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Immortal Beings
A Tale for the Shadows follows a murdered woman who is reborn as a ghost and finds unexpected love and purpose alongside a hunted vampire in a world where death is only the beginning. What drew you to combining ghost lore with vampire mythology in the same narrative?
The simplest answer is that I love stories about ghosts, and I love stories about vampires, so I combined them for my own entertainment. I knew that I wanted to write a novel that I would love to read.
A longer answer would include a recognition that the lore around ghosts and vampires is deep, centuries of material. Those stories are also ingrained in our societal consciousness. We tend to view ghosts as fearful entities in most European traditions, but in so many cultures, they’re welcomed, revered. Vampires are feared because they are alpha predators of human beings. In the Victorian novels (Bram Stoker’s Dracula, for example), vampires are symbolic of a frightening force of sexuality. I think the fear of ghosts and vampires also rises from a fear of death, our own and that of those we love. My idea was to turn this fear on its head, at least to some degree. No group of humanity is monolithic. That includes the dead and undead. Could there not be kind ghosts, wise vampires? We know that, for those who live on, love lingers after death. What would happen if love were a force for those who have died?
And, finally, I was intrigued by how a friendship might develop between a ghost and a vampire, two supernatural beings. And from there, how love might develop. From that rose the promise of an eternity together, as two immortal beings. How cool would that be?
Senka’s story begins in trauma but grows into something more complex. How did you shape her emotional evolution?
A lot of my shaping of Senka’s character was instinctual, based on my own experiences. Life, not just mine but everyone’s, is a process of accumulating anniversaries—of births, marriages, deaths, significant events. When I was in high school, my father died suddenly. My grandmother, mother, and life partner all died in the space of a year. My son’s fianceé died about a year after he was in a devastating car accident that left him paralyzed from the collarbones down. I watched him recover and learned a lot about forgiveness from him. Senka’s losses and her eventual choices about how to heal come from my own beliefs about the value of life and the extraordinary healing power of forgiveness and compassion.
The novel explores love after betrayal. Do you see the story as more about love, survival, or transformation?
Hmmm. I see those three as inextricably intertwined. Each supports the others; each makes the others possible. In Shadows, there are obviously several different kinds of love: Finn’s for his mom, hers for him; Senka and Silas for Luna, his for them; Mrs. Wang for her husband; Jeremy for his parents; Sarah/Senka’s for Stanley; and, of course, Senka and Silas for each other. There are also several kinds of transformation: from living to dead, from apparently good husband to … not so good husband, from smoke to monster, from revenge-focused to justice-focused. There’s even a shape-shifter. If Senka hadn’t transformed from the self-absorbed, willfully blind actress she was into the compassionate, caring, introspective ghost she became, she wouldn’t have been capable of finding the love with Silas that she finds. At the same time, if Silas hadn’t found the love he has with Senka, he wouldn’t have been interested in continued survival.
What is the next book that you are working on, and when will it be available?
It’s 1972. When Poppy is forced to move to Monterey, California, just before her senior year in high school, she’s furious and powerless to stop it. Then she discovers a mysterious journal that answers her anger with something irresistible: every wish she writes becomes real. At first, it feels like freedom, like finally taking control. But the magic has a cost, and someone else always pays. As the consequences grow darker, Poppy realizes she must give up the magic and develop the strength to shape her life without it. It’s a coming-of-age story with a dollop of Twilight Zone. I’m hoping it will be in bookstores by October 2026.
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She was murdered by the man she loved. Now she’s a ghost bound to the cabin where she died—until a wounded vampire, an ancient enemy, and a mysterious cat change everything.
Senka was once a rising television star. Now, she’s a restless spirit, trapped in the site of her betrayal. But everything shifts the night Silas appears—an ageless Native American vampire fleeing a ruthless Maker determined to erase him from existence. When a violent confrontation leaves the cabin in flames, Senka is finally freed, and an unlikely partnership is born.
