To ask you for your best scary book

[Floursacktabletop]

I want to read something scary for October. I don't already own anything . Here's my wants
Must be horror genre, not crime thriller or mystery like The Girl on the Train type.
I've read most of the older Stephen King novels, Needful Things/The Green Mile probably faves
Not gory or body horror.
Any great recommendations? Would be much appreciated.

Nightwatching by Tracy Sierra made me hold my breath nearly constantly!

I found "Dark Matter" by Michelle Paver quite spooky.

The Cement Garden, Ian McEwan
The Little Stranger, Sarah Waters
Beloved, Toni Morrison

Unsettling and spooky rather than outright horror, but all worth reading if you haven’t already.

Gallows Hill by Darcey Coates is proper haunted house horror, which still gives me the creeps when I am alone at night.

Withered Hill by David Barnett is a modern folk horror; less likely to give you the creeps but with elements of weird village life and WTF is going on.

Diavola (can't remember the author) has White Lotus, dysfunctional family on holiday vibes, but in a creepy haunted villa. Unlikeable (well, not entirely) female protagonist, avoid if you want your lead to be a really good person! Loved this one.

Nightwatching I enjoyed but it's not horror, nothing supernatural, more suspenseful thriller.

Early works of Susan Hill such as I'm The King of the Castle or The Bird of Night

Salem’s Lot by Stephen King.

I read it as a student. Wouldn’t read it if I was in the flat alone, or after dark, and I actually didn’t like reading it alone in my room, I used to go into my flatmate’s room while she was studying and read in her bed.

She pissed herself laughing at that, until she read it herself - and did the same thing.

Dark Matter by Michelle Paver

I love ghost stories and this one is fantastic.

The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters. Post WWII supernatural.

TBH the scariest book I ever read was In Cold Blood by Truman Capote, the real story of a Midwest family killed by intruders. Thoroughly researched by Capote and beautifully written showing perspective of the family, the community and the killers. Scary because in real life horror is so banal, there are no harbingers of doom.

Pet Semetary Stephen King, my favourite book
The reason I wil not be buried!

The secret of Crinkley Hall James Herbert truely scary

Adding my vote to The Little Stranger.

also if you like classics, find a collection of ghost stories by M R James. So creepy and unsettling.

Yes I have read this one a few years ago great!

Thank you I haven't read any of these

Yes read these too and agree

Also came here to say the little stranger. Read it on a night bus, on a really stormy night, traveling from London to Edinburgh years ago and freaked myself out throughly.

salems lot genuinely horrified me. Some of the scenes were just awful- but obviously a classic.

I read Stephen King’s “The Birds” when I was a teenager. I remember being terrified at 2am but unable to put it down. That’s the brilliance of King.

Agree about Needful Things. The scariest part is people doing it to themselves and each other just because they are following human nature.

The Elementals by Michael McDowell

Stave Acre by Andrew Michael Hurley

Do you mean Daphne du Maurier’s The Birds?

I second this

I don’t read many scary books but i really enjoyed Hari Kunzru’s White Tears when I read it a few years ago- about a young DJ (cough Moby cough) haunted by the old spiritual samples he used in his music.

Definitely this one!

The Fisherman by John Langan
Black river orchard by Chuck Wendig
Six stories by Matt Wesolowski

I second MR James short stories, and also EF Benson's short ghost stories. His short story 'the room in the tower' terrified me, and is going to be the next BBC ghost story for Christmas, so now is a good time to read it.

I found Diavola to be so badly written it was unreadable. Couldn't even finish the Amazon preview!

I'm reading EF Benson's ghost stories at the moment and agree, The Room in the Tower is very good.

Just placemarking.

The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon - one of Stephen King’s lesser known books. I don’t think I’ve ever held my breath for so long before.