Senseless

Praise

Sensational! A spellbinding dive into the devil’s playground that is Los Angeles, where everybody is simultaneously hunter and hunted. Ronald Malfi is the real deal—you don’t read this book, you live it.—Josh Winning, author of Burn the Negative and Heads Will Roll


A brutal Rubik’s Cube of a book covered in blood… This vamped out, sun-bleached mobius strip is a masterclass in horror noir.—Clay McLeod Chapman, author of Wake Up and Open Your Eyes


A stark look at a haunted world, filled with ghosts of once-people.—Hailey Piper, Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Queen of Teeth and All the Hearts You Eat


A crackling procedural dipped in psychedelics, Senseless drags you along on a thrill ride through Los Angeles’s neon-lit underworld, where nothing is what it seems. Weaving merciless storytelling with prose that’s equal parts luminous and queasy, Ronald Malfi’s got you trapped—and he never lets up. By the end, you’ll find yourself as transfigured as this book’s perfectly realized characters.—Andy Marino, author of The Swarm and It Rides a Pale Horse


If stories about LA are like visits to a theme park, Ronald Malfi’s Senseless is the wildest dark ride you’ve ever dreamed of, whirling and shrieking at Tinseltown’s throbbing neon-veined heart. A consummate storyteller, Malfi is a master of shadowy noir, nerve-wracking suspense and balls-out horror, drawing the reader deep into a winding web of terror from which there is no escape. Senseless may be his best work yet–a breathlessly compulsive thriller that twists and turns on itself and tightens like the knot of a noose. Don’t miss it!—David Demchuk, author of The Butcher’s Daughter and RED X


In this thought-provoking new thriller, Ronald Malfi burrows into the human heart and carves out its darkest beats. Set against the background of Hollywood’s magic and L.A.’s worst streets, Senseless is a gripping meditation on the nature of violence and the origin of evil. You’ll want to read it again and again—but you might be too scared to.—Wendy N. Wagner, author of Girl in the Creek and The Deer Kings


The City of Angels is some of the most well-trod literary territory there is, but Malfi stakes out dark regions all his own in a tale that slithers like a rattler and bites like one, too. From the high desert to the desperate cracked downtown streets, from Glendale to the valley and beyond, heat, grit, and pain roil off every page, ones you’ll be turning at a desperate pace from the opening body to curtain’s final bow.—Brian Asman, author of Good Dogs and Man, F*ck This House (And Other Disasters)


Senseless is a novel that demands to be read with the lights on, but even then, you’ll feel the shadows pressing in around you. It’s a dark, unnerving descent into the heart of human and inhuman monstrosity, and Malfi’s voice ensures every whisper, every heartbeat, echoes long after the final line.—Shane Hawk, co-editor of the internationally bestselling Never Whistle at Night


Senseless is a blistering, twist-filled rollercoaster of a novel, ripe with visceral horror and complex characters who will have you questioning their motives along with their hold on reality. You’ll feel the heat from the California desert and the hum of the city streets in this noir-touched supernatural thriller. I couldn’t put it down!—Paulette Kennedy, bestselling author of The Devil and Mrs. Davenport


With Senseless, Malfi has created a warped, psychological thriller novel and painted it black with horror, creating something totally unique. Senseless combines all the chills of a crime-driven story about a serial killer with the dark, knife-twisting terrors of furious madness; the compulsion of a murder mystery with the distorted reality of the supernatural. I’ve never read anything quite like it.—Philip Fracassi, author of Boys In the Valley


PRAISE FOR THE AUTHOR


“Malfi is horror’s Faulkner, and Small Town Horror might be his best novel yet. Stylish, dark, and with a haunting, salty atmosphere, this is a superb novel about how the ghosts of the past always dance with those of the present.” Gabino Iglesias, Bram Stoker and Shirley Jackson award-winning author of The Devil Takes You Home


“This is bedrock American horror fiction, sure to be a classic. Malfi deftly draws you down into the darkness of a group of friends in a small town (natch) who find themselves literally haunted by the secrets and mistakes of their shared past.” Chuck Wendig, New York Times bestselling author of Wanderers 


Ronald Malfi is a talented storyteller known for the quality of his writing and the way he brings an element of elegance to the genre, and Small Town Horror—relentlessly creepy, unapologetically dark, and surprisingly heartfelt—might just be his best novel yet—Locus Magazine 


“An eerie and deeply unsettling horror epic with faint shadows of Peter Straub and Robert R. McCammon flickering at the periphery . . . Small Town Horror is the kind of masterful and deftly written horror fiction that makes me fall in love with the genre all over again.” Eric LaRocca, Bram Stoker Award finalist, and author of Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke


“This isn’t only Malfi’s masterpiece, it’s a heroic swing at the Great American Novel, and will be nakedly terrifying to anyone who’s been a kid—and to anyone who’s grown up with regret. This is heavyweight horror, a total knockout.” Daniel Kraus, New York Times bestseller and author of Whalefall


“Stunningly good, with echoes of King, Bradbury, Straub, and McCammon, but somehow purely Malfi. Full of malevolence and dread, and peopled by truly compelling characters, the book locks in Malfi’s place as one of the best writers in the genre.”
Christopher Golden, ‘New York Times’ bestselling author of ‘Road of BONES’ and ‘Ararat’


“‘Black Mouth’ is good magic about dark magic: a powerful meeting between adulthood and childhood, the people we pretend to be and the people we have to be. Smart, character-driven horror.”
Andrew Pyper, author of ‘The Residence’ and ‘The Demonologist’


“Malfi has established himself as one of the all-time great horror writers, and ‘Black Mouth’ shows him working at the peak of his dark powers. Equally terrifying and heartbreaking, ‘Black Mouth’ is a book filled with terror, ghosts, and murder, but also hauntings of the heart, and the soul. Riveting, bloody, and cosmic, this novel will tear you apart in all the best ways.” 
Philip Fracassi, author of ‘Beneath a Pale Sky’


Malfi is a modern-day Algernon Blackwood… I’m gonna be talking about this book for years
JOSH MALERMAN, author of Bird Box


Part mystery, part ghost story, Come with Me chimes with rare beauty and page-turning brilliance. I surrendered to it completely.
Rio Youers, author of Lola on Fire


Shines as both a nightmare journey of shadows and secrets, and a poignant testimony to love and loss. I read it in a single day because I had no other choice: it’s that damn good.
Richard Chizmar, author of Gwendy’s Button Box