As Senka and Silas forge a path through shadows and centuries-old grudges, they begin to pursue justice—not just for Senka’s murder but for the other lives shattered along the way. Guided by ghosts who’ve chosen to remain in the world of the living and aided by Luna the twenty-third, a clever feline with a talent for love and loyalty, they face vengeful vampires, unravel hidden truths, and awaken powers Senka never imagined.
But love in the afterlife is complicated. Haunted by the past and hesitant to trust again, Senka must confront the choices that led her here—and decide if an eternity with Silas is worth risking her heart one more time.
Lush, lyrical, and darkly romantic, A Tale for the Shadows is a supernatural fantasy that blends ghost stories and vampire lore with emotional depth, wit, and resilience. Perfect for fans of The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, The Dead Romantics, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, this is a tale of second chances, found family, and the quiet power of choosing love—even after death.
A Tale for the Shadows
A Tale for the Shadows is a paranormal fantasy novel with a strong gothic streak and a surprisingly tender emotional core. It begins with murder, which sounds blunt because the book is blunt about it: Sarah Sommers is killed by her husband, becomes a ghost, and from there the story opens outward into something larger about grief, loneliness, survival, and connection. As her ghostly life unfolds, she becomes Senka and crosses paths with Silas, a hunted vampire, while another thread follows Finn, a sick teenage boy in a hospital, listening night by night to a story that may be doing more than simply entertaining him. It is a book about death and love, just as the subtitle promises, but it is also about what keeps a person, or spirit, moving when they have every reason to stop.
Author Joyce Sherry writes in a way that feels intimate without getting precious, and that is not easy to pull off in fantasy. The book has ghosts, vampires, ancient rules, and real danger, but the language keeps bringing everything back to feeling. A cabin smells wrong. A hospital room feels long after visiting hours. Loneliness sits in the air. That grounded quality made the supernatural parts easier to trust. I also liked the author’s choice to frame the novel through storytelling itself. The repeated sense that stories “want” to be told gives the book a self-aware quality, but it never turns smug. It feels more like someone sitting across from you and saying, let me tell you what happened, and meaning it.
I found myself especially drawn to the way Sherry handles character. Senka could have been written as pure vengeance, Silas as pure brooding, and Finn as the sentimental heart of the book. None of them stay that flat. Senka grows into someone more thoughtful and more brave. Silas has the old-world vampire sadness you expect from the genre, but he is not just a dark silhouette in a doorway. He is wounded, weary, funny in flashes, and very human in the ways that matter. Finn, meanwhile, gives the novel an anchor. His scenes keep the book honest. They stop it from drifting too far into mood for mood’s sake. I also appreciated that the novel takes its big ideas seriously without dressing them up in heavy language. It asks what love looks like after betrayal, whether pain has to define a life, and what it means to keep choosing existence. Big questions. Quietly asked.
I would recommend A Tale for the Shadows most strongly to readers who like paranormal fantasy, gothic romance, and character-driven supernatural fiction that cares as much about emotional healing as it does about eerie atmosphere or mythic stakes. It will appeal to people who enjoy vampire and ghost stories but want something softer around the edges and more reflective at heart. I came away thinking this book understands that darkness is only interesting if there is some light pressing against it. That balance is what gives it its pull. It is thoughtful, strange, and sincere, and for the right reader, that combination will feel like being led into the dark by someone who knows exactly where they are going.
Pages: 292 | ASIN : B0FBYTKMSB
The World’s Scariest Haunted Lighthouses, Vanishings, and Murders
The book delivers a sweeping tour through some of the world’s eeriest lighthouses, pulling together ghost stories, tragic histories, strange vanishings, and unsettling folklore into one long chain of atmospheric tales. Each chapter focuses on a different lighthouse and mixes documented events, local legends, and paranormal claims. From the child spirits said to roam the St. Augustine Lighthouse to the grim disappearance of the Flannan Isles keepers to the piano-driven madness on Seguin Island, the book moves quickly from story to story, tying them all together with a clear fascination for the lonely, haunted nature of lighthouse life.
