MEET DANIELLE
“I’ve imagined monsters in the corner for as long as I can remember…”
The first monster appeared on a winter night in the late 70’s, in the town where I grew up outside San Francisco. The rain had drizzled on and off for three days, but the constant patter on the windows had finally stopped.
Every noise reverberated in my brain and sent my pulse drumming. I tossed and turned with each creak, every whisper. At the sound of the floor in my room groaning, I bolted upright. Heart pounding, I squinted into the dark.
A scream stopped cold in my throat when I saw him.
Practicing what I preach…
He stood as tall as the door. A dark hood covered his face, revealing only the shadows of deep-set eye sockets. Long sleeves draped past his hands, hiding what I was sure were long, sharp claws. The metal headboard dug into my spine as I clenched the covers in damp fists. He stepped forward. A tiny whimper escaped my lips when I tried to scream. I was frozen. But soon the room grew silent. Eyes slowly adjusting to the darkness, I forced myself to look again.
The man had melted into a robe hanging on the back of the closet door--his head the hood of my green terrycloth bathrobe, his eyes nothing more than shadows in the fabric’s folds, his arms the robe’s sleeves.
Trembling slightly, I turned on the porcelain fairy lamp on the bedside table and the light cast the room in a pale amber glow. There was no man. Instead, the room was just as it had been in daylight--the small desk under the window, stuffed animals and scattered toys scattered across the carpet from that day's play.
The monster was in my mind. He still is…
“Monsters are real... they live inside us, and sometimes, they win.” —Stephen King
Author Bio
Danielle Girard is the USA Today and Amazon #1 bestselling author of sixteen novels, including the Annabelle Schwartzman Series, Chasing Darkness, and The Rookie Club series. Her books have won the Barry Award, the Romantic Times Reviewers’ Choice Award, and White Out was in the top 100 bestselling e-books of 2020. In addition, two of her titles have been optioned for screen. Her next thriller, Pinky Swear, will be out from the Emily Bestler Imprint of Atria books February 24, 2026.
Danielle is also the creator and host of the Killer Women podcast, where she interviews the women who write today’s best crime fiction. A graduate of Cornell University, Danielle received her MFA in Creative Writing at Queens University of Charlotte, North Carolina. When she’s not traveling, Danielle lives in the mountains of Montana.
