Dear Reader,
Happy May everybody!
Have you heard about our newest imprint, Trepidatio Publishing? Much like JournalStone, it’ll focus on speculative fiction with a literary bend. Want to learn more? Follow Trepidatio on Facebook! We’ll be debuting our new website soon!
Speaking of Trepidatio, on May 19th we’re proud to be releasing the debut fiction collection from Emily B. Cataneo, Speaking to Skull Kings and Other Stories.
A ballet dancer can’t escape an unwanted suitor—even after death. Three sisters live by a strict etiquette book in an abandoned house, until one of them starts to question why. Two children venture into the treacherous forest to find their missing bird-guardian. A magician struggles to find a cure for the plague descending on her city before it’s too late.
Emily B. Cataneo’s debut fiction collection is rife with the decayed grandeur of old Europe, girls who love and loathe ghosts, and magic that comes with a price. These stories, many of which have appeared on year’s best longlists, span the gamut from soft science fiction to noir, to high fantasy and everything in between. They unfold in settings rendered both beautiful and sinister: a wintry post-Revolution Russia, a gossipy New England town, a lonely bathhouse where robots go to die.
As the characters in these tales live out their lives, from childhood to death and beyond, they search for meaning, connection, and safety, struggling to transcend their circumstances and ultimately grappling with the question: how far will they go to escape?
We think it’s pretty awesome, but don’t take just our word for it—Jack Ketchum says: “You’ll want to stop and savor each and every one. This is unique fantasy, fresh, gripping and brilliantly realized.” If Jack says it, it must be true! Pre-order your copy here!
The week before, on May 12th, be on the lookout for Sacculina by Philip Fracassi. In it, brothers Jim and Jack – along with their broken father and Jack’s menacing best friend – decide to charter an ocean fishing boat to celebrate Jack’s new freedom.
Once the small crew is far out to sea, however, a mutant species rises from the deep abyssal darkness to terrorize the vessel and its occupants.
As the horror of their situation becomes clear, the small group must find a way to fend off the attack and somehow, someway, return to safety; but as the strange parasitic creatures overrun them, they must use more extreme – and deadly – measures to survive.
Ooh, who will survive and what will be left of them? Pick up the book to find out!
We’ve also had an audiobook explosion (an audio-plosion, if you will)! That’s right, we’ve got audiobooks from Ronald Malfi, Adam L.G. Nevill, Laird Barron, Richard Chizmar, the list goes on and on. To check out our full audiobook catalogue, clicky click here.
JournalStone and Trepidatio are also open to novel and fiction collection submissions! For more information, please review our submissions page.
The JournalStone Network is on the hunt for a Social Media Coordinator. Check out the full listing below, and join ussss!
Phew! That’s it, that’s all, folks. Until next month!
Jess
Assistant Publisher
NEW & UPCOMING RELEASES
SACCULINA
By Philip Fracassi
When Jim’s big brother Jack is released from prison, the brothers – along with their broken father and Jack’s menacing best friend – decide to charter an ocean fishing boat to celebrate Jack’s new freedom.
Once the small crew is far out to sea, however, a mutant species rises from the deep abyssal darkness to terrorize the vessel and its occupants.
As the horror of their situation becomes clear, the small group must find a way to fend off the attack and somehow, someway, return to safety; but as the strange parasitic creatures overrun them, they must use more extreme – and deadly – measures to survive.
AVAILABLE MAY 12th!
SPEAKING TO SKULL KINGS AND OTHER STORIES
By Emily B. Cataneo
A ballet dancer can’t escape an unwanted suitor—even after death. Three sisters live by a strict etiquette book in an abandoned house, until one of them starts to question why. Two children venture into the treacherous forest to find their missing bird-guardian. A magician struggles to find a cure for the plague descending on her city before it’s too late.
Emily B. Cataneo’s debut fiction collection is rife with the decayed grandeur of old Europe, girls who love and loathe ghosts, and magic that comes with a price. These stories, many of which have appeared on year’s best longlists, span the gamut from soft science fiction to noir, to high fantasy and everything in between. They unfold in settings rendered both beautiful and sinister: a wintry post-Revolution Russia, a gossipy New England town, a lonely bathhouse where robots go to die.
As the characters in these tales live out their lives, from childhood to death and beyond, they search for meaning, connection, and safety, struggling to transcend their circumstances and ultimately grappling with the question: how far will they go to escape?
AVAILABLE MAY 19th FROM TREPIDATIO PUBLISHING, AN IMPRINT OF JOURNALSTONE
COME TO DUST
By Bracken MacLeod
Ever since her mother abandoned her, five-year-old Sophie has had to depend on her uncle Mitch for everything. Though their life is difficult, he works hard to keep their family together, despite the obstacles in their way. But just when everything seems to be looking up for them, it all comes crashing down when Sophie dies tragically. Mitch descends into a crippling grief, not knowing how to continue on without her.
When scores of children around the world begin to inexplicably rise from the dead—Sophie among them—everything becomes much harder.
