We all know that scary movies can keep us up late at night; listening to the creaking of the floors and walls and imagining its every horrifying monster come to life. Reading can do the same thing, sometimes to a worse extent because you imagine all the creepy stuff on your own and an image isn’t already placed in your mind like it is for movies. If you enjoy the lack of sleep and love being terrified, then these novels are right up your alley. A dark, creepy, cold alley that is.
1. Don’t Look Back by Jennifer L. Armentrout
This is personally one of my favorite books. The characters are stunning and the twists and mystery are amazing. It’s eerie at parts and horrifying at others. It’s about a girl named Samantha who shows up after being missing for four days with no memory of who she is or what happened to her. Her best friend Cassie also went missing, but has yet to be found. Samantha needs her memories back in order to find Cassie. But her lost memory may be the only thing keeping her alive.
2. The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin
With an opening that starts out with the use of a ouija board, this book is bound to be creepy. Mara wakes up in the hospital after a devastating accident in an asylum that killed her best friend, boyfriend and boyfriend’s sister. Without any recollection of how they got there or what happened, she tries to get her life back to normal but when hallucinations start to fill her days, she realizes normal will be out of the question.
3. The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater
The Raven Boys is part of a series and each book becomes more frightening than the last. Blue comes from a whole family of mediums. Everyone except her that is. Then, on one night as she sits with her mother to watch the dead walk past, Blue sees her first spirit. A boy by the name of Gansey. There’s only two ways she would be able to see someone who’s dead. Either he’s her true love, or she killed him.
4. Poison Princess by Kresley Cole
Poison Princess is the first book in an amazing series. While it’s not entirely scary (although there are some parts that really freaked me out), it’s full of suspense and on the darker side. Set at the end of an apocalyptic event, Evie realizes that her hallucinations were the forecast of the future. And now in a world shriveled and empty, she has to survive. What she doesn’t know is that there are twenty-one other people who have been experiencing the same hallucinations and they’re supposed to battle each other to fulfill an ancient prophecy of good against evil.
5. Darkling by K.M. Rice
This story is haunting and chilling. In Willow’s village, the sun has stopped shining and the plants and trees have stopped growing. All the villagers know is that a man in the woods has something to do with it. So, to save her family and the people she loves, Willow sacrifices herself to him.
6. Spring Break by Barbara Steiner
Angie and four other friends are ready for the perfect spring break when they all realize they can go without their parents. A last minute adventure, they have trouble finding places to stay on the beach and have to settle with an old and abandoned beach house. As Angie’s friends start disappearing, she realizes that their first vacation might be their last. This book was written in the nineties, but it’s still a very chilling story and a short read for Halloween!
Classics:
1. The Hannibal Lecter Series by Thomas Harris
This series was turned into a movie where multiple characters won awards for their amazing acting. These books follow a FBI agent as he tries to find a serial killer but the only way he can find the serial killer is if he turns to Hannibal Lecter for help. The cannibal that he captured and caused his early retirement
2. Pet Sematary by Stephen King
Stephen King has always been known for his terrifying books, from The Shining to Cujo to Carrie, many of them have even been turned into horror movies. This book is said to be his scariest. In fact, it’s so scary, that it’s notoriously known as the book King thought was too scary to be published. You have been warned. Read at your own risk.
3. Anything by Edgar Allen Poe
The guy was known for his creepiness, so if you pick up any book by him, you’re bound to want to sleep with the light on.