Monster Fiction

It’s not easy making the career jump from office-supplies-store middle manager to heroic interdimensional adventurer. At least, Jason tries to be heroic, but it's hard to be good when all your powers are evil. He’ll face off against cannibals, cultists, wizards, monsters...and that’s just on the first day. He’s going to need courage, he’s going to need wit, and he’s going to need some magic powers of his own. But first, he’s going to need pants.

31 Brand-New Dark Fantasy Horror Stories. Bloody corridors of ancient rock. A castle surrounded by poisonous thorns. A lost temple of traps and corpses. A subaqueous cave at the bottom of a cursed lake. These are the places where secrets are buried, where ancient evils are summoned, where beasts are imprisoned, where the insane lie in wait. These are tombs of darkness and nightmare, where if you stare into the abyss, the abyss will stare back. Heed the warnings of your elders and return from whence you came. Ahead lie monster lairs.

In many ways Richland, Ohio is the same tiny, sleepy rural village it has been for the last 150 years: The same families, the same farms, the same heartland beliefs and traditions that have sustained it for generations. But right now times are especially hard, as social and economic forces inside and outside the community roil the surface of the once-placid town. Richland, in other words, is primed to explode... just not the way that anyone anywhere could ever have expected. And when things do explode, well, that’s when things start getting really weird.

When I answered an ad for a caretaker at Saint Mark’s Sanctuary, I thought I’d be dusting chandeliers and polishing floors. I didn’t expect to be tricked into a curse, going into debt to a monster, and being forced to take a self-paced “let’s learn magic” course so I can fix a 2,000-year-old problem. And that monster? Not your ordinary, everyday beast. He has hooves, and horns, and fur on his legs. But you know where he doesn’t have fur? Yeah. There. Which is fine. Except he doesn’t wear pants.

Valentina takes Navaeh to her realm and tells her she wants to marry her by the end of the week. Valentina is crowned queen and is plotting her take over the world with the help of Leilani. The only problem is Navaeh isn't ready to get married just yet and knows something suspicious is going on. Is Valentina really the monster she didn't want to see?

Not all monsters are fantasy. Some are very real, and they walk among us. They're our friends, family, neighbors, and co-workers. They're the people we're supposed to trust...and they know it. Contained within this anthology are 35 never-before-published works by supremely talented authors and best-selling novelists. Brace yourself for the unexpected and unimaginable horror of...human monsters.

She spends her days chasing around her high-energy, half-shifter toddler and her nights working full-time trying to make ends meet. Oh, and add in the absolute cluster of a situation her ex dumped in her lap on his way out? Well, that's just icing on the cake. With virtually no options left, Emerson heads for Haven, a sanctuary city for monsters and humans alike. Survival means taking a job at The Monster's Den—a club that caters to the inhuman residents of her new home. But freedom comes with complications of its own.

A gas station clerk at twenty-seven with no future prospects on the horizon, Mike Reynolds is a dropout with an addiction to video games and a less-than-ideal living situation. Life definitely isn't great, but could it really get much worse? When monsters appear on Earth and begin destroying the fabric holding together humanity, that thought is thrown out the window: everything is getting worse, and fast. 'Is my world becoming an MMRPG Apocalypse?' Can Mike make good on his prior experience and carve a foothold for himself as a Necromancer in this RPG world?

The carnival arrived at dusk, bleeding rust and promising escape. For Lily, it was a one-way ticket out of her dead-end town. But when the moon rises, the main attraction is unleashed. The Carnival Nocturne is a predator, and its charismatic owner holds a monstrous secret. When a local boy vanishes and the first body is found mutilated near the Ferris wheel, Lily realizes the truth: the cheap tricks and rigged games are a cover for something ancient and hungry. A violent storm cuts them off from the world. The power dies. The screams begin. Trapped on the carnival grounds with a handful of ...

My dating life was already hell before I was spirited away to this treacherous Labyrinth with pitfalls and traps around every turn. The King holds my best friend hostage, while the men in the maze play with my life like I'm a disposable toy. The Minotaur hunts the twisted corridors, while a mischievous fox tempts me into dangerous trials, where each encounter is more terrifying than the last.

