“[Acevedo] manages to update vampire lore in clever and imaginative ways.” —El Paso Times If you haven’t yet encountered Gulf War veteran-turned-vampire private eye Felix Gomez, then now is the time! Jailbait Zombie—the fourth in author Mario Acevedo’s outrageously original dark fantasy p.i. series—pits the undead against the living dead, as vampires meet zombies for a no-holds-barred beatdown. As dark, sexy, funny, and endearingly strange as Acevedo’s previous vampiric excursions—Nymphos of Rocky Flats, X-Rated Bloodsuckers, and Undead Kama Sutra—Jailhouse Zombie is more of the top-shelf bloody madness that inspired Tim “Nuclear Jellyfish” Dorsey to comment that Mario Acevedo “is a very disturbed man—and I mean that in the absolute finest sense of the term.”

Catty, the girl born with a burden, fighting a never ending war to save the world from the smelly, bad breath creatures of the night we call Zombies. She calls the Angry Dead. It seems no one else is up for the job, so Catty hunts the night, destroying the flesh chomping, brain gnawing monstrosities that would destroy us all. The hell and death of High School is nothing to compare with the horror of the army of wretched flesh eaters that stumble out of the dark, seeking the prey upon the innocent. The Necromancer is plotting the very destruction of the entire world, and raising an army of the undead for the grim task. Only Catty stands in the way of all our doom, and then she has to pass Geometry. Stopping the terror of the walking abominations with their rotting flesh dropping from their animate bones is her mission, and Catty will never rest when she knows there are Angry Dead about. A deranged rail trip through the darkest mental landscape since psychosis became a thing. This crazy train is off the tracks, and you have to book your ticket now, or regret it forever. -Horace Thrace the 13th

Evil, death, demons, reanimation, and resurrection. While such topics are often reserved for the darker mindscapes of the vampire subgenre within popular culture, they are equally integral elements of religious history and belief. Despite the cultural shift of presenting vampires in a secular light, the traditional figure of the vampire within cinema and literature has a rich legacy of serving as a theological marker. Whether as a symbol of the allure of sin, as an apologetic for assorted religious icons, or as a gateway into a discussion of liberationist theology, the vampire has served as a spiritual touchstone from Bram Stoker's Dracula, to Stephen King's Salem's Lot, to the HBO television series True Blood. In Such a Dark Thing, Jess Peacock examines how the figure of the vampire is able to traverse and interconnect theology and academia within the larger popular culture in a compelling and engaging manner. The vampire straddles the ineffable chasm between life and death and speaks to the transcendent in all of us, tapping into our fundamental curiosity of what, if anything, exists beyond the mortal coil, giving us a glimpse into the interminable while maintaining a cultural currency that is never dead and buried.

Celebrities take refuge in a white-walled mansion as plague and fever sweep into Cannes; a killer finds that the living dead have no appetite for him; a television presenter stumbles upon the chilling connection between a forgotten animal act and the Whitechapel Murders; a nude man unexpectedly appears in the backgrounds of film after film; mysterious lights menace the crew of a small plane; a little girl awakens to discover her nightlight--and more--missing; two sisters hunt vampire dogs in the wild hills of Fiji; lovers get more than they bargained for in a decadent discotheque; a college professor holds a classroom mesmerized as he vivisects Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death"... What frightens us, what unnerves us? What causes that delicious shiver of fear to travel the lengths of our spines? It seems the answer changes every year. Every year the bar is raised; the screw is tightened. Ellen Datlow knows what scares us; the seventeen stories included in this anthology were chosen from magazines, webzines, anthologies, literary journals, and single author collections to represent the best horror of the year. Legendary editor Ellen Datlow (Poe: New Tales Inspired by Edgar Allan Poe), winner of multiple Hugo, Bram Stoker, and World Fantasy awards, joins Night Shade Books in presenting The Best Horror of the Year, Volume Two.

The undead are very much alive in contemporary entertainment and lore. Indeed, vampires and zombies have garnered attention in print media, cinema, and on television. The vampire, with roots in medieval European folklore, and the zombie, with origins in Afro-Caribbean mythology, have both undergone significant transformations in global culture, proliferating as deviant representatives of the zeitgeist. As this volume demonstrates, distribution of vampires and zombies across time and space has revealed these undead figures to carry multiple meanings. Of all monsters, vampires and zombies seem to be the trendiest--the most regularly incarnate of the undead and the monsters most frequently represented in the media and pop culture. Moreover, both figures have experienced radical reinterpretations. If in the past vampires were evil, blood-sucking exploiters and zombies were brainless victims, they now have metamorphosed into kinder and gentler blood-sucking vampires and crueler, more relentless, flesh-eating zombies. Although the portrayals of both vampires and zombies can be traced back to specific regions and predate mass media, the introduction of mass distribution through film and game technologies has significantly modified their depiction over time and in new environments. Among other topics, contributors discuss zombies in Thai films, vampire novels of Mexico, and undead avatars in horror videogames. This volume--with scholars from different national and cultural backgrounds--explores the transformations that the vampire and zombie figures undergo when they travel globally and through various media and cultures.

“[Acevedo] is a very disturbed man—and I mean that in the absolute finest sense of the term.” —Tim Dorsey, author of Nuclear Jellyfish Felix Gomez, Latino vampire detective extraordinaire, tackles a sexy werewolf cabal in Werewolf Smackdown, the fifth installment in Mario Acevedo’s satirical supernatural series. The author’s wonderfully twisted blend of comedy, horror, and detective noir—expertly flourished in such books as The Nymphos of Rocky Flat and Jailbait Zombie—places him in the august company of Eric “Anonymous Rex” Garcia and Christopher “Bloodsucking Fiends” Moore, while earning him raves from coast to coast. The Baltimore Sun calls Acevedo’s novels, “decidedly good, unclean, unwholesome fun,” while author and fan J.A. Konrath calls them, “a smooth combination of Anne Rice and Michael Connelly, with a generous portion of Dave Barry.”

In the early days of the Civil War, rumors of gold in the frozen Klondike brought hordes of newcomers to the Pacific Northwest. Anxious to compete, Russian prospectors commissioned inventor Leviticus Blue to create a great machine that could mine through Alaska's ice. Thus was Dr. Blue's Incredible Bone-Shaking Drill Engine born. But on its first test run the Boneshaker went terribly awry, destroying several blocks of downtown Seattle and unearthing a subterranean vein of blight gas that turned anyone who breathed it into the living dead. Now it is sixteen years later, and a wall has been built to enclose the devastated and toxic city. Just beyond it lives Blue's widow, Briar Wilkes. Life is hard with a ruined reputation and a teenaged boy to support, but she and Ezekiel are managing. Until Ezekiel undertakes a secret crusade to rewrite history. His quest will take him under the wall and into a city teeming with ravenous undead, air pirates, criminal overlords, and heavily armed refugees. And only Briar can bring him out alive. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.