American Horror Short Story

Many Indigenous people believe that one should never whistle at night. This belief takes many forms: for instance, Native Hawaiians believe it summons the Hukai’po, the spirits of ancient warriors, and Native Mexicans say it calls Lechuza, a witch that can transform into an owl. But what all these legends hold in common is the certainty that whistling at night can cause evil spirits to appear—and even follow you home. These shiver-inducing tales introduce listeners to ghosts, curses, hauntings, monstrous creatures, complex family legacies, desperate deeds, and chilling acts of revenge.

Whether weaving family life and history into dark fiction or writing speculative Afrofuturism, American Book Award winner and Essence best-selling author Tananarive Due’s work is both riveting and enlightening. In her debut collection of short fiction, Due takes us to Gracetown, a small Florida town that has both literal and figurative ghost; into future scenarios that seem all too real; and provides empathetic portraits of those whose lives are touched by otherness. Featuring an award-winning novella and 15 stories, Ghost Summer: Stories is sure to haunt and delight.

Two traveling college students confront their disintegrating relationship and the new American reality in a breakdown lane along the Italian Superstrade. A woman chases the ghost of her neglectful father to a vanished amusement park at the end of the Long Beach pier. In these atmospheric, wide-ranging, surprisingly playful, and deeply mournful stories, grandkids and widows, ice cream-truck drivers and judges, travelers and invalids all discover — and sometimes even survive — the everyday losses from which the most vengeful ghosts so often spring.

In this followup to his hugely popular Midnight Storm Moonless Sky: Indigenous Horror Stories, Blackfoot storyteller Alex Soop plunges us again into enthralling tales that mix reality with dark terror. Within its stories, Whisper at Night and They Will Come reveals ancient theories of the paranormal, post apocalyptic scenarios, impossible wells of grief, and monstrous phobias. Soop scares the wits out of listeners, all the while uncovering overlooked social anxieties and racism affecting Indigenous Peoples across North America.

The ancient Druid Atticus O’Sullivan gets more than greasy corn dogs and flat soda when he visits a carnival in Kansas to which his apprentice, Granuaile, drags him. He runs across a barker with a strange power over the crowd: attractive women leave their men and disappear into an unmarked tent, never to be seen again, and the men wander away, forgetting that they ever had girlfriends or wives. When Granuaile falls under the barker’s influence and enters the tent, Atticus isn’t about to forget it and move on.

A mother and daughter negotiate the Oregon Trail with grisly results; an elementary teacher watches the carnage of the Challenger explosion spill over into her own classroom. A possible prospector traveling west is drawn to an isolated inn where no one walks away hungry; a 1950s housewife shares the gruesome repertoire of behavior expected of a proper lady. Prohibition and women’s suffrage, the Civil War and the Vietnam War, the JFK assassination conspiracy and the Y2K hysteria.

Henry Chapman Mercer (1856-1930) was, amongst other things, an eccentric archaologist, historian, architect, antiquarian collector and author of Gothic horror stories very much after the fashion of M. R. James. 'The Dolls' Castle' is the creepy story of a haunted house with a sinister past which uses old, rotting dolls to lure unwary children away from their parents.

This is a story from the "Great Ghost Stories" collection.

These three stories come with a breath of cold and a sort of longing, the sort of thing that consumes someone if they let it. "Wendy Won't Go" is the story of a family whose loss threatens to consume them all, "Love like Blood" is a story about the limits one will reach before love is gone, and "Cold Comfort" is about the bitterness that devours us within before it goes on to consume everything around us.

When Kiley learns firsthand what evil lurks in the heart of her boyfriend, he’ll learn about the Cold Girl, and her penchant for retribution.

This cross-genre anthology written by superstar YA authors from across the Latin American diaspora offers bold new thrills for every monster fan. In these fifteen original short stories, bloodthirsty vampires are hunted by a quick-witted slayer; children are taken from their beds by “el Viejo de la Bolsa” while a military dictator steals their parents; and anyone you love might be a monster waiting to strike. The sinister worlds of these narratives are also magical ones, where supernatural beings can be avatars for justice, vengeance, sisterhood, and empowerment.

Blackfoot storyteller Alex Soop plunges us into a shocking well of imagination in this collection of short stories, Midnight Storm Moonless Sky. From hauntings on the Highway of Tears to fearful gatherings of ghosts and the sorrows of racism, Soop combines the social anxieties of Indigenous life with spellbinding flights and frights of speculative fiction. Through these enthralling stories of reality mixed with terror, listeners get a wicked glimpse into the genre of Indigenous horror.

A Charlie Madigan short story - from the series praised for "intricate world-building and richly complex characters" ( Publishers Weekly) - as it first appeared in the Carniepunk urban fantasy anthology.

During a visit to her dying friend, a woman discovers to her horror that his family and his home are one. SonicMovies are premium audios with strong vocal performances enhanced by music and sound effects to such an extent they sound like movies, hence, SonicMovies.

Delbert Thompson lived all by himself on a farm deep in the country and never bothered anyone until a group of teen's car broke down about a half mile down the road from Delbert's farm. The teens were only looking to use Delbert's phone to get help, but Delbert was in no mood for company, so the teens picked the wrong door to knock on for help. Delbert was sitting in his rocking chair on his front porch whittling a piece of wood when he stopped what he was doing and noticed a group of people headed his way.

Gwendolyn Ranger Wormser's was a Victorian writer best known for her weird psychological horror stories. The best known of these is 'The Scarecrow', an eerie tale of a sinister scarecrow beckoning to the young son of the farmer from the moonlit cornfield.

Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce (1842 - 1914) was an American writer famous for his dark and cynical writings, which earned him the nickname Bitter Bierce. He is famous also for his mysterious demise. He wrote a letter to a friend, which he closed by saying, "As to me, I leave here tomorrow for an unknown destination," and then he vanished without a trace, his disappearance becoming one of the most famous in American literary history.

Elizabeth Gaskell, famed author of Cranford, is cherished for her incise social observations and portrayals of the changing nature of English life through the Industrial Revolution of the Victorian era. In Cousin Phillis, Paul Manning has only recently left home to work on the railway line for the dashing Mr Holdsworth. Lodging with an Independent Minister on the outskirts of London, he becomes acquainted with his distant cousins, where he is delighted to meet his genial relations, and not least his cousin Phyllis

Nelson Olmsted and Raymond Massey read a selection of Edgar Allan Poe's finest work, including 'The Raven', 'The Cask of Amontillado', 'Lionizing', and 'The Purloined Letter'.

Having just quit Julliard, disillusioned fiddler Melanie St. James finds herself as part of a group of traveling musicians en route to an OtherFolk carnival. Eager to break the chains of a lifetime of conformity, Melanie throws caution to the wind and enters a reckless bargain, plying her musical skills for the chance to win a violin that can open Doors to the CrossRoads. But the competition turns out to be far more than she expected.