TH - 844/1 - Speaks the Nightbird (Matthew Corbett #1) by Robert R. McCammon

The Carolinas, 1699: The citizens of Fount Royal believe a witch has cursed their town with inexplicable tragedies, and they demand that beautiful widow Rachel Howarth be tried and executed for witchcraft. Presiding over the trial is traveling magistrate Issac Woodward, aided by his astute young clerk, Matthew Corbett. Believing in Rachel's innocence, Matthew will soon confront the true evil at work in Fount Royal.

After hearing damning testimony, magistrate Woodward sentences the accused witch to death by burning. Desperate to exonerate the woman he has come to love, Matthew begins his own investigation among the townspeople. Piecing together the truth, he has no choice but to vanquish a force more malevolent than witchcraft in order to save his beloved Rachel and free Fount Royal from the menace claiming innocent lives.

ID:  TH - 844/1

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TH - 844/2 - The Queen of Bedlam (Matthew Corbett #2) by Robert R. McCammon

His epic masterwork, Speaks the Nightbird, a tour de force of witch hunt terror in a colonial town, was hailed by Sandra Brown as "deeply satisfying...told with matchless insight into the human soul." 

Now, Robert McCammon brings the hero of that spellbinding novel, Matthew Corbett, to eighteenth-century New York, where a killer wields a bloody and terrifying power over a bustling city carving out its identity -- and over Matthew's own uncertain destiny.

The unsolved murder of a respected doctor has sent ripples of fear throughout a city teeming with life, noise, and commerce. Who snuffed out the good man's life with the slash of a blade on a midnight street? The local printmaster has labeled the fiend "the Masker," adding fuel to a volatile mystery...while young law clerk Matthew Corbett has other obsessions in mind. 

Earnest and hardworking, Matthew spends his precious spare time attempting to vindicate the abuses he witnessed growing up in the Sainted John Home for Boys, at the hands of its monstrous headmaster. But Matthew's true calling lies not in avenging the past but salvaging the future -- for when the Masker claims a new victim, Matthew is lured into a maze of forensic clues and heart-pounding investigation that will both test his natural penchant for detection and inflame his hunger for justice.

In the strangest twist of all, the key to unmasking the Masker may await in an asylum where the Queen of Bedlam reigns -- and only a man of Matthew's reason and empathy can unlock her secrets. 

From the seaport to Wall Street, from society mansions to gutters glimmering with blood spilled by a deviant, Matthew's quest will tauntingly reveal the answers he seeks -- and the chilling truths he cannot escape.

ID:  TH - 844/2

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TH - 843 - Usher's Passing by Robert R. McCammon

In this most gothic of Robert McCammon's novels, setting is key: the continuing saga of the Usher family (descended from the brother of Roderick and Madeline of Edgar Poe's "Fall of the House of Usher") takes place in the weird and picturesque heart of the North Carolina mountains. 

The haughty, aristocratic Ushers live in a mansion near Asheville; the poor but crafty mountain folk (whose families are just as ancient) live on Briartop Mountain nearby. At harvest time, when the book's action unfolds, the mountains are a blaze of color. 

Add to the mixture a sinister history of mountain kids disappearing every year, a journalist investigating those disappearances, a monster called "The Pumpkin Man," moldy books and paintings in a huge old library at the Usher estate, and a secret chamber with a strange device involving a brass pendulum and tuning forks--and you've got a splendid recipe for atmospheric horror.

Originally published: New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1984.

ID:  TH - 843

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TH - 842 - Mine by Robert R. McCammon

Adrift in the 1980s and slowly losing her mind, a heavily armed former '60s radical kidnaps a baby with the hope, deluded as it may be, of returning her life to simpler times. The child's mother, though, isn't about to take it lying down and, along with a tracker, begins a cross-country chase to get her child back.

ID:  TH - 842

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TH - 841 - Gone South by Robert R. McCammon

It was hell's season, and the air smelled of burning children....

With "one of the most arresting first sentences in contemporary writing" (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution), Robert McCammon unfurls his visionary masterpiece of survival, redemption, and the astonishing transformations love can create.

GONE SOUTH chronicles a desperate man's journey through a desperate land, in "a gothic picaresque that mixes gritty plot and black comedy...a smoothly constructed and satisfying story" (The Wall Street Journal ).

