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Bram Stoker Award Winners (horror)
Description: The Bram Stoker Awards are given by the Horror Writers Association in acknowledgment of superior achievement in the horror genre. Bookshare is pleased to offer the following titles awarded the Bram Stoker Award for best novel. #award
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American Gods
by Neil GaimanFirst published in 2001, American Gods became an instant classic--an intellectual and artistic benchmark from the multiple-award-winning master of innovative fiction, Neil Gaiman. Now discover the mystery and magic of American Gods in this tenth anniversary edition. Newly updated and expanded with the author's preferred text, this commemorative volume is a true celebration of a modern masterpiece by the one, the only, Neil Gaiman.
A storm is coming . . .
Locked behind bars for three years, Shadow did his time, quietly waiting for the magic day when he could return to Eagle Point, Indiana. A man no longer scared of what tomorrow might bring, all he wanted was to be with Laura, the wife he deeply loved, and start a new life.
But just days before his release, Laura and Shadow's best friend are killed in an accident. With his life in pieces and nothing to keep him tethered, Shadow accepts a job from a beguiling stranger he meets on the way home, an enigmatic man who calls himself Mr. Wednesday. A trickster and rogue, Wednesday seems to know more about Shadow than Shadow does himself.
Life as Wednesday's bodyguard, driver, and errand boy is far more interesting and dangerous than Shadow ever imagined-it is a job that takes him on a dark and strange road trip and introduces him to a host of eccentric characters whose fates are mysteriously intertwined with his own. Along the way Shadow will learn that the past never dies; that everyone, including his beloved Laura, harbors secrets; and that dreams, totems, legends, and myths are more real than we know. Ultimately, he will discover that beneath the placid surface of everyday life a storm is brewing-an epic war for the very soul of America-and that he is standing squarely in its path.
Relevant and prescient, American Gods has been lauded for its brilliant synthesis of "mystery, satire, sex, horror, and poetic prose" (Michael Dirda, Washington Post Book World) and as a modern phantasmagoria that "distills the essence of America" (Seattle Post-Intelligencer). It is, quite simply, an outstanding work of literary imagination that will endure for generations.
Nebula Award Winner
Winner of Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel
Ararat
by Christopher GoldenArarat is the heart-pounding tale of an adventure that goes wrong...on a biblical scale.
When an earthquake reveals a secret cave hidden inside Mount Ararat in Turkey, a daring newly engaged couple are determined to be the first ones inside...and what they discover will change everything.
The cave is actually a buried ancient ship that many quickly come to believe is Noah’s Ark.
When a team of scholars, archaeologists, and filmmakers make it inside the ark, they discover an elaborate coffin in its recesses.
Inside the coffin they find an ugly, misshapen cadaver—not the holy man they expected, but a hideous creature with horns.
Shock and fear turn to horror when a massive blizzard blows in, trapping them thousands of meters up the side of a remote mountain.
All they can do is pray for safety. But something wicked is listening to their prayers...and it wants to answer.
Audrey's Door
by Sarah LanganBuilt on the Upper West Side, the elegant Breviary claims a regal history. But despite 14B's astonishingly low rental price, the recent tragedy within its walls has frightened away all potential tenants . . . except for Audrey Lucas. No stranger to tragedy at thirty-two--a survivor of a fatherless childhood and a mother's hopeless dementia-- Audrey is obsessively determined to make her own way in a city that often strangles the weak. But is it something otherworldly or Audrey's own increasing instability that's to blame for the dark visions that haunt her . . . and for the voice that demands that she build a door? A door it would be true madness to open . . .
Bag of Bones
by Stephen KingA powerful tale of grief, love&’s enduring bonds, and secrets of the past from #1 New York Times bestselling author and master storyteller Stephen King.Four years after the sudden death of his wife, bestselling novelist Mike Noonan is still grieving. Unable to write and plagued by vivid nightmares set at the western Maine summerhouse he calls &“Sara Laughs,&” Mike reluctantly returns to the lakeside getaway. There, he finds his beloved Yankee town held in the grip of a powerful millionaire, Max Devore, whose vindictive purpose is to take his three-year-old granddaughter, Kyra, away from her widowed young mother, Mattie. As Mike is drawn into Mattie&’s and Kyra&’s struggle—and as he falls in love with both of them—he is also drawn into the mystery of Sara Laughs…now the site of ghostly visitations and escalating terrors. What are the forces that have been unleashed here—and just what do they want of Mike Noonan?