I was pulled in by the sheer variety of stories. Some chapters felt almost tender in their sadness, especially the tales involving children and grieving families. Others hit me harder, with their accounts of shipwrecks, murders, and unexplained deaths. The author uses simple, steady language to walk through each event, and I appreciated how easy it was to sink into the scenes. I actually enjoyed how the stories flowed one after another. The steady pace kept me immersed, almost like sitting by a campfire and hearing ghost stories, which gave the book an exciting, continuous energy.
I also liked how the book has a sense of empathy. The author never treats the tragedies lightly. Even in the more sensational chapters, there’s a clear respect for the people who lived and died in these remote places. It gave weight to the paranormal claims, even when the supernatural elements may have felt a bit embellished. Some moments had me smiling because the stories leaned into classic ghost-story theatrics. Other moments actually gave me a chill. The mix worked for me. The book doesn’t try to convince the reader of the paranormal. It simply invites you to experience the atmosphere, and that made the whole thing feel warmer, more human, and honestly more fun.
I’d recommend this book to readers who enjoy ghost lore, maritime history, or just a good eerie tale told with heart. It’s a storyteller’s collection, and it works best when read that way. Anyone who loves abandoned places, lonely coastlines, and mysteries that refuse to be solved will find something here to enjoy.
Pages: 94 | ASIN : B0GCTPPW1G
The Can Sack Ghost
The Can Sack Ghost is a collection of personal paranormal experiences that author John Russell has gathered across a lifetime of psychic work. The book moves through story after story with the ease of someone who has lived these moments so fully that they spill out of him. Russell blends ghost tales, philosophical reflections, humor, and straight talk. He jumps from haunted homes to guardian angels to strange synchronicities and encounters that linger in the mind. He frames it all with a simple aim. He wants readers to feel the mystery he’s lived with since childhood and to see the supernatural as both real and meaningful.
I found myself torn between fascination and a kind of wide-eyed wonder. Russell writes in a voice that feels conversational and familiar. He talks about spirits turning radios on during power outages and unseen guests laughing downstairs in the middle of the night. He writes about odd visitors on motorcycles, and even haunted Halloween candy bowls that carry on like they’re trying to join the conversation. What struck me most was not the strangeness of the events but the sincerity behind them. He tells these stories with such calm conviction that it’s hard not to lean in. At times I felt wrapped up in his world, and at other times I caught myself pausing to think, Did that really happen. His storytelling carries that kind of pull.
I appreciated the honesty that shows up when he talks about loss or doubt or the way people dismiss the unusual. Some chapters made me laugh because the moments were just so odd and human. Others made me feel a kind of quiet sadness. He can shift from soft nostalgia to sharp frustration, especially when he writes about so-called skeptics who refuse to believe their own eyes. He doesn’t pretend to be perfect. He doesn’t claim to always be right. Instead, he writes like a man who has lived a wild and unpredictable spiritual life and wants to share what he has learned. That earnestness makes the ideas really resonate with the reader.
I’d recommend The Can Sack Ghost to readers who enjoy true paranormal tales, personal memoirs with heart, or reflective stories told by someone who has walked a very unusual path. If you like books that make you sit back and say, huh, I didn’t see that coming, this one will hook you.
Pages: 156 | ASIN : B0FFLX1YCV
Final Curtain
Final Curtain is a rich and eerie collection that gathers voices from across time and imagination and sets them wandering through the long shadow of The Phantom of the Opera. Each story pulls a thread from Leroux’s world and spins it into something new. Sometimes it feels dreamy. Sometimes it slips into horror so quietly that you only notice once you’ve already shivered. The book opens with Steve Berman’s thoughtful introduction, setting the stage for the authors’ explorations of obsession, beauty, grief, and the strange spell of performance, and then moves through an eclectic lineup of tales that echo the Phantom’s myth without ever repeating it.
The memoir-style opening by Nadia Bulkin really resonated with me. The voice of the Countess trembles with longing and dread, and I found that mix weirdly relatable. Her fear of mirrors and her slow unraveling got under my skin. I could feel her confusion and her sorrow settling over me as if I were living in that drafty house with her. Other stories came at the Phantom from sideways angles, and that variety kept me on my toes. One moment, the writing felt delicate and sad. The next, it felt sharp and uncomfortable. I liked that. I liked not knowing what emotional corner I’d be pushed into next.
