Staff Picks
Terrifying Tales for Spooky Season: Adult Edition
- Leighan C.
- Monday, October 02, 2023
Collection
2023 has been a banner year for horror lovers! Check this list to see if your favorites from this year are included, or discover some new, amazing authors.
The Scourge Between Stars
Published in 2023
"A tense, claustrophobic sci-fi/horror blend set aboard a doomed generation ship harboring something terrible within its walls. As acting captain of the starship Calypso, Jacklyn Albright is responsible for keeping the last of humanity alive as they limp back to Earth from their forebears' failed colony on a distant planet. Faced with constant threats of starvation and destruction in the treacherous minefield of interstellar space, Jacklyn's crew has reached their breaking point. As unrest begins to spread throughout the ship's Wards, a new threat emerges, picking off crew members in grim, bloody fashion. Jacklyn and her team must hunt down the ship's unknown intruder if they have any hope of making it back to their solar system alive"-- Provided by publisher.
Vampires of El Norte
Published in 2023
"As the daughter of a rancher in 1840s Mexico, Nena knows a thing or two about monsters--her home has long been threatened by tensions with Anglo settlers from the north. But something more sinister lurks near the ranch at night, something that drains men of their blood and leaves them for dead. Something that once attacked Nena nine years ago. Believing Nena dead, Néstor has been on the run from his grief ever since, moving from ranch to ranch working as a vaquero. But no amount of drink can dispel the night terrors of sharp teeth; no woman can erase his childhood sweetheart from his mind. When the United States attacks Mexico in 1846, the two are brought abruptly together on the road to war: Nena as a curandera, a healer striving to prove her worth to her father so that he does not marry her off to a stranger, and Néstor as a member of the auxiliary cavalry of ranchers and vaqueros. But the shock of their reunion--and Nena's rage at Néstor for seemingly abandoning her long ago--is quickly overshadowed by the appearance of a nightmare made flesh. And unless Nena and Néstor work through their past and face the future together, neither will survive to see the dawn"-- Provided by publisher.
The Haunting of Alejandra
Published in 2023
"A woman is haunted by the Mexican folk demon La Llorona as she unravels the dark secrets of her family history in this ravishing and provocative horror novel"-- Provided by publisher.
What Kind of Mother
A Novel
Published in 2023
"Madi returns to her hometown and reconnects with an ex from high school, now known locally for his refusal to give up looking for his infant son who has been missing for years. As Madi gets drawn into the search, she begins to see visions that lead to disturbing revelations about the real story of the boy's disappearance"-- Provided by publisher.
The Spite House
Published in 2023
"A terrifying Gothic thriller about grief and death and the depths of a father's love, Johnny Compton's The Spite House is a stunning debut by a horror master in the making--The Babadook meets A Headful of Ghosts in Texas Hill Country. Eric Ross is on the run from a mysterious past with his two daughters in tow. Having left his wife, his house, his whole life behind in Maryland, he's desperate for money--it's not easy to find steady, safe work when you can't provide references, you can't stay in one place for long, and you're paranoid that your past is creeping back up on you. When he comes across the strange ad for the Masson House in Degener, Texas, Eric thinks they may have finally caught a lucky break. The Masson property, notorious for being one of the most haunted places in Texas, needs a caretaker of sorts. The owner is looking for proof of paranormal activity. All they need to do is stay in the house and keep a detailed record of everything that happens there. Provided the house's horrors don't drive them all mad, like the caretakers before them. The job calls to Eric, not just because there's a huge payout if they can make it through, but because he wants to explore the secrets of the spite house. If it is indeed haunted, maybe it'll help him understand the uncanny power that clings to his family, driving them from town to town, making them afraid to stop running"-- Provided by publisher.
This Delicious Death
Published in 2023
"When four best friends with a hunger for human flesh attend a music festival in the desert they discover a murderous plot to expose and vilify the girls and everyone like them. This summer is going to get gory."--Publisher's description
Episode Thirteen
Published in 2023
"Fade to Black is the newest hit ghost hunting reality TV show. It's led by husband and wife team Matt and Claire Kirklin and features a dedicated crew of ghost-hunting experts. Episode Thirteen takes them to Matt's holy grail: the Paranormal Research Foundation. This crumbling, derelict mansion holds secrets and clues about the bizarre experiments that took place there in the 1970s. It's also, undoubtedly, haunted, and Matt hopes to use their scientific techniques and high tech gear to prove it. But, as the house begins to slowly reveal itself to them, proof of an afterlife might not be everything Matt dreamed of. A story told in broken pieces, in tapes, journals, correspondence, and research files, this is the story of Episode Thirteen--and how everything went horribly wrong"-- Provided by publisher.