Blood Kin
by Steve Rasnic Tem2015 Bram Stoker Award Winner for Superior Achievement: Novel
Steve Rasnic Tem's new novel Blood Kin is set in the southern Appalachians of the U.S., alternating between the 1930s and the present day. It's a dark Southern Gothic vision of ghosts, witchcraft, secret powers, snake-handling, Kudzu, Melungeons, and the Great Depression.
Blood Kin is told from the dual points of view of Michael Gibson and of his grandmother Sadie. Michael has returned to the quiet Appalachian home of his forebears following a suicide attempt and now takes care of his grandmother-- old and sickly but with an important story to tell about growing up poor and Melungeon (a mixed race group of mysterious origin) while bedeviled by a snake-handling uncle and empathic powers she but barely understands.
In a field not far from the Gibson family home lies an iron-bound crate within a small shack buried four feet deep under Kudzu vine. Michael somehow understands that hidden inside that crate is potentially his own death, his grandmother's death, and perhaps the deaths of everyone in the valley if he does not come to understand her story well enough.
Blood of the Lamb
by Thomas F. MonteleoneThe previous Pope died in his arms, blessing him with his last breath. He can perform miracles. His mother was a virgin. His DNA came from the Shroud of Turin. Peter Carenza is the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy and a secret, Vatican-sponsored experiment. But is he the Second Coming, or something far, far worse? Believers the world over hail Carenza as the new Pope and rejoice as he creates a new Church for the new Millennium. Few people know the truth -- that mixing science with the works of God has created not a Savior but the Anti-Christ. Now the latest -- and last -- Pope scours the world for the human guardians of the Biblical seven seals, which must be destroyed before the final cataclysm can begin. Opposing him are a lone Archbishop, the female American journalist who chronicled Carenza's rise to power, and Peter's mother, a nun who truly hears the Word of the Lord.
Boy's Life
by Robert R. MccammonIn me are the memories of a boy's life, spent in that realm of enchantments. These are the things I want to tell you....
Boy's Life is a richly imagined, spellbinding portrait of the magical worldview of the young -- and of innocence lost.
Zephyr, Alabama, is an idyllic hometown for eleven-year-old Cory Mackenson -- a place where monsters swim the river deep and friends are forever. Then, one cold spring morning, Cory and his father witness a car plunge into a lake -- and a desperate rescue attempt brings his father face-to-face with a terrible, haunting vision of death. As Cory struggles to understand his father's pain, his eyes are slowly opened to the forces of good and evil that surround him. From an ancient mystic who can hear the dead and bewitch the living, to a violent clan of moonshiners, Cory must confront the secrets that hide in the shadows of his hometown -- for his father's sanity and his own life hang in the balance....
Winner of Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel
The Cabin at the End of the World
by Paul TremblayPaul Tremblay’s terrifying twist to the home invasion novel—inspiration for the upcoming major motion picture from Universal Pictures“Tremblay’s personal best. It’s that good.” — Stephen KingSeven-year-old Wen and her parents, Eric and Andrew, are vacationing at a remote cabin on a quiet New Hampshire lake. Their closest neighbors are more than two miles in either direction along a rutted dirt road.One afternoon, as Wen catches grasshoppers in the front yard, a stranger unexpectedly appears in the driveway. Leonard is the largest man Wen has ever seen, but he is young, friendly, and he wins her over almost instantly. Leonard and Wen talk and play until Leonard abruptly apologizes and tells Wen, “None of what’s going to happen is your fault.” Three more strangers then arrive at the cabin carrying unidentifiable, menacing objects. As Wen sprints inside to warn her parents, Leonard calls out: “Your dads won’t want to let us in, Wen. But they have to. We need your help to save the world.”Thus begins an unbearably tense, gripping tale of paranoia, sacrifice, apocalypse, and survival that escalates to a shattering conclusion, one in which the fate of a loving family and quite possibly all of humanity are entwined. The Cabin at the End of the World is a masterpiece of terror and suspense from the fantastically fertile imagination of Paul Tremblay.
Carrion Comfort
by Dam SimmonsThe Past... Caught behind the lines of Hitler’s Final Solution, Saul Laski is one of the multitudes destined to die in the notorious Chelmno extermination camp. Until he rises to meet his fate and finds himself face-to-face with an evil far older, and far greater, than the Nazis themselves.... The Present... Compelled by the encounter to survive at all costs, so begins a journey that for Saul will span decades and cross continents, plunging into the darkest corners of twentieth-century history to reveal a secret society of beings who throughout the ages may exist behind the world’s most horrible and violent events. Killing from a distance, they are people with the psychic ability to “use” humans: read their minds, subjugate them to their wills, experience through their senses, and force them to acts of unspeakable aggression. Each year, three of the most powerful of this hidden order meet to discuss their triumphs of bloodshed and destruction. But at this reunion, something will go terribly wrong. Saul’s quest is about to reach its elusive object, drawing hunter and hunted alike into a struggle that will plumb the depths of mankind’s attraction to violence, and determine the future of the world itself.
