A Selection of Horror Books Released, 31 Mar to 6 Apr 2024

13 horror books this week

Themes: Supernatural, psychological, toy, revenge, cosmic, sci-fi, war, and fantasy horror

All the Fiends of Hell – Adam Nevill

Sci-fi horror

Seeing the morning is no blessing. The handful of scattered survivors are confronted by blood-red skies and an infestation of predatory horrors that never originated on earth. An occupying force intent on erasing the remnants of animal life from the planet.

Across the deserted landscapes of England, bereft of infrastructure and society, the overlooked can either hide or try to outrun the infernal hunting terrors. Until a rumour emerges claiming that the sea may offer an escape.

Ordinary, unexceptional, directionless, Karl is one of the few who made it through the first night. In the company of two orphans, he flees south into horrifying revelations and greater peril, where a transformed world and expanding race of ravening creatures await.

Driven to the end of the country and himself, he must overcome alien and human malevolence and act in ways that were unthinkable mere days before.

The Black Girl Survives in this One – Flatiron Books

YA horror anthology

Celebrating a new generation of bestselling and acclaimed Black writers, fifteen chilling and thought-provoking stories place Black girls front and center as heroes and survivors who slay monsters, battle spirits, and face down death. Prepare to be terrified and left breathless by the pieces in this anthology.

Authors include Erin E. Adams, Monica Brashears, Charlotte Nicole Davis, Desiree S. Evans, Saraciea J. Fennell, Zakiya Dalila Harris, Daka Hermon, Justina Ireland, L.L. McKinney, Brittney Morris, Maika & Maritza Moulite, Eden Royce, and Vincent Tirado.

Cranberry Cove – Hailey Piper

Supernatural crime horror

For decades, the chilling mystery within the derelict hotel has claimed those foolish and unwary enough to go inside.

Following the violent assault of a criminal kingpin’s adult son, enforcer Emberly Hale takes a dark journey into the haunted core of Cranberry Cove, and her own past, to discover the horrible truth.

Death’s Other Kingdom: Horror Tales of World War 1 – Coy Hall (editor)

War horror anthology

The War to End All Wars blazed from 1914 to 1918, spreading until no continent escaped the touch of its flame. By the day of armistice, no civilization in history had witnessed more death, destruction, and carnage in such a short time.

Curated by historian Coy Hall, Death’s Other Kingdom collects nine frightening tales from this baptismal storm of steel. Within these pages, horrors of the supernatural bleed into the terrors of war. In this ritual of violence, humans have never been more vulnerable.

Delilah – Edmund Stone

Supernatural horror – Book 3 of The Within Series

Katy Sanchez is on a mission to find and kill the ruthless drug cartel boss, Guadalupe Mendes. His killing spree has taken over the Mexican state of Nuevo Leon, the area once dominated by the Trio de le Meutre gang, an organization Katy and her deceased brother, Lenny, helped to topple. Mendes has other dealings, though, one of which is human trafficking with a preference toward young, disenfranchised women.

Armed with her blade, Delilah, Katy embarks on a journey through the bloodthirsty and sinister lands of Mendes’ empire, slicing and dicing her way to Mendes himself. Along the way, she’ll not only find cutthroats and vicious killers bent on her destruction but also something else she didn’t expect; a love she thought was gone forever.

The Psychographist – Carson Winter

Psychological horror

The Hoyers are an American family. Two parents, two kids, a house they can’t afford, and a deep desire for more.

When the black-clad, seemingly omniscient Mr. Cormorant comes to town, it seems that they might finally be able to cash in on their American Dream.

You see, Mr. Cormorant is a psychographist, an expert in consumer personas. And Mr. Cormorant is testing a Product. And Mr. Cormorant has selected the Hoyers for a simple task: test the Product. Live with it. Breathe it in. Abide by its demands.

In return? Riches.

The cost? Immeasurable.

Scrappy The Thug Boat – Tory Favro

Toy horror

In a city where the water flows thick with sewage and the streets are filled with human filth, Scrappy the red-painted toy thug boat reigns supreme. His eyes gleaming with malice and with a whistle that sounds like impending doom, Scrappy embarks on a journey of destruction and revenge.

From the boy in the bathtub to the depths of the sewers, Scrappy leaves a trail of chaos and murder in his wake, fueled by his desire for vengeance against those who wronged him. But as the city becomes submerged in a watery grave, Scrappy realizes that his thirst for destruction knows no bounds.

Join Scrappy on a thrilling and darkly humorous adventure as he navigates the murky waters of revenge and redemption in this fully illustrated twisted tale of a toy thug boat’s quest for greatness and bigger things.

