A book release is always an exciting thing, and this month, horror fans have a lot to look forward to with the release of Philip Fracassi’s dark slasher novel The Autumn Springs Retirement Home Massacre. Releasing through Tor Nightfire, Fracassi’s novel hits shelves on September 30th. The official book synopsis sets the stage for a uniquely bloody tale:
Rose DuBois is not your average final girl.
Rose is in her late 70s, living out her golden years at the Autumn Springs Retirement Home.
When one of her friends dies alone in her apartment, Rose isn’t too concerned. Accidents happen, especially at this age!
Then another resident drops dead. And another. With bodies stacking up, Rose can’t help but wonder: are these accidents? Old age? Or something far more sinister?
Together with her best friend Miller, Rose begins to investigate. The further she digs, the more convinced she becomes: there’s a killer on the loose at Autumn Springs, and if she isn’t careful, Rose may be their next victim.
The novel is a genre-blender, mixing supernatural horror with gory slasher, and psychological thriller with a haunted house novel. The result is a fresh take on the horror novel, and unlike anything currently out there.
ScreenRant was lucky enough to get an exclusive excerpt of Fracassi’s novel before its release next week, and we’re bringing it to you. Beware: it’s not for the faint of heart or squeamish of stomach.
Excerpt Of The Autumn Springs Retirement Home Massacre
By Philip Fracassi
Beneath the covers, Angela goes still.
She stops breathing, stops thinking. Her blood turns to ice.
Something… something in the other room…
Moved.
Now she hears more sounds in the dark. Sounds like… the shuffling of clothes?
And then—
Creeaak.
Was that the living room’s closet door?
Feeling like a scared, silly little girl, Angela defiantly pushes herself up on one elbow and turns to look across the bedroom, glaring at the door which leads to the living room.
And there, framed in the open doorway, is a shadow darker than the night.
A person.
Standing there. Watching her.
“Hello?” she says, voice choked with fear.
Terror, alive and ice-cold, crawls into Angela’s bed, snakes beneath her fluffy cream nightgown, and settles itself atop her body like a slinking, hairless cat. “What do you want?” she whimpers, lips trembling. She debates reaching for her glasses so she can see better, but she’s too afraid to move, too afraid to do anything that might make that person in the doorway become more real; shatter the threadbare illusion that this could all be a dream, a horrible nightmare.
Then the figure—clad all in black, Angela is certain—walks quickly toward her.
“Oh, God!” she yells and, with a sudden burst of energy—of bravery—her survival instincts kick in and she rips away the sheets, throws her legs from the bed. She has no weapon—no stray scissors or knitting needles, not even a dulled letter opener—but she thinks if she can get to the front door, pull it open and scream for help, perhaps this intruder will run. Perhaps they’ll leave her alone.
This is what she thinks. This is what she desperately hopes.
But as she gains her feet, a fist grips the front of her gown and a ghastly black mask stares down at her, only inches from her face.
“Leave me alone!” she screams, and slaps weakly at the intruder’s head.
There’s a laugh—a strange, horrible chuckle from beneath that fabric—and then Angela is pushed away. Hard. She falls backward into the nightstand, the edge of which digs sharply into her hip. The bedside lamp crashes to the floor, along with her glasses and the well-worn paperback she’d borrowed from the library, an old Fannie Flagg book she’d read several times over in her eighty-plus years.
She catches her balance but is immediately grabbed once more, this time by the neck, where a strong gloved hand squeezes, harder and harder, until her throat is forced closed. Her tongue juts from her gaping mouth as her breath and voice are stolen away, her trachea slowly crushed. She gags, tries desperately to pull away, but the intruder simply spins her around like a doll and shoves her across the room, toward the open door.
Stumbling, she smacks into the doorframe and hears—actually hears—something snap in her hip, as if a precocious child had pulled the trigger of a loaded cap gun. She falls hard to the ground, pain shooting through her side like fire.
The front door! her mind screams. Angela immediately begins crawling away from the devil in her room, this would-be murderer. But the pain is too much, and her throat burns horribly. She tries to call out but realizes that something is very wrong with her throat. Something inside her has been badly broken, damaged to such an extent that she can hardly breathe, much less cry for help.
