FREE/BARGAIN - Horror/Supernatural

[ReadingManiac]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

Did you read her follow-up? Dark Mountain.

It's not a sequel. Just another book in the same vein.

Didn't know about it. I'll look into it now.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by radbaddude

A few books by Jonathan Janz are on sale. I've read The Dark Game and The Siren and the Spectre. Both quality books, 4/5 rating from me. Haven't yet read The Sorrows. All $0.99 Amazon US.

Thanks for that. I picked up all three. I've previously purchased Janz' Children of the Dark, but haven't read it yet.

The Dark Game

Ten writers are selected for a summer-long writing retreat with the most celebrated and reclusive author in the world. Their host is the legendary Roderick Wells. Handsome, enigmatic, and fiendishly talented, Wells promises to teach his pupils about writing, about magic, about the untapped potential that each of them possesses. Most of all, he plans to teach them about the darkness in their hearts.

The writers think they are signing up for a chance at riches and literary prestige. But they are really entering the twisted imagination of a deranged genius, a lethal contest pitting them against one another in a struggle for their sanity and their lives. They have entered into Roderick Wells’s most brilliant and horrible creation.

The plot sounds a little bit like Scott Nicholson's The Manor/Creative Spirit

"When artists gather at a remote Appalachian estate for a retreat, they are unaware that their energy is feeding something unwholesome. Sculptor Mason Jackson and dying parapsychologist Anna Galloway must uncover the dark secrets of Korban Manor before their spirits become trapped forever."

If you like one, you may like the other.

The Sorrows

The Sorrows, an island off the coast of northern California, and its castle have been uninhabited since a series of gruesome murders in 1925. But its owner needs money, so he allows film composers Ben and Eddie and a couple of their female friends to stay a month in Castle Blackwood. Eddie is certain a haunted castle is just the setting Ben needs to find inspiration for a horror film.

Does stuff like that ever happen outside of a horror story? I like these kind of stories, but I always approach them with a wink or an eye roll. Bernard Hermann didn't need to stay at a haunted house to compose the score for Psycho

[ZodWallop]

Terminal by Michaelbrent Collings is $0.99 ay Amazon US

All passengers, please prepare for departure...

An employee, a cop, and six passengers; a prisoner, a stowaway, and a madman.

These are the people waiting at the Lawton bus terminal.

Mostly late-night travelers who want nothing more than to get to their destinations, and employees who want nothing more than to get through the graveyard shift.

But when a strange, otherworldly fog rolls in, the night changes to nightmare. Because something hides in the fog. Something powerful. Something strange. Something... inhuman.

Soon, those in the terminal have been cut off from the rest of the world. No phones, no computers. Just ten strangers in the terminal... and The Other.

The Other is the force in the mist. The Other is the thing that has captured them. And The Other wants to play a game.

The rules are simple:

1. The people in the terminal must choose a single person from among them. That person will live. The rest will die.
2. Anyone who attempts to leave the terminal before the final vote will die.
3. The final vote... must be unanimous.

A nightmare. And getting worse, because the best way to make a vote unanimous... is to kill the other voters.

Welcome to the Terminal.

I kinda like the original cover more than the new one.

Original


New

[curtw]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

Terminal by Michaelbrent Collings is $0.99 ay Amazon US

Interesting concept. I always try to put myself into the books I read, and imagine what I would do. In this case, knowing how much people suck, I would take my chances and just try to sneak out at the first opportunity.

[Dr. Drib]

I went ahead yesterday and bought "Terminal," by Collings.

Thanks for the heads-up.

[radbaddude]

Read book 1 last year and gave it 4/5. Have been waiting for Book 2 to drop. Would definitely recommend you pick up book 1. Chris is a good writer and he can be followed on twitter. Wrapped the plot of book 2 in a spoiler tag, didn't read it myself but bought it today.

The Nightmare Room (The Messy Man Series Book 1) by Chris Sorensen
Amazon US $0.99

New York audiobook narrator Peter Larson and his wife Hannah head to his hometown of Maple City to help Peter's ailing father and to put a recent tragedy behind them. Though the small, Midwestern town seems the idyllic place to start afresh, Peter and Hannah will soon learn that evil currents flow beneath its surface.

They move into an old farmhouse on the outskirts of town—a house purchased by Peter's father at auction and kept secret until now—and start to settle into their new life.

But as Peter sets up his recording studio in a small basement room, disturbing things begin to occur—mysterious voices haunt audio tracks, malevolent shadows creep about the house. And when an insidious presence emerges from the woodwork, Peter must face old demons in order to save his family and himself.

