Peter Straub Books

The spellbinding saga of The Talisman is now a stunning graphic novel, vividly illustrated by artist Tony Shasteen. Here’s a bold new look at the classic tale of treachery and betrayal that could only have sprung from the imaginations of master storytellers Stephen King and Peter Straub.In a run-down amusement park on a desolate beach in New Hampshire, thirteen-year-old Jack Sawyer is about to learn some hard truths—about his father’s death, about why he and his mother are on the run from his sinister uncle Morgan, and about the real nature of the mysterious realm Jack once called the Daydreams. Now, with help from his newfound friend Speedy Parker, this young man will reclaim his identity as Travellin Jack and make his first foray back into the Territories to retrieve the magical Talisman, an object of immense cosmic significance. Yet even more important to Jack, the Talisman holds the key to saving his mother’s life. In the Terrorities, where monsters lurk, evil watches, and an unbelievably precious prize awaits, Jack embarks upon a desperate quest to fulfill a destiny he never sought but cannot escape.The Talisman: The Road of Trials comprises Issues 0 through 5 of the thrilling comic book series and features original, never-before-seen material, including interviews and early sketches. Be warned: Once you’ve seen the Talisman, nothing will ever be the same.

From the Flap: Twenty years ago, a boy named Jack Sawyer traveled to a parallel universe called The Territories to save his mother and her Territories "twinner" from a premature and agonizing death that would have brought cataclysm to the other world. Now Jack is a retired Los Angeles homicide detective living in the nearly nonexistent hamlet of Tamarack, WI. He has no recollection of his adventures in the Territories and was compelled to leave the police force when an odd, happenstance event threatened to awaken those memories. When a series of gruesome murders occur in western Wisconsin that are reminiscent of those committed several decades earlier by a real-life madman named Albert Fish, the killer is dubbed "The Fisherman" and Jack's buddy, the local chief of police, begs Jack to help his inexperienced force find him. But is this merely the work of a disturbed individual, or has a mysterious and malignant force been unleashed in this quiet town? What causes Jack's inexplicable waking dreams, if that is what they are, of robins' eggs and red feathers? It's almost as if someone is trying to tell him something. As that message becomes increasingly impossible to ignore, Jack is drawn back to the Territories and to his own hidden past, where he may find the soul-strength to enter a terrifying house at the end of a deserted track of forest, there to encounter the obscene and ferocious evils sheltered within it.

They are dying, one by one. Wealthy, middle-aged women in an exclusive Connecticut suburb. Their murderer remains at large. Nora Chancel, wife of publishing scion Davey Chancel, fears she may be next. After all, her past has branded her a victim . . . . "Combines the intellectual-puzzle mystery with a powerful vein of psycho-thriller suspense." -- The Washington Post Then Davey tells Nora a surreal story about the Hellfire Club, where years before he met an obsessed fan of Chancel House's most successful book, Night Journey --a book that has a strange history of its own. . . . "One of the most chilling villains to come along since Hannibal Lecter." -- San Francisco Chronicle Suddenly terror engulfs Nora: She must defend herself against fantastic accusations even as a madman lies in wait. And when he springs, she will embark on a night journey that will put her victimhood to rest forever, dead or alive. . . .

Members of the Chowder Society told each other ghost stories that didn't always stop when the teller finished speaking. A series of obscene outrages, grows into a horrifying spiral of senseless atrocities, then the town of Milburn is pitted against a force of terror and chaos.

Straub completes the Blue Rose trilogy with this searing novel of psychological terror. Tim Underhill and the brilliant and reclusive Tom Pasmore court ultimate destruction as they dare to look back to a dark past that holds the secret of evil which signs its name Blue Rose.

Jack Sawyer, a twelve-year-old boy, begins a terrifying quest for the Talisman--for only the Talisman can save his dying mother and defeat their enemy

With a new Introduction by the author, Straub's classic tale of an evil lurking in the Vermont woods is beautifully repackaged with new cover art. Reissue.

Let the terror begin again in this "deliciously imaginative" (San Francisco Chronicle) novel from #1 New York Times bestselling author Peter Straub. The quiet suburban town of Hampstead is threatened by two horrors. One is natural. The hideous unstoppable creation of man’s power gone mad. The other is not natural at all. And it makes the first look like child’s play... “Unspeakable horror…has ‘Bestseller’ written all over it.”—Los Angeles Times “Straub’s effects are quite spectacular…I was fairly awed by some of the more nightmarish scenes in Floating Dragon.”—The New York Times

This collection of 27 never-before published stories from an impressive cast—Roddy Doyle, Joyce Carol Oates, and Stuart O'Nan, among others—sets out to shift genre paradigms. The overarching theme is fantastic fiction, or fiction of the imagination, with fantasy being used in the most broad-sweeping sense rather than signaling the familiar commercial staples of elves, ghouls, and robots. Consequently, the collection's offerings run a wide gamut. In Joe Hill's Devil on the Staircase, an Italian boy commits a crime of passion and subsequently meets an emissary of Satan. In Jodi Picoult's Weights and Measures, a young couple who have just lost their daughter struggle to hold their marriage together as they both start noticing strange changes taking place. Chuck Palahniuk's The Loser features a college kid on acid as a contestant on a game show, and in Kurt Andersen's Human Intelligence, a geologist meets an explorer from another planet who has been studying humans for the past 1,600 years. The range of voices and subjects practically guarantees something for any reader, but the overall quality is frustratingly variable: most stories are good, some aren't, and few are exceptional —Publishers Weekly

Every year on his birthday, Ned Dunstan has a paralysing seizure in which he is forced to witness scenes of ruthless slaughter perpetrated by a mysterious figure in black whom he calls Mr X. - and again his birthday is fast approaching.