Here’s a small selection of the horror and genre news that caught our eye during the last week …
Winter Haunts the online ghost story, gothic and supernatural fiction day returns
As the air grows cold, our thoughts turn to all things spooky and uncanny – and that can only mean the return of Winter Haunts! Back for its third year, the event will once again present an exciting range of workshops, interviews and panels from some of the leading names in ghost story, Gothic and supernatural fiction. Join Alex Davis Events for the biggest year of Winter Haunts yet, with a stunning line-up of writing talent taking part! For full details and to pick up your ticket, check out the event on Eventbrite, here.
Out now from author Stephen Barnard, Download the Dead
It’s nothing but a harmless eBook, promising a fright for Halloween. But the narrative tells of the thin veil between the living and the dead being torn, and how – just by accessing the story – readers have brought Hell a little bit closer.
The members of the Thriller Thursday Reading Group are somewhat cynical, until – from all corners of the world – disturbing events begin to unfold, pointing back to Download the Dead.
And now, with Halloween approaching, they will each have to face their very own demon.
Did you download it? Are you ready to face the consequences of your actions? Available now in eBook, you can grab your copy here.
Arriving 27 November from writer Eden Royce and Tordotcom, Psychopomp and Circumstance
Phee St. Margaret is a daughter of the Reconstruction, born to a family of free Black business owners in New Charleston. Coddled to within an inch of her life by a mother who refuses to let her daughter live a life other than the one she dictates, Phee yearns to demonstrate she’s capable of more than simply marrying well.
When word arrives that her Aunt Cleo, long estranged from the family, has passed away, Phee risks her mother’s wrath to step up and accept the role of pomp―the highly honored duty of planning the funeral service. Traveling alone to the town of Horizon and her aunt’s unsettling home, Phee soon discovers that visions and shadows beckon from every reflective surface, and that some secrets transcend the borders of life and death. Available for pre-order now in eBook and hardcover, you can guarantee your copy here.
Coming 7 November from writer Jacy Morris and Crystal Lake Publishing, One-Shot
One-Shot, an Indigenous naturopathic insemination expert, is teetering on the brink of sanity. His life takes a sudden turn when he’s tasked with transporting his grandfather’s ashes from Pittsburgh, PA, to their ancestral reservation.
As he embarks on this cross-country odyssey, the scars of past traumas reawaken. The highways become a surreal landscape, where spectral figures from Native folklore and twisted horrors of a Lovecraftian nature emerge. These apparitions are not just hauntings but reflections of a fracturing mind, struggling to discern reality from nightmare.
With his grandfather’s ashes as his solemn companion, One-Shot confronts these terrors, each mile bringing him closer to a harrowing truth. This journey is more than a physical traverse—it’s a pilgrimage through the fragmented realms of memory, heritage, and fear.
What lies at the reservation is more than the end of a journey—it’s the precipice of insanity. Available for pre-order now in eBook, with other editions to follow, you can guarantee yours here.
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KEV HARRISON
