Evil Stalks the Night Tour: Review & Giveaway

Evil Stalks the Night - Revised Author's Edition

Author: Kathryn Meyer Griffith

Genre: Horror

Publisher: Damnation Books

Buy Link: Damnation Books

Book Description:

Twenty years ago psychic Sarah Summers fled from the evil that lurked in the woods behind her childhood home after it killed most of her family, but a nasty divorce and financial hardships forces her back when nothing else could.

With her son, Jeremy, she returns to her grandmother’s dilapidated house and tries to begin a new life. She meets a man, police detective, Ben, who falls for her, and she prays her fresh visions of bloodshed and death deep among the dark trees are not true.

Then the murders begin again and Sarah is hurtled back into the familiar nightmare that has haunted her her whole life. The evil in the woods is awake again…and this time it wants her last remaining brother, her son…and her.

With Ben and Jim’s help can she defeat it this time…and live?

 

Desperate, Jim got up and, grabbing the wheel, slammed his foot over the driver’s on the brake. They fought for a few wild, dizzying seconds then the bus zigzagged with a sickening crash into an embankment on the other side of the road. People were tossed against the windows and thrown to the floor in heaps. The silence was deafening. Smoke engulfed the bus. Jim had been dumped on the floor again and knocked out cold.

When he came to, he had no idea how long he’d been out. It could have been minutes or hours. The only hint was it was still dark. He woke to an eerie silence and propped himself up on an elbow to survey the damage. So far he was the only one moving. “Damn,” he moaned, staring around at the indistinct forms littering the bus like corpses. The driver was slumped over the wheel, unconscious.

What had happened to the car?

Jim didn’t know what drew him, but he crawled over to the open door and fell outside into the wet grass. He took a deep breath of fresh air and tried to stop his head from spinning. How many were dead in there? It was his fault.

“I can’t take it anymore,” he whispered, looking up into the bus’s blank windows. There was blood all over him and burying his face in his hands, he cried, “I give up!” He yelled into the woods. “Anything you want!” He released a long sigh of defeat. “You win!” There was a great hush as he spoke. Something stirred in the wind. The darkness was silent. Jim didn’t move.

“Jimmy?” The voice, a child’s voice, startled him and he looked up.

“Jimmy, what’s the matter?” A gentle, caring voice.

It took Jim a minute to understand. “Charlie?” His eyes grew wide. It was Charlie, as he’d looked so many years ago as a small child, standing patiently above him in the dawn’s twilight. He was smiling at him and clutching his mangy old cat, the one he’d slammed the door on by accident, and lopped off part of its tail. The one he used to torment to no end.

Jim’s mouth went dry. But Charlie was dead! Charlie was…

“Oh, it’s me,” the ghost child chuckled, petting his cat and looking amused.

“Charlie! My God! Where did you come from?” You’re dead, he thought but didn’t say. Instead he groaned, “What do you want?”

He was quivering. Did this mean he was dead, too? Jim jerked his head around and saw the smoking hulk of the bus behind him.

Was he dead, and didn’t know it yet?

“Oh, Jimmy, are you hurt?” The small ghost reached out its pale hand towards him as if to comfort, but Jim recoiled in fright.

“Don’t touch me,” Jim cried. He stood up unsteadily and propped himself against the trunk of a nearby tree. His eyes never left Charlie. “Am I dead, too?” There was cold sweat beaded on his face. “I don’t feel dead.” He ran his hands over his arms and down his body. The blood had dried on his face and hands, he wasn’t bleeding anymore, so it must mean something. He felt shaken, bruised and sore, but not dead.

Charlie was laughing at him and Jim gaped in amazement at the remnant.

He’d seen a lot of terrible things in his life, had been aware of existences most people would never experience in their lifetimes, but this took the cake.

He’d never thought he’d see Charlie again. Not in this lifetime…not in any.

“You want me to tell you if you’re dead or not?” Charlie chortled again.

Jim put up his hand as if to ward off evil. “No, I don’t want to know.”

“What do you think?” Charlie was floating a few feet above the wet earth stroking his stiff cat in long, gentle strokes and it made Jim’s teeth itch to watch him.

“I don’t really know.” He eyed him suspiciously sideways. “I don’t feel dead.” He mulled over the notion he might be in the Twilight Zone this time for real. No, it wasn’t likely, he felt too normal. “You’re not real.” He glared down at Charlie. “I’m hallucinating this whole thing.”

Charlie shook his head and slowly floated away.

Jim closed his eyes and prayed when he opened them again, Charlie would be gone. It didn’t work. “This isn’t happening.”

“Stubborn.” Charlie giggled. “You’re a silly goose, Jimmy. Like always.” The child had stopped at a distance and was grinning at Jim from behind a tree.

“Go away,” Jim moaned, as he slid down to the ground at the base of the tree and hid his head in his hands.

“I can’t go away. I came here to help you, Jimmy. I wasn’t very nice to you when I was alive, so I owe you something. You and Sarah were my favorites and now she needs us. I can help.” The eerie voice was sincere but Jim sensed fear, too. What could a ghost be afraid of?

Review:

Evil Stalks the Night is a fast paced thrill ride that follows the life of Sarah, a psychic who comes to learn there is real evil living in the woods by her childhood home. After moving away, she is forced to return to her grandmother's home and to the haunted woods that have claimed so many children's lives. Will she be able to stop the spirit that is terrorizing the forest before it's too late?

