with the overgrown lawn. The darkened store window in a forgotten corner of the shopping mall. The colorful characters of a children's TV show. What dark secrets do they hide?

From award-winning author Christopher Hawkins come thirteen tales of the horrors lurking right next door.

• A shut-in sets out to make a new life for himself by losing weight at the point of a scalpel.
• A store clerk with a mannequin obsession hides a macabre and tragic secret.
• A master thief tries for one last score in a house that doesn't want him to leave.
• Two friends learn the hard way that having superpowers doesn't always make you a hero. It might just make you a monster.
• A lonely painter finds freedom with the help of something lurking beneath the ocean waves.

At turns whimsical and somber but always unsettling, this debut collection of short horror stories is essential reading from a rising voice in dark literary fiction.