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Cover Reveal: Painted Monsters & Other Strange Beasts

Coming next month from Word Horde, Orrin Grey’s new collection Painted Monsters & Other Strange Beasts. Here’s your first peek at the cover!

ORRIN GREY LOVES MONSTERS. That is abundantly clear in the stories he spins. No matter where he draws inspiration from, whether the weird tales of Lovecraft, Machen, and Poe or the films of Murnau, Corman, and Argento, the end result is inevitably fresh and new. And wonderfully monstrous.

If you love monsters—the macabre, the murderous, the misunderstood; the strange, the sinister, the sympathetic; the cinematic and the literary—you will find plenty to love in Orrin Grey’s Painted Monsters & Other Strange Beasts.

Cover Art by Nick Gucker
Cover Design by Scott R. Jones

Table of Contents:

Introduction by John Langan
The Worm That Gnaws
The White Prince
Night’s Foul Bird
The Murders on Morgue Street*
Ripperology
Walpurgisnacht
The Red Church
Remains
The Labyrinth of Sleep
Lovecrafting
Persistence of Vision
Strange Beast*
Painted Monsters*

* Titles marked with an asterisk are original to the collection.

Pre-order Painted Monsters & Other Strange Beasts today!

Now Available: Cthulhu Fhtagn!

Happy 125th Birthday, H. P. Lovecraft. To celebrate, we baked you an anthology. Featuring 19 weird tales inspired by H. P. Lovecraft by 20 of the best authors working in Weird Fiction today, Cthulhu Fhtagn! is sure to satisfy. But don’t just take our word for it. Check out Cthulhu Fhtagn! for yourself!

In his house at R’lyeh, Cthulhu waits dreaming…

What are the dreams that monsters dream? When will the stars grow right? Where are the sunken temples in which the dreamers dwell? How will it all change when they come home?

Within these pages lie the answers, and more, in all-new stories by many of the brightest lights in dark fiction. Gathered together by Ross E. Lockhart, the editor who brought you The Book of Cthulhu, The Children of Old Leech, and Giallo Fantastique, Cthulhu Fhtagn! features nineteen weird tales inspired by H. P. Lovecraft.

Edited by Ross E. Lockhart
Cover Art by Adolfo Navarro
Cover Design by MMP

Table of Contents

Introduction: In His House at R’lyeh… – Ross E. Lockhart
The Lightning Splitter – Walter Greatshell
Dead Canyons – Ann K. Schwader
Delirium Sings at the Maelstrom Window – Michael Griffin
Into Ye Smoke-Wreath’d World of Dream – W. H. Pugmire
The Lurker In the Shadows – Nathan Carson
The Insectivore – Orrin Grey
The Body Shop – Richard Lee Byers
On a Kansas Plain – Michael J. Martinez
The Prince of Lyghes – Anya Martin
The Curious Death of Sir Arthur Turnbridge – G. D. Falksen
Aerkheim’s Horror – Christine Morgan
Return of the Prodigy – T.E. Grau
The Curse of the Old Ones – Molly Tanzer and Jesse Bullington
Love Will Save You – Cameron Pierce
Assemblage Point – Scott R. Jones
The Return of Sarnath – Gord Sellar
The Long Dark – Wendy N. Wagner
Green Revolution – Cody Goodfellow
Don’t Make Me Assume My Ultimate Form – Laird Barron

Pie by Petaluma Pie Company.

Ask for Cthulhu Fhtagn! wherever books are sold.

Now Available: Mr. Suicide

Remember when horror fiction actually felt transgressive? Like it was something dangerous, something that had the potential do damage. A sort of literary hand grenade, pin pulled, primed and ready to go off. And in exploding, maybe change the world. I do. Once upon a time, horror was ripe with a sense of palpable risk. I felt that sense of danger the first time I read Poppy Z. Brite’s Exquisite Corpse, and in Jack Ketchum’s The Girl Next Door, and in Ray Garton’s Live Girls. I’ve felt it in King and Keene and Barker and Kiernan. Lately, however, too much horror plays it safe. Warmed-over tropes and familiar monsters. Stories without any real sense of risk, or danger, or transgression. It’s enough to make the genre feel almost… cozy.