VenCo
A Novel
Published in 2023
"An incredibly inventive, highly anticipated second adult novel--with witches, magic, and a road trip through America--from Cherie Dimaline, the critically acclaimed author of Empire of Wild"-- Provided by publisher.
Our Share of Night
Published in 2023
"In 1981, a young father and son set out on a road trip across Argentina, devastated by the mysterious death of the wife and mother they both loved. United in grief, the pair travels to her family home near Iguazú Falls, where they must confront the horrific legacy she has bequeathed. For the woman they are grieving came from a family like no other--a centuries-old secret society called the Order that pursues eternal life through ghastly rituals. For Gaspar, the son, this cult is his destiny. As Gaspar grows up he must learn to harness his developing supernatural powers, while struggling to understand what kind of man his mother wanted him to be. Meanwhile Gaspar's father tries to protect his son from his wife's violent family while still honoring the woman he loved so desperately"-- Provided by publisher.
All Hallows
Published in 2023
"New York Times bestselling, Bram Stoker Award-winning author Christopher Golden is best known for his supernatural thrillers set in deadly, distant locales...but in this suburban Halloween drama, Golden brings the horror home. It's Halloween night, 1984, in Coventry, Massachusetts, and two families are unraveling. Up and down the street, secrets are being revealed, and all the while, mixed in with the trick-or-treaters of all ages, four children who do not belong are walking door to door, merging with the kids of Parmenter Road. Children in vintage costumes with faded, eerie makeup. They seem terrified, and beg the neighborhood kids to hide them away, to keep them safe from The Cunning Man. There's a small clearing in the woods now that was never there before, and a blackthorn tree that doesn't belong at all. These odd children claim that The Cunning Man is coming for them ... and they want the local kids to protect them. But with families falling apart and the neighborhood splintered by bitterness, who will save the children of Parmenter Road? All Hallows. The one night when everything is a mask ..."-- Provided by publisher.
Black Sheep
Published in 2023
"A cynical twentysomething must confront her cultish family in this fiery, irreverent novel from the national bestselling author of Such Sharp Teeth and Cackle. Vesper Wright is in hell. The night she gets fired from her unglamorous restaurant job, she comes home to find an envelope waiting on her doorstep. There's no return address, but she knows exactly who it's from --her estranged family. Inside the envelope is an invitation to the wedding of Vesper's cousin and childhood best friend, Rosemary, the one person she regrets losing touch with. She's getting married at the family home. A home that, according to the rules of her strictly religious family, Vesper shouldn't be allowed to return to. But Vesper has always been an exception to the rule, and something inside her is telling her she has to attend the wedding, even if it means suffering through a weekend in the staunchly religious community she defected from. Even if it means reuniting with her mother, Constance, a former horror film star and forever ice queen. When Vesper's homecoming exhumes a horrifying family secret, she's forced to reckon with her family's fanatical beliefs and her own unexpected identity. This haunting novel explores the way family ties can bind us as we struggle to define our own separate identities"-- Provided by publisher.
How to Sell a Haunted House
Published in 2023
"New York Times bestselling author Grady Hendrix takes on the haunted house in a hilarious and terrifying new novel that explores the way your past--and your family--can haunt you like nothing else... Louise's parents have passed away, and she's returning to the small Southern town where she grew up to get their house ready to sell. It means she'll have to spend time with her younger brother--and their old grudges make that a terrifying prospect. But childhood hurts pale in comparison to the dangers posed by what still lives inside the house"-- Provided by publisher.
