Book picks similar to
Naming the Bones by Laura Mauro


horror
novellas
weird-fiction
lib-pros

Slice and Dice


Jeff Strand - 2021
    Desperate to win back his father’s approval, the boy hatches a plan involving his father’s love of slasher films. If the boy can become a real-life slasher right out of the movies, it just might be an opportunity to make his father proud again, no matter what the cost.In Iain Rob Wright’s “The Reckoning,” the year is 2035 and people live inside their individual worlds. Amelie’s ‘pod’ is a marvel of tech-centric existence, taking care of her every need. But when a serial killer that the press have named ’The Reckoning’ comes calling for Amelie, her futuristic living space turns deadly.In William Malmborg's "Billy's Blade," a budding serial killer bites off more than he can chew when he tries to stab Stacy Collins to death on the Prairie Path. A ruthless investigative journalist, Stacy goes on the offensive, goading the killer with unflattering articles, all in hopes of sparking a second encounter. Will Billy and Stacy meet again?Jeff Strand’s “Twentieth Anniversary Screening” recounts the grisly events surrounding the terrible slasher flick THE ROOFER, remembered only because an obsessed fan tried to reenact the murders as they played out on the screen. When the same theater shows the film twenty years later, will the warnings that this is a really, really bad idea be justified?

Hammers on Bone


Cassandra Khaw - 2016
    He’s been hired by a ten-year-old to kill the kid’s stepdad, McKinsey. The man in question is abusive, abrasive, and abominable. He’s also a monster, which makes Persons the perfect thing to hunt him. Over the course of his ancient, arcane existence, he’s hunted gods and demons, and broken them in his teeth.As Persons investigates the horrible McKinsey, he realizes that he carries something far darker. He’s infected with an alien presence, and he’s spreading that monstrosity far and wide. Luckily Persons is no stranger to the occult, being an ancient and magical intelligence himself. The question is whether the private dick can take down the abusive stepdad without releasing the holds on his own horrifying potential.At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Concourse D with Love


Cassandra B. - 2020
    Take the step into the unknown and find what you’ve been missing.”Those words lead Kelani Thomas into a forty-eight-hour adventure with a handsome, alluring, mysterious stranger. With Kelani missing a flight and Israel’s flight was delayed a spark was ignited in the Sky Lounge of Concourse D. But after the haze of lust evaporates in forty-eight hours can the raw emotions formed last?Join Kelani and Israel for the ride and find out.

Flyaway


Kathleen Jennings - 2020
    In a small Western Queensland town, a reserved young woman receives a note from one of her vanished brothers—a note that makes question her memories of their disappearance and her father’s departure.A beguiling story that proves that gothic delights and uncanny family horror can live—and even thrive—under a burning sun, Flyaway introduces readers to Bettina Scott, whose search for the truth throws her into tales of eerie dogs, vanished schools, cursed monsters, and enchanted bottles.In these pages Jennings assures you that gothic delights, uncanny family horror, and strange, unsettling prose can live—and even thrive—under a burning sun.Holly Black describes as “half mystery, half fairy tale, all exquisitely rendered and full of teeth.” Flyaway enchants you with the sly, beautiful darkness of Karen Russell and a world utterly its own.

Subject 11


Jeffrey Thomas - 2011
    We are currently seeking 10 individuals to participate in a research study. Participants shall receive a sum to be discussed during initial telephone interview. Interested parties should email us via our contact page, subject11.webs.com, providing their telephone number and a brief biography of approximately 100 words, describing themselves in terms of gender, age, race, and occupation if any. The study will take place in a series of abandoned buildings rented for this purpose. Note: subjects involved in this test may find themselves experiencing certain psychological distortions. They may experience lapses in memory regarding others and themselves. Subjects may even forget how long this test is supposed to go on for. And please disregard any additional people you may feel you've sighted in the complex, beyond those in the test group. We thank you for your interest in our research. “Cutting right to the chase, SUBJECT 11 is one of the best novellas I've read all year. Jeffrey Thomas is at his best in this eerie story following a group of ten people (five women and five men) taking part in a mysterious experiment...The mysteries are enticing, and Thomas brings them together for an ending that is sure to linger long in the minds of readers.” - Justin Steele, THE ARKHAM DIGEST

Tip of the Dagger


Kate Avery Ellison - 2017
    But sometimes, even the most loyal have second thoughts. Author's note: This is a novella set between the events of A GIFT OF POISON (Book #1 of the Kingmakers' War series) and A BED OF BLADES (Book #2 of the Kingmakers' War series).

