Showing results by narrator "Lauren Ezzo" in All Categories

Morgan is determined to prevent her daughter from making the same mistakes she did. By getting pregnant and married way too young, Morgan put her own dreams on hold. Clara doesn’t want to follow in her mother’s footsteps. Her predictable mother doesn’t have a spontaneous bone in her body.

Gwen Proctor won the battle to save her kids from her ex-husband, serial killer Melvin Royal, and his league of psychotic accomplices. But the war isn’t over. Not since Melvin broke out of prison. Not since she received a chilling text... You’re not safe anywhere now. Her refuge at Stillhouse Lake has become a trap. Gwen leaves her children in the protective custody of a fortified, well-armed neighbor.

Near an isolated mansion lies a beautiful garden. In this garden grow luscious flowers, shady trees...and a collection of precious “butterflies” - young women who have been kidnapped and intricately tattooed to resemble their namesakes. Overseeing it all is the Gardener, a brutal, twisted man obsessed with capturing and preserving his lovely specimens.

Kate Bennett vanished from a parking lot eleven years ago, leaving behind her husband and young daughter. When she shows up at a Montana gas station, clutching an infant and screaming for help, investigators believe she may have been abducted by a cult. Kate’s return flips her family’s world upside down—her husband is remarried, and her daughter barely remembers her. Kate herself doesn’t look or act like she did before.

Bea has barely been scraping by since her husband died. After falling for a telephone scam, she loses everything and is forced to abandon her trailer. With only two-thirds of a tank in her old van, she heads toward the Pacific Ocean with her cat - on a mission to reclaim what's rightfully hers, even if it means making others pay for what she lost.

Foster sisters Krystal and Nichole have always been there for each other, so when Nichole is committed to a psychiatric hospital after trying to kill her husband, Krystal drops everything to defend her. Scarred by a hard upbringing, Nichole and Krystal managed to construct comfortable lives for themselves. Krystal became a respected lawyer, and Nichole was happily married to an architect - until Nichole starts raving that her husband isn’t her husband, believing that he’s an imposter.

Ignorant of civilization and cautioned against its evils, nineteen-year-old Wren and her two sisters, Sage and Evie, were raised in off-the-grid isolation in a primitive cabin in upstate New York. When the youngest grows gravely ill, their mother leaves with the child to get help from a nearby town. And they never return. As months pass, hope vanishes. Supplies are low. Livestock are dying.

I would say Dr. Cruz Costello is my archenemy. But that would require acknowledging one another, which we haven’t done in more than a decade. He’s the town’s golden child. The beloved quarterback-turned-physician. I’m the girl who got knocked up at 16 and now works at a diner. He is Fairhope royalty. I get my monarch dose from tabloid gossip. He’s well-off. I’m...well, off. When our siblings get engaged, Cruz’s parents invite both families to a pre-wedding cruise. Except Cruz and I find ourselves stuck on a different ship from everyone else.

The Hull family has owned the Gallows Hill Winery for generations. Their wine wins awards. Their business prospers. Their family thrives. People whisper that the curse has awakened once more. The sprawling old house has long been perched on top of a hill overlooking the nearby town, jealously guarding the estate's secrets.

Sally has mostly loved her creepy hometown of Halloween Town. But lately, she can't help but want something more. Soon Sally is surprised to learn that the Pumpkin King, Jack, is longing for a change of his own. Determined to find a solution for them both, Sally follows a vision that could be the key to changing their fates. But the more time Sally spends in the strange, jolly land of Christmas Town, the more suspicious she grows of the seemingly idyllic winter wonderland. Will Sally be able to save the best of both towns—before it's too late?

After the loss of her mother and her own battle with breast cancer, Joanna Teale returns to her graduate research on nesting birds in rural Illinois, determined to prove that her recent hardships have not broken her. She throws herself into her work from dusk to dawn, until her solitary routine is disrupted by the appearance of a mysterious child who shows up at her cabin barefoot and covered in bruises. The girl calls herself Ursa, and she claims to have been sent from the stars to witness five miracles.

My enemy murdered my wife and my father, so I took his daughter... I stole the Bratva princess and locked her away on my island. An eye for an eye. A tooth for a tooth. Blood for blood. Stealing Isabella is the only way to find her father. I just wasn't prepared for the temptation of her, nor...

True crime podcaster Trinity Scott is chasing breakout success, and her brand-new serial may get her there. Her subject is Clayton Jay Pelley. More than two decades ago, the respected family man and guidance counselor confessed to the brutal murder of teenage student Leena Rai. But why he killed her has always been a mystery. In a series of exclusive interviews from prison, Clayton discloses to Trinity the truth about what happened that night beneath Devil’s Bridge. It’s not what anyone in the Pacific Northwest town of Twin Falls expects.

In spite of a harrowing past still haunting her, Gwen Proctor is trying to move forward. Until a new assignment gives her purpose: the cold-case disappearance of a young man in Tennessee. Three years missing, no clues. Just Ruth Landry, a tortured mother in limbo. Gwen understands what it’s like to worry about your children. Gwen’s investigation unearths new suspects…and victims. As she follows each sinister lead, the implications of the mystery grow more disturbing. Because the closer Gwen gets, the closer she is to a threat that looms back home.

In the year 2420, war looms between the galaxy's two most powerful empires: the tyrannical Theocracy and the protectionist Commonwealth. Caught in the middle sits the occupied outpost system Cadiz, where young officer and aristocrat Katherine "Kat" Falcone finds herself prematurely promoted at the behest of her powerful father. Against her own wishes, Kat is sent to command the Commonwealth navy's newest warship, Lightning.

Ida is a self-confessed serial killer of predatory men. She feels no remorse for her victims but has decided she needs psychiatric help...if only to lay the groundwork for an insanity plea if she gets caught. Clarissa is a celebrity psychotherapist, the best in her field, a familiar face on television and in glossy magazines. For her, every patient is special—someone only she can save. When Ida walks into Clarissa's consulting room one day, the therapist doesn't know that they share a dark secret, buried in both their pasts.

Gather round as today’s most diabolically clever authors twist simple moments into otherworldly horrors. An empty baby stroller. A scratching underneath the bed. A farmhouse in the moonlight. With an unnerving sense of the macabre, these stories transform our greatest fears into bone-chilling realities.

I’ve spent years keeping control—on the job and at home. My daughter is my world, my badge is my duty, and I don’t let anyone close enough to become a weakness. Then Josie Lark walked into my life. Classy, gorgeous, stubborn as hell. One night with her should’ve been enough, but now I can’t stop thinking about the way she looks at me, or how easily she slips past the defenses I’ve built. She’s trouble I can’t afford—and the one risk I can’t resist.

Gwen Proctor escaped her serial-killer husband and saved her family. What she can’t seem to outrun is his notoriety. Or the sick internet vigilantes still seeking to avenge his crimes. For Gwen, hiding isn’t an option. Not when her only mission is to create a normal life for her kids. But now, a threatened woman has reached out. Marlene Crockett, from the remote town of Wolfhunter, is panicked for herself and her daughter. When Gwen arrives in the small, isolated rural community, Marlene is already dead - her own daughter blamed for the murder.

In his Locus review of Two Worlds and in Between - the first volume of The Best of Caitlín R. Kiernan - Gary K. Wolfe wrote, “...it makes you wish the second volume were here now.” Well, the long wait is over. This second volume completes this ambitious undertaking, collecting the finest of Kiernan’s stories from 2004 to 2012, selected by the author herself. The book includes 25 short stories and one poem, plus the short novel Black Helicopters - more than 200,000 words of fiction, including the World Fantasy Award-winning “The Prayer of 90 Cats”.