Natural Beauty
A Novel
Published in 2023
"In this sly, surprising, and razor-sharp debut novel, a virtuoso pianist gives up her future as a musician to work at a high-end wellness store in New York City where the pursuit of beauty comes at a staggering cost. Our narrator is the youngest student at the Conservatory. She produces a sound from the piano no one else does, employing a special technique she learned from her parents-also stunningly talented musicians-who fled China in the wake of the Cultural Revolution. But when an accident leaves her parents debilitated, she abandons her future as a pianist and accepts a job at a high-end beauty and wellness store in New York City. Holistik is known for its remarkable products and outrageous procedures: remoras that suck cheap Botox from the body, eyelash extensions made of spider silk, emotional support ducklings bred to imprint on their owners. Every product is ethically sourced and made with nothing but the highest quality ingredients. Our narrator's new job is a coveted one among New York's beauty-obsessed, and it affords her entry into a new world of privilege. She becomes transfixed by Helen-a model, and the niece of Holistik's charismatic owner-and the two strike up a close friendship that hazily veers into more. All the while, Holistik plies our narrator with products that slim her thighs, smooth her skin, lighten her hair, and change her eye color. But beneath these fancy creams and tinctures lies a terrible truth that threatens to consume her. After all, beauty is nothing without ugliness. NATURAL BEAUTY is a piercing, terrifying, and darkly funny debut that eviscerates the beauty and wellness industry, exploring questions of consumerism, self-worth, race, and identity. This propulsive novel takes a world that feels familiar and pushes it to a conclusion that at first might seem jarring, but when we inch closer, settles on us as truth"-- Provided by publisher.
Bad Cree
A Novel
Published in 2023
A young Cree woman is tormented by vivid dreams from before her sister's untimely death and wakes up with a severed crow's head in her hands before returning to her rural hometown in Alberta seeking answers.
Don't Fear the Reaper
Published in 2023
"Four years after her tumultuous senior year, Jade Daniels is released from prison right before Christmas when her conviction is overturned. But life beyond bars takes a dangerous turn as soon as she returns to Proofrock. Convicted serial killer, Dark Mill South, seeking revenge for thirty-eight Dakota men hanged in 1862, escapes from his prison transfer due to a blizzard, just outside of Proofrock, Idaho"-- Provided by publisher.
The Salt Grows Heavy
Published in 2023
"You may think you know how the fairytale goes: a mermaid comes to shore and weds the prince. But what the fables forget is that mermaids have teeth. And now, her daughters have devoured the kingdom and burned it to ashes. On the run, the mermaid is joined by a mysterious plague doctor with a darkness of their own. Deep in the eerie, snow-crusted forest, the pair stumble upon a village of ageless children who thirst for blood, and the three "saints" who control them. The mermaid and her doctor must embrace the cruelest parts of their true nature if they hope to survive"-- Provided by publisher.
A House with Good Bones
Published in 2023
"T. Kingfisher's A House With Good Bones is a contemporary Southern Gothic from a master of modern horror that explores the deep, dark roots of family and in which grandma's ghost haunting your house may be the least of your worries. In this ordinary North Carolina suburb, family secrets are always in bloom. Samantha Montgomery pulls into the driveway of her family home to find a massive black vulture perched on the mailbox, staring at the house. Inside, everything has changed. Gone is the eclectic warmth Sam expects; instead the walls are a sterile white. Now, it's very important to say grace before dinner, and her mother won't hear a word against Sam's long-dead and little-missed grandmother, who was the first to put down roots in this small southern town. The longer Sam stays, the stranger things get. And every day, more vultures circle overhead... "I was compelled to read the book in one breathless, white-knuckled sitting. Vultures, ladybugs, and underground children, oh my!"-Paul Tremblay, author of The Pallbearers Club. "Wickedly witty, intensely scary, and a thoroughly modern take on the Southern Gothic, about thorny family secrets that refuse to stay buried."-Rachel Harrison, author of Cackle. Also by T. Kingfisher Nettle & Bone, What Moves the Dead"-- Provided by publisher.
The Trees Grew Because I Bled There
Published in 2023
"Eight stories of literary dark fiction from a master storyteller. Exploring the shadow side of love, these are tales of grief, obsession, control. Intricate examinations of trauma and tragedy in raw, poetic prose. In these narratives, a woman imagines horrific scenarios whilst caring for her infant niece; on-line posts chronicle a cancer diagnosis; a couple in the park with their small child encounter a stranger with horrific consequences; a toxic relationship reaches a terrifying resolution ... Originally published under the title The Strange Thing We Become and Other Dark Tales, this is a much-praised collection of deeply unsettling, painfully dark tales."-- Publisher marketing.