It’s about time someone take you out of your comfort zone. It’s about time someone publishes a horror novel that actually aims to horrify. Which is why I’ve come to you today, to tell you about the debut novel from Nicole Cushing, Mr. Suicide, which Word Horde releases today.

Audaciously written in the second person, Mr. Suicide puts you in the driver’s seat as an abused young man is pushed to the breaking point. And Nicole Cushing is the perfect storyteller for this unrelentingly transgressive tale, as evidenced by her 2013 Shirley Jackson Award nomination for her novella Children of No One. Here are just a few of the raves (and warnings) Mr. Suicide has received so far:

“…a work of brutal and extreme horror… disturbingly graphic content…” —Publishers Weekly

“This tale of a damaged and murderous child is the most original horror novel I’ve read in years. Cushing’s prose is rapidfire, grisly, and passionate.” —Poppy Z. Brite, author of Exquisite Corpse and Lost Souls

“Novels don’t come much more transgressive than this one, folks. Got a taboo? Watch Nicole Cushing grin while she dances all over it. In other hands that might be reason enough for the witty Mr. Suicide to exist. But this is more and better than that—a truly nightmare world, richly imagined, told to us in a canny, subversive second-person voice that makes you, the reader, the hero of this tale, like it or not. That it also manages to be ultimately life-affirming is yet another wonder.” —Jack Ketchum, award-winning author of Off Season and The Girl Next Door

“Nicole Cushing uses her sharp and confident prose like a surgical instrument to dissect both her characters and our emotions. Mr. Suicide is horrifying and harrowing, but just as much for the emotional devastation it causes in the reader as for the violence and depravity—as well as the twisted humor—it portrays. This is horror fiction that leaves marks.” —Ray Garton, author of Live Girls and Sex and Violence in Hollywood

Like everyone else in the world, you’ve wanted to do things people say you shouldn’t do.

How many times in your life have you wanted to slap someone? Really, literally strike them? You can’t even begin to count the times. Hundreds. Thousands. You’re not exaggerating. You’re not engaging in… whatchamacallit? Hyperbole? You’re not engaging in hyperbole.

Maybe the impulse flashed through your brain for only a moment, like lightning, when someone tried to skip ahead of you in line at the cafeteria. Hell, at more than one point in your life you’ve wanted to kill someone; really, literally kill someone. That’s not just an expression. Not hyperbole. Then it was gone and replaced by the civilized thought: You can’t do that. Not out in public.

But you’ve had the thought…

Order from Word Horde, Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, Ziesings, and wherever better books are sold. Ask for Mr. Suicide by name.

Now Available: Giallo Fantastique

An anthology of original strange stories at the intersection of crime, terror, and supernatural fiction. Inspired by and drawing from the highly stylized cinematic thrillers of Argento, Bava, and Fulci; American noir and crime fiction; and the grim fantasies of Edgar Allan Poe, Guy de Maupassant, and Jean Ray, Giallo Fantastique seeks to unnerve readers through virtuoso storytelling and startlingly colorful imagery.

What’s your favorite shade of Yellow?

Table of Contents

Introduction – Ross E. Lockhart
Minerva – Michael Kazepis
In the Flat Light – Adam Cesare
Terror in the House of Broken Belles – Nikki Guerlain
The Strange Vice of ZLA-313 – MP Johnson
Sensoria – Anya Martin
The Red Church – Orrin Grey
Balch Creek – Cameron Pierce
Hello, Handsome – Garrett Cook
We Can Only Become Monsters – Ennis Drake
The Threshold of Waking Light – E. Catherine Tobler
The Communion of Saints – John Langan
Exit Strategies – Brian Keene

“Lockhart translates giallo fantastique as weird crime, and each story, while very different in style and tone, melds crime and supernatural horror with panache and verve. […] The stories’ conclusions are never definitive, leaving the reader with a delicious sense of lingering unease.” —Publishers Weekly

“A lavish, sumptuous tapestry of luxurious surrealism and strangeness.” –Christine Morgan, The Horror Fiction Review

“…ultimately satisfying, with a few tales that skirt tantalizingly close to brilliance.” –Mer Whinery, Muzzleland Press

Order from Word Horde or wherever better books are sold.