Flooded by memories, poisoned by Agent Orange, Dan Lambert kills a man in a moment of fear and fury -- and changes his life forever. Pursued by police and bounty hunters, Dan flees south toward the Louisiana bayous. In the swamplands he meets Arden Halliday, a young woman who bears the vivid burdens of her own past, and who is searching for a legendary faith healer called the Bright Girl. Looking for simple kindness in a world that rarely shows it, bound by a loyalty stronger than love, Dan and Arden set off on a journey of relentless suspense and impassioned discovery...over dark, twisting waterways into the mysterious depths of the human heart.

ID:  TH - 841

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PN - 284 - Swan Song by Robert R. McCammon

An ancient evil roams the desolate landscape of an America ravaged by nuclear war.

He is the Man with the Scarlet Eye, a malevolent force that feeds on the dark desires of the countless followers he has gathered into his service. His only desire is to find a special child named Swan—and destroy her. But those who would protect the girl are determined to fight for what is left of the world, and their souls.

In a wasteland born of rage, populated by monstrous creatures and marauding armies, the last survivors on earth have been drawn into the final battle between good and evil that will decide the fate of humanity....

ID:  PN - 284

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PN - 283 - They Thirst by Robert R. McCammon

A MASS MURDER.
A DISAPPEARANCE.
A CEMETERY RANSACKED.

It looked like another ordinary day in Los Angeles
Then night came....

Evil as old as the centuries has descended upon the City of Angels---it comes as a kiss from the terrifying but seductive immortals. Slowly at first, then by the legions, the ravenous undead choke Los Angeles with bloodthirsty determination---and the hordes of monstrous victims steadily mount each night.

High above glitter city a deadly contest begins. In the decaying castle of a long-dead screen idol, the few remaining human survivors prepare to face the Prince of Evil and his satanic disciples. Whilst the very forces of nature are called into play, isolating the city from the rest of the world and leaving it at the mercy of the blood-hungry vultures of the night....

THEY THIRST
Theirs is a lust that can never be satisfied...

ID:  PN - 283

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PN - 282 - The Night Boat by Robert R. McCammon

From the living hell of her watery grave she rises again...
THE NIGHT BOAT

Deep under the calm water of a Caribbean lagoon, salvage diver David Moore discovers a sunken Nazi U-boat entombed in the sand. A mysterious relic from the last war. Slowly, the U-boat rises from the depths laden with a long-dead crew, cancerous with rot, mummified for eternity.

Or so Moore thought.

UNTIL HE HEARD THE DEEP HOLLOW BOOM OF SOMETHING HAMMERING WITH FEVERISH INTENSITY...SOMETHING DESPERATELY TRYING TO GET OUT!

Beneath the waves she will seduce the living and devour the dead...
THE NIGHT BOAT

ID:  PN - 282

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PN - 281 - Stinger by Robert R. McCammon

McCammon's novel "takes place during a single twenty-four hour period in Inferno, Texas. 

Inferno is a town in trouble, driven to the brink by racial tension, gang violence, and a collapsing economy. But things can always get worse, and they do so with astonishing speed when an unidentified spacecraft crash lands in the desert outside of town, followed by a second craft bearing the alien being who will soon be known as Stinger. 

Stinger is a kind of interstellar hunter on a mission he intends to complete, whatever the cost. He brings with him an endless array of technological marvels and an infinite capacity for destruction that threaten the existence of Inferno, its inhabitants, and the larger world beyond"--Dust jacket flap.

ID:  PN - 281

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PN - 280/1 - The Wolf's Hour (Michael Gallatin #1) by Robert R. McCammon

First published in 1989, The Wolf's Hour remains one of Robert McCammon's most indelible creations. Ranging freely and with great authority through realms of history, folklore, and myth, it combines two seemingly disparate genres the World War II action thriller and the paranormal romance into a seamless, irresistible whole.

McCammon's hero is Michael Gallatin, embattled inhabitant of two different worlds. Born into the Russian aristocracy, but 'changed' and raised by a pack of werewolves, Michael's journey takes him from the wild regions of his native Russia to the battle-scarred landscapes of a world at war. Offering his unique talents to the Allied cause, Michael becomes a sort of secret weapon aimed at the destruction of Hitler and his 'Thousand Year Reich.'

