🎪 Night Terrors: The Devil’s Big Top A Carnival Horror Anthology Presented by Lucien Vale Tagline: The show goes on... even in Hell. Step right up, dear reader, and take your seat beneath the bleeding velvet tent. The lights are dim, the crowd is hushed, and the Ringmaster is waiting with a smile too wide to be human. Welcome to The Devil’s Big Top —a collection of thirteen twisted tales from the haunted midway where laughter dies in the throat and every encore demands a soul. From the moment the calliope begins its cursed song, the carnival awakens. Mirrors breathe. Fire eats back. The cotton candy tastes like ash. The carousel horses remember who they used to be. And the Ringmaster—Lucien Vale himself—welcomes you into his eternal show, where every performance ends with applause and regret. Inside these pages you’ll find: 🎭 Thirteen interconnected stories , each a macabre “act” beneath the tent—featuring haunted performers, cursed spectators, and the dark machinery that keeps the carnival alive. 🔥 Horrors of spectacle and sin , from the painted faces of eternal clowns to the blinding flame of a fire-eater who learns that hunger burns both ways. 🩸 Psychological and supernatural dread , blending gothic atmosphere with cinematic pacing and poetic language that will haunt your imagination long after the curtain falls. 🎪 A living mythos , told through the Ringmaster’s voice—a narrator equal parts confessor, monster, and magician—binding every tale into one infernal performance that refuses to end. Readers of Clive Barker’s Books of Blood , Ray Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes , and Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities will feel right at home under this tent. Each story stands alone, yet together they form a grand design—a carnival that devours its creator and resurrects with every audience brave enough to believe. Night Terrors: The Devil’s Big Top is not just an anthology—it’s a ritual, an invitation, a dare. Open it at midnight. Read aloud if you must. But remember: once you buy your ticket, you’re part of the act. Inside, you’ll encounter: The Ringmaster’s Smile — where charm becomes possession. - Painted Faces — where a clown’s laughter hides centuries of grief. - The Strongman’s Shadow , The Fire Eater , The Fortune Teller’s Curse , and more—thirteen acts of dread, each tied by blood, belief, and the echo of applause. Every light in the carnival is a soul. Every shadow wants its turn on stage. And when the final curtain falls, when the music fades and the smoke clears, you’ll realize: the carnival doesn’t travel to towns. It travels to you. Whether you’re drawn by the music, the mystery, or the madness, remember the Ringmaster’s final warning: You bought your ticket. You stayed until the end. Now the carnival belongs to you. A haunting, lyrical, and beautifully grotesque horror anthology from Lucien Vale—master of ceremonies for the damned. So come one, come all. The calliope is playing. The mirrors are open. The tent is waiting. The show goes on... even in Hell.