Top Ten Tuesday; 2024 Releases I Was Excited to Read but Still Haven’t Gotten To
It's Tuesday, which means it's probably time for another Top Ten Tuesday post courtesy of That Artsy Reader Girl and today's topic is 2024 releases I was excited to read, but still haven't gotten to.
After sitcom star Willow tweeted herself into infamy and stumbled blind-drunk into a swimming pool, her agent shipped her off to Camp Castaway. Tucked away in upstate New York, Castaway is a summer camp for adults who are desperate to leave their mistakes behind. No real names, no phones . . . no way to call for help.
Willow’s fellow campers seem okay. Her own favorite actress is even here, making a s’more. And did that jaded writer, Dani, just wink at her? But the peaceful vibe is shattered when one of the campers vanishes and Willow finds a mutilated doll in her room with a threatening message rolled up inside its mouth. Terror grips the group, campers begin to lose their heads—literally—and disturbing past deeds come to light.
Is Willow about to get cancelled all over again, this time for good?
The black water has been waiting. Watching. Hungry for the souls it needs to survive.
When small-town athlete Avery’s morning run leads her to a strange pond in the middle of the forest, she awakens a horror the townspeople of Crook’s Falls have long forgotten.
Avery can smell the water, see it flooding everywhere; she thinks she’s losing her mind. And as the black water haunts Avery—taking a new form each time—people in town begin to go missing.
Though Avery had heard whispers of monsters from her Kanyen’kehá:ka (Mohawk) relatives, she’s never really connected to her Indigenous culture or understood the stories. But the Elders she has distanced herself from now may have the answers she needs.
When Key, her best friend and longtime crush, is the next to disappear, Avery is faced with a choice: listen to the Kanyen’kehá:ka and save the town but lose her friend forever…or listen to her heart and risk everything to get Key back.
In her stunning debut, Cheryl Isaacs pulls the reader down into an unsettling tale of monsters, mystery, and secrets that refuse to stay submerged.
The mayor finds a solution that serves everyone but Faolan. He hires a gunslinger to ship her off to the Settlement, a remote fort where social outcasts live under the leadership of His Benevolence Gideon Dillard. It's a place rife with mystery, kept afloat by suspicious wealth. Dillard's absolute command over his staff just doesn't seem right. And neither do the strange noises that keep Faolan up at night.
When Faolan finds the body of a Settlement boarder, mangled by something that can’t possibly be human, it’s clear something vicious is stalking the palisades. And as Settlement boarders continue to drop like flies, Faolan knows she must escape to evade the creature’s wrath.
Ever the supportive wife, I’m tagging along. I researched Budapest and had a long itinerary of things to do. That is, I did. When we arrive, we find out that the Guild headquarters is in the ruins of an abandoned insane asylum. Awesome. If there’s one thing I love, it’s being hounded by mentally unstable Hungarian ghosts.
Let’s just say this isn’t the romantic getaway I’d been hoping for. With Clive in top secret meetings and a bunch of creepy Renfields skulking around corners, nowhere is safe. I want to help Clive because I know he really wants the job, but the other Guild members are ancient and scary powerful. Between you and me, I thought Vlad would be taller.
Wish us luck! We’re going to need it.
Vicken has a plan: throw himself into the Saint Lawrence River in Montreal and end it all for good, believing it to be the only way out for him after a lifetime of depression and pain. But, stepping off the subway, he finds himself in an endless, looping station.
Determined to find a way out again, he starts to explore the rooms and corridors ahead of him. But no matter how many claustrophobic hallways or vast cathedral-esque rooms he passes through, the exit is nowhere in sight.
The more he explores his strange new prison, the more he becomes convinced that he hasn’t been trapped there accidentally, and amongst the shadows and concrete, he comes to realise that he almost certainly is not alone.
A terrifying psychological nightmare from a powerful new voice in horror.
Eunice lives her life by three simple rules: One, always refer to Cinderella as family. Two, never let Cinderella gain access to rats or mice. Three, never look upon Cinderella between the hours of twelve and three a.m.
Cinderella has dark and terrifying powers. As her stepsister, Eunice is expected to care for her and keep the family’s secret. For years, Eunice has faithfully done so. Her childhood flew by in a blur of nightmares, tears, and near-misses with the monster living in the cellar. But when she befriends the handsome Prince Credence and secures an invitation to the ball, Eunice is determined to break free.
When her younger sister, Hortense, steps up to care for Cinderella, Eunice grabs her chance to dance the night away—until Cinderella escapes. With her eldritch powers, Cinderella attends the ball and sweeps Prince Credence off his feet, leaving behind a trail of carnage and destruction as well as a single green glass slipper.
