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A Light Most Hateful in Library Journal Best Horror of 2023

Posted on 2023-12-05 by Hailey Piper a light most hateful novel

So jazzed to share that my recent Titan Books novel A Light Most Hateful landed on Library Journal’s Best Horror of 2023 list!

” If Neil Gaiman, Mary Shelley, and Shirley Jackson could collaborate, this stunning novel would be the result.”

It’s an honor to see my cosmic horror tale appear alongside brilliant work by Tananarive Due, Grady Hendrix, Stephen Graham Jones, Cassandra Khaw, Victor LaValle, Josh Malerman, Cynthia Pelayo, Jade Song, and Chuck Tingle.

This year was another incredible time to be a horror fan, and I can already tell 2024 is shaping up to be another beautiful storm.

Release day: A Light Most Hateful + 100th short story

Hear that thunder crash and boom—A Light Most Hateful is here!

Released today by Titan Books, with cover art by Julia Lloyd, my new novel is also my tenth book, a twisting story of small-town survival horror set against a summer storm of monsters, madness, and the breaking of reality and friendship.

“An ambitious, genre-shredding novel that takes big swings and, improbably, lands every one.”

– Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“A stunning novel that purposefully plays with genre conventions and centers love, even as it actively terrifies readers to their core.”

– Library Journal (starred review)

Available from Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org, Amazon, Penguin Random House, LibroFM

Mona Awad’s Bunny meets Stranger Things in this mind-bending and terrifying examination of female friendship and the lengths we’ll go to protect the ones we love, from the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Queen of Teeth.

Three years after running away from home, Olivia is stuck with a dead-end job in nowhere town Chapel Hill, Pennsylvania. At least she has her best friend, Sunflower.

Olivia figures she’ll die in Chapel Hill, if not from boredom, then the summer night storm which crashes into town with a mind-bending monster in tow.

If Olivia’s going to escape Chapel Hill and someday reconcile with her parents, she’ll need to dodge residents enslaved by the storm’s otherworldly powers and find Sunflower.

But as the night strains friendships and reality itself, Olivia suspects the storm, and its monster, may have its eyes on Sunflower and everything she loves.

Including Olivia.

ALSO out today, my 100th published short story, “Scratch-Off Universe,” appears in Weird Tales: 100 Years of Weird, a beautiful anthology celebrating the 100th anniversary of Weird Tales, featuring essays, poetry, stories from magazine issues of yesteryear, as well as new work.

I’m honored to be part of this piece of weird horror history, especially with my milestone tale about a group desperate to change the world in the parking lot outside a small-town baseball field and what they discover in scratching away layers of the known to find the unknown.

Out now: La Reina Dentada

Posted on 2023-10-02 by Hailey Piper New release novel queen of teeth translation

It’s release day for La Reina Dentada, the Spanish edition of my Bram Stoker Award-winning novel Queen of Teeth!

Dilatando Mentes Editorial has done another amazing job both in translating the tale of Yaya, Doc, and the vagina monster Magenta, and in the presentation, with a beautiful cover by Raúl Ruiz, as well as lots of tentacled sweetness inside the book.

Imagina que, un buen día, te levantas y haces un descubrimiento sobre tu cuerpo, uno tan sorprendente, que provocaría que tu vida cambiase drásticamente; imagina descubrir que tienes dientes en partes de tu cuerpo donde no deberían estar. Eso es lo que le sucede a Yaya Betancourt, una mujer que padece una rara afección genética causada por unos experimentos llevados a cabo hace décadas por la Farmacéutica AlfaBeta, cuando ella, y miles de personas más, a las que se les denomina quimeras, aún estaban en el útero de sus respectivas madres. Lo que no puede imaginar Yaya, es el alcance y las repercusiones que tendrá su descubrimiento y la metamorfosis que este acarrea, no solo en su vida, sino en la del resto de la humanidad.

«Una historia de terror tan poderosa como hermosa». (Kirkus Reviews)

Cruel Angels Past Sundown, now in audio!

Posted on 2023-09-22 by Hailey Piper audiobook cruel angels past sundown novel

It’s release day for the audiobook of Cruel Angels Past Sundown!

A couple months ago, paperback and ebook readers met Annette Klein in 1880s New Mexico in this queer Biblical horror Splatter Western, and now audiobook fans can sink into this night from hell too. Jenn Lee’s voice will be familiar to anyone who’s listened to Queen of Teeth, and she’s just as stellar here, delivering a gripping read of Annette, Gloria, Balthazar, and everyone involved in the bloody clash at Low’s Bend.

Available on LibroFM, Audible, Barnes & Noble, and everywhere else audiobooks are sold!

Cover reveal: La Reina Dentada

Posted on 2023-09-09 by Hailey Piper novel queen of teeth translation

I’m so pleased to share the cover to La Reina Dentada, the Spanish edition of Bram Stoker Award-winning novel Queen of Teeth, coming from Dilatando Mentes Editorial this fall!

Dilatando Mentes also published the Spanish edition of The Worm and His Kings last year, El Gusano y Sus Reyes. It’s a beautiful book through and through, and having seen their edition of Queen of Teeth, it’s just as gorgeous inside (and full of tentacles). The cover art is by Raúl Ruiz is so beautiful and striking (and also full of tentacles).

