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We Sent Them Down Singing
by Libby Edwardson
In the small coal camp of Jubilee, West Virginia, Phinnie Skinny Caldwell has been plagued with nightmares of the last time she ever saw her mama alive and the man responsible for stealing her away: Zell Dorsey. When Zell Dorsey returns thirteen years later, alone, Skinny is determined to find out what really happened. As she uncovers disturbing truths about her mama's fate and Zell's sinister plan, she turns to Happy Walker, her school bus driver and the closest thing she has to a father. However, nothing can prepare them for what they find: Behind Zell Dorsey's charming veneer, is a creature both older and far more evil than any devil, and he's hellbent on turning everyone Skinny loves into oil-slicked monsters. This book is a testament to the resilience of grieving mothers and the tenacity of the beautiful people of Appalachia, a place where the accents sing rather than talk and the tea is always sweet.
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The Flayed Man
by Chloe Lauter
Ellis Karsten spends nights working triage in the ER and days having the same conversation with her mom. The early onset dementia is exhausting, but the real challenge is their curse--Ellis's family must feed daily on blood, or risk becoming mindless, skinless killing machines. When Ellis's uncle, who supplies their blood, vanishes, she takes it upon herself to find a new source, aided by a prickly paramedic who's equal parts unpredictable and intoxicating. But as Ellis fights to balance her bloodthirsty nature with a new relationship, her mom's impossible demands transform into panicked warnings that a fabled monster, The Flayed Man, is stalking them. As she traverses the desert in search of blood, Ellis risks her safety and her family's secret, until it becomes clear that her mom is right: something ancient and hungry is hunting them, and it has come for her mom. Blood hunger begins to overtake Ellis, transforming her body into something ghoulish and frightening--exactly what The Flayed Man wants.
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A Date with Death
by Kelly Creagh
Helena Hart isn't having the best night. Her date just ditched her, her Halloween costume bombed, and her only sympathetic ear is a dead silent partygoer in a Grim Reaper get-up. But when she falls off a balcony and he catches her with a very real skeletal hand, she realizes he may not be a party guest at all. Before she can process the near-death experience, he vanishes, leaving her to wonder if she hallucinated the whole thing. Grim isn't supposed to save souls. He's supposed to reap them. And while he's not sure why he spared Helena, he does know that if his superiors find out, he's as good as dust--which is saying something for a guy who's mostly bones. But keeping away from Helena is proving harder than expected--especially when she isn't the least bit afraid of his monstrous form. Worse, to his horror, Helena makes him feel. And for a reaper, feeling is a fate far more dangerous than death.
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The Red Sacrament
by Sara Hinkley
Paris, 1869. Arnault and his clan of vampires have survived for as long as they have by observing a rigid set of rules. At night, they perform on stage at the Théâtre Saint-Siméon, picking off just enough people in the audience to survive. But they understand the city, and how to live in it without being noticed. Their peace is shattered first with a visit from Béatrice, a witch who forms a strange connection to Arnault; then with the arrival of Victor de Rouvray and his sister Françoise, vampires from a very different world. For a terrible change is on the horizon, revolt and revolution are brewing in the streets and soon, the city, and Arnault will never be the same again.
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Carry Me to My Grave
by Christopher Golden
Maggie Wise will take your eyes. When Malcolm was growing up, the local kids made up that chant about his mother, claiming she was a witch. Now, Maggie is dying, and those same siblings have left Malcolm and his sister-in-law Violet to hold a vigil at her bedside. But they're not as alone as they think they are. A dark figure waits and watches from beneath the willow tree across the street. Hundreds of miles away, an ancient evil stirs in its burrow under a farmer's cornfield. Across the country, other buried things begin to dream in anticipation of Maggie's demise. On her deathbed, the old woman elicits a promise from Malcolm when she dies, he and Violet must return her body to her birthplace in Shediak, Maine. From the moment she takes her last breath, before her remains are even loaded aboard the baggage car of the Imperial Limited, there are forces trying to stop Malcolm from fulfilling that promise. Violence erupts on the train, evil preys on its passengers, and once the sun goes down, those long-buried things are coming to make Maggie Wise pay for her past. God help anyone who stands in their way.
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The Language of Knives: Stories
by Haralambi Markov
A murderous nine-headed monster from legend permits a podcast interview. The mall has opened its doors, and nothing, not even certain death, will keep the shoppers away. A dead man's curse drives his descendants to drown themselves, no matter how far from home they flee. An eerie haunted house attraction receives an even more unnerving guest. A grieving widower, knife in hand, undertakes a painstaking, gruesome ritual to appease the gods. If seeking a boon from Baba Yaga sounds nerve-shattering, imagine having to live under her roof. These thirteen tales from Bulgarian author Haralambi Markov meld Slavic mythology, pitch-black humor, and moving explorations of queer identity with vistas rooted in body horror and nightmares, yielding results that are sometimes deeply disquieting, sometimes surprisingly hopeful, and always strikingly novel.
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Lovecraft's Brood: Nineteen Tales of Cosmic Horror
by Book Author
Fans of H. P. Lovecraft will rejoice in--and recoil from--these nineteen mesmerizing tales of cosmic horror. A prison guard and a convict have an affair fueled by the hallucinations of fungal spores. Squatters arrive in a weird train station, where they unearth a strange idol. Researchers discover skin thieves instead of normal turtles. A mezcal-tasting tour turns utterly terrifying. An old woman stitches a portal that is disrupted by a nameless cat. Discover the Mythos as you've never experienced it before. These dizzying new spins on classic Lovecraftian themes will leave you disoriented, but sane (we hope--we make no promises).
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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