From an old regional theatre on the English coast to a Hollywood sound stage, an odd audition in London, by way of a sad and lonely hotel that attracts a series of strange residents. And much else too. Here are reflections on the nature of truth, how fiction and childish verse can impact reality, and the dangers inherent in retreating from that reality. Photographs and hauntings. Loss and longing. Just how lucky is it being lucky. Strange revenges and even stranger curses....

“A prodigiously imaginative collection.”—New York Times Book Review, Editor’s Choice“Dazzling tales from a master of the fantastic.”—Washington Post Book WorldFragile Things is a sterling collection of exceptional tales from Neil Gaiman, multiple award-winning (the Hugo, Bram Stoker, Newberry, and Eisner Awards, to name just a few), #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Graveyard Book, Anansi Boys, Coraline, ...

The best of the best …This essential book takes a decade of Best Australian Stories and selects the most outstanding short fiction by the country’s finest writers. These stories range widely in style and subject matter: there is drama and comedy, subtlety and extravagance, tales of suspense, love, fantasy, grief and revenge. Together they showcase the strength and diversity of Australian fiction at its very best.Contributors include: Murray Bail, D...

Winner of the British Fantasy Society Award for “Best Anthology”An electrifying horror anthology featuring 19 stories by award-winning heavyweights of the genre—including Bird Box author Josh Malerman and Ramsey CampbellThe horror genre’s greatest living practitioners drag our darkest fears, kicking and screaming, into the light . . . In “The Boggle Hole” by Alison Littlewood, an ancient folk tale leads to irrevocable loss. In Josh...

An incredible fourth book in the horror anthology series which Booklist called "Highly recommended for longstanding horror fans and those readers who may not think horror is for them. There is something for everyone in this one."Darkness Beckons is the fourth volume in the non-themed horror series of entirely original stories, showcasing the very best short fiction that the genre has to offer, and edited by Mark Morris. This new anthology contains...

Darkness, both literal and psychological, holds its own unique fascination. Despite our fears, or perhaps because of them, readers have always been drawn to tales of death, terror, madness, and the supernatural, and no more so than today when a wildly imaginative new generation of dark dreamers is carrying on in the tradition of Poe and Lovecraft and King, crafting exquisitely disturbing literary nightmares that gaze without flinching into the abyss—and linger in the mind long after.

A doctor makes a late-night emergency call to an exclusive California riding school; a professor inherits a mysterious vase... and a strange little man; a struggling youth discovers canine horrors lurking beneath the streets of Albany; a sheriff ruthlessly deals with monstrosities plaguing his rural town; a pair of animal researchers makes a frightening discovery at a remote site; a sweet little girl entertains herself... by torturing faeries; a group of horror aficionados attempts to trac...

The nation's favourite annual guide to the short story, now in its seventh year.Best British Short Stories invites you to judge a book by its cover – or more accurately, by its title. This critically acclaimed series aims to reprint the best short stories published in the previous calendar year by British writers, whether based in the UK or elsewhere. The editor's brief is wide ranging, covering anthologies, collections, magazines, newspapers and web sites, looking...

'A masterful collection' MAXINE PEAKE'Astonishing and long overdue, you really need to read this’ ALAN MOORE**'**An absolute treat' ADAM S. LESLIEUnleash the dark and delirious with this electrifying anthology of folk horror from some of Britain's most iconic working-class voicesA phonograph cylinder that plays on a loop for eternity, casting out ghostly spectres of violence; a centuries-old s...

A hilarious and empowering perimenopausal Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, about Clover Hendry, 46, and the day she decides to stop keeping the plates spinning, say F@#! it all, and finally get hers.Today is not the day to mess with Clover Hendry.Clover hasn’t said “No” a day in her life. Until today. Normally a woman who tips her hairdresser even when the cut is hideous, is endlessly patient with her horrendous mother, and says yes every time he...

The nation's favourite annual guide to the short story, now in its sixth year.Best British Short Stories invites you to judge a book by its cover – or more accurately, by its title. This new series aims to reprint the best short stories published in the previous calendar year by British writers, whether based in the UK or elsewhere. The editor's brief is wide ranging, covering anthologies, collections, magazines, newspapers and web sites, looking for the b...

What happens when mirth turns to murder? When the screams are not from joy, but flesh-ripping pain? Dead Funny: Encore is the second helping of monstrous tales from the brightest lights in UK comedy.Award winners Robin Ince and Johnny Mains team up for this second exploration of the relationship between comedy and horror, the dark follow up to 2014's smash hit debut, Dead Funny.Featuring stories by: James Acaster, Clare Ferguson Walker, Toby Hadoke, Natali...