The Best Horror Books

Whether you're scared most by graphic body horror, the uncategorisable, or the blurring of boundaries between supernatural menace and psychological unraveling, this list will have something for you. Reflecting on the complex nature of fear, Xavier Aldana Reyes surveys the best modern horror and explores whether the genre might offer consolation as well as terror.

H. P. Lovecraft has been hugely influential on many leading names in speculative fiction today, and is also frequently adapted – and frequently subverted. Jeffrey Weinstock, co-editor of The Age of Lovecraft, introduces five stories that best illustrate the themes and range of this influential figure: the anxieties, the typical Lovecraftian twists, and the ‘cosmic indifferentness’ that set his work apart.

It's not too late to discover your favourite book of the year. Here, we offer a round-up of the horror novels garlanded at the Horror Writers Association's annual Bram Stoker Awards in 2024, which offers everything from haunted houses to slasher homages: a perfectly curated selection for those who prefer their books to scare them senseless.

Why was 1897 such a great year for horror? How did Charles Darwin's discoveries impact the genre? Trinity College, Dublin professor Darryl Jones selects some of the best of the genre—and discusses why we find these stories so fascinating.

The most unnerving and disturbing novels are often those books that leave room for interpretation and uncertainty. Here, the acclaimed Irish novelist Sue Rainsford selects five frightening works of literary horror, by authors who are masters of the unsettling implication—because nothing is quite so scary as what you dream up to fill the voids.

Some books frighten and thrill us in equal measure. If that sounds good to you, you will love novelist Aliya Whiteley's recommendations: five outstanding sci-fi horror books that, like the original Frankenstein, use dread and disgust to raise fascinating questions about science and what it means to be human.

You can’t turn on a television or pass an airport bookstore without seeing the influence of America’s most generative writer, Edgar Allan Poe. He orginated true life crime and detective fiction, sci-fi and horror story tropes, and wrote unforgettable poems. Poe expert Shawn Rosenheim, a professor at Williams College, recommends where to start with Poe, as well as the best books about his influence.

Shirley Jackson, the 20th-century horror author, has had a remarkable resurgence in popularity in recent years, with a series of screen adaptations bringing her writing to a new audience. Joan Passey, an academic at Bristol University and co-editor of an upcoming collection of essays on the 'mother of horror', selects five books that offer the best introduction to Shirley Jackson's work.

The Gothic puts flesh on the bones of our darkest fears, British novelist Sarah Perry tells Five Books. Here, she chooses five favourite novels in this 'irresistible' genre.

If you love to get scared silly then we have reading recommendations for you. Will Maclean, author of the unsettling new novel The Apparition Phase, selects the best ghost stories, including writing from the queen of screams Shirley Jackson, and a four-page, pitch-black nightmare that might just be the perfect ghost story.