The Children of Old Leech Nominated for the Shirley Jackson Award

It is with pleasure and gratitude that we announce the following: The Children of Old Leech: A Tribute to the Carnivorous Cosmos of Laird Barron has been nominated for the Shirley Jackson Award. Needless to say, we are over the moon.

It requires an army of people to put together an anthology like The Children of Old Leech, so a huge THANK YOU! goes out to the following: Co-editor Justin Steele; authors Allyson Bird, Jesse Bullington, Michael Cisco, Jesse James Douthit-Nicolay, Gemma Files, Richard Gavin, J. T. Glover, Cody Goodfellow, T.E. Grau, Orrin Grey, Michael Griffin, Stephen Graham Jones, John Langan, Daniel Mills, Scott Nicolay, Joseph S. Pulver, Sr., Molly Tanzer, Jeffrey Thomas, and Paul Tremblay; copyeditor Marty Halpern; hardcover artist/designer Matthew Revert; softcover artist Dalton Rose; softcover designer Scott R. Jones; and, of course, Laird Barron, for letting all of us play in his universe. Thanks also to all of you who purchased the book (and other Word Horde titles), and to all of the readers and reviewers who have taken the time to recommend the book to others. Thanks to the Shirley Jackson Awards Board of Directors and jurors. And thanks to everyone who shared a toast to Old Leech with us back when we launched the book. Cheers!

Read the full list of nominees here: http://www.shirleyjacksonawards.org/nominees/

Cthulhu Fhtagn! Cover Reveal

Coming from Word Horde this August: Cthulhu Fhtagn!

Now available to preorder: https://wordhorde.com/product/cthulhu-fhtagn-bundle/

From Ross E. Lockhart, the editor who brought you The Book of Cthulhu, The Children of Old Leech, and Giallo Fantastique comes Cthulhu Fhtagn!, 19 weird tales inspired by H. P. Lovecraft.

Table of Contents:

Preorder today: https://wordhorde.com/product/cthulhu-fhtagn-bundle/

Cover art by Adolfo Navarro

Horror Talk Reviews The Children of Old Leech

HorrorTalk today reviews The Children of Old Leech, saying, “The Children of Old Leech is about paying tribute to a man who has made us be afraid of what lives in the woods in new and terrifying ways, but it also ends up being an outstanding collection of short fiction by some of the best authors out there. Throw in an introduction by Justin Steele and an afterword by Ross E. Lockhart, undoubtedly two of the best dark fiction editors and anthologists, and what you get is a book worthy of being followed into the woods on a dark, moonless night.”

Read the full review at this link, and ask for The Children of Old Leech by name wherever books are sold. Or order direct from Word Horde.

NPR Reviews Vermilion

NPR Books’ Jason Heller has reviewed Molly Tanzer’s Vermilion, calling the debut novel “a work of alt-history that finds a fresh kind of magic in the mingling of fact and fantasy,” and concluding “Vermilion is a unique, hearty, thought-provoking romp that rewrites history with a vivacious flourish.” Read the full review at this link, and ask for Vermilion by name wherever books are sold. Or order direct from Word Horde.

‘Vermilion’ Finds New Magic In The Old West

Cthulhu Fhtagn! Table of Contents Reveal!

This August, the stars will be right. Cthulhu Fhtagn! Weird Tales Inspired by H. P. Lovecraft will be unleashing cosmic horror onto an unsuspecting–but deserving–world, just in time to commemorate H. P. Lovecraft’s 125th birthday. In the next few weeks, we’ll be revealing the cover and opening up pre-orders, so that you can bring this monster home, but today, as promised, here’s the full Table of Contents:

Cthulhu Fhtagn!
Table of Contents

Photo: H. P. Lovecraft’s own depiction of Cthulhu.

Poppy Z. Brite praises Nicole Cushing’s Mr. Suicide

One of the most influential and transgressive horror writers of the last few decades has high acclaim for Nicole Cushing’s forthcoming Word Horde debut, Mr. Suicide:

“This tale of a damaged and murderous child is the most original horror novel I’ve read in years. Cushing’s prose is rapid-fire, grisly, and passionate.”
–Poppy Z. Brite, author of Exquisite Corpse and Lost Souls

Pre-Order Mr. Suicide today.

And a tremendous Thank You goes out to Billy Martin for providing us with the blurb.

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