10 Creeptastic Books To Get You In The Halloween Mood

• MEXICAN GOTHIC
  Haunted house/ occult

  A woman uncovers terrifying secrets in a run-down mansion near a remote mining town in 1950s Mexico. We meet 22-year-old Noemí Taboada, who at the request of her father, travels from Mexico City to check in on her cousin, Catalina who recently sends a disturbing letter, begging Noemí for help, claiming she is bound by an evil she cannot escape.

  Shortly after Noemi arrives, she starts to experience horrific hallucinations and nightmares, visions of terrifying things alive and lurking in the wallpapered walls of this crumbling mansion. Before too long, Noemí knows she must get herself and Catalina out from the evil clutches of the house, but once she uncovers the sinister secrets generations have hidden, she may be too late.

  This is a fascinating, absorbing narrative woven with elements of Mexican folklore to deliver a fresh and frightening take on classic horror. I can’t recommend this book enough. It’s the gothic haunted-house thriller you didn’t know you needed, and that I promise will stay with you long after you’re done.

  READ IT | MY REVIEW

• HOME BEFORE DARK
  Haunted house thriller

  A woman confronts the ghosts of her past in one of my favorite Riley Sager books. With this one, he freshens a classic horror trope to deliver an outstanding gothic thriller. Wonderfully atmospheric and creepy, his latest channels The Amityville Horror and House on Haunted Hill.

  Twenty-five years ago, in the dead of night, Maggie Holt and her family fled Baneberry Hall—a Victorian estate nestled in the Vermont woods. In House of Horrors, a novel that subsequently fascinated readers worldwide, her father claims they were terrorized by evil spirits. But Maggie has no memories of these malevolent encounters. She’s confident that what her father penned is nothing but lies—lies which have haunted the whole of her adulthood.

  Maggie decides to return to Baneberry Hall to prove just that, but once she arrives, history begins to repeat itself making her question everything she’s believed.

  Brilliantly plotted, wonderfully creepy and impossible to put down.

  READ IT | MY REVIEW

• FINAL GIRLS
  Slasher thriller

  With a fresh, unsettling perspective, Riley Sager evokes slasher flicks and our macabre fascination with the last girl standing—the final girl who makes it out alive.

  We meet Quincy Carpenter, who ten years ago ran from the place where her friends had all been killed. As the sole survivor of the Pine Cottage massacre, she became a real-life final girl, along with two others who each survived their own nightmares.

  But when one of the three Final Girls is found dead, it’s clear the past won’t leave her alone. Before too long, she’ll have to relive the nightmare all over again and hope she can survive a second time around.

  I loved this book—it’s the perfect Halloween read with it’s ratcheting tension which will rattle and shock you until it’s final, blood-spattered twist.

  READ IT | MY REVIEW

• THE THIRST
  Serial killer thriller

  A dark, disturbing and impossibly addictive installment in the Harry Hole series.

  A woman is violently murdered after a Tinder date—largely drained of blood, marks on her neck with slight traces of rust. Two days later, a second victim, also a Tinder user, left dead after a similar attack.

  Soon, Harry is in the thick of it and recognizes echoes from his past—the killer is someone who’s haunted his dreams for years. The case grows darker and more tangled as the narrative continues, each twist making you feel as if you’ve fallen down a rabbit hole of unending surprises.

  And while there are so many fantastic Harry Hole novels (like THE SNOWMAN), this one totally has those creeptastic Halloween vibes.

  READ IT | MY REVIEW

• THE SANDMAN
  Serial killer thriller

  Pretty much every Joona Linna installment is amazing to read this time of year. Husband-and-wife duo Lars Kepler deliver the best, dark, absorbing serial-killer thrillers. And while this one is the fourth in a series, you can start here and go back to the others if you’d like to read them all (that’s how I did it).

  In THE SANDMAN, a man is found wandering alone along some train tracks. Thirteen years prior, he and his sister mysteriously vanished, presumed dead at the hands of a notorious serial killer now imprisoned. The man tells police his sister is being held by someone called The Sandman and police must convince the man behind bars to reveal the truth behind the person who must be his accomplice.

