Showing results by narrator "Matt Godfrey" in All Categories

Jackson Stone is hot-like burn-down-buildings kind of hot. He's also my brother's best friend, and the memory of one kiss with him years ago still might get to me. Maybe. But, I am not looking for a second chance. When I return to the small town of Stolen Hearts Valley, my life is a hot mess. I'm a few bucks shy of broke with nowhere else to go. My heart's battered and bruised, and when it comes to romance, the door is nailed shut. But Jackson's the kind of man women ruin panties over. Oh, and he's my roommate. Talk about too close for comfort.

The Deadfall Hotel is where our nightmares go, it’s where the dead pause to rest between worlds, and it’s where Richard Carter and his daughter Serena go to rediscover life - if the things at the hotel don’t kill them first. Think of it as the vacation resort of the collective unconscious. With the powerful prose that has earned him awards and accolades, Steve Rasnic Tem explores the roots of fear and society’s fascination with things horrific, using the many-layered metaphor of the Deadfall Hotel.

In the spring of 1912, American writer Arthur Pearce is reeling from the wounds inflicted by a disastrous marriage. But his plans to travel abroad, write a new novel, and forget about his ex-wife are interrupted by a young woman he encounters on a London-bound train. Her name is Sarah Coyle, and the tale she tells him chills his blood. Sarah’s younger sister has been entranced by Count Richard Dunning, who is rumored to dabble in bizarre religious rites and experimental medicine. Arthur agrees to help, but he has no idea of what awaits him at Altarbook, Sarah’s ancestral mansion

Ben Harris and his best friends Richie and Jack knew the stories about Old Man Brewster, what happened to his wife...and the flies. They had no idea why anybody would want to live there, but then they met Greg Lupescu, the new kid who had moved in. He looked strange, his father was never around, and he had this creepy butler named Karl. Soon, however, he became their close friend.

Peel back that rotting skin and behold the improbable creatures, nightmarish places, and horrifying events that lie waiting just beyond everyday experience. Witness the terror of a man stalked for decades by entities from across the void. Feel the agony of an unholy union between technology and flesh. Know the decay of our reality as it collapses into a darker plane. Our deepest fears are mere shadows on the wall. Find out what casts those shadows in this collection of short stories by Felix Blackwell and Colin J. Northwood.

With a folksy style, an eye for the absurd, and a passion for the history and environment of his home state, Pittman describes some of Florida's oddest wildlife as well as its quirkiest people. The State You're In includes a love story involving the most tattooed woman in the world, a deep dive into the state's professional mermaid industry, and an investigation of a battle between residents of a nudist resort and the US Postal Service.

Oscar and his dog have made a pretty good life for themselves, despite the fact that Oscar’s family has all but vanished - his father is dead; his mother has a new boyfriend. His older sister, Rachel, fled five years ago...right after Mr. Cigar bit off her hand. Despite the freak accident, Oscar knows his dog is no menace. Mr. Cigar is a loyal protector: a supernatural creature that can exact revenge, communicate telepathically, and manipulate car doors and windows with ease.

These 21 stories - four published here for the first time - explore some of our fundamental fears: death, loss, grief, and aging. In “Reflections in Black”, a man takes a phantasmagoric Halloween journey in search of a former love. In “The Parts Man”, a man enters a desperate contract with a sinister entity in a long, vintage automobile. The darkly beautiful “The Dead Outside My Door” is a haunting post-apocalyptic tale unlike any you’ve ever experienced.

The science we do, the movies we watch, and the culture we consume is the stuff of fiction that became fact, the future imagined in our past - the future we now inhabit. The Science of Science Fiction is the story of how science fiction shaped our world. No longer a subculture, science fiction has moved into the mainstream with the advent of the information age it helped realize. Explore how science fiction has driven science.

