Lutie always wanted a pet ghost?but the devil’s in the details.

The Sarrazins have always stood apart from the rest of their Bayou-born neighbors. Almost as far as they prefer to stand from each other. Blessed?or cursed?with the uncanny ability to see beyond the spectral plane, Aurie has raised his children, Sol, Baz, and Lutie, in the tradition of the traiteur, finding wayward spirits and using his special gift to release them along Deadroads into the afterworld. The family, however, fractured by their clashing egos, drifted apart, scattered high and low across the continent.

But tragedy serves to bring them together. When Aurie, while investigating a series of ghastly (and ghostly) murders, is himself killed by a devil, Sol, EMT by day and traiteur by night, Baz, a traveling musician with a truly spiritual voice, and Lutie, combating her eerie visions with antipsychotics, are thrown headlong into a world of gory sprites, brilliant angels, and nefarious demons'small potatoes compared to reconciling their familial differences.

From the Louisiana swamps to the snowfields of the north and everywhere in between, Deadroads summons you onto a mysterious trail of paranormal proportions.

Skyhorse Publishing, under our Night Shade and Talos imprints, is proud to publish a broad range of Titles for readers interested in science fiction (space opera, time travel, hard SF, alien invasion, near-future dystopia), fantasy (grimdark, sword and sorcery, contemporary urban fantasy, steampunk, alternative history), and horror (zombies, vampires, and the occult and supernatural), and much more. While not every Title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller, a national bestseller, or a Hugo or Nebula award-winner, we are committed to publishing quality books from a diverse group of authors.

Robin Riopelle was born and raised on Canada’s west coast. In addition to writing fiction for adults, she is also an illustrator for children’s books. Deadroads is her first novel. Riopelle lives in Canada.

Robin Riopelle's profile page

"Deadroads is an amusement park of the undead: ghosts, killers (and killed), demons abound. Robin Riopelle remembers to keep the dark fantasy nice and dark."
?Andrew Pyper, author of The Demonologist

"Moves deftly between the flashbacks of three children growing up in southern swampland (here Bayou Country in the 1990s) and contemporary scenes of the hunt for an uncanny serial killer [...] Riopelle knows what she's doing."
?Faren Miller, Locus

"Vividly drawn [...] maintains a nice pace with more than a few surprises along the way."
?Monsters & Critics

"Entertaining, its mystery compelling, but it was also far more emotionally complex than I’d expected [...] If you enjoy supernatural fantasy and a good ghost story then Robin Riopelle’s debut Deadroads should suit you to a tee"
?A Fantastical Librarian

"...a vivid, languorous, chilling tale of the supernatural."
?Linda Poitevin, author of the Grigori Legacy series

?A ghost story more haunting than most, about a family more haunted than most. [?] Dangerously easy to sink into.”
?Kate Heartfield, writer and editor