When mystery author D. B. Ziegler is late delivering her book, Abi Schore steps in to help. Surely she can give her favorite author moral support over the holiday break and get the manuscript to her boss at Tea & Sympathy Publishing in time for the new year. When Abi shows up on Ms. Ziegler’s doorstep bearing holiday treats, she’s met by the author’s handsome grandson Dov, who reveals a startling plot twist. His grandmother isn’t able to finish the book and Dov promised he’d complete it so fans won’t be disappointed—a task that’s harder than he ever imagined.

Two little girls stand with their heads bowed in my living room. I’m told they’re my granddaughters. Daisy is nine, and Alice seven. Daisy is the spitting image of her mother. This is the first time I’ve met them since my daughter and I fell out after she married that waste of space, Vince. They’ve come to live with me because their mother — my daughter — was murdered. In her own home while they slept close by. I think Vince killed her. But the police can’t prove it. I’ve always known he was no good. He treated my daughter like dirt. I said he’d cheat on her — but she wouldn’t listen.

There's no place like home for the holidays ... especially for Lesley Carver. Life in the big city just wasn't her jam and now she's back in Hickory Falls, working at the family diner and helping her mom after she took a tumble. Lesley longs to build a life here, working at the cafe, selling her handmade ornaments and ... er, apparently reviving her high school crush on her best friend’s older brother. Only one problem, her mom wants her to leave Hickory Falls far behind.

Tilly Farriday isn’t feeling very jolly this season. Recently divorced and broke, she’s squatting in one of her rental agency’s properties until her new home is ready. The sprinkles on top of the burnt Christmas cookie that is her life? The new owner shows up early, forcing Tilly to hide in the attic to save her job…and what remains of her dignity.

First published in 1843, it tells the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, a mean and unpleasant man who dislikes people generally and Christmas especially. One Christmas Eve he is visited by the ghost of his former business partner Jacob Marley and the spirits of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come and given a glimpse of the many homes and lives which Scrooge has touched in his wretched life to date. After their visits, Scrooge is transformed into a kinder, gentler man.

It’s 1984, and life has changed beyond recognition. Airstrip One, formerly known as Great Britain, is a place where Big Brother is always watching, and nobody can hide. Except, perhaps, for Winston Smith. Whilst working at the Ministry of Truth, rewriting history, he secretly dreams of freedom. And in a world where love and sex are forbidden, where it’s hard to distinguish between friend and foe, he meets Julia and O’Brien and vows to rebel.

Clark Griswold was onto something...at least with his annual holiday meltdown. And since the last three weeks of my life have been riddled with humbug—another breakup, a broken toe, an office promotion I deserved and didn’t get—I’m not at all in the mood to celebrate nor have the happ, happ, happiest Christmas EVER.

My fiancé brought me tea and scrambled eggs in bed that morning, and we snuggled together, talking about buying our rings, and about our perfect wedding next year. Then we headed into town. He held my hand and gazed at the ring I liked best, a smile spreading slowly over his face. Then a glass of bubbly to celebrate. I felt flushed, excited and ready for the rest of my life with the man I loved. We race to get on the train home. It screams to a halt and I run towards its open doors. Made it. I think he’s right behind me — but when I turn around, he’s gone.

Lucas knows the perfect night entails just three things: video games, wine, and pad thai. Peanuts are a must! Other people? Not so much. Why complicate things when he’s happy alone? Then one day the apartment board, a vexing trio of authority, rings his doorbell. And Lucas’s solitude takes a startling hike. They demand to see his frying pan. Someone left one next to the recycling room overnight, and instead of removing the errant object, as Lucas suggests, they insist on finding the guilty party. But their plan backfires. Colossally.

Johnnie Rico never really intended to join up—and definitely not the infantry. But now that he’s in the thick of it, trying to get through combat training harder than anything he could have imagined, he knows everyone in his unit is one bad move away from buying the farm in the interstellar war the Terran Federation is waging against the Arachnids. Because everyone in the Mobile Infantry fights. And if the training doesn’t kill you, the Bugs are more than ready to finish the job.

Halloween is more than a holiday; more than a fun time of candy and costumes for the young. It is inoculated into our very being at an early age and there it remains. As we grow old, it grows dormant… but it is still there. For the lucky ones, such as us, it emerges every year, like a reanimated corpse digging its way out of graveyard earth to shamble across our souls. And we rejoice… oh, if we are the fortunate ones, we most certainly rejoice.

It all starts with a flick of the wrist as a madman unleashes a cataclysmic plague. Despite the best efforts of the military, the infection spreads like wildfire. Soon, the undead are everywhere, and the fate of humanity hangs in the balance.

Master of horror Lee Mountford invites you to gather round and prepare yourselves. This collection is guaranteed to have you hiding under your covers at night.

When a mysterious truck crashes through the gates of the AccuTech factory, the final shift descends into a nightmare of inhuman proportions. An extraterrestrial parasite capable of absorbing and perfectly mimicking any life form has arrived, leaving a trail of blood and chaos in its wake. Desperate to contain the outbreak at any cost, a shadowy military faction places the factory under quarantine, sealing the doors and condemning everyone inside to a grisly fate.

John Sackville will soon be dead. Shadows writhe in the corners of his cell as he mourns the death of his secret lover and as the gnawing hunger inside him grows impossible to ignore. He must write his last testament before it is too late. The story he tells will take us to the darkest part of the human soul. It is a tale of otherworldly creatures, ancient cults, and a terrifying journey from the stone circles of Scotland to the icy peaks of Tibet. It is a tale that will take us to the end of the world.

The first sign was the disgustingly mutilated carcass of a cow. The second, an old man torn to pieces. The third, the eerily beautiful blue fires that hovered over the small town… Stark white faces, diabolical eyes—raging within the unearthly flames—were turned toward the innocent town. And now it moved—toward the children walking home from school. Toward the young priest who wondered if this hideous power came from heaven…or from hell.

Organization is key. The building needs scouting. Web rooms need creating. Then you need to bait the meat. Take it from on the street without being seen. Get to the shoot. Set the scene. Bring in the talent. Then you can open the room. Let the clients browse. Turn them on. Take their money. Make a profit.

When you first enter The Halloween Store, things seem normal. Fun and frightful decorations, ghastly costumes and masks of the season, and bags of candy galore. Then, as you travel farther into its shadowy depths, things begin to change. The air smells of damp autumn leaves and candle-scorched pumpkin. The shelves of All Hallows’ Eve fare grow darker and more disturbing. Strange and unsettling things of Halloweens past and present lurk amid the cobwebs and dust....

The rural town of Old Hickory. Tennessee was a quiet, picturesque community...until the O'Sheas came to town. Becoming the new proprietors of the town's only funeral parlor, with the help of their charming patriarch, Square McManus, the Irish family was wholeheartedly accepted by the local town folk. The thing began to happen. Strange things...horrible, unspeakable things...in the dead of night. The sighting of wolfish beasts congregating around an open grave in the town cemetery.

Down below the Mason-Dixon Line, deep in the shadowy hills and hollows of Tennessee, lives a teller of terrifying tales and a spinner of dark yarns unlike any you have ever heard before. Stories to chill your bones and pepper your flesh with goose bumps. What his true name may be, no one knows for sure. But, if you listen closely, you can hear his voice ringing through the dead of night!