Here are the new releases from Crossroad Press for July and August 2024. Unless noted otherwise, you can purchase any of them at Amazon, B&N, Apple, Google Play, Smashwords, or Kobo.
(Release date – 7/2/2024)
Carroll Dressler was a dreary man with a dreary life and a wife who could nag off his ears. He didn’t think things could get any worse. He was wrong. One night, en route from his girlfriend to his wife, a chance stop at a closed gas station threw Carroll into the path of a serial killer. Aptly named The Beast, this psychopath was known for mutilating his victims, all of whom were women. Now, The Beast is on Carroll’s trail, determined to eliminate the only witness who could possibly ID him.
When Carroll hits on the idea that he could use The Beast to solve all his problems, he begins a dangerous game of cat and mouse. Can Carroll use this brutal killer to his advantage? Will he become the next victim? Will the relentless detective catch up to them both and put a stop to it all? If Carroll wants to come out on top, he’ll have to be very cunning. And very creative. But most of all, he’ll have to be very lucky.
(Release date – 7/5/2024)
Nowhere to Hide
Undead monsters prowl the city streets, hidden from the eyes of an oblivious world. Those few humans aware of the threat face an uphill battle. Douglas Sands has seen his fellow hunters die. Fleeing monster and law alike, he and three other survivors seek refuge beyond the city—only to discover that the wild forests hold their own secret horrors.
Kaitlin Stinnet also sees the monsters for what they are. But are the bloodthirsty, raging beasts that much different from the humans she has known? Is there middle ground to be discovered, or are the answers all black and white, merely to be confirmed by blood?
Predator & Prey: Jury is the fourth in this series of six novels that explores the Hunters newly arrived within the World of Darkness and the supernatural foes they believe they have an obligation to confront. In the course of the series, the line between hunter and the hunted continues to blur. The series continues with Predator & Prey: Mage.
Dark Dreamers: Facing the Masters of Fear
(Release date – 7/6/2024)
There has never been a book like this before….
Dark Dreamers: Facing the Masters of Fear is a unique collection of images celebrating over one hundred of the greatest authors, artists and filmmakers in the world! With each and every amazing photograph—coupled with insightful commentary by (or about) each subject—the photographer and the journalist fearlessly illuminate those who work on the dark side of the arts.
Among the authors: Stephen King, Dean Koontz, Clive Barker, Peter Straub, Ray Bradbury, Richard Matheson, John Saul, Joyce Carol Oates, Poppy Z. Brite, Richard Laymon, Jack Ketchum, Robert Bloch, Neil Gaiman, Dan Simmons, and dozens of others.
Among the artists: Bernie Wrightson, Gahan Wilson, H. R. Giger, Alan M. Clark, Bob Eggleton, and many more.
by Julie Hyzy
(Release date – 7/8/2024)
DON’T BELIEVE EVERYTHING YOU THINK
Today’s technology
Tomorrow’s trap
Gutsy and resourceful, Kenna Ward is a “lifeguard for the brain,” an envoy for Virtu-Tech, the preeminent virtual reality provider whose implants allow consumers to experience exhilarating imagined adventures—all while remaining perfectly safe. Most of the time, that is.
In the rare instance when a participant mistakes an overwhelming situation as real, it’s up to Ward to enter their scenario and pull them back to reality.
But when Ward’s partner goes rogue and the system begins responding in odd and dangerous ways, she delves deeper, uncovering a sinister conspiracy to dominate not only the virtual reality world, but the real one as well.
Ward must stop this psychological sabotage before there are no more independent minds left to control.
(Release date – 7/9/2024)
“Oh, Mrs. Sirman, there’s a problem with your husband’s cremation.”
“What sort of problem?”
“It’s his body.”
“What about it?”
“It won’t burn.”
And so it begins for Pam Sirman…the first step toward learning that everything she thought she knew about her husband is wrong, perhaps even his humanity. But if he’s not human, what is he?
