Horror Trained

New York Times bestselling author Richard Kadrey and Cassandra Khaw have teamed up to deliver a new dark story where Neil Gaiman meets Jessica Jones with magic, monsters, and mayhem. Julie Crews is a coked-up, burnt-out thirty-something who packs a lot of magic into her small body. She’s...

Jonah Rourke is a railroad man, and railroad men don’t believe in miracles. So when his sister, Nell, disappears into a town that shouldn’t exist—one that won’t let anyone in, and won’t let anyone out, Jonah follows her anyway. Past the last streetlamp. Past the last honest mile. Onto a road that counts down like an execution and charges for every step. On this road, you don’t pay in money. You pay in pieces of yourself. Because something is coming. Something hungry. Something that doesn’t care who you are, only what you’re willing to surrender to keep moving. Jonah isn’t ...

Come on board for a Gothic journey in a funicular railway in Victorian England, a freight train in the Carpathian mountains, a high tech sky train in Bangkok, an underground railway in Tokyo. Visit stations which lure with the promise of safe shelter but harbour unexpected dangers. Meet the people who work on the tracks – stationmasters, porters, signal-men – and those who travel – commuters, tourists, dead bodies, murderers and ghosts. In this volume, editor Rayne Hall has collected twenty of the finest– and creepiest – railway tales. The book features the works of established ...

A carnival of horrors, outer space, heaven: these are just a few of the locations visited in this collection of short stories. Though I’ve always found long form fiction to be easier to write, like many other authors, I started by writing short fiction, where words are precious and each pithy sentence must do the work of an entire chapter. Please join me in my early journey through the abbreviated worlds of the short story.

On December 18, 1867, the Buffalo and Erie Railroad's eastbound New York Express derailed as it approached the high truss bridge over Big Sister Creek, just east of the small settlement of Angola, New York, on the shores of Lake Erie. The last two cars of the express train were pitched completely off the tracks and plummeted into the creek bed below. When they struck bottom, one of the wrecked cars was immediately engulfed in flames as the heating stoves in the coach spilled out coals and ignited its wooden timbers

When private investigator and lifelong train enthusiast Rodney Burfoot arrives on the mist-shrouded Isle of Ravenshorn, he thinks he's chasing a haunting. But the truth is far more terrifying. A monstrous, skull-faced locomotive called The Doom Train. Each of the island's twelve stations hides a twisted legend, guarded by secretive locals and warped by time itself. But it's not only ghosts that haunt the carriages. It's versions of Rodney himself, trapped across timelines, struggling to communicate. With the new moon approaching, and the tracks looming beneath the sea, Rodney must confront ...

A ceremonial collar, a public unveiling, a name left behind — Clara’s hucow transformation nears its completion. Once defiant, now obedient, Clara has embraced her place in the hucow project. The injections have reshaped her, the training has molded her, and the ceremony will finalize her new purpose. Presented before handlers and clients, she is displayed with pride — renamed, exposed, and aching for use. Her body responds on command, her thoughts melting into instinct and desperate need. The woman she once was is gone. In her place kneels Lulu: full, docile, overflowing, and ready ...

Fifteen-year-old Bren doesn’t scare easily, especially since her father left, making her head of the house. So when a group of kids dare each other to pass through a tunnel rumored to be haunted by a train that steals people away to "the Nevermore," Bren steps up. But when she reaches the other end of the tunnel, more than she bargained for awaits. For fans of “kids on bikes” ‘80s-style horror.

“An addictive read; a strong recommendation for those who like suspense tinged with a little romance.”—Booklist A woman without a memory struggles to discover the truth about her past and her identity in this cerebral and dark thriller reminiscent of works by bestselling authors S.J...

They say this train runs on stolen souls. They say if you fall asleep, you might wake up somewhere else…or worse, as someone else. Step aboard with modern horror master Michael Squid, conductor of nightmares, as he guides you through these and other destinations of pure terror.

Deputy Marshal Zebediah Clemens has a problem: the dead aren’t staying in their graves. As a lawman, Zeb’s life is already complicated, but his duties don’t end with the living. He’s tasked with protecting the world from things most people don’t believe in—and it’s getting harder to keep the balance between the mundane and the supernatural. Despite it all, Zeb still dreams of a quiet life, maybe even a family. The woman he’s taken a shine to seems to fancy him as well, and her young son already looks up to him as a father. But proposing will have to wait. The town of Silver ...