Mitch rescues her from the morgue, determined to carve out a normal life for them no matter what, though it soon becomes clear that may not be possible. While the kids who’ve returned behave like living children, they still look very dead. And they can do something else that normal children cannot. Something terrifying. While debate rages over whether the children’s return is a mercy or a sign of approaching judgment, a congregation of religious fanatics determined to usher in the apocalypse has their own plan for salvation.
Now Mitch must find a way to save Sophie from an increasingly hostile world that wants to tear them apart and put her back in the ground for good.
AVAILABLE JUNE 23rd
I WISH I WAS LIKE YOU
By S.P. Miskowski
“First rule. Never open your story with a corpse. It’s a cliché. If you do it to be ironic, I’ll throw your manuscript in your face.”
Greta didn’t set out to solve a murder. But if the first thing you see when you come home after a long day at a lousy job is your own dead body, it can make even the most cynical non-starter in 1994 Seattle take an interest. Refusing to believe her dead eyes, the one-time theater editor at the city’s least noteworthy periodical – now a bitter ghost haunting the streets and busways of the Emerald City – will happily break every rule of crime fiction to tell her story and prove she didn’t die a lame-ass, suicidal Cobain imitator. If Greta manages to figure out who really killed her, in the process? That’s just an extra shot in her overpriced espresso.
Hauntingly scary, darkly funny, and occasionally nostalgic, I Wish I Was Like You is one vengeful spirit’s look at a city learning to embrace narcissism and the dead inhabitants who will always call it home.
AVAILABLE JULY 7th!
SOME WILL NOT SLEEP (Audiobook)
By Adam L.G. Nevill
A bestial face appears at windows in the night.
In the big white house on the hill angels are said to appear.
A forgotten tenant in an isolated building becomes addicted to milk.
A strange goddess is worshipped by a home-invading disciple.
The least remembered gods still haunt the oldest forests.
Cannibalism occurs in high society at the end of the world.
The sainted undead follow their prophet to the Great Dead Sea.
A confused and vengeful presence occupies the home of a first-time buyer.
In ghastly harmony with the nightmarish visions of the award-winning writer’s novels, these stories blend a lifelong appreciation of horror culture with the grotesque fascinations and childlike terrors that are the author’s own.
COMING JULY 17th IN AUDIOBOOK FORMAT
SWIFT TO CHASE (AUDIOBOOK)
By Laird Barron
Laird Barron’s fourth collection gathers a dozen stories set against the backdrops of the Alaskan wilderness, far-future dystopias, and Giallo-fueled nightmare vistas.
All hell breaks loose in a massive apartment complex when a modern day Jack the Ripper strikes under cover of a blizzard; a woman, famous for surviving a massacre, hits the road to flee the limelight and finds her misadventures have only begun; while tracking a missing B-movie actor, a team of man hunters crashes in the Yukon Delta and soon realize the Arctic is another name for hell; an atomic-powered cyborg war dog loyally assists his master in the overthrow of a far-future dystopian empire; following an occult initiation ritual, a man is stalked by a psychopathic sorority girl and her team of horrifically disfigured henchmen; a rich lunatic invites several high school classmates to his mansion for a night of sex, drugs, and CIA-funded black ops experiments; and other glimpses into occulted realities a razor’s slice beyond our own.
Combining hardboiled noir, psychological horror, and the occult, Swift to Chase continues three-time Shirley Jackson Award winner Barron’s harrowing inquiry into the darkness of the human heart.
AVAILABLE NOW IN AUDIOBOOK FORMAT!
BEYOND THE GREAT, BLOODY, BRUISED, AND SILENT VEIL OF THIS WORLD
By Jordan Krall
Find yourself on a starship as it lumbers across the desert.
Find yourself on a train looking out at the stars, the earth a blue marble in the infinite black abyss behind you.
Find yourself overdosing on narcotics in a bathtub at home.
The Red Planet.
Pharmaceuticals.
The Demiurge.
Assassins.
Suicide bombers.
Underground railroads between worlds.
What mysteries link them?
Pull back the veil and see.
In Beyond the Great, Bloody, Bruised and Silent Veil of this World, author Jordan Krall creates a wholly unique experience; all at once revelatory, hypnotic, and hallucinatory.
All literal, all parable, all a twisted drug-trip. So read on and know this; it’s all true, and it’s all in your head.
PSEUDOPSALMS: SOLOM
By Peter Adam Salomon
Bram Stoker nominated author Peter Adam Salomon returns to his examination of the human struggle for salvation in his third poetry collection, PseudoPsalms: Sodom. Exploring the realms of politics, religion, love, and more, this continuing search for light in the darkness discovers only shadows. When all else fails, at the final judgement, poetry is the ultimate sin.
ARE YOU SOCIAL MEDIA SAVVY?
We’re looking for a Social Media Coordinator to assist with the following tasks:
-growing our numbers across all our social media platforms
-scheduling posts on multiple accounts (familiarity with Hootsuite is a bonus, but not a necessity)
-reading and responding to private messages
-interacting with other horror outlets
-plus more!
Does this sound like you? Then let’s talk! Send the JournalStone Network Editor-in-Chief, Stuart Conover, an email!