With Cinderella unleashed, Eunice must determine how much of herself she is willing to sacrifice in order to stop Cinderella. Unsettling and macabre at every turn, this page-turning horror will bewitch horror fans and leave its readers anxiously checking the locks on their cellar doors.
You can’t kill someone already dead.
That’s what Lavinia keeps telling her jailer after—allegedly—killing her mistress, Simone Arceaneau. But how could Simone be dead when she was taking callers just a few minutes before? And why was her house always so dark?
Lavinia, a recently freed slave, met Simone, a recently undead vampire, on a plantation in post-Civil War Georgia. With nothing remaining for either woman in the South, the two form a fast friendship and head north. However, Lavinia quickly learns that teaming up with this white woman may be more than she bargained for.
Simone is reckless and impulsive—which would’ve been bad enough on its own, but when combined with her particular diet Lavinia finds herself in way over her head. As she is forced to repeatedly compromise her morals and struggle to make lasting human connections, Lavinia begins to wonder if is she truly free or if has she merely exchanged one form of enslavement for another. As bodies pile up in the small Indiana town they’ve settled in, people start to take a second look at the two newcomers, and Simone and Lavinia’s relationship is stretched to its breaking point...
You spin it slowly, ignoring the grating squeaks that try to warn you of the dangers The Rack holds. You shiver as you take in the glossy covers: gothic mansions cloaked in fog, bulging eyes on blood-soaked faces, and all the creepy dolls you could ever wish for. You weigh the possibilities, pondering which nightmare to select, the vengeful vampire, the werewolf, demonic children, or perhaps parasitic insects?
It doesn't matter because The Rack will beckon to you long after the last page is turned. The Rack always contains new tales of terror by today's masters of horror. And The Rack is never done with you.
The twenty stories you're holding are throwbacks to those golden years of horror, presented to you by today's brightest stars in the genre. Giant spiders, haunted books, swarms of cicadas, killer bears, chemical spills, and so many more chronicles of carnage and camp await you.
And did we mention the creepy dolls?
So go ahead... spin The Rack, if you dare.
But don't say we didn't warn you.
Every night, in the college’s ancient cemetery, five people cross paths as they work the late shift: a bartender, a rideshare driver, a hotel receptionist, the steward of the derelict church that looms over them, and the editor-in-chief of the college paper, always in search of a story.
One dark October evening in the defunct churchyard, they find a hole that wasn’t there before. A fresh, open grave where no grave should be. But who dug it, and for whom?
Before they go their separate ways, the gravedigger returns. As they trail him through the night, they realize he may be the key to a string of strange happenings around town that have made headlines for the last few weeks—and that they may be closer to the mystery than they thought.
Atmospheric and eerie, with the ensemble cast her fans love and a delightfully familiar academic backdrop, Graveyard Shift is a modern Gothic tale in If We Were Villains author M. L. Rio’s inimitable style.
Alfred Smettle is not your average Hitchcock fan. He is the founder, owner, and manager of The Hitchcock Hotel, a sprawling Victorian house in the White Mountains dedicated to the Master of Suspense. There, Alfred offers his guests round-the-clock film screenings, movie props and memorabilia in every room, plus an aviary with fifty crows.
To celebrate the hotel’s first anniversary, he invites his former best friends from his college Film Club for a reunion. He hasn’t spoken to any of them in sixteen years, not after what happened.
But who better than them to appreciate Alfred’s creation? And to help him finish it.
After all, no Hitchcock set is complete without a body.
Here's my ten (spooky) picks.
Heads Will Roll by Josh Winning
Description from Goodreads
Willow’s worst nightmare was being canceled. But the shadows in the woods of Camp Castaway might destroy more than her reputation.After sitcom star Willow tweeted herself into infamy and stumbled blind-drunk into a swimming pool, her agent shipped her off to Camp Castaway. Tucked away in upstate New York, Castaway is a summer camp for adults who are desperate to leave their mistakes behind. No real names, no phones . . . no way to call for help.
Willow’s fellow campers seem okay. Her own favorite actress is even here, making a s’more. And did that jaded writer, Dani, just wink at her? But the peaceful vibe is shattered when one of the campers vanishes and Willow finds a mutilated doll in her room with a threatening message rolled up inside its mouth. Terror grips the group, campers begin to lose their heads—literally—and disturbing past deeds come to light.
Is Willow about to get cancelled all over again, this time for good?
The Unfinished by Cheryl Isaacs
Description from Goodreads
In this debut YA horror novel by Cheryl Isaacs (Mohawk), small-town athlete Avery is haunted by the black water and Unfinished beings of Kanyen’kehá:ka stories and must turn to the culture she hasn’t felt connected to in order to save her town.The black water has been waiting. Watching. Hungry for the souls it needs to survive.