The Duke's Inconvenient Bride


Eva Grace - 2018
    When one of the Duke's former lovers manipulates it so that Raff and Catherine are caught in a compromising situation the pair are forced into a hasty marriage of convenience, one that Catherine fears will end in disaster. Raff William James D'Alton, Sixth Duke of Albright had always been a huge admirer of wives --provided that they belonged to other men, of course. When his old love takes her revenge by forcing him into an unwanted marriage with a dowdy spinster, Raff vows that he will not let an inconvenient thing like a bride ruin his bachelor lifestyle. However, as time passes Raff and Catherine begin to realise that the sparks that fly between the pair have more to do with attraction than tension and that this inconvenient marriage might just have a happy ending --if only they'll allow it.

Witch of the Water


B.B. Griffith - 2017
    His son, Rowan, will follow in his footsteps, just like Matthew followed in the footsteps of his father before him. Soon, Matthew will have to share with Rowan the dark secret that their family keeps. The lighthouses must always shine at night because their light does much more than guide ships safely in…it also keeps a terrible evil out. When the storm of the century puts the lighthouses in danger, Rowan finds himself following in his father’s footsteps sooner than he thought, where he’ll come face to face with the greatest fear he’s ever known. The Witch of the Water.

Margaret the First


Danielle Dutton - 2016
    The eccentric Margaret wrote and published volumes of poems, philosophy, feminist plays, and utopian science fiction at a time when “being a writer” was not an option open to women. As one of the Queen’s attendants and the daughter of prominent Royalists, she was exiled to France when King Charles I was overthrown. As the English Civil War raged on, Margaret met and married William Cavendish, who encouraged her writing and her desire for a career. After the War, her work earned her both fame and infamy in England: at the dawn of daily newspapers, she was “Mad Madge,” an original tabloid celebrity. Yet Margaret was also the first woman to be invited to the Royal Society of London—a mainstay of the Scientific Revolution—and the last for another two hundred years.Margaret the First is very much a contemporary novel set in the past, rather than “historical fiction.” Written with lucid precision and sharp cuts through narrative time, it is a gorgeous and wholly new narrative approach to imagining the life of a historical woman.

Fever Dream


Samanta Schweblin - 2014
    A boy named David sits beside her. She’s not his mother. He’s not her child. Together, they tell a haunting story of broken souls, toxins, and the power and desperation of family. Fever Dream is a nightmare come to life, a ghost story for the real world, a love story and a cautionary tale. One of the freshest new voices to come out of the Spanish language and translated into English for the first time, Samanta Schweblin creates an aura of strange psychological menace and otherworldly reality in this absorbing, unsettling, taut novel.

The Only Harmless Great Thing


Brooke Bolander - 2018
    Around the same time, an Indian elephant was deliberately put to death by electricity in Coney Island.These are the facts.Now these two tragedies are intertwined in a dark alternate history of rage, radioactivity, and injustice crying out to be righted. Prepare yourself for a wrenching journey that crosses eras, chronicling histories of cruelty both grand and petty in search of meaning and justice.

The Beauty


Aliya Whiteley - 2014
    For when the women are all gone the rest of your life is all there is for everyone. The men are waiting to pass into the night.The story shall be told to preserve the past. History has gone back to its aural roots and the power of words is strong. Meet Nate, the storyteller, and the new secrets he brings back from the woods. William rules the group with youth and strength, but how long can that last? And what about Uncle Ted, who spends so much time out in the woods?Hear the tales, watch a myth be formed. For what can man hope to achieve in a world without women? When the past is only grief how long should you hold on to it? What secrets can the forest offer to change it all? Discover the Beauty.

Ice


Anna Kavan - 1967
    The country has been invaded and is being governed by a secret organization. There is destruction everywhere; great walls of ice overrun the world. Together with the narrator, the reader is swept into a hallucinatory quest for this strange and fragile creature with albino hair. Acclaimed upon its 1967 publication as the best science fiction book of the year, this extraordinary and innovative novel has subsequently been recognized as a major work of literature in its own right.

Penetralia


Jordan Krall - 2012
    Using the knowledge left by his father, the Plague Doctor, he seeks to unlock the secrets of the universe, but weakness of the flesh won’t be ignored. The sordid overtures of his nymphomaniac sister, combined with his own perverse desires, soil his subjects before revelation can be found.Now the return of Philip’s father is imminent. Judgment is at hand, and if the fate of his mother taught him anything, it’s that one mustn’t disappoint the Plague Doctor.

There Once Lived a Mother Who Loved Her Children, Until They Moved Back In: Three Novellas About Family


Ludmilla Petrushevskaya - 2002
    Among her most famous and controversial works, these three novellas—The Time Is Night, Chocolates with Liqueur (inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado”), and Among Friends—are modern classics that breathe new life into Tolstoy’s famous dictum, “All happy families are alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” Together they confirm the genius of an author with a gift for turning adversity into art.