The Spirit Room is a different kind of Southern Gothic.
Nicole Givens Kurtz delivers stories from the world left by crumbling plantations, Jim Crow, and generational poverty. Gone are the ancient mansions and good ol’ boys, replaced with southern streets and battles for justice.
The stories take place in cities you ’ll recognize: Knoxville, Charlotte, Baltimore, etc… But Kurtz takes us behind the curtain to reveal the indomitable spirit of those living on the wrong side of town, to show us the battle we ’ re aware of, but never quite see.
The Spirit Room isn ’t a ghost story collection. It’ s a celebration of the Southern heart, the pride and persistence that keeps fighting no matter what pain it endures. Here amongst the horror and the history, you ’ll find tales of the spirit’ s defiance and determination. This is Southern Gothic at its purest and finest.
The Spirit Room is a collection you don ’t want to miss.
Nicole Givens Kurtz has been called “a genre polymath who does crime, horror, and science fiction and fantasy (Book Riot). ” Her horror weird western, Sisters of the Wild Sage, was included in Book Riot’ s “The Best of the West: 8 Alternative History Westerns. ” She ’ s a two-time Atomacon Palmetto Scribe Award winner (2021 and 2022), a recipient of the Ladies in Horror Grant, and a recipient of the HWA Diversity Grant. With over 20 years in publishing, Nicole has over 50 published short stories and is the editor of the groundbreaking anthologies SLAY: Stories of the Vampire Noire and Blackened Roots: An Anthology of the Undead with Tonia Ransom. In 2025, Kurtz’s own publishing house, Mocha Memoirs Press, won the Horror Writers Association’s Specialty Press Award, given to a specialty publisher whose work has substantially contributed to the horror genre. To learn more, visit nicolegivenskurtz.net.
