Love Lost Souls? Readers share 100 books like Lost Souls...

By Poppy Brite,

Here are 100 books that Lost Souls fans have personally recommended if you like Lost Souls. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of Let the Right One in

Katie Marie Author Of A Man in Winter

From my list on horror with child protagonists that are not for kids.

Why am I passionate about this?

Horror is my passion and most things I read and everything I write fits neatly into the genre. But I am also passionate about telling stories from a unique perspective, or if not entirely unique then at least one that is underused. My novella A Man in Winter is told from the perspective of an elderly chap with dementia for instance. I have also found that many people think books with child protagonists must be childrenā€™s books and it makes me sad to think of all the wonderful work is being missed out on, I hope that my list has convinced you to try one of the above books.

Katie's book list on horror with child protagonists that are not for kids

Katie Marie Why did Katie love this book?

So much of Lindqvists writing is fantastic, but this has to be my favorite. I read it while in university and then I re-read it and re-read it until one of my housemates asked why it was taking me so long to read a single book then seemed confused when I admitted that every time I finished it I just started it again. 

I love the take Lindqvist has on the vampire as a ā€˜monsterā€™ Eli is complex and sympathetic, dangerous and vulnerable itā€™s a wonderful balancing act. But what I enjoyed most of all was that Eli, while being hundreds of years old, is physically and mentally, twelve. Their long life did not make them an adult in a childā€™s body, they literally stunted their growth and that makes them so compelling.

By John Ajvide Lindqvist, Ebba Segerberg (translator),

Why should I read it?

6 authors picked Let the Right One in as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

John Ajvide Lindqvistā€™s international bestseller Let the Right One In is ā€œa brilliant take on the vampire myth, and a roaring good storyā€ (New York Times bestselling author Kelley Armstrong), the basis for the multi-film festival award-winning Swedish film, the U.S. adaptation Let Me In directed by Matt Reeves (The Batman), and the Showtime TV series.

It is autumn 1981 when inconceivable horror comes to Blackeberg, a suburb in Sweden. The body of a teenager is found, emptied of blood, the murder rumored to be part of a ritual killing. Twelve-year-old Oskar is personally hoping that revenge has come atā€¦


Book cover of Cycle of the Werewolf

Katie Marie Author Of A Man in Winter

From my list on horror with child protagonists that are not for kids.

Why am I passionate about this?

Horror is my passion and most things I read and everything I write fits neatly into the genre. But I am also passionate about telling stories from a unique perspective, or if not entirely unique then at least one that is underused. My novella A Man in Winter is told from the perspective of an elderly chap with dementia for instance. I have also found that many people think books with child protagonists must be childrenā€™s books and it makes me sad to think of all the wonderful work is being missed out on, I hope that my list has convinced you to try one of the above books.

Katie's book list on horror with child protagonists that are not for kids

Katie Marie Why did Katie love this book?

I had to include at least one King book, Iā€™m a big fan of King and this is one of his lesser-known books. 

I love this book because itā€™s a good and interesting story that hooked me from the first chapter and kept me till the end. 

But also, I am passionate about good representation (particularly disability representation) in the horror genre, Iā€™m writing my PhD thesis on it. King is a mixed bag when it comes to good and bad representation but he does a good job in this one. Marty is a 10-year-old paraplegic boy who suspects a werewolf is in his town.

The story revolves around Marty hunting and defeating the beast. Itā€™s a high stakes, exciting, and utterly plausible (if you suspend belief for the werewolf lol).

By Stephen King, Bernie Wrightson (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Cycle of the Werewolf as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The classic masterpiece by #1 New York Times bestselling author Stephen Kingā€”illustrated by the legendary artist Bernie Wrightson!

Terror began in Januaryā€”by the light of the full moon...

The first scream came from the snowbound railwayman who felt the werewolfā€™s fangs ripping at his throat. The next month there was a scream of ecstatic agony from the woman attacked in her cozy bedroom. Now scenes of unbelievable horror unfold each time the full moon shines on the isolated Maine town of Tarkerā€™s Mills. No one knows who will be attacked next. But one thing is sure. When the full moonā€¦


Book cover of The Thief of Always: A Fable

D.J. MacHale Author Of Beyond Midnight

From my list on supernatural that will scare you witless.

Why am I passionate about this?

To understand why I write macabre stories, you could ask my therapist if I had one. Iā€™ve had this bent since my mother read me Dr. Seussā€™ What Was I Scared Of? (A title that inspired the title of my TV series Are You Afraid of the Dark?) Blame it on her. My reading was dominated by the short stories I mentioned and magazines like Eerie and Creepy. I also consumed a steady diet of Twilight Zone and Saturday matinee horror movies. Why? I believe itā€™s because these stories offer imaginative conflicts that are far removed from reality yet told through the perspective of common experience. And theyā€™re always wrapped in a compelling mystery.

D.J.'s book list on supernatural that will scare you witless

D.J. MacHale Why did D.J. love this book?

Like Stephen King, Clive Barker has an impressive list of horror-themed novels for all tastes, ranging from fantasy to deeply disturbing and graphic horror tales like Books of Blood. This book skews more toward fantasy but still has its share of scares and disturbing imagery.

