Dead Of Winter

A shadowy Detroit real estate billionaire. A ruthless fixer. A successful Mexicantown family business in their crosshairs. Gentrification has never been bloodier. Authentico Foods Inc. has been a part of Detroit’s Mexicantown for over thirty years, grown from a home kitchen business to a city block–long facility that supplies Mexican tortillas to restaurants throughout the Midwest. Detroit ex-cop and Mexicantown native August Snow has been invited for a business meeting at Authentico Foods. Its owner, Ronaldo Ochoa, is dying, and is being blackmailed into selling the company to an anonymous entity. Worried about his employees, Ochoa wants August to buy it. August has no interest in running a tortilla empire, but he does want to know who’s threatening his neighborhood. Quickly, his investigation takes a devastating turn and he and his loved ones find themselves ensnared in a dangerous net of ruthless billionaire developers. August Snow must fight not only for his life, but for the soul of Mexicantown itself.

A predator stalks the frozen woods. At a fort deep in the Ontario wilderness in 1878, a ghastly predator is attacking colonists and spreading a gruesome plague—his victims turn into ravenous cannibals with an unending hunger for human flesh. Inspector Tom Hatcher has faced a madman before, when he tracked down Montreal’s infamous Cannery Cannibal. But can even he stop the slaughter this time? In Montreal exorcist Father Xavier visits an asylum where the Cannery Cannibal is imprisoned. But the killer who murdered thirteen women is more than just a madman who craves human meat. He is possessed by a shape-shifting demon. Inspector Hatcher and Father Xavier must unravel a mystery that has spanned centuries and confront a predator that has turned the frozen woods into a killing ground where evil has come to feed.

Michael Vyner recalls a terrible story, one that happened to him. One that would be unbelievable if it weren't true! Michael's parents are dead and he imagines that he will stay with the kindly lawyer, executor of his parents' will . . . Until he is invited to spend Christmas with his guardian in a large and desolate country house. His arrival on the first night suggests something is not quite right when he sees a woman out in the frozen mists, standing alone in the marshes. But little can prepare him for the solitude of the house itself as he is kept from his guardian and finds himself spending the Christmas holiday wandering the silent corridors of the house seeking distraction. But lonely doesn't mean alone, as Michael soon realises that the house and its grounds harbour many secrets, dead and alive, and Michael is set the task of unravelling some of the darkest secrets of all. A nail-biting story of hauntings and terror by the master of the genre, Chris Priestley.

Nine chilling tales to read under the Cold Moon. A tinker's son acquires a cursed soul. A dying woman is haunted by her own reflection. An uninvited presence haunts a Christmas seance. A festive holiday turns macabre. Despite the twinkling lights and steaming cocoa, the end of the year is the darkest time of the year--a season of short days, long nights, and cold skies. In this special anniversary anthology, the authors of Black Spot Books mix Ye Olde Yuletide hauntings with modern-day holiday horrors to weave a chilling new collection of dark winter tales. From frozen forests stalked by eerie Christmas ghosts to rotting gifts of winter malice, the spirits of Christmas come home for the holidays in the Dead of Winter.

Winter isn’t coming…it’s already here, and with it comes a horror no door can keep out. It’s there in the yard, in the faces of the snowmen a young boy doesn’t remember building. It’s in the oddly empty streets below Santa Claus’s crumbling sleigh. It’s in the unnatural movement of the snow that suffocates a widower’s town, and in the cold eyes of a lonely man’s estranged children. Here, there is no holiday cheer, only spine-chilling fear, in the DEAD OF WINTER. Featuring seven stories, an introduction by the author, and a list of recommended books for the winter season.

Despite leaving a part of her heart behind with Death, Evie sets out into a frozen and perilous post-apocalyptic wasteland to meet up with her allies and launch an attack on The Lovers and the vast army they command.

Winner of the Hammett Prize and the Nero Award From the wealthy suburbs to the remains of Detroit’s bankrupt factory districts, August Snow is a fast-paced tale of murder, greed, sex, economic cyber-terrorism, race and urban decay. Tough, smart, and struggling to stay alive, August Snow is the embodiment of Detroit. The son of an African-American father and a Mexican-American mother, August grew up in the city’s Mexicantown and joined the police force only to be drummed out by a conspiracy of corrupt cops and politicians. But August fought back; he took on the city and got himself a $12 million wrongful dismissal settlement that left him low on friends. He has just returned to the house he grew up in after a year away, and quickly learns he has many scores to settle. It’s not long before he’s summoned to the palatial Grosse Pointe Estates home of business magnate Eleanore Paget. Powerful and manipulative, Paget wants August to investigate the increasingly unusual happenings at her private wealth management bank. But detective work is no longer August’s beat, and he declines. A day later, Paget is dead of an apparent suicide—which August isn’t buying for a minute. What begins as an inquiry into Eleanore Paget’s death soon drags August into a rat’s nest of Detroit’s most dangerous criminals, from corporate embezzlers to tattooed mercenaries.

Private Investigator Karl Kane returns to the streets of Belfast investigating the discovery of a severed hand. Karl believes it's the work of an elusive serial killer, but the police are claiming a simple vendetta between local criminals. Karl embarks on a nightmarish journey as he attempts to solve the mystery and soon he's suspecting Mark Wilson, his detested ex brother-in-law. But as the winter days become darker, Karl discovers that Wilson is more than a match for him when it comes to dirty dealing and even dirtier fighting, as he battles to keep from becoming the next victim.

Edgar Award Finalist for Best First Mystery: “Eerie . . . A book you will gulp down” (The New York Times). Lyons, Basche, and Tyler—three ordinary guys—find their fourth poker night partner, Reece, fatally beaten on the floor of his apartment. Reece was a quiet, unassuming fellow but he had one outstanding trait: his fabulous memory. On Friday nights he could recall every card that was played. Yet his final slurred words were: “I don’t remember.” His three remaining friends, shocked by the indifference of the police, form their own tribunal of retribution: to find the people who had used Reece so ruthlessly and who had disposed of him in the same way; to deal with the assassins with a like kind of justice; and to ferret out the “lost” information that cost Reece his life. Their motivation and their mission culminate in an unforgettable tale of vengeance and its consequences. “Breathtaking and tough.” —Library Journal

Like the thousands of others who visit Winters Farm and Orchard each year, four young friends eagerly anticipate picking apples and pumpkins and taking the challenge of the Giant Corn Maze together. Its the last day of PumpkinFest season, and the weather and farm are picture perfect. They discover they picked the wrong weekend to stay at the farms Bed and Breakfast for their reunion, however, as after a frantic twenty-four hours of deception and mayhem, they find themselves unwilling participants in a horrific family tradition. -- Amazon.com.