It’s a brand-new year, and the Chill Quill is back! Each month we’re bringing you reading recommendations from the spooky side to keep you shivering all through the year with a selection of hot off the press thrillers, horrors, mysteries, and dark fantasies from well-known and emerging authors.
Grab a mug and chill with these seven new titles on bookshelves this month!
Witchcraft for Wayward Girls by Grady Hendrix
(Berkley, Jan 14)
When a pregnant teen arrives at a home for girls in the sweltering summer of 1970, she receives an occult book about witchcraft from a librarian that puts the power in the hands of the girls for the first time in their lives. Already a New York Times bestseller, horror is sharp, raw, and ruthlessly real in Hendrix’s latest.
The Last Room on the Left by Leah Konen
(Putnam, Jan 14)
The caretaker at an isolated mountain hotel finds herself fighting for her life — and her sanity — in this twisty, addictive thriller. Konen’s feminist spin on The Shining is a textured romp through unreliable snow that ramps up tension while staying on the lighter side to deliver a chilling, nail-biting mystery.
Beautiful Ugly by Alice Feeney
(Flatiron Books, Jan 14)
Nothing is what it seems when a grieving widower tries to get his lift back on track and sees a woman who looks exactly like his missing wife. Prepare to spin sideways in Feeney’s twisty island thriller about marriage, revenge, and a man who can’t trust his own mind.
Wake Up and Open Your Eyes by Clay McLeod Chapman
(Quirk, Jan 7)
Chapman has made history with his satirical yet brazenly honest look into a not-as-unlikely-as-you’d-hope near-future in this relentless social horror novel. A family on the run, a divided nation, and an epidemic of demonic media possession — this is fiction, but perhaps not for long.
Honeysuckle and Bone by Trisha Tobias
(Zando, Jan 14)
A teen girl becomes the nanny for a prestigious family in the lush tropics of Jamaica only to discover things aren’t quite as they seem, and paradise may be haunted. Eerie, propulsive, and full of intrigue, an imperfect yet courageous teen seeks to remake herself in the homeland she always idealized, only to discover that new beginnings don’t always come easy Tobias’s debut.
At Dark, I Become Loathsome by Eric Larocca
(Blackstone, Jan 28)
Horror sensation LaRocca is back with his best work yet in this “grim yet gentle, horrifying yet hopeful, intense tale of death, trauma, and love.” A man on the brink constructs a peculiar ritual for those whose desire to die only to find connection with a candidate that traps the two men in a spiral of painful revelations.
Tartufo by Kira Jane Buxton
(Grand Central Publishing Jan 28)
It’s not a foul-mouthed crow and his loveable hound companion, but a giant truffle that can change the fate of a dying Italian village forever in the newest from the author of Hollow Kingdom. Buxton’s characteristic charm rings true in this delightfully absurd tale about a local truffle hunter and a giant truffle with the power to either be the greatest gift or the foulest curse ever seen.
The Chill Quill is a monthly roundup of thriller, horror, mystery, and dark fantasy titles released each month by Lindy Ryan. Read previous editions here.
