Halloween is my favorite holiday and October my favorite month, so I thought I’d compile a list of some of the scariest stories out there for my readers to enjoy this season. These shivery treats were compiled from my own favorites and recommendations from fellow lovers of ghosties and goblins. Scroll down past the images for links.































- Wait Till Helen Comes by Mary Downing Hahn
- This House is Haunted by John Boyne
- ‘Salem’s Lot by Stephen King
- Curse of the Blue Figurine by John Bellairs
- The Changeling by Victor LaValle
- A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay
- Asylum by Madeleine Roux
- The Terror by Dan Simmons
- Jane Emily by Patricia Clapp
- Coraline by Neil Gaiman
- The Case of Charles Dexter Ward by H.P. Lovecraft
- Lost Souls by Poppy Z. Brite
- The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
- Took by Mary Downing Hahn
- The Fireman by Joe Hill
- The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty
- Hell House by Richard Matheson
- The Collected Ghost Stories of E.F. Benson (especially Room in the Tower)
- Carmilla by J. Sheridan leFanu
- The Halloween Tree by Ray Bradbury
- Amityville Horror by Jay Anson
- I am Legend by Richard Matheson
- Ghost Story by Peter Straub
- The Road by Cormac McCarthy
- Psycho by Robert Bloch
- It by Stephen King
- The Death Chamber by Sarah Rayne
- Tales of the Uncanny and the Supernatural by Algernon Blackwood
- A Thin Ghost by M.R. James
- The Shining by Stephen King
- Hex by Thomas Olde Heuvelt
I hope you find something in this list that makes you shiver. Happy Halloween!
I’ve read probably 75% of those books. So awesome to find somebody who loves horror and the fact that you included Jane Emily was totally awesome. That book was one of the defining books of my childhood and I still have my copy that I purloined from the library. Don’t tell…….haha!
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I can’t believe there’s another Jane Emily fan out there! I wish I still had that copy I read in the 1970s! That story haunted me for years!
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Yes, love that book so much. I reread it occasionally and it still creeps me out. 🙂
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