A collection of short stories by Joe Hill, Stephen Graham Jones, Grady Hendrix, Catriona Ward and Owen King, five amazing writers.

Every day life tinged with the unexpected, these authors know their craft and produce some of the best stories. Each very different, but all so good. Though all creepy, the standout in giving me goosebumps was the Grady Hendrix offering, a real gem.

As they are short stories, to go into too much detail spoils the outcome for other readers. Suffice to say a really good read, more short story collections of this calibre, please!

Thank you NetGalley and Amazon Original Stories.

Five creepy short stories, a little of the supernatural mixed in with the doldrums and minutiea of everyday life. Anything can be the source of the chills: nature, a deranged office setting, a grieving mother, a struggling son.

Two favorites:

The Indigo Room by Stephen Graham Jones nailed the corporate office setting. What the company does doesn't matter. It's all the same office-speak, and the image of the boss's hairdo stalking the cubicles like a leopard was plain brilliant.

The Letter Slot by Owen King had the feel of an old timey fable and was the perfect blend of a kid going through the motions and getting mixed up in something beyond his control.

My thanks to NetGalley and Amazon Original Stories for the Advance Reader Copy. (pub date 4/15/2025)

Shivers” is such a killer collection—seriously creepy in the best way. Each story brings its own flavor of horror. The authors? A strong lineup of some of the greats in modern horror—folks who really know how to mess with your head in all the right ways. If you're into unsettling short stories that linger, this one's definitely worth checking out.

This is an absolutely smashing collection of short stories from five of today's most well known and respected horror authors. Each story is wonderfully unnerving and disturbing in its own right and just long enough to pack a punch. My favourites are the first and last story but they are honestly all fantastic. Highly recommended.

This was a great collection of short stories. I read the whole thing in an afternoon. Each story was unique, and fast paced. This introduced me to 2 authors I hadn’t read before, Hill & King. And honestly those were some of my favorite stories! I did enjoy all of them though, and would recommend this fast paced collection to any horror fan looking to get out of a slump.

Thank you to @netgalley and Amazon for my DRC!

New horror stories from some of my favorites? Auto-read! I enjoyed each of these stories and appreciate that we are getting more frequent short story collections from super popular authors.

Thanks to Amazon Original Stories for providing this eARC via NetGalley. All opinions are my own!

This was a great chance to check out a bunch of different authors, though the stories leaned more towards depressing than they did spooky. I really enjoyed the concept of horrors hiding in plain sight.

Overall Rating - 3.35⭐

Jackknife - 2.75⭐

This was a too predictable, but I appreciate the originality of this one. With such an insufferable main character, it was nice to get to root for the monster.

The Indigo Room - 3.5⭐

I loved how this story reminded me of one of my favorite horror movies (you'll know if you read it), though again, not that surprising of a read.

Blanks - 4.25⭐

This was the story of the collection that actually felt scary to me; I was not prepared at all and it ended up being my favorite of the collection. Definitely would recommend.

Night and Day in Misery - 3.25⭐

This was really on the depressing side, and I would probably recommend checking out trigger warnings for this one.

Letter Slot - 3⭐

Not the most original, but still not bad. A new take on an old classic, but I didn't like the ending much.

I have been so disappointed in thrillers lately - but leave it to my auto-buy authors to come together and create the best short story collection I have ever read. These supernatural stories were all PERFECTION. I cannot even tell you which one is my favorite, because they are all so unique and chilling. But could you imagine a tree cursing and stalking you? At first I thought it sounded a little silly until I actually read the story... and I had goosebumps.

Please, please, please write more of these! I am obsessed.

The Shivers short story collection was spectacular. Anything that Catriona Ward writes, I am reading. Night and Day in Misery is heartbreaking and deals with grief and the death of a child. The Blanks by Grady Hendrix is my favorite story and had me feeling all the feelings. Mail Slot by Owen King is also a strong contender for favorite because it feels like old-school horror. The Indigo Room by Stephen Graham Jones took a classic fear and showed it in a new way. Jackknife by Joe Hill is the most uncomfortable story personally. Do not eat while listening to this one as there are graphic scenes. This is an excellent short story grab bag by some of the horror genre’s top authors. ARC was provided by Amazon Original Stories via NetGalley. I received an advance reading copy for free and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

There is something about a horror short that hits different, especially in our current climate where every day feels like a horror. These heavy-hitters deliver not only on the scares, but deliver deep cuts, the kind of fiction that burrows into your head for days or weeks after. The perfect appetizer or mid-day snack between their (highly recommended!) novel-length works.

Jackknife - 3.25
This was a quick tale of a disgraced professor who thinks he’s found an Ent. This moving tree seems to have insidious intents though…
This short story had a fantastic atmosphere, but the story felt a bit too unfinished. I would have liked an additional 10-15 pages to wrap up the storylines!

The Indigo Room - 3
What would you do if you got a flash image of your coworker headless?
I liked this story well enough, but it won’t be staying with me past the last page. The writing and imagery was superb as always, just didn’t pack the punch I was hoping for.

The Blanks - 5
An idyllic summer beach getaway is plagued by a dark threat.
This was chilling, thrilling, and dark. Exactly what a short story should be. Loved the story arc and the world that was built!

