid to help. Raising ghosts and zombies is one thing, but finding a murderer? She's broke, but she's not stupid. And then she becomes the target...As the saying goes, when it rains it pours, especially in Seattle.

Carnacki: Heaven and Hell


William Meikle - 2010
    It includes six interior illustrations from artist Wayne Miller.All new tales of William Hope Hodgson's Carnacki.Meet an Edwardian occult detective who goes where no other gentleman will dare. Nine stories and a novella that take Carnacki deep into neolithic barrows, into the crypts of ancient cathedrals and see him fighting the elemental powers of darkness on his own terms.The Blooded Iklwa: A malevolent spirit is intent on blood. Can Carnacki identify the source of the attacks and stop the Zulu blade from its nightly haunting? Or will his client be forced to suffer a death of a thousand cuts?The Larkhill Barrow: A pounding terror has been called up out of Salisbury Plain; an ancient darkness that will haunt your dreams.The Sisters of Mercy: Battle hardened old soldiers lie sick abed in fear for their souls. Only someone with intimate knowledge of the powers of darkness can help them.The Hellfire Mirror: The rituals of an infamous club have left their mark on a mirror, leading Carnacki into a fight to stop his own home from being overrun with the forces of darkness.The Beast of Glamys: Danger to the daughter of a Scottish Lord leads Carnacki to a remote castle, and the uncovering of the secret behind a legend that has persisted for centuries.The Tomb of Pygea: Something serpentine whispers in the dark under Admiralty Arch, and only Carnacki has the skills, and the nerve, to descend, and to listen.The Lusitania: A cruise ship is berthed in Liverpool, deserted by passengers and crew, stuck in port until Carnacki can remove the cause of their terror; apparitions of disaster and shipwreckThe Haunted Oak: Ghosts of the recent dead walk beneath its spreading boughs and the Church needs Carnacki's expertise. But some things are best left to take their course -- natural, or supernatural.The Shoreditch Worm: When one of the churches of London changes its chimes, something old starts to wake. Can Carnacki stop it before it is too late?The Dark Island: Carnacki uncovers a gateway to a dark realm of magic and myth, where the far future of our planet can be touched and seen, if a man has the stomach for it.Meet Carnacki: Ghosthunter.