His adventures take him from the deserts of North Africa to the German-occupied countries of Western Europe. There, with the aid of a vivid assortment of friends, comrades, and lovers, he uncovers a horrific conspiracy known as 'Iron Fist,' which threatens to disrupt the Allies' long-planned invasion of Europe and to alter the very outcome of the war.

Both a scrupulously researched historical thriller and a brilliant re-imagining of the traditional werewolf tale, The Wolf's Hour offers pleasure, excitement, and illumination on virtually every page. Exotic, enthralling, and endlessly inventive, it is the work of a master storyteller in full command of his matchless narrative gifts.

ID:  PN - 280/1

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PN - 279 - Mystery Walk by Robert R. McCammon

One talks to the dead. 
The other heals the living. 
Both must make the ... "Mystery Walk" 

From deep within the empty house of a murdered family, Billy Creekmore hears his name whispered... and is drawn inside. At a revival meeting in Alabama, Wayne Falconer demonstrates his miraculous healing powers... while demons feast and grow in his soul. 

On separate journeys through the Deep South to Chicago, from a world of innocence to a world of evil, greed and lust, the two young men discover their manhood - and fuel a deadly rivalry. On a scorched slab of desert they will meet in fear and unite their extraordinary powers against a raging, unshackled spirit - the walking, hungry corpse of the Shape Changer.

ID:  PN - 279

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PN - 278 - Boy's Life by Robert R. McCammon

A bizarre murder in an idyllic southern town propels a boy and his father into a world of evil in this World Fantasy Award–winning horror novel.

Small town boys see weird sights, and Zephyr has provided Cory Jay Mackenson with his fair share of oddities. He knows the bootleggers who lurk in the dark places outside of town. On moonless nights, he’s heard spirits congregate in the churchyard to reminisce about the good old days. He’s seen rain that flooded Main Street and left it crawling with snakes. Cory knows magic, and relishes it as only a young boy can.

One frosty winter morning, he and his father watch a car jump the curb and sail into the fathomless town lake. His father dives into the icy water to rescue the driver, and finds a naked corpse handcuffed to the wheel. This chilling sight is only the start of the strangest period of Cory’s life, when the magic of his town will transform him into a man.

“Strongly echoing the childhood-elegies of [Stephen] King and [Ray] Bradbury, and every bit their equal,” Boy’s Life represents the finest work of one of the most accomplished writers of modern horror (Kirkus Reviews).

ID:  PN - 278

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PN - 277 - Bethany's Sin by Robert R. McCammon

Even God stays away from the village of BETHANY'S SIN.

For Evan Reid, his wife Kay, and their small daughter Laurie, the beautiful house in the small village was too good a bargain to pass up. Bethany's Sin was a weird name, but the village was quaint and far from the noise and pollution of the city.

But Bethany's Sin was too quiet. There were no sounds at all...almost as if the night had been frightened into silence.

Evan began to notice that there were very few men in the village, and that most of them were crippled. And then there was the sound of galloping horses. Women on horses. Riding in the night.

Soon he would learn their superhuman secret. And soon he would watch in terror as first his wife, then his daughter, entered their sinister cabal.

An ancient evil rejoiced in Bethany's Sin. A horror that happened only at night...and only to men.

ID:  PN - 277

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PN - 276 - Baal by Robert R. McCammon

Baal was Robert McCammon’s first novel, a debut that would lead to some of the finest popular fiction of our time. Written at the age of 25 and published as a paperback original in 1978, it has been out of print for years. This deluxe new edition from Subterranean Press will give McCammon’s many readers — both newcomers and longtime fans — the opportunity to trace the development of an extraordinarily talented man.

The story begins with a horrific rape on the streets of New York City. Nine months after that violation, a most unusual child is born. His name is Jeffrey Harper Raines, but he quickly assumes his true name — and true purpose — as Baal, a new incarnation of the ancient prince of demons. The narrative recounts his lethal progress through the 20th century, which begins with the destruction of his earthly “family.” From there, Jeffrey/Baal moves to a doomed Catholic orphanage, where he unleashes carnage on an unprecedented scale, then out into the wider world, where he embraces his destiny as the Prophet of the Damned, generating a legacy of chaos, violence, and despair.

Baal is very much a young man’s book, raw and brimming with emotion. Listen closely and you’ll hear the voice of a gifted storyteller struggling to be born. In 1980, the career that would encompass Swan Song, Boy’s Life, and The Five still lay waiting several years down the road. This is where it began.

ID:  PN - 276

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