Ghost River

Everything dies in the desert.

Dark horror for adults. A standalone novel of extreme horror and dark fantasy — graphic, mythic, and merciless — for readers of Stephen King, Clive Barker, and Peter Straub.

It is also a Southwestern Gothic — an American magical-realist nightmare in desert country, where the devil keeps a church and the dirt remembers everything done on it.

Some places have a history so dark it stains the dirt.

Orphan Rock is one of them.

Minister Northamm was born a snake — a boonchild who can invade minds. But that door swings both ways, and what came knocking was the Pigfather, the same devil that drove his father to ruin. One day, it will claim his son, Markus, to continue its dogma of pain.

Esther was kidnapped as a teenager and brought to Orphan Rock to survive and appease the Pigfather's bloodlusts. In that hell, she and young Minister fell in love and dreamed of escape. But under the Pig's barbaric rule, they had no future of their own.

So they made a bloody bargain with the Pigfather's mortal enemy — Delora, the Crooked Woman, eater of children. But her price was their unborn daughter, Shelby, transformed into something with an endless hunger and a taste for human flesh to rival Delora's own.

Now Delora's Grim Seed rises. The pigs are crossing over for war. And Orphan Rock itself is tearing free from the earth. Trapped between two ancient evils, the Northamms will do anything — sacrifice anything — to survive one more day together.

Even if it means becoming monsters themselves.

ADVISORY:

Content warning: Ghost River is extreme horror. It contains graphic violence, sexual assault, body horror, child endangerment, and disturbing supernatural imagery. Not for the faint of heart.

Goodreads readers compared Ryan's writing to a mashup of Clive Barker and Stephen King — and called it "award-worthy like the Bram Stoker awards."