The Night Birds

By Christopher Golden

Book Overview

The next gripping, atmospheric horror novel from New York Times bestselling author Christopher Golden, set in a deteriorated, half-sunken freighter ship off the coast of Galveston, TX.

Charlie Book and Ruby Cahill have history. After their love ended in heartbreak years ago, they never expected to see each other again.

Now, as part of his work for the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, Book lives aboard the Christabel, a 19th century freighter half-sunken off the shore of Galveston. Over many years, a massive forest of mangrove trees has grown up through the deck of the ship, creating a startlingly beautiful enigma Book calls the Floating Forest. As a powerful storm churns through the Gulf, he intends to sleep on board as usual.

But when he arrives at the dock, he's stunned to find Ruby there waiting for him. And she's not alone. With her are a mysterious woman and her infant child, asking Book to hide them safely aboard the Christabel while they're on the run. Only it isn't the police who are after them, it's a coven of witches the woman, Mae, has fled, stealing away the helpless infant for whom the coven had hideous plans...or so Mae claims.

It's lunacy and Book wants nothing to do with it. But after the way he and Ruby ended things, and the unspoken pain between them, he can't refuse. Yet even as he brings them out to the ruined ship and its floating forest, there are shadowed figures looming back in Galveston, waiting out the storm. And despite the worsening wind and rain, the night birds are flying, scouring the coastline for their prey.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1250285917
• ISBN13: 9781250285911
• Release Date: May 2025
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press
• Length: 304 Pages
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.2" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Witches and Sunken ships!

I will say that the setting of this book is absolutely creeptastic! The cover is quite eye catching and the description of the that terrible night with a hurricane going on, getting worse, people on a derelict ship that contains its own little floating mangrove forest, maniac birds, and disturbing witchy weaver women on the hunt for a baby for despicable sacrifice (and the trail of bodies left behind them!). It is a reunion for Ruby and Book and a second chance for Book to rise to the occasion and be the man that Ruby needs. Despite the seriousness of the situation though, it takes agonizingly long for the for the full story to get told so I could find out all the whys of who wants the baby and what has happened in the time between Ruby and Mia's frantic running to their arrival with Book at the sunken ship. I still was on the edge of my seat as the horrors rose higher and higher as the storm got worse, culminating in a climax that was heartbreaking, with all the nightmares becoming true and the sacrifices made to try and save little baby Aiden. Very dark and tragic and memorable and top notch horror, though I think that it would be cool to see the Cristabel though not with the night weavers on board or during a storm. I definitely like this author's books which are quite nicely creepy horror with a hit of thriller to keep me reading long into night!