The Wishing Well: A Collection, Volume 1

De: Christopher Ruíz

Narrado por: Darren Eliker

Step into The Wishing Well, where your deepest desires are granted … and your soul is forfeited.

A horrifying collection of interconnected tales, The Wishing Well centers around an ever-shifting, unearthly bar where desires are commodities and the price is everything. Each story follows a different patron, driven by want, ambition, or desperation, who casts a wish into the bar’s namesake.

Join our patrons as they discover this well is less a cheap gimmick and more a dark conduit for twisted fulfillment, revealing the true horror of getting exactly what you wished for.

In this malignant mess of the macabre you’ll:

Meet “The Captive,” a man who’d do anything to escape his past and present. Anything …Join a young student who hopes to find happiness once again with a little help from “The Substitute.”

Take a dip in “The Lake” for rest, relaxation, and a final, permanent reprieve.

From a woman’s late-night visit by “The Creeper” to a child’s Christmas visit by something not quite Santa in “The Unholy,” these nine creepy tales are served neat by newcomer Christopher Ruíz.

What do you desire? The Wishing Well has what you need …

©2025 Christopher Ruíz (P)2025 Christopher Ruíz

Interconnected tales of dark desire and dread

It's 4am as I submit this review. I've been unable to pause this collection of short stories for the last several hours. Each one, in first-person telling, creates a captivating experience of being emotionally invested in, then smothered in the storyteller's deepest feelings of delight, doubt, despair, and dread. The tales are varied and timely, expertly voiced in silky-smooth tone by Darren Eilker, whose delivery of psychological terror is as cool as a freshly poured beer. (Whet brand, of course.) Brought back fond memories of Heavy Metal (1981). [Disclosure: I received this title for free and listened at 2.9x.]