Halloween is just around the corner, and it’s a perfect excuse to terrify yourself with some dark, creepy, and downright homicidal reading! Plop a bowl full of candy on the porch, turn out the lights, and get in the spirit with these ghoulish novels. (For a suitably spooky treat, try baking Bloody Glass cupcakes.)

DroughtDrought
Author: Graham Masterton
In our daily world, we fear politics, power, and pestilence. Chillingly accurate to our time and place in history, Drought combines horror with the realism of political intrigue and a background conspiracy theory mastered by a reverse Robin Hood (kill the poor and save the rich). The world is experiencing a sudden drought, so violent that the greedy government is using it to shut off the water and effectively clear out those undesirable members of the population (those who are poor or not of an esteemed race). Only one man, Martin, understands the full genocide; he is coming to terms with his knowledge, his past, and a new, apocalyptic world in this thriller/horror novel that leaves you thinking late into the night. Who are we really, and who will we become when the chips are down? You’ll never look at a glass of water quite the same way again… or a green golf course lawn. See our full review.

 

 

 

Goodnight My SweetGoodnight, My Sweet
Author: Vince Churchill
Following on the entire-world-ending theme (hello, Ebola), it’s time to cuddle up and stay up as Churchill punches the paranoia in this combination thriller/Nightmare on Elm Street/ Dawn of the Dead story of isolation, sudden disaster, and intense fear. Dylan Myles stays up all night, ending his long-distance marriage by phone, only to trudge to work through an eerily quiet city the next morning. When 9 o’clock comes, the office lights still aren’t on, and no one is at their desk, he begins to notice the beginning of the end. Apparently, everyone who feel asleep the previous night is now dead, including Dylan’s friends, families, neighbors, stepchildren – everyone except his now ex-wife. Now Dylan must  use his remaining time to earth to try and unravel the mystery and come back to his wife, before they both fall into the deadly sleep plague that is inexplicably shutting the world down.

 

 

 

The Girl with All the GiftsThe Girl With All the Gifts
Author: M.R. Carey
20-ish years after a pandemic destroyed most of the human population, the last remnants of civilization hunker down for survival inside well-defended military bases. In one such base, a curious and intelligent little girl named Melanie — part of a small group of very special children — lives alone in a prison cell under armed guard, attends “school” every day while strapped into a chair, and gets fed once a week. These children may hold the key to humanity’s future… if we can figure out the answers in time. The spooky setting gets a little potboilery during the second act, when it evolves into a more typical post-apocalyptic-quest tale, but the ending is satisfying and original. Buckle up for lots of gory death scenes and violence.

 

 

 

snowdropSatan’s Snowdrop
Author: Guy N. Smith
Here’s a little blast from the past. Let’s go back to the ‘80s, when horror was truly visceral and entertaining. In this little bargain-bin find, we certainly got a spooky jewel. An ancient house with a strange history terrorizes family after family as ghosts, trapped and eternally tortured by their undead tormentor, live out the cruelty of their Gestapo oppressors throughout the ages, bringing new victims into the fold. Satan’s Snowdrop is hardly for the faint of heart, but if you’re in the mood for some hardcore horror and chilling sequences of gore and eternal torment, this unrecognized classic is the way to go as you celebrate all things that go bump in the night. See our full review.

 

 

 

Killer of Little Shepherds Cover (200x300)The Killer of Little Shepherds
Author:  Douglas Starr
If horrific true crime stories are your thing, spiced up with a dash of forensic science, The Killer of Little Shepherds may be to your liking. Telling the story of Joseph Vacher, a flagrantly disturbed serial killer who roamed the French countryside for much of the 1890s, this book by Boston University professor Douglas Starr deftly balances gore, science, and history to create a thoroughly entertaining read. Put together like a 19th-century version of CSI or Law and Order, it’s sure to provide creeps aplenty.  Read our full review of the book.

 

 

 

 

Walking Dead CompendiumThe Walking Dead: Compendium One (Compendium 1)
Author: Robert Kirkman
For all you Dead heads out there, what better way is there to begin the Halloween season (and that epic premiere of Season 5) than to go back to the original comic that spawned the nation’s most-loved show? And there are no spoilers! The Walking Dead compendium collects all the comics together from (roughly) season 1 through season 4, so there aren’t any spoilers that will ruin your debut watching. The graphic novel is brutal, well-drawn, terrifying, and intriguing, and surprisingly different in many ways from AMC’s portrayal. Series fans clearly need both. Indulge yourself with a little katana wielding and zombie carnage (and maybe a Daryl Dixon Doll).

 

 

 

neverceeseNever Ceese
Author: Sue Dent
For your Halloween pleasure, Never Ceese is the timeless tale of a vampire and a werewolf, inexplicably bound together as they struggle toward their own redemption while fighting off the temptation inherent within their true nature. A unique read, Never Ceese combines morality and the attempt at goodness with a frightening, cursed nature leaving our hero and heroine beleaguered, but by no means down and out. As the clock tickets out and a new player, intent on getting cursed himself, enters the story, the vampire and werewolf must band together to unravel the mysteries of their past and the difficult road into the future. Oddly heart-rending and heartwarming, it’s a modern-day Dark Shadows for gothic horror lovers who value plot over gore. See our full review.

 

 

 

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Stephanie Perry
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