A town is held hostage by an unholy bargain made by some of the inhabitants; a party game on Halloween brings back memories better left forgotten; one misstep changes the balance of survival during the apocalypse; a group of seemingly typical travelers are stranded in an airport; a widower’s holiday in a seaside town becomes a nightmare . . . The Best Horror of the Year showcases the previous year’s best offerings in short fiction horror. This edition includes award-winning and critically acclaimed authors Neil Gaiman, Kelley Armstrong, Stephen Graham Jones, Carmen Maria Machado, and more. For more than three decades, award-winning editor and anthologist Ellen Datlow has had her finger on the pulse of the latest and most terrifying in horror writing. Night Shade Books is proud to present the eighth volume in this annual series, a new collection of stories to keep you up at night. Table of Contents: Summation 2015 - Ellen Datlow We Are All Monsters Here - Kelley Armstrong Universal Horror - Stephen Graham Jones Slaughtered Lamb - Tom Johnstone In a Cavern, In a Canyon - Laird Barron Between the Pilings - Steve Rasnic Tem Snow - Dale Bailey Indian Giver - Ray Cluley My Boy Builds Coffins - Gary McMahon The Woman in the Hill - Tamsyn Muir Underground Economy - John Langan The Rooms Are High - Reggie Oliver All the Day You’ll Have Good Luck - Kate Jonez Lord of the Sand - Stephen Bacon Wilderness - Letitia Trent Fabulous Beasts - Priya Sharma Descent - Carmen Maria Machado Hippocampus - Adam Nevill Black Dog - Neil Gaiman The 21st Century Shadow - Stephanie M. Wytovich This Stagnant Breath of Change - Brian Hodge Honorable Mentions

An Air Force Loadmaster is menaced by strange sounds within his cargo; a man is asked to track down a childhood friend... who died years earlier; doomed pioneers forge a path westward as a young mother discovers her true nature; an alcoholic strikes a dangerous bargain with a gregarious stranger; urban explorers delve into a ruined book depository, finding more than they anticipated; residents of a rural Wisconsin town defend against a legendary monster; a woman wracked by survivor's guilt is haunted by the ghosts of a tragic crash; a detective strives to solve the mystery of a dismembered girl; an orphan returns to a wicked witch's candy house; a group of smugglers find themselves buried to the necks in sand; an unanticipated guest brings doom to a high-class party; a teacher attempts to lead his students to safety as the world comes to an end around them... What frightens us, what unnerves us? What causes that delicious shiver of fear to travel the lengths of our spines? It seems the answer changes every year. Every year the bar is raised; the screw is tightened. Ellen Datlow knows what scares us; the twenty-one stories and poems included in this anthology were chosen from magazines, webzines, anthologies, literary journals, and single author collections to represent the best horror of the year. Legendary editor Ellen Datlow (Poe: New Tales Inspired by Edgar Allan Poe), winner of multiple Hugo, Bram Stoker, and World Fantasy awards, joins Night Shade Books in presenting The Best Horror of the Year, Volume One. Skyhorse Publishing, under our Night Shade and Talos imprints, is proud to publish a broad range of titles for readers interested in science fiction (space opera, time travel, hard SF, alien invasion, near-future dystopia), fantasy (grimdark, sword and sorcery, contemporary urban fantasy, steampunk, alternative history), and horror (zombies, vampires, and the occult and supernatural), and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller, a national bestseller, or a Hugo or Nebula award-winner, we are committed to publishing quality books from a diverse group of authors.

