Book picks similar to
Samson and Denial by Robert Ford


horror
novella
paranormal-thriller
thunderstorm

The Necromancer's House


Christopher Buehlman - 2013
    We know where you are. And we are coming.”The man on the screen says this in Russian.“Who are you?”The man smiles, but it’s not a pleasant smile.The image freezes.The celluloid burns exactly where his mouth is, burns in the nearly flat U of his smile. His eyes burn, too.The man fades, leaving the burning smiley face smoldering on the screen.“Oh Christ,” Andrew says.The television catches fire.Andrew Ranulf Blankenship is a handsome, stylish nonconformist with wry wit, a classic Mustang, and a massive library. He is also a recovering alcoholic and a practicing warlock, able to speak with the dead through film. His house is a maze of sorcerous booby traps and escape tunnels, as yours might be if you were sitting on a treasury of Russian magic stolen from the Soviet Union thirty years ago. Andrew has long known that magic was a brutal game requiring blood sacrifice and a willingness to confront death, but his many years of peace and comfort have left him soft, more concerned with maintaining false youth than with seeing to his own defense. Now a monster straight from the pages of Russian folklore is coming for him, and frost and death are coming with her.

Husk


Matt Hults - 2011
    A fast-paced read with a generous body count, ‘Husk’ will make your skin crawl.” —Scott Nicholson, Bestselling author of They Hunger “Remember the first time you read Joe Lansdale’s The Drive-In, or Freezer Burn? Remember how exhilarated you felt as you tore through the pages as Lansdale kept knocking your jaw to the floor with his endless inventiveness, unexpected belly-laughs, and those even more unexpected moments of terror and pathos? Miss that feeling of being completely at the mercy of a writer’s imagination and boundless energy for his subject? Fret no more, friends—you now have Matt Hults’s Husk. This sucker is the real thing, an in-your-face, rollicking, scary, funny, and unexpectedly poignant potpourri of a horror story, an unabashed and unapologetic throwback to the early pulps infused with a vindictive modern-day sensibility that will have your head spinning and your mouth hanging open. It doesn’t get any more fun than this.” —Gary A. Braunbeck, winner of the Bram Stoker Award and International Horror Guild Award, author of Coffin County and Destinations Unknown “Suspenseful and gruesome, with just the right leavening of hopefulness and nod-wink humor.” —Dr. Kim Paffenroth, Bram Stoker Award Winner for Dying to Live. “Husk is wild, bloody, scary, action-packed, and entertaining as hell. Matt Hults seems to be having a blast telling his tale, and I had a blast going along for the ride. Great fun!” —Jeff Strand, Bram Stoker Nominated Author of PRESSURE "'Husk' is a chilling and relentless tale that will make you want to check your closets, lock your windows and keep an eye in your review mirror...but don't think that'll save you!" ––Fran Friel, Bram Stoker Nominated Author of Mama's Boy “Husk is violent, intense and terrifying. The characters are as real as you and I, and every triumph is rapturous while every death is harrowing. Matt Hults proves himself as a master of the genre with his striking debut novel. It will leave you feeling skinned alive and dying for more.” —Joel A. Sutherland, Bram Stoker Nominated Author of Frozen Blood “I have come across some pretty mind-blowing demons on paper, on the big screen, and especially in my mind. But the ‘Husk’ Matt Hults created in this his first novel breaks all my thresholds for fear, and believe me I have built some pretty sound barriers in my time.” —Giovanna Lagana, author of With Black & White Comes the Grey About the book: ONE NIGHTMARE ENDS… Serial killer Kale Kane has finally died, having survived five years in a coma after a shootout with police. But is his reign of terror truly over? When he died, Kane took the reasons for his atrocities with him, along with the answer to a question police never got to ask: did he work alone? …AND A NEW HORROR BEGINS. Mallory Wiess is a typical teenage girl… or so it seems. When she moves to rural Minnesota with her father and younger brother, she quickly discovers her new home won’t be as boring as she’d feared. Who is the dark figure watching her from the house across the street? What is the shape hanging in the shadows of the old barn behind the neighborhood? And why has someone begun digging up graves at the ancient cemetery in the forest? Soon Mallory will learn the truth. For she has attracted the attention of a killer, a ruthless predator who believes only her death will finish the work Kale Kane began, and unleash an evil that has faded into legend.

Dead Man Walking


David Green - 2020
    There is a Hell, and we are living in it. Demons, ghosts, and fallen angels live amongst us, and only a cursed few know.Taking cases to earn his ticket into Heaven, a job falls into Holleran's lap that tests his new found virtues, when he is forced to deal with the one thing he has avoided, the man that killed him. Will Nick be able to keep his past behind him, or will it destroy his present?Revenge is a sin, and sinners stay in Hell.** Get an in-depth look into the world of your favourite private detective Nick Holleran in this brand new extended edition of Dead Man Walking. **

Mrs Jones


B.A. Morton - 2011
    With hired killers hot on their trail, Connell must protect Mrs. Jones and uncover the truth.‘A fast paced roller-coaster of a ride’ ‘Twisty-turny romantic suspense’Yeovil Literary Prize winner 2011

The Town That Feared Dusk


Calvin Demmer - 2019
    She begins searching the tabloid's archives for a story that can get her career back on track. A strange bridge, with an abnormally high rate of suicides, seems like the perfect place to start. She journeys to the little town, eager to investigate, but encounters a tale far more sinister than she ever expected… Paperback includes two bonus tales set in the same world as The Town That Feared Dusk: 'A Gift from the Bridge' and 'From Dusk till Death'.

