The Malevolent Dark Horror Fiction Top 25 September 2024 Edition
Check out the charts for August and July
1. Angel of Vengeance by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
The bestselling series featuring FBI Special Agent Pendergast and Constance Greene continues as they take a final stand against New York’s deadliest serial killer, who happens to be Pendergast’s own ancestor and Constance’s greatest enemy.
2. Hush, My Darling by Leigh Kenny
When an American tourist becomes stranded on a road trip deep in the mountains, she is rescued by a family. Is it luck or will it become a nightmare? Billed as an ideal book for fans of Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Deliverance.
3. Demons in My Bloodstream by Candace Nola
Called “a masterpiece of gore and splatter” by Queen of African Horror Nuzo Onoh, Demons in My Bloodstream features six nightmarish tales by Nola, a two-time Splatterpunk Award winner.
4. The Barricade by Stephanie Ellis
Described as “a riveting story that doesn’t flinch from the worst in us” by two-time Bram Stoker Award winner Angela Yuriko Smith, The Barricade is a dystopian novel where a select few go to an underground complex when the world is threatened, leaving everyone else above to survive any way they can.
5. The Night Guest by Hildur Knútsdóttir
Translated by Mary Robinette Kowal, The Night Guest is an eerie story set in contemporary Reykjavík about a woman who falls asleep with a step-counting watch on and wakes up to find she’s walked over 40,000 steps in the night. What happens when she sleeps and why does she wake up with increasingly disturbing injuries?
6. Blood Like Mine by Stuart Neville
In Neville’s foray into horror fiction, a mother takes desperate measures to protect her daughter in a sinister, blood-chilling highway pursuit across the Southwest.
7. Whispers in the Hollow Room by Dan Padavona
Book 10 of A Logan and Scarlett Serial Killer Thriller series follows Scarlett in pursuit of an escaped killer who murdered an FBI agent’s family.
8. The Dead Children’s Playground by James Kaine
Book 1 of the American Horrors series is about two sisters who face a malevolent force located in a graveyard for young victims of the Spanish flu and a local serial killer.
9. Wildefell by H.B. Diaz
After the brutal murders of her sister and grandmother, a reluctantly clairvoyant reporter returns to her family’s historic estate in idyllic Beaufort, South Carolina to stop a vicious killer and save her family’s legacy.
10. Vault of Southern-Fried Horror by Ronald Kelly
Book 3 of the Southern-Fried Horror Tales series features 11 stories by the Splatterpunk Award-winning author of The Essential Sick Stuff.
11. Crypt of the Moon Spider by Nathan Ballingrud
Book 1 of the Lunar Gothic Trilogy is a dark and dreamy tale of horror set on the moon in 1923 when a woman visits a renowned facility where a doctor uses a legendary spider silk to treat melancholy. However, not all is as it seems.
12. The Unmothers by Leslie J. Anderson
A journalist sent to a small town begins to unravel a dark secret that the women there have been keeping in an atmospheric tale of female rage, bodily autonomy, and generational trauma.
13. The Rule of Three by Sam Ripley
Billed as The Whisper Man meets the paranoia of The Blair Witch Project, The Rule of Three is a suspenseful thriller about an urban legend coming true.
14. Sacrificial Animals by Kailee Pedersen
Inspired by the author’s own journey of adoption from China in 1996 and growing up alongside her family’s farm in Nebraska, Pedersen’s rich and atmospheric supernatural horror debut explores an ancient Chinese mythology.
15. Zombie Fallout 23: The Broken Road by Mark Tufo
Book 23 in the Zombie Fallout series is marked by hostages, treachery, sacrifice, and fierce battle just as hope is finally on the horizon, while in an alternate universe an unhinged version of Michael Talbot is unleashed.
16. Creatures of the Night: Vicious Vampire Tales by Simon Clark, Kevin J. Kennedy, and Gord Rollo
Book 17 of Crystal Lake Publishing’s Dark Tide series features three novellas about vampires: Clark’s “Return of the Blood-Feeders,” Kennedy’s “Perspective,” and Rollo’s “Beneath Still Waters.”
17. The Strandling by James Brogden
A teenager’s life changes after a violent storm hits her village, unleashing a shape-shifting horror of the ancient world. However, with a friend’s help, she must reckon with the occult powers awakening in her and face the ghosts of her childhood while trying to save her home.
18. Mickey and Mo by Robert Essig and Tomasz Czarny
An extreme horror tale about meth makers in the backwoods of eastern Maryland who become involved in something even more deadly, dangerous, and addicting than speed. Edward Lee, a 2020 recipient of the J.F. Gonzalez Lifetime Achievement Award, writes, “This international collaboration is certain to establish Czarny and Essig high on the list of extreme horror writers.”
19. Meat by Dane Cobain
A veterinarian takes a job at a factory farm for animals called Sunnyvale where it’s rumored that a strange creature lives beneath the complex. When disaster rocks Sunnyvale, everyone must come together under the leadership of a ruthless CEO to learn what happens when there’s a sudden change to the food chain.
20. Dead Children’s Playground by M.L. Bullock
Book 3 in Season 3 of the Gulf Coast Paranormal Series has the team investigating the infamous Dead Children’s Playground in the heart of Huntsville, Alabama.
21. Levitating: Stories by Gage Greenwood
A collection of 10 tales by the author of Bunker Dogs and On a Clear Day, You Can See Block Island.
22. Saurian by Michael Cole
A group of people in the quiet town of McClellen, Michigan team up to stop a creature that crash-landed from space and is hellbent on bloodshed.
23. Snuggling the Grotesque by Jeff Strand
A collection of 26 tales by the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of “Twentieth Anniversary Screening.” Includes fan favorites, “Torture Porn for Prudes” and “Rope and Limb,” and the Splatterpunk Award-winning short story “Next Best Baker.”
24. Splatterpunk Dreams edited by Ann Keeran and Kevin J. Kennedy
Book 20 of The Horror Collection series features 14 gory splatterpunk stories by
25. Liminal by Black Widow Press
Subtitled 15 Horror Stories about Infinite Spaces, Book 4 in the Anthologies of Terror series features tales written by
THE NEXT TEN
The next 10 releases just outside the Top 25 chart:
26. House of Bone and Rain by Gabino Iglesias
27. The Town Erased by Time by Boris Bacic
28. The Ojanox: Book II: Ashes to Ashes by Daemon Manx
29. Blood of the Lost: The Horrors of Sobolton: Book 9 by Amy Cross
30. Vile, Terrible Things by Alex Hartwell
32. It Came from Inside by D.W. Hitz
33. Metro Kinetic by Brian Bowyer
34. Hell’s Cargo by Michelle Garza and Melissa Lason
35. Patchwork by Matt Shaw