A young boy is sent on a whimsical and horrifying imaginative adventure. Itā€™s like a modern-day Grimm fairy tale, right up my alley.

By Clive Barker,

Why should I read it?

4 authors picked The Thief of Always as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 9, 10, 11, and 12.

What is this book about?

The horror story your students have been asking you for! The only children's story by the master of horror.


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Book cover of The Ballad of Falling Rock

The Ballad of Falling Rock by Jordan Dotson,

Truth told, folks still ask if Saul Crabtree sold his soul for the perfect voice. If he sold it to angels or devils. A Bristol newspaper once asked: ā€œAre his love songs closer to heaven than dying?ā€ Others wonder how he wrote a song so sad, everyone who heard itā€¦

Book cover of The Troop

J. Lincoln Fenn Author Of The Nightmarchers

From my list on horror that will make you cancel your travel plans.

Why am I passionate about this?

Growing up in New England, my mother had a set of books that she kept in the living room, more for display than anything else. It was The Works of Edgar Allen Poe. I read them and instantly became hooked on horror. In the seventh grade, I entertained my friends at a sleepover by telling them the mysterious clanking noise (created by the baseboard heater) was the ghost of a woman who had once lived in the farmhouse, forced to cannibalize her ten children during a particularly bad winter. And Iā€™ve been enjoying scaring people ever since.

J.'s book list on horror that will make you cancel your travel plans

J. Lincoln Fenn Why did J. love this book?

Alright, so a theme seems to be developing here, but in this case, ā€˜Donā€™t mess with natureā€™ gets a Canadian island treatment (those poor Boy Scouts). And, of course, a storm is coming. And, of course, the communications go out. I was gripped and frankly grossed out by this Stephen King-esque tale. 

There are also shades of Frankenstein and Lord of the Flies, and I love a horror novel that asks the question of which monsters are worseā€”the ones we create or the ones that lurk inside. 

By Nick Cutter,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

'THE TROOP scared the hell out of me, and I couldn't put it down. Not for the faint-hearted' STEPHEN KING

He felt something touch his hand. Which is when he looked down.

For the scouts of Troop 52, three days of camping, hiking and survival lessons on Falstaff Island is as close as they'll get to a proper holiday.

Which was when he saw it.

But when an emaciated figure stumbles into their camp asking for food, the trip takes a horrifying turn. The man is not just hungry, he's sick. Sick in a way they have never seen before.ā€¦


Book cover of Edinburgh

Alina Grabowski Author Of Women and Children First

From my list on exploring how place shapes community.

Why am I passionate about this?

Iā€™m a writer who grew up in Massachusetts and now lives in Austin, Texas. Though I havenā€™t lived in Massachusetts for over a decade now, I find myself drawn back to the stateā€™s coast in my fiction. My novel, Women and Children First, takes place in a fictional town south of Boston called Nashquitten. Iā€™m obsessed with how where weā€™re from shapes who we become and the ways we use narrative to try and exert control over our lives. 

Alina's book list on exploring how place shapes community

Alina Grabowski Why did Alina love this book?

This is a book about many thingsā€”guilt, artmaking, and love among themā€”but when I think of it, I think of a novel that depicts the complexities of making and sustaining a life more deftly than anything else Iā€™ve read. How things like cruelty and beauty, innocence and evil, truth and lies all coexist. How we move forward despite this uneasy balance.

The novel follows Fee, a boy who grows up in Maine and sings in an all-boys choir. The choir director turns out to be an abuser, and his actions haunt Fee and the other boys in the choir into adulthood.

On a prose level alone, Cheeā€™s writing is unparalleled, his sentences sharp enough to cut glass. I donā€™t see how anyone could read this book and come away unchanged. 

By Alexander Chee,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

A poignant work of mature, haunting artistry, Edinburgh heralds the arrival of a remarkable young writer. Fee, a Korean-American child growing up in Maine, is gifted with a beautiful soprano voice and sings in a professional boys' choir. When the choir director acts out his paedophilic urges on the boys in the choir, Fee is unable to save himself, his first love, Peter, or his friends.


Book cover of Subculture: The Meaning of Style

Katherine Giuffre Author Of Outrage: The Arts and the Creation of Modernity

From my list on maverick creativity.

Why am I passionate about this?

Iā€™ve spent my career as a sociologist studying how creative people work, what social settings are most conducive to creativity, and how to foster creativity for everyone in our daily lives. I know that creativity is often not easy and can even be met with hostility much more frequently than we might think. Creativity is, after all, a type of deviance and creative people can face real obstacles in finding and following their vision. But a richer understanding of how and why creativity happens ā€“ and of its obstacles ā€“ can be a tool for making a more vibrant, creative, inclusive, and just world.

Katherine's book list on maverick creativity

Katherine Giuffre Why did Katherine love this book?

When I first read this book (almost 40 years ago), it became the foundation for how I think about culture, creativity, and their connection to revolution.

Hebdige shows how little things like the cut of a pair of trousers or a hairstyle can make important social critiques that are understood and reverberate far beyond the youth subcultures that spawn them. And he provides a theoretical framework for thinking about possibilities for revolution in everyday life. Plus, itā€™s the most insightful book about punk ever written.