Some trains only run at night. And some passengers never come home. Judd hears it every night. The distant whistle. The grinding wheels on abandoned tracks. No one else believes him—not his mother, not the neighbors. They say the tracks were torn up years ago. But the train keeps calling. Determined to prove he isn’t crazy, Judd sneaks out on his bike after midnight, flashlight and sandwich in tow. He finds the old depot, the crumbling platform, the ghostly tracks gleaming in the moonlight—and Reggie, the ragged old man who warns him about what really comes through here. Because the ...

The Countess Luchia de Sarracenia comes from a long line of very powerful vampires. She is accustomed to getting her way. Her greatest wish, however, has always eluded her — the ability to see her own face. She hires artist after artist to paint her portrait. But when they fail to capture her perceived ethereal beauty, the consequences are dire. Enter Venus Faucher. Coming from humble beginnings, she has spent her life trying to make a name for herself as a woman painter in a world which underestimates her.

In the winter of 1943, a train from Warsaw bound for the Treblinka death camp went missing. Now, in modern-day Poland, the train still haunts the countryside, luring people to leave their homes and step aboard. A group of American travelers with a penchant for ghost hunting decide to look into the disappearances, only to discover a plot that could change the world, and that the Ghost Train's origins reach much further back than the Holocaust.

Something deadly is stalking the corridors of the King's Cross train, preying on the passengers. It once attacked commuter Mark Davies and threw him from the train. Ex-policeman Les Chadderton is obsessed with the murders and suicides on the Easst Coast mainline. His own wife has been among the victims. Together, Davies and Chadderton must board the Ghost Train and face their own fears made real, travelling on a one-way ticket on the Nightmare Express....

When Ishmael Jones and his partner, Penny, are asked to escort a VIP on the late-night train to Bath, it would appear to be a routine case. The Organisation has acquired intelligence that an attempt is to be made on Sir Dennis Gregson’s life as he travels to Bath to take up his new position as Head of the British Psychic Weapons Division. Ishmael’s mission is to ensure that Sir Dennis arrives safely. How could anyone orchestrate a murder in a crowded railway carriage without being noticed and with no obvious means of escape?

1312 pages of murder, mystery, suspense, and ghost all wrapped up in one package.Deadman’s Highway:Joe Brock has never been suspected of the murders he's committed—until now. This time he's left a victim alive. After accepting the hospitality of a benevolent motorcyclist, he leaves the man's girlfriend's naked and mutilated body hanging in the garage. Before he makes the last and fatal swipe with his knife he's interrupted by the arrival of the man's friend, another motorcyclist. After beating the new arrival into unconsciousness, he figures he's out of time. Taking the man's motorcycle...

In this sequel to Ghost Train, phantoms from a nearby haunted mansion also want Kat's small house and property. The spirits have had the run of the house for the last two years since her grandfather died and left Kat the property. Now that she has decided to move in they consider her an interloper. They intend to drive her out. The first to appear is a ghost girl and her ghost dog. Soon other ghost children will appear. She might have lost her mind if not for a young man about her own age who has dealt with these long dead individuals in the past.

The final movie has been shelved, the register closed. For Jake, working the late shift at the Video Vault in the quiet, isolated New England town of Ashworth Creek, midnight means one thing: the freedom to catch the 12:45 AM train and leave the unsettling stillness of the town behind. But tonight, Ashworth Creek isn't just quiet. It's unnervingly silent. As an unnatural hush blankets the fog-choked streets, and fleeting, misshapen figures flicker at the edge of vision, Jake's ordinary walk to the station transforms into a desperate race against time. What begins with subtle dread quickly ...

Summer is here and school's out, but boredom quickly sets in for the penniless kids of the Redsow housing estate. If only they had something to do... In an effort to escape a pack of local bullies, best friends, Ashley and Jude, decide to brave Devil's Ditch, a place deep in the woods that everyone says is haunted by something ancient and evil. At first, everything seems fine, but then they discover an old farmhouse covered in weeds. Inside is a naked woman in chains. Her name is Rose, and there's something not quite right about her.