Most Popular Books by John Saul

From the bestselling author of "Guardian," "Creature," and "Black Lightning," a spine-tingling tale of all-consuming evil as riveting and chilling as any he has ever produced. It will be a sweet homecoming for Karen Spellman. After years of living in Los Angeles, the pretty, young widow and her two daughters are returning to the lush countryside of Pleasant Valley, where Karen grew up. In this verdant, fertile place, Karen hopes to find not only a refuge from urban chaos, but love, for she is going home to marry her high school sweetheart. But something sinister awaits her. Something as primal as nature, as demonic as hell itself. For long ago, a shadowy menace stalked Pleasant Valley. A menace forgotten, thought dead. But only sleeping. Now Karen''s homecoming will become a confrontation with terror as she battles to protect her daughters from a malign, preternatural force that must satisfy its gruesome thirst for innocent prey . . .

New York Times bestselling author John Saul is a master at writing novels that chill the bones, curdle the blood, and tap into our darkest fears. He creates characters so real that you’ll feel as if they’re friends or family, and throws them into situations so terrifying that you won’t be able to look away until you turn the final page. Now, in Faces of Fear, Saul proves that there’s a fine line between perfection and madness. Fifteen-year-old Alison Shaw may not be beautiful, but she doesn’t really care: She’d much rather read a good book than primp in front of a mirror anyway. But Alison’s gorgeous mother, Risa, knows that beauty can be a key to success and wishes only the best for her daughter, especially when Risa marries a widowed plastic surgeon and moves Alison from Santa Monica to Bel Air. Beauty may be only skin deep, but to the denizens of Bel Air it means the world. Everywhere mother and daughter look, they are surrounded by beautiful people, many of whom have benefited from the skills of Alison’s new stepfather, the charismatic Peter Dunn. Peter is certain he can turn Alison into a vision of loveliness, and Risa–drawn in by his cool confidence–is delighted. Reluctantly, Alison agrees to undergo the first procedure, and her transformation begins. But soon Alison discovers a picture of Peter’s first wife. To Alison’s horror, she notices a resemblance between the image in the photo and the work her stepfather is doing on her. Though Risa refuses to acknowledge the strange similarity, Alison becomes increasingly frightened. Digging further into her stepfather’s murky past, Alison uncovers dark secrets–and even darker motives–and realizes that her worst fears are fast becoming her reality.

Lush, a deceptively tranquil, the secluded island basks in splendid isolation off the South Carolina coast--as does the Devereaux mansion, a once-great plantation house now crumbling amidst the ancient oaks. Now, for the first time in two decades, Kevin Devereaux has returned here with his wife and children to visit Kevin''s hated, and frightening mother. She said she was ill--but is that really why the old woman has summoned the son she has not seen in so many years? Suddenly, horribly, one of the Devereauxs is going to die. And now, all the dark secrets of this once-proud family will emerge to wrap their evil around the unsuspecting children. Until, in the shadowed corridors and dust-covered rooms of the decaying old house, they learn the true terror of The Unloved.

Summer vacation becomes a season in hell for an ordinary family who unwittingly stir something invisible, insidious, and insatiable from its secret slumber–unleashing a wave of horror only the darkest evil could create, that only a master of spine-tingling terror like John Saul could orchestrate. For deep in the shadows in the dark of the night lurks something as big as life . . . and as real as death. It has waited seven years for someone to come back to the rambling lakeside house called Pinecrest, which has stood empty since its last owner went missing. For upscale Chicago couple Dan and Merrill Brewster, the old midwestern manse is an ideal retreat, and for their kids, Eric and Marci, it’s the perfect place to spend a lazy summer exploring. Which is how Eric and his teenage friends discover the curious cache of discarded objects stowed in a hidden room of Pinecrest’s carriage house. The bladeless hacksaws, shadeless lamps, tables with missing legs, headless axe handle, and other unremarkable items add up to a pile of junk. Yet someone took the trouble to inventory each worthless relic in a cryptic ledger. It has all the makings of a great mystery–whispering, coaxing, demanding to be solved. But the more the boys devote themselves to restoring the forgotten possessions and piecing together the puzzle behind them, the more their fascination deepens into obsession. Soon their days are consumed with tending the strange, secret collection–while their nights become plagued by ever more ghastly dreams, nightmares that soon seep into reality. And when a horrifying discovery surfaces, so does the chilling truth–about the terrifying events that rocked the town seven years before, the mysterious disappearance of Pinecrest’s last resident, and a twisted legacy with a malevolent life of its own . . . and a bottomless hunger for new victims.

Italy 1252. Inquisition. Accusation. Fear. Torture. The guilty and the innocent dying for sins real and imagined in the flames of the burning stake. Neilsville, 1978. Peter Blasam has come to this sleepy desert town to teach its youth, and finds a mystery of mounting horror. Something is happening to the young girls of St. Francis Xavier High School -- something evil. In bloodlet and terror a suicide contagion has swept the two... while a dark order of its holy men enacts a secret medieval ritual. Is hysteria manipulating these innocent children into violent self-destruction? Or has supernatural force, a thirteenth-century madness, returned to... Punish The Sinners.