Seven Rabbits – Timothy King

Revenge horror

In the town of Tall Oak, high school football reigns supreme. Led by star Quarterback Justin Jackson, the players walk the halls of their school like gods, but a sinister side lies behind their “Golden Boy” facade. Despite their best efforts, their atrocities will come to life.

Every year, the star players take a retreat to an isolated cabin in the woods for a week of debauchery. This drug-fueled party is intended to be their final send-off before college.

This time, it will be different.

This time, they’ve pushed their victims too far.

Trapped in an isolated cabin, they will finally know what it means to be the victim.

Someone You Can Build a Nest In – John Wiswell

Fantasy monster horror

Shesheshen is a shapeshifter, who happily resides as an amorphous lump at the bottom of a ruined manor. When her rest is interrupted by hunters intent on murdering her, she constructs a body from the remains of past meals: a metal chain for a backbone, borrowed bones for limbs, and a bear trap as an extra mouth.

The hunters chase Shesheshen out of her home and off a cliff. Badly hurt, she’s found and nursed back to health by Homily, a warm-hearted human, who has mistaken Shesheshen as a fellow human. Homily is kind and nurturing and would make an excellent co-parent: an ideal place to lay Shesheshen’s eggs so their young could devour Homily from the inside out. But as they grow close, she realizes humans don’t think about love that way.

Shesheshen hates keeping her identity secret from Homily, but just as she’s about to confess, Homily reveals why she’s in the area: she’s hunting a shapeshifting monster that supposedly cursed her family.

Eating her girlfriend isn’t an option and Shesheshen didn’t curse anyone. To give herself and Homily a chance at happiness, she has to figure out why Homily’s twisted family thinks she did. As the hunt for the monster becomes increasingly deadly, Shesheshen must unearth the truth quickly, or soon both of their lives will be at risk.

And the bigger challenge remains: surviving her toxic in-laws long enough to learn to build a life with, rather than in, the love of her life.

Spectrum – Third Estate Books

Autistic horror anthology

Deep in the recesses of our minds are twisted realities that so closely mirror our own. In these pages, our nightmares are laid bare, made to manifest. There is no waking up; there is no going back once you fall into the tapestry of terrors that await. Are you ready?

From courteous neighbors gone awry to the burning brightness of everlasting daylight, this anthology is reflective of the vast array of neurodivergent artists in our community and the things that keep them up in the night, the things they can’t look away from.

This Skin Was Once Mine and Other Disturbances – Eric LaRocca

Horror collection

This Skin Was Once Mine: When her father dies under mysterious circumstances, Jillian finds herself grieving the man she idolized while struggling to feel comfortable in the childhood home she was sent away from nearly twenty years ago. Then Jillian discovers a dark secret that will threaten to undo everything she has ever known about her father.

Seedling: A young man’s father calls him early in the morning to say that his mother has passed away. He arrives home to find his mother’s body still in the house. Struggling to process what has happened he notices a small black wound appear on his wrist. Then he discovers his father is cursed with the same affliction.

All the Parts of You That Won’t Easily Burn: Enoch Leadbetter goes to buy a knife for his husband to use at a forthcoming dinner party. He encounters a strange shopkeeper who draws him into an intoxicating new obsession and sets him on a path towards mutilation and destruction.

Prickle: Two old men revive a cruel game with devastating consequences.

Trailer Park – C.D. Kester

YA supernatural horror novella

The boys at Los Hermanos Trailer Park are no strangers to a good urban legend.

The legends and reality collide when they notice strange activity in the trailer down the street.

As times grow harder, Richie, Jose, Frankie, and Roberto are pulled into things that they probably shouldn’t.

But, sometimes that’s just the way that it goes when you’re passing the time with your brothers in the trailer park.

The Unlikely Affair of the Crawling Razor – Joe R. Lansdale

Cosmic horror novella

Edgar Allan Poe’s great private investigator, Auguste Dupin, gets a make-over in this unusual adventure involving a bloody mystery dipped deep in the strange.

A young woman comes to Dupin and his assistant for help concerning her brother, who is increasingly obsessed with the dark world that sets alongside our own. A world where strange creatures dwell and even stranger events occur. A world where our laws of physics are no longer applicable. A world with its own geometry of evil.

It’s the place from which all our nightmares spring. And now that dimensional world, due to spells and sacrifices, is wide open into our own, releasing the deadliest denizen of the dark: The God of the Razor.

It’s a case that will require all of Dupin’s knowledge and the highest courage from his faithful assistant, as they traverse the Parisian streets, as well as the famous Catacombs of skulls and bones, in search of answers.

Published: 6 April 2024