Lone Women
Published in 2023
"Adelaide Henry carries an enormous steamer trunk with her wherever she goes. It's locked at all times. Because when the trunk is opened, people around her start to disappear... The year is 1914, and Adelaide is in trouble. Her secret sin killed her parents, and forced her to flee her hometown of Redondo, California, in a hellfire rush, ready to make her way to Montana as a homesteader. Dragging the trunk with her at every stop, she will be one of the "lone women" taking advantage of the government's offer of free land for those who can cultivate it-except that Adelaide isn't alone. And the secret she's tried so desperately to lock away might be the only thing keeping her alive"-- Provided by publisher.
Maeve Fly
Published in 2023
""This is gory and brutal and beautiful and painful and terrifying and a pure delight." -Stephen Graham Jones, New York Times bestselling author A provocative debut that is both a blood-soaked love letter to Los Angeles and a gleeful send-up to iconic horror villains, Maeve Fly will thrill fans of My Heart is a Chainsaw and Caroline Kepnes' You series. By day, Maeve Fly works at the happiest place in the world as every child's favorite ice princess. By the neon night glow of the Sunset Strip, Maeve hauntsthe dive bars with a drink in one hand and a book in the other, imitating her misanthropic literary heroes. But when Gideon Green - her best friend's brother - moves to town, he awakens something dangerous within her, and the world she knows suddenly shifts beneath her feet. Untethered, Maeve ditches her discontented act and tries on a new persona. A bolder, bloodier one, inspired by the pages of American Psycho. Step aside Patrick Bateman, it's Maeve's turn with the knife. "An apocalyptic Anaheim Psycho." -Grady Hendrix, New York Times bestselling author of How to Sell a Haunted House"-- Provided by publisher.
Graveyard of Lost Children
Published in 2023
"At four months old, Olivia Dahl was almost murdered. Driven by haunting visions, her mother became obsessed with the idea that Olivia was a changeling, and that the only way to get her real baby back was to make a trade with the "dead women" living at the bottom of the well. Now Olivia is ready to give birth to a daughter of her own ... and for the first time, she hears the women whispering. Everyone tells Olivia she should be happy. She should be glowing, but the birth of her daughter only fills Olivia with dread. As Olivia's body starts giving out, slowly deteriorating as the baby eats and eats and eats, she begins to fear that the baby isn't her daughter at all and, despite her best efforts, history is repeating itself. Soon images of a black-haired woman plague Olivia's nightmares, drawing her back to the well that almost claimed her life-tying mother and daughter together in a desperate cycle of fear and violence that must be broken if Olivia has any hope of saving her child ... or herself. Baby Teeth meets The Invited in a haunting story of the sometimes-fragile connection between a woman's sense of self and what it means to be a "good" mother."-- Provided by publisher.
Silver Nitrate
Published in 2023
"A meld of Mexican horror movies and Nazi occultism: a dark thriller about the curse that haunts a legendary lost film--and awakens one woman's hidden powers"-- Provided by publisher.
The September House
Published in 2023
"A thrilling psychological horror debut about a woman who is determined to stay in her dream home even after it becomes haunted, no matter the cost... You can survive anything. That's what Margaret tells herself when the walls of her house start to drip blood every September. She's learned how to live with it...and the other terrifying apparitions that have made the sprawling Victorian house she and her husband bought four years ago turn from a dream home into a living nightmare. But she can outlast all of it. Hal felt differently, though. Her husband couldn't take the hauntings anymore, and he left. But now he's not returning calls, and their daughter Katherine arrives, intent on looking for her missing father, convinced something grim has happened to him. With every desperate attempt Katherine makes at finding Hal, the hauntings at the September House grow more harrowing, because there are some secrets the house needs to keep"-- Provided by publisher.
