The best horror books that offer more than just a good scare

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m an award-winning and bestselling novelist known for writing in a wide variety of genres. My most popular work to date is Lovecraft Country, a supernatural horror novel that served as the basis for the acclaimed HBO series of the same name.


I wrote...

The Destroyer of Worlds: A Return to Lovecraft Country

By Matt Ruff,

Book cover of The Destroyer of Worlds: A Return to Lovecraft Country

What is my book about?

It is a standalone sequel to Lovecraft Country. It chronicles the lives of two black families in 1950s Chicago as they grapple with paranormal horrors and the more mundane terrors of life in the Jim Crow era.

Picking up two years after Lovecraft Country ended, Destroyer features new adventures, new challenges, and the return of an old nemesis.

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of The Dead Zone

Matt Ruff Why did I love this book?

It’s not the scariest Stephen King novel I’ve ever read—I’d give that honor to The Shining—but this book remains my all-time favorite.

The story of John Smith, who awakens from a five-year coma with psychic powers that are more curse than blessing, plays to King’s greatest strength as a writer: the ability to create believable characters who you really care about.

The book is also a time capsule of American politics in the 1970s—one that seems newly relevant in the 2024 presidential season.

By Stephen King,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Dead Zone as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Set in the fictional town of Castle Rock, Maine

A #1 New York Times bestseller about a man who wakes up from a five-year coma able to see people’s futures and the terrible fate awaiting mankind—a “compulsive page-turner” (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution).

Johnny Smith awakens from a five-year coma after his car accident and discovers that he can see people’s futures and pasts when he touches them. Many consider his talent a gift; Johnny feels cursed. His fiancée married another man during his coma and people clamor for him to solve their problems.

When Johnny has a disturbing vision after he…


Book cover of The Sundial

Matt Ruff Why did I love this book?

I love books that refuse to fit neatly into genre categories. This underappreciated novel by the author of "The Lottery" and The Haunting of Hill House reads like a Seinfeld episode set on the eve of the apocalypse.

The Sundial’s combination of social satire and horror got lackluster reviews when it was published in 1958, but that’s just because it was way ahead of its time.

By Shirley Jackson,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Sundial as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Before there was Hill House, there was the Halloran mansion of Jackson’s stunningly creepy fourth novel, The Sundial

When the Halloran clan gathers at the family home for a funeral, no one is surprised when the somewhat peculiar Aunt Fanny wanders off into the secret garden. But then she returns to report an astonishing vision of an apocalypse from which only the Hallorans and their hangers-on will be spared, and the family finds itself engulfed in growing madness, fear, and violence as they prepare for a terrible new world.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher…


Book cover of Blindsight

Matt Ruff Why did I love this book?

I also love books that combine thrilling adventure stories with the thoughtful exploration of ideas.

The protagonists of this haunting sci-fi/existential horror novel make contact with an alien species that, while highly intelligent, appears to lack any sense of self-awareness. This leads to the scary question: Are the aliens the weird ones in this scenario, or is human consciousness a unique mutation in a universe filled with zombies?

By Peter Watts,

Why should I read it?

5 authors picked Blindsight as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Two months have past since a myriad of alien objects clenched about the Earth, screaming as they burned. The heavens have been silent since until a derelict space probe hears whispers from a distant comet. Something talks out there: but not to us.Who should we send to meet the alien, when the alien doesn't want to meet?Send a linguist with multiple - personality disorder and a biologist so spliced with machinery that he can't feel his own flesh. Send a pacifist warrior and a vampire recalled from the grave by the voodoo of paleogenetics. Send a man with half his…


Book cover of Freedomland

Matt Ruff Why did I love this book?

The author, Richard Price, is a street reporter trapped in the body of a novelist. He takes firsthand observation and research on life in urban America and spins it into incredibly realistic and moving works of fiction.

Freedomland, my favorite of his novels, was inspired by the case of Susan Smith, who blamed the disappearance of her two sons on a fictitious black carjacker.

Though billed as a crime novel, it is also absolutely a horror story—and it’s fantastic.

By Richard Price,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Freedomland as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

An injured woman stumbles into an inner-city hospital with a horrifying story: she has just been carjacked by a man who was apparently unaware that her son was asleep on the back seat. As a search ensues, a shrewd detective and an ambitious young reporter smell a hoax and begin to suspect that the woman is holding back a terrible truth: could she have murdered her own child?


Book cover of The Night Ocean

Matt Ruff Why did I love this book?

This book borrows its title from a short story coauthored by H.P. Lovecraft, and it starts out like a classic Lovecraft tale, with an escaped psychiatric patient sending his wife a message from beyond the grave.

But just when you think you know what kind of book you’re reading, author La Farge throws in a twist—and then he does it again and again. It’s a unique and amazing novel that defies categorization.

By Paul La Farge,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked The Night Ocean as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

From the award-winning author and New Yorker contributor, a riveting novel about secrets and scandals,  psychiatry and pulp fiction, inspired by the lives of H.P. Lovecraft and his circle.

Marina Willett, M.D., has a problem. Her husband, Charlie, has become obsessed with H.P. Lovecraft, in particular with one episode in the legendary horror writer's life: In the summer of 1934, the "old gent" lived for two months with a gay teenage fan named Robert Barlow, at Barlow's family home in central Florida. What were the two of them up to? Were they friends--or something more? Just when Charlie thinks he's…


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Kanazawa

By David Joiner,

Book cover of Kanazawa

David Joiner Author Of Kanazawa

New book alert!

Why am I passionate about this?

My book recommendations reflect an abiding passion for Japanese literature, which has unquestionably influenced my own writing. My latest literary interest involves Japanese poetry—I’ve recently started a project that combines haiku and prose narration to describe my experiences as a part-time resident in a 1300-year-old Japanese hot spring town that Bashō helped make famous in The Narrow Road to the Deep North. But as a writer, my main focus remains novels. In late 2023 the second in a planned series of novels set in Ishikawa prefecture will be published. I currently live in Kanazawa, but have also been lucky to call Sapporo, Akita, Tokyo, and Fukui home at different times.

David's book list on Japanese settings not named Tokyo or Kyoto

What is my book about?

Emmitt’s plans collapse when his wife, Mirai, suddenly backs out of purchasing their dream home. Disappointed, he’s surprised to discover her subtle pursuit of a life and career in Tokyo.

In his search for a meaningful life in Japan, and after quitting his job, he finds himself helping his mother-in-law translate Kanazawa’s most famous author, Izumi Kyoka, into English. He becomes drawn into the mysterious death of a friend of Mirai’s parents, leading him and his father-in-law to climb the mountain where the man died. There, he learns the somber truth and discovers what the future holds for him and his wife.

Packed with subtle literary allusion and closely observed nuance, Kanazawa reflects the mood of Japanese fiction in a fresh, modern incarnation.

Kanazawa

By David Joiner,

What is this book about?

In Kanazawa, the first literary novel in English to be set in this storied Japanese city, Emmitt's future plans collapse when his wife, Mirai, suddenly backs out of negotiations to purchase their dream home. Disappointed, he's surprised to discover Mirai's subtle pursuit of a life and career in Tokyo, a city he dislikes.

Harmony is further disrupted when Emmitt's search for a more meaningful life in Japan leads him to quit an unsatisfying job at a local university. In the fallout, he finds himself helping his mother-in-law translate Kanazawa's most famous author, Izumi Kyoka, into English.

While continually resisting Mirai's…


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