When small-town athlete Avery’s morning run leads her to a strange pond in the middle of the forest, she awakens a horror the townspeople of Crook’s Falls have long forgotten.
Avery can smell the water, see it flooding everywhere; she thinks she’s losing her mind. And as the black water haunts Avery—taking a new form each time—people in town begin to go missing.
Though Avery had heard whispers of monsters from her Kanyen’kehá:ka (Mohawk) relatives, she’s never really connected to her Indigenous culture or understood the stories. But the Elders she has distanced herself from now may have the answers she needs.
When Key, her best friend and longtime crush, is the next to disappear, Avery is faced with a choice: listen to the Kanyen’kehá:ka and save the town but lose her friend forever…or listen to her heart and risk everything to get Key back.
In her stunning debut, Cheryl Isaacs pulls the reader down into an unsettling tale of monsters, mystery, and secrets that refuse to stay submerged.
Red in Tooth and Claw by Lish McBride
Description from Goodreads
Faolan Kelly’s grandfather is dead. She’s alone in the world and suddenly homeless, all because the local powers that be don’t think a young man of sixteen is mature enough to take over his grandfather’s homestead…and that’s with them thinking Faolan is a young man. If she revealed that her grandfather had been disguising her for years, they would marry her off at the first opportunity.The mayor finds a solution that serves everyone but Faolan. He hires a gunslinger to ship her off to the Settlement, a remote fort where social outcasts live under the leadership of His Benevolence Gideon Dillard. It's a place rife with mystery, kept afloat by suspicious wealth. Dillard's absolute command over his staff just doesn't seem right. And neither do the strange noises that keep Faolan up at night.
When Faolan finds the body of a Settlement boarder, mangled by something that can’t possibly be human, it’s clear something vicious is stalking the palisades. And as Settlement boarders continue to drop like flies, Faolan knows she must escape to evade the creature’s wrath.
The Bloody Ruin Asylum & Taproom by Seana Kelly
Description from Goodreads
I’m Sam, the werewolf book nerd owner of The Slaughtered Lamb Bookstore & Bar. My husband, Master vampire Clive, has been asked to go to Budapest to interview for a position in the Guild, a council of thirteen vampires who advise the world’s Masters. The competition for the recently vacated spot is fierce. I worry about Clive, as it quickly becomes apparent that the last person to hold the position didn’t leave voluntarily.Ever the supportive wife, I’m tagging along. I researched Budapest and had a long itinerary of things to do. That is, I did. When we arrive, we find out that the Guild headquarters is in the ruins of an abandoned insane asylum. Awesome. If there’s one thing I love, it’s being hounded by mentally unstable Hungarian ghosts.
Let’s just say this isn’t the romantic getaway I’d been hoping for. With Clive in top secret meetings and a bunch of creepy Renfields skulking around corners, nowhere is safe. I want to help Clive because I know he really wants the job, but the other Guild members are ancient and scary powerful. Between you and me, I thought Vlad would be taller.
Wish us luck! We’re going to need it.
Coup de Grâce by Sofia Ajram
Description from Goodreads
A mindbending and visceral experimental horror about a young man trapped in an infinite Montreal subway station, perfect for readers of Mark Z. Danielewski and Susanna Clarke.Vicken has a plan: throw himself into the Saint Lawrence River in Montreal and end it all for good, believing it to be the only way out for him after a lifetime of depression and pain. But, stepping off the subway, he finds himself in an endless, looping station.
Determined to find a way out again, he starts to explore the rooms and corridors ahead of him. But no matter how many claustrophobic hallways or vast cathedral-esque rooms he passes through, the exit is nowhere in sight.
The more he explores his strange new prison, the more he becomes convinced that he hasn’t been trapped there accidentally, and amongst the shadows and concrete, he comes to realise that he almost certainly is not alone.
A terrifying psychological nightmare from a powerful new voice in horror.
We Kept Her in the Cellar by W. R. Gorman
Description from Goodreads
There are always two sides to a story. This dark and twisted reimagining of Cinderella, told from her stepsister's POV, is perfect for fans of T. Kingfisher and Naomi Novik.Eunice lives her life by three simple rules: One, always refer to Cinderella as family. Two, never let Cinderella gain access to rats or mice. Three, never look upon Cinderella between the hours of twelve and three a.m.
Cinderella has dark and terrifying powers. As her stepsister, Eunice is expected to care for her and keep the family’s secret. For years, Eunice has faithfully done so. Her childhood flew by in a blur of nightmares, tears, and near-misses with the monster living in the cellar. But when she befriends the handsome Prince Credence and secures an invitation to the ball, Eunice is determined to break free.
