Kill Beth, Smile for the Cameras top July 2025 chart
The Top 5
Two novels about creatives returning to the spotlight after a past tragedy lead the list of June releases in Malevolent Dark’s Horror Fiction Top 25 July 2025 Edition.
Billed as psychological horror for fans of Paul Tremblay, Riley Sager, and Stephen King, Kill Beth is about a theater director trying to leave behind a tragedy in Seattle. A mysterious script draws him back into the spotlight and into a nightmare with the haunting message to kill Beth. However, he doesn’t know a Beth, but he must figure out the mystery before it’s too late.
Smile for the Cameras is another novel about a return to the spotlight. It’s about an actress who was the popular final girl in a cult horror slasher 20 years ago before mysteriously disappearing from the movie scene. When she reunites with her castmates to film a reunion documentary at the original set’s cabin, they start dying in the same way as the characters they played in the film. Can the final girl survive again for real?
Splatterpunk Award winner D.W. Hitz returns to Custer Falls with the No. 3 title on the July chart, Black Creek Mystic. It’s about a woman who makes a deal with a witch to end her nightmares stemming from something disturbing she witnessed as a high school girl.
At No. 4 is the ghostly thriller debut Glass Girls by Danie Shokoohi. It’s about a former child medium forced to face her deadly past from a curse that she thought she had escaped. People Magazine describes its Best Book of the Week pick as “part thriller, part ghost story and delightfully twisty all the way through.” Gone Girl author Gillian Flynn raves that “Danie’s earnest, spellbinding, and emotionally rich debut breathes new life into the classic ghost story.”
Rounding out the Top 5 is twisty supernatural thriller The No-End House by Jeremy Bates. It’s about two strangers who unknowingly volunteer for the ultimate haunted house challenge in Barcelona’s Gothic Quarter. The challenge is to complete nine tests in nine rooms, but the house emanates a seductive power that causes participants to do anything to survive.
Anthologies and Collections
For fans of shorter fiction, there are two collections and two anthologies in this month’s Horror Fiction Top 25.
Two-time Splatterpunk Award winner Bryan Smith pulls in at No. 8 with his retro horror release Drive-Thru of the Dead: Drayton Falls: Volume 1. This five-story collection is set in a strange and cursed town with a weird and unexplainable history. With Smith behind the projector, you know it’s going to be pretty effed up, too. A master of extreme horror, Smith delivers stories with a retro vibe, including tales about zombies with a strange hunger for fast food, a masked slasher in a cheerleading outfit, and a mysterious night-walking phantom.
At No. 11 is The Horror Collection: Sinister Edition presented by Kevin J. Kennedy. The 24th entry in the anthology series, Sinister Edition features 16 twisted tales by authors Ju Collins, C.M. Forest, J.L. Lane, Mark Towse, Veronica Smith, Elizabeth Massie, Jeff Strand, Brian Moreland, S.E. Howard, Joel Austin, Adam Millard, Andrew Kurtz, Viggy Parr Hampton, Ben Young, Bryan W. Alaspa, and RJ Meldrum.
Zombie Sharks with Metal Teeth by Bram Stoker Award-winning author Stephen Graham Jones is No. 12. The 22-story collection takes a dive into the chilling waters of Graham’s short fiction. Stories include “Old Meat,” about a man who writes to Dear Abby for advice on whether or not to tell his wife of 38 years that she transforms into a wolf at night; and “I Was a Teenage Slasher Victim,” which explores the generational trauma of summer camp serial killer survivors.
Subtitled Three Hollywood Horror Novellas, 24 Frames Per Second makes the cut at No. 13. The 21st entry in Crystal Lake Publishing’s Dark Tide series, 24 Frames Per Second features stories by Gary A. Braunbeck, Tim Waggoner, and Andrew Nadolny. Braunbeck’s “This Is Not My Movie” is about a theater consumed by fire, but its charred ruins become a nexus for ghosts and alternate realities, birthing a dark force that traps the souls of the victims killed in the blaze. Waggoner’s “The Last Zombie” is about a group of student filmmakers who embark on a project to create a zombie holocaust script, but when their fictional nightmare unfolds in real life, they must face the terrifying reality of their own creation. Nadolny’s “I Am the Rainbringer” is about a woman who’s transformed into a serial killer by her father’s dying wish and whose husband turns her deadly past into a movie, but the ghosts of their pasts rise to haunt them both.
The Rest of the Top 10
At No. 6 is Sanguine Summer by Abe Moss. It’s a Southern Gothic vampire novel set in a motel in the backwoods of Tennessee. It also had one of my favorite lines that I read in June: “The Silver Lining Motel squatted dark and lonesome along the deserted outskirts of Main Street, where the railroad was loudest and the cicadas never slept.”
Hank Flynn: The Return by Candace Nola rides into town at No 7. Set in the Midwest of the early 1900s, Hank Flynn: The Return finds the former lawman battling evil again in a small town where something unseen preys on the townsfolk.
Billed as James Herbert meets Silent Hill, Hostile by Luke Scull reaches No. 9 on the chart. It’s about a struggling writer — battling depression and experiencing strange dreams — who embarks on a journey to save his estranged wife and discover why all the animals have become bloodthirsty and ferocious.
Rounding out the Top 10 is Forest of the Sasquatch 3 by Luka T. Jacobs. Subtitled The Uprising, the third entry in the series follows the brutal slaying of a Sasquatch Elder, causing the rest of the clan to retaliate and launch a violent campaign against the human world.
Anyway, that wraps up my report on this month’s chart. Without further ado, here’s the Top 25. As always, clicking on the book titles takes you to their Amazon pages where they can be purchased.