  Super creepy with twists aplenty, I devoured the pages of this book which started my obsession with anything Lars Kepler writes.

  READ IT

• THE WHISPER MAN
  Serial killer thriller

  A suspenseful generational tale of a father and son caught in the crosshairs of an investigation to catch a serial killer preying on a small town.

  Twenty years past, a serial killer abducted and murdered five little kids. The man responsible is now in jail. He was nicknamed “The Whisper Man,” for he would lure his victims out by whispering at their windows at night.

  But just as a father and son settle into their new home, another boy vanishes. And before too long, the son begins to hear whispers by his window too.

  Super unsettling and spooky.

  READ IT

• THE CRAFTSMAN
  Thriller / procedural / occult

  A female detective solves the case of three teenagers who were buried alive only to re-examine it thirty years later and realize the killer is still at large… especially when the past begins to repeat itself.

  Assistant Commissioner Florence Lovelady returns to the small town of Lancshire, England, where thirty years prior, she solved a grisly case involving three teenagers were buried alive. The culprit: local coffin-maker Larry Glassbrook who’s just died in prison. Lovelady re-examines the case when she finds a clay effigy baring an uncanny resemblance to her—an effigy strikingly similar to the ones buried with the teenagers. Had she gotten it all wrong? Could she be next?

  The novel alternates between past and present making the mood of the novel deeply unsettling. Tension ratchets when in the present, Florence’s son goes missing and a race against time ensues.

  I absolutely loved everything about this nightmarish thriller that brilliantly blends a riveting procedural with the supernatural.

  READ IT | MY REVIEW

• THE BONE HOUSES
  Historical horror / zombies / occult

  Found this gem of a novel completely by chance on Amazon—I loved the cover. It’s a fantastic historical horror about a seventeen-year-old girl whose family own and runs a graveyard. But the family isn’t doing well financially, struggling to make ends meet as gravediggers in a remote village at the foot of a mountain once home to the fae. But as we figure out almost immediately, the dead walk amongst them because of a decades-old curse. The walking dead are known as “bone houses.”

  Soon, the girl partners up with a mysterious boy who visits town, to take down the bone houses who are increasingly attacking. Together, they journey up the mountain to face the curse and so much more.

  A mix of fairy tale and horror, myth and magic, this novel is haunting, spellbinding and perfect for those who love devouring dark fantasies. I loved it.

  READ IT

• NINTH HOUSE
  Horror / fantasy 

  The secrets of Yale’s “Ancient Eight” societies come to light in Bardugo’s first foray into adult fantasy.

  She ingeniously uses Yale’s secret societies as repositories of magic to explore those who wield power, their hidden rituals, and the influence they brandish.

  And although Galaxy “Alex” Stern, a misfit and once drug addict, is hardly a fit for Yale, she is lured by Lethe and offered a free ride. It’s not Alex’s academic merits that entice, however, it’s her ability to see ghosts—“Grays” who trudge around campus and threaten rituals when gateways to the veil unseal.

  But when a girl is murdered, Alex feels as if there’s something more to her death and before too long, Alex uncovers something far more sinister and dangerous than she anticipated.

  No punches held in a twisting narrative that weaves horror and mystery. I loved the richness and depth of the novel, and the foundational history on which magic embellishes. It’s utterly engrossing.

  READ IT | MY REVIEW

• BABY TEETH
  Horror / domestic thriller

  There is something about this book that forever unnerves me. The premise: A sweet little girl who is obsessed with killing her mother. This is an unsettling story of a deteriorating mother-daughter relationship. We meet Hanna Jensen, who is selectively mute. Her parents, Suzette and Alex, have put her through a litany of tests to ensure there is no physical disability. But Hanna is disarmingly sharp even at seven, and chooses not to speak. Instead, she expresses herself through violent outbursts including feral barking.

  I’ve never read a book like this before—it’s so chilling, dark, unrelenting and wickedly addictive.

  READ IT | MY REVIEW

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