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Jennifer McMahon is the best-selling author of 12 suspense novels, including The Winter People and Promise Not to Tell. In her latest book, Stay Buried, siblings new to a remote Vermont town discover that the locals live in fear of a vengeful spirit.
‘The Legend of Sleepy Hollow’ by Washington Irving (1820)
The story of Ichabod Crane terrified me as a kid. I remember running home on wooded paths from a friend’s house, certain I heard hoofbeats behind me. I was sure that if I turned back, I’d see a rider with his head tucked under his arm, and that just as I was making out the lights of home through the trees, he’d hurl it through the air at me. Buy it here.
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‘The Lottery’ by Shirley Jackson (1948)
Until I read this masterpiece in middle school, I had no idea people wrote stories about things like this: small towns full of normal people who were capable of terrible things. It really made me think about the way groups of people can normalize brutality in the name of “tradition.” Buy it here.
‘Harvest Home’ by Thomas Tryon (1973)
This quintessential folk-horror novel taught me never to trust a seemingly idyllic setting, remote location, or tight-knit community—things that all seem so charming on first glance! Buy it here.
‘Pine’ by Francine Toon (2020)
Pine is the perfect example of a book in which the setting feels like a character. The novel’s little Scottish village, surrounded by forest, feels claustrophobic, isolated, steeped in dread. Throw in a girl with a missing mother, sightings of a mysterious woman, and a vanished teenager and you have all the ingredients of a very compelling tale. Buy it here.
‘The Ritual’ by Adam Nevill (2011)
I wouldn’t venture into the woods for a long time after reading this. Four college friends meet up for a reunion hiking trip and make an ill-advised decision to take a shortcut. When they come upon a disemboweled animal hanging from the trees, we know something truly terrifying awaits them. Buy it here.
‘Starve Acre’ by Andrew Michael Hurley (2019)
This many-layered story centers on the tragic loss of a young child. His mother is convinced some part of him is still there at the family home; his father becomes obsessed with digging up the roots of a legendary oak tree. Hurley’s writing is gorgeous, the sort that I willingly get lost in knowing all the while it’s going to take me someplace unsettling. Buy it here.