Pam is one of three lives that will be drawn together by the apocalypse of the Upwelling.
The other two are Chan and Danni, but their worlds are already in chaos. A few weeks ago a fierce storm accompanied by an upwelling from the Atlantic abyssal plain tore into Atlantic City. When it receded, the city and its 25,000 inhabitants were gone without a trace. Chan and Danni remember being in the city that day, but the ten hours during which the Upwelling occurred have been wiped from their memories.
They want those memories back. Or do they? Did they witness something so unspeakably ghastly that their minds can’t face it? Or worse: Was that ghastly thing something they did? And worst yet: Were they responsible for the Upwelling?
by David Shobin
(Release date – 7/11/2024)
Actress Jacqueline Ramsey has it all—beauty, stardom, and a figure other women would kill for. Behind her dazzling success is one person: Dr. Hume, head of the nation’s most exclusive diet clinic. It was his unique medical weight-loss technique that gave her the body which has become her obsession.
But now, something is terribly wrong.
Suddenly, inexplicably, her weight is rising. Her sleep is tormented by hideous nightmares. Her days are tortured by uncontrollable, frenzied cravings. Her life and career are falling apart. Terrified, she runs back to Dr. Hume as he knew she would.
For Dr. Hume’s chilling treatments have merely begun.
Only Jacqueline’s psychiatrist lover suspects the truth. And only he can save her from the same horrifying fate that awaits all the stunning women who trust their bodies to Hume’s healing hands.
by Chris Bauer
(Release date – 7/13/2024)
Whatever happened to Jane Roe’s baby?
Norma McCorvey, of Caddo-Comanche heritage, did not terminate the pregnancy that led her to become the anonymous plaintiff of the landmark US Supreme Court women’s rights case Roe v Wade because in 1971, when the motion was first argued, abortion in the US was illegal. The Jane Roe real-life child is now a woman in her fifties, and for most of her life she never knew she was her, nor, therefore, did she know the potential of her polarizing celebrity.
In JANE’S BABY, it’s 2016, and this is about to change. A religious rights splinter group has blackmailed its way into learning the identity of the Roe baby, the product of a closed adoption. To what end, only a new Supreme Court case will reveal. Tourette’s-afflicted K9 bounty hunter Judge Drury, a Marine, stands in the way of the splinter group’s attempt at stacking the Supreme Court via blackmail, murder, arson, sleight of hand, and secret identities.
by David Simms
(Release date – 7/16/2024)
On the way home from a gig with his band, Derek Boone dies. Then, miraculously, doctors manage to revive him, using new cutting-edge technology. He’s alive, but in a coma.
Months later Boone wakes into a world of blurred visions and danger. The memories of that accident are incomplete. He experiences them in strange flashbacks he calls “bruised memories.” And he’s not the only one. A deranged cult made up of men and women who’ve had near death experiences begins to harass him, wanting to know what he experienced, and a dangerous agent from a religious organization wants him to tell his story… if that story is the one the church needs. Otherwise, they want him dead.
Finally, while on a talk show with others who have had similar experiences, a gunman opens fire on the entire panel. Escaping with his life, Boone is on the run from New Jersey to the Adirondack mountains, desperately seeking his own truth, even if it leads him into the hands of an enemy.
His experience could change everything and leave the world’s religions in shambles.
Tales of an Eldritch Wasteland
By C. T. Phipps
(Release date – 7/26/2024)
“There are a million tales of the Mythos. Here are some of mine.” – C.T. Phipps
Author C.T. Phipps wrote the post-apocalypse meets H.P. Lovecraft novel Cthulhu Armageddon in 2015 but he had been a fan of the Cthulhu Mythos for far longer. Having written stories ranging from Assassins in Acre to detectives in the Dreamlands, he’s tackled every part of the sinister tentacle-filled world that has been influenced by authors ranging from authors Robert E. Howard and Brian Lumley to film directors George Miller and Stuart Gordon.
