Right out of prison, Joe Openshaw settles back at home with his father. He’s trying to pick up the pieces of his life, letting go of his old habits, like the habits that made him an addict and landed him in prison in the first place.
While hiking along Lowback Trail, he discovers one of the town’s oldest secrets. A jar of pennies. But this isn’t an ordinary jar of pennies. Taped to each coin is a scrap of paper. On the paper, is a wish, handwritten by a child.
Then the wishes start to come true. Simple things. Harmless things.
Joe begins to realizes they aren’t really wishes. They’re exchanges, and the bill is coming due.
‘Nothing is free in life.
Sooner or later, you always pay.’
Why we’re excited about this book:
Robert Ford and Matt Hayward are two names in horror that you can count on to consistently deliver the goods. Ford is the author of No Lipstick in Avalon, The Compound, the story collection The God Beneath My Garden, as well as numerous stories in anthologies like Lost Highways and Welcome to the Show. Hayward is the author of Practitioners (with Patrick Lacey), The Faithful, What Do Monsters Fear, and is featured in many anthologies, including the aforementioned Lost Highways and Welcome to the Show. A Penny for Your Thoughts is Ford and Hayward’s first collaboration and sounds like a book you’re not going to want to miss. Forthcoming from Poltergeist Press, A Penny for Your Thoughts by Robert Ford and Matt Hayward releases 1 June 2019 and is available for pre-order.
BOB PASTORELLA