Horror stories for 11 year old

[lightswitchmoment]

My 11 year old is a reluctant reader but has to read 20 minutes every night am for school. This is becoming a bit of a battle ground so was thinking of getting her some books that might be more to her taste than the ones she is bringing home from school.

She loves Stranger Things and The Quiet Place which are full of jumps but not too scary. I was thinking a horror story pitched at her age group may be suitable if anyone has any recommendations?

Mine enjoy the goosebumps books, not sure they are scary enough but worth a try

Thank you for the suggestion. We did have some of these donated by a friend but apparently they're too childish.

Crater Lake by Jennifer Killick is great.

Thank you. Wonder if there are any slightly scarier books anyone can recommend

Point Horror series is aimed at slight older than Goosebumps but you would have to seek them out secondhand. There are various other R L Stine (author of Goosebumps) series that are for older readers. Fear Street I think is one series.
Anthony Horowitz also has a series of horror stories.

Oo yes Point Horrors, loved all the RL Stine, Christopher Pike etc!

How about starting on the short stories collections like these ones?

Another vote for point horror! I used to read these around 12-14ish and I loved them. May dig them out again for a nostalgia read

Wilkie Collins?

At that age I loved the Robin Jarvis Whitby witches series, which are creepy but not actually horror.

Ah point horror, loved them. I remember point romance too.

Invisible Fiends series by Barry Hutchison!

So good and genuinely scary. We kept wanting to read more as every chapter is a cliffhanger. Loads of action too.

Scary Stories We Tell In the Dark

Would she like Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury? It's not too long, creepy but not horrifying, and has a reasonably happy ending.

The Five Nights at Freddy's books?

Thank you for the suggestions, going to show her now

I used to like the Armada Ghost Stories books at that age, they are probably out of print but you can get them secondhand on Amazon. As far as I remember they were a mix of classic and new (for the time) ghost stories and some of them were pretty chilling. Then I went on to terrify myself with Stephen King a few years later.

My reluctant reader loved the Red Eye books at that age. Simple language, fast moving and suitably trashy. Point Horror for the current generation!

I loved Stephen King at that age 😁

The Darren Shan books are good.

Not horror as such but Paul Jennings has some great books 'Round the Twist' TV show was based on his stories. I introduced my boys to the show on YouTube and then the books which I read as a kid too.

Stephen King - the girl who loved Tom Gordon, it's quite a short novel and not as scary as his other books, more psychological than horror. Maybe read it first though, so you can judge whether it's appropriate or not.

They're mainly quite short stories, which might be better for a reluctant reader too.

Anthony Horrowitz has a collection of horror stories called Horrowitz Horror (see what he did there?). Probably each could be read in 20 minutes, which would also help with motivation. Read some with my Y6s and they loved them.

The Red Eye books are now on my favourite list for her but she's gone for Fear Street to begin with. A lot of the suggestions are already in the school library so she's going to try them as she has to pick a library book as well as her own personal choice at home.

My DS loved (and still loves) Skulduggery Pleasant at that age, with the bonus that there are loads of the books if she likes them.