Stephen (ed.) - The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 18

September 13th was designated “Roald Dahl Day” for children in the UK. It would have been the author’s 90th birthday.

Lemony Snicket (Daniel Handler) finally wrapped up his “Series of Unfortunate Events” after thirteen volumes with the aptly-titled The End , in which the Baudelaire siblings and evil Count Olaf encountered a group of white-robed islanders named after nautical literary figures.

Christopher Golden and Ford Lytle Gilmore’s The Hollow: Mischief was the third volume about teenagers living in a cursed town. It was followed by The Hollow: Enemies .

In Scott Westerfield’s Midnighters 3: Blue Moon , the final volume in the trilogy, the five members of the eponymous group had to prevent the secret hour spilling over into the real world.

Graham Joyce’s Do the Creepy Thing was about a teenage girl’s decision to live with a cursed bracelet. A boy who could talk to ghosts made contact with a missing cheerleader in Dead Connection by Charlie Price, and a group of college students tried to stop a demon that fed on emotions in Nina Kiriki Hoffman’s Spirits That Walk in Shadow .

Nancy Holder’s Pretty Little Devils was a young adult novel about a clique of girls, while cheerleaders found themselves being stalked at summer camp in Laura Kasischke’s Boy Heaven .

Dead teenagers were trapped in the eponymous world of Neal Shusterman’s Everlost , a boy kept receiving strange calls on his Hell Phone by William Sleator, and a monstrous dog terrorised a village for centuries in Janet Lee Carey’s The Beast of Noor .

Slawter and Bec were the third and forth books, respectively, in “The Demonata” series by Darren Shan (Darren O’Shaughnessy). A stand-alone novel, Koyasan , was written by Shan for World Book Day 2006.

A trio of Victorian teenagers discovered that a factory owner was reanimating the dead in Justin Richards’ The Death Collector , while the same author’s The Invisible Detective: Ghost Soldiers was the third in the series set in the 1930s. A ghost led a teenager back to the 1940 bombing on London in Edward Bloor’s London Calling .

Three children became lost in an attic of universe proportions in Garry Kilworth’s Attica , a teenager killed in a steamship tragedy returned as a ghost in T. K. Welsh’s The Unresolved , and David Levithan’s novella Marly’s Ghost was a contemporary Valentine’s Day retelling of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol .

Mirroring their popularity amongst romance readers, vampire novels also continued to do well with the young adult audience.

The Last Days was a loose sequel to Scott Westerfield’s Peeps , set in a world ravaged by a vampire-parasite plague, while Vampirates: Tide of Terror was the second book in Justin Somper’s post-apocalyptic series.

Vampire Plagues: Outbreak and Vampire Plagues: Extermination were the latest titles in the series published under the byline “Sebastian Rook”. Vampire Beach: Bloodlust and Vampire Beach: Initiation were the first two volumes in a new YA series published by the pseudonymous “Alex Duval”.

A sixteen-year-old college student discovered that she was living with some odd housemates in Glass House , the first volume in “The Morganville Vampires” series by Rachel Caine (Roxanne Longstreet Conrad).

A popular girl at school was turned into a vampire in Serena Robar’s Braced2Bite and Fangs4Freaks , the first two books in a new series.

Teenage vampire twins wanted revenge on a girl’s undead boyfriend in Vampireville , the third in the series by Ellen Schreiber. A girl was accidentally bitten by her twin’s vampire boyfriend in Mari Mancusi’s Boys That Bite . The sequel, Stake That! , was about a vampire slayer who would rather be undead herself.

A teenager discovered vampires living amongst New York high society in Melissa de la Cruz’s Blue Bloods, New Moon was the second book in the trilogy by Stephanie Meyer, and mass-murderer Countess Bathory was the subject of Alisa M. Libby’s The Blood Confession .

Issued as a handsome-looking hardcover by Californian imprint Medusa Press, with a Foreword by publisher Frank Chigas, Left in the Dark: The Supernatural Tales of John Gordon collected a career-spanning thirty stories (one original) by the acclaimed British author. It was published in a limited edition of 450 copies and a deluxe signed edition of 50 copies.

All Hallows’ Eve: 13 Stories was an impressive collection of all-new tales by Edgar Award-winning author Vivian Vande Velde, each set on Halloween night and aimed at ages twelve and up.

Fragile Things: Short Fictions and Wonders contained twenty-seven previously uncollected stories and poems (one original) by Neil Gaiman. The contents of the US and UK editions differed slightly.

Collected Stories contained fifty-one previously published tales for adults by Roald Dahl.

From Serpent’s Tail, Mortality collected twenty short stories (one original and two only previously available electronically) by Nicholas Royle.

Laurell K. Hamilton’s Strange Candy collected fourteen stories, including a new “Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter” tale, while Saffron and Brimstone: Strange Stories contained eight stories (one original) by Elizabeth Hand, along with an Afterword by the author.

Twisted Tales presented fourteen original stories by Brandon Massey.

Alone on the Darkside: Echoes from the Shadows of Horror was the fourth in the series of original paperback anthologies edited by John Pelan. It featured sixteen all-new stories by Brian Hodge, Eddy C. Bertin, Mark Samuels, Glen Hirshberg, David Riley, Gerard Houarner, Lucy Taylor and Paul Finch, amongst others.

Edited by Iain Sinclair, London: City of Disappearances was a literary anthology that featured contributions from J. G. Ballard, Michael Moorcock, Will Self, Marina Warner and Nicholas Royle.

Ghosts in Baker Street edited by Martin H. Greenberg, Jon Lellenberg and Daniel Stashower included ten supernatural mystery stories featuring Sherlock Holmes. There was also an Introduction by “Dr Watson” and non-fiction pieces from Barbara Roden, Loren D. Estleman and Caleb Carr.

Edited by Brandon Massey, Dark Dreams II: Voices from the Other Side was an original anthology of seventeen stories by black authors.

Despite any publisher and author’s profits being donated to the Save the Children Tsunami Relief Fund, Elemental , edited by Steven Savile and Alethea Kontis, was published almost a year-and-a-half after the tragedy in the Indian Ocean and appeared woefully redundant. Among those authors who donated their work for free were Brian Aldiss, David Drake, Joe Haldeman, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, Larry Niven and Michael Marshall Smith.

Edited by P. N. Elrod, My Big Fat Supernatural Wedding contained nine stories by such writers as Charlene Harris, Jim Butcher, Esther Friesner, Sherrilyn Kenyon and the editor herself.

Mysteria presented four paranormal romances set in a demon-haunted town in Colorado by Maryjanice Davidson, Susan Grant, P. C. Cast and Gena Showalter. Hell With the Ladies collected three linked stories about the sons of Satan by Julie Kenner, Kathleen O’Reilly and Dee Davis.

Dates from Hell contained four otherworldly tales of paranormal trysts by Kim Harrison (Dawn Cook), Lynsay Sands, Kelley Armstrong and Lori Handeland featuring werewolves, demon lovers and the romantically challenged undead. Yet another paranormal romance volume, Dark Dreamers featured a reprint “Carpathian” story by Christine Feehan and a new “Dirk & Steele” novella by Marjorie M. Liu.