Spooky, scary season is upon us—the best month of the year gives us the best vibes (you can try to fight me on this one). I may be a scaredy cat, but that doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate the spooky nature of Halloween, nor does it mean I wouldn’t read a horror book.
For this year, these books I picked for my bookstore’s Halloween range from classics like The Exorcist and Carrie and foreign ones like Ring (exactly what you think it is) and Tender is the Night. A touch on different subject matter to fill your time in spooky October.
These are the books on my bookstore’s Halloween display this year:
| FEMINIST HORROR |
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A Certain Hunger by Chelsea G. Summers
“A satire of early foodieism, a critique of how gender is defined, and a showcase of virtuoso storytelling, Chelsea G. Summers’ A Certain Hunger introduces us to the food world’s most charming psychopath and an exciting new voice in fiction.”
Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado
“Earthy and otherworldly, antic and sexy, queer and caustic, comic and deadly serious, Her Body and Other Parties swings from horrific violence to the most exquisite sentiment. In their explosive originality, these stories enlarge the possibilities of contemporary fiction.”
The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell
“When newly widowed Elsie is sent to see out her pregnancy at her late husband’s crumbling country estate, The Bridge, what greets her is far from the life of wealth and privilege she was expecting . . .”
“his is the story of an apparently young, amnesiac girl whose alarmingly unhuman needs and abilities lead her to a startling conclusion: She is in fact a genetically modified, 53-year-old vampire.”
Mary: An Awakening of Terror by Nat Cassidy
A middle-aged woman moves back to her hometown to reconnect with her past, but starts getting “visions of terrifying, mutilated specters [that] overwhelm her with increasing regularity and begins auto-writing strange thoughts and phrases. She discovers that these experiences are echoes of an infamous serial killer.”
| FOREIGN LANGUAGE HORROR |
|---|
“A mysterious videotape warns that the viewer will die in one week unless a certain, unspecified act is performed. Exactly one week after watching the tape, four teenagers die one after another of heart failure. ”
“Spirals… this town is contaminated with spirals…”
Tender is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica
“Working at the local processing plant, Marcos is in the business of slaughtering humans —though no one calls them that anymore.”
Fever Dream by Samanta Schweblin
“Fever Dream is a nightmare come to life, a ghost story for the real world, a love story and a cautionary tale.”
Battle Royale by Koushun Takami
“In a dystopian future Japan, forty-two junior high school students are outfitted with weapons and bid to kill one another until there is only one left standing.”
| CLASSICS |
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“Stephen King’s legendary debut, about a teenage outcast and the revenge she enacts on her classmates.”
The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty
“Inspired by a true story of a child’s demonic possession in the 1940s, The Exorcist focuses on Regan, the eleven-year-old daughter of a movie actress residing in Washington, D.C. A small group of overwhelmed yet determined individuals must rescue Regan from her unspeakable fate, and the drama that ensues is gripping and unfailingly terrifying.”
The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
“It is the story of four seekers who arrive at a notoriously unfriendly pile called Hill House: Dr. Montague, an occult scholar looking for solid evidence of a “haunting”; Theodora, his lighthearted assistant; Eleanor, a friendless, fragile young woman well acquainted with poltergeists; and Luke, the future heir of Hill House. At first, their stay seems destined to be merely a spooky encounter with inexplicable phenomena. But Hill House is gathering its powers—and soon it will choose one of them to make its own.”
“A bone-chilling story about evil that exists far beyond the grave
“Mary Shelley’s timeless gothic novel presents the epic battle between man and monster at its greatest literary pitch. In trying to create life, the young student Victor Frankenstein unleashes forces beyond his control, setting into motion a long and tragic chain of events that brings Victor to the very brink of madness. How he tries to destroy his creation, as it destroys everything Victor loves, is a powerful story of love, friendship, scientific hubris, and horror.”
| GENERAL HORROR |
|---|
“Ignatius Perrish spent the night drunk and doing terrible things. He woke up the next morning with a thunderous hangover, a raging headache . . . and a pair of horns growing from his temples.”
My Best Friend’s Exorcism by Grady Hendrix
“1988. Charleston, South Carolina. High school sophomores Abby and Gretchen have been best friends since fourth grade. . But after an evening of skinny-dipping goes disastrously wrong, Gretchen begins to act… different. She’s moody. She’s irritable. And bizarre incidents keep happening whenever she’s nearby.”
House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
“A young family moves into a small home on Ash Tree Lane where they discover something is terribly wrong: their house is bigger on the inside than it is on the outside.”
White Is for Witching by Helen Oyeyemi
“At once an unforgettable mystery and a meditation on race, nationality, and family legacies, White is for Witching is a boldly original, terrifying, and elegant novel by a prodigious talent…set in the strange Silver family house.”
Dark Harvest by Norman Partridge
“Halloween, 1963. They call him the October Boy, or Ol’ Hacksaw Face, or Sawtooth Jack. Whatever the name, everybody in this small Midwestern town knows who he is. How he rises from the cornfields every Halloween, a butcher knife in his hand, and makes his way toward town, where gangs of teenage boys eagerly await their chance to confront the legendary nightmare. Both the hunter and the hunted, the October Boy is the prize in an annual rite of life and death.”
| WITCHY ROMANCES |
|---|
“Erin Sterling casts a delightful spell with a spine-tingling romance full of wishes, witches, and hexes gone wrong.”
Payback’s A Witch by Lana Harper
“A queer witchy romcom about a witch returning home to fulfill familial duties and spend time with her best friend, but finds herself avenging her best friend’s heart and falling for the badass Talia. ”
Witchful Thinking by Celestine Martin
“Love is the trickiest spell of all.”
The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna
“A warm and uplifting novel about an isolated witch whose opportunity to embrace a quirky new family–and a new love–changes the course of her life.”
The Kiss Curse by Erin Sterling
“Welcome to Spooky Season!! The follow-up to Erin Sterling’s New York Times bestselling hit The Ex Hex features fan favorite Gwyn and the spine-tinglingly handsome Wells Penhallow as they battle a new band of witches and their own magical chemistry.”
| NONFICTION |
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Buzzfeed Unsolved: Supernatural by Ryan Bergera and Shane Madej
“Based off one of the most popular web series on the internet, Ryan Bergara and Shane Madej present BuzzFeed Unsolved Supernatural, 101 of the scariest, spookiest, and creepiest locations around the USA and a few abroad.”
Lore: Monstrous Creatures by Aaron Mahnke
“A fascinating, beautifully illustrated guide to the monsters that are part of our collective psyche.”
Ghostland: An American History in Haunted Places by Colin Dickey
“An intellectual feast for fans of offbeat history, Ghostland takes readers on a road trip through some of the country’s most infamously haunted places—and deep into the dark side of our history.”
“An illustrated compendium that reveals the true stories behind the most infamous, creepy, and bizarre real-life cursed objects throughout history. Spanning decades and continents, subjects range from the opulent Hope Diamond to the humble Busy Stoop chair.”
Monster, She Wrote: The Women Who Pioneered Horror & Speculative Fiction by Lisa Kroger
“Meet the women writers who defied convention to craft some of literature’s strangest tales, from Frankenstein to The Haunting of Hill House and beyond.”
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