Pretty Marys All in a Row

You'll find her on a lonely highway, hitchhiking at midnight. She calls herself Rhee, but everyone else knows her by another name: Resurrection Mary. And when she's transported home each night to a decrepit mansion on a lane to nowhere, she's not alone.

In the antique mirror, call her name three times, and Bloody Mary will appear. Outside, wandering through a garden of poisonous flowers is Mistress Mary, Quite Contrary, a nursery rhyme come to gruesome life. Downstairs is another jump-rope rhyme-Mary Mack, forever conscripted to build her own coffin. And brooding in the corner with her horse skull is the restless Mari Lwyd.

They are the Marys, the embodiment of urban legend and what goes bump in the night. Every evening, they gather around the table and share nightmares like fine wine, savoring the flavors of those they've terrified.

But other than these brief moments together, the Marys are alone, haunting a solitary gloom that knows them better than they know themselves. That's because they don't remember who they were before-or even if there was a before. And worst of all, they don't know how to escape this fate.

That is, until a moment of rage inspires Rhee to leap from the highway-and into the mirror with Bloody Mary. Suddenly, the Marys are learning how to move between their worlds, all while realizing how much stronger they are together.

But just when freedom is within their reach, something in the gloom fights back-something that isn't ready to let them go. Now with her sisters in danger of slipping into the darkness, Rhee must unravel the mystery of who the Marys were before they were every child's nightmare. And she'll have to do it before what's in the shadows comes to claim her for its own.

PRETTY MARYS ALL IN A ROW is dark urban fantasy that follows the (after)lives and times of five ghosts and their haunts. The novella combines contemporary fairy tale and urban legend in a story that shows that being dead isn't always a bed of roses.

WHAT OTHERS ARE SAYING

"Underneath the creepy images and ghostly lore, Gwendolyn Kiste has created a story about the power of women's friendships, a subject often handled with all the cloying sweetness of a bag of candy corn. But these Marys are wicked and wonderful-just the gals you'll want to hang out with on a dark and stormy night. A darkly fantastic delight!" (Wendy N. Wagner, author of An Oath of Dogs)

"Gwendolyn Kiste excels in creating subtle, unsettling disturbia. Her writing is clever, imaginative, eerily beautiful. It lingers with you days later-perhaps long into the night as you stare at the shifting light on the ceiling-twining itself through your thoughts. Pretty Marys harkens back to the writing of Shirley Jackson and Daphne DuMaurier, whose work speaks to the fears of women and our struggle to find and keep our space in the world. The fear of not being heard. Of being replaceable. Perhaps most nerve-wracking of all: being forced to confront the darkness that lies inside all of us, telling us we're not worthy, we're not enough. Kiste writes empowering horror, handling these challenging subjects deftly and with a tough tenderness that lets the reader know: yes, there will be a fight... but you can do this." (Eden Royce, author of Spook Lights)

"Wholly original and profoundly haunting, Pretty Marys All in a Row is Gwendolyn Kiste's finest work to date. Her prose glides effortlessly through the (after) lives of her protagonists, adding an unfamiliar humanity to the women of myth that we feared as children-a humanity that will resonate within the darkest heart. Devastating in the best sense of the word, Pretty Marys All in a Row will leave you wanting more of Kiste and her undeniable talent." (Jess Landry, author and publisher)