New articles in CrimeReads and Writer’s Digest

Posted on 2023-08-18 by Hailey Piper article cruel angels past sundown novel

I have a new article up on CrimeReads! With my new novel Cruel Angels Past Sundown having recently released and being a mix of religion and horror, my new article includes seven recommendations for other books/stories on the subject. Check it out here!

And for writers, I also have a new article up on Writer’s Digest: “5 Tips for Adding Otherworldly Elements Into Your Novel.” I use Cruel Angels Past Sundown as an example in a few steps for addressing and incorporating speculative elements. Remember, the weirder, the better!

Starred PW review for A Light Most Hateful

Posted on 2023-08-10 by Hailey Piper a light most hateful novel

I’m still jittery with this exciting news, but I’m bravely typing anyway! My upcoming small-town survival horror novel A Light Most Hateful has received a STARRED REVIEW from Publishers Weekly!

I could not be more thrilled right now.

“Piper’s prose crackles with energy and wit as it ties the novel’s wilder excesses together into a story at once comfortingly familiar in its themes and cosmically alien in its execution. The story twists reader expectations into knots, flipping genre conventions and connecting unlikely elements to make something truly singular.”

A Light Most Hateful releases October 10th from Titan Books!

Cruel Angels Past Sundown release day

Posted on 2023-07-25 by Hailey Piper cruel angels past sundown New release novel

It’s release day!

Overjoyed that my new novel Cruel Angels Past Sundown is out at last from Death’s Head Press and flashing that amazing Justin T. Coons cover art like its Splatter Western fellows.

It’s out in paperback and ebook today, which can be ordered at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop, and soon enough the audiobook will be out, narrated by Jenn Lee, whom you might have heard on the audiobook for Queen of Teeth.

New Mexico Territory, 1882: She comes to the Klein ranch at sunset, a strange naked pregnant woman dragging a cavalry saber. Annette Klein and her husband have built peace between their marriage and secret relations beyond, but their serenity dies in bloodshed tonight through a cannibalistic demon and a mad preacher.

Annette barely escapes the bloodbath to the nearby town of Low’s Bend. where she might find safety with a shotgun-toting barkeep, two no-nonsense boarding house ladies, and the gunslinging bounty hunter who’s captured Annette’s heart.

But hell is at her heels. If she’s going to survive until dawn, she’ll have to forget everything she knows about peace and mercy, and face a hollow malevolence more ancient and ruthless than she’s ever imagined.

One of Paste Magazine’s “15 Horror Books We Can’t Wait to Read in Summer 2023”

“Cruel Angels Past Sundown is a gorgeous, bloody, surreal nightmare with a palpable, pulsing heart. Piper’s innovative prose is tactile and immersive. It binds you to Annette’s soul and the people of Low’s Bend and makes you want to fight for them. Long live queer horror in the face of those who would call us blasphemous. Thank you, Hailey, for this battle cry in the darkness. This book is a treasure.”

– Suzan Palumbo, Nebula Finalist, author of Skin Thief

“From its unforgettable opening image through to its furious, apocalyptic-in-the-original-meaning-of-the-word climax, Cruel Angels Past Sundown moves with the implacable dread of a nightmare. But the slashes it leaves in your gut, and the hardpan dust it rubs in the wounds, are all too real.”

– Nat Cassidy, author of Mary: An Awakening in Terror

Novel announcement: All the Hearts You Eat

Posted on 2023-06-22 by Hailey Piper all the hearts you eat Announcement novel

Exciting news—I have a new book coming from Titan, publisher of my still-upcoming novel A Light Most Hateful.

All the Hearts You Eat is a monstrous vampire novel about a dead girl, a haunted coast, an ancient curse, and a thirst for blood, and it will release in October 2024! This will be my fifth novel after the two still releasing this year. It’s gutting and harsh and personal, but also a bloody beastly time.

Halloween season 2024 and its vampires are still a long ways off, but we’re getting the word out early as this book is a chunky monster, and I can’t wait for everyone to read it!

“She Tasted of Good Fortune” in We’re Here + more

Posted on 2023-06-15 by Hailey Piper flash fiction no gods for drowning novelette short story

I’m heading to StokerCon in Pittsburgh this afternoon, but a quick update before hitting the road on two new stories.

We’re Here: An Anthology of LGBTQ+ Horror is out today in ebook! All stories by queer authors, and all proceeds go to the Trevor Project, and with it releasing during Pride Month, what could be more perfect?

I have a novelette inside, “She Tasted of Good Fortune,” which takes place in the world of No Gods for Drowning and tells of curses, criminals, and a sultry deal to find a fortune teller before the night is done. It’s a standalone tale, so whether this is your first dive into the No Gods for Drowning world or you’re returning from reading the book, you’re good to go.

I’ve added a hub page for No Gods for Drowning as a series/setting, where you’ll be able to find links to the current book and novelette, as well as future books and stories as they’re announced/released.

Also if you’re attending StokerCon, I have a flash fic in the new souvenir book, The Monsters That Made Us, which isn’t available beyond the con. “The Black Lagoons of Our Eyes” is my queer love letter to The Creature from the Black Lagoon and series, and how I see myself in its titular creature. I’m delighted it can appear with many top-notch essays and stories of horror origins.