Cocktails & Conversation

What better pick for October than a book ranked in the Top 10 most terrifying and unsettling stories by horror writers? Soon to be a movie, SONY picked up the rights.

A woman returns to the house made famous by her father’s bestselling horror memoir. Is the place really haunted by evil forces, as her father claimed? Or are there more earthbound—and dangerous—secrets hidden within its walls?

What was it like? Living in that house.

Maggie Holt is used to such questions. Twenty-five years ago, she and her parents moved into Baneberry Hall, a rambling Victorian estate in the Vermont woods. They spent three weeks there before fleeing in the dead of night, an ordeal Ewan later recounted in a nonfiction book called House of Horrors. His tale of ghostly happenings and encounters with malevolent spirits became a worldwide phenomenon, rivaling The Amityville Horror in popularity—and skepticism.

Today, Maggie is a restorer of old homes and too young to remember any of the events mentioned in her father’s book. But she also doesn’t believe a word of it. Ghosts, after all, don’t exist . . .

When Maggie inherits Baneberry Hall, she returns to renovate it for a quick sale but her homecoming is anything but warm. People from the past, chronicled in House of Horrors, lurk in the shadows. And locals aren’t thrilled that their small town has been made infamous thanks to Maggie’s father. Even more unnerving is Baneberry Hall itself—a place filled with relics that hint at a history of dark deeds.

As Maggie experiences strange occurrences straight out of her father’s book, she starts to believe that what he wrote was more fact than fiction. And someone - or something - doesn't want her back. And that she might be in danger all over again.

389 pages
Gothic Thriller

A story about connection, community, and the kindness of strangers.

Six strangers with one thing in common: their lives aren't always what they make them out to be.

What would happen if they told the truth instead?

Julian Jessop decided lying made life so much easier. Until it didn't. He got tired of pretending. And lonely. No one can ever know you if your lying about important bits of yourself.

So he begins The Authenticity Project - a small green notebook containing the raw truth about his life.

Leaving the notebook on a table in his friendly neighborhood cafe, Julian never expects Monica (the owner) to be inspired to write down her own story and leave it at the shop across the street for others to discover, and add their own truths.
Little do they realize that such small acts of honesty hold the power to impact all those who discover the notebook and change their lives completely.

357 pages
Contemporary Fiction/Up-Lit

• RNA Best Debut Novel Award (2021)