Pumpkin: A Halloween Short Story

by Bill Pronzini

The first Amanda Sutter knew of the pumpkin, the strange pumpkin, was a day in late September. Something was wrong. Amanda felt it. She couldn't have explained that, though; it was just an aura, a sense of something emanating from the pumpkin that made her uneasy, brought primitive little stirrings of fear and disgust into her mind. Amanda remembered something her uncle, who had been a Presbyterian minister, had said to her when she was a child: Evil takes many forms, Mandy. Evil shares our bed and eats at our own table. Evil is everywhere, in every size and shape...

Genres: Ebooks, Horror

14 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 25, 2012

About the author

Mystery Writers of America Awards "Grand Master" 2008
Shamus Awards Best Novel winner (1999) for Boobytrap
Edgar Awards Best Novel nominee (1998) for A Wasteland of Strangers
Shamus Awards Best Novel nominee (1997) for Sentinels
Shamus Awards "The Eye" (Lifetime achievment award) 1987
Shamus Awards Best Novel winner (1982) for Hoodwink

Married to author Marcia Muller.

Pseudonyms:
Robert Hart Davis (collaboration with Jeffrey M. Wallmann)
Jack Foxx
William Jeffrey (collaboration with Jeffrey M. Wallmann)
Alex Saxon

Reviews

[Phil Zimmerman · Rating 1 out of 5]

I didn't like this story very much. A bland story of a haunted pumpkin. Maybe I missed something, but none of it connected with me.

[Thomas Bruso · Rating 4 out of 5]

A shirt but effective mystery. As always, Pronzini keeps his readers gripped until the very end of the story.