Showing results by author "Steve Vernon" in All Categories

"Leave Luther's body right where we flung him," Bates said. "You aren't burying him today." After Sally Mae Webster phoned me up to tell me that my Korean War buddy Luther Webster had been shot and killed by the Bates brothers, I knew that I wasn't going to stop until I had righted that wrong. I wondered just how many graves I was going to have to dig today.

Some stories tiptoe up and whisper in your ear - all sweetness and gumdrops and happy-ever-after-after-there-you-go. Then, there are the weird ones. We're talking talking-chickens, blue plague spam monkeys, tug boats of unbridled and fetid fecundity, tulwar-swinging cab drivers, malls that maul you, gnawing on screwdrivers and jig-lining elder gods coming at you faster than a ride-on mow-down massacre mower shopping cart caravan. This is a collection for the seriously messed up minds of all you listeners who have grown tired of the trite detritus of day-to-day storytelling.

Ghost stories. Everyone knows one. Everyone can tell you one. Ghost stories haunt and linger and tantalize. Come on along with Steve Vernon - ghost story collector, writer, and teller - as he brings you eight of the creepiest yarns imaginable, stories that will creep up on you and teach you the fine old art of the booga-booga. Eight stories - including Steve's haunting salute to the road gang, "The Forever Long Road of Olan Walker". Walk down this road, if you'd like to. Or better yet - run!

So you think you know all about superheroes? Those guys in the capes and the lightly starched spandex speedoes? Leaping tall buildings and always getting the girl? You don't know nothing. Join Steve Vernon, Nova Scotia's hardest working horror writer, as he takes you into the world of Captain Nothing. It's a world without hope, a world that is as cold and dark as a landlord's heart, three days after the rent is due. It's a world that could give the Batman a case of the squirming night fears.

Here it is. The whole entire story of the Book of Genesis as told to you by the world's oldest storyteller, Uncle Bob. If you think you know the truth behind the Bible Stories you really ought to pick up a copy of this book. If you are one of those folks who thinks that it is bad manners to giggle a little in church - well, you might want to take a good listen to the sample before you go throwing down any of your hard-earned money. This isn't exactly a solemn retelling of the Bible. In fact, I guarantee a giggle or two along the way. The fact is this is the story of the Book of Genesis as retold by a country gentleman who read the Bible a couple of times and is doing his level best to retell it in his own words.

You can smell that long-dying aroma of Autumn in the air. Kids are talking trick or treat and the leaves are already screaming at you in red and yellow and deep golden rust as they prepare for one final parachute down into the dirt. The tombstones are talking amongst themselves and winter is hiding just around the corner. It is the time of the year when people draw around the wood stove and the campfire and whisper stories of death and omens and ghosts and things that don't even have a name.

Nobody really knew how long the old Funnel mansion had stood empty, waiting up there high on Carpenter's Hill like a child's forgotten lunch box, any more than anybody knew just how long that old cat had squatted in behind the screen of the front porch window. Three young boys are about to find out just exactly what the dark and horrifying secret is behind that cat. Only two of them will survive.

The story of a young farmer, a wishing ring, and a fairy named Queen Maab. This is old school fairytale telling at its very finest.

"There's things out there that you ain't dreamed of. Like back-from-the-dead mountain men, green ghost mountain spirits, carrion stallion, time-traveling mad scientists and zombified buffalo... just for starters." This weird western novella starts at a gallop and gathers momentum faster than a stampeding avalanche. You will never look at a severed head the same way again.

Welcome to the hard streets. These are four of the nastiest stories I have ever written: "Leftovers", "Statistic", "Soul Survivor", and "Dopple Dribble".

There is a big old sledding hill not more than two or three good snowballs' worth of distance from our home, just behind Hank Macabee's house. That hill was waiting for me and my brand new toboggan. It's one of those sneak-up kind of hills with a long slow ride down that picks up speed as it goes with a bump-hump at the end that you never see coming. The Christmas tree crashed through Hank Macabee's bay window. The tree stand clattered behind it and bounced with a clank on Hank's half-frozen front lawn. Hank came through the door with a shotgun in hand.

Detours are amazing creatures. A detour can cut your existence short or it can lead you down a long road that will linger far into the distant reaches of eternity. These unexpected tangents, which people stumble across nearly every day, will haunt you in a frighteningly familiar fashion. I offer you 18 eerie tales of fantasy, horror, science fiction, and all around strangeness that will take you to the edge of the map and then nudge you just a little bit further.

Just imagine you walk into a cheesy old greasy-spoon diner, the kind that ought to hand out antacid along with a napkin, knife, and fork. You ask the waitress for eggs and bacon, and she brings you a plate with live chicken on it. I mean, feathers and beak and the whole bonanza. Just think about a mix of Kafka and O'Henry and you are somewhere close to the mark.

Love is one of those four letter words that some people like to throw around - but sometimes love can be one of the meanest and nastiest games in town. Here are six of the strangest love stories you have ever heard. Find love and memories in the bag of a mysterious 18 wheeler in "Do-Overs and Detours - Somewhere North of Bigfoot". Find out just how bitter love can truly taste in "Hard Soup". Find out why the sea is so darned salty in "The Woman Who Lost Her Tooth While Laughing at the Sea".

So how does a kelpie, an ex-assassin high school librarian, Santa Claus, the Flying Dutchman, and the Krampus wind up going toe-to-toe with a Martian Expeditionary Force in a highly unidentifiable flying gravy bowl? Why don't you grab this audiobook and hear for yourself?

Love is one of those four-letter words that people like to throw around, but sometimes love can be one of the meanest and nastiest games in town. If you have ever had your heart broken - then this audiobook is for you. If you enjoy the taste of strong meat - then this audiobook is for you. If you've got a sense of weird that is honed as sharp as a cutthroat's knife - then this audiobook is for you. Here are three of the strangest love stories you have ever read.

So what happens when Bigfoot, the Trickster Coyote, the ghost of Sam Steele and the long-lost spirit of The Prophet, brother to the mighty Tecumseh and reincarnated in the form of a giant pink flying Winnebago go toe-to-toe with dark supernatural forces in a cross-Canada battle ranging from Cape Breton to Labrador to Thunder Bay? I'm not saying that it is going to be pretty...

Let's face it. About 75 percent of the world is covered in water - and of that water nearly 97 percent of it can be found in the sea. Maritimers will tell you that there is a story for every wave that has ever washed upon the shoreline. Here are seven of them.

Meet Bass Clayton, a bounty killer turned professional drunkard. Silver Grimes is the man who inadvertently turned Bass Clayton into a drunk; after Bass accidentally shot Silver's arm off with an eight gauge shotgun. Sally Jezebel has a secret that she is keeping from both of them. Their lives are going to turn when Newt Gallagher comes riding into Willy Jake's bar on top of Pritcher Targate's prize sow. What you have got to ask yourself is just how far one man will go for revenge?

It happened just yesterday or perhaps the day before. The bombs were dropped. No one knew why. Whatever the reason, due diligence was undoubtedly done and all aspects were carefully considered. Certainly the motion was passed around the Senate a time or two. After all, an election was coming. Every vestige of civilization was blown away, save for a few stubborn traces barnacled along the grim fringes of existence. Like say, maybe the Maritimes....