Edgar Award-winning author J.W. Ocker spins a dark, psychological thriller about a travel writer who stays for 13 nights at the infamous Rotterdam Mansion unprepared for the horrors that lie within in this true love letter to the haunted house genre."It's easy to recognize Ocker as a future master of madness after this thrilling haunted house trip." —Fangoria MagazineFelix Allsey is a travel writer with a keen eye for the paranorma...

It’s almost Y2k, the start of a new millennium, and freshman William Sturm’s faith is withering. His eight-year-old sister has just been diagnosed with cancer, but his parents insist the best thing he can do for the family is return to his fundamentalist Christian college in the murky swamps of Florida and pray the semester away. Everything will work out. After all, He has a plan.Some plan that turns out to be. On his first day back, Will’s roommate is impaled on the chapel steeple...

Tread the drowsy shades of Sleepy Hollow with Edgar Award-winning travel writer J.W. Ocker in this spirited exploration of haunted corners, local lore, and America's most famous ghost story.This immersive travelogue investigates the town that inspired Washington Irving's famous short story “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” and dives into the storied history of the Headless Horseman’s stomping grounds. Within the pages you'll visit the village’s graveyard where Irving ...

Beware...this book is cursed! These strange but true stories of the world’s most infamous items will appeal to true believers as well as history buffs, horror fans, and anyone who loves a good spine-tingling tale.They’re lurking in museums, graveyards, and private homes. Their often tragic and always bizarre stories have inspired countless horror movies, reality TV shows, novels, and campfire tales. They’re cursed objects, and all they need to unleash a wave of mis...

Embark on a guided tour of 30 of the most dangerous and mysterious locations that we simply cannot stay away from.Have you ever visited a forest or an abandoned building and gotten a bad vibe? There are places that are rife with rumors of hauntings, monsters, and sinister phenomena that can’t be explained. And there are just as many sites that are the confirmed home of disasters, murders, and man-made mistakes. Everyone’s heard about the Bermuda Triangle, but do yo...

Welcome to the stranger side of America—where monsters lurk in forests, lakes, swamps, deserts, and roadside legends across all fifty states.The United States of Cryptids: A Tour of American Myths and Monsters is a fascinating and fully illustrated journey through the weird world of American cryptids, from iconic creatures like Bigfoot and Mothman to bizarre local legends most people have never heard of. Written by travel writer and folklore enthusiast J. ...

The Ghost Show is coming . . . are you ready? Three friends must face their deepest fears in this spine-tingling horror novel by USA Today bestselling author J.W. Ocker, a spooky middle grade book perfect for fans of R.L. Stine and Mary Downing Hahn.When mysterious ads for the Ghost Show appear around town, nobody can tell what it is. A band? A movie? A game? But that magic word—ghost—excites Hazel Gold, or Zel to her friends. As founder of her school’s Creepy Club (three members s...

From USA Today bestselling author J.W. Ocker comes a chilling middle grade horror perfect for fans of R.L. Stine and Holly Black alike.Noe Wiley couldn’t be more excited to move. After the slumber party sleepwalking incident of last year, she’s ready to make some new friends.But Noe didn’t expect the sullen, strange girls who live on her new street. And she certainly didn’t expect the strange warning they give her—to stay out of h...

From weird history expert J. W. Ocker, an eye-popping compendium of the 30 most infamous, audacious, and dangerous cults in history.**“A must-read.”—**Publishers WeeklyEverything you’ve ever wanted to know about history’s most notorious cults—and the psychology of the people who join them—is packed into this accessible, engaging volume. Walk in the footsteps of those who were lured into sinister groups from Heaven’s Gate to NXIVM. ...

Edgar Award-winning travel writer spends an autumn living in one of America's spookiest tourist destinations: Salem, MassachusettsSalem, Massachusetts, may be the strangest city on the planet. A single event in its 400 years of history—the Salem Witch Trials of 1692—transformed it into the Capital of Creepy in America. But Salem is a seasonal town—and its season happens to be Halloween. Every October, this small city of 40,000 swells to close to half a million as w...

An ominous new slide on the playground leads to a world of fear in USA Today bestselling author J.W. Ocker’s latest middle grade horror, perfect for fans of R.L. Stine and Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark.Griffin Birch isn’t known for being brave, but there’s something about the new black slide on the elementary school playground that’s made him curious. Against his better judgment, he just has to follow his best friend, Laila, down.But the Black Slide is no ordinary piece...

Winner of the 2015 Edgar Award for Best Critical/Biographical!Follow the footsteps of the father of American horror fiction.Edgar Allan Poe was an oddity: his life, literature, and legacy are all, well, odd. In Poe-Land, J. W. Ocker explores the physical aspects of Poe’s legacy across the East Coast and beyond, touring Poe’s homes, examining artifacts from his life—locks of his hair, pieces of his coffin, original manuscripts, his boyhood ...