TALES OF AN ELDRITCH WASTELAND collects over a dozen of his short stories, novelettes, and novellas set both before as well as after the Great Old Ones’ rising. Stories of action, horror, and everything in between.
“I’m a sucker for anything C.T. Phipps. I can’t get enough of his style of writing.” – Brian’s Book Blog
“Dark and sinister with a side order of action.” – The Bookwyrm Speaks
“Phipps […] should appeal to those who like full kitchen sink Cthulhu Mythos stories and the attendant sports of restructuring the Mythos.” – Marzaat
by Paul Kane
(Release date – 7/26/2024)
What’s that sound coming from the walls?
Who is the mysterious stranger chasing a bounty hunter across a Wild West terrain?
Why is a famous boxer so scared before the biggest fight of his career?
Why is a man suddenly finding bits of his body are vanishing?
And why are two others so frightened of Christmas?
Find out in another clutch of stories by award-winning and # 1 bestselling author Paul Kane (Hooded Man, Sherlock Holmes and the Servants of Hell, Before, Tempting Fate), including one of his PL Kane crime mysteries, a brand new modern Carnacki adventure and an early bonus tale only just uncovered. With an introduction by award-winning author and screenwriter Philip Fracassi (Gothic, Boys in the Valley), cover photography from Michael Marshall Smith (The Straw Men, The Intruders), plus the script and audio download for Bounty, this book is bound to set you on the right—or should that be wrong?—road.
by Carl Bowen
(Release date – 7/30/2024)
Is Ignorance Truly Bliss?
Adrian Cross is unwittingly abetting the efforts of the Technocracy to further their grandiose plans, which have already essentially assured them world domination. However, in order for their latest efforts to hear fruit, the Technocracy needs a larger sacrifice of Adrian. The circumstances that are to lead to Adrian’s further involvement have been planned carefully. Yet they fail.
This small crack in their encompassing plans may be an opening to the possibility of free will, something that Adrian and all his fellow humans seem to be slowly losing. With the assistance of two very different strangers who wish for very different things for him, Adrian begins a terrifying journey of discovery into the true inner workings of the World of Darkness. But as he learns more, he begins to wonder if perhaps he was safer in his ignorance.
Predator & Prey: Mage is the fifth in this series of six novels that explores the Hunters newly arrived within the World of Darkness and the supernatural foes they believe they have an obligation to confront. In the course of the series, the line between hunter and hunted continues to blur. The series continues with Predator & Prey: Executioner.
(Release date – 7/30/2024)
No Turning Back
Douglas Sands wants his old life back. He wants to salvage his crumbling marriage. He wants to walk down the street without knowing that some of the people around him are not human. He wants to ignore the ghost of his dead son that calls to him at night. Is that so much to ask? Apparently so.
Julia and Nathan see the monsters too. They’ve taken up the lives of hunters—lives that tend to be tragically short. Julia won’t stop—can’t stop—until she finds her own son. Nathan feels the need to give meaning to the sacrificed lives of so many of his friends. But the line between friend and enemy sometimes blurs, and with it the distinction between predator and prey.
by Alison Scott
(Release date – 7/30/2024)
Can a man be in two places at one time?
Three months have passed. Gil is confined to Jason Fairchild’s clinic, his sanity doubted by all but Crazy Ivan, when Feannag appears with Aidan’s seeing stone. Rescued by Ivan, he escapes to the river, the Underwater Bridge, and 9th Century Orkney.
All has changed. Burned by the Golden Knight, Cille Aidan and Einar’s Holm are deserted ruins, their people exiled to Floki’s lands on Hrolf’s Isle. Mercenaries roam the islands, seeking rumoured treasure and a stolen royal bride.
Hidden on an island across a treacherous tide-race, Janetta is safe. Rachel shelters in a cell beside Aidan’s new church. Percy, Earl’s Cupbearer at Floki’s High Table, never leaves his side. But Danni, Ismail and Hakon, captured in the flight from Caledon and sold to a Norwegian sea-king, are hostages in Norway, awaiting ransom. While Magnus broods on the high price paid for the Warrior’s quest, Floki raises a sea force to win them back.
