Dark Fantasy Mystery Thriller

For more than 30 years, Ellen Datlow has been at the center of horror. Bringing you the most frightening and terrifying stories, Datlow always has her finger on the pulse of what horror fans crave. Now, with the 11th volume of the series, Daltow's back again to bring you the stories that will keep you up at night. With each passing year, science, technology, and the march of time shine light into the craggy corners of the universe, making the fears of an earlier generation seem quaint. This light creates its own shadows. The Best Horror of the Year chronicles these shifting shadows.

The gods are dead. Decades ago, they turned on one another and tore each other apart. Nobody knows why. But are they really gone forever? When 15-year-old Hark finds the still-beating heart of a terrifying deity, he risks everything to keep it out of the hands of smugglers, military scientists, and a secret fanatical cult so that he can use it to save the life of his best friend, Jelt. But with the heart, Jelt gradually and eerily transforms. How long should Hark stay loyal to a friend who’s becoming a monster - and what is Hark willing to sacrifice to save him?

Sister murdered, best friend dead, married to the patron saint of death, Santa Muerte. Necromancer Eric Carter's return to Los Angeles hasn't gone well, and it's about to get even worse. His link to the Aztec death goddess is changing his powers, changing him, and he's not sure how far it will go. He's starting to question his own sanity, wonder if he's losing his mind. No mean feat for a guy who talks to the dead on a regular basis.

Adventuress Countess Alessandra Zorzi has a new vocation: reacquiring the occult artifacts she stole to put into the safer hands of Miskatonic University. With her new apprentice, Pepper Kelly, Zorzi tracks the infamous Zanthu Tablets to Paris. But the city is rife with spies and the countess has many enemies. When Pepper is kidnapped, it becomes clear that someone is out for revenge.

Oona Crate was born to be the Wizard's apprentice, but she has another destiny in mind. Despite possessing the rare gift of natural magic, Oona wants to be a detective. Eager for a case, she wants to show her uncle - the Wizard of Dark Street - that logic is as powerful as magic. But when someone attacks the Wizard, Oona must delve even deeper into the world of magic. Full of magic, odd characters, evil henchmen, and a street where nothing is normal, The Wizard of Dark Street will have you guessing until the very end.

A pack is only as strong as their Alpha. After an attack injures our Alpha, a rival pack tries to take control of the Midwest Pack. I have to consider the unimaginable to protect my pack - challenge our Alpha. A challenge against the pack's Alpha is a challenge to the death. Am I prepared to do this? Loyalties are divided, and our pack is ready to implode. Saving my pack from self-destruction becomes impossible when Sky's relationship with an enigmatic vampire puts a price on her head, and Josh's continued use of dark magic brings on the wrath of the witches and earns him new enemies.

In I Am Not a Serial Killer, John Wayne Cleaver saved his town from a murderer even more appalling than the serial killers he obsessively studies, using his own repressed homicidal proclivities to even the odds. But it turns out even demons have friends, and the disappearance of one has brought another to Clayton County. Soon there are new victims for John to work on at the mortuary, and a new mystery to solve. But this time something's different. John has tasted death, and the dark nature he used as a weapon might now be using him.

Adria, wolf changeling and resilient soldier, has made a break with the past-one as unpredictable in love as it was in war. Now comes a new territory, and a devastating new complication: Riaz, a SnowDancer lieutenant already sworn to a desperate woman who belongs to another.For Riaz, the primal attraction he feels for Adria is a staggering betrayal. For Adria, his dangerous lone wolf appeal is beyond sexual. It consumes her. It terrifies her. It threatens to undermine everything she has built of her new life.

In the beginning was the Oak, its hungry roots reaching deep into the earth, its gnarled limbs searching the distant heavens. Two hundred years ago, Obediah Magrute worshipped the Oak and died violently beneath it, feeding it with his blood and bone, shouting his chilling curse to the skies. Now, Laura and Mark Avery have come to the bustling little Vermont village.

Just when Della feels like she’s starting to figure out her life, she finds herself reborn…and her new existence comes with a whole different rulebook. Della's secret powers always made her feel like an outsider in the human world. Now, just when she’s starting to feel like she belongs - at Shadow Falls, a camp for teens with paranormal powers - her life is turned upside down all over again. Attacked by a deadly virus, she must make the difficult choice to be reborn.

It is called Crota...and it has awakened. Sheriff Skip Harding is called out to investigate a double homicide unlike any he has seen before. The bodies have been torn to pieces in the woods. Some think it's a bear. But others whisper something different. "It is the Crota," they say, - the great beast of Native American legend that one day will reawaken. Now that day has arrived.

Anita Blake is a vampire hunter. But when someone else sets his sights on her prey, she must save them both from the inferno.

Mirella wants to be a normal college student...but she's far from normal. Since she was born, her mother has been hiding the truth. Mirella is a descendent of a powerful bloodline that spans centuries, a bloodline that gives her an uncontrollable sixth sense. Masked men desire her blood. Strangers long for her to join their cause, and a gorgeous man with magic of his own seeks to forge a forbidden bond between them.

Taking its cue from powerhouse teen properties like Riverdale, Sabrina, and Katy Keene, this is a new, fresh, live-action take on the beloved Winx characters as they band together to protect the magical realm of Alfea. The series follows Bloom, an intelligent and wickedly funny fairy, and her friends as they unravel the mysteries of Alfea College (a high school for fairies) and train to become protectors of the realm.

John Decker has never been so far from home… Alone in the year 1911 and stranded in London, John Decker searches for Mina, whom he fears is trapped in the past along with him. Instead, he finds the precursor to CUSP, an organization known as The Order of St. George. And when he does, it raises more questions than answers. Meanwhile, in a village on the city's outskirts, something terrifying has been released. A supernatural force that drives people to murder.

When Eric Carter helps a friend with a deadly ritual that could determine the fate of the most powerful mage family in Los Angeles he steps into the middle of centuries-long feuds with people who make the Borgias look like the Brady Bunch. Eric's just fine with the murder, soul eaters, and death magic. He's just having trouble adjusting to being brought back from the grave. If he's not careful, somebody's going to put him right back.

Big things are happening for Maeve and her tight-knit coven in Kilbeg, Ireland. Fiona lands a role on a TV show, Roe’s band is poised to hit the big leagues, and Lily is embracing a new style and outlook. Then there’s Maeve, whose magic is growing stronger all the time. Yet she finds herself increasingly lashing out, doing and saying cruel things without knowing why.

Della had the perfect life - the family, a boyfriend, and a bright future - until she was turned, and abandoned by everyone she loves. She takes refuge at Shadow Falls, a camp for teens with paranormal powers. It’s where she and her best friends, Kylie and Miranda, heal their heartbreak with laughter, and where Della is training to be a paranormal investigator - and she refuses to be distracted.

After thwarting the man behind the gruesome ironborn murders—and breaking several fae laws to do so—all Arlo wants is a quiet summer. As the deity of luck’s Hollow Star, capable of bringing about endless possibilities, this shouldn’t be too much to ask, right? But someone is still trying to summon the mythical Seven Deadly Sins. All signs point to immortal meddling, and if this is the gods’ attempt at returning to the Mortal Realm, it’s Arlo they’re going to use to do it.

Business has been booming since Morgan Carter solved the case of the monster living in Lake Michigan. The Odds and Ends bookstore is thriving, of course, but Morgan is most excited by the doors that were opened for her as a cryptid hunter. Recently, there have been numerous sightings of a Bigfoot-type creature in the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest area of Bayfield County, Wisconsin. After a man is found dead from a vicious throat injury in the forest, the conservation warden asks Morgan to investigate.