| Horror December 2006 |
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"The good horror tale will dance its way to the center of your life and find the secret door to the room you believed no one but you knew of." ~ Stephen King, American author
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| New and Recently Released! |
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World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War
- by Max Brooks
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Publisher:
Crown
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Pub Date:
09/12/2006
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Check library catalog
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ISBN:
0307346609
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Better start preparing for war: Zombies will soon attack according to Max Brooks, the author of The Zombie Survival Guide (and son of Mel Brooks). This account of the Zombie War--a "near future" conflict between humankind and hordes of the recently reanimated--is told from the point-of-view of dozens of survivors. Soldiers, politicians, and civilians provide compelling first-hand accounts of their roles in the epic battle in this non-linear novel. Fans of zombie movies should love this "history" book that the critics think is to die for. |
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American Morons
- by Glen Hirshberg
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Publisher:
Earthling Publications
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Pub Date:
10/30/2006
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ISBN:
0976633981
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| Glen Hirshberg combines genre fiction with literary fiction to create stories that should please fans of both. Seven short stories, featuring a wide variety of people and places, including an American couple in Italy, an ice cream delivery truck driver, two Los Angeles teachers, and a ghost, make up this new collection. Author Peter Straub says it is "horror as it should be writ." Fans who like their fiction in well-done, bite-sized chunks should check this out. |
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Lisey's Story: A Novel
- by Stephen King
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Publisher:
Scribner
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Pub Date:
10/24/2006
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Check library catalog
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ISBN:
0743289412
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A love/horror story from the master, where one of the characters seems familiar--well, except for the being dead part. Scott, an award-winning, bestselling Maine horror writer (see?) died two years ago. His grieving widow Lisey faces an office of unpublished works and miscellanea--as well as the threatening people who want them--and her unstable sister. To survive, Lisey looks to her life with Scott, to Scott's troubled childhood, and to the place he found ideas and inspiration: Boo'ya Moon, a world as dangerous as it is fruitful. Kirkus Reviews calls this meditation on love and creativity "one of King's finest works." |
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The Keeper
- by Sarah Langan
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Publisher:
HarperCollins
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Pub Date:
09/01/2006
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ISBN:
006087290X
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Beautiful, petite Susan Marley, ignored by the townspeople, walks the dark streets of the dying town of Bedford, Maine, never saying a word to anyone, not even to her own sister, Liz. Comparatively plain Liz plans for college and a future away from the small town, but a death precipitates strange, terrible occurrences--will Liz make it out of the town alive? Will anyone? This debut garnered comparisons to the King: The Washington Times says "echoes of Stephen King resound throughout" and Publishers Weekly calls this "horror on a big scale, akin to the more ambitious work of Stephen King." |
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Chasing the Dead: A Novel
- by Joe Schreiber
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Publisher:
Ballantine Books
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Pub Date:
09/26/2006
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ISBN:
0345487478
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A mother's nightmare comes true when Sue Young discovers that her one-year-old daughter and the nanny have both been kidnapped--and that the kidnapper knows dark secrets from Sue's past. And then things get bad. Sue follows the kidnapper's instructions and finds herself on a hellish road trip driving through a series of small New England towns doing bizarre things (including digging up a grave). This debut also caused critics to refer to the King: Publishers Weekly says it "pays respectful, clever homage to Stephen King's backyard" and Library Journal says "this fast-paced novel tips its hat to Stephen King." |
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| Long wait for the new Stephen King? Try one of these... |
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Stephen King, the unequivocal horror master of this era and a fine writer in general, prolifically produces deliciously scary stories that often focus on likeable, everyday characters who end up being terrorized and tormented. Newcomers to the author's horror work will want to start with The Shining or It. Or Pet Sematary. Oh, or maybe 'Salem's Lot. Or...well, you get the picture.
For established fans, of course there's no one just like the King of Horror, but if you can't get your hands on Lisey's Story, you may enjoy the following books:
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Bad Men
- by John Connolly
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Publisher:
Pocket Star Books
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Pub Date:
05/01/2005
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Check library catalog
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ISBN:
0743487850
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King fans who enjoy the small-town Maine settings, the focus on good people versus evil forces, and appreciate a story's need for extreme violence, will be interested in Irishman Connolly's Bad Men. Three hundred years after a massacre wiped out a colony of peaceful settlers on the small Maine island of Sanctuary, policeman Joe Dupree tries to protect the island's residents from a band of vengeful killers--and some supernatural beings related to the earlier slaughter. Publishers Weekly says the book is "haunting [and] compelling, but not for the faint of heart." |
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Boy's Life
- by Robert R. McCammon
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Publisher:
Pocket Books
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Pub Date:
05/01/1992
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Check library catalog
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ISBN:
0671743058
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Readers who've enjoyed King's stories featuring children may want to try McCammon's leisurely-paced ode to boyhood centered around a murder. Cory Mackenson and his father are delivering milk one cold March morning when they see a car sink into the town lake. Cory's dad dives in to save the driver and finds only a badly beaten naked corpse. Who in their small town could do such a thing? The two search for answers over the next year and Cory finds horror and the supernatural homegrown in his ordinary town. |
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The Relic
- by Douglas J. Preston and Lincoln Child
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Publisher:
Tor Books
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Pub Date:
08/01/2005
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Check library catalog
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ISBN:
0765354942
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King fans who enjoy his fast-paced suspenseful stories may want to read the first book co-written by successful authors Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. Like The Shining, the setting here plays a large role too, acting almost a character itself. A series of savage murders threatens to disrupt a massive new "Superstition" exhibition at the eerie New York Museum of Natural History. Graduate student Margo Green along with FBI agent Pendergast and journalist Bill Smithback investigate. The trio searches the museum and discovers possible ties to a failed Amazonian expedition--could a mythological beast be to blame? |
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Lost Boy, Lost Girl
- by Peter Straub
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Publisher:
Ballantine Books
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Pub Date:
09/01/2004
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Check library catalog
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ISBN:
0449149919
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Peter Straub, who collaborated with King on The Talisman and Black House, may please King fans with many of his stories. Like King, he finds horror in everyday life, fills his works with personable characters, and often includes psychological undertones--all of which he does in this award-winning book. Tim Underhill, a novelist who makes appearances in earlier Straub books, visits his hometown after the bizarre suicide of his sister-in-law and the disappearance of his 15-year-old nephew, Mark. He investigates and discovers both a neighborhood haunted by a serial killer and an abandoned house whose inhabitant, a lost girl, may have lured Mark away. |
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| Still looking for the right book? Contact your librarian. |
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