Labouring in Eyolf Grimsson’s shipyard and daring the tide-race in a skiff to meet Janetta, Gil learns both ships and sailing. When Silver Dragon leads Floki’s fleet to Norway, Gil is on the steersman’s bench, Helmsman to the Earl.
Arriving, they meet betrayal. The king has sold the hostages to a slave trader, ten days before. Demanding the release of Hakon’s crew, Floki takes the king’s young son hostage to ensure he keeps his word. As the weeping boy is carried to Silver Dragon, Gil swears he will find a better way to live. But can he?
So begins a voyage far longer than any imagine. From Norway to the slave markets of Jorvik, on to the pilgrim port of Dofras and beyond to the island fortress of Mont Tombe, where in a tournament melee Gil crosses lances with Jocelyn Guidbairn and finds his father, Lance’lot. But still the sea roads roll on before them, and still Danni is captive …
Come sail the Northlands seas as Odin’s Maiden’s dance and follow Frigga’s spindle South. Come helm a Viking warship with the Warriors of Tir nan Og.
Edgar Allan Poe and the Specter Eliminator
by Keith Gouveia and Matt Peters
(Release date – 8/6/2024)
Edgar Allan Poe, American writer, poet, critic, and Steampunk Ghostbuster!
Poe has always had a close and personal relationship with death. Once he used his pen to keep his demons at bay, but after the death of his beloved wife Virginia, he is taking a more direct approach. Poe has invented The Specter Eliminator, a portable device capable of extinguishing spirits. With it, he moonlights as a ghost hunter while trying to raise the funds to start his one magazine, The Stylus.
When Poe is tasked with clearing a malevolent spirit from a Georgia mansion, he meets a rival ghost hunter who is very interested in the Specter Eliminator. Poe refuses to join forces and the rival makes it clear he will have Poe’s invention one way or another.
Join Edgar Allan Poe as he uncovers an insidious plot to enslave the dead and revolutionize modern warfare in this steampunk, ghost-hunting adventure that takes you from Boston, Massachusetts, to the Wild West.
(Release date – 8/6/2024)
Barbara Connolly thought she was giving her daughters a better life when she left her abusive ex-husband and moved back to her home town. But Rapture, Pennsylvania, just wasn’t the same anymore. There have been two murders right on her street, in the same house her brother disappeared in over twenty years before. Bodies are turning up everywhere, all missing flesh and with the same ragged teeth marks on the bones. Teenage girls are disappearing.
And something—or someone—is crawling around inside Barbara’s walls.
As the police race to find the killer, Barbara fights to keep her daughters from becoming its next victim.
(Release date – 8/8/2024)
THE STREETS OF MIAMI ARE HOT WITH SLEAZE AND SIN
And nobody knows those streets better than homicide detective Christopher Blaze. Or so he thought…
As an undercover cop, it was his job to bust the creatures of the night, not become one of them. But sometimes even the best cops turned and no one suspected, not their captains, not their girlfriends, not even their partners.
Now Chris Blaze is working the graveyard shift, hunting a centuries-old serial killer leaving behind a trail of beautiful young victims. For another vampire is stalking the hot Miami night and this time Blaze has nothing to lose but his immortal soul!
Lucifer’s Shadow: Tales of Fallen Angels
Edited by Philippe Boulle
(Release date – 8/9/2024)
Fallen Angels Walk the Earth
At the dawn of creation, Lucifer ignited the fires of rebellion. A third of the heavenly host rallied by his side, believing his cause was just. The fallen defied the armies of Heaven for a thousand years, never questioning their leader’s resolve; even in defeat, they chose to suffer the fate of their prince rather than recant and betray their convictions. They went into the abyss with their heads unbowed, but when the gates of Hell clanged shut, Lucifer the Morningstar was not among the damned.
