Book picks similar to
The Red Girl by Luke Walker


horror
contemporary
paranormal
action-adventure

The Impossible Julian Strande: Complete Box Set


Kathryn Ann Kingsley - 2020
    and he won't take no for an answer. Read the whole series with all the deleted content included!As eager as Alice was to start her new job, she got far more than she bargained for when entering employment at Strande Estate. Inexplicable noises. Haunting legends. A sexy-as-they-come amateur magician. And…an enticingly wicked ghost.Alice didn’t believe in anything paranormal when she arrived, but each day that passes leaves her questioning things she never thought she would—like whether or not her gorgeous boss was as magically gifted in the bedroom as he was at illusions.But deep within the walls of the Strande manor, a malevolent spirit has taken a keen interest in the new caretaker. Thrilled to have a new plaything at his disposal, he has devilish games planned for the unsuspecting Alice.Will she make it out of the Strande Estate alive? Or be lured into the seductive darkness?

The Bloodline


C.S. Feldman - 2017
    But it turns out to be harder than she expected, and not just because of the estranged step-family waiting for her—Because maybe Kat’s mind was never playing tricks on her after all, and maybe the manor harbors a far more malevolent presence than she ever dreamed...

Between Seasons


Aida Brassington - 2011
    And after his parents leave the house, he's trapped without company -- until a mysterious woman who can channel his memories buys the house forty years later. The spring brings with it new life, but falling in love with the new owner may only bring heartbreak to them both

Blood & Sawdust


Jason S. Ridler - 2012
    But nothing prepared him for Milkwood: a fat, ugly bastard who could take a beating like a government mule, but never, ever won. So when Malcolm risks his life to discover Milkwood's secret, he convinces the fighter to stop being a punching bag and to go for broke in the local tournament. Only problem? A beautiful woman called Lash who needs Milkwood for her own purposes, and a fouler creature on her heels known only as Dizzy Colt. But for Malcolm and Milkwood? Hell, it’s just another day of Blood and SawdustPRAISE FOR BLOOD AND SAWDUST!"With wicked, playful prose that blends the best of pulp with the supernatural, Jason Ridler’s Blood and Sawdust creates an unholy, hell-raising hybrid, the kind of tale Christopher Moore and Jim Thompson might swap after a long night of drinking, trying to one-up one another with acerbic absurdity." Joe Clifford, Author of CHOICE CUTS and JUNKIE LOVEPRAISE FOR THE WORK OF JASON RIDLER!"An exciting new writer." Lucius Shepard, multiple-award-winning author of HANDBOOK OF AMERICAN PRAYER. “Jason Ridler is kind of like a bull rider who’s tossed a saddle on a Tiger tank, and he’s riding that bucking sucker for all he’s worth, because, hey, no one told him that he couldn’t do it, did they? So here he is, the Man in the Barbed-Wire Straitjacket." Norman Partridge, Award Winning Author of DARK HARVEST. "Jason Ridler’s work is intense and taut, with incredible characters and plots that keep your mind buzzing long after you’ve reached the final page." Trent Zelazny, author of TOO LATE TO CALL TEXAS, and FRACTAL DESPONDENCY. ABOUT THE AUTHORJason S. Ridler is the author of BLOOD AND SAWDUST, the Spar Battersea thrillers (DEATH MATCH, CON JOB and DICE ROLL), the short story collection KNOCKOUTS, and has published over fifty stories in such magazines and anthologies as Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Brain Harvest, Chilling Tales, and more. His popular non-fiction has appeared in Clarkesworld, Dark Scribe, and the Internet Review of Science Fiction. A former punk rock musician and cemetery groundskeeper, Mr. Ridler holds a Ph.D. in War Studies from the Royal Military College of Canada. Visit him at twitter at http://twitter.com/JayRidler, Facebook ,http://www.facebook.com/Ridlerville, or his writing blog, Ridlerville, atwww.jsridler.com

House of Echoes


Brendan Duffy - 2015
    Ben has hit a dead end with his new novel, Caroline has lost her banking job, and eight-year-old Charlie is being bullied at his Manhattan school.When Ben inherits land in the village of Swannhaven, in a remote corner of upstate New York, the Tierneys believe it’s just the break they need, and they leave behind all they know to restore a sprawling estate. But as Ben uncovers Swannhaven’s chilling secrets and Charlie ventures deeper into the surrounding forest, strange things begin to happen. The Tierneys realize that their new home isn’t the fresh start they needed . . . and that the village’s haunting saga is far from over.House of Echoes is a novel that shows how sometimes the ties that bind us are the only things that can keep us whole.

The Woman in the Dark


Vanessa Savage - 2019
    But after her mother's death, Sarah spirals into depression and overdoses on sleeping pills. While Sarah claims it was an accident, her teenage children aren't so sure. Patrick decides they all need a fresh start and he knows just the place, since the idyllic family home where he was raised has recently come up for sale. There's only one catch: for the past fifteen years, it has become infamous as the "Murder House", standing empty after a family was stabbed to death within its walls.Patrick believes they can bring the house back to its former glory, so Sarah, uprooted from everything she knows, pours her energy into painting, gardening, and giving the rotting old structure the warmth of home. But with locals hinting that the house is haunted, the news that the murderer has been paroled, strange writing on the walls, and creepy "gifts" arriving on the doorstep at odd hours, Sarah can't shake the feeling that something just isn't right. Not with the house, not with the town, or even with her own, loving husband--whose stories about his perfect childhood suddenly aren't adding up. Can Sarah uncover the secrets of the Murder House before another family is destroyed?

