Novel-Verse

Read The Locked Box, a gripping free mystery and noir short story online. Follow Detective Julian Vance as a mysterious waterlogged mahogany box arrives on his desk, locked with a padlock he threw into the harbor five years ago.

Read Shallow Graves, a gripping free mystery and noir short story online. Follow Detective Julian Vance as he struggles to bury a blackmailer in the frozen woods, haunted by the cynical advice of the victim’s projection.

Read The Vanishing Act, a gripping free mystery and noir short story online. Follow Detective Julian Vance as he investigates the sudden disappearance of a magician from a locked safe, only to find the body of his long-lost partner inside.

Read Three Days to Disappear, a gripping free mystery and noir short story online. Follow Detective Julian Vance as he races against a seventy-two hour countdown after receiving a mysterious obituary predicting his own murder.

Read The Silence of the Valley, a gripping free mystery and noir short story online. Follow Detective Julian Vance as he investigates a series of mysterious disappearances in a remote, snow-bound mountain valley where sound itself seems to vanish.

Read Red Ink, a gripping free mystery and noir short story online. Follow Detective Julian Vance as he investigates a blackmail letter written in the fresh blood of a partner declared dead twelve years ago.

Read The Smoke and the Mirror, a gripping free mystery and noir short story online. Follow Detective Julian Vance as he tracks a legendary thief who leaves his own reflection frozen in a glass mirror at the crime scene.

Read Cold Case on 5th Street, a gripping free mystery and noir short story online. Follow Detective Silas Vance on his final night before retirement as a record-breaking storm uncovers a long-buried secret on 5th Street.

Read The Enchanted Compass, a breathtaking and gripping free fantasy and magical realism short story online. Follow Mara, a cartographer in the coastal town of Solace, as she uses a magical compass to find her lost grandfather and save her town from a memory-erasing fog.

Read Feather and Flame, a breathtaking and gripping free fantasy short story online. Follow Silas, a scribe of the Phoenix Order, as he risks everything to preserve the last ash feather before the eternal flame consumes his city.