The Restless Dead: Ten Original Stories of the Supernatural

by Deborah Noyes (Editor), Herbie Brennan, Nancy Etchemendy

Ten extraordinary authors spin hair-raising original tales collected by the anthologist of GOTHIC!

With scary stories by: M. T. Anderson, Holly Black, Libba Bray, Herbie Brennan, Nancy Etchemendy, Annette Curtis Klause, Kelly Link, Deborah Noyes, Marcus Sedgwick, and Chris Wooding

Enter the murky world of the undead. From a beyond-the-grave stalker to prankster devil worshippers, from a childish ghost of the future to a vampire lover with bloody ties to the past, the characters in these ten original stories will send shivers down your spine. Why do we fear the undead? Find out in this spooky companion volume to GOTHIC! TEN ORIGINAL DARK TAKES, and enjoy another graveyard walk in the company of ten contemporary masters of horror and suspense.
Contents:
The Wrong Grave - Kelly Link
The House and the Locket - Chris Wooding
Kissing Dead Boys - Annette Curtis Klause
The Heart of Another - Marcus Sedgwick
Necromancers - Herbie Brennan
No Visible Power - Deborah Noyes
Bad Things - Libba Bray
The Gray Boy's Work - M.T. Anderson
The Poison Eaters - Holly Black
Honey in the Wound - Nancy Etchemendy

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Young Adult, Anthologies, Paranormal, Fantasy, Fiction

272 pages, Hardcover

First published July 10, 2007

About the author

Deb writes for adults and children and is also an editor and photographer. She lives in Massachusetts with her family.

Reviews

[Amber Hetchler · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meh. The stories were either horrible or pretty good, there was no in between.

The Wrong Grave: 1/5 stars
The Houses and The Locket: 3/5 stars
Kissing Dead Boys: 2/5 stars
The Heart of Another: 3/5 stars
The Necromancers: 1/5 stars
No Visible Power: 3/5 stars
Bad Things: 3/5 stars
The Gray Boy's Work: 1/5 stars
The Poison Eaters: 3/5 stars
Honey in the Wound: 3/5 stars

[Neal · Rating 5 out of 5]

i picked this book up because it had a short story by one of my favorite writers (chris wooding). after i had read that story i read another just for fun. and i couldn't put it down. i read the whole thing in one day. all the stories in this book were awsome.

[Bhl Spectrum · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you enjoy stories about a pack of bored teenagers hunting for supposed devil worshipers in the dark and foggy woods or a young boy digging up the grave of a one-time crush in order to retrieve his lost poetry, then this collection of short stories might be the book for you. Even though most of the stories fit a common formula, a character in some scary or lonely or boring place and then something creepy happens, the mood of each story is filled with enough suspense and creepiness to keep you flying through the pages. Another nice touch are the variety of endings: some stories end as you would expect, some end happily, and then there are the few that end badly (blood and guts and all that sadness).

Sometimes short story collections can be hit-or-miss. Luckily, Deborah Noyes, the book's editor, has a knack for picking great stories. A grouping of "supernatural" stories for young adults often run the risk of being cheesy or too much like a bad Goosebumps story. This time around, Noyes got it right. Even though the individual stories deal in different realms of the supernatural, all of the tales possess a common thematic element, the dead. More specifically, the restless dead. More importantly than shared themes, every story in this collection is unique, well-written, and very engrossing.

[Nora · Rating 5 out of 5]

When we were in High School, my friend Danny wanted to be a botanist. He'd go to the Arboretum on weekends, and he met this guy there once who, despite having been to the arboretum every week for something like twenty years, had never made it all the way up to the top of this one particular hill. It wasn't that he'd never tried, it was just that every time he started to climb, he'd find something new and fascinating to examine on the way up. And next thing you knew it would be dusk, the park would be closing and that was that.

Danny thought this guy was the most amazing arborist ever.

I'm the same way with this anthology, so far. Kelly Link's "The Wrong Grave" (the first story in the book), is jsut so wonderful, so perfect, such a delight fo interlocking gears and whells adnd doodly bits, that I just can't get past it. I could read it again forever.

[Janell]

The Restless Dead was a great book. It was basically 10 short stories in one book. I really liked it. My favorite story was "The Wrong Grave". This story was about a young boy going to visit his girlfriend's grave to get his poems. He somehow dug up the wrong grave but the right girl and became scared. It's an amazing story. I recommend this book to anyone.

[Carrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

🎃Spookoplathon 2025 Book 4🎃

Fun collection of YA spooky stories. I read a little here and there, and was happily surprised that they were all good, which isn't always the case with anthologies. Some are more serious, some are like a PG version of a Tales From the Crypt episode, and some make you wonder what is even happening until the end is revealed. If I had to choose, The House and the Locket, Bad Things, No Visible Power, and The Wrong Grave were my favorites.

The Wrong Grave (Kelly Link)

Pretentious and clueless teenage boy leaves some of his poetry in his dead girlfriend's coffin, but then regrets it and digs up her grave to retrieve them only to find it's the wrong grave (but it isn't, she's just older and looks different now and succeeds in scaring the crap out of him with her new sentient hair and cobra tattoo.) Dark humor. Reminds me of the kind of folk tales you'd find in "Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark"

The House and the Locket (Chris Wooding)

Serial cheater and frequent Whitechapel customer (yes, that Whitechapel) is bummed that his player card is about to be revoked because his dad is threatening to take away his allowance if he doesn't propose to his girlfriend/parents' ward. He's drinking his pain away with his best friend, Henry, who tells him to cheer up because even married men can find time to wander in the city, winkwink. On their walk back to Henry's house, they're chased by a beast into a creepy house where the nightmares they find are a preview of what will come if he doesn't stop being such a skeeze.

He says he never told his fiancée the story of that terrible night and how his best friend died, but suspects that she has known all along, and leaves us with this final quote: "I catch her eye sometimes, and in it I see hints of matters that I might never understand: women's ways, dark and strange. It is best that I leave such things undisturbed."

Sound advice, my friend.

Kissing Dead Boys (Annette Curtis Klause)

A girl doles out vigilante justice in a vampire night club to avenge the death of her younger sister, one vamp at a time.

The Heart of Another (Marcus Sedgwick)

A college student and Poe enthusiast with a bad heart is the lucky recipient of a heart transplant, but in order to receive the organ someone else had to die. Now she's craving beer, wants to go fishing, discovered a love of fitness - and is having nightmares about the removal of her donor's heart and his murder. She believes that it was her middle-aged tutor who killed a slew of young organ donors just before her surgery, though he denies it and the evidence is circumstantial at best. She strangles him to death on the floor of her apartment, but ponders whether it was really her, or the influence of the murdered donor inside her taking revenge.

The Necromancers (Herbie Brennan)

Twin teenagers resurrect their dead grandfather's spirit to find out where he put all his money in hopes of bailing their dad out of his failed business, but grandpa returns to life completely and refuses to help. While he's out living his best (second) life, he takes the girl (Cassandra, who is underage, might I add) the twins are crushing on out on a date in his new Lamborghini. At that point, the boys decide playboy Gramps needs to die for real and they try all kinds of ways to get him pushing up daisies again, but to no avail. After the Lamborghini is written off thanks to a scheme to kill the old man with cut brake lines, the girl dumps him and the twins unironically decide they don't want a girl with "superficial values." They instead want to ask gramps for money again, as he "owes them" for bringing him back to life, but the old man suggests selling the book they used to resurrect him instead. 400k pounds later, the boys decide that it would be better to woo the girl with a Lambo of their own rather than waste it on their dad, who would probably lose it anyway.

No Visible Power (Deborah Noyes)

A young woman torments her family with poltergeist activity after she drowns in the river while escaping her oppressive father and restrictive late Victorian societal expectations in order to try to join up with a Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show-style traveling act.

Bad Things (Libba Bray)

Rural Texas teenagers go out one night to play chicken with the rumored devil worshippers who'd mutilated cows the night before, only to be murdered by the vengeful (demonic?) ghost of a little boy named Hank. Hank was the brother of one of the teenagers, Danny, who ran off from Danny after he took his irritation out on the kid and said cruel things to him before running into the murderer who would end his life. His last words to Danny were, "Someday I'll make you scared of me! You just wait!"

Evil Dead Hank then makes sure to show Danny how he'd tricked them into thinking devil worshippers were in the field, and how he'd fooled Danny's friends into following him into the shed where he killed them all. After showing him the bodies and bragging about how he finally scared his big brother, he forces Danny to take out the hearts of his dead friends, sealing the brothers together forever as Danny leaves town with blood on his clothes and his brother's twisted voice in his head. They're the bad things unleashed on the world now.