Thirteen Storeys


Jonathan Sims - 2020
    Penthouse access is available via the broken freight elevator. Black tie optional.A dinner party is held in the penthouse of a multimillion-pound development. All the guests are strangers - even to their host, the billionaire owner of the building. None of them know why they were selected to receive his invitation. Whether privileged or deprived, besides a postcode, they share only one thing in common - they've all experienced a shocking disturbance within the building's walls.By the end of the night, their host is dead, and none of the guests ever said what happened. His death remains one of the biggest unsolved mysteries - until now.But are you ready for their stories?Jonathan Sims' debut is a darkly twisted, genre-bending journey through one of the most innovative haunted houses you'll ever dare to enter.

The Last Days of Jack Sparks


Jason Arnopp - 2016
    No stranger to controversy, he'd already triggered a furious Twitter storm by mocking an exorcism he witnessed.Then there was that video: forty seconds of chilling footage that Jack repeatedly claimed was not of his making, yet was posted from his own YouTube account.Nobody knew what happened to Jack in the days that followed - until now.

The Sleep Tight Motel


Lisa Unger - 2018
    Check in for the night with New York Times bestselling author Lisa Unger.Eve has a fake ID, a .38, and a violent lover receding in the rearview mirror. He’ll never find her at the isolated motel, and its kindly manager is happy to ease her fears. But if Eve is the only guest, whom does she keep hearing on the other side of the wall? Eve won’t get a good night’s rest until she finds out.Lisa Unger’s The Sleep Tight Motel is part of Dark Corners, a collection of seven heart-stopping short stories by bestselling authors who give you so many new reasons to be afraid. Each story can be read in a single sitting. Or, if you have the nerve, you can listen all by yourself in the dark.

House of Echoes


Barbara Erskine - 1996
    Eager to begin a new life there with Luke, her husband, and Tom, her small son, she is also impatient to find out about her newly discovered family who lived there for generations.But not long after they move in, Tom wakes screaming at night. Joss hears echoing voices and senses an invisible presence, watching her from the shadows. Are they spirits from the past? Or is she imagining them? As she learns, with mounting horror, of Belheddon's tragic and dramatic history, her fear grows very real, for she realises that both her family and her own sanity are at the mercy of a violent and powerful energy which seems beyond anyone's control.

The Scarlets


Madeleine Roux - 2014
    But Cal wasn't always the cold, sarcastic guy he is now. In this digital original story preceding the events of Sanctum, we meet Cal when he is experiencing college like any other kid with a group of close friends and a dad who piles on the pressure. Only, when the pressure starts getting to him and Cal accepts an invitation to meet a selective group of students and alumni known only as the Scarlets, the course of Cal's life changes forever. And the price of joining the Scarlets might be higher than he can pay.With plenty of twists, turns, and thrills, The Scarlets is an exhilarating installment in the Asylum series that can stand on its own for new readers or provide a missing piece of the puzzle for series fans.

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.

Mr. Splitfoot


Samantha Hunt - 2016
    Splitfoot tracks two women in two times as they march toward a mysterious reckoning.Ruth and Nat are orphans, packed into a house full of abandoned children run by a religious fanatic. To entertain their siblings, they channel the dead. Decades later, Ruth’s niece, Cora, finds herself accidentally pregnant. After years of absence, Aunt Ruth appears, mute and full of intention. She is on a mysterious mission, leading Cora on an odyssey across the entire state of New York on foot. Where is Ruth taking them? Where has she been? And who — or what — has she hidden in the woods at the end of the road?In an ingeniously structured dual narrative, two separate timelines move toward the same point of crisis. Their merging will upend and reinvent the whole. A subversive ghost story that is carefully plotted and elegantly constructed, Mr. Splitfoot will set your heart racing and your brain churning. Mysteries abound, criminals roam free, utopian communities show their age, the mundane world intrudes on the supernatural and vice versa.

Unholy Hunger


Heather James - 2013
    As long as her daughter's murderer dies with her, she is ready to go. Why did this man—this stranger—destroy her family? Why has he not been brought to justice? Why is she forced to live a life of anger and grief? Amid a million questions she cannot answer, Evelyn knows one thing for sure: this murderer must be punished for his crime. Perhaps the harder lesson is this: the ultimate truth—of crime and verdict, of life and death—cannot be swayed by a mother's revenge.In this first book of a new, page-turning series, a woman will be brought to her limits before she finally recognizes the movement of the Holy Spirit and reconnects with the source of true peace.

Death Ain't But A Word


Zander Marks - 2012
    And they've been haunting him since he was seven years old. Mostly he ignores them.But when the ghost of his childhood friend shows up at the local motel, Wilkin can't ignore the call of friendship. And when his friend's killer buys the motel so he can destroy the remains, Wilkin can't ignore that, either.Wilkin steals his friend's skull before the killer can destroy it and is plunged into a hot mess of a supernatural thrill ride.A death-race pursuit of a child's skull. A ghost-talking trucker hauling plush toys to Kansas. Five demonic farm-kids in a housing project. A Dodge City marshal with justice on his mind. And a graveyard full of snitches.It's enough to make you want to hit the crackpipe. All leading to a climax where staying alive is the least of Wilkin's worries.Because when most of the people around you are spirits anyway, DEATH AIN'T BUT A WORD.