I found this novel to be well written with a great pace. It flowed easily and the story seemed to tell itself, which made it hard to put down. The possibility of a scary evil being killing children in the woods is told with just the right amount of description that it seems plausible - which scares and thrills the reader. I was drawn in from the very first chapter and couldn't wait to figure out what was happening in the woods and how the novel was going to end. I loved the psychic and the supernatural/paranormal aspects to the story - I thought that the author did a great job with inserted them believably into the narrative. Finally, I felt that the storyline was done in such a way that it kept me at the edge of my seat - waiting to see what was going to happen next. I recommend this for readers who love paranormal/supernatural fiction and for those who want a creepy and thrilling read.

 

About the Author:

Since childhood I’ve always been an artist and worked as a graphic designer in the corporate world and for newspapers for twenty-three years before I quit to write full time. I began writing novels at 21, over forty years ago now, and have had fourteen (nine romantic horror, one historical romance, one romantic suspense, one romantic time travel and two murder mysteries) previous novels and eight short stories published

from Zebra Books, Leisure Books, Avalon Books, The Wild Rose Press, Damnation Books and Eternal Press.

I’ve been married to Russell for thirty-four years; have a son, James, and two grandchildren, Joshua and Caitlyn, and I live in a small quaint town in Illinois called Columbia, which is right across the JB Bridge from St. Louis, Mo. We have two quirky cats, ghost cat Sasha and live cat Cleo, and the four of us live happily in an old house in the heart of town. Though I’ve been an artist, and a folk singer in my youth with my brother Jim, writing has always been my greatest passion, my butterfly stage, and I’ll probably write stories until the day I die. 

Find the Author:

Goodreads

Facebook

Bebo

Authors Den

Jacket Flap

Shout Life

Romance Writer and Reader

Romance Book Junction

MySpace (To see all my book trailers with original music by my singer/songwriter brother JS Meyer) 

 

Novels and short stories from Kathryn Meyer Griffith:

Evil Stalks the Night (Leisure, 1984; Damnation Books, June 2012)

The Heart of the Rose (Leisure, 1985; Eternal Press Author’s Revised Edition 2010) Eternal Press Buy Link: http://www.eternalpress.biz/book.php?isbn=9781615722327

Blood Forge (Leisure, 1989; Damnation Books Author’s Revised Edition, 2012)

Vampire Blood (Zebra, 1991; Damnation Books Author’s Revised Edition, 2011)

Damnation Books Buy Link: http://damnationbooks.com/book.php?isbn=9781615724253

The Last Vampire (Zebra, 1992; Damnation Books Author’s Revised Edition out 2010) Damnation Books Buy Link: http://damnationbooks.com/book.php?isbn=9781615722075

You Tube Book Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZU77j_q4S8

Witches (Zebra, 1993; Damnation Books Author’s Revised Edition out 2011)

Damnation Books Buy Link:http://damnationbooks.com/book.php?isbn=9781615723553

The Nameless One (short story in 1993 Zebra Anthology Dark Seductions; Damnation Books Author’s Revised Edition, 2011) Damnation Books Buy Link: http://damnationbooks.com/book.php?isbn=9781615723201

The Calling (Zebra, 1994; Damnation Books Author’s Revised Edition, 2011)

Damnation Books Buy Link: http://damnationbooks.com/book.php?isbn=9781615725007

Scraps of Paper (Avalon Books Murder Mystery, 2003)

All Things Slip Away (Avalon Books Murder Mystery, 2006)

Egyptian Heart (The Wild Rose Press, 2007; Author’s Revised Edition, Eternal Press 2011) Eternal Press buy link: http://www.eternalpress.biz/book.php?isbn=9781615724437 My self-made

You Tube Book Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cogCNYKzPqc

Winter’s Journey (The Wild Rose Press, 2008; Author’s Revised Edition, Eternal Press 2011) Eternal Press Buy Link: http://www.eternalpress.biz/book.php?isbn=9781615724604)

You Tube Book Trailer address: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZYCs2DVhHg

The Ice Bridge (The Wild Rose Press, 2008; Author’s Revised Edition, Eternal Press 2011)

Eternal Press Buy Link: http://www.eternalpress.biz/book.php?isbn=9781615725182

You Tube Book Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28HZqu-my1g

Don’t Look Back, Agnes novella & bonus short story: In This House (2008; ghostly romantic short story out; Eternal Press 2012)

You Tube Book Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3q9rZryFMo

Eternal Press Buy Link: http://www.eternalpress.biz/people.php?author=422

BEFORE THE END: A Time of Demons (Damnation Books 2010)

Damnation Books buy link: httphttp://damnationbooks.com/book.php?isbn=9781615721313

You Tube self-made Book trailer with original song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0-U9c2Lwfo

The Woman in Crimson (Damnation Books 2010)

Eternal Press Buy Link: http://www.eternalpress.biz/book.php?isbn=9781615721979

You Tube Book Trailer Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcRBvDI5G4Y

The Complete Guide to Writing Paranormal Fiction: Volume 1 (I did the Introduction)

** To follow all the stops on the tour, click on the banner at the beginning of my post or click here. **

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway