Happy October! Not that we needed to be convinced, but it is definitely spooky season now. For those of us who write horror and thriller books, it’s perpetually spooky season. But we level up in October!
I’ve previously published a handy post for where to start with all my books across genres, if you’re new to my work. You can find that here:
But if you specifically want a horror or thriller book by me, I’ve gathered all the info you need in “Spooky Season Reads”!
GODFESTATION
Godfestation is my Appalachian weird horror novella published in August 2026 via Sley House Publishing.
In Godfestation, Ivy “Fern” Fernberg encounters monstrous beings and strange people following the death of her father. Fern initially brushes them off as hallucinations from complicated grief. Then she realizes that she is not the only one experiencing these visions, and her father could somehow be involved. This is a strange journey of grief, horror, and wonder set in Southern Appalachia.
More about Godfestation:
ATACAMA
Atacama is a 2025 thriller novel with horror and science fiction elements, great for fans of The X-Files, The Thing, Annihilation, and Black Mirror. Longlisted for the British Science Fiction Association Award for Best Novel and Best Artwork (interior artwork by Jendia Gammon). Published via Sley House Publishing.
A missing research team is found dead in the Atacama Desert under mysterious circumstances. Far away in East Tennessee, researcher Fiona Hawthorne reels from the death of her best friend, Alva, among the Atacama team. When Fiona’s university professor Dr. Bingham is visited by members of a shadowy corporation, she begins to suspect not everything is as it seems. Enlisting her intense coworker Lafe Lambert, the two dig deep looking for answers around Alva’s death…too deep. Fiona soon realizes that she not only faces sinister corporate agents, but also a monster hiding in plain sight.
Find out more about Atacama:
DOOMFLOWER
Doomflower is a gonzo campy horror novel published via Encyclopocalypse Publications. Think Mean Girls, Heathers, and Night of the Comet meets Day of the Triffids and The Thing. Perfect for fans of Grady Hendrix. Longlisted for the British Science Fiction Association Award for Best Novel. Young adult / new adult.
The meanest teen queen in high school might be the world’s only chance against killer plants run amok!
Camellia Dume is the meanest teen queen in her Malibu high school, a rich daddy’s girl thanks to her father’s elaborate scams. But she might be the only hero for humanity as an extraterrestrial mutation sends plants tearing across the country and through people in bloody fashion. As if that weren’t enough drama, Camellia just might meet her own personal match or worst enemy, in the new student Wray, as sparks fly and opposites attract. Only by working together can they uproot a deadly conspiracy that may have torn Camellia’s family apart.
Get Doomflower!
DUNGEON CRAWL AT THE HAUNTED MALL
Dungeon Crawl at the Haunted Mall is a brand new Choose Your Own Adventure® book published via Chooseco LLC on April 21, 2026, distributed by Penguin Random House. Middle grade.
Delve into the gnarly guts of a long-dead mall in this gloriously weird and whacked-out romp, where friendship, 80s music, and food court slushies are your weapons of choice against spandexed supernatural creeps.
Choose Your Own Adventure books–the 4th bestselling children’s series of all time–are back and as much fun as you remember. Kids and adults agree, these are the books that get 9- to 12-year-olds reading.
In the late 80s, a toxic spill rendered your local mall too hazardous to occupy—or at least, that’s what your parents told you. In reality, the spill was the work of Vaaldrant, a warlock from another dimension who’s been transforming mall employees into horrifying supernatural creatures ever since. You and your friends decide to film a video for your vlog channel, but when you meet up at the entrance, you find that your friend Drea is missing! Will you delve into the depths of the mall to rescue Drea from Vaaldrant? Or will his team of mutant mall workers get you first?
With all the gooey gross-out chaos of a classic Nickelodeon game show and the high-stakes magical mayhem of a first-class Dungeons and Dragons game, this poltergeist-packed page-turner will keep readers coming back again and again until they’ve found every good – or gristly – end!!
Start your Dungeon Crawl at the Haunted Mall… if you dare!
THE SHADOW GALAXY: A Collection of Short Stories and Poetry
My first collection, writing as J. Dianne Dotson, The Shadow Galaxy features short stories and poetry spanning magical realism, science fiction, fantasy, horror, and Appalachian tales. The Shadow Galaxy was longlisted for both the BSFA Award and the British Fantasy Award. JournalStone also published a second collection of mine, the lighter To Wonder and Starshine (July 25, 2025).
With stories and poetry spanning three decades of work, I tap into journeys both fantastical and deeply personal. Categories include Shadow Shores: Tales from the Sea; Other Futures: Tales of the Galaxy and a Place Called Earth; Into the Darkest Hollow: Tales of Horror; Love and Other Moments: Traces of the Heart; Far Appalachia: Tales from the Ancient Mountains; and Resonant Thoughts: Some Poetry.
Among these pages, I capture the longing, regrets, and dreams of those living by the sea, such as in “One Evening in Fogvale.” In “RODER,” a young woman risks her life to help find a robot who captured her heart. “Topaz Sundered” explores an exoplanet mining expedition gone horribly wrong. In “The Queen and the Mountain Laurel,” a young Appalachian girl teaches her father an important lesson with the help of mountain spirits. The poem “Obsidian” eviscerates with raw pain from betrayal.
There are stories of hauntings, sinister Appalachian landscapes, horrifying alien entities, and powerfully disturbing Gothic tales. These stories and poems are filled with mysticism, exploration, horror, pain, nostalgia, and wonder, for no shadow can exist without light.
Buy The Shadow Galaxy:
And One More Suggestion: HELIOPAUSE
Heliopause, the first book in my space opera series quadrilogy, called The Questrison Saga, is actually pretty creepy. Set at the heliopause, the boundary between the solar system and interstellar space, a horrific entity wreaks havoc on Mandira Research Station. A workaday man named Forster finds himself at the center of a disturbing mystery that could threaten the entire solar system, and discovers he might be more than he seems…
Flashes of light. An unseen menace. Messages from the void. Secrets at the edge of the solar system that threaten to destroy the future.
Mandira Research Station beckons at the heliopause–the brink of interstellar space. After Forster sees flashes outside that no one else can, the captain of an incoming ship is attacked by an invisible foe. Forster and his enigmatic coworker Efron search for a missing daughter who might be the cause of it all. Can the team stop the force from taking over Mandira, and the entire solar system?
Continue the adventure with Ephemeris, Accretion, and Luminiferous!
Buy Heliopause:
More Horror Ahead!
Currently, I’m working on new horror and thriller novels and a new, horror-only short story collection. I hope to have news about some of these in the new year!
For all my books, short stories, collections, and anthologies across several genres, head HERE. Thank you for reading and supporting my work!