As one by one the children housed at The Academy, a clifftop mansion school for gifted children, begin to die mysterious deaths, Josh McCallum, a brilliant but lonely boy, knows that someone or something evil is to blame. Reprint.

“[John] Saul has the instincts of a natural storyteller.”—People Something is happening to the children of Eastbury, Massachusetts. Something that causes healthy babies to turn cold in their cribs. Something that strikes at the heart of every parent’s darkest fears. Something is taking the children one by one. Now, an entire town waits on the edge of panic for the next nightmare. there must be a reason for the terror. They all know it. But no one ever suspected . . .

The dark history and dire secrets of a peaceful small town are summoned from the shadows of the past. Unholy forces are stirred from long slumber to monstrous new life. And two young misfits discover the chilling art of turning persecution into retribution. With these eerie ingredients, bestselling master John Saul once again works his unique brand of sinister magic to conjure an unforgettable tale of unspeakable terror. For most of her young life, thirteen-year-old Angel Sullivan has been on the outside looking in, enduring the taunts of cruel schoolmates and the angry abuse of a bitter father. Then Angel’s family moves to the quaint town of Roundtree, Massachusetts—where a charming home is available, a promising job awaits Angel’s unemployed father, and most of all, the chance to make a new start beckons to the shy, hopeful teenager. But when she is shunned by her new classmates, Angel falls deeper into despair. Until she meets Seth Baker, a fellow outcast—and a fateful kinship is forged. It’s Seth who tells Angel the unspoken truth about the legacy of murder that hangs over her family’s home—and the whispered rumors that something supernatural still dwells there. Uncertain whether the stories are true, and desperate to escape the torment of their daily lives, Angel and Seth devote themselves to contacting whatever restless soul haunts the dark recesses of Black Creek Crossing. But once they have begun, there is no turning back. Guided by an anguished and vengeful spirit, they uncover the shocking events and centuries-old horrors that lay buried beneath the placid veneer of Roundtree. And along with the ghastly revelations comes a terrifying power—one that feeds upon the rage of the victimized, turning the basest impulses and most dangerous desires into devastating weapons. Now, the closer Angel and Seth are pushed toward the edge by their tormentors, the deeper they descend into the maelstrom of dark forces they’ve unleashed . . . and the more unspeakable the hour of reckoning will be.

When the Conways move into their ancestral home in Louisiana after the death of an estranged aunt, it is with the promise of a new beginning. But the house has a life of its own. Abandoned for the last forty years, surrounded by thick trees and a stifling sense of melancholy, the sprawling Victorian house seems to swallow up the sunlight. Deep within the cold cellar and etched into the very walls is a long, dark history of the Conway name--a grim bloodline poisoned by suicide, strange disappearances, voodoo rituals, and rumors of murder. But the family knows nothing of the soul-shattering secrets that snake through generations of their past. They do not know that terror awaits them. For with each generation of the Conways comes a hellish day of reckoning. . . .

For a hundred years, the people of Prairie Bend have whispered Nathaniel''s name in wonder and fear. Some say he is a folktale, created to frighten children on cold winter nights. Some swear he is a terrifying spirit retumed to avenge the past. But soon . . . very soon . . . some will learn that Nathaniel lives still--that he is darkly, horrifyingly real. Nathaniel--he is the voice that calls to young Michael Hall across the prairie night . . . the voice that draws the boy into the shadowy depths of the old, crumbling, forbidden barn . . . that chanting, compelling voice he will follow faithfully beyond the edge of terror.

Falsely convicted of a brutal crime, college student Jeff Converse sees his future vanishing before his eyes. But someone has other plans for Jeff, in a far deadlier place than any penitentiary. Jeff finds himself beneath the teeming streets of Manhattan, in a hidden landscape of twisting tunnels and forgotten subterranean chambers. Here, an invisible population of the homeless, the desperate, and the mad has carved out its own shadow society. But they are not alone. For someone has made this forsaken civilization a private killing ground. Now, with no weapon but his wits, and an unimaginable threat lurking around every dark corner, Jeff must somehow move heaven and earth to escape from a living hell. . . .

“Enough smoothly crafted suspense to keep readers turning pages long after dark.”—The Seattle Times Beyond the sparkling Hawiian beaches, masked by the deceptive beauty of the rainforest, evil awaits sixteen-year-old Michael Sundquist and his mother, Katharine, and anthropologist who has come to the Islands to study the unusual skeletal remains unearthed on the volcanic flanks of Halekala, Maui. Yet far below the black depths of the Pacific a mysterious substance snakes through undiscovered fissures in the ocean floor, as nature itself seems to portend the terror to come. Then, with the sudden, unexpected death of Michael’s friend, a disturbing truth dawns: the corporation that is funding Katherine’s dig has a far greater investment than she ever imagined—an investment in medical terror. And her son may be part of their hideous grand plan. . . . “A suspenseful thriller . . . provocative . . . Nicely done, indeed.”—Kirkus Reviews “Classic Saul . . . A potent brew.”—Publishers Weekly

A terrifying new novel by the author of Darkness and Shadows Borrego, New Mexico. A peaceful little desert town. Except for one thing. Somebody here hates teenagers. Hates them. These troublemakers, these rebels, have to be controlled. Silenced. Forever. Now he has discovered an insidious way to strike back at them. In their sleep. In their waking hours. Anytime. He is a madman with terrifying powers. And soon, he will draw Borrego''s children beyond the brink of night. . . .

After the untimely death of her mother and the arrest of her father for killing a man in barroom brawl, fourteen-year-old Sarah Crane is forced to grow up fast. Left in the cold care of a foster family and alienated at school, Sarah befriends classmate Nick Dunnigan, a former mental patient still plagued by voices and visions, and the eccentric art instructor Bettina Phillips, a mentor eager to nurture Sarah’s talent for painting. But within the walls of Bettina’s ancestral mansion, Sarah finds that monstrous images from the house’s dark history seem to flow unbidden from her paintbrush—images echoed by Nick’s chilling hallucinations. It seems the violence and fury of long-dead generations have finally found a gateway from the grave into the world of the living. And Sarah and Nick have found a power they never had: to take control, and take revenge.

If you open your house to strangers, who knows who might come in. And what they might be after. Or whom. Now, ponder the unthinkable and surrender to your darkest dread, as sinister storyteller extraordinaire John Saul weaves a heart-stopping tale of lurking terror and twisted intent. Every parent’s nightmare becomes reality for Kara Marshall when her daughter, Lindsay, vanishes from her bedroom during the night. The police suspect that the girl is just another moody teenage runaway, angry over leaving behind her school and friends because her family is moving. But Lindsay’s recent eerie claim–that someone invaded her room when the house was opened to prospective buyers–drives Kara to fear the worst: a nameless, faceless stalker has walked the halls of her home in search of more than a place to live. Patrick Shields recognizes Kara’s pain–and carries plenty of his own since he lost his wife and two children in a devastating house fire. But more than grief draws Patrick and Kara together. He, too, senses the hand of a malevolent stranger in this tragedy. And as more people go missing from houses up for sale, Patrick’s suspicion, like Kara’s, blooms into horrified certainty. Someone is trolling this peaceful community–undetected and undeterred–harvesting victims for a purpose no sane mind can fathom. Someone Kara and Patrick, alone and desperate, are determined to unmask. Someone who is even now watching, plotting, keeping a demented diary of unspeakable deeds . . . and waiting until the time is ripe for another fateful visit.

Innocence dies so easily. Evil lives again . . . and again . . . and again. One hundred years ago in Port Arbello a pretty little girl began to scream. And struggle. And die. No one heard. No one saw. Just one man whose guilty heart burst in pain as he dashed himself to death in the sea. Now something peculiar is happening in Port Arbello. The children are disappearing, one by one. An evil history is repeating itself. And one strange, terrified child has ended her silence with a scream that began a hundred years ago.

The old mill has been silent for a hundred years, its dread secrets locked from view. Still, the people of Westover, Massachusetts, remember . . . and whisper of that terrible day when horrifying flames claimed eleven innocent young lives. The day the mill''s doors slammed shut--forever. But now, the last of the once-powerful Sturgess family is about to unlock those doors again . . . and unleash an elemental fury. For behind the padlocks, deep within the dark, abandoned building, a terrible vengeance waits. A vengeance conceived in HELLFIRE.

Now, for the first time, the New York Times bestselling serial thriller is complete in one terrifying volume. John Saul, the master of supernatural suspense, John Saul, brings to chilling life the small New England town of Blackstone—and the secrets and sins that lay buried there. . . . From atop Blackstone''s highest hill, the old Asylum casts its shadow over the village. Built in the 1890s to house the insane, the Asylum has stood vacant for decades. But now, the wrecker''s ball is about to strike—and unleash an ominous evil. Strange gifts begin to appear on the doorsteps of Blackstone''s finest citizens. Each bears a mysterious history. Each brings a horrifying power to harm. Each reveals another thread in the suspensefully woven web of . . . THE BLACKSTONE CHRONICLES Part I—An Eye for an Eye: The Doll Part II—Twist of Fate: The Locket Part III—Ashes to Ashes: The Dragon''s Flame Part IV—In the Shadow of Evil: The Handkerchief Part V—Day of Reckoning: The Stereoscope Part VI—Asylum

A powerful high-tech company. A postcard-pretty company town. Families. Children. Sunshine. Happiness. A high school football team that never-ever loses. And something else. Something horrible ... Now, there is a new family in town. A shy, nature-loving teenager. A new hometown. A new set of bullies. Maybe the team''s sports clinic can help him. Rebuild him. They won''t hurt him again. They won''t dare.