If you like your stories scary and gross, you'll like these horror tales.

In this mischievous and utterly original debut, Hansel and Gretel walk out of their own story and into eight other classic Grimm-inspired tales. As readers follow the siblings through a forest brimming with menacing foes, they learn the true story behind (and beyond) the bread crumbs, edible houses, and outwitted witches. Fairy tales have never been more irreverent or subversive as Hansel and Gretel learn to take charge of their destinies and become the clever architects of their own happily ever after.

Relates twenty-one gruesome and disgusting tales drawn from folklore, most of them from urban legends.

Essays on great figures and important issues, advances and blind alleys—from trepanation to the discovery of grandmother cells—in the history of brain sciences. Neuroscientist Charles Gross has been interested in the history of his field since his days as an undergraduate. A Hole in the Head is the second collection of essays in which he illuminates the study of the brain with fascinating episodes from the past. This volume's tales range from the history of trepanation (drilling a hole in the skull) to neurosurgery as painted by Hieronymus Bosch to the discovery that bats navigate using echolocation. The emphasis is on blind alleys and errors as well as triumphs and discoveries, with ancient practices connected to recent developments and controversies. Gross first reaches back into the beginnings of neuroscience, then takes up the interaction of art and neuroscience, exploring, among other things, Rembrandt's “Anatomy Lesson” paintings, and finally, examines discoveries by scientists whose work was scorned in their own time but proven correct in later eras.

A spooky history of the American Midwest—from grave robbers to ghost sightings and more—by the author of Creepy California. Most people think of the American Midwest as a place of wheat fields and family farms; cozy small towns and wholesome communities. But there’s more to the story of America’s Heartland—a dark history of strange tales and unsettling facts hidden just beneath its quaint pastoral image. In Horror in the Heartland, historian Keven McQueen offers a guided tour of terrible crimes and eccentric characters; haunted houses and murder-suicides; mad doctors, body snatchers, and pranks gone comically—and tragically—wrong. From tales of the booming grave-robbing industry of late 19th-century Indiana to the story of a Michigan physician who left his estate to his pet monkeys, McQueen investigates a spooky and twisted side of Indiana, Ohio, Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan. Exploring burial customs, unexplained deaths, ghost stories, premature burials, bizarre murders, peculiar wills and much more, this creepy collection reveals the region’s untold stories and offers intriguing, if sometimes macabre, insights into human nature.

In ancient Egypt they were worshiped. In the Middle Ages they were crucified. From a gentle purr to a sudden scratch, enter the dark, secret world of the creature who is definitely not man's best friend - and who likes it just fine that way. In this extraordinary collection, twenty-four master storytellers look into the inscrutable eyes of felis catus, and see a reflection of the frightening, the fantastic, and the bizarre. From birds' feet left at your door to a howl in the night, from a preen to a pounce, find out who they really are... if you dare.

Selected stories from the 3rd ed. (1822) of Kinder- und Hausm'archen by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm.

From Mallory Ortberg comes a collection of darkly mischievous stories based on classic fairy tales. Adapted from the beloved "Children's Stories Made Horrific" series, "The Merry Spinster" takes up the trademark wit that endeared Ortberg to readers of both The Toast and the best-selling debut Texts From Jane Eyre. The feature has become among the most popular on the site, with each entry bringing in tens of thousands of views, as the stories proved a perfect vehicle for Ortberg's eye for deconstruction and destabilization. Sinister and inviting, familiar and alien all at the same time, The Merry Spinster updates traditional children's stories and fairy tales with elements of psychological horror, emotional clarity, and a keen sense of feminist mischief. Readers of The Toast will instantly recognize Ortberg's boisterous good humor and uber-nerd swagger: those new to Ortberg's oeuvre will delight in this collection's unique spin on fiction, where something a bit mischievous and unsettling is always at work just beneath the surface. Unfalteringly faithful to its beloved source material, The Merry Spinster also illuminates the unsuspected, and frequently, alarming emotional complexities at play in the stories we tell ourselves, and each other, as we tuck ourselves in for the night. Bed time will never be the same.

Fun, fun and more fun oozes from the covers of "That's Gross!", a perfect book for reading by torchlight under the covers or bathroom reader. Just don't tell them how much real science and history they're learning.

"Amongst the Top 50 Horror Books of All Time" - Cosmopolitan Three dark and disturbing horror stories from an astonishing new voice, including the viral-sensation tale of obsession, Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke. For fans of Kathe Koja, Clive Barker and Stephen Graham Jones. Winner of the Splatterpunk Award for Best Novella. A whirlpool of darkness churns at the heart of a macabre ballet between two lonely young women in an internet chat room in the early 2000s—a darkness that threatens to forever transform them once they finally succumb to their most horrific desires. A couple isolate themselves on a remote island in an attempt to recover from their teenage son’s death, when a mysterious young man knocks on their door during a storm… And a man confronts his neighbour when he discovers a strange object in his back yard, only to be drawn into an ever-more dangerous game. Three devastating, beautifully written horror stories from one of the genre’s most cutting-edge voices. What have you done today to deserve your eyes?