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Zero Dark Thirty book cover
Zero Dark Thirty
The 30 Darkest Stories from Dark Matter Magazine, 2021-'22
2024
First Published
4.50
Average Rating
349
Number of Pages

DARK MATTER MAGAZINE'S 30 DARKEST STORIES FROM THE MAGAZINE'S FIRST TWO YEARS (2021-2022)Zero Dark Thirty is a curated collection of the thirty darkest stories to haunt the pages of Dark Matter Magazine's first two years of publication (2021-2022). These are the most depressing and deranged tales the magazine has to offer. Enter if you must, but beware. Stories "Potato" by Ken Altabef "Annihilate Mankind and Impress Your A Correspondence Course" by Matthew Andrew "Set for Life" by Warren Benedetto "Helter Smelter" by Mark Burnham "Declare the Typhoon's Coming" by Noah Codega "Bodhisattva from Bit" by Andy Dudak "Decommissioned" by Brittany Groves "The Liminal Men" by Thomas Ha "Recycle of Violence" by Andrew Leon Hudson "The Three Breeds of Lie" by T. M. Hurree "Scintillae" by Ariel Marken Jack "This Choir of Ghosts" by Monte Lin "Little Lives" by Patrick Lofgren "Of the Sea-Born and the Brine-Hearted" by Christine Lucas "Lady of the Dullahan" by Anna Madden "The Hottest on the Hotline" by Evan Marcroft "Storm Cellar" by Jen Marshall "A Twisted Run" by Guy McDonnell "Binge" by R. L. Meza "Finishers" by Christi Nogle "Queen of the Cloven Heart" by Hailey Piper "Rider Within" by Lowry Poletti "Cube" by Grace R. Reynolds "Her Tongue Was Weighted" with Salt by Alexandra Seidel "The Devil's Travel Agency" by Alex Sobel "Marasa, or a Withdrawal of Pure Joy for Mr. Antar" by Prashanth Srivatsa "The Ground Shook" by Roni Stinger "All the Sludge You Want to Drink" by Mary G. Thompson "This Will Be the Most Vulnerable Post I've Ever Made" by Marissa van Uden "Your Augmented Home is Now Ready" by Erich Alan Werner

Avg Rating
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Authors

Hailey Piper
Hailey Piper
Author · 34 books

Hailey Piper is the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Queen of Teeth, No Gods for Drowning, The Worm and His Kings series, Your Mind Is a Terrible Thing, Unfortunate Elements of My Anatomy, Benny Rose, the Cannibal King, and The Possession of Natalie Glasgow. She is an active member of the Horror Writers Association, with articles and short fiction appearing in Tor Nightfire, CrimeReads, Library Journal, Pseudopod, Cast of Wonders, Vastarien, Cosmic Horror Monthly, and various other publications. She lives with her wife in Maryland, where their occult rituals are secret. Find her on Twitter via @HaileyPiperSays or at www.haileypiper.com.

Andy Dudak
Author · 3 books
Andy Dudak is a writer and translator living in Beijing. He’s sold stories to many venues, including Analog, Clarkesworld, and Daily Science Fiction. He’s an SFWA member and Codexian
Christi Nogle
Christi Nogle
Author · 6 books

Christi Nogle’s debut novel, Beulah, is out now from Cemetery Gates Media and her collection The Best of Our Past, the Worst of Our Future is coming in early 2023 from Flame Tree Press, to be followed by Promise (mid-2023) and One Eye Opened in That Other Place (2024). Her short stories have appeared in over fifty publications including PseudoPod, Vastarien, and Dark Matter Magazine along with anthologies such as C.M Muller’s Nightscript and Flame Tree’s American Gothic. Christi is a member of the Horror Writers Association, Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America, and Codex Writers’ Group. She lives in Boise, Idaho with her partner Jim and their gorgeous dogs. Follow her at christinogle.com or on Twitter @christinogle Praise for Beulah: “Nogle, like all writers with a rare knack coupled with incredible skill and imagination, makes everything she writes look easy and effortlessly ingenious. Even the Table of Contents of her latest novel, Beulah, reflects that sense of effortless ingenuity (The beginning chapter is called “When you talk to the dead”, followed by 12 month named titles, followed by the last chapter, “When you walk with the dead”). I’ve been lucky enough to publish Nogle’s short stories twice now, and I hope to publish her work many more times in the future. My initial reaction to reading this debut novel is simply this: how in the hell could this be anyone’s first novel? It’s so assured, so masterful, so in control at every level. This is not the typical mess of even the most talented writer’s first attempt at that tricky long form. This is the work of a top tier author in top form. Anyone writing a book blurb is tempted to summarize the plot and shower the book (and writer) with hyperbolic praise. I won’t do the former, and I promise you I’m not doing the latter. Nogle has all the goods, a singularly weird imagination, a tremendous sense of pacing and voice, and a mastery of clarity and control on the sentence level. Beulah will easily prove to be one of the best horror novels (never mind debut novels) of 2022. Read it. “ -Jon Padgett, author of The Secret of Ventriloquism With a skilled and unflinching hand, Nogle guides us through layers of time and experience in Beulah. Through the eyes of reluctantly “gifted” Georgie, we see what is usually hidden—the heartbreaking and terrifying—every rich and textured detail leading to a truly satisfying payoff. I will never forget this walk with the dead. — J.A.W. McCarthy, author of SOMETIMES WE’RE CRUEL AND OTHER STORIES Beulah: Beulah is the story of Georgie, an eighteen-year-old with a talent (or affliction) for seeing ghosts. Georgie and her family have had a hard time since her father died, but she and her mother Gina and sisters Tommy and Stevie are making a new start in the small town of Beulah, Idaho where Gina’s wealthy friend Ellen has set them up to help renovate an old stone schoolhouse. Georgie experiences a variety of disturbances—the town is familiar from dreams and she seems to be experiencing her mother’s memory of the place, not to mention the creepy ghost in the schoolhouse basement—but she is able to maintain, in her own laconic way, until she notices that her little sister Stevie also has the gift. Stevie is in danger from a malevolent ghost, and Georgie tries to help, but soon Georgie is the one in danger.

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