Now, after an eternity, the gates of Hell are broken and the angels of the abyss walk the Earth once more, in the stolen bodies of hopeless humans. Some seek redemption, others revenge. Most of all they seek the fate of the angel that led them into darkness.
In the so-called City of Angels, a terrible earthquake sparks three days and nights of rioting, and tales of the end of the world. The Devil himself walks the burning streets of Los Angeles. Answering the clarion call, demons congregate in the modern Babylon, searching for answers and for blood.
(Release date – 8/13/2024)
A less violent, but equally skillful, Lisbeth Salander, with an inherited drive for justice…on her own terms
With a suspended federal prison sentence looming compliments of an ex-boyfriend’s betrayal, Fatál Wood accepts an almost-legal request by her new boss to hack the Ohio college where she’s rebuilding her life. But she discovers the school’s director is using the network for personal, illegal, reasons, leading to a second betrayal and the death of her best friend. Fatál is framed for the crimes, and she’s caught between rival law enforcement agencies, a suspicious probation officer…and a murderer. She marshals her personal geek squad, twenty-first-century tech savvy, and a too often ignored Romani sixth-sense to protect her newly reunited family and to give justice—and karma—a push.
Ameri-Scares: Pennsylvania – The Ghost Notes
(Release date – 8/20/2024)
Allie and her mom are hard at work recreating the dress of a nineteenth-century ancestor Clare Rapple for the upcoming Founder’s Day celebration. Nate, newly arrived in Rappleville to live with his aunt after losing both parents in a terrible car accident, wishes for one last chance to talk to them one last time.
Both teenagers find themselves caught in the web of the local Legend of The Ringing Rocks: the Ghost Notes, and the secret of possibly bringing the dead back to life. What Allie and Nate don’t realize is that the Ghost Notes might bring back more than fabled ancestors or lost loved ones. They might also summon evil thoughts, terrible creatures, your worst nightmare…
by Ani Fox
(Release date – 8/20/2024)
There can be an eeriness to silence in war. No screaming men, no wailing children, no malicious explosions, or crack crack crack of small arms punctuated with a sudden thump whack of something scoring a near miss. The torpedoes had killed all pursuit literally and figuratively. The remainder of the living aboard the floundering coast guard ships would most likely be dead by drowning, internal injuries, or just plain brutal shock.
There are times when you hold a mirror to yourself and wonder, am I damned? Plain old evil? I’d just killed hundreds of strangers. By my hand, mass murder had been done. Sure, war necessitates these kinds of things, but does that absolve us? It’s a question that ran through my head every day I baked bread in Amherst. My conclusion: yep, it made me evil. I am what I do. I killed without remorse or reflection. Just because it had been obligatory self-defense didn’t change the morality of the act.
But then your children appear and ask questions. What is it to be a soldier, to kill despite remorse and reflection? To defend the weak and the vulnerable from evil itself? Before me the hushed waves embraced my dying enemies. They died for no better reason than they’d been on the wrong side. Defined as being anyone but Us. Yeah, not much moral high ground here. Which reinforced Oslo’s point. Until we got humanity free of our own hideous game the whole world washed itself in the blood of innocents.
by Andrew Bates
(Release date – 8/21/2024)
The Ghost Storm Rages
Drawn into a struggle against the forces of darkness, Thea Ghandour encounters and enigmatic figure who shares her same immodest goal: the ultimate destruction of evil. Maxwell Carpenter has tracked an entity of incredible power to an obscure temple in the heart of Chicago. Only with the aid of Thea and her fellow hunters can Carpenter hope to stand against its dark might.
An Ancient Force Awakens
But Thea learns that Carpenter has not yet revealed everything—not about his actual goals, nor about the mysterious entity’s true nature. Only by entering the formidable Temple of Akhenaton can Thea hope to discover the truth—and uncover a revelation that may change the world.
