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Darker Days

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What to expect

Brought to you by Penguin.

When the darker days fall, the debt must be paid, . . . get ready for the chilling new folk horror from the Hugo Award-winning, bestselling author of HEX - from the publisher of The Exorcist and perfect for fans of Shirley Jackson and Stephen King.

In Lock Haven, a quiet little town in Washington State, there is a very special street.
Bird Street. The residents of Bird Street are all successful, wealthy, healthy and happy. And their children are all well-mannered and smart and high achievers.

At least they are for eleven months of the year.

In November, however, the ‘Darker Days’ begin. For November’s the month when things take a turn for the worse: accidents, bad luck, familial conflict and illness take hold. And it is in November that a stranger comes to Bird Street to collect the debt owed by the residents.

Because, you see, there is a price that must be paid for all the happiness and good fortune they enjoy for the other eleven months of year. And that price is one human life. Every November. Without fail.

And so it has been for over a hundred years. To ease their guilt, the residents of Bird Street seek out individuals – usually the elderly or the terminally ill – who wish to die with dignity and are content to be helped on their way.

But this year, things don’t go to plan. This year events take a terrifying turn . . .

Propulsive and haunting, Darker Days is a devastating modern take on the Faustian pact, and begs the question: how far would you go for your own happiness?

‘One of the most vital and exciting voices in modern horror.’ Mike Flanagan, award-winning director of ‘Doctor Sleep’ and ‘The Haunting of Hill House’

'No one builds agonizing tension like Thomas Olde Heuvelt. Darker Days is his best yet.' Catriona Ward, bestselling author of The Last House on Needless Street

© Thomas Olde Heuvelt 2025 (P) Penguin Audio 2025

Critics Review

Darker Days is a meticulous work of terror, a harrowing drop into a moral nightmare. If you can imagine the philosophical oomph of Bergman's The Seventh Seal joined to the rustic shocks of Midsommer, and all of it transported to America's suburbia, you'd have something like Darker Days. It's a scream.
JOE HILL, Sunday Times bestselling author of King Sorrow
No one builds agonizing tension like Thomas Olde Heuvelt. Darker Days is his best yet - a terrible sacrificial offering that doesn’t reveal its shocking nature until the very last page.
CATRIONA WARD, author of The Last House on Needless Street
Thomas Olde Heuvelt is back with another wicked, fascinating, chilling tale, expertly balancing the supernatural with the horrors inherent in human nature. Darker Days reinforces that Olde Heuvelt is one of the most vital and exciting voices in modern horror.
MIKE FLANAGAN, director of ‘Doctor Sleep’ and ‘The Haunting of Hill House’
This masterly work of horror, gripping and terrifying on more than one level, is probably Heuvelt’s best novel yet.
Guardian
What price would you pay for a life of privilege? Darker Days is a new take on the Faustian bargain completely in keeping with our new age of greed and entitlement, with a twist at the end you won't see coming. This is Olde Heuvelt at the height of his powers.
ALMA KATSU, author of The Hunger
A rich, witty and often gruesome tale that encompasses black humour and disturbing horror. Full of morally dubious but fascinating characters, questions about the nature of evil and moments of almost near-cinematic tensions, it’s a compelling and though provoking read.
SFX
The devilish genius behind Hex brings us a new collision of sly suburban satire and devastating folkloric nightmare . . . the perfect read for fans of Shirley Jackson, Sarah Langan, and stories you wanna read from behind your fingers, as if that’ll somehow keep you safe from the escalating darkness.
NAT CASSIDY, bestselling author of When the Wolf Comes Home and I Know A Place
Darker Days begins on an uncomfortably grim and mysterious note. Olde Heuvelt increases the dread and tension over the course of this labyrinthine and distressing novel until the pressure is almost unbearable. There’s a distinctly unpleasant current of inevitability coursing beneath every page of this genuinely distressing work—the inevitability of ritual, retribution, sacrifice, and death. This is a daring and uncompromising jewel of horror fiction. Reminiscent of the flawless work of Stephen King, Michael McDowell, and Robert R. McCammon, but still completely its own singular and disturbing vision.
ERIC LaROCCA, author of Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke
Stephen King is so associated with horror stories set in cozy small-town America, seamlessly blending pedestrian everyday living with supernatural dread, that it comes as a surprise that Darker Days is not from his pen . . .utterly creepy and mesmerizing.
Irish Independent
Darker Days is a remarkable and disturbing morality tale about the true cost of lucky lives. It’s a tremendous achievement by Thomas Olde Heuvelt as well as a frightening gift for readers.
OWEN KING, author of The Curator
Author Thomas Olde Heuvelt
Narrator Teri Schnaubelt
Duration 15 hours and 32 minutes
Release Date
ISBN 9781529981650
Format Audiobook
Publisher Transworld
Genre Contemporary horror and ghost stories, Esoteric thriller, Narrative theme: Social issues, Occult fiction
Availability AU, GB, IE

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