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.

Z-WORLD


B.V. Larson - 2010
    Bizarre monsters of blended flesh shamble in the streets. The world has shifted. Guns don't always work anymore, and the dead don't always die. Corpses lie everywhere--and many of them are still dangerous...Gannon is one of the last living humans in Redmoor. Most of the other residents have shifted into something else. "They are coming, Gannon. The flying ones."Do you want to have nightmares? Z-WORLD is a novel of Fantasy and Horror by bestselling author B. V. Larson.

The Skin Show


Kristopher Rufty - 2014
    There is no cover charge, the drinks are free, and rules do not exist within the walls of The Skin Show. However, once you’ve entered, you’ll never leave, for what exists underneath each club is something of fairytales. Danny Raab was drawn into The Skin Show's inescapable clutch, and he never returned. Now, Andy Raab is in the midst of a desperate search for his brother. Accompanied by Karen, Danny’s probation officer, they will infiltrate The Skin Show’s living nightmares of debauchery, only to learn they have been on the guest list all along.

The Witnesses


James Patterson - 2016
    Or so they think. No one will answer their questions. And the terrifying truth may come too late....BookShotsLIGHTNING-FAST STORIES BY JAMES PATTERSONNovels you can devour in a few hours. Impossible to stop reading. All original content from James Patterson.

Harmony Black


Craig Schaefer - 2016
    In addition to being a practicing witch, she’s also an operative for Vigilant Lock, an off-the-books program created to battle occult threats—by any means necessary. Despite her dedication to fighting the monsters threatening society, Harmony has become deeply conflicted about her job. Her last investigation resulted in a pile of dead bodies, and she suspects the wrong people are being punished for it.While on a much-needed vacation, Harmony gets pulled back into action. This time, though, she’s gone from solo work to being part of a team. Their target: the Bogeyman, a vicious and elusive figure…and the creature that destroyed Harmony’s childhood.Surrounded by quirky, fascinating characters as dedicated to one another as they are to their new partner, Harmony must learn to trust her team—and a new romantic interest—on a dangerous and deadly mission that conjures up memories she’d much rather forget.

The Desert


Bryon Morrigan - 2007
    During the opening engagements of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, a platoon of U.S. soldiers disappears. The Army attributes this disappearance to the "fog of war," and the subsequent investigation into the disappearance fails to locate even a single body or destroyed vehicle. Six years later, two soldiers on a routine search for "weapons of mass destruction" locate a cave with the remains of one of the missing soldiers and his journal. Unfortunately, Captain Henderson and Specialist Densler find out all too soon that what happened to the "Lost Platoon" is also happening to them. Trapped, they must confront this unspeakable menace, or risk suffering the same fate as that of the soldier in the cave. "Bryon Morrigan's first novel, THE DESERT, is everything you hope to find in a first novel and then some. An original plot, solid characterization and a refreshing change of pace from the standard chains rattling in the attic. A fine mesh of horror and military drama that I can't recommend enough." -James A. Moore, author of BLOOD RED & HARVEST MOON "The Desert by Bryon Morrigan is a weird and wild novel of men againt monsters. In the grand tradition of James Cameron's Aliens, Bryon Morrigan gives a whipcrack tale of U.S. soldiers pitted against the very forces of Hell. It's fun, fast-paced, and deliciously creepy." -Jonathan Maberry, Bram Stoker Award-winning author of GHOST ROAD BLUES & BAD MOON RISING

Mind of a Killer


Dan Padavona - 2018
     A teenage girl is brutally murdered in an idyllic lake community. In over his head, the local sheriff calls upon the Behavior Analysis Unit’s best profiler, Scarlett Bell, to find the murderer. Is a serial killer stalking Coral Lake? Now Scarlett faces a killer unlike any she’s encountered. Bloodthirsty. Cunning. Insane. Another girl goes missing, and the special agent must stop the killer before time runs out. But the killer is a ghost, a phantom hiding in plain sight, and Scarlett must untangle a confusing web of evidence if she hopes to track him down. If she fails, the girl dies. The body count will grow. Scarlett should beware. The killer is coming for her now.

The List


J.A. Konrath - 2009
    One of them is a homicide cop who's determined to find out. All of them are marked for death--because they're next on . . .THE LISTThe explosive new thriller from bestselling author J.A. Konrath, THE LIST takes you deep inside a top-secret techno-conspiracy that's too shocking to comprehend, too insidious to detect, and far too powerful to stop . . .

Turn Her Face to the Wall


William Hussey - 2013
    In this creepy tale, the twist comes with the very last word…

A Gnarly Christmas


Lauren Carr - 2012
    Now he's in the dog house--or rather the boathouse--after stealing the Christmas feast! Moments after Archie and Mac leave Spencer Manor, Gnarly hears a call for help from Rocky, the Maltese down the street. Four assassins for hire have invaded the home of Rocky's elderly owners. While the home invaders wait for instructions from a mysterious caller, Gnarly must plot to stop them. Can Gnarly save Christmas with only the help of an 8-pound Maltese dressed in an elf suit?Also, in this mini-anthology, Lucky Dog: A Mac Faraday Mystery Short Story."Today is going to be your day, you lucky dog," Lance Collins thought while waiting for the Spencer Police to notify him about his estranged wife's sudden death. He has planned the perfect murder to inherit her massive estate.One thing Lance hasn't planned on was Mac Faraday and his German Shepherd Gnarly. Gnarly hates murderers, especially dog hating murderers.Today is going to be one lucky dog's day. But which one?