Children of the Dusk
by Janet BerlinerConcluding the saga of Solomon, Erich, and Miriam, Dusk begins as they land on Nosy Mangabé, a small island off the coast of Madagascar, in the midst of one of the most dense rainforests on Earth. Along with their mysterious Malagasy guide Bruqah, 144 Jews, 40 heavily armed Nazis, and Erich's crack canine unit, the three fight to find a place in this strange new world, while also fighting to stay alive. Winner of the Bram Stoker Award
Coyote Rage
by Owl GoingbackBram Stoker Award-Winning author Owl Goingback makes a triumphant return to horror and fantasy in this gripping new novel. Coyote is on a murderous hunt, leaving behind a trail of carnage. The shape-shifter is determined to kill the human representatives to the Great Council in Galun'lati, eliminating the rule of mankind in the New World. But Raven has overheard the Trickster's evil plan, and will do anything to protect Luther Watie and his daughter, Sarah Reynolds, even if it means turning his skin inside out. The forces of evil are aligning in two very different worlds. Can mankind be saved, or will creatures of fur and fangs once again reign supreme?
Creepers
by David MorrellFive urban explorers meet up and begin preparations to break into the abandoned Paragon Hotel. But after finding their way inside, it becomes clear that they will get more than they bargained for.
A Dark Matter
by Peter StraubThe incomparable master of horror and suspense returns with a powerful, brilliantly terrifying novel that redefines the genre in original and unexpected ways.The charismatic and cunning Spenser Mallon is a campus guru in the 1960s, attracting the devotion and demanding sexual favors of his young acolytes. After he invites his most fervent followers to attend a secret ritual in a local meadow, the only thing that remains is a gruesomely dismembered body--and the shattered souls of all who were present. Years later, one man attempts to understand what happened to his wife and to his friends by writing a book about this horrible night, and it's through this process that they begin to examine the unspeakable events that have bound them in ways they cannot fathom, but that have haunted every one of them through their lives. As each of the old friends tries to come to grips with the darkness of the past, they find themselves face-to-face with the evil triggered so many years earlier. Unfolding through the individual stories of the fated group's members, A Dark Matter is an electric, chilling, and unpredictable novel that will satisfy Peter Straub's many ardent fans, and win him legions more.
Dead in the Water
by Nancy HolderThe shipwrecked, vacationing passengers of the ill-fated freighter, Morris, are picked up by the H.M.S. Pandora and sail into a cruise of metaphysical terror, madness, and death.
Winner of Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel
The Devil Takes You Home
by Gabino IglesiasThis genre-defying, Shirley Jackson and Bram Stoker award-winning thriller follows a father desperate to salvage what's left of his family—even if it means a descent into violence. Buried in debt due to his young daughter&’s illness, his marriage at the brink, Mario reluctantly takes a job as a hitman, surprising himself with his proclivity for violence. After tragedy destroys the life he knew, Mario agrees to one final job: hijack a cartel&’s cash shipment before it reaches Mexico. Along with an old friend and a cartel-insider named Juanca, Mario sets off on the near-suicidal mission, which will leave him with either a cool $200,000 or a bullet in the skull. But the path to reward or ruin is never as straight as it seems. As the three complicated men travel through the endless landscape of Texas, across the border and back, their hidden motivations are laid bare alongside nightmarish encounters that defy explanation. One thing is certain: even if Mario makes it out alive, he won&’t return the same. The Devil Takes You Home is a panoramic odyssey for fans of S.A. Cosby&’s southern noir, Blacktop Wasteland, by way of the boundary-defying storytelling of Stephen Graham Jones and Silvia Moreno-Garcia. NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY: NPR, Harper's Bazaar, Chicago Tribune, Vulture, Oprah Daily, CrimeReads, The Millions, and many more!An Edgar Award Finalist • A Bram Stoker Award Winner • A Shirley Jackson Award Winner • A Book of the Month Club Pick • An August Indie Next List Selection • An ABA Indie Bestseller
Doctor Sleep
by Stephen KingNow a major motion picture starring Ewan McGregor! From master storyteller Stephen King, his unforgettable and terrifying sequel to The Shining—an instant #1 New York Times bestseller that is &“[a] vivid frightscape&” (The New York Times). Years ago, the haunting of the Overlook Hotel nearly broke young Dan Torrance&’s sanity, as his paranormal gift known as &“the shining&” opened a door straight into hell. And even though Dan is all grown up, the ghosts of the Overlook—and his father&’s legacy of alcoholism and violence—kept him drifting aimlessly for most of his life. Now, Dan has finally found some order in the chaos by working in a local hospice, earning the nickname &“Doctor Sleep&” by secretly using his special abilities to comfort the dying and prepare them for the afterlife. But when he unexpectedly meets twelve-year-old Abra Stone—who possesses an even more powerful manifestation of the shining—the two find their lives in sudden jeopardy at the hands of the ageless and murderous nomadic tribe known as the True Knot, reigniting Dan&’s own demons and summoning him to battle for this young girl&’s soul and survival...