Even worse, based on the searing pain and the way the bone is shifting down there, she knows that her hip is truly broken. As certain as death and taxes. Her legs, meanwhile, have gone numb, powerless.
Realizing that it’s useless, Angela stops her feeble attempt at escape and rolls slowly, painfully onto her back, desperately trying to pull in oxygen as she wheezes on the floor like a broken doll. With growing horror, she watches as the masked killer approaches slowly, almost casually, from the bedroom, head cocked, as if studying her with curiosity.
I don’t want to die, she thinks, her mind wild with panic and fear. Please, God, I don’t…
And then she remembers.
How stupid she’d been! Why hadn’t she thought of it before?
Ever since her 80th birthday, Angela has worn a Medical Alert device around her neck. It was tasteful—a simple black square with a button in the middle—and she’d attached it to a heavy silver chain that she thought quite pretty.
She’d never had to use it, and wouldn’t have it at all if her granddaughter hadn’t insisted (even if it was more for the girl’s peace of mind than her elderly grandmother’s).
But she could use it now. All she had to do was press the darn button and emergency services would be sent—sent right away!
As the dark figure steps closer, Angela digs her fingers beneath the neckline of her gown, reaching… reaching…
That strange laughter comes once again: a high-pitched, muffled chuckle from the killer who has invaded her home, from the one who is even now dropping to a knee in front of her, a single gloved hand thrust forward, as if proposing.
Even in the dark, and even without her glasses, Angela sees the familiar silver necklace in the killer’s fist, the onyx rectangle of the Medical Alert device swinging back-and-forth from the chain like a pendulum… a hypnotist’s charm.
Tears run down her face as she stares at the chain, at her last gasp of salvation.
Well, that’s it then, she thinks sadly.
That’s it.
Even so, hating to be defeated so easily, and refusing to simply give up, Angela rolls onto her belly once more and crawls, inch-by-inch, toward the front door, which might as well be a million miles away. After a few feet, however, her broken hip is screaming in agony, and her throat is all but completely closed, restricting her breath to nothing but short, raspy, painful gasps.
Broken windpipe, maybe, she thinks, sickened by the taste of blood on her tongue.
Her tired heart is pounding—pounding, pounding—in her chest. Going fast, much too fast, and thumping so loud that it creates a dull, rhythmic drumbeat in her ears.
But still she crawls.
Only when a pair of heavy-looking, black combat boots step into her path does she accept defeat. As if relieved that she can finally give up—finally give in—Angela sighs and lets her forehead drop to the floor, rest lightly against the cool, brittle carpet.
She is resigned to whatever comes next. All the fight has been beaten out of her, and all the years of her life have been whittled down to this strange end. This impossible murder.
Owen… she thinks. My sweet Owen. Perhaps in the next—
The killer raises one thick-soled boot high above Angela’s prone body then stomps down onto the back of the old woman’s frail neck, snapping three vertebrae as if they were nothing more than dried-out chicken bones, thereby abruptly ending Angela Forrest’s long, joy-filled life.
Horror & Sci-Fi Fans Will Be Familiar With Philip Fracassi
Genre fans deep into horror and science fiction will no doubt be familiar with the name Philip Fracassi. The novelist and screenwriter has started carving out a name for himself over the past decade, beginning with short stories and novellas in magazines and publications such as Nightmare Magazine and Black Static. In 2021, his short story collection Beneath a Pale Sky was even nominated for a Bram Stoker Award.
In the past few years, he’s moved to novels and immediately made a splash in the horror space. His 2023 book Boys in the Valley, a historical coming-of-age supernatural thriller, was nominated for a British Fantasy Award. More recently, his novel The Third Rule of Time Travel was released earlier this year and is one of the best sci-fi books of 2025.
With The Autumn Springs Retirement Home Massacre, he brings it back to horror, his first and most well-loved world. With it releasing at the end of this month, Fracassi’s book arrives just in time for anyone looking for a unique setting for their next spooky season horror read.