A whacko walking into a workplace after first making a threatening phone call ("I'm gonna get you") serves as the premise for each of the three novellas in this grisly anthology. Fans of the late Richard Laymon will revel in his characteristic mix of horror and sadism in the title story, in which a shotgun-toting psycho wreaks havoc in a law office. A secretary named Sharon flees, gains help from a stranger and returns to the office, where she discovers a heap of bodies, the killer beneath. The killer pops out, shoots Sharon's rescuer, sexually assaults her and escapes the police but not her ultimate revenge. Just another day in the office. In Edward Lee's "In the Year of Our Lord: 2202," his heroine, also named Sharon, lives in a Christianized future world. When the threatening message comes, she reacts quickly enough to call in the securitechs, who blast the intruder away, along with the story, which abruptly shifts into another theme. After an explanation of how things got so religious, with outbursts of four-star profanity by the less godly characters and gobs of SF babble by the sardonic author, the plot plows along to a predictable ending. Jack Ketchum's "Sheep Meadow Story," the best and the shortest of the three contributions, opens with the by-now-familiar bloody scenario, but it proves to be the dream of a disgruntled editor paid to critique and encourage the work of talentless would-be authors. The story is a funny riff on literary ambition, while the inevitable gunplay surprises hero and reader alike.

Our team of crack historians has uncovered the truth you never learned in school: the living dead have walked among us since the dawn of time. In this collection of gruesome tales from throughout the ages, the ravenous undead shamble through bloody battlefields, plague-ridden cities, genteel country estates, and dusty frontier towns. They emerge from foggy cemeteries, frozen barrows, loamy bogs, cursed mines, and gore-spattered operating rooms to prey on the living. But these zombies don't just eat people. They help painters and writers save their faltering careers. They unwittingly push humankind on the quest for fire. They topple evil capitalists and their corporate empires. They fight crime. They fall in love. Join us on a journey into our zombie-filled past... Neither history nor the living dead have ever been this exciting!

Different Seasons (1982) is a collection of four novellas, markedly different in tone and subject, each on the theme of a journey. The first is a rich, satisfying, nonhorrific tale about an innocent man who carefully nurtures hope and devises a wily scheme to escape from prison. The second concerns a boy who discards his innocence by enticing an old man to travel with him into a reawakening of long-buried evil. In the third story, a writer looks back on the trek he took with three friends on the brink of adolescence to find another boy's corpse. The trip becomes a character-rich rite of passage from youth to maturity.

These first three novellas have been made into well-received movies: "Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption" into Frank Darabont's 1994 The Shawshank Redemption (available as a screenplay, a DVD film, and an audiocassette), "Apt Pupil" into Bryan Singer's 1998 film Apt Pupil (also released in 1998 on audiocassette), and "The Body" into Rob Reiner's Stand by Me (1986).

The final novella, "Breathing Lessons," is a horror yarn told by a doctor, about a patient whose indomitable spirit keeps her baby alive under extraordinary circumstances. It's the tightest, most polished tale in the collection. —Fiona Webster

What happends to the wide-eyed observer when the window between reality and unreality breaks, and the glass begins to fly? Here are four answers from the ultimate expert, Stephen King. Includes "The Langoliers," "Secret Window, Secret Garden," "The Library Policeman," and "The Sun Dog."

In his introduction to Everything's Eventual, horror author extraordinaire Stephen King describes how he used a deck of playing cards to select the order in which these 14 tales of the macabre would appear. Judging by the impact of these stories, from the first words of the darkly fascinating "Autopsy Room Four" to the haunting final pages of "Luckey Quarter," one can almost believe King truly is guided by forces from beyond.

His first collection of short stories since the release of Nightmares & Dreamscapes in 1993, Everything's Eventual represents King at his most undiluted. The short story format showcases King's ability to spook readers using the most mundane settings (a yard sale) and comfortable memories (a boyhood fishing excursion). The dark tales collected here are some of King's finest, including an O. Henry Prize winner and "Riding the Bullet," published originally as an e-book and at one time expected by some to be the death knell of the physical publishing world. True to form, each of these stories draws the reader into King's slightly off-center world from the first page, developing characters and atmosphere more fully in the span of 50 pages than many authors can in a full novel.

For most rabid King fans, chief among the tales in this volume will be "The Little Sisters of Eluria," a novella that first appeared in the fantasy collection Legends, set in King's ever-expanding Dark Tower universe. In this story, set prior to the first Dark Tower volume, the reader finds Gunslinger Roland of Gilead wounded and under the care of nurses with very dubious intentions. Also included in this collection are "That Feeling, You Can Only Say What It Is in French," the story of a woman's personal hell; "1408," in which a writer of haunted tour guides finally encounters the real thing; "Everything's Eventual," the title story, about a boy with a dream job that turns out to be more of a nightmare; and "L.T.'s Theory of Pets," a story of divorce with a bloody surprise ending.

