Laurel Hightower Books In Order

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Short Stories/Novellas

Publication Order of Collections

Publication Order of DarkLit Books

Publication Order of Dark Tide Horror Novellas Books

Publication Order of Split Scream Books

Publication Order of Anthologies

Laurel Hightower is a horror fiction novelist who grew up in Kentucky and went to college in Tennessee and California before she moved back home. She currently makes her home in horse country alongside her husband and son and their Pitbull.

Laurel published “Whispers in the Dark” her debut novel in 2018 and now has at least eight works to her name. Her first attempt was truly awful and it will never see the light of day but she has since seen some significant improvements in her writing.
Outside of her writing, she works a day job in a midsize firm as a paralegal and usually writes at night and wrangles litigators by day. Laurel can usually be found writing into the late hours of the night as long as her toddler will allow it.
She has also co-edited “We Are Wolves,” the charity anthology in addition to an identity horror anthology titled “The Dead Inside.”

A beer and bourbon girl, she is a huge fan of true-life ghost stories and horror movies. She can sometimes be found on social media posting cute pictures of her kids and dogs.

Like many novelists, Laurel Hightower has a very similar background to her contemporaries.

Her mother was a writer but surprisingly, writing works for public consumption was something she hated for a long while. It was not because it was not a cool thing to do while she was a kid or that there was something wrong with it.
The big reason was that she never thought of herself as a very creative person as rather than stories, all she loved were accounting, spreadsheets, and legal stuff.

As a child growing up, she wrote a lot but it was not until she was doing her final year of her degree while working a full-time job, that she realized she wanted to become a writer.
Laurel suddenly had all manner of characters in her head whether she applied herself to it or not.

Now that she is a paralegal she does not think she will ever become a full-time author since she loves the routine and certainty too much.

Moreover, she loves her job too much and still cannot consider how hard it would be to live with limited means, which she would have to do for a while as a full-time author.

As for how she got into the horror genre, Laurel Hightower has said that she has always loved ghost stories and never could get enough of them.
As such, it only made sense that when she decided to start writing stories, she gravitated toward horror and ghost stories.

Even though many people told her that it was almost impossible to sell horror fiction works, it was her first love and there was no way she would write anything else.

She has over the years expanded her definition of horror and believes there are just so many subgenres to invent and explore, that there is no way she will ever run out of material to write.

Laurel gets her inspiration from many different sources. Her brother inspires her to take no prisoners, her sister inspires her to be kinder to herself and her son inspires her to be adventurous, patient, and kind.
As for her peers, they inspire her to keep pushing but to also take a breather whenever she needs it.

Laurel Hightowers’ novel “Whispers in the Dark” is a fascinating work of fiction that tells the story of a trained killer named Rose McFarland, a Memphis S.W.A.T. sniper with a secret.
Her colleagues know all about the house fire that killed her brother and father sixteen years earlier and left her with ugly burn marks under her clothes.

Her bosses know that she had spent two years in rehab learning to cope with trauma and healing.

However, no one knows about the angry spirits that she battled in childhood, the visions that drove her there and the things that made her doubt her sanity and alienated her from her own family.

When her estranged half-brother Charlie Ackers takes a bullet from her rifle, she unwittingly triggers several events that result in some increasingly dangerous paranormal visitations for her family.

Charlie refuses to stay in the grave and it is not long before the ghost from her past are reaching out to her present life. Family she believed was long buried and people she killed while at work are coming back to haunt her every waking hour.

Below by Laurel Hightower is a fascinating and unsettling work of fiction that will give you the creeps long after you read the last page.

The lead in the novel is a newly divorced woman named Addy who goes all alone to a horror convention and gets into a weird encounter that shakes her up.

She has always been haunted by the voice of her former husband, even though he is not dead and nothing about him is paranormal.

Nonetheless, the man lives rent-free in her head much of the time and provides unwanted advice, judgments, and opinions at the most inopportune moments, especially when she does not have personal conviction.
Experiencing some strange electrical moments, She parks at a rest stop to calm her nerves and while relaxing for a bit, she meets a man who is a little too friendly.

Her new friend is a trucker and he could not have been more charming as he offers to help her navigate through the treacherous mountain roads of West Virginia.

Addy decides to trust the stranger but then a bizarre creature with haunting red eyes gets between them, forcing her to make a very difficult decision.

Laurel Hightower’s novel “Crossroads” introduces the lead as Chris who unexpectedly lost her son in a tragic accident two years earlier and is yet to heal from it.

Chris is coping with the loss of his son by regularly visiting the spot where he lost his life, as she believes she feels closer to him and often talks to him about her day.
But after an accidental injury, she stumbled upon a few drops of her blood, and out of nowhere, she can talk to her son and sometimes she can see him.

But how long will the dew drops of blood keep her son there? Maybe she would have to give a lot more to bring back Trey completely.

It is an emotional story and it is incredible how Chris is portrayed with all her flaws and strengths, relatability, and grief, which all make her a very compelling character.
Her desperation and pain are palpable which makes the impact of the story more heartbreaking just like a sledgehammer to the guts.