Dread in the Beast
by Charlee JacobNovel which culls from the histories and mythologies of humankind. it follows the trail of the Mother Spirit of the worst that the world is capable of producing.
The Drowning Girl
by Caitlin R. KiernanIndia Morgan Phelps-Imp to her friends-is schizophrenic. Struggling with her perceptions of reality, Imp must uncover the truth about her encounters with creatures out of myth-or from something far, far stranger...
Winner of the Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel.
Duma Key
by Stephen KingMaster storyteller Stephen King&’s classic, terrifying #1 New York Times bestseller of what happens when the barrier between our world and that of the supernatural is breached.After a terrible construction site accident severs Edgar Freemantle&’s right arm, scrambles his mind, and implodes his marriage, the wealthy Minnesota builder faces the ordeal of rehabilitation, all alone and full of rage. Renting a house on Duma Key—a stunningly beautiful and eerily undeveloped splinter off the Florida coast—Edgar slowly emerges from his prison of pain to bond with Elizabeth Eastlake, a sick, elderly woman whose roots are tangled deep in this place. And as he heals, he paints—feverishly, compulsively, his exploding talent both a wonder and a weapon. For Edgar&’s creations are not just paintings, but portals for the ghosts of Elizabeth&’s past…and their power cannot be controlled…
The Fisherman
by John LanganIn upstate New York, in the woods around Woodstock, Dutchman's Creek flows out of the Ashokan Reservoir. Steep-banked, fast-moving, it offers the promise of fine fishing, and of something more, a possibility too fantastic to be true. When Abe and Dan, two widowers who have found solace in each other's company and a shared passion for fishing, hear rumors of the Creek, and what might be found there, the remedy to both their losses, they dismiss it as just another fish story. Soon, though, the men find themselves drawn into a tale as deep and old as the Reservoir. It's a tale of dark pacts, of long-buried secrets, and of a mysterious figure known as Der Fisher: the Fisherman. It will bring Abe and Dan face to face with all that they have lost, and with the price they must pay to regain it.
Flesh Eaters
by Joe MckinneyBattered by three devastating hurricanes in a row, the Texas coast is flattened. But for the people of Houston--and soon all of America--the most terrifying events are just beginning. . .They Rise. . .Out of the flooded streets of Houston, they emerge from plague-ridden waters. Dead. Rotting. Hungry. And as human survivors scramble to their rooftops for safety, the zombie hordes circle like sharks. The ultimate killing machines.They Feed. . .Houston is quarantined to halt the spread of the zombie plague. Anyone trying to escape is shot on sight--living and dead. Emergency Ops sergeant Eleanor Norton has her work cut out for her. Salvaging boats and gathering explosives, Eleanor and her team struggle to maintain order. But when civilization finally breaks down, the feeding frenzy begins.They Multiply. . .Biting, gnawing, feasting--but always craving more--the flesheaters increase their ranks every hour. With doomsday looming, Eleanor must focus on the people she loves--her husband and daughter--and a band of other survivors adrift in zombie-infested waters. If she can't bring them into the quarantine zone, they're all dead meat.Praise for Joe McKinney and His Novels"A merciless, fast-paced and genuinely scary read that will leave you absolutely breathless." --Bram Stoker Award-winning author Brian Keene on Dead City"Compelling. . .with a lightning-fast pace. Earns its place in any library of living dead fiction." --New York Times Bestselling Author Jonathan Maberry on Apocalypse of the Dead
The Green Mile
by Stephen KingMasterfully told and as suspenseful as it is haunting, The Green Mile is Stephen King&’s classic #1 New York Times bestselling dramatic serial novel and inspiration for the Oscar-nominated film starring Tom Hanks.Welcome to Cold Mountain Penitentiary, home to the Depression-worn men of E Block. Convicted killers all, each awaits his turn to walk &“the Green Mile,&” the lime-colored linoleum corridor leading to a final meeting with Old Sparky, Cold Mountain&’s electric chair. Prison guard Paul Edgecombe has seen his share of oddities over the years working the Mile, but he&’s never seen anything like John Coffey—a man with the body of a giant and the mind of a child, condemned for a crime terrifying in its violence and shocking in its depravity. And in this place of ultimate retribution, Edgecombe is about to discover the terrible, wondrous truth about John Coffey—a truth that will challenge his most cherished beliefs…
A Head Full of Ghosts
by Paul TremblayA chilling thriller that brilliantly blends domestic drama, psychological suspense, and a touch of modern horror, reminiscent of Mark Z. Danielewski’s House of Leaves, John Ajvide Lindqvist’s Let the Right One In, and Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House.
