With Halloween fast approaching, it only seems fair to give ghosts their due. You probably have a few favorite ghost stories from when you were little–the ones that made you shiver and burrow a little bit deeper under your blanket. After all, if the ghosts can’t see you, they can’t get you, right? I still love a good ghost story, so here are some of my favorite ghost-related novels below.
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Jackaby series by William Ritter- (4/5 stars) These books have been described as Buffy the Vampire Slayer meets Sherlock Holmes, which initially made me roll my eyes. But then I picked up the first one, and wow. It was so much fun! A memorable and witty cast of characters (including a ghost) solve supernatural mysteries and over the course of the series find themselves entangled in a sinister plot. I loved the world-building, the characters, and the concept!
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The Woman in Black by Susan Hill- (4/5 stars) We actually just read this one for book club this month. It’s a bit older, but still very readable, with a classic, spooky horror vibe. A lawyer sent to sort out the will of a recently deceased woman gets more than he bargained for when he starts hearing and seeing ghostly apparitions on the English moors. Very small-town gothic, and something I admit I had to read with the lights on.
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The Mediator series by Meg Cabot- (4/5 stars) Meg Cabot is probably best known for The Princess Diaries, but I liked The Mediator series a lot more. Our protagonist can see ghosts, and deals with them on a regular basis. This series has lovable characters, a well-developed romance, and lots of action. Tons of fun to read.
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The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman- (4/5 stars) More of a middle-grade read, but I love Neil Gaiman’s writing style and The Graveyard Book was no exception. There are ghosts galore, most of them friendly, but darker shadows lurk in the cemetery where our protagonist, a young boy raised by the graveyard’s inhabitants lives. I found out after reading this one that it’s also a loose retelling of The Jungle Book, which adds a whole dimension of interesting to the novel.
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Texas Gothic by Rosemary Clement-Moore- (3/5 stars) I’m not that into Westerns, but Texas Gothic was fun. We’ve got cowboys, ghosts, and a really snarky protagonist. This one’s also got more of a supernatural-but-that’s-totally-normal vibe as opposed to the protagonist whose discovery of the supernatural drops on them like a ton of bricks. It was also well-paced and very neatly resolved, which is always nice.
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Asylum (Asylum #1) by Madeleine Roux- (2/5 stars) I have yet to read an asylum ghost story that I’ve thought was actually well done. It’s really tricky to navigate that setting while being respectful about mental illness–it usually results in some blend of psycho killers and twisted doctors victimizing their patients. Another factor that limited my enjoyment of this book was that the writing felt pretty juvenile. Also, the incorporation of the pictures (think sort of like Miss Peregrine’s Home of Peculiar Children) was somewhat jumbled and didn’t quite fit. Overall, I wasn’t impressed.