Joan Hall Hovey Books In Order

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Short Stories/Novellas

Publication Order of Collections

Publication Order of Anthologies

As well as penning suspense novels, Joan Hall Hovey’s work has appeared in numerous publications including Seek, Atlantic Advocate, Home Life, Mystery Scene, Murderous Ink Press Inc and various other magazines and anthologies. Her short story, Dark Reunion, was anthologized in Investigating Women. Two of her novels, Nowhere to Hide and Chill Waters both won best thriller awards.

The author has conducted workshops and given talks on creative writing at various schools and libraries, including New Brunswick Community College, and the University of New Brunswick.

Her passion is writing.

“I’ve always been drawn to the dark side of the human psyche, and devoured books by Edgar Allan Poe, Shirley Jackson growing up,and of course later authors like Stephen King, Joyce Carol Oates, Patricia Highsmith and Ruth Rendell. And so many more. My genre is psychological suspense, often with threads of paranormal and mystery.”

Joan Hall Hovey lives in Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada with her calico cat Bella.

“The Deepest Dark” is a stand alone novel that was released in the year 2014. Author Abby Miller, after the deaths of Corey (her husband), and Ellie (her ten year old daughter), sinks even deeper down into depression. She ponders suicide as a way to be back with them, and to finally end her ceaseless pain.

In a final effort to find any peace, she drives to Loon Lake where they had their last vacation together, wanting to just believe they’ll be waiting there for her, if only in spirit, anyway. Barring that, the pills she was given to sleep by Dr. Gregory, are in her purse, too.

The cabin located at Loon Lake was the secret hideaway that she shared with Corey, and not even Karen, Abby’s sister and whom she is close to, knows where it’s at. However somebody certainly does, and he is one of the three men that escaped from Pennington prison. All of them are dangerous predators going to stop at absolutely nothing to get what they want, and to not be sent back to prison. They have nothing to lose already, having committed the worst crimes of all, already.

Unknowingly, she is on a collision course with evil itself. The choice to live or die is soon going to be ripped right out of her hands.

Readers found this novel to be disturbing on multiple levels and were able to read it in just a single sitting, being riveted to each page and the story line. Roach and Abby are both strongly developed as characters and it is easy to empathize with Abby.

“Tragic Spawn” is a stand alone novel that was released in the year 2015. Melanie Snow, a therapist, is heading to her office as her Honda gets hit by a dark-colored van and sent spinning off into the ditch, where it then catches fire. The driver just keeps going. A passerby pulls her from the car just an instant before it blows up.

Melanie, waking up from the coma nine days later, and is devastated to learn that she is now blind. While she struggles to cope with this new reality, living as a blind woman, her fragile state of mind gets threatened further by a madman that is stalking and strangling disabled women. His first two victims are mentally challenged and Detective Matt O’Leary, that carries a torch for Melanie (despite her being engaged to somebody else) tells himself she’s not the murderer’s targeted prey.

However then a woman that lost a leg to cancer gets murdered, and another physically disabled woman is getting stalked. Even with the entire town in terror, she refuses to live her life in fear and opens up her practice in the basement of her own home, as she does have a living to earn.

Detective Matt O’Leary also has to figure a way to keep her safe until this monster gets caught. How, though? Her door’s now open to the public, enabling the killer to be able to walk right through anytime that he decides to.

“And Then He Was Gone” is a stand alone novel that was released in the year 2016. Where did Adam go? Julie Raynes’ husband went missing six months ago. Confused and devastated, she refuses to believe he would just leave her voluntarily, even though her best friend believes differently. But, her Aunt Alice (who is a psychic), tells her that Adam has been killed, and when she tells Julie how she knows this, any hope that he is still alive, vanishes.

The cops are starting to believe that Adam Raynes was murdered. And their prime suspect, is Julie. Her life is left in ruins, and she vows to hunt down whomever is responsible for his murder and make them pay for this crime.

At the same time, David Gray, who is a young man that was pulled out of a lake by a fisherman when he was just nine years old, wakes from a coma after close to two decades. What Julie doesn’t know is that Adam and David share a dark connection. It is a darkness that threatens to devour each of them, in a horrifying race with death.