Over four years have passed, and still Matthew Doyle can't shake the guilt of turning his back on Ruby, the girl who saved his life. As much as he's tried to avoid returning home to Hanceville, Alabama, he must do so in order to complete his service with the Tennessee Valley Authority, helping to establish electricity throughout the county. But Ruby continues to haunt his dreams, and the only way to move on is to seek her out and make things right.

In recent years, nicotine has become as verboten as many hard drugs. The literary styles in this volume are as varied as the moral quandaries herein, and the authors have successfully unleashed their incandescent imaginations on the subject matter, fashioning an immensely addictive collection.

Once America’s capitalist dream town, Detroit is our country’s greatest urban failure, having fallen the longest and the farthest. But the city’s worst crisis yet (and that’s saying something) has managed to do the unthinkable: turn the end of days into a laboratory for the future. Urban planners, land speculators, neopastoral agriculturalists, and utopian environmentalists―all have been drawn to Detroit’s baroquely decaying frontier. With an eye for both the darkly absurd and the radically new Detroit-area native Mark Binelli has chronicled this convergence.

Glencoe, Illinois: A home invasion turned kidnapping at the mansion of billionaire financier Kenneth J. Druckman brings Mason “Mace” Reid and his cadaver dog, Vira, to this wealthy northern suburb of Chicago. Druckman was assaulted, left behind while his wife and young daughter were taken for ransom. Brought to the scene by the FBI, Reid specializes in human remains detection, and Vira is the star of his pack of cadaver dogs. After Vira finds the dead body of the mother, everyone is on high alert to find Druckman’s missing daughter before she disappears forever.

Dani Love is the girl who got away. Actually, she dumped me. Not exactly a stroke to my ego. When I move back home, Dani is just as much everything as she was before. Maybe even more. Snappy and smart with an attitude for days. I want her, even if it's stupid. Dani can't decide if it's better to ignore me, or fight with me. I'll fight and win. She just doesn't see it coming yet.

My rules: No players. No flirts. No cocky jerks. My exception: Dawson Marsh. Dawson might be every girl's crush in this small town, but not mine. I can appreciate him from a distance, and that suits me fine. Except that one time he kissed me. Up close and personal. Once is a mistake. But the second time? Sublime. The man should come with some kind of a warning sign: Not safe for work! Hot to the touch! But what kind of girl can't handle a little friends with benefits action, right? The one who missed the most important warning: Danger, risk of falling.

My priorities are my daughter and my job as a first responder. Romance isn't even on the radar. Until one little package changes everything. In a single mind-blowing hour, I end up with a package meant for Valentina Smith, and I find out she's innocent. I won't even mention what's in that package. Next thing I know, my other brain gets the best of me. Valentina deserves the best, so that brain says, running my mouth like it has no business. I don't expect to fall for her. So hard it brings me to my knees. Did I mention she's meant to be worshipped?

Every state has an urban legend that evokes fear and curiosity in equal parts, and we've chronicled all of these logic-defying horrors here in the Haunted States of America anthology. From the Jersey Devil to La Llorona, each story included introduces a new chill inducing, stomach churning monster, specter, or poltergeist certain to keep you up at night. A broad ranging collection of authors, including seasoned veterans and some first timers making a fright-tastic debut, have all united to unearth the scariest lore from each state in the US, as well as D.C. and Puerto Rico.

A recovering addict and former child star, Jimmy Cooper gets a second shot at fame as a “famous” private detective in Los Angeles.

Charlotte Anne Mattas longs to turn back the clock. Before her husband, Sam, went to serve his country in the war, he was the man everyone could rely on—responsible, intelligent, and loving. But the person who's come back to their family farm is very different from the protector Annie remembers. Sam's experience in the Pacific theater has left him broken in ways no one can understand—but that everyone is learning to fear.

When McGarvey’s best friend, Otto, is charged with treason, Mac and his wife, Petey, set out on a desperate odyssey to clear Otto’s name. Crossing oceans and continents, their journey will take them from Japan to the US to Pakistan to Russia. Caught in a Kremlin crossfire between two warring intel agencies, Mac and Petey must fight for their lives every step of the way.