Best horror books to read this Halloween

Whether you're a horror buff or just looking to get into the Halloween spirit, October is the perfect time to pick up a horror book.

Scary movies dominate the season, but thriller novels can offer a subtler, eerier scare. If you are looking to be kept up all night, opt for one of these masterfully scary horror novels.

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

Shirley Jackson’s quintessential gothic horror novel is "thrillingly well written, full of complex, economical, vivid insight", said Aida Edemariam in The Guardian. In the "brilliant" classic, Dr Montague invites an eclectic group of four to spend the summer at the supposedly haunted Hill House, looking for scientific evidence of the supernatural. The inhabitants begin to experience strange phenomena and the lighthearted experiment quickly becomes "seriously scary" and "filled with a sense of mounting dread", said The New York Times. Eleanor, invited because of her childhood ability to activate poltergeists, struggles to separate reality from imagination in the house. Jackson's horror novel is a must-read this Halloween and "caviar for the connoisseurs of the cryptic".

The Dangers of Smoking in Bed by Mariana Enríquez

Filled with decaying ghouls, victims of military dictatorship, and cannibalism, the award-winning Argentinian author's short story collection is perfect if you want to "wince, flinch, and momentarily panic", said Chris Power in The Guardian. The longest of the stories, "Kids Who Come Back" begins with missing children reappearing in the parks of Buenos Aires, not a day older than when they left. Giving a "flavour" of José Saramago's fiction, the work is "beautiful" and "horrible" and the most "exciting discovery" in fiction for some time, said Kazuo Ishiguro in the same paper.

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

The Hotel by Daisy Johnson

Daisy Johnson is the "demon offspring of Shirley Jackson and Stephen King", said Alex Preston in The Guardian. The Booker-shortlisted author's newest work delivers a series of 15 interlinked stories voiced by different narrators, one even narrated by the haunted house. The "mesmerising" book is "an homage" to "The Shining", said Johanna Thomas-Carr in The Times.

Set in The Hotel, a gothic building on the Fens with a violent past, each story reveals new myths, rumours, and secrets. The guests are aware of the mythology, entering in hopes of communing with their dead loved ones. Some leave unscathed, others are forever haunted by their stay and readers will bring their "own demons to each story".

Lone Women by Victor LaValle

It's 1915 and Adelaide Henry is alone in Montana "haunted by her secrets", said Chanelle Benz in The New York Times. LaValle opens his novel, set in the American frontier, with a scene of "dark, bloody upheaval" throwing the reader into this "genre-melding" book where nothing "is as it seems". Adelaide slowly discovers other lone women in the terrain, the only other black woman for miles, she realises sharing these secrets may be "the key to her self-preservation". With blood shed, missing people, and a looming white lynch mob, LaValle "deftly weaves history, horror" and suspense, providing an "impossible to put down" novel.

The Turn of The Screw by Henry James

This 19th-century novella isn't outdated. Modern readers will still find the seminal horror text "remarkably vivid and disquieting", said Calum Marsh in The New York Times. The classic gothic ghost story centres on a young governess sent to a country manor with strict instructions to care for two young children. While in the grounds, the governess starts to see apparitions, identified by the housekeeper as her predecessor. As the children begin to act strangely, the governess vows to protect them. A true classic of the genre, this haunting tale is "prized for its ambiguity and sophistication".