“An excellent collection” of vampire stories, from authors such as Harlan Ellison, Dan Simmons, Gahan Wilson, Tanith Lee, and Fritz Leiber (Publishers Weekly). Renowned editor Ellen Datlow has gathered seventeen variations on vampirism ranging from classically Gothic to postmodern satire, from horrific to erotic. These stories reflect the evolution of vampire literature from Bram Stoker to Anne Rice and beyond, resulting in a deeper exploration of their inner lives. Expanding the concept of vampirism to include the draining of a person’s will or life force, Datlow’s collection transcends the traditional “black capes and teeth marks on the neck” to reinvent an eternally fascinating subgenre of horror. In Harlan Ellison’s “Try a Dull Knife,” an empath stumbles bleeding into a nightclub, on the run from emotional vampires. A Broadway actress steals the emotions of her fellow performers in “. . . To Feel Another’s Woe” by Chet Williamson. And in “The Sea Was Wet as Wet Could Be,” Gahan Wilson offers his own surreal twist on Lewis Carroll’s “The Walrus and the Carpenter,” as two strangers on a beach lure intoxicated picnickers to a different kind of picnic . . . Blood Is Not Enough includes contributions by Dan Simmons, Gahan Wilson, Garry Kilworth, Harlan Ellison, Scott Baker, Leonid Andreyev, Harvey Jacobs, S. N. Dyer, Edward Bryant, Fritz Leiber, Tanith Lee, Susan Casper, Steve Rasnic Tem, Gardner Dozois and Jack Dann, Chet Williamson, Joe Haldeman, and Pat Cadigan.

Rooted in place, slipping between worlds - a rich collection of unnerving ghosts and sinister histories. 'An impressive line-up of established and emerging names.' The Sunday Times 'These eerie, unsettling stories are guaranteed to send shivers down your spine.' Daily Express Eight authors were given the freedom of their chosen English Heritage site, from medieval castles to a Cold War nuclear bunker. Immersed in the past and chilled by rumours of hauntings, they channelled their darker imaginings into a series of extraordinary new ghost stories. 'Subtly evocative of human relations loss, grief, or the fear of loneliness.' TLS 'A satisfying and spooky read.' Sun Also includes a gazetteer of English Heritage properties which are said to be haunted.

From Ellen Datlow (“the venerable queen of horror anthologies” (New York Times) comes a new entry in the series that has brought you stories from Stephen King and Neil Gaiman comes thrilling stories, the best horror stories available. For more than three decades, 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 readers crave. Now, with the eleventh volume of the series, Datlow is back again to bring you the stories that will keep you up at night. Encompassed in the pages of The Best Horror of the Year have been such illustrious writers as: Neil Gaiman, Kim Newman, Stephen King, Linda Nagata, Laird Barron, Margo Lanagan, and many others. 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. But this light creates its own shadows. The Best Horror of the Year chronicles these shifting shadows. It is a catalog of terror, fear, and unpleasantness as articulated by today’s most challenging and exciting writers.

"A strange plague called the 'Gets is decimating humanity on a global scale. It causes people to forget--small things at first, like where they left their keys, then the not-so-small things like how to drive or the letters of the alphabet. Then their bodies forget how to function involuntarily. There is no cure. But far below the surface of the Pacific Ocean, a universal healer hailed as 'ambrosia' has been discovered. In order to study this phenomenon, a special research lab has been built eight miles under the sea's surface. When the station goes incommunicado, a brave few descend through the lightless fathoms in hopes of unraveling the mysteries lurking at those crushing depths...and perhaps to encounter an evil blacker than anything one could possibly imagine"--Page [4] of cover.

The supernatural, the surreal, and the all-too real . . . tales of the dark. Such stories have always fascinated us, and modern authors carry on the disquieting traditions of the past while inventing imaginative new ways to unsettle us. Chosen from a wide variety of venues, these stories are as eclectic and varied as shadows. This volume of The Year's Best Dark Fantasy and Horror offers more than four hundred pages of tales from some of today’s finest writers of the fantastique?sure to delight as well as disturb!

A collection of the best horror stories of 1996 includes contributions by Poppy Z. Brite, Storm Constantine, Iain Sinclair, and Karl Edward Wagner

The Turn of the Screw is an 1898Horrornovella by Henry James that first appeared in serial format in Collier's Weekly magazine (January 27 - April 16, 1898). In October 1898 it appeared in The Two Magics, a book published by Macmillan in New York City and Heinemann in London. Classified as both gothic fiction and a ghost story, the novella focuses on a governess who, caring for two children at a remote estate, becomes convinced that the grounds are haunted.