It was an age of adventure. An age of sorcery. An age of unrelenting horror. Sword and sorcery and pulp horror go hand-in-hand. Sinister enchanters working foul magic. Hideous beasts lurking in shadowy dungeons. Blasphemous elder gods uncoiling from forgotten and forbidden temples SWORDS IN THE SHADOWS features twenty-one stories with a bloody stake driven into the heart of both the horror and fantasy camps. Herein, you will find fantasy worlds, brave warriors, fabulous creatures, wondrous magic. But you will also uncover bloodcurdling chills, spine-tingling horror, and an examination of those things that truly terrify.

Mike Oliveri

More by Mike Oliveri

Stephen Graham Jones

Stephen Graham Jones is the author of fifteen novels and six story collections. He has received numerous awards, including the NEA Literature Fellowship in fiction, the Texas Institute of Letters Jesse H. Jones Award for Best Work of Fiction, the Independent Publisher Book Award for Multicultural Fiction, and the This Is Horror Award, as well as making Bloody Disgusting’s Top Ten Horror Novels of the Year. Stephen was raised in West Texas. He now lives in Boulder, Colorado, with his wife and children.

More by Stephen Graham Jones

Justin C Key

Justin C. Key is a practicing psychiatrist and a speculative fiction writer. He is the author of the debut novel The Hospital at the End of the World and the story collection The World Wasn't Ready for You. His stories have appeared in the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Strange Horizons, Escape Pod, Lightspeed, and on Tor.com. He received a BA in biology from Stanford University and completed his residency in psychiatry at UCLA. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife and three children.

More by Justin C Key

Jonathan Janz

Jonathan Janz is the author of more than a dozen novels, as well as numerous shorter works. His novels Children of the Dark and The Dark Game were chosen by Booklist and Library Journal as Top Ten Horror Books of the Year. Jonathan's main interests are his amazing wife and three wonderful children. You can follow him on Instagram, Threads, Facebook, Goodreads, and Bluesky. You can also sign up for his newsletter at his website www.JonathanJanz.com.

More by Jonathan Janz

Glenn Parris

More by Glenn Parris

Heath Amodio

More by Heath Amodio

Allison Pang

Allison Pang is the author of the urban fantasy Abby Sinclair series, as well as the writer for the webcomic Fox & Willow. She likes LEGOS, elves, LEGO elves…and bacon. She spends her days in Northern Virginia working as a cube grunt and her nights waiting on her kids and cats, punctuated by the occasional husbandly serenade. Sometimes she even manages to write. Mostly she just makes it up as she goes.

More by Allison Pang

Josh Roberts

Josh Roberts has written for publications as varied as USA Today, The Boston Globe, and Business Insider over a 20-year career as an award-winning editor and travel journalist. These days, he writes the kind of middle-grade and young adult novels he always wanted to read when he was a kid growing up in a spooky Victorian funeral home.Find Josh Roberts online at www.willowcove.com #WillowCove #TheWitchesofWillowCove #TheCurseofWillowCove

More by Josh Roberts

Aaron Conaway

More by Aaron Conaway

Hailey Piper

Hailey Piper is the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Queen of Teeth, A Light Most Hateful, The Worm and His Kings, No Gods for Drowning, and other books of horror. She is an active member of the Horror Writers Association, with over 100 short stories appearing in various publications. She lives with her wife in Maryland, where their occult rituals are secret.

More by Hailey Piper

Charles R Rutledge

More by Charles R Rutledge

Scott Schmidt

More by Scott Schmidt

James A. Moore

James A. Moore is a horror, thriller, and dark fantasy novelist and short story writer best known for his Bram Stoker Award-nominated novel Serenity Falls.

More by James A. Moore

Rena Mason

RENA MASON is a three-time Bram Stoker Award–winning author of The Evolutionist and East End Girls, as well as a 2014 Stage 32 / The Blood List Presents: The Search for New Blood Screenwriting Contest quarter finalist. She’s had nearly two dozen short stories, novelettes, and novellas published in various award-winning anthologies and magazines and writes a monthly column, often featuring special guest articles. Her debut novel, The Evolutionist, has been used in creative writing workshops to teach Southeast Asian students how to write minority characters as metaphors. Rena has also helped spearhead the Horror Writers Association’s Diverse Works Inclusion Community that now runs a website feature titled The Seers’ Table, hosting and promoting diverse authors and their works. Born in Nakhon Sawan, Thailand, Rena is a Thai-Chinese American and frequently incorporates Asian characters and mythos into her stories. A retired registered nurse, avid scuba diver, and world traveler, she currently resides in Reno, Nevada.
 

More by Rena Mason

Jonathan Maberry

Jonathan Maberry is a New York Times bestselling and five-time Bram Stoker Award–winning author, anthology editor, comic book writer, executive producer, and writing teacher. He is the creator of V Wars (Netflix) and Rot & Ruin (Alcon Entertainment). His books have been sold to more than two dozen countries. To learn more about Jonathan, visit him online at jonathanmaberry.

More by Jonathan Maberry

Why Readwise Books?

Readwise Books is an ebook & audiobook platform that automatically logs how much you and your friends read, making it fun and easy to read more. Learn more →