King also includes an introductory essay on the lost art of short fiction and brief explanatory notes that give the reader background on his intentions and inspirations for each story. As with any occasion when King directly addresses his dear Constant Readers, his tone is that of a camp counselor who's almost apologetic for the scare his fireside tales are about to throw into his charges, yet unwilling to soften the blow. And any campers gathered around this author's fire would be wise to heed his warnings, for when King goes bump in the night, it's never just a branch on the window. —Benjamin Reese

In Just After Sunset Stephen King delivers an astonishing collection of short stories, his first since Everything's Eventual six years ago. One of the longer stories in this book, "N." recently broke ground when it was adapted as a graphic digital entertainment and brought to vibrant life through a series of 25 video episodes. Introduced by the author, those episodes are presented on the DVD included in this Collector's Set. A trailer for the video episodes, and a special "Behind the Scenes" segment complete the DVD package available only in this special edition of the book.

Who but Stephen King would turn a Port-O-San into a slimy birth canal, or a roadside honky-tonk into a place for endless love? A book salesman with a grievance might pick up a mute hitchhiker, not knowing the silent man in the passenger seat listens altogether too well. Or an exercise routine on a stationary bicycle, begun to reduce bad cholesterol, might take its rider on a captivating-and then terrifying-journey. Set on a remote key in Florida, "The Gingerbread Girl" is a riveting tale featuring a young woman as vulnerable-and resourceful-as Audrey Hepburn's character in Wait Until Dark. In "Ayana," a blind girl works a miracle with a kiss and the touch of her hand. For King, the line between the living and the dead is often blurry, and the seams that hold our reality intact might tear apart at any moment. "N." tells the story of a psychiatrist who falls victim to the same deadly obsession as his patient - an obsession that just might save the world!

Just After Sunset-call it dusk, call it twilight, it's a time when human intercourse takes on an unnatural cast, when nothing is quite as it appears, when the imagination begins to reach for shadows as they dissipate to darkness and living daylight can be scared right out of you. It's the perfect time for Stephen King.

SPECIAL SIGNED AND NUMBERED EDITION. LIMITED to 500 copies. Blue boards with embossed silver gilt lettering. Frontispiece drawing by Gahan Wilson. Foreward by Kealan Patrick Burke, Introduction by Hank Wagner. This anthology presents a gathering of stories by todays best known authors including F. Paul Wilson, Peter Straub, Stephen King, Thomas F. Monteleone, Douglas E. Winter, Bentley Little, Kim Newman, Craig Shaw Gardner, Steven Spruill, Chet Williamson, Joe R. Lansdale, Scott Edelman, Paul Finch, Bill Pronzini, Kathryn Ptacek, William Relling Jr., Al Sarrantonio, David B. Silva, Steve Rasnic Tem, David Niall Wilson, Darren O. Godfrey, Gary A. Braunbeck, P.D. Cacek, Thomas Smith, Wendy Webb, Hank Wagner, T. Liam McDonald, Gahan Wilson, and Charles L. Grant. SIGNED BY 30 CONTRIBUTORS including Stephen King

Joe R. Lansdale compiles and introduces 26 of his own favorite and most violent dark horror tales in this review of his work. "God of the Razor" introduces the dark god behind serial killers. A martial arts fight to the death between a reluctant champion and a sadistic alpha male is featured in "Master of Misery." Human sacrifice to ensure prosperity and as a coming-of-age ritual, are themes of "On a Dark October" and "Duck Hunt." In "The Fat Man," young boys learn the hard way that some mysteries should not be investigated. Many of the tales are truly weird, such as "Chompers," a story of false teeth with an appetite. All of the stories are individually introduced by Lansdale, who explains the humorous, weird, and sometimes sad genesis for each.

A Message from Richard Laymon:
On several occasions over the years, I've been asked to edit anthologies of horror stories. I always declined the offers, figuring my time would be better spent in writing new fiction of my own. Besides, how would I get stories for an anthology? 

Then, last October at the World Fantasy Convention in Monterey, while Ann and I were hanging out with Matt Johnson and John Skipp, there was banter about an anthology called Haunted Pants. The notion seemed hilarious. We talked to several other writers about it. Everyone laughed and wanted to write stories for it. 

I came home from Monterey with plans to get in touch with John Skipp. I would tell him, "If you don't seriously want to edit Haunted Pants, maybe I'll do it." Then I got to thinking. Why go to so much effort for a "joke" anthology? Why not do a serious one? That's when I decided to do Bad News. 

