Book picks similar to
A Voice So Soft by Patrick Lacey
horror
grindhouse-press
humor
gore
My Pet Serial Killer
Michael J. Seidlinger - 2013
“Be mine, she said. “I didn’t know anything until she came along.“She told me I had ‘full of fight’ tattooed on my insides and then she made me believe it. The first time I took someone for her I knew it was true. I was a taker. She told me she only loved the takers of this world. Of course, we all eventually get taken in the end. You know what I remember from that first time though? The sounds. It almost like the sound a baby makes when it’s sighing. That’s how quiet it is. I just kept needing that sound over and over again. So I took and I took and I took and I took and I took some more. “Of course, I couldn’t go deep enough for her in the end. She poured salt on me and I melted into nothing.“You know that old saying? She was the type of person who tells you that dragons don’t exist, and then she leads you to their caves. I never even really called her by her name even. I never really called her Claire. I just thought of her as god. I asked her what it was like studying forensics and she told me that once you know about the invisible world then the visible world didn’t matter anymore.“She told me the visible world is what we’re all trying to get away from. I just wanted to become invisible with her.”- Scott M., aka “Scott the Slaughter,” serving back-to-back life sentences at Montgomery State Prison.“This book defies categorization: A new kind of serial killer story that pushes and prods in all the unexpected directions. You’ve never read anything quite like this.”–Carlton Mellick III, author of Kill Ball“Michael Seidlinger’s swift-moving novel is an interesting addition to the genre, with all kinds of offbeat touches there for the connoisseur. He reminds me, in style, of some of the Swedish crime-writers we’ve seen. The narrative moves quickly towards a satisfying payoff.”–Todd Grimson, author of Stainless“‘And now they’re talking about media icons and murder’: Michael J. Seidlinger’s strange tale of Claire Wilkinson, forensics major, and her ‘Gentleman Killer’ is a wonderful romp through American wound culture, exploring the connection between art, media, serial killing, romance and anonymity. It reshapes the college romance plot as a wing of JG Ballard’s The Atrocity Exhibition.”–Johannes Göransson, author of Entrance to a colonial pageant in which we all begin to intricate“A rowdy menagerie of the unexpected, this book will delight and disturb even the bravest of readers; all preconceptions of what to trust and what to fear are masterfully upended within these pages.”–Alissa Nutting, author of Unclean Jobs for Women and Girls
The Sandman Slim Series Books 1-4
Richard Kadrey - 2013
Or, if you’re James Stark, you spend eleven years in Hell as a hitman before finally escaping, only to land back in the hell-on-earth that is Los Angeles.Now Stark’s back, and ready for revenge. And absolution, and maybe even love. But when his first stop saddles him with an abusive talking head, Stark discovers that the road to absolution and revenge is much longer than you’d expect, and both Heaven and Hell have their own ideas for his future.Resurrection sucks. Saving the world is worse.Darkly twisted, irreverent, and completely hilarious, the Sandman Slim series is the must-read.Includes: Sandman Slim, Kill the Dead, Aloha From Hell and Devil Said Bang.
Here There Are Monsters
Amelinda Bérubé - 2019
Moving across the country seems like the perfect chance to start over.In their isolated new neighborhood, Skye manages to fit in, but Deirdre withdraws from everyone, becoming fixated on the swampy woods behind their house and building monstrous sculptures out of sticks and bones.Then Deirdre disappears.And when something awful comes scratching at Skye's window in the middle of the night, claiming she's the only one who can save Deirdre, Skye knows she will stop at nothing to bring her sister home.
The Warm Glow of Happy Homes
Andersen Prunty - 2012
The theme: Mexico Frat Funland. There are going to be khaki cargo shorts, red cups, even a pinata. Maybe sombreros. Team Klaus will be there to DJ the event. But it won't be without its challenges. People are canceling left and right. No one seems to be acting the way they should and space birds are ripping the sky apart. What is intended to be the social event of the summer totters on the brink of becoming a violent nightmare.
The Ghost of Hooker Alley (Shingles Book 1)
Robert Bevan - 2018
Open at your own risk. Sarah and Tommy have the same kinds of problems as most any ten-year-old girl and six-year-old boy. Homework, bullies, Dad not going in to work since Mom ran off to fuck the postman. That sort of thing. But they're not going to take their problems lying down. After a quick bus ride into town to buy a gun, they think their problems are all but solved. That is, until a creepy weirdo follows them into an alley. But they aren't the only ones in that alley. What they discover will make you soil your pants in terror. It will make your skin crawl. It might even give you... Shingles.
Iron Maiden: Legacy of the Beast
Llexi Leon - 2018
"When dark forces conspire to corrupt the fabric of reality, Eddie's immortal soul is shattered and strewn across the cosmos - his unbound essence corrupting countless worlds! Now, a weakened, primal Eddie must journey across space and time to battle the twisted legions of The Beast, seek out the lost shards of his soul, and bring order to the realms!" The first official Iron Maiden comic series, based on the band's hit mobile role playing game - Iron Maiden: Legacy of The Beast - where players battle as Eddie across the many worlds of Iron Maiden's discography, from the ancient sands of Powerslave to the far future of the Final Frontier.
