Violet Lichen Books is thrilled to announce the acquisition of The Cellar Below the Cellar by Ivy Grimes, a delightfully weird and surreal coming-of-age, folk-horror novella inspired by the legend of Alpine winter witch Frau Perchta and the Russian fairy tale “Vasilisa the Beautiful.”
When Jane finds herself isolated in a small village in the woods, she must not only learn to become part of a strange community that hides dark secrets but also find the courage to face what waits for her below her grandmother’s house. The Cellar Below the Cellar seamlessly blends the dark and the playful, the domestic and the fantastic, while exploring themes of community, spirituality, and identity. For fans of Kelly Link, Karen Russell, and Barbara Comyns.
Marissa van Uden, Violet Lichen’s EiC, said: “I completely fell in love with Ivy’s wonderfully odd characters, but it was the narrator’s voice that captured me from the first page: Jane views the world in a way that is darkly funny, sincere, and disquieting all at the same time. This novella is filled with weird and unpredictable surprises, and I’m so excited to work with Ivy and share it with readers.”
Violet Lichen Books has distribution via Diamond Book Distributors and is an imprint of Apex Book Company, which has published award-winning titles such as Plague Birds by Jason Sanford (Nebula Award Finalist for Best Novel and Philip K. Dick Award Finalist), Danged Black Thing by Eugen Bacon (Philip K. Dick Award finalist 2023), and the Weird horror cult hit Greener Pastures by Michael Wehunt.
Ivy Grimes lives in Georgia, and her stories have been published in The Baffler, Vastarien, Interzone, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and elsewhere. Her collection Glass Stories was published by Grimscribe Press (2024), and her horror novella Star Shapes was released in January 2025 by Spooky House Press.
The Cellar Below the Cellar is scheduled for release in early 2026 and is the second slated release in Violet Lichen’s lineup, following ECO24: The Year’s Best Speculative Ecofiction anthology in November 2025.
