"... a work of great importance." Soji Shimada, author of "The Toko Zodiac Murders" "Death Among the Undead" is the only novel ever to have achieved first place in all four major annual mystery fiction rankings in Japan. It was an overnight sensation and was turned into a film and a manga. Its success was due to the novel twist of adding zombies to a shin honkaku country house setting, but fans of locked room mysteries and closed circle plots need not worry. The iron-clad rules regarding the zombies' behaviour and existence are rigorously observed, and are used to create the boundaries of the mystery in a highly ingenious way. A dozen students decide to rent a boarding house in the mountains. A nearby bioterrorism event results in the house being surrounded by zombies. Initially they are repelled by the occupants using swords and spears, but then a murder occurs inside a room locked on the inside. A human could not have made the bite marks that killed the victim, but a zombie could not have got into the room to make them. More murders occur. Theories abound, but are knocked down as soon as they are proposed. The solution is an extraordinary exercise in deduction. Locked Room International translates and publishes the works of international impossible crime authors past and present.

The walking dead from 15 centuries haunt this compendium of ghostly visitations through the ages, exploring the history of our fascination with zombies and other restless souls. Since ancient times, accounts of supernatural activity have mystified us. Ghost stories as we know them did not develop until the late nineteenth century, but the restless dead haunted the premodern imagination in many forms, as recorded in historical narratives, theological texts, and personal letters. The Penguin Book of the Undead teems with roving hordes of dead warriors, corpses trailed by packs of barking dogs, moaning phantoms haunting deserted ruins, evil spirits emerging from burning carcasses in the form of crows, and zombies with pestilential breath. Spanning from the Hebrew scriptures to the Roman Empire, the Scandinavian sagas to medieval Europe, the Protestant Reformation to the Renaissance, this beguiling array of accounts charts our relationship with spirits and apparitions, wraiths and demons over fifteen hundred years, showing the evolution in our thinking about the ability of dead souls to return to the realm of the living—and to warn us about what awaits us in the afterlife. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

One bad corpse can ruin your whole day. Rhiannon's Law, Book 1 After leaving the flash and sass of Miami for the no-nonsense groove of New York, Rhiannon Murphy is eager for a clean slate and fresh start. A bartender by trade, a loud mouth by choice, and a necromancer by chance, she's managed to keep her nasty habit of seeing dead people hidden from those around her-until now. The dangerous and deliciously sexy vampire, Disco, knows her secret. When he strolls into her club to ask for help investigating the mysterious disappearances of his kind, she quickly gets the vibe that he's not exactly the kind of guy you tell no. Yet in a world where vampires peddle their blood as the latest and greatest drug of choice, it's only a matter of time before the next big thing hits the market. Someone is killing vampires to steal their hearts and, unlike Rhiannon, this isn't their first stroll around the undead block. Warning: Includes violence, strong language, and references to sexual abuse that may disturb some readers. Oblique references to '80s films are hidden here and there, which could result in tickling your geek-like fancy.

In his new novel, John Ajvide Lindqvist does for zombies what his previous novel, Let the Right One In, did for vampires. Across Stockholm the power grid has gone crazy. In the morgue and in cemeteries, the recently deceased are waking up. One grandfather is alight with hope that his grandson will be returned, but one husband is aghast at what his adored wife has become. A horror novel that transcends its genre by showing what the return of the dead might really mean to those who loved them.

"A fun, fast read...it will resonate with readers who dabble in any sort of arts, dark or otherwise." --NPR.org "With a singular and hilariously cutting teen voice, UNDEAD GIRL GANG is sure to be one of the most talked-about YA novels of the year." --BookPage Veronica Mars meets The Craft when a teen girl investigates the suspicious deaths of three classmates and accidentally ends up bringing them back to life to form a hilariously unlikely--and unwilling--vigilante girl gang. Meet teenage Wiccan Mila Flores, who truly could not care less what you think about her Doc Martens, her attitude, or her weight because she knows that, no matter what, her BFF Riley is right by her side. So when Riley and Fairmont Academy mean girls June Phelan-Park and Dayton Nesseth die under suspicious circumstances, Mila refuses to believe everyone's explanation that her BFF was involved in a suicide pact. Instead, armed with a tube of lip gloss and an ancient grimoire, Mila does the unthinkable to uncover the truth: she brings the girls back to life. Unfortunately, Riley, June, and Dayton have no recollection of their murders. But they do have unfinished business to attend to. Now, with only seven days until the spell wears off and the girls return to their graves, Mila must wrangle the distracted group of undead teens and work fast to discover their murderer...before the killer strikes again.

Betsy Taylor, Queen of the undead, has snagged a dream job in a shoe store (just like a normal person!). But when vampires start getting killed off, Betsy enlists the help of the sexy vampire Sinclair. Now she's really treading dangerous ground-but this time in brand-new high heels.

Vampire Queen Betsy Taylor discovers that it is not all marital bliss in the suburbs as her husband, Sinclair, takes up reading "The Book of the Dead," and a pack of once-feral vampires decides to pay an unwelcome visit.