"A desperate woman’s plot to frighten her husband out of her life takes a nightmarish turn in a chilling novel of modern horror by a Bram Stoker Award–winning author."
Just in time for Halloween, Christa Carmen's HOW TO FAKE A HAUNTING will be released by Thomas & Mercer on October 7th. A story of a "fake haunting gone... real," we're excited to share the first look at the cover, along with a preview you can read right now!
"Lainey Taylor is being pushed to the brink by her alcoholic husband, Callum. Prone to hallucinations and erratic behavior, it’s only a matter of time before he puts Lainey’s life―and that of their daughter, Beatrix―in jeopardy. A divorce and full custody is out of the question. In Callum’s words: Over my dead body.
Lainey’s sympathetic friend Adelaide has a wild solution. They’ll stage a haunting so convincing it will drive Callum out of Lainey’s life for good. Nothing too over the top: strange smells, noises in the walls, and flies unleashed along the windowsills. It could work. Considering Callum’s alcohol-induced night terrors, he’s already close to broken. With each new scare, Lainey is closer to seeing the haunting through to its bitter, freeing end.
But in a house filled with so much rage, resentment, and fear, is it any wonder that Lainey and Adelaide’s plan goes horribly wrong? As their fake haunting spirals into something no one can control, Lainey discovers that the only way out of this frightening trap is to join forces with Callum, or die trying."
Early Praise for HOW TO FAKE A HAUNTING: "Christa Carmen joins the eerie echelon of Catriona Ward and Silvia Morena-Garcia as one of the reigning queens of modern gothic. How to Fake a Haunting forgoes the fog and centuries old castles for something far more frightening: the beguiling black mold insinuating itself within contemporary homelife. The gloom and ghouls may be prefab, but the ghosts lingering within this toxically-haunted house are real all the same." — Clay McLeod Chapman, author of Wake Up and Open Your Eyes
"How to Fake a Haunting is a poignant, frightening, and utterly original story about the ghosts that haunt families and the homes they create. By turns darkly funny, emotionally devastating, and memorably chilling, this book twists the horror genre in ways I never saw coming." — Tracy Sierra, author of Nightwatching
“A table-turning thrill ride that chases you to the very end. Carmen puts a terrifying new spin on what it means to be haunted.”— Lindy Ryan, author of Bless Your Heart
About Christa Carmen: "Christa Carmen lives in Rhode Island. She is the author of The Daughters of Block Island, winner of the Bram Stoker Award and a Shirley Jackson Award finalist, the Indie Horror Book Award-winning Something Borrowed, Something Blood-Soaked, and the Bram Stoker Award-nominated "Through the Looking Glass and Straight into Hell" ( Orphans of Bliss: Tales of Addiction Horror). She has a BA from the University of Pennsylvania, an MA from Boston College, and an MFA from the University of Southern Maine."
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For more information and to pre-order a copy for yourself, visit: https://tinyurl.com/How-To-Fake-A-Haunting
To keep up with the latest from Christa Carmen, visit: https://www.christacarmen.com/
To read the excerpt from HOW TO FAKE A HAUNTING, click on the cover below or visit this link directly: https://dailydead.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/HOW-TO-FAKE-A-HAUNTING.pdf
After spending more than 10 years as a consultant in the tech and entertainment industry, Jonathan James launched Daily Dead in 2010 to share his interest in horror and sci-fi. Since then, it has grown into an online magazine with a staff of writers that provide daily news, reviews, interviews, and special features.
As the Editor-in-Chief of Daily Dead, Jonathan is responsible for bringing the latest horror news to millions of readers from around the world. He is also consulted with as an expert on zombies in entertainment and pop culture, providing analyses of the zombie sub-genre to newspapers, radio stations, and convention attendees.
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