When her younger sister, Hortense, steps up to care for Cinderella, Eunice grabs her chance to dance the night away—until Cinderella escapes. With her eldritch powers, Cinderella attends the ball and sweeps Prince Credence off his feet, leaving behind a trail of carnage and destruction as well as a single green glass slipper.
With Cinderella unleashed, Eunice must determine how much of herself she is willing to sacrifice in order to stop Cinderella. Unsettling and macabre at every turn, this page-turning horror will bewitch horror fans and leave its readers anxiously checking the locks on their cellar doors.
American Ghoul by Michelle McGill-Vargas
Description from Goodreads
A wildly entertaining debut from Michelle McGill-Vargas, American Ghoul deftly combines horror and social commentary—with a dash of a buddy comedy—in an innovative twist on the vampire genre.You can’t kill someone already dead.
That’s what Lavinia keeps telling her jailer after—allegedly—killing her mistress, Simone Arceaneau. But how could Simone be dead when she was taking callers just a few minutes before? And why was her house always so dark?
Lavinia, a recently freed slave, met Simone, a recently undead vampire, on a plantation in post-Civil War Georgia. With nothing remaining for either woman in the South, the two form a fast friendship and head north. However, Lavinia quickly learns that teaming up with this white woman may be more than she bargained for.
Simone is reckless and impulsive—which would’ve been bad enough on its own, but when combined with her particular diet Lavinia finds herself in way over her head. As she is forced to repeatedly compromise her morals and struggle to make lasting human connections, Lavinia begins to wonder if is she truly free or if has she merely exchanged one form of enslavement for another. As bodies pile up in the small Indiana town they’ve settled in, people start to take a second look at the two newcomers, and Simone and Lavinia’s relationship is stretched to its breaking point...
The Rack - Stories Inspired by Vintage Horror Paperbacks edited by Tom Deady
Description from Goodreads
It's 1980 and you have three crisp dollar bills in your pocket. You run to the drugstore, or maybe the supermarket, because you know The Rack will be there, waiting... that black wire rack, tempting you with the latest and best horror paperbacks and their lurid covers.You spin it slowly, ignoring the grating squeaks that try to warn you of the dangers The Rack holds. You shiver as you take in the glossy covers: gothic mansions cloaked in fog, bulging eyes on blood-soaked faces, and all the creepy dolls you could ever wish for. You weigh the possibilities, pondering which nightmare to select, the vengeful vampire, the werewolf, demonic children, or perhaps parasitic insects?
It doesn't matter because The Rack will beckon to you long after the last page is turned. The Rack always contains new tales of terror by today's masters of horror. And The Rack is never done with you.
The twenty stories you're holding are throwbacks to those golden years of horror, presented to you by today's brightest stars in the genre. Giant spiders, haunted books, swarms of cicadas, killer bears, chemical spills, and so many more chronicles of carnage and camp await you.
And did we mention the creepy dolls?
So go ahead... spin The Rack, if you dare.
But don't say we didn't warn you.
Graveyard Shift by M. L. Rio
Description from Goodreads
Author of sales sensation If We Were Villains returns with a story about a ragtag group of night shift workers who meet in the local cemetery to unearth the secrets lurking in an open grave.Every night, in the college’s ancient cemetery, five people cross paths as they work the late shift: a bartender, a rideshare driver, a hotel receptionist, the steward of the derelict church that looms over them, and the editor-in-chief of the college paper, always in search of a story.
One dark October evening in the defunct churchyard, they find a hole that wasn’t there before. A fresh, open grave where no grave should be. But who dug it, and for whom?
Before they go their separate ways, the gravedigger returns. As they trail him through the night, they realize he may be the key to a string of strange happenings around town that have made headlines for the last few weeks—and that they may be closer to the mystery than they thought.
Atmospheric and eerie, with the ensemble cast her fans love and a delightfully familiar academic backdrop, Graveyard Shift is a modern Gothic tale in If We Were Villains author M. L. Rio’s inimitable style.
The Hitchcock Hotel by Stephanie Wrobel
Description from Goodreads
A Hitchcock fanatic with an agenda invites old friends for a weekend stay at his secluded themed hotel in this fiendishly clever, suspenseful new novel.Alfred Smettle is not your average Hitchcock fan. He is the founder, owner, and manager of The Hitchcock Hotel, a sprawling Victorian house in the White Mountains dedicated to the Master of Suspense. There, Alfred offers his guests round-the-clock film screenings, movie props and memorabilia in every room, plus an aviary with fifty crows.
To celebrate the hotel’s first anniversary, he invites his former best friends from his college Film Club for a reunion. He hasn’t spoken to any of them in sixteen years, not after what happened.
But who better than them to appreciate Alfred’s creation? And to help him finish it.
After all, no Hitchcock set is complete without a body.
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