BIG HAIR AND FLYING COWS
Dolores Wilson - 2014
To say the least. She calls Sweet Meadow, Georgia, home, where she works for her father doing auto repairs. She also drives the tow-truck, although Sweet Meadow's rather colorful denizens tend to treat Bertie more like the local, free taxi service. You know, someone has to get to a doctor's appointment or pick something up at the dry cleaners. Bertie's favorite day of the week is Friday, when she leaves the wrecker with her father for the whole weekend and joins her friends at the Dew Drop Inn for a night of dancing. Her best friend, Mary Lou, sometimes fixes her up with dubious dates, although Bertie has to remind her friend not to tease her hair too high for those occasions. Like the time when they went to Carrie Sue's open house, and a ceramic cow with angel wings hanging from a ceiling fan locked its hooves into Bertie's big hair and refused to let go. She had to wear it all night, dangling chain and all. Bertie's nearly perfect life is about to take a downhill turn, however. It starts when her landlord, Pete, currently a resident in a nearby nursing home, starts showing up at her house. In his birthday suit. A very badly wrinkled birthday suit. And then she goes to her mailbox, a rubber large mouth bass, and finds a notice from the zoning commission saying she can no longer park the wrecker in her driveway. The notice is signed by George Bigham. But when she goes to the courthouse to take care of her little problem, it is only to discover George Bigham is deceased. And Mary Lou's pregnancy test just came up positive. Can it get any worse? In a word... yes.
Blood and Salt
Kim Liggett - 2015
You will be all in—blood and salt.” These are the last words Ash Larkin hears before her mother returns to the spiritual commune she escaped long ago. But when Ash follows her to Quivira, Kansas, something sinister and ancient waits among the rustling cornstalks of this village lost to time. Ash is plagued by memories of her ancestor, Katia, which harken back to the town’s history of unrequited love and murder, alchemy and immortality. Charming traditions soon give way to a string of gruesome deaths, and Ash feels drawn to Dane, a forbidden boy with secrets of his own. As the community prepares for a ceremony five hundred years in the making, Ash must fight not only to save her mother, but herself—and discover the truth about Quivira before it’s too late. Before she’s all in—blood and salt.
Deadlocked Dollhouse
Mixi J. Applebottom - 2017
He remembered his own excitement as a child, innocent and sweet, and just wanted to give his daughters a present to remember. They certainly won't forget this dollhouse. It's cursed, and he doesn't know how to stop it, and all he wanted to do was be a good father.
The Living Dead
George A. Romero - 2020
A pair of medical examiners find themselves facing a dead man who won’t stay dead.It spreads quickly. In a Midwestern trailer park, an African American teenage girl and a Muslim immigrant battle newly-risen friends and family.On a US aircraft carrier, living sailors hide from dead ones while a fanatic preaches the gospel of a new religion of death.At a cable news station, a surviving anchor keeps broadcasting, not knowing if anyone is watching, while his undead colleagues try to devour him.In DC, an autistic federal employee charts the outbreak, preserving data for a future that may never come.Everywhere, people are targeted by both the living and the dead.We think we know how this story ends.We. Are. Wrong.
Break the Bodies, Haunt the Bones
Micah Dean Hicks - 2019
Their ghosts were thickest near the abandoned downtown, where so many of the town’s hopes had died generation by generation. They lingered in the places that mattered to them, and people avoided those streets, locked those doors, stopped going into those rooms... They could hurt you. Worse, they could change you.Jane is haunted. Since she was a child, she has carried a ghost girl that feeds on the secrets and fears of everyone around her, whispering to Jane what they are thinking and feeling, even when she doesn’t want to know. Henry, Jane’s brother, is ridden by a genius ghost that forces him to build strange and dangerous machines. Their mother is possessed by a lonely spirit that burns anyone she touches. In Swine Hill, a place of defeat and depletion, there are more dead than living.When new arrivals begin scoring precious jobs at the last factory in town, both the living and the dead are furious. This insult on the end of a long economic decline sparks a conflagration. Buffeted by rage on all sides, Jane must find a way to save her haunted family and escape the town before it kills them.
Afterlife with Archie, Vol. 1: Escape from Riverdale
Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa - 2014
Archie and the gang go where they've never been before -- to the grave and back! A horrific accident sets off a series of grim events and Sabrina the Teenage Witch must try to repair the unspeakable evil her spell has unleashed. Gasp in horror as Riverdale faces an impending zombie Arch-pocalypse in this spine-tingling ongoing series -- but be warned, kiddies, this one's not for the faint of heart! For TEEN+ readers.Collects Afterlife with Archie #1-5
A Lush and Seething Hell: Two Tales of Cosmic Horror
John Hornor Jacobs - 2019
P. Lovecraft, The Sea Dreams It Is the Sky examines life in a South American dictatorship. Centered on the journal of a poet-in-exile and his failed attempts at translating a maddening text, it is told by a young woman trying to come to grips with a country that nearly devoured itself.In My Heart Struck Sorrow, a librarian discovers a recording from the Deep South—which may be the musical stylings of the Devil himself.Breathtaking and haunting, A Lush and Seething Hell is a terrifying and exhilarating journey into the darkness, an odyssey into the deepest reaches of ourselves that compels us to confront secrets best left hidden.
Those Across the River
Christopher Buehlman - 2011
At first, the quaint, rural ways of their new neighbors seem to be everything they wanted. But there is an unspoken dread that the townsfolk have lived with for generations. A presence that demands sacrifice. It comes from the shadowy woods across the river, where the ruins of Savoyard still stand. Where a longstanding debt of blood has never been forgotten. A debt that has been waiting patiently for Frank Nichols's homecoming...
Savage Jungle: Lair of the Orang Pendek
Hunter Shea - 2017
Henrik Kooper watched his father die at the brutal hands of the orange-haired ape men. Having barely survived helping twins Natalie and Austin McQueen discover and destroy the beasts lurking in Loch Ness, it’s now his turn for vengeance. Within the treacherous jungles of Sumatra lies the fabled lost city of Gadang Ur. Its secrets are guarded by a savage band of Orang Pendek who lord over the strange and deadly creatures of the hidden land. Utter madness is the lifeblood of Gadang Ur. Henrik’s journey into darkness will take them to the ragged edge of hell on Earth. Some places were never meant to be discovered.