AustLit

'Some curses don’t know how to die. Over two centuries, the artists, Ahava, Alex and Angel inherit a family curse passed down aunt-to-niece through the generations. The curse goes all the way back to a village in Poland where a mad uncle sold his soul to a witch for a shot at eternity. Although the witch gave his female heirs a fifth word to transform the curse into a blessing, this has forced them into a strange ritual of desecrating their own art in order to keep it sacred, an act of self-vandalism that consumes their bodies and their minds. A ritual that cannibalises their friendships, their love affairs, their lives, the darkness always just a brush stroke away. Until one day, one year and in one city, the curse comes too close to home, and the final niece learns the true meaning of wearing your he/art on your sleeve.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'Seasons have always been connected with the passing of time and the changes of life, inspiring myths, folklore, poems, and songs. In this short collection award-winning J.S. Breukelaar and Seb Doubinsky have decided to pay tribute to the old tradition of yearly almanacs, which contained short pieces of lore and traditions. Keeping with the short format, they have renewed the genre by infusing it with a modern-day setting, pushing the boundaries of the folk-horror uncanny into the borders of our cities. A succession of disturbing stories and vignettes, sometimes poetic, sometimes funny, but always gruesome, Turning of The Seasons will surely be an almanac you will never forget.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'Meera and her twin sister Kai are among thousands of hybrid women—Mades—bred in the Blood Temple cult, from which Meera was rescued by a mysterious healer and storyteller, Narn. Years later, Meera, still racked with guilt and grief, enrolls in college to take advantage of a generous new Redress Program. There she can only dream of ever being real, of ever being whole again without her twin, for whose death she blames herself. When Narn’s conjure stories buy Meera a free ride to a notorious horror reading series, she is soon the darling of the lit set, feted by the other students, finally whole, finally free of the idea that she should have died so Kai could have lived. It seems like, thanks to Narn, Meera can be re-made after all, her life redressed.

'But college is not all it seems and there is a price to pay for belonging to something that you don’t understand. Narn has lost a sister too, and Meera agrees to try and find her if Narn keeps giving Meera the stories that are slowly changing her—opening her up to memories she’s never acknowledged, secrets she’s never wanted to know—about Narn and her connection to a violent campus stalker. Time is closing in on all Meera holds dear—she is afraid, not just for, but of herself, of what she’s becoming, and of where she stands on the bridge between worlds—fearful of what waits on the other side, and of the price she’ll have to pay for knowing what she truly is.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'A collection of twelve of J.S. Breukelaar's darkest, finest stories with four new works, including the uncanny new novella "Ripples on a Blank Shore." Introduction by award-winning author, Angela Slatter. Relish the Gothic strangeness of "Union Falls," the alien horror of "Rogues Bay 3013," the heartbreaking dystopia of "Glow," the weird mythos of "Ava Rune," and others.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'The remote lake town of Little Ridge has a memory problem. There is an island out on the lake somewhere, but no one can remember exactly where it is--and what it has to do with the disappearance of the eccentric Frankie Harpur or the seven-year-old son of a local artist, Lee Montour.

'When Thettie Harpur brings her family home to find Frankie, she faces opposition from all sides--including from the clan leader himself, the psychotic Doc Murphy.

'Lee, her one true ally in grief and love, might not be enough to help take on her worst nightmare. The lake itself.

'A tale of that most human of monsters--memory--Aletheia is part ghost story, part love story, a novel about the damage done, and the damage yet to come. About terror itself. Not only for what lies ahead, but also for what we think we have left behind.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'- Mommy? Are you there?

'- Norma?

'- Is everything all right?

'- Everything's fine. I just want to go home is all.

'- Where are you?

'- I already told you.

'- Tell me again.

'- Outside a pharmacy on the coast. It's almost dawn and I'm barefoot.

'- Barefoot?

'- I don't know if he's the guy.

'- When you find the guy, you can come home.

'- I know. It's just, the longer I'm here the more it...

'- it hurts?

'- And it's just that we dropped I don't know how many pills. Couldn't you just come get me? You can drop me back, okay? I just need a break. I'd like to see

'to hold, to touch, to have

'to be

'In the beginning, KALI I8 created Norma (a network operation requiring minimal access) with a singular goal: bring back the horn of the perfect male.

'Spill City: the coast of a near-future California, newly broken from the continental United States. In a temporary calm between storms, Norma combs the exposed intestines of the human world for the Guy. The Guy, the horn, is the only way home. If home exists. If home ever existed.

'The longer Norma stays, the harder it is to remember.

'She is a woman, a mother, a harbinger, a vessel, a tool, a program. She can be written and unwritten over and over again until something, someone, sticks.

'And people, humans, are starting to stick.

'Mommy is not pleased.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

Ame, a girl without arms, joins a struggling bar's new eighties cover band as their new piano player. Despite her initial wariness, the owner, Deel, finds herself drawn to her as the band grows more successful.