Here’s a small selection of the horror and genre news that caught our eye during the last week …
Four months to the day he first encountered the boy at Walmart, the last of Phil Pendelton’s teeth fell out. At first glance, Phil Pendleton and his son Adam are just an ordinary father and son, no different from any other. Some might say the father is a little too accommodating given the lack of discipline when the child loses his temper in public. Some might say he spoils his son by allowing him to set his own bedtimes and eat candy whenever he wants. Some might say that such leniency is starting to take its toll on the father, given how his health has declined. What no one knows is that Phil is a prisoner, and that up until a few weeks ago and a chance encounter at a grocery store, he had never seen the child before. But now Adam is in his life, altering and controlling it, and it will take a particular kind of horror to get him out. Because there is nothing ordinary about Adam, or the monsters that come when he calls. With artwork by Jason Felix and editing by Sandy King, you can pre-order your copy in paperback now.
People are stopping, bodies halting regardless of situation or location. They are still alive but completely unresponsive, vulnerable statues utterly at the mercy of their environment. Unable to run from fire, some burn. Unable to return to shore, some drown. Unable to move from the path of a truck, some are crushed. Nor are you safe at home—unable to move, you starve. Dr Alex Griffiths heads a research department in a university hospital. As more and more succumb to this strange affliction—including his own family—it becomes a race against time for his team to find an answer before they too are affected. Available now in paperback, eBook and hardcover editions, you can grab your copy here.
From the lauded author of The Queen of the Cicadas (which picked up starred reviews from PW, Kirkus and Booklist who called her “a dynamic and innovative voice”) comes a short story collection of nightmares, dreams, desire and visions focused on the Chicana experience. V.Castro weaves urban legend, folklore, life experience and heartache in this personal journey beginning in south Texas: a bar where a devil dances the night away; a street fight in a neighborhood that may not have been a fight after all; a vengeful chola at the beginning of the apocalypse; mind swapping in the not so far future; satan who falls and finds herself in a brothel in Amsterdam; the keys to Mictlan given to a woman after she dies during a pandemic. The collection finishes with two longer tales: The Final Porn Star is a twist on the final girl trope and slasher, with a creature from Mexican folklore; and Truck Stop is an erotic horror romance with two hearts: a video store and a truck stop. Available for pre-order in paperback, eBook and hardcover editions, you can guarantee your copy now, here.
Professor Claire Davenport yearns to be a mother. After suffering four miscarriages, the university microbiologist tries and fails to qualify as an adoptive mother. Then Claire’s husband leaves. Alone and emotionally wounded, Claire takes a summer sabbatical from her microbiology classes and escapes to rural Virginia to heal. There, she meets local farmers with strange agricultural practices. Claire moves into the historic manor house she rented for the summer, and an abandoned child greets her. Is the child real, an answer to her prayers? Or is he a figment of her tormented emotions? Perhaps the tight-knit locals are playing a trick on the science lady from the city. Whatever the boy’s origin, Claire is determined to find the truth, but the truth may be bloody. Available in Ebook edition, you can grab your copy here.
Eyes of a man look upon the future world… The sun has been blocked out….it is a mega city of eternal night… Everyone is inoculated into utter submission, medicated beyond imagination and scanned to know if they are up to date with all the injections. There are cameras on almost every street. Even tiny mosquito ones. Cyborgs patrol the streets, watching anyone who shows any inappropriate emotions… The air is polluted and slowly eats away at the lungs. A single man has a way of avoiding the scans…he thinks himself a spider weaving a web of destruction…but is he really someone to challenge the web that the system itself has created? Available now in paperback or eBook formats, you can pick up your copy here.
KEV HARRISON