My Story
My name is Mark French, and I write Noir‑flavoured horror and dark mysteries about ordinary people crushed between progress and something hungry in the dark. I grew up on Stephen King, then fell for classic Noir, so my stories marry creeping dread with hard‑edged, working‑class grit.
I’ve been telling stories since I was a kid, but I’ve spent the last few years pushing toward publication, earning an English scholarship and an honourable mention in the NYC Midnight Short Story Challenge along the way. My column, Second Saturday Stories, held a recurring audience for my fiction, and now I bring that same voice home to my own corner of the web.​
I’m in the final stages of my debut novel, Skeleton Unburdened, and I publish shorter, self‑contained horror and mystery tales—like a nineteenth‑century family shattered when their father comes back from the mines something more than a man. Take a tour of the free stories, then dig into the paid ones if you’re ready for something that stays with you.​
To keep up with new releases, behind‑the‑scenes peeks, and bonus stories, sign up for my newsletter and follow me on Instagram @markfrench_fiction
Blog
Ink & Shadows: A Professional Horrorist's Journey
Free horror lives here. Readers will also gain insight into questions like where do I get my ideas from? What kinds of problems have I overcome? And what inspired my character creations? Writers will gain tips I've used to polish my writing and tell a better story. Plus you can find out what a Horrorist actually is.
Skeleton
Unburdened
Available soon
Autumn 1922. In the shadow of World War One an evil is growing in North Bay, a small northern Ontario town nursing scars leftover from the Great War.
Percy Slate, once a sharp private eye, now wanders through life haunted by the spectre of his late wife Louise and a past steeped in regret. Percy is hounded by his brother-in-law Harry who gives Percy a choice: exile from the city or a jail cell for murder.
Percy escapes into the labyrinth of the city, embedding himself in one final case. Tasked with finding a missing doctor, Percy must channel the detective he used to be while out running Harry Clemens and his legion of police, the mob debt tied to his wife’s death, and the ghost of Louise, who refuses to leave him in peace.
As Percy spirals further into the dark underbelly of North Bay, he becomes the target of a plot masterminded by a sadistic army Major hellbent on creating a living weapon used to ignite racial hatred, fanning flames of fear that threaten to engulf the city.
As the case wears on, Percy spirals further into a private hell that he may never turn away from.
In Skeleton Unburdened the present is shattered by the echoes from the past, and the line between friend and enemy is blurred in a wash of blood and torment. When ghosts of the past won’t stay dead, everyone is burdened by the skeletons in their closet.
