Short Thrillers

For over three decades, Ellen Datlow has been at the center of horror. Bringing you the most frightening and terrifying stories, Datlow always has her finger on the pulse of what horror listeners crave. Now, with the eighth volume of the series, Datlow is back again to bring you the stories that will keep you up at night. Encompassed in the audio of The Best Horror of the Year have been such illustrious writers as: Neil Gaiman; Kelley Armstrong; Stephen King; Linda Nagata; Laird Barron; Margo Lanagan; and many others.

He wakes on a cold floor, his mind a perfect blank. A dead man lies beside him, and the only clues are a wallet with his name, and keys to a life he can’t remember. Each step is shadowed by the chilling certainty that he is not who he seems. His search for the truth leads him to a past more terrifying than the amnesia. Maybe some memories are buried for a reason, and the truth may destroy the last remnants of his soul.

The explosive new thriller in the Spider Shepherd series Dan 'Spider' Shepherd's career path - soldier, policeman, MI5 officer - has always put a strain on his family. So he is far from happy to learn that MI5 is using teenagers as informants. Parents are being kept in the dark and Shepherd...

Dr. Margaret Richter has it all. She’s rich, thanks to her best-selling self-help books. She has a beautiful home in Cape Cod overlooking the beach. And she has a monthly book club that everyone is dying to get invited to. Literally. Because behind the crystal wine glasses, the fine linens and the catered hors d'oeuvres lies a tangled web of secrets, of deceit, of murder. No member of the book club is innocent—and many are guilty. And the person with the most to hide is Margaret Richter herself.

Everyone has a little darkness inside them ... But just how dark is yours, and what are you willing to do to keep it hidden? "Cherry Hollow is a place where if you leave to live elsewhere, you never return, and if an outsider moves in, they never leave." It may seem like your average rural town in the Lake District, but Cherry Hollow hides more secrets than most. And it all started with the disappearance of Kieran Jones in 1998. Didn't it?

Sherlock Holmes and Lucy James have become a formidable family crime-fighting team. But one murderous woman has evaded their grasp. And when they’re called to London’s Olympia Theatre to investigate the strange death of a circus clown, they quickly discover their cunning foe has struck again. Tracking the enigmatic killer through London Zoo, a fancy-dress ball, and a sinister occult organization, the erudite duo stays hot on her heels. Each time they close in, a powerful criminal mastermind intervenes, and she slips through their fingers.

In his three novellas, In Short Measures, Strong Conspirators, and Sally Forth, Michael Ruhlman delves deeply into the nuanced complexity of romantic and sexual love - and the inevitable evolution of the heart over the span of years and decades. Each novella asks questions about the nature of love in terms of loyalty and fidelity - what are one's obligations toward one's spouse, one's family, and one's heart?

If you’re a fan of Vince Flynn’s Mitch Rapp, Lee Child’s Jack Reacher, and Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan, you won’t be able to pause the compulsively addictive Danny Pearson thriller series.

Meet John Milton. He considers himself an artisan. A craftsman. His trade is murder. Milton is the man the government sends after you when everything else has failed. Ruthless. Brilliant. Anonymous. Lethal. You wouldn't pick him out of a crowd but you wouldn't want to be on his list. In this second dip into his case files (see 1000 Yards for a further novella), Milton is sent to Italy to investigate the death of a colleague from Group 15.

If you love corruption, conspiracy, mystery, and a whole hell of a lot of action, then Lacklan Walker and the OMEGA series is for you!

Nathan Tyler is an unassuming professor at a middling American university with a rather obscure specialty in mathematics—in short, a nobody from nowhere. So why is the White House calling? Summoned to Washington, DC, for a top-secret briefing, Nathan discovers that he’s the key to a massive foreign intelligence breakthrough. Reading between the lines of a cryptic series of equations, he could open a door straight into the heart of the Kremlin and change the global balance of power forever.

Tune in, turn on, and drop in to the rock 'n' roll rabbit hole! Along Comes Scary is set in an alternate spooky ’60s where vampires play screaming guitars, hell-bound hotrodders start a new trend on AM radio, and there are groupies who will do anything for a piece of their favorite band. Stories include "Papa’s Got a Brand-New Body Bag", "Hell-A Woman", and "She’s Got a Ticket to Die".

‘DCI Matilda Darke is the perfect heroine’ Elly Griffiths A short story and prequel featuring DCI Matilda Darke, star of Michael Wood’s darkly compelling crime series. Perfect for fans of Stuart MacBride, Mark Billingham and Val McDermid. It’s Christmas in Sheffield. But not everyone is...

Introducing Punk Rock Private Eye, Nick Paras. He has to work on Christmas. He's got a new client, but taking care of the case isn't what he expected it to be, and it turns out he isn't who he expected to be.

Detectives can’t bury their mistakes, murderers can. DCI Liam Doyle is haunted by the demons from his past and the challenges of the present: a broken marriage, a tarnished reputation, and a troubled young son who needs him. He’s newly moved out of south London – and out of his comfort zone. When a murdered woman is found at a Lancashire beauty spot in his new patch. Doyle is tasked with finding her killer, along with his new detective sergeant, Anna Morgan. As the investigation progresses, it becomes clear that things are not as they seem.

What drives someone to keep reaching for all that glitters, no matter the price? It’s easy to believe that more is better: more acclaim, more control, more wealth. But when dreams are fueled by greed, they can quickly twist into nightmares. These six propulsive short stories explore what happens when the true cost of ambition comes due.

Random House presents the audiobook edition of the short story The Christmas Scorpion by Lee Child, read by Jeff Harding. Jack Reacher likes to head south for the winter, to stay warm: so just before Christmas he arrives in a small town in Southern California. But the weather there is not warm...

Maya Alexander is the organized-and-in-charge office manager of the Bond Agency, Los Angeles's premier PI firm, specializing in catching cheating husbands. But when Maya is thrust into the field to catch her first mark in the act, she realizes this case is personal. Her mark just happens to be her ex-fiancé... and things did not end well between them. Can Maya prove that he's repeating his past mistakes with his current wife? Or is something more sinister happening in this Beverly Hills couple's life?

In his first collection of short stories, Ron Ripley delivers eight spine-tingling tales of the strange and the macabre. Weaving an intricate web of storytelling, listeners are asked to join him on a journey through some of the darkest of his works. Book a room at the old Crowe’s Bed and Breakfast, but be certain you can leave. Join the treasure hunter as he digs up graves and awakens more than just the dead. Lay beside a homeless man in a shelter, but make sure you’re not trespassing.

It gets lean between cases, so when Punk Rock Private Eye, Nick Paras gets handed a soft side-quest escorting a VIP on a spooky season tour of the LA punk scene, the last thing he expected is a tour down the dark side of the soul.