The book’s ideas were intriguing, maybe even more than its plots. So many of the stories are really about the ache of wanting something you can’t have or the way art can consume you before you even realize you’ve handed it your soul. There were times when the writing made me slow down and sit with a feeling for a bit. Some pieces were more lyrical than others, and some wandered off into tonal experiments that didn’t always land cleanly for me, but even when I wasn’t fully connecting, I still admired the nerve of the attempt. I found myself rooting for the writers as much as for the characters.
I’d recommend Final Curtain to readers who enjoy moody stories that riff on classics without getting trapped in imitation. It’s a great pick for anyone who likes gothic atmospheres, emotional messiness, or tales that play with memory, love, and the dark edges of creativity.
Pages: 302 | ASIN : B0G4MWKX56
Blood on the Trailhead – A Lost Grove Mystery
Blood on the Trailhead is a haunting, slow-burn mystery that tangles horror, folklore, and small-town secrets into a story that seeps under your skin. It opens with an archaeologist’s quiet curiosity and ends in something much darker, something that feels both ancient and alive. The book’s plot threads stretch across Devil’s Cradle State Park, where strange glyphs, a missing child, and old wounds converge. The story blends investigative suspense with mythic terror, pulling you through the redwoods and into the dark pulse of the land itself.
The writing is lush and eerie, with that grounded sense of place that author’s Zang and Knudsen do so well. They write forests the way others write cities, every root and shadow alive with intent. The pacing is steady, sometimes deliberately slow. When the horror hits, it lands hard, not with cheap shocks but with creeping inevitability. I found myself both enchanted and unsettled by how human the story felt, even when it slipped into the supernatural. The grief, guilt, and obsession in these characters are raw. Sometimes the dialogue feels almost too clean, but that’s balanced by the way silence and atmosphere carry the emotion.
What really struck me was how the story handles belief, scientific, spiritual, and everything in between. It doesn’t force explanations. It lets mystery exist, and that takes confidence. The book asks you to trust your instincts, even when they’re wrong. There were moments I felt real affection for the characters, especially the flawed ones who keep searching for truth when it’s obvious the truth is going to hurt. The story gave me that same uneasy calm as walking through an empty parking lot after dark, knowing you’re probably fine but not quite believing it.
I’d recommend Blood on the Trailhead to anyone who loves mysteries with a side of folklore and a heavy dose of unease. It’s perfect for readers who like their horror thoughtful, their detectives damaged, and their endings not too tidy. If you enjoy stories that make you linger on the last page before closing the book, this one’s worth every step into the woods.
Pages: 444 | ASIN : B0FVZH16H9
Midnights in October – eerie nightly escapes
Midnights in October is a collection of 31 tiny tales, each just fifty-five words, crafted to match the eerie, mystical mood of every October night. Each story aligns with a calendar day in October, some rooted in real-world observances and others purely imagined. The book doesn’t follow a linear plot but rather unfolds like a haunted advent calendar, with each entry offering a flash of the supernatural, a flicker of fear, or a jolt of dark whimsy. Ghosts, witches, misfits, rebels, and spirits lurk behind every page, waiting to whisper their fifty-five-word truths into the reader’s ear.
I wasn’t sure what to expect at first. I’ve seen microfiction before, but never quite like this. The tight word limit could’ve been a creative straitjacket, but Bossano wears it like armor. Each story punches harder because there’s no room to soften the blow. The writing is sharp, vivid, and almost lyrical. It dances between poetic and unsettling without getting bogged down in over-explanation. I found myself rereading many entries just to let the mood sink in again. One second, you’re smirking at a sly jab; the next, you’re genuinely creeped out. It was like sipping thirty-one shots of moonlight and ink, each with a different burn going down.
