Mystery/thriller Reading Friends

1943. Soviet Union is under attack as WW2 is raging. Fighting in the doomed battle of Kursk, Andrei finds himself in a strange city where Svetlana, a girl he has never seen but who looks eerily familiar, saves him from a fist-faced creature. When Svetlana’s family is lost, the two embark on a harrowing odyssey across the snow-covered plain, battling deformed former humans and taken prisoners by the army of black stars. Against impossible odds, they reach their destination where they discover a secret that will change history.©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

The fate of the world rests in the hands of four dysfunctional teenagers and a bunch of oddball adults. ©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

Eidolon Avenue: Where the secretly guilty go to die. One building. Five floors. Five doors per floor. Twenty-five nightmares feeding the hunger lurking between the bricks and waiting beneath the boards. The sequel to Eidolon Avenue: The First Feast (“a great read...powerful and jarring” - Cemetery Dance) returns to the voracious Eidolon as it savors The Second Feast. A narcoleptic man in apartment 2A battles a vengeful past determined to rob him of everything as he runs from the barbaric disaster of a delusional love. A woman in 2B, reinventing herself to please a callous boyfriend, discovers the horrors that wait in the shadows of her self-renovation. The man in 2C, a teacher at the nearby Catholic girl’s school, collapses beneath the brutal consequences of his lecherous desires. An older woman in 2D, after decades dedicated to the church, is cornered at last by the grisly carnage beating at the hollow center of her faith. And a college student in 2E, hungry to escape an ignored life of invisible anonymity, finds herself captured between the pages of a ravenous book. All thrown into their own private hell as every cruel choice, every drop of spilled blood, every silent, complicit moment of cowardice is remembered, resurrected and relived to feed the ancient evil that lives on Eidolon Avenue. ©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

Miles Landry is trying to put violence behind him when he takes up work as a private detective focused on humdrum adultery cases. But when a Tibetan monk hires him to find a missing person, things get weird fast. Charged with tracking down the reincarnation of a man possessed by a demonic guardian from the Tibetan Book of the Dead, Miles is plunged into a world of fortune-tellers, gangsters, and tantric rituals. The year is 1991 and a series of grisly murders has rocked New York City in the run up to a visit from the Dalai Lama. The police attribute the killings to Chinatown gang warfare. Miles–skeptical of the supernatural–is inclined to agree. But what if the monster he's hunting is more than a myth? ©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

There are monsters in this world. And they used to be us. Now it's time to euthanize to survive in a hospice where Emily, a woman haunted by her past, only wants to do her job and be the best mother possible. Post-infection Chicago. Christmas. Inside The Hospice, Emily and her fellow nurses do their rounds. Here, men and women live out their final days in comfort, segregated from society, and are then humanely terminated before fate turns them into marrow-craving monsters known as ‘Smilers.’ Outside these imposing walls, rabid protesters swarm with signs, caught up in the heat of their hatred. Emily, a woman haunted by her past, only wants to do her job and be the best mother possible. But in a world where mortality means nothing, where guns are drawn in fear and nobody seems safe anymore – at what cost will this pursuit come? And through it all, the soon to be dead remain silent, ever smiling. Such is their curse. It won't be long before that snow-speckled ground will be salted by blood. ©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

Sound of his Bones Breaking, a novella that will leave you truly shaken. Board for free. But the cost might be your life. ©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

The evening wind and tranquility wiped away all the chaos that had been filling my mind for the preceding few days. It felt as though I had been granted a second opportunity at life, akin to that of a newborn kid. I'd always wanted to feel that way for so long, and that night was a very captivating time for me to begin with. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, feeling the breeze brush against my skin as I relived all the horrific events that had occurred. All the turmoil that seemed to escape reappeared in an instant. Tears rush down my cheeks as I feel my body shudder as a dreadful understanding dawns on me. It feels as if every second of my existence has been squandered, and as if the sense of despair and worry has taken over the little strand of sanity that exists for me as it pours through my veins and fills my spirit to the core. "You've got this. All you have to do is think that you can," I said to myself persuasively. "You can't, you just can't. You'll never be able to do it, and you'll have to live with the repercussions for the rest of your life," a familiar voice said. My senses begin to be overpowered by numbness. And with that, I realized I could not go away. The reality that this is my fate hits me like a ton of bricks. As I stretched out to wipe away all my tears, I felt thick moisture on my fingers and was terrified to find blood instead of tears. I felt as if my world was spinning before I could even scream. Then, all of a sudden, darkness crept inside me. And eventually sends me to oblivion.

As Jason and I try to stay one step ahead of the Marching Tides and their nefarious associates, we draw ever closer to the shocking truth of who the mastermind behind the Marching Tides really is. Something tells me I’ll regret learning the answers at the end of my journey.©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

Willow refused to attend a Halloween show her sister invited her to, because of her grandma she had to take care of. But she never knew that would be the last time she would see her sister, leaving her in a difficult dilemma. Three years later with no positive report about her lost sister, she received an invitation to the same Halloween show that marked the no return of her sister. Attending it, she discovered somethings. Volunteers for the magic show were put inside a coffin, after which they vanish and drinks were given out which made people forget about the show. In a quest to find her sister and others who were lost in the Halloween show, Willow took a journey alongside a friend to a secret tomb that might lead them to the missing people. And there, tbet wished they never visted the underground tunnel based on their discovery. Will these two be successful in this mission?

"I'm not yours!" I snap, my eyes narrowing into slits as I glare at him. A wicked grin curls on his lips. "Oh, but you are, little deer. How can you even begin to deny it?" He leans in closer, his breath hot against my neck as he drags his nose along my skin, inhaling deeply. "You let me touch you. Now, you. Are. Mine." I shake my head vigorously, my voice trembling as I stammer, "I... I wasn't awake. I didn't know it was you. I thought it was him!" The words spill out, more an attempt to convince myself than to sway him. His dark, sinister laugh reverberates as he presses closer, pinning me against the wall, his body a cage around mine. "Yet your eyes were fixed on his face, weren't they, little deer? Even as you came so hard around my fingers." He's right. My heart pounds as I recall the moment, my gaze locked on Justin, terrified he would wake and discover us. Luna thought she had everything she wanted—a loving relationship with her boyfriend, Justin, and a life that felt secure. But everything changed in a single, haunting night. For years, Luna had been living under the shadow of a mysterious stalker, someone who invaded her apartment, left unsettlingly sweet gifts, and even stole her clothing. She never imagined that the danger was closer than she could have ever suspected. After a night of partying, Luna drifts off to sleep between Justin and his best friend, Dante. But what she doesn't know is that Dante, the man she trusted, is the very stalker who has been obsessing over her for years. And now, with her so close, his twisted desires are becoming impossible to resist.