Showing results by author "John Hornor Jacobs" in All Categories

In the contested and unexplored territories at the edge of the Empire, a boat is making its laborious way up stream. Riding along the banks are the mercenaries hired to protect it - from raiders, bandits and, most of all, the stretchers, elf-like natives who kill any intruders into their territory. The mercenaries know this is dangerous, deadly work. But it is what they do. In the boat the drunk governor of the territories and his sons and daughters make merry. They believe that their status makes them untouchable.

The world is on the brink of war. Fisk and Shoe - mercenaries, not wanting to get caught in the middle of a political whirlwind - must deliver a very important message and find a very dangerous man. They have caught the eye of the powerful men of the world, and now the stakes are higher than they like. And the Emperor has decreed that Livia Cornelius, pregnant with Fisk's child, must travel to the far lands of the Autumn Lords on a diplomatic mission. It will mean crossing half the world and facing new dangers.

The award-winning and critically-acclaimed master of horror returns with a pair of chilling tales - both never-before-published in print or audio - that examine the violence and depravity of the human condition. Bringing together his acclaimed novella The Sea Dreams It Is the Sky and an all-new short novel My Heart Struck Sorrow, John Hornor Jacobs turns his fertile imagination to the evil that breeds within the human soul.

A terrifying collection of horror and crime noir from the author of Southern Gods and A Lush and Seething Hell. Featuring 10 tales, two never before in print, Murder Ballads and Other Horrific Tales is an exciting glimpse into the dark territories of the human heart. These are coming-of-age stories. Stories of love and loss, grief, and revenge. Survival and redemption. From old gods to malevolent artificial intelligences, vampires to zombies to ghosts, Jacobs exposes our fears and worst imaginings.

Recent World War II veteran Bull Ingram is working as muscle when a Memphis DJ hires him to find Ramblin' John Hastur. The mysterious blues man's dark, driving music - broadcast at ever-shifting frequencies by a phantom radio statio - is said to make living men insane and dead men rise. Disturbed and enraged by the bootleg recording the DJ plays for him, Ingram follows Hastur's trail into the strange, uncivilized backwoods of Arkansas, where he hears rumors the musician has sold his soul to the Devil.

Fifteen-year-old Shreve Cannon doesn't mind juvie. He's got a good business dealing contraband candy, and three meals a day are more than his drunk mother managed to provide. In juvie, the rules never change and everyone is the same. In juvie, Shreve has life figured out. Then the new fish shows up. Jack's a quiet kid. Small. Cries himself to sleep too. He's no standard-issue titty-baby, though. There's his hands - more specifically his fingers, all 12 of 'em. And when he gets angry, something weird happens.

A 10-year-old prodigy when the world ended, Gus is now a battle-hardened young man. He designed Bridge City to protect the living few from the shamblers eternally at the gates. Now, he's being groomed by his physician mother, Lucy, and the gentle giant, Knock-Out, to become the next leader of men. But an army of slavers is on its way, and the war they'll wage for the city's resources could mean the end of mankind as we know it. Can Gus become humanity's savior? And if so, will it mean becoming a dictator, a martyr...or maybe something far worse?