Fever House
A Novel
Published in 2023
"When leg-breaker Hutch Holtz rolls up to a rundown apartment complex in Portland, Oregon to collect overdue drug money, a severed hand is the very last thing he expects to find stashed in the client's refrigerator. Hutch quickly realizes that the hand induces uncontrollable madness: anyone in its proximity is overcome with a boundless compulsion for violence. Within hours, catastrophic forces are set into motion: dark-op government agents who want the hand for themselves are on Hutch's tail, more and more of the city's residents fall under the hand's influence and roam the streets as bloodthirsty beings, and the entire world stands at the precipice of apocalypse... But it's all the same for Katherine Moriarty, a singer whose sudden fame and precipitous downfall were followed by the mysterious death of her estranged husband--suicide, allegedly. The traumas she's experienced have made her an agoraphobe, shackled within the confines of her apartment. Her son, Nick, has moved home to care for her, quietly making his living as the middleman for Hutch's boss, who loves odd, rare, sometimes illegal objects. When Hutch calls Nick in distress, looking for someone else to take possession of the hand, mother and son are looped into a global struggle that threatens to decimate the precarious safety they've so painfully built. Katherine and Nick must evade both zombielike fevered ones and deceitful government agents, while exorcising family secrets that have risen from the dead--secrets, they soon discover, that might hold the very key to humanity's survival"-- Provided by publisher.
Tell Me I'm Worthless
Published in 2023
Alison Rumfitt’s Tell Me I’m Worthless is a dark, unflinching haunted house story that confronts both supernatural and real-world horrors through the lens of the modern-day trans experience. Three years ago, Alice spent one night in an abandoned house with her friends, Ila and Hannah. Since then, Alice’s life has spiraled. She lives a haunted existence, selling videos of herself for money, going to parties she hates, drinking herself to sleep. Memories of that night torment Alice, but when Ila asks her to return to the House, to go past the KEEP OUT sign and over the sick earth where teenagers dare each other to venture, Alice knows she must go. Together, Alice and Ila must face the horrors that happened there, must pull themselves apart from the inside out, put their differences aside, and try to rescue Hannah, whom the House has chosen to make its own. Cutting, disruptive, and darkly funny, Tell Me I’m Worthless is a vital work of trans fiction that examines the devastating effects of trauma and how fascism makes us destroy ourselves and each other--Publisher's description.
Monstrilio
A Novel
Published in 2023
Grieving mother Magos cuts out a piece of her deceased eleven-year-old son Santiago's lung. Acting on fierce maternal instinct and the dubious logic of an old folktale, she nurtures the lung until it gains sentience, growing into the carnivorous little Monstrilio she keeps hidden within the walls of her family's decaying Mexico City estate. Eventually, Monstrilio begins to resemble the Santiago he once was, but his innate impulses--though curbed by his biological and chosen family's communal care--threaten to destroy this fragile second chance at life.
Delicious Monsters
Published in 2023
Told in alternating timelines, seventeen-year-old Daisy and her mother move into her deceased uncle's mansion, only to find horrors waiting inside, and ten years later, Brittney investigates the mystery behind the Miracle Mansion that turned her mother's life around.
Sister, Maiden, Monster
Published in 2023
"Sister, Maiden, Monster is a visceral story set in the aftermath of our planet's disastrous transformation and told through the eyes of three women trying to survive the nightmare, from Bram Stoker Award-winning author Lucy A. Snyder. To survive they must evolve. A virus tears across the globe, transforming its victims in nightmarish ways. As the world collapses, dark forces pull a small group of women together. Erin, once quiet and closeted, acquires an appetite for a woman and her brain. Why does forbidden fruit taste so good? Savannah, a professional BDSM switch, discovers a new turn-on: committing brutal murders for her eldritch masters. Mareva, plagued with chronic tumors, is too horrified to acknowledge her divine role in the coming apocalypse, and as her growths multiply, so too does her desperation. Inspired by her Bram Stoker Award-winning story "Magdala Amygdala," Lucy A. Snyder delivers a cosmic tale about the planet's disastrous transformation ... and what we become after"-- Provided by publisher.
Chlorine
A Novel
Published in 2023
Ren Yu is a swimmer. Her daily life starts and ends with the pool. Her teammates are her only friends. Her coach, her guiding light. If she swims well enough, she will be scouted, get a scholarship, go to a good school. Her parents will love her. Her coach will be kind to her. She will have a good life. But these are human concerns. These are the concerns of those confined to land, those with legs. Ren grew up on stories of creatures of the deep, of the oceans and the rivers. Ones that called sailors to their doom. Ones that dragged them down and drowned them. Ones that feasted on their flesh. Ones of the creature that she's always longed to become: mermaid.