By Dick Hebdige,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

'Hebdige's Subculture: The Meaning of Style is so important: complex and remarkably lucid, it's the first book dealing with punk to offer intellectual content. Hebdige [...] is concerned with the UK's postwar, music-centred, white working-class subcultures, from teddy boys to mods and rockers to skinheads and punks.' - Rolling Stone

With enviable precision and wit Hebdige has addressed himself to a complex topic - the meanings behind the fashionable exteriors of working-class youth subcultures - approaching them with a sophisticated theoretical apparatus that combines semiotics, the sociology of devience and Marxism and come up with a very stimulating short bookā€¦


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Book cover of The Bedfordshire Warlock

The Bedfordshire Warlock by Patrick R. Field,

The Bedfordshire Warlock is a speculative fiction novel that explores the concept of reincarnation with respect to the inheritance of supernatural powers and a quest to increase those powers to the level of god-like abilities.

The main character, Dorian Leeves, is the reincarnation of a 300-year-old warlock murdered during oneā€¦

Book cover of Orange Sunshine: The Brotherhood of Eternal Love and Its Quest to Spread Peace, Love, and Acid to the World

Chris Elcock Author Of Psychedelic New York: A History of LSD in the City

From my list on history of the American counter-culture.

Why am I passionate about this?

Iā€™ve always been fascinated by the American counter-culture and its promise to change society, be it with radical lifestyles, drugs, or creating new cultural settings. I was going to study this from a more sociological approach until I discovered the history of the psychedelic movement and its promise to create a new society by reforming American individuals from within. Although I wound up becoming more interested in what the counter-culture actually achieved rather than dwelling on its excesses, I am currently working on a new book project that will shed light on an organization that managed to achieve both.

Chris' book list on history of the American counter-culture

Chris Elcock Why did Chris love this book?

This is a slightly biased choice as a historian of LSD and psychedelics, but to me, this book offers the most staggering illustration of acid-infused idealism by telling the riveting story of a group of California hoodlums turned LSD crusaders.

This dizzying page-turner takes you through the rise of evangelical acid chemists who manufactured millions of doses and had them distributed by the Brotherhood of Eternal Love, who made very little profit and often gifted their acid. A book I would have loved to write! 

By Nicholas Schou,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Few stories in the annals of American counterculture are as intriguing or dramatic as that of the Brotherhood of Eternal Love.

Dubbed the "Hippie Mafia," the Brotherhood began in the mid-1960s as a small band of peace-loving, adventure-seeking surfers in Southern California. After discovering LSD, they took to Timothy Leary's mantra of "Turn on, tune in, and drop out" and resolved to make that vision a reality by becoming the biggest group of acid dealers and hashish smugglers in the nation, and literally providing the fuel for the psychedelic revolution in the process.

Just days after California became the firstā€¦


Book cover of Youth to Power: Your Voice and How to Use It

Tanja Hester Author Of Wallet Activism: How to Use Every Dollar You Spend, Earn, and Save as a Force for Change

From my list on to equip you to fight for change.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have spent 20+ years working on the question of how social and environmental change happens, from my long-time career in progressive politics to my current work writing about the most pressing issues of our time through an economic lens, and occasionally talking about them on my podcast, also called Wallet Activism. So I know well how intimidating it can feel to get involved, whether itā€™s worrying your voice isnā€™t needed (trust me, it is!) or not knowing the nuts and bolts of where to start. But we have so much power when we act collectively, and I want you to feel personally invited to take action.

Tanja's book list on to equip you to fight for change

Tanja Hester Why did Tanja love this book?

Ignore the word ā€œyouthā€ in the title, because this is not just a book for kids and teens! Jamie is a young, queer activist who has achieved some impressive activism victories at a young age, but best of all, she combines real activist know-how with a sense of hope and optimism thatā€™s hard to find in older activists. This book is an excellent guide to getting involved and staying involved anywhere from the local level up to a global scale. This is a must-read for people who are fired up to take action but donā€™t know where to start.

By Jamie Margolin,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

The 1963 Children's March in Birmingham, Alabama. Tiananmen Square, 1989. The 2016 Dakota Access Pipeline protests. March for Our Lives, and School Strike for Climate. What do all these social justice movements have in common? They were led by passionate, informed, engaged young people. Jamie Margolin has been organizing and protesting since she was fourteen years old. Now the co-leader of a global climate action movement, she knows better than most how powerful a young person can be. You don't have to be able to vote or hold positions of power to change the world.

In Youth to Power, Jamieā€¦


Book cover of Darius the Great Deserves Better

Abdi Nazemian Author Of Only This Beautiful Moment

From my list on queer youth to make you laugh, cry, and grow.

Why am I passionate about this?

I grew up feeling invisible in media, and absent in history. My Iranian history was hidden from me by a culture that believed shielding young people from trauma was the right thing to do, and my queer history was hidden from me by a homophobic time. Iā€™m passionate about the power of seeing yourself represented in storytelling and in history, and have devoted much of my life