Night and Day in Misery - 4.5
A woman wracked with grief takes a road trip to Missouri to relive memories.
Grief and loss are strong themes in this one. It felt emotional and the writing really drew me into the character’s points of view. A solid short story!

Letter Slot - 4
A boy sends a letter through a defunct letter slot and is surprised to receive a response.
I haven’t read from Owen King before and his writing was a pleasant surprise. This short story was well-paced and engaging throughout. It was a creepy, fun tale.

Thank you to NetGalley and Amazon Original Stories for access to this work. All opinions are my own

Thank you for the ARC. I appreciate the chance to read this collection before release. I want to say that I like these authors a lot on a normal basis , but this is not their best work

Jack Knife - was a quick old school horror with a Saw twist in the end. Definitely was creepy.
The Indigo Room- creepy but if I’m being honest I just expected it to be better because hello SGJ like it was the beginning of a possible good story. It was cut off too soon I think.

The blanks- disturbing! What is a blank …Maybe a zombie? Who knows but dude ….. they just let it take their kid at the end … um hard no
Night and day in misery- this was actually a decent story. Kind of heartbreaking but it was told well.
Letter slot- this one was really good and there was quite the lesson to be learned in this one too. All in all I think this story for being a horror had a good hidden message.

A terrific collection of short stories by some of the biggest names in horror today. My favorite was the one by Catriona Ward, in which a grieving mother struggles for closure, but they're all very much worth reading if you love spooky stories.

I thought all of these short stories were good. Although I feel like they were all too short to really get the horror vibes. But I like all of these authors and I did enjoy these stories.

As soon as I saw these pop-up, I started reading. Each story is unique and touches on separate topics. The standouts to me are Letter Slot and Jacknife. All the stories are a great introduction to some of the greatest horror authors writing today, and I'd recommend these as a quick read to anyone!

Thank you, NetGalley and Amazon Original Stories for this eArc out 4/15

I really enjoyed all five stories in this collection. I would classify them all as spooky, with little gore and violence (most happens "off-screen"). My favorite was "The Blanks" by Grady Hendrix but, like I said, all five are good stories. Joe Hill and Owen King have certainly proven that they can uphold their father's legacy while perfecting their own voice and style. Stephen Graham Jones is pretty much an auto-read for me by this point. I haven't read as much of Catriona Ward's work, but am looking forward to more after this!

Loved this collection. My favorite was the one by Catriona Ward! Easy to binge read with the lights on!

🖤🩸📖The Shivers📖🩸🖤

This short array of stories has something for everyone, with the majority being centered in our around grief. This was a great assembly of stories.

🗡🌳Jacknife
Dude gets kicked out of home for getting too fresh with a student. While staying at an AirBnB, the tree outside is being creepy. 5☆

💙💺The Indigo Room
Being stuck in a meeting, the mind wonders, is it hallucinations, or is it premonition? 4☆

⛱️🌊The Blanks
A family vacation went extremely wrong. 5☆

🗝🏨Night and day in misery
A grieving mother and wife. 4☆

📮📨Letter Slot
A kid sends an anonymous letter and gets answers.

These were all good stories, the favorite one was The Blanks, it completely destroyed me, maybe it wasn't a good idea to read it while waiting on the car rider pick up line.

I would like to thank NetGalley for allowing me to read and review these e-book ARCs.

I liked but didn't love the Joe Hill story - which is highly unusual as I usually love both his novels and his shorter form work. This one was enjoyable but didn't quite have the magic of his longer stuff - the characters just didn't feel as robust as usual. It was still a cool construct though.

I've been struggling with Grady Hendrix's newer material lately, and blanks was more of the same in that regard for me. I just couldn't find the rhythm of the writing, which was also the case with the most recent Wayward Girls book.

The Indigo Room was odd - I still don't really know if I would say I liked it or not, which is an unusual position that I don't usually find myself in after finishing something. Of all five authors, he was the one I was least familiar with, I can't really say whether that is a typical reaction or not. It was an unusual enough concept that I will look for more from Graham Jones, though.

The Catriona Ward was one of my favorite of the stories. It just had a fully three-dimensional feel in a way that the others, even the Joe Hill, did not for me. I really enjoy her writing. This one felt less quirky and unusual than the novels of hers that I have read, but it was every bit as magical for all its bleak intensity.

The Owen King was also fabulous. In general I am a big fan of all of the Kings, Father and Sons, and this one just had that magically eerie tone that embodies any of their writings at its finest. It was crisp and tight and absolutely perfect.

Short stories are hard to write. You need the perfect balance of world-building, exposition, and in this case, shivers, to keep readers on the edge of their seat. This five story collection features some big names in horror showing us how it should be done. The tales are about how the supernatural hides in plain sight: when those everyday situations become grim and haunting.

Not all of these stories worked for me. I thought "Night and Day in Misery" was a little predictable, and the main character of "Jackknife" had some disgusting views of the women in his life. My two favourites in this case were "The Indigo Room" & "The Blanks." Jones' story was frantic and disorienting in the best way, and Hendrix served up serious Shirley Jackson "The Lottery" vibes. "The Blanks" made me want to scream by the end of it. Overall, it's a pretty solid collection and a quick read.

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CW blood, death (adult, child and animal), misogyny, alcoholism, suicidal ideation