The following Stephen Graham Jones books are prime examples of the author's ability to utilize, invert, and invent horror tropes in frighteningly effective ways. However, if you’re just beginning to explore Stephen Graham Jones’s vast literary world, much like I did back during The Velvet days, we'll need to rewind and offer you some preliminary recommendations as a jumping-off point. But right when you think the story might be a mythical take on the film It Follows, Jones continues to reinvent the slasher formula, keeping the reader guessing. Weaving elements of a slasher film with that of a literary meditation on facing the consequences of our actions, Jones introduces us to a group of Blackfeet Native American men who are being hunted down by a she-elk monster. Jones's latest book, The Only Good Indians, set for publication on July 14, 2020, is a perfect blend of horror and heritage.

And Jones is still churning out a bibliography that’s the envy of most, remixing nearly every horror trope with his uncanny ability to subvert fear itself. His genre-blending body of work has earned him multiple accolades and awards: a Bram Stoker Award, an NEA fellowship, an Independent Publishers Award for Multicultural Fiction, four This is Horror Awards, and he has been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award and World Fantasy Award. In the years since I first discovered The Velvet, the board has closed, Baer disappeared, and Clevenger has continued to work on a still-unpublished masterpiece…but Jones has never slowed down. Related: Colin Wilson: Essential Creepy Reads from a Master of Horror and True Crime I started buying everything he had published, and never looked back. But almost immediately, I swiped a copy of Demon Theory by Stephen Graham Jones, and became absolutely enamored by his already diverse, prolific range of work. The Velvet had been founded around a merging of fans devoted to the work of three authors: the aforementioned Baer, Craig Clevenger (author of the cult favorite, The Contortionist’s Handbook), and none other than Stephen Graham Jones.Īt the time, I had become a member so that I could request help in tracking down copies of Baer’s Phineas Poe trilogy.

It was Baer, specifically, that led me to a message board called The Velvet, where a devoted group of readers and writers shared book recommendations and chatted about horror and literature, and pretty much anything else of interest to its members.

Danielewski, Monica Drake, Will Christopher Baer, and yes, even Chuck Palahniuk. Long before I ever wrote anything myself, I, like many others, was inspired by transgressive books from the likes of Mark Z.

Death Mask by Graham Masterton