Recommendations based on "Night of the Lightbringer"

Andrew Vachss's implacable private eye has a new client, Strega. She wants Burke to find an obscene photograph—and that search will take him into the ocean that flows just beneath the city, an ocean whose currents are flesh and money, the anguish of children and the pleasure of twisted adults. It is a place that Burke can visit only at the risk of his sanity and his life. But between the power of Strega and his own sense of justice, there is no turning back.In Strega one of our most acclaimed crime writers gives us a thriller that might have been imagined by Dante. For this is a tour of hell with no stops left out, conducted by a novelist who writes with the authority of the damned.

From the international bestselling author of The Girl with All the Gifts comes a wildly original and enthrallingly dark medieval fantasy unlike anything you've read before – a fable of twisted folklore, macabre magic, and the strangest of found families. "A masterpiece of medieval dark fiction." – Christopher Buehlman, author of Between Two Fires "A wild fever dream – monstrous and beautiful." – Seanan McGuire, author of Every Heart a Doorway Eleven hundred and some years after the death of Christ, in the kingdom that had but recently begun to call itself England, I, Once Was Willem, rose from the dead to defeat a great evil facing the humble village of Cosham. The words enclosed herein are true.   I speak of monsters and magic, battle and bloodletting, and the crimes of desperate men. I speak also of secret things, of that which lies beneath us and that which impends above. By the time you come to the end of this account you will know the truth of your own life and death, the path laid out for your immortal soul, your origin and your inevitable end.   You will not thank me. "It's been a long time since a book has reached out and just entirely enveloped me in its world the way Once Was Willem did. Astounding, and I loved every moment of it." – RJ Barker, author of The Bone Ships

Santa Claus, my dear old friend, you are a thief, a traitor, a slanderer, a murder, a liar, but worst of all you are a mockery of everything for which I stood.You have sung your last ho, ho, ho, for I am coming to take your head. I am coming to take back what is mine, to take back Yuletide...The author and artist of The Child Thief returns with a modern fabulist tale of Krampus, the Lord of Yule and mortal enemy of Santa Claus.One Christmas Eve in a small hollow in Boone County, West Virginia, struggling songwriter Jesse Walker witnesses a strange spectacle: seven devilish figures chasing a man in a red suit toward a sleigh and eight reindeer. When the reindeer leap skyward taking the sleigh, devil men, and Santa into the clouds, screams follow. Moments later, a large sack plummets earthward, a magical sack that will thrust the down-on-his luck singer into the clutches of the terrifying Yule Lord, Krampus. But the lines between good and evil become blurred as Jesse's new master reveals many dark secrets about the cherry-cheeked Santa Claus, and how half a millennium ago, the jolly old saint imprisoned Krampus and usurped his magic.Now Santa's time is running short, for the Yule Lord is determined to have his retribution and reclaim Yuletide. If Jesse can survive this ancient feud, he might have the chance to redeem himself to his family, to save his own broken dreams...and help bring the magic of Yule to the impoverished folk of Boone County.

Now an HBO® Series from J.J. Abrams (Executive Producer of Westworld), Misha Green (Creator of Underground) and Jordan Peele (Director of Get Out)The critically acclaimed cult novelist makes visceral the terrors of life in Jim Crow America and its lingering effects in this brilliant and wondrous work of the imagination that melds historical fiction, pulp noir, and Lovecraftian horror and fantasy.Chicago, 1954. When his father Montrose goes missing, 22-year-old Army veteran Atticus Turner embarks on a road trip to New England to find him, accompanied by his Uncle George—publisher of The Safe Negro Travel Guide—and his childhood friend Letitia. On their journey to the manor of Mr. Braithwhite—heir to the estate that owned one of Atticus’s ancestors—they encounter both mundane terrors of white America and malevolent spirits that seem straight out of the weird tales George devours.At the manor, Atticus discovers his father in chains, held prisoner by a secret cabal named the Order of the Ancient Dawn—led by Samuel Braithwhite and his son Caleb—which has gathered to orchestrate a ritual that shockingly centers on Atticus. And his one hope of salvation may be the seed of his—and the whole Turner clan’s—destruction.A chimerical blend of magic, power, hope, and freedom that stretches across time, touching diverse members of two black families, Lovecraft Country is a devastating kaleidoscopic portrait of racism—the terrifying specter that continues to haunt us today.

Laszlo is afraid of the dark.The dark lives in the same house as Laszlo. Mostly, though, the dark stays in the basement and doesn't come into Lazslo's room. But one night, it does.This is the story of how Laszlo stops being afraid of the dark.With emotional insight and poetic economy, two award-winning talents team up to conquer a universal childhood fear.

