Dawn Kurtagich

From the author of The Madness comes a haunting folk horror fable of lost sisters, old gods, and the terrible power of belief left to rot in the woods. After the tragic death of their parents, the seven Ward sisters are sent to live with their grandmother on the remote forest island of Beltane, a place suspended between time and shadow. What begins as an attempt to mend their fractured lives soon twists into a waking nightmare, where grief bleeds into childhood fantasy and ancient rites awaken a dark and eerie devotion to Daudir, the Forgotten God of the Wood. When another cruel tragedy strikes, the sisters are left to fend for themselves, learning to live with death as a constant, lurking presence. The fragile world they’ve carved splinters beneath the weight of isolation, and the forest around them grows restless…Years later, a cryptic letter summons the surviving sisters home. Drawn back into the wild embrace of their dangerous faith, they confront a truth more terrible than memory, and the dreadful secret that waits, silent and sentient, in the depths of the all-seeing trees. This lyrical and haunting folk horror explores how trauma can root itself in the soil of childhood, how love can curdle into obsession, and how gods, especially forgotten ones, never stay buried for long. But at its heart, it’s about sisters: how they fracture, survive, return, and reckon with what they’ve made together.

In this hauntingly twisted tale, an author reconnects with an old boarding school friend, forcing her to reckon with their shared past and the imaginary creature she thought they left behind.Touch a line, you break your spine.Stacey is the dusty air, the cracked soil, the drought. To thirteen-year-old Bethany Sloane, she?s everything.Abandoned by her mother at a remote African boarding school, Bethany will do anything to stay in Stacey?s good graces. And that means learning the rules of each twisted game.Touch a crack, you break your back.Years later, Bethany is a bestselling author. Disabled now, she can?t remember what happened back in the bush. But there?s no mistaking Stacey Preston?s name in her inbox.Glassy, glassy, cut my arsey.That email brings Bethany?s childhood rushing back. The Glass Man was just a story the Thorns invented, a game of wits. But every game has its rules?and consequences for breaking them. To stay alive this round, Bethany needs to play right into Stacey?s hands.Dark and disturbing, The Thorns explores the horrifying world of adolescent abuse, controlling friendships, and blinding obsession.