Short Reads

Von der preisgekrönten Autorin von „The Twisted Ones“ kommt eine fesselnde und atmosphärische Nacherzählung von Edgar Allan Poes Klassiker „Der Untergang des Hauses Usher“. Als Alex Easton, ein pensionierter Soldat, erfährt, dass die Freundin aus Kindertagen, Madeline Usher, im Sterben liegt, eilt Alex zum Stammsitz der Ushers in der abgelegenen Landschaft Ruravias. Dort erwartet Alex ein Albtraum aus Pilzwucherungen und besessenen Wildtieren, die einen dunklen, pulsierenden See umgeben. Madeline schlafwandelt und spricht nachts mit seltsamen Stimmen, und ihr Bruder Roderick wird von einem rätselhaften Nervenleiden aufgezehrt. Mit der Hilfe einer unerschrockenen britischen Mykologin und eines ratlosen amerikanischen Arztes muss Alex das Geheimnis des Hauses Usher lüften, bevor es sie alle verschlingt.

"When you're given a gift, something else gets taken away." A precocious young girl with an unusual imagination is sent on an odyssey into the depths of depravity. After her father dies violently, young Mara is surprised to find her mother welcoming a new guest into their home, claiming that he will protect them from the world of devastation and destruction outside their door. A grotesque and thrilling dark fantasy, We Can Never Leave This Place is a harrowing portrait of inherited grief and familial trauma.

Angela has everything she thought she ever wanted—a successful husband, a lavish house, and a bottomless fortune. But the sight of a strange man in a grocery store one night reawakens her dormant sexuality and soon Angela embarks on a dangerous descent into the world of underground pornography and back-alley plastic surgery. As the stakes get higher, long-buried memories resurface and Angela finds herself enamored with Reena, a fetish film performer. With some help from a queer gang called The Waifs, Angela is forced to make the decision between her unhappy upper-class life and the treacherous world of underground film.

Bart is thirty. He is bald. He is overweight. He wears glasses. He is a fry cook. He hates cats. And kids. Bart occasionally does very bad things. He is looking for his perfect match. He has done his research.

From the Bram Stoker Nominated Author Ross Jeffery comes a new nightmare. Only The Stains Remain is the haunting story of Jude and Kyle, two brothers whose lives are destroyed when, following the death of their mother, their three abusive uncles Dwight, Lucius, and Lenny move in to the family home. But whilst Jude suffers to a degree, Kyle is the one who takes the brunt of their attention, submitting himself to preserve his younger brother’s innocence. As a grown man, Jude’s mind turns to vengeance for what they have endured. He has waited a long time, but now he is strong enough, and cold-hearted enough, to do the deed. Enacting one harrowing revenge after another, Jude’s dark quest to punish the wrongs of the past will show that after all is said and done, only the stains of the past will remain.

"The Mark on the Wall" is the first published story by Virginia Woolf. It was published in 1917 as part of the first collection of short stories written by Virginia Woolf and her husband, Leonard Woolf, called Two Stories. It was later published in New York in 1921 as part of another collection entitled Monday or Tuesday. The Mark on the Wall is written in the first person, as a "stream of consciousness" monologue. The narrator notices a mark on the wall, and muses on the workings of the mind. Themes of religion, self-reflection, nature, and uncertainty are explored. The narrator reminisces about the development of thought patterns, beginning in childhood.

On a remote island in a tropical sea, Celaena Sardothien, feared assassin, has come for retribution. She's been sent by the Assassin's Guild to collect on a debt they are owed by the Lord of the Pirates. But when Celaena learns that the agreed payment is not in money, but in slaves, her mission suddenly changes - and she will risk everything to right the wrong she's been sent to bring about.

The Silent Assassins of the Red Desert aren't much for conversation, and Celaena Sardothien wouldn't have it any other way. She's not there to chatter, she's there to hone her craft as the world's most feared killer for hire. When the quiet is shattered by forces who want to destroy the Silent Assassins, Celaena must find a way to stop them, or she'll be lucky to leave the desert alive.

Celaena Sardothien is the assassin with everything: a place to call her own, the love of handsome Sam, and, best of all, freedom. But Celaena won't be truly free until she is far away from her old master, Arobynn Hamel - so she and Sam decide to take one last daring assignment that will liberate them forever. And that's how Celaena learns that having everything... means everything can be taken away. This fourth e-novella gives readers an inside look at the characters who appear in the full-length novel THRONE OF GLASS. Don't miss it!

When the King of the Assassins gives Celaena Sardothien a special assignment that will help fight slavery in the kingdom, she jumps at the chance to strike a blow against an evil practice. The mission is a dark and deadly affair which takes Celaena from the rooftops of the city to the bottom of the sewer—and she doesn't like what she finds there.

Meet the Assassin: beautiful, defiant, destined for greatness. Celaena Sardothien has challenged her master. Now she must pay the price. Her journey to the Red Desert will be an arduous one, but it may change the fate of her cursed world forever...