Heralds of the Storm is the first novel in the Year of the Scarab trilogy. This three-volume epic reveals the rise of an ancient power that threatens to forever alter the World of Darkness… the immortal beings known as Mummies.
by Carl Bowen
(Release date – 8/21/2024)
A Beautiful Killer
Harmonious Jade is one of the deadliest women in the legendary time that is the Second Age of Man. Chosen by the Unconquered Sun himself, she has been remade into a demigod whose bow can fell whole companies of men. With that exaltation, however, have come echoes of ancient memories and a sense that she must use her gifts for some greater purpose. Chasing these phantasms of a past life and the trail of the demonic cultists who raised and betrayed her, she comes to the trading city of Nexus.
There, she meets others of her kind. But are they long-lost companions, deadly enemies or, worse yet, both? And what do the hellish masters of her family have in store for her?
Exalted: A Day Dark As Night is the first in a new, unlimited series of novels based on the hugely successful Exalted property.
by C. T. Phipps
(Release date – 8/23/2024)
“Give me the incredibly short summary of what the hell is going on, please. The kind you could fit into a movie trailer.”
“You’re trapped in a video game world based on a hack dark fantasy author’s rip-off of better books.”
“Uh huh. Maybe you could be a bit more detailed.”
Aragorn “Aaron” Bartkowski was a programmer working at Epic DungeoneeringTM, the world’s largest fantasy video game company. Much to his surprise, he was selected to pick up the latest manuscript from reclusive author Larry C.C. Weis. Weis had been working on his newest book for over a decade and the good folk at Aaron’s company had dibs on adapting it. Unfortunately, Weis was also a wizard and sent Aaron to the world that inspired his books.
Aaron proceeded to find himself in a Slavic mythology themed world where he’s believed to be Weis’ main character, Garland of Nowhere. Equipped with the powers of a RPG protagonist, Aaron must accumulate experience and equipment while navigating a setting that seems worse off than Game of Thrones and Dark Souls put together.
LORDS OF DRAGON KEEP is a LitRPG progression fantasy isekai that takes the grim out of grimdark with biting humor as well as intelligent exploitation of the rules. It has excellent world-building, a great supporting cast, a bit of romance, and lots of laughs. Oh and there’s a talking raven.
(Release date – 8/24/2024)
Dark Ride is a collection of short fiction by one of the brightest writers in the genres of horror and dark fantasy. These stories range from the horrific to the surreal, and prove Michael Laimo to be a compelling stylist and relentless storyteller. None have been collected previously and some are original to this volume.
“Summer Fling” is not just another monster tale, and wraps up with a resolution that is as wicked as it is unexpected. In “The Rash,” the author re-examines a personal nightmare to create a universal tale of biological terror—illuminating that moment when we discover something is going very wrong with our own bodies. Other tales which explore this territory are “Contact Lenses” and “Scarred for Life.”
Laimo uses his knowledge as a native New Yorker to summon up a frightening and memorable subway ride in “End of the Line.” Then he switches gears in “Something in the Air” to examine a small town visited by a very original kind of evil.
Other tales range from the playful, such as “Aftermath,” to the extreme, as in “The Exploitations of George Frederick Leighton,” and the oddly experimental “I Exude in Partials.”
In addition, a new novelette, “The Startling Supplements to Brione Heloise’s Depictions” appears here for the first time. Written as an homage to the work of H. P. Lovecraft, it reveals yet another aspect of Laimo’s admirable talent.