"Dunn delivers a brisk page-turner that chills and thrills." --Scott Nicholson, Liquid Fear "Thaw is an action-packed, heart-pumping thrill ride that keeps readers on the edge of their seats" -- Will Plyler, Mania.com Arctic bush pilot Harry McNills is minding his own business and dreaming of retiring to the Caribbean--when two scientists from Cryolabs Corporation charter his plane for a scientific expedition. The beautiful young biologist Amy Tyler and her boss, the avaricious Hayden Lockwood, want to explore for freeze-tolerant organisms. Harry gets more than he bargained for when he ...

It was an ordinary job. Another night, another asshole collector of the supernatural. I free some poor little beasties from their cages, pocket a few trinkets to pay my bills, and burn the place down on my way out. Just call me the Robin Hood of monster emancipation. I didn’t count on three manly monsters following me home like lost puppies. Stunningly hot lost puppies, but still. Now I’ve got a seductively cheeky incubus, a sweetly enthusiastic demon, and a grimly stoic angel camped out in my kitchen.

A Vengeful Killer Carries Out an Insidious Plan of Death and Retribution When a troubled woman is lured to her death in the small coastal town of Belle Harbor, Florida, Special Agent Bailey Flynn discovers an unsettling connection between the gruesome murder and the mutilated body of a teenage girl found hidden in a long-abandoned grave. As the local police begin an investigation into the latest homicide and quickly identify a surprising prime suspect, Bailey realizes that all is not as it seems. And when a resource working closely with the investigation becomes the killer’s next victim, ...

All his life, Mark Fields has dreamed of joining the Defense Force to fight the vicious, alien Exlian, just like the rest of his renowned family. But so far, he’s … a dishwasher, trapped in a dead-end job with no powers, no money, and even fewer friends. But an encounter with a dying woman changes everything—granting him the abilities he needs to join the training camps—and his life finally feels like it’s turning around, faster than a movie martial-arts montage (just ignore the weird cat).

As the daughter of Dracula, you would think I’d be born the perfect monster. You couldn’t be more wrong. As far as monsters go, I’m a screw up—if I’m not tripping over my own feet, I’m accidentally murdering someone (it’s a real issue, guys). Left with no choice, Dad decides to send me to Prodigium—otherwise known as Monster Academy—to train me on how to be a better monster. When bodies turn up on campus, I’m the prime suspect (not that I can blame them).

The locals warned them. The science couldn't explain it. Now, the hunt is on—and they are the prey. In the deep, isolated woods of Appalachia, a patch of land lies sick and silent. They call it Hemlock Hollow, a place where technology fails and nature itself seems to hold its breath. For research scientist Dr. Alistair Finch and his team, it’s the perfect place to study a mysterious ecological blight. They believe in data, in observation, in rational explanations. But the hollow doesn't care about reason. The warnings from the tight-lipped townspeople were just folklore. The strange ...

“Sharks are as timid as rabbits,” says a superintendent of the Coast Guard, dismissing the possibility that a shark could be the culprit in an unprecedented fatal attack at the Jersey Shore. It’s July, and swimming in the sea is a popular new pastime, but people up and down the East Coast are shocked and mystified by the swimmer’s death. A prominent surgeon at the shore, Dr. Edwin Halsey is the one who examines the victim, and the only one who believes the perpetrator was a shark—and that it will strike again.

After a wedding cake catastrophe, local decorator Tegan finds herself being helped by a solid wall of fur and fangs named Atlas. She's never met anyone like him and finds herself enamored by his wolfish charm. After their sweet encounter, Atlas invites her to his gym anytime she needs his cake-lifting services. Tegan decides that instead—she wants to lift the cakes herself. She signs up for a membership with Leviathan Fitness, determined to build her strength.

Alone in the Zeta quadrant, I made one reckless choice. Now I’m pregnant, trapped on a pirate ship, and my only ally is a gruff, brooding cook with a dark past. Ruby As a lone human in the Zeta quadrant, my life revolves around survival. It’s isolating, and in a moment of weakness, I give in to my deepest desire—to have a child. Now, pregnant and more vulnerable than ever, everything is twice as terrifying. When I discover smuggled drugs aboard my ship, I’m furious. When pirates arrive to steal everything of value, I’m horrified. Desperate to survive, I strike a deal with the ...

After my ex announces his wedding to someone other than me, I'm eager to leave town. A new life and a new job are just what I need to restore my mojo. On the way to my destination, I overnight at a hotel where edible unmentionables and a tattooed orc construction worker rock my world. I sneak out the next morning, figuring I'll never see him again. Until I walk into my new job. That hot orc construction worker? He's my boss.