Several years ago, I wrote a short story called "Bad News" for Night Visions 7. It's about a little monster that a guy brings into his house with his morning newspaper. For some reason, "Bad News" popped into my head and I thought it would be a very appropriate title for an anthology of "bad" short stories. The title is the only connection between my earlier short story and the Bad News anthology. 

Now, what sort of theme should the anthology have? I'm often being invited to submit stories to anthologies, and almost every anthology has a theme, a unifying gimmick. Often, they're very bizarre. The stories must all "take place ten years after werewolves have taken over the world" or "deal with the repercussions of psychotic behavior in our educational system" or "explore the chaos theory in terms of goblinolgy," etc. I'm sure themes do have a place — apparently a major place in the minds of many publishers. But I don't much like 'em. I find them not only restrictive, but sometimes incomprehensible. The moment I came up with the idea of doing Bad News, I knew that I didn't want it to have a "theme." 

I just wanted to get the best stories possible from a special, limited number of writers whose fiction appeals to me. Writers I know. Writers I respect. Maybe that was my theme. 

Before contacting any writers about contributing to the anthology, I got in touch with Richard Chizmar. Cemetery Dance had done a great job publishing several of my books, so I went to Rich first and he expressed interest in doing Bad News. 

Now that I could say the anthology would be published by Cemetery Dance, I contacted the writers and asked them to contribute stories. I wrote to them, "The anthology doesn't have any special theme. I just want a scary story. It can be horror, dark crime, whatever." This caused some perplexity. "You sure there isn't a theme?" And I would tell them, "Write about whatever you want. I just want a good, scary story from you." 

And in came the stories from my own personally selected list of the best writers around. I know all the people who wrote them. In some cases, I've been reading and enjoying their work for many years. In other cases, I've discovered them more recently: they're newcomers who deserve to be better known. In every case, they write powerful fiction.

A complete short novel, AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS is a tale of terror unilke any other. The Barren, windswept interior of the Antarctic plateau was lifeless—or so the expedition from Miskatonic University thought. Then they found the strange fossils of unheard-of creatures...and the carved stones tens of millions of years old...and, finally, the mind-blasting terror of the City of the Old Ones. Three additional strange tales, written as only H.P. Lovecraft can write, are also included in this macabre collection of the strange and the weird.

"The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown."
—H. P. LOVECRAFT, "Supernatural Horror in Literature"

Howard Phillips Lovecraft forever changed the face of horror, fantasy, and science fiction with a remarkable series of stories as influential as the works of Poe, Tolkien, and Edgar Rice Burroughs. His chilling mythology established a gateway between the known universe and an ancient dimension of otherworldly terror, whose unspeakable denizens and monstrous landscapes—dread Cthulhu, Yog-Sothoth, the Plateau of Leng, the Mountains of Madness—have earned him a permanent place in the history of the macabre.

In Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos, a pantheon of horror and fantasy's finest authors pay tribute to the master of the macabre with a collection of original stories set in the fearsome Lovecraft tradition:

¸ The Call of Cthulhu by H. P. Lovecraft: The slumbering monster-gods return to the world of mortals.
¸ Notebook Found in a Deserted House by Robert Bloch: A lone farmboy chronicles his last stand against a hungering backwoods evil.
¸ Cold Print by Ramsey Campbell: An avid reader of forbidden books finds a treasure trove of deadly volumes—available for a bloodcurdling price.
¸ The Freshman by Philip José Farmer: A student of the black arts receives an education in horror at notorious Miskatonic University.

PLUS EIGHTEEN MORE SPINE-TINGLING TALES!

Originally written for the pulp magazines of the 1920s and 1930s, H. P. Lovecraft's astonishing tales blend elements of horror, science fiction, and cosmic terror that are as powerful today as they were when they were first published. This tome brings together all of Lovecraft's harrowing stories, including the complete Cthulhu Mythos cycle, just the way they were first released. It will introduce a whole new generation of readers to Lovecraft's fiction, as well as attract those fans who want all his work in a single, definitive volume.

Lovecraft is "the American writer of the twentieth century most frequently compared with Poe, in the quality of his art ... [and] its thematic preoccupations (the obsessive depiction of psychic disintegration in the face of cosmic horror)," writes Joyce Carol Oates in the New York Review of Books. Del Rey has reprinted Lovecraft's stories in three handsome paperbacks. This first volume collects 16 classic tales, including "The Rats in the Walls," "The Call of Cthulhu," "The Dunwich Horror," and "The Colour Out of Space." Introduction by Robert Bloch. Wraparound cover art by Michael Whelan.