The Gray Boy's Work (M.T. Anderson)

This one was one of the weirdest. It takes place at the end of the Revolutionary War, when a farmer comes home to his family, "victorious" from his final battle and ready to get back to his life again. Victory and Despair/Prayer are personified as angels that are physically seen interacting with the family. Omens and other things are as well. It comes out that the man is a deserter who served two years and decided couldn't take it anymore, but his oldest son, who has been holding down the farm, is almost a man now and he has no respect for the father who ran away so dishonorably. The father has PTSD and struggles with guilt and shame, as well as the atrocities of war, starvation, disease in the camps, and horrors of battlefield amputations. His son refuses to understand, and makes sure everyone in their violently patriotic town knows he deserted, and feeling self-satisfied when they shun his beaten-down father. The father saw stacks of discarded arms from the surgeon's tent and decided he wanted to be able to hold his kids again. It was the final straw that made him desert. His son and the townspeople are rigidly black and white and can't (won't) see any shades of gray in his circumstance.

Then a gray boy comes to help at the farm, doing the work at supernatural speed and dragging an impaired leg behind him and rotting all the food he touches while being coddled by the mom who doesn't realize he's manipulating her, and staring creepily at the father and son. He locks the oldest son in a sheep shed to die of exposure while leading the father away in the wrong direction (likely to leave him to die too), and the son starts to regret the way he treated his dad. In the end, both father and son are blinded and aid each other with the sun on their faces while the boy goes off to live in the sheep shed, complaining that no one understands what it's like to live with a leg like his.

It was good, but strange, and packed with symbolism.

The Poison Eaters (Holly Black)

Twisty story about three "sisters" who are poisoned all their lives by the man who took them in as their father so that their touch could kill almost instantly, making them tools to get revenge on two nobles and the king that the father felt wronged him. It has the hallmarks of a Holly Black story, with the presence of unusual foods, ruthless parental figures, and double-crossing. It felt very faerie-like, even though the characters seemed to all be human.

Honey in the Wound (Nancy Etchermendy)

Sad story set in 1925 about a family who has already lost their eldest son to the Spanish Influenza when the 12 year-old middle son falls through a rotten floor and has a severe leg break that nicks the artery. He suffers a terrible infection and our narrator, the youngest and last child, is sent by her mother to a neighbor's house for his special honey, which has cured an infection like this for another neighbor before. The honey may have helped, but the father is a doctor and dismisses it as nonsense, and he takes the leg anyway. The boy dies as a result, but the distraught mother refuses to give up and spoons the honey into his mouth, essentially creating a zombie. The parents are out of their minds with all that's happening and don't seem to realize their son is suffering, so the narrator must go back to the neighbor for the means to kill him for good.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I checked this out from the library and read the whole book in one day while I was sick. There were some very creative and well written stories in here. I thought that because it was in the juvenile section that the writing might be more simple, but the stories were complex and unpredictable. I'm guessing that it was in the young adult section because the language and sex in the stories was PG rated. Thank heavens! If that's why it merits a juvenile shelving, I'll check there more often. I think stories that require more suspense and less gore are a better sign of an author's skill, anyway. I had read another anthology, "Gothic" edited by Deborah Noyes and really enjoyed it too. I might need to look for more of her work.

[Orrin Grey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another re-read, of the sort of spiritual successor/sister book to Gothic!. This one has really strong stories by Holly Black, M. T. Anderson, and Kelly Link, among others. I didn't enjoy it quite as much as Gothic!, but it's still a favorite.

[Debbie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A creepy collection about the dead who won’t always remain dead to read with all the lights on. A few of the stories were excellent.

Highlights:

“The Wrong Grave” by Kelly Link (boy digs up a grave to retrieve his poetry)
“The Necromancers” by Herbie Brennan (two boys on a quest to bring their grandpa back from the dead)
“No Visible Power” by Deborah Noyes (a home is terrorized by an unquiet spirit)
“Bad Things” by Libba Bray (best story in the collection—kids traipsing through a graveyard looking for satanists find more than they bargained for)
“The Poison Eaters” by Holly Black (a dark fairytale)

[Crowinator · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've actually been reading this off and on at work on my breaks for a while, and I finally finished the last story.

Favorite stories: "Bad Things" by Libba Bray, "The Gray Boy's Work" by M.T. Anderson (the man really knows how to write intriguing horror stories), and "Honey in the Wound" by Nancy Etchemendy.