Roland and his companions venture on a new journey into the Gunslinger's past, during which Roland unfolds a tale revealing the secrets of his youth, including the tragic loss of his first love. 30,000 first printing.

The Spook and his apprentice, Thomas Ward have travelled to Priestown for some unfinished business. For, deep in the catacombs of the cathedral, lurks the Spook's nemesis - the Bane.

Four of the best novellas from one of the most underrated names in horror and weird fiction. Writers such as H. P. Lovecraft rated Blackwood as one of the very best writers of the genre. This title features an introduction and notes contextualizing this characterful author. "It is my firm opinion that...The Willows is the greatest weird tale ever written." - H.P. Lovecraft From one of the greatest and most prolific authors of 20th century weird fiction come four of the very best strange stories ever told. In "The Willows," two men become stranded on an island in the Danube delta, only to find that they might be in the domain of some greater power from beyond the limits of human experience. "The Wendigo" features a hunting party in Ontario who begin to fear that they are being stalked by an entity thought to be confined to legend. In "The Man Whom the Trees Loved," a couple is driven apart as the husband is enthralled by the possessive and jealous spirits dwelling in the nearby forest. And lastly, in conversation with the occult detective and physician Dr. John Silence, a traveler relates his nightmarish visit to a strange town in Northern France, and the maddening secret from his past revealed by its inhabitants, in "Ancient Stories."

Set in a world of ominous landscape and macabre menace, The Dark Tower features one of Stephen King's most powerful creations--The Gunslinger, a haunting figure who embodies the qualities of the lone hero through the ages, from ancient myth to frontier Western legend. As Roland crosses a desert of damnation in a macabre world that is a twisted image of our own, he moves ever closer to the Dark Tower of his dreams--and nightmares.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY SUSPENSE MAGAZINE • Includes Dean Koontz’s short story “You Are Destined to Be Together Forever” From “one of the master storytellers of this or any age” (The Tampa Tribune) comes the stunning final adventure of “one of the most remarkable and appealing characters in current fiction”(The Virginian-Pilot)—as Dean Koontz brings the unforgettable odyssey of Odd Thomas to its dazzling conclusion.   Odd Thomas is back where it all started . . . because the time has come to finish it. Since he left his simple life in the small town of Pico Mundo, California, his journey has taken him to places strange and wonderful, mysterious and terrifying. Across the land, in the company of mortals and spirits alike, he has known kindness and cruelty, felt love and loss, saved lives and taken them—as he’s borne witness to humanity’s greatest good and darkest evil. Again and again, he has gone where he must and done what he had to do—for better or worse—with his courage and devotion sorely tested, and his soul forever changed. Every triumph has been hard won. Each sacrifice has taken its toll.   Now, whatever destiny drives him has finally steered his steps home, where those he cares for most surround him, the memory of his tragically lost true love haunts him, and one last challenge—vast and dreadful—awaits him. For Odd Thomas, born to serve a purpose far greater than himself, the wandering is done. Only the reckoning remains. Praise for Saint Odd   “Equal parts supernatural thriller, cultural satire, character study, bildungsroman, offbeat love story, road trip, spiritual meditation, and apocalyptic adventure, the Odd Thomas books . . . are more than irresistible page-turners. They are intimate, haunting, often heartrending, exhilarating, and beautifully composed.”—Biography.com   “Odd Thomas is such an endearing and likable character and, more than anything else, has been the reason for the success of the series. . . . For readers who have been with Odd all along, Saint Odd will satisfy.”—Bookreporter   Acclaim for Dean Koontz and his Odd Thomas novels   “Odd’s strange gifts, coupled with his intelligence and self-effacing humor, make him one of the most quietly authoritative characters in recent popular fiction.”—Publishers Weekly   “Koontz gives his character wit, good humor, a familiarity with the dark side of humanity—and moral outrage.”—USA Today   “The ultimate Everyman . . . an avatar of hope and honor and courage for all of us—the linchpin of a rollicking good tale . . . Odd evokes the homespun wisdom of Forrest Gump amid the mind-spinning adventures of a Jack Bauer.”—BookPage   “There’s never anything predictable about an Odd Thomas adventure.”—Booklist   “The nice young fry cook with the occult powers is [Koontz’s] most likable creation . . . candid, upright, amusing and sometimes withering.”—The New York Times   “An inventive . . . mix of suspense, whimsy and uplift.”—The Washington Post   “Heartfelt and provocative . . . a wonderfully rich and entertaining story.”—Chicago Sun-Times