(Release date – 8/24/2024)
Wellsbourne’s a town like no other, an ordinary English seaside town where extraordinary things happen, a place of magic, mystery and madness. Here you’ll meet the woman stalked by drones and her own past, the politician who discovers the dark secret of the Green Man, the corpse collector with another self, the girl who menstruates yellow paint and the woman with the red, red hands. You’ll discover a garden that can disappear, boxes of books haunted by a dead writer and a 3D printer that can bring the dead back to life, though in a somewhat altered state. Wellsbourne welcomes careful drivers, but doesn’t necessarily let them leave again…
Stories included in this collection:
The Wakeman Recreation Ground
What I Found in the Shed
The Follow Up
From Rojava with Love
Mask of the Silvatici
Little Match-Stick Girl
The Coroner’s Collector (A Good Body Washed up on the Beach)
The Beast in the Palace
Stealer of Faces
Our Lady of the Red Hands
Oldstone Gardens
The Apotheosis of Jenny Swallow
A Bloody Mary, a Tomato Juice and a Tin of Yellow Paint
Last Stop: Wellsbourne
You Have Reached Your Destination
(Release date – 8/24/2024)
At the deep, dark bottom of the Pacific Ocean lies a sunken Soviet submarine. On board is equipment and information vital to both sides of the deadly arms race, and the U.S. has to qet it before it’s too late.
The U.S. Navy and the C.I.A. devise a bold plan to salvage the vessel secretly… in broad daylight. But failure or detection could spell doom…
(Release date – 8/24/2024)
Christian Miles was shocked when his best friend dies in a seemingly odd Mexican scuba diving accident. The body was never found, so, with all his fears and suspicions, Miles sets out in search of some dangerous answers.
The trail to the truth involves an innocent Miles in a ring of smuggling, corruption and murder, as he faces first-hand the same fate as his friend.
(Release date – 8/24/2024)
A beautiful, haunted woman in a glittering and corrupt era takes center stage in this sizzling novel based on a true sex scandal that rocked New York City in the Roaring Twenties. Vincent T. Bugliosi, bestselling author of Helter Skelter, masterfully blends an irresistible tale of crime and passion with a richly textured re-creation of a time gone by.
Brought to life are the 1920s—this century’s wildest decade, when New York was the capital of pleasure, and anything went for a price. To this city of bright lights and dark corners comes the lovely, innocent Emily Stanton, hoping for fame on the stage. What she finds is marriage to Warren Matthews, who has hooked his wagon to the gravy train of Tammany Hall’s political corruption and is riding it to the social heights. When the marriage turns into a nightmare of brutality, Emily flees with her young daughter, Jessica, only to find herself the victim of a vicious frameup masterminded by her husband to gain custody of Jessica.
Robbed of her child, her reputation, and her career, a desperate Emily begins her single-minded odyssey through Manhattan’s illicit and dazzling high life to get evidence against those who framed her, so she can win her precious daughter back. Still beautiful and magnetic, she becomes a singing hostess at Texas Guinan’s notorious speakeasy. There she makes connections with the powerful likes of famed madam Polly Adler, Judge Joseph Crater, gambler Arnold Rothstein, and dapper Mayor Jimmy Walker. Finally, Emily’s battle to get back her child threatens to destroy the people who savaged her and the infamous system that spawned them. And as the decade’s frenzy mounts to its explosive climax, Emily’s very life reaches its moment of decision in a sensational murder trial that rips the last shred of secrecy from a revelation so shocking, it will shake even this blasé city to its core.
With this riveting human drama, Vincent Bugliosi evokes a legendary era and its glamorous and decadent underworld of speakeasies and bootleg gin, mobsters and flappers—a time and way of life that never ceases to fascinate.
(Release date – 8/29/2024)
For eighteen-year-old Johnny Petrie, the dilapidated farmhouse in Maine meant a way out. When the letter arrived saying he had inherited an estate from a man he’d never heard of before, Johnny knew he could finally escape the hell of living with his religious zealot mother and drunken father. He didn’t realize that the hell he was moving into would be far, far worse.
The previous owner of the estate was Benjamin Conroy, a man obsessed with securing eternal life for himself and his family, even if he had to kill them to do it. Conroy’s ultimate ritual, a perverse ceremony of blood and butchery, went hideously wrong, denying him the immortality he sought, leaving him and his family dead. But now that Johnny has arrived at the house, Conroy’s spirit will have a second chance…..