Mothered
A Novel
Published in 2023
"Grace isn't exactly thrilled when her newly widowed mother, Jackie, asks to move in with her. They've never had a great relationship, and Grace likes her space--especially now that she's stuck at home during a pandemic. Then again, she needs help with the mortgage after losing her job. But living with Mother isn't for everyone. Good intentions turn bad soon after Jackie moves in. Old wounds fester; new ones open. Grace starts having nightmares about her disabled twin sister, who died when they were kids. When Jackie makes an earth-shattering accusation against her, Grace sees it as an act of revenge, and it sends her spiraling into a sleep-deprived madness. As the walls close in, the ghosts of Grace's past collide with a new but familiar threat: Mom"-- Provided by publisher
Camp Damascus
Published in 2023
""A joyful, furious romp through dark places, Tingle proves he's as good at fear as he is at love." --T. Kingfisher, bestselling author of What Moves the Dead. From beloved internet icon Chuck Tingle, Camp Damascus is a searing and earnest horror debut about the demons the queer community face in America, the price of keeping secrets, and finding the courage to burn it all down. Welcome to Neverton, Montana: home to a God-fearing community with a heart of gold. Nestled high up in the mountains is Camp Damascus, the self-proclaimed "most effective" gay conversion camp in the country. Here, a life free from sin awaits. But the secret behind that success is anything but holy. And they'll scare you straight to hell"-- Provided by publisher.
She is a Haunting
Published in 2023
Seventeen-year-old bisexual Jade Nguyen is spending the summer in Vietnam at the French colonial house her estranged father is fixing up as a vacation rental, but unbeknownst to her family, the house and its ghosts have other plans.
The Beast You Are
Stories
Published in 2023
"Paul Tremblay has won widespread acclaim for illuminating the dark horrors of the mind in novels and stories that push the boundaries of storytelling itself. The fifteen pieces in this brilliant collection are all monsters of a kind, ready to loudly (and lovingly) smash through your head and into your heart"-- Provided by publisher.
Delicate Condition
Published in 2023
"The Push meets The Silent Patient in a gripping thriller that follows a woman convinced a sinister figure is going to great lengths to make sure her pregnancy never happens - while the men in her life refuse to believe a word she says. Anna Alcott is desperate to have a family. But as she tries to balance her increasingly public life as an indie actress with a grueling IVF journey, she starts to suspect that someone is going to great lengths to make sure that never happens. Crucial medicines are lost. Appointments get swapped without her knowledge. Cryptic warnings have her jumping at shadows. And despite everything she's gone through to make this pregnancy a reality, not even her husband is willing to believe that someone is playing twisted games with her. Then her doctor tells her she's had a miscarriage - except Anna's convinced she's still pregnant despite everything the grave-faced men around her claim. She can feel the baby moving inside her, can see the strain it's taking on her weakening body. Vague warnings become direct threats as someone stalks her through the bleak ghost town of the snowy Hamptons. As her symptoms and sense of danger grow ever more horrifying, Anna can't help but wonder what exactly she's carrying inside of her...and why no one will listen when she says something is horribly, painfully wrong"-- Provided by publisher.
Looking Glass Sound
Published in 2023
"In a lonely cottage overlooking the windswept Maine coast, Wilder Harlow begins the last book he will ever write. It is the story of a sun-drenched summer of his youth, and of the killer that stalked the small New England town. And of the terrible tragedy that forever bonded him with his friends Nat and Harper in unknowable ways. Decades later, Wilder returns to the town in an attempt to recount that summer's events in his memoirs. But as he writes, Wilder begins to fear his grip on the truth is fading...and that the book may be writing itself"-- Provided by publisher.
Black River Orchard
A Novel
Published in 2023
"A small town is transformed when seven strange trees begin bearing magical apples in this horror novel from the bestselling author of Wanderers and The Book of Accidents"-- Provided by publisher.
Mister Magic
A Novel
Published in 2023
Reuniting 30 years after a tragic accident ended their show Mister Magic, the five surviving cast members, who hold the secret of their close circle, the mystery of the beloved magical host and what really happened on that deadly last day, soon wonder if they’ve been lured into a trap.