Word Count: 98000
Summary: The Big Cinch embeds readers in a magic-laced St. Louis, once known as Mound City, home of the indigenous Americans’ Mississippian ancestors. Little evidence of their civilization survives in 1924, apart from the popular Piasa monster image, invoked to sell plows as well as ornament civic pageants. Sean Joye, a recent Irish immigrant, tried to avoid fae attention and ignore his magical abilities since childhood. A young veteran of 1922’s Irish Civil War, he aims to atone for his assassin past and make a clean life in America. Sean helps a wealthy, powerful, magic-dabbling family—founders of the most exclusive club in town, the Piasa Lodge--with a discreet inquiry or two. Sexually involved with a secretive, high-society flapper, he falls hard for her fiancé, a Great War flying ace with a few secrets of his own. But Sean asks the wrong questions about a kidnapped toddler and missing Native American artifacts and becomes a suspect in his lover’s bludgeoning and a tycoon’s murder. Can he master the paranormal abilities he’s rejected for so long in time to protect the innocent and save his own skin?
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Summary: ONE UNDERWORLD ENTANGLEMENT. ONE HAUNTED MUSIC VENUE. ONE CHANCE TO MAKE IT OUT ALIVE. Despite the ghosts, Barry Matthews takes on the job as booker for the Boardwalk View Hotel. But the renovations uncover something much more sinister. When Barry “Bazza” Matthews leaves his band The Maggots to become the booker for Melbourne’s hottest music venue, he never expects to find a link to the past buried deep within the rubble from the renovations. And now the new spate of threatening phone calls are becoming as troubling as the disappearing visitors and the malevolent activity in the basement. Trapped within the hotel with the alluring Simon, or Felicia, depending on his choice of outfit, they must join together to survive the threats from outside, as well as the dangers growing within the walls of the hotel. But the longer the renovations go on, the stronger the dark forces become. Will Barry and Simon uncover the secrets behind the hotel’s sinister history before it’s too late, or will they become the hotel’s latest victims? Rainbow Awards 2021 - Honorable Mention "Wonderfully strange" - Rainbow Awards Website: https://www.gracehudson.net Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gracehudsonauthor Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gracehudsonau Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/gracehudsonau.bsky.social Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/grace-hudson Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Grace-Hudson/author/B010TJ6XVG Mastodon: https://mastodon.social/@GraceHudsonAU Twitter/X: https://www.twitter.com/GraceHudsonAU Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/gracehudson
Word Count: 77,200
Summary: It’s August of 1850, deep in the bayou country of southern Louisiana. Four good friends are working in the fields harvesting the crops when a sudden thunderstorm drives them all indoors. There’s kind, warm-hearted J. P. Ayo; eager, earnest young T-Joe Lirette; wry, hard-bitten Clovis Dantin; and gentle, easy-going Leandre Naquin. “Hell of a night,” Leandre remarks, as they share a drink and wait for the storm to pass. “The kind of night when the ghosts walk.” This seemingly offhand comment is the impetus to the four men sharing their own ghost story. The tale each man tells--by turns tragic, funny, frightening, and heartbreaking--gives them a window into their friends’ souls. When one of them confesses that his own personal ghost story isn’t over, that he’s still trapped in the middle of it, the events that follow will test the depth of their loyalty and friendship in ways that none of them could ever have dreamed. What is certain is that after that night, none of the four will ever be the same.
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Summary: Every town has a mystery. The Crimshaw family were once the caretakers of the prestigious Strathmore Estate. After the great blizzard of 1868, the townspeople found Elizabeth Crimshaw’s body hanging from the banister. Her young son and husband were declared missing and never found. Every town has a legend. The locals say they have seen Elizabeth’s ghost and that the manor is haunted. Others claim to have heard a woman’s scream and have witnessed strange lights and shadow people. Some mysteries are better left unsolved. What really happened to the promising Crimshaw family? Are the rumors surrounding the family true? Intent on investigating these claims, Stephen Davenport, adjunct professor of Paranormal Studies at Strathmore University, along with students from the school’s paranormal investigations club begin a weekend investigation. What they find confirms their beliefs in the paranormal—and challenges them to simply stay alive.
Word Count: 90000
Summary: In 1915, gay men don't get married, they don't take care of children together, and if they do, they don't get caught. Gael and Jack are a lot of firsts to each other. Gael is the first other gay man Jack has ever met, kissed, or wanted. Jack is the first really decent man who only see an Irish gangster and whore that Gael has ever known. Gael and Jack just work for each other. First love is fabulous, even if it's forbidden. Enduring love is hard, extra hard in the face of WWII, Prohibition, and a world that can't know them as they are. The story is presented as a serial and is free to read.
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Summary: Do you think ghosts haunt only houses? As a repo man, Mel just pulled off the smoothest take of his life. Kate, a college student, was undecided on which major to pursue. All of their plans went out the window the night Mel found Kate in the back of a ’74 Nova. When Mel becomes a suspect in Kate’s murder, he must leave his life behind and make a new start in Sacramento, where he and Kate meet other people with supernatural gifts. But not everything is sunshine and roses in California. Awakening to power comes at a cost, and all ghosts eventually become monsters. Can Mel trust these new friends in Sacramento? Can he help Kate find some peace without landing himself in jail? The fateful night Mel slipped behind the wheel of an old Chevy, it wasn’t just the car that became repossessed.
Word Count: 21600
Summary: It’s been twenty years since the quiet Midwestern town of Lakeview was struck by tragedy. But every year on the anniversary of the event Teddy returns home for ‘The Reunion’. Lakeview, like Teddy, has secrets and not all mysteries should come to light.
Word Count: 76144
Summary: Fairy tales. Prince Charming fights evil, wins the princess, lives happily ever after. Three sons, three wishes, witches, dragons, a quest, and happily ever after. These stories are part of our cultural fabric. The stories change in retellings to reflect contemporary culture, such as Princess Charming, or heroes and heroines as people of color. In this collection, queer characters take center stage in stories that grew out of questions: What if the prince falls in love with Cinderella's gay stepbrother? What if Rumpelstiltskin doesn't really want the Queen's child but rather the King himself? What if Beauty and the Beast are two men? These stories explore metaphors of magic and the magical, this time, with a gay perspective. What price must be paid for happily ever after? Duty or love? Is love worth great sacrifice? Once upon a time ...
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Summary: In Book 2 of The Fairville Woods series - the sequel to "From The Ashes" - the ghost of a little girl begins to haunt Lundy, in a stark reminder that Karel's curse has not been completely broken. Harlan is now a happy fixture in her life, unbeknownst to her parents, but the school year begins and she finds herself dealing with mean girls, popular guys, and troubled friends, as well as her developing physical relationship with Harlan. But even with Karel's coven gone, all is not right in Fairville - children are missing from the elementary school, and Harlan and Dr. Weinhelm sense an alarming presence in the town. Lundy begins to have dreams about a mad woman who has lost her children, while the little girl ghost leaves her clues she doesn’t understand. The vampires from the Smoky Mountains reluctantly arrive to help defeat a creature from ancient, frightening legends - one whose existence yields an unlikely clue to the new nature of Lundy's curse.
Word Count: 54000
Summary: Silas Thornwood's worst nightmare has come to life. Darien's familiar Pip is gravely injured, and Darien and Jasper have been kidnapped. Someone ruthless and violent is holding the man Silas loves prisoner, for purposes he doesn't want to imagine. Silas needs help from his friends to locate and rescue Darien. And when he does, those responsible― whether sorcerer, human, or demon― are going to be truly, utterly sorry…