[Rad · Rating 4 out of 5]

The only short story I wasn't in the least bit crazy about was the first one. M.T. Anderson's and Chris Wooding's stories were my favorites, but they were all surprisingly good. (I've been wary of YA short story collections since Prom, which had mostly terrible stories.)

[Ashlyn Oglesby]

I just checked out this book,and i'm already addited to it.I predict that diggin up bethany's grave, a curse would be broken and everyone who she knew would have a terrible death.I can't wait to read some more of this book.

[LA Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

These "scary" stories are more silly than anything, but are totally appropriate for middle school readers.

[Jillian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kelly Link's 'The Wrong Grave' is a must read. Herbie Brennan's 'The Necromancers' was quite entertaining, and Nancy Etchemendy's 'Honey in the Wound' made my skin crawl.

[Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Even though designed for young adults I thought that the stories were fantastic :) I highly recommend reading this book :)

[Moana Literaria · Rating 4 out of 5]

Este libro es una recopilación de diez cuentos escritos por distintos autores, todos centrados en la temática de los muertos. La variedad de relatos ofrece experiencias tenebrosas y misteriosas, en las que los muertos cobran vida y se convierten en protagonistas de las historias (familiares que reviven por unos instantes, vampiros, duelos, etc.). Sin embargo, debo reconocer que algunas escenas resultaron más graciosas por lo irónico de la situación que realmente aterradoras.

Al tratarse de una antología, fue un libro fácil de leer e ideal para momentos cortos como viajes en transporte público. Comprobado por su servidora, ya que más de la mitad lo disfruté entre trayectos en tren y colectivo, lo que demuestra su versatilidad. Aunque algunos relatos me gustaron más que otros, todos tienen su toque único e interesante que los hace destacar.

[Karina Andrea ✨ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amé este libro desde el primer momento.
No olvido que en el colegio nos hacían una lectura obligatoria después del primer recreo y este fue una de esas muchas lecturas que hice y se convierto en una de mis favoritas, un libro que me adentró en la lectura sin duda.

Son varios cuentos son su toque tenebroso y de misterio, usando referencias o guiños de clásicos de la literatura llevándolos a otro punto y atrapándote en la lectura.

Fue tanto lo que me gustó este libro que lo pedí prestado y nunca lo devolví, uno de los primeros libros físicos en mi estantería y le tengo un cariño gigante.

[Cazadora De Mundos · Rating 3 out of 5]

En pocas palabras un mix, algunos cuentos buenos, varios con final dudoso, uno que yo personalmente no entendí, un clásico victoriano, otros que dan más risa que miedo (y la verdad los momentos en que dan miedo son cuando hay niños involucrados), algunos tienen un buen giro de rosca y otros son interesantes en la forma en la que se muestra el terror, la forma que este tiene.
Para entretenerse y relatar en vos alta sin duda.

[Bethany · Rating 4 out of 5]

I first read this book when I was 12 and loved it, then leant it to a friend who lost it. At 26 I've just bought and read it again. And love it again, but honestly some stories are better than others. On a whole, excellent.
Bad Things gave me a wicked flashback to my first vivid imaginings of this story, had my heart racing; And I never forgot Kissing Dead Boys.

[Amber Allen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this because Holly Black's story in it was on a "disturbing short story" iceberg a Youtuber I watch did. It was a great story, but by far not the most disturbing.

Overall a great collection with authors I know of in some capacity. I'm just not much of a short story girlie so I won't give it 5 stars because it doesn't reflect my interests as much.

[Pa Houa Moua · Rating 1 out of 5]

Maybe I'm too old for these stories but they weren't scary or intriguing.

[Sean W. 8A19 · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a good book and it was very interesting.

[Bobby · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think this book is good, in have a good picture make me imagine what just happen,but the story is not good that I think.

[Elliefint · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked some of them.

[Shannon · Rating 4 out of 5]

i'm gonna be thinking about the gray boy's work for a WHILE now trying to figure it out

[Dee Buck]

did not read. selected in error

[Shelby Loren · Rating 2 out of 5]

The first two or three stories were interesting, but the further in I got, the worse the stories became. Guess it just wasn't for me, but it's really a hit or miss with most anthologies.

[EricL_D1 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed the book. The theme of the book is horror and with each short story, there was a lesson to be learned. There was a story I did not understand.