The lives of the Barretts, a normal suburban New England family, are torn apart when fourteen-year-old Marjorie begins to display signs of acute schizophrenia.
To her parents’ despair, the doctors are unable to stop Marjorie’s descent into madness. As their stable home devolves into a house of horrors, they reluctantly turn to a local Catholic priest for help. Father Wanderly suggests an exorcism; he believes the vulnerable teenager is the victim of demonic possession. He also contacts a production company that is eager to document the Barretts’ plight. With John, Marjorie’s father, out of work for more than a year and the medical bills looming, the family agrees to be filmed, and soon find themselves the unwitting stars of The Possession, a hit reality television show. When events in the Barrett household explode in tragedy, the show and the shocking incidents it captures become the stuff of urban legend.
Fifteen years later, a bestselling writer interviews Marjorie’s younger sister, Merry. As she recalls those long ago events that took place when she was just eight years old, long-buried secrets and painful memories that clash with what was broadcast on television begin to surface—and a mind-bending tale of psychological horror is unleashed, raising vexing questions about memory and reality, science and religion, and the very nature of evil.
Winner of the Bram Stoker Award
In the Night Room
by Peter StraubIn his latest soul-chilling novel, bestselling author Peter Straub tells of a famous children's book author who, in the wake of a grotesque accident, realizes that the most basic facts of her existence, including her existence itself, have come into question. Willy Patrick, the respected author of the award-winning young-adult novel In the Night Room, thinks she is losing her mind-again. One day, she is drawn helplessly into the parking lot of a warehouse. She knows somehow that her daughter, Holly, is being held in the building, and she has an overwhelming need to rescue her. But what Willy knows is impossible, for her daughter is dead. On the same day, author Timothy Underhill, who has been struggling with a new book about a troubled young woman, is confronted with the ghost of his nine-year-old sister, April. Soon after, he begins to receive eerie, fragmented e-mails that he finally realizes are from people he knew in his youth-people now dead. Like his sister, they want urgently to tell him something. When Willy and Timothy meet, the frightening parallels between Willy's tragic loss and the story in Tim's manuscript suggest that they must join forces to confront the evils surrounding them. From the Hardcover edition.
Lisey's Story
by Stephen King*Now an Apple TV+ limited series starring Julianne Moore and Clive Owen* The &“haunting…tender, intimate book that makes an epic interior journey&” (The New York Times), Lisey&’s Story is a literary masterpiece—an extraordinarily moving and haunting portrait of a marriage and its aftermath.Lisey lost her husband Scott two years ago, after a twenty-five year marriage of profound and sometimes frightening intimacy. Scott was an award-winning, bestselling novelist and a very complicated man. Early in their relationship, before they married, Lisey knew there was a place Scott went—a place that both terrified and healed him, could eat him alive or give him the ideas he needed in order to live. Now it&’s Lisey&’s turn to face Scott&’s demons, to go to that terrifying place known as Boo&’ya Moon. What begins as a widow&’s effort to sort through the papers of her celebrated husband becomes a nearly fatal journey into the darkness he inhabited. &“Intricate...exhilarating&” (The New Yorker), perhaps Stephen King&’s most personal and powerful novel ever, Lisey&’s Story is about the wellsprings of creativity, the temptations of madness, and the secret language of love. It is a beautiful, &“rich portrait of a marriage, and the complicated affection that outlives death&” (The Washington Post).