What I liked most, though, were the ideas hidden behind the shadows. There’s anger here. Power. Longing. Justice. Loss. Bossano doesn’t just want to scare or amuse you, she wants you to see something. Sometimes it’s political, sometimes it’s personal, sometimes it’s just raw. Stories like “¡Salud!” and “Uprising” stirred something deep and real. Others, like “It’s My Party Day” or “National Cat Day”, brought a strange tenderness to the eerie. It’s rare that something so short can carry so much weight, but these stories do. They sneak up on you. You’ll feel a little haunted afterward.
Midnights in October is a perfect companion for dark, quiet nights when the wind starts to rattle the windows and you want something strange to keep you company. I’d recommend it to fans of flash fiction, lovers of all things spooky, and anyone who craves clever, offbeat storytelling that doesn’t overstay its welcome. If you enjoy Halloween vibes with a side of soul-searching, this is for you.
Pages: 39 | ASIN: B0FJMVJF85
Following Your Gut
Between the Living and the Dead follows a teen girl whose friends die in a hit-and-run accident, causing her to discover she has the ability to interact with ghosts and leading her to uncover long-buried secrets about her heritage. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
There were multiple inspirations for this story. When I was a teenager for some reason I was convinced my bathroom hallway had magical potential. I had recurring nightmares and dreams about magical events happening in there. When I was a kid, I was curious and often volunteered to investigate “mysteries” for friends at school. Most of the time it was trivial stuff, but in my imagination, I dreamed of solving Sherlock Holmesian-like mysteries. As I grew older I fell on some Hercule Poirot books and I devoured them. I am also an adoptee from Venezuela and the search to find my origins has been a major part of my life in recent years; I chose to incorporate that into my main character’s journey. I have always loved ghost stories, (even though I was thoroughly spooked about the idea of ghosts for a while in my teens). I thought it would be cool for an average teenager who had nothing but curiosity, observation, and gumption going for her to suddenly have magical powers and being able to see things in the “In Between” having just enough of a different lens of the world to see what others cannot.
The supporting characters in this novel were intriguing and well-developed. Who was your favorite character to write for?
This is a hard question; probably Cavilla; she is heavily modeled on me, and she is what an alternate version of me would have been (minus the magic powers of course!)
What were some themes that were important for you to explore in this book?
The most important themes for me were: cultural heritage and identity. Growing up in a white family that didn’t acknowledge my ethnic origins was a challenge. Having my birth family and adoption papers withheld also added a layer of complexity and grief. I think others can relate to this experience. As I did research on Peruvian lore and mythology as well, I found it was almost impossible to find authentic source material and primary resources about it. So much has been erased by colonialist retellings. So I took the liberty to adapt and add to the original lore. I am a 90s baby, so I incorporated that 90s feel in the story; a generation that is often teased now for being “old” but there were many cool things despite there being less tech for example. Most importantly the themes of friendship, solidarity, and following your gut were key to this book. Encouraging kids to explore, to keep digging, and care for their friends and family is vital.
Is this the first book in the series? If so, when is the next book coming out, and what can your fans expect in the next story?
Yes, it is the first book in the series. I have no idea when the next book is coming out. The sequel(s) will expand more into the different pachas, Cavilla’s powers, more cases for her to explore as she gets older, and more into her birth family.
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Cavilla Ramirez is an average Peruvian teen, tethered to the 1990s rhythm of clarinet rehearsals, dog-eared Agatha Christie novels, and low-stakes schoolyard mysteries. But when a hit-and-run claims her two best friends, her world implodes—and then restructures itself in a seemingly impossible and unnerving way. Her friends aren’t gone. Their ghosts linger, needing her help in solving their murder so that they can cross over. And it’s not just them. Ghosts are everywhere, and somehow, she’s the only one who can see them.
With a protector in the form of a god-turned-cat, Cavilla becomes a reluctant guide between Peru’s realms of the living and the dead. Solving murders and helping the dead find closure becomes her new normal. But every answer she uncovers tugs loose something else: long-buried secrets about her own heritage, secrets her aunt Tia Luz would rather keep six feet under.
And as Cavilla finds out, not all ghosts need guidance. One presence stands apart, watching her… waiting.
And he isn’t asking for help. He wants her – or something she has.