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

Teen book club notes with summaries and of story:

The Wrong Grave: Miles digs up Bethany’s grave to retrieve his poetry but seems to have dug up the wrong grave when he finds Gloria, with writhing black hair, instead of his girlfriend, but it turns out she was simply spooking him and it was her after all. Dark humor ****

The House and the Locket: Set in Victorian London, this story has a dark, Gothic mood. Henry has grown up with Lizbeth but shirks his betrothal to her because he doesn’t want to denounce his wanton ways. In a scene seeped in fog and things that go bump in the night, Henry is scared into her arms by a hideous ghosts who were actually the couple and their son-to-be if he did not curtail his ways and marry her. Cautionary tale ***

Kissing Dead Boys: A modern, edgy vampire tale set in a bar called Nosferatu, where vampire groupies hang out to give their blood to the undead, a girl gets revenge for her reckless sister’s death by a bar-hopping vampire. Cautionary tale ***

The Heart of Another: Referencing Poe’s Tell Tale Heart, a young graduate student in need of a heart transplant finds herself recovering in the hospital after surgery and haunted by thoughts of the stranger’s heart in her body. She has new talents and tastes and does not seem like herself. She forgoes her studies to research the possible donor, only to discover her advisor may have murdered him, among other, looking for a proper donor for her, because her academic achievements would glorify him. Smart and scary with an ambiguous ending. ****

The Necromancers: Twins Tar and Wit raise their dead grandfather using ancient incantations in hopes of finding his hidden wealth, only to be rudely ignored by the carefree spirit who proceeds to live it up, spending wildly and cavorting with a young gold-digger. A funny morality tale. ***

No Visible Power: I plodded through this story not enjoying the narrative style and sort of skimming the dialogue, but I liked the surprise ending and the protagonist as unreliable narrator. ***

Bad Things: A small town is aghast at a series of animal mutilations that seem to be evidence of a satanic cult, so a group of high school head-bangers decide to take action and smoke out that cultists at the local cemetery, only to fall prey to the protagonist’s evil ghost little brother. A very scary cautionary tale. ***

The Gray Boy’s Work: Set during the Revolutionary War, M.T. Anderson’s allegorical tale of a war deserter who brings home the angels of victory and despair and the ghost of a boy who haunt his home and set his oldest son against him. This was probably the most complex story in the anthology and may be challenging to interpret and discuss; seems like the workings of a novel. Historical paranormal story. ***

The Poison Eaters: Also in Holly Black’s collection of the same name, this rich fantasy story introduces a cast of zombie-like girls selected by the king as agents of death, raised to believe they are his daughters, yet kept imprisoned and fed on a diet of bitter greens that barely keeps their nearly ephemeral bodies intact. Two of the sisters die, leaving one to kill the princes who could challenge the king’s throne, and it takes merely a touch of her hand as the fatal blow. As the realization of her fate and the king’s evil becomes clear to her, she takes it upon herself to alter the king’s plan and deliver to him the lethal touch. ****

Honey in the Wound: Set in 1925, a ten year old girl witnesses the death of her brother while her parents attempt to save him from a fatal accident. Her surgeon father uses the best techniques of the day to bind his broken bones and stitch his wounds, but a dangerous infection sets in, and his desperate mother seeks the aid of the local mysterious herbalist to apply his honey to the wound. Zombie-ness ensues and the sister must decide if it is her parents or herself who have gone mad. ***

[Vicky · Rating 4 out of 5]

* 3.5*
Este libro tiene relatos realmente buenos y originales. Lo disfrute mucho.
Calificación por relato:
La tumba equivocada Kelly Link:3.5/5
La idea del relato es muy buena pero esta mal desarrollada, tal vez yo no la supe entender pero me quedaron muchos interrogantes.

La Casa y el relicario Chris Wooding:5/5
Este relato es sencillamente genial.

Razones para besar vampiros Anette Curtis Klause:4.5/5
Le faltó algo para gustarme

Un corazón ajeno Marcus Sedwick: 1.000.000/5
Es mi favorito del libro

Los nigromantes Herbie Brennan:3/5
Le faltaron páginas

Fuerzas Invisibles Deborah Noyes:2/5
Ñe

Cosas Malas Libba Bray: 1.000.000/5
Otro de mis favoritos. Lo amo.

El trabajo del hombre Gris:4/5
Le falta un No-Se-Qué

Los envenenadores Holly Black:4/5
También le falta un No-Se-Qué

Miel en la herida Nancy Etchemery:2/5
Es un buen relato simplemente no me gusto