The Hungry Ones (The Messy Man Series Book 2) by Chris Sorensen
Amazon US $0.99

Spoiler:

At the outskirts of Maple City sits the Crossroads Motel, a throwback to the days when the motor lodge was king. Two years ago, the motel was the site of an act so brutal that its buildings were left to rot.

Jessie Voss, however, sees promise in the Crossroad's bare bones and buys it up, determined to breathe new life into the place.

When the Larson family shows up on her doorstep, road-weary and desperate for a break, Jessie offers them lodging, even though her grand opening is still a week away.

But the arrival of guests awakens the motel, and Jessie soon finds herself host to both the living and the dead.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by radbaddude

The Nightmare Room (The Messy Man Series Book 1) by Chris Sorensen
Amazon US $0.99

Went to Amazon... I bought book one earlier this year.

But as Peter sets up his recording studio in a small basement room, disturbing things begin to occur—

He's hired to narrate the 50 Shades of Grey sequels?

[radbaddude]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

Went to Amazon... I bought book one earlier this year.



He's hired to narrate the 50 Shades of Grey sequels?

The heavy sounds of thwapping could be heard through the brick walls of the basement...

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by radbaddude

The heavy sounds of thwapping could be heard through the brick walls of the basement...

Terrifying!

[ZodWallop]

The Hunger by Alma Katsu is $1.99 at Amazon US. Donner party plus supernatural threat.

Incidentally, it falls under the $5 credit for Random House, so I got my copy for free.

Evil is invisible, and it is everywhere.

That is the only way to explain the series of misfortunes that have plagued the wagon train known as the Donner Party. Depleted rations, bitter quarrels, and the mysterious death of a little boy have driven the isolated travelers to the brink of madness. Though they dream of what awaits them in the West, long-buried secrets begin to emerge, and dissent among them escalates to the point of murder and chaos. They cannot seem to escape tragedy...or the feelings that someone--or something--is stalking them. Whether it's a curse from the beautiful Tamsen Donner (who some think might be a witch), their ill-advised choice of route through uncharted terrain, or just plain bad luck, the ninety men, women, and children of the Donner Party are heading into one of one of the deadliest and most disastrous Western adventures in American history.

As members of the group begin to disappear, the survivors start to wonder if there really is something disturbing, and hungry, waiting for them in the mountains...and whether the evil that has unfolded around them may have in fact been growing within them all along.

Effortlessly combining the supernatural and the historical, The Hunger is an eerie, thrilling look at the volatility of human nature, pushed to its breaking point.

[ZodWallop]

Anyone ever read Mark Edward? He has numerous books published by Thomas and Mercer, Amazon's 'professional' publishing house. A number of his books are on sale for $0.99 a piece.

His work appears to move between psychological thriller and horror. In particular, The Retreat grabbed my attention:

A missing child. A desperate mother. And a house full of secrets.

Two years ago, Julia lost her family in a tragic accident. Her husband drowned trying to save their daughter, Lily, in the river near their rural home. But the little girl’s body was never found—and Julia believes Lily is somehow still alive.

Alone and broke, Julia opens her house as a writers’ retreat. One of the first guests is Lucas, a horror novelist, who becomes obsessed with finding out what happened to Lily. But within days of his arrival, the peace of the retreat is shattered by a series of eerie events.

When Lucas’s investigation leads him and Julia into the woods, they discover a dark secret—a secret that someone will do anything to protect…

What really happened that day by the river? Why was Lily never found? And who, or what, is haunting the retreat?

This looks like one of those 'is the house really haunted?' stories.

[Dr. Drib]

Mark Edwards.

Interestingly, about a week ago I picked up my first Edwards title (a freebie from Amazon, "Follow You Home"), but I have yet to read it.

In fact, you may have been the one to mention it here.

[BetterRead]

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

Mark Edwards.

Interestingly, about a week ago I picked up my first Edwards title (a freebie from Amazon, "Follow You Home"), but I have yet to read it.

In fact, you may have been the one to mention it here.

I posted about Mark Edwards last week in the Mystery, Suspense & Thrillers thread.

[Dr. Drib]

^ Ah, my correction.

Thank you, BetterRead, for mentioning this writer.

[BetterRead]

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

^ Ah, my correction.

Thank you, BetterRead, for mentioning this writer.

You might not want to thank me before either of us have read him.

(But he has gotten a lot of good reviews & high ratings, so hopefully... )