"Growing up on Cape Cod in the 1960s, Liza Rodman was a lonely little girl. During the summers, while her mother worked days in a local motel and danced most nights in the Provincetown bars, her babysitter--the kind, handsome handyman at the motel where her mother worked--took her and her sister on adventures in his truck. He bought them popsicles and together, they visited his 'secret garden' in the Truro woods ... Everyone thought he was just a 'great guy.' But there was one thing she didn't know: their babysitter was a serial killer. Some of his victims were buried--in pieces--right there, in his garden in the woods"--
A private citizen discovers compelling evidence that a decades-old murder in Nashville was not committed by the man who went to prison for the crime but was the result of a conspiracy involving elite members of Nashville society. Nashville 1964. Eighteen-year-old babysitter Paula Herring is murdered in her home while her six-year-old brother apparently sleeps through the grisly event. A few months later a judge's son is convicted of the crime. Decades after the slaying, Michael Bishop, a private citizen, stumbles upon a secret file related to the case and with the help of some of the world's top forensic experts--including forensic psychologist Richard Walter (aka "the living Sherlock Holmes")--he uncovers the truth. What really happened is completely different from what the public was led to believe. Now, for the very first time, Bishop reveals the true story. In this true-crime page-turner, the author lays out compelling evidence that a circle of powerful citizens were key participants in the crime and the subsequent cover-up. The ne'er-do-well judge's son, who was falsely accused and sent to prison, proved to be the perfect setup man. The perpetrators used his checkered history to conceal the real facts for over half a century. Including interviews with the original defense attorney and a murder confession elicited from a nursing-home resident, the information presented here will change Nashville history forever.
Everyone has weird thoughts sometimes. But for seventeen-year-old Dani Solomon, strange thoughts have taken over her life. She loves Alex, the little boy she babysits, more than anything. But one day, she has a vision of murdering him that's so gruesome, she can't get it out of her mind. In fact, Dani's convinced that she really will kill Alex. She confesses the thoughts to keep him safe, setting off a media frenzy that makes Dani Death the target of an extremist vigilante group. Through the help of a brave therapist, Dani begins to heal her broken mind. But will it be too late? The people of her community want justice . . . and Dani's learning that some thoughts are better left unsaid.
Over 13 months in 1976-1977, four children were abducted in the Detroit suburbs, each of them held for days before their still-warm bodies were dumped in the snow near public roadsides. The Oakland County Child Murders spawned panic across southeast Michigan, triggering the most extensive manhunt in U.S. history. Yet after less than two years, the task force created to find the killer was shut down without naming a suspect. The case "went cold" for more than 30 years, until a chance discovery by one victim's family pointed to the son of a wealthy General Motors executive: Christopher Brian Busch, a convicted pedophile, was freed weeks before the fourth child disappeared. Veteran Detroit News reporter Marney Rich Keenan takes the reader inside the investigation of the still-unsolved murders--seen through the eyes of the lead detective in the case and the family who cracked it open--revealing evidence of a decades-long coverup of malfeasance and obstruction that denied justice for the victims.
Jenny's last babysitting job nearly ended in death. But she's a survivor. She's getting over it. The crazy guy who was after her is gone and she's even got a new babysitting job. When she answers the phone, she hears a familiar voice, a voice from the past, from the grave.
The whispers may scare you . . . In River Glen, Oregon, rumors are spreading about the Babysitter Stalker. One victim was fatally stabbed. A second fell—or was pushed—from a rooftop deck. High school sophomore Jamie Whelan, scheduled to watch the Ryerson twins tonight, isn’t worried. She’s more interested in the party she’ll go to later, as soon as her sister Emma arrives to take over babysitting duties. But nothing goes according to plan . . . But the truth . . . Twenty years after that night’s vicious attack, Emma remains scarred in body and mind. Jamie, back in River Glen after their mother’s death, still feels guilty over trading places that fateful evening. Then suddenly another young babysitter is attacked. Jamie, with a teenage daughter of her own, fears something much more twisted than coincidence. Is even more terrifying . . . Is this new nightmare connected with those long-ago crimes? Emma’s fractured memories may contain the answer. But the deeper Jamie digs, the darker the secrets waiting to be uncovered—and avenged . . .
THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER VOTED GOODREADS CHOICE AWARD BEST HORROR NOVEL OF 2021 A Good Morning America Buzz Pick “The horror master…puts his unique spin on slasher movie tropes.”-USA Today A can't-miss summer read, selected by The New York Times, Oprah Daily, Time, USA Today, The Philadelphia Inquirer, CNN, LitHub, BookRiot, Bustle, Popsugar and the New York Public Library In horror movies, the final girls are the ones left standing when the credits roll. They made it through the worst night of their lives…but what happens after? Like his bestselling novel The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires, Grady Hendrix’s latest is a fast-paced, frightening, and wickedly humorous thriller. From chain saws to summer camp slayers, The Final Girl Support Group pays tribute to and slyly subverts our most popular horror films—movies like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, A Nightmare on Elm Street, and Scream. Lynnette Tarkington is a real-life final girl who survived a massacre. For more than a decade, she’s been meeting with five other final girls and their therapist in a support group for those who survived the unthinkable, working to put their lives back together. Then one woman misses a meeting, and their worst fears are realized—someone knows about the group and is determined to rip their lives apart again, piece by piece. But the thing about final girls is that no matter how bad the odds, how dark the night, how sharp the knife, they will never, ever give up.
From one of America’s most renowned storytellers—the bestselling author of Blonde—comes a novel about love and deceit, and lust and redemption, against a backdrop of shocking murders in the affluent suburbs of Detroit. "Hannah’s unreliable, elliptical narrative is seductive and compelling, like following someone into a fever dream ... [Oates] is in no hurry to trigger the action, dropping tiny morsels of foreshadowing to keep us on our toes." —The New York Times Book Review “Unsettling, mysterious, deft, sinister, eerily plausible.” —Margaret Atwood, best-selling author of The Handmaid's Tale and The Testaments, via Twitter In the waning days of the turbulent 1970s, in the wake of unsolved child-killings that have shocked Detroit, the lives of several residents are drawn together with tragic consequences. There is Hannah, wife of a prominent local businessman, who has begun an affair with a darkly charismatic stranger whose identity remains elusive; Mikey, a canny street hustler who finds himself on a chilling mission to rectify injustice; and the serial killer known as Babysitter, an enigmatic and terrifying figure at the periphery of elite Detroit. As Babysitter continues his rampage of abductions and killings, these individuals intersect with one another in startling and unexpected ways. Suspenseful, brilliantly orchestrated, and engrossing, Babysitter is a starkly narrated exploration of the riskiness of pursuing alternate lives, calling into question how far we are willing to go to protect those whom we cherish most. In its scathing indictment of corrupt politics, unexamined racism, and the enabling of sexual predation in America, Babysitter is a thrilling work of contemporary fiction.
A good babysitter is hard to find... especially when they're all DEAD! Larkin's first night with the babysitter's club has her filling in for a friend that's blowing off work for a hot date. The simple little lie will have dire consequences that trigger a series of unthinkable events and spurs a killer's need for revenge! With the bodies-and suspects-stacking up, the girls race to stop the killer and unearth the blood-stained secret behind the lunatic's grisly murders. Can Larkin's unmask the Kohler Slasher or will she become another victim of DADDY'S LITTLE KILLER? From the twisted mind of David O'Hanlon, comes the first book in Henrique Couto's Babysitter Massacre series!
Dolls can't move by themselves. . . . Or can they? This special anniversary edition of the hair-raising mystery that's kept readers up at night for thirty-five years features a foreword by Goosebumps creator R.L. Stine. Amy is terrified. She hears scratching and scurrying noises coming from the dollhouse in the attic, and the dolls she was playing with are not where she left them. Dolls can't move by themselves, she tells herself. But every night when Amy goes up to check on the dollhouse, it's filled with an eerie light and the dolls have moved again! Are the dolls trying to tell her something? Could this all be connected to the murders of her great-grandparents? Sinister secrets unravel as Amy gets closer to revealing the mystery of the dolls in this haunting novel that combines complicated family relationships with a bone-chilling mystery. Even readers who love scary stories will want to keep the lights on after finishing! The all-new foreword and jacket art make this spooky classic, an Edgar award nominee, perfect for sharing with a new generation.
