Ghost Fiction

In this collection of three stories, after the brutal murder of his wife, Victor Daniels is thrust into a supernatural world he struggles to comprehend. Seeking answers, he teams up with paranormal expert Jeremy Rhinehart. They race against time to stop a man who’s spreading chaos and violence by way of deadly, haunted objects.

The ghost story is perhaps the oldest of all the supernatural literary genres and has captured the imagination of almost every writer to put pen to the page. Here, Edgar Award-winning editor Otto Penzler has followed his keen sense of the supernatural to collect the most chilling and uncanny tales in the canon.

When I first realized that I could see the dead, I never imagined that it would allow me to help save the lives of others, or pull me into Detective Maddox Booker’s path. Through my ability, ghosts have become some of my greatest friends and allies. But now, someone’s dead, and his ghost is gone. Ghosts have sought my help for my entire life, wanting to be heard. Now, something is keeping them quiet, almost hostile. as our search for the ghost of the dead man leads us to a small village. Everything looks normal on the outside, but I wonder what’s happening on the inside.

Winifred has lived in the apartment above the cemetery office with her father, who works in the crematorium, all her life, close to her mother's grave. With her sixteenth birthday only days away, Winifred has settled into a lazy summer schedule, lugging her obese Chihuahua around the grounds in a squeaky red wagon to visit the neglected gravesides and nursing a serious crush on her best friend, Jack.

As Shane Ryan and Frank Benedict arrive on Maple Grove Island to find a missing man, they discover a community that feeds people to the spirits in the forest. When Shane destroys these cannibal ghosts, he discovers the horrifying truth: he's unleashed something far worse. Deep within the island's caves lurks the Cannibal King—a powerful specter who has perfected the art of killing for over a millennium. As his army of rotting ghosts emerge from the bowels of the earth, Shane and Frank must battle forces beyond their understanding.

Set in a small-town North Carolina amusement park in 1973, Joyland tells the story of the summer in which college student Devin Jones comes to work as a carny and confronts the legacy of a vicious murder, the fate of a dying child, and the ways both will change his life forever. Joyland is a brand-new novel and has never previously been published.

A storm of steel wrapped in a shell of human flesh, the Queen of Smiles has finally become a ruler in more than just name. But before she can get down to the business of empire building, there are words that must be said to a person she once knew: a boy who became a man, then a monster, and then something else entirely. Her quest will take her back through the Badlands, down past the ruins of Old Texas and into the heart of Fallen Mexico, and not even she knows what she'll do when she finds her target. Because this isn't just another job. This one is personal.

Quick-witted, ambitious Ji Lin is stuck as an apprentice dressmaker, moonlighting as a dance hall girl to help pay off her mother’s Mahjong debts. But when one of her dance partners accidentally leaves behind a gruesome souvenir, Ji Lin may finally get the adventure she has been longing for. Eleven-year-old houseboy Ren is also on a mission, racing to fulfill his former master’s dying wish: that Ren find the man’s finger, lost years ago in an accident, and bury it with his body. Ren has 49 days to do so, or his master’s soul will wander the earth forever.

New York jewelry designer Genie Darling has returned to her childhood home in quaint Cobblewood Cove for one reason only: to sort through generations of old family heirlooms and hand anything of historical interest over to the local museum. But after a failed mugging attempt, and the appearance of a beautiful but ghostly young stranger in a vintage evening dress, Genie realizes there's something suspicious—and spooky—going on. The glamorous and friendly specter turns out to be Genie's own great-great-aunt Adriana, who died in 1929 in mysterious circumstances.

When a young woman from Tokyo contacts the go-between to request a meeting with a deceased TV star who once helped her, she doesn’t expect a teenage boy to show up. Dressed in a designer duffel coat and carrying a tattered notebook, Ayumi Shibuya offers an extraordinary service: he reunites the living with their dearly departed. Meeting his clients at a luxury hotel, Ayumi lays down the ground rules: each reunion is a one-time arrangement that the dead can refuse, the service is entirely free, and the meeting must take place during a full moon.

When Ginger’s father died, his family secrets were buried with him. But when Ginger receives a mysterious envelope informing her that she is the sole heir of a vast fortune on her father’s side, she jumps at the opportunity to meet her long-lost family. As Ginger uncovers the truth of her father’s past, she’ll understand why he never spoke about his childhood and how some secrets should remain buried.

When a violent storm cuts off their only contact with the outside world, stranding them in the haunted manor, Tara and Kyle must find a way to protect themselves from their increasingly erratic grandparents… and from the ghosts that haunt the Folcrofts' house. All at once, they're forced to confront the secrets of the manor. But can they ever hope to escape the unforgivable secret that has ensnared their family for generations?

An Imperial general has defected to the enemy, and the secrets he carries could spell the end of the Sabbat Worlds Crusade. Colonel-Commissar Gaunt and a small team from the Tanith First must infiltrate an enemy-held world and gain the trust of the local underground, all the while trying desperately to avoid the ever-present taint of Chaos. Their mission: to stop the traitor general from revealing his secrets - by any means necessary.

Nash and Nate have finished the task set before them by their hataali and have set their foot on the path to healing. Neither one knows what to expect, however, and Nash does have a few concerns about their future. But those will have to wait as the tribal council has more important things for them to do when they get back to Vegas: deal with a bunch of organ-jackers who have been preying on the young women of several of the local tribes. Then, of course, there's still the problem Nate's been having with the good folks of Raycon Corporation, who really want a look inside his head.

James and Johnny Golden were once inseparable. For as long as she can remember, James shared an almost supernatural connection with her twin brother, Johnny, that went beyond intuition—she could feel what he was feeling. So, when Johnny is killed in a tragic accident, James knows before her phone even rings that her brother is gone and that she’s alone—truly alone—for the first time in her life.

In a desperate bid to survive as hordes of bloodthirsty undead now dominate the ravaged US population, a navy commander discovers an incredible secret about the pandemic in this fourth novel in the acclaimed Day by Day Armageddon series. Task Force Phoenix may be humanity's final hope, and the narrator's agonizing decisions could mean living one more day - or surrendering to the eternal hell that exists between life and death.

Darkness lives within.... Cash strapped, working for agencies and living in shared accommodation, Stephanie Booth feels she can fall no further. So when she takes a new room at the right price, she believes her luck has finally turned. But 82 Edgware Road is not what it appears to be.

Winter, with its unsettling blend of the cosy and the sinister, has long been a popular time for gathering by the bright flame of a candle, or the warm crackling of a fire, and swapping stories of ghosts and strange happenings. Now eight best-selling, award-winning authors, master storytellers of the sinister and the macabre bring this time-honoured tradition to vivid life in a spellbinding collection of new and original haunted tales.

What happens to us after we die? Chris Nielsen had no idea, until an unexpected accident cut his life short, separating him from his beloved wife, Annie. Now Chris must discover the true nature of life after death. But even Heaven is not complete without Annie, and the divided soul mates will do anything to reach each other across the boundaries between life and death. When tragedy threatens to divide them forever, Chris risks his very soul to save Annie from an eternity of despair.

Dimos Horacki is a Borolian journalist and a cynical patriot, his muckraking days behind him. But when his newspaper ships him to the front, he’s embedded in the Imperial Army and the reality of colonial expansion is laid bare before him. His adventures take him from villages and homesteads to the great refugee city of Hronople, built of glass, steel, and stone, all while a war rages around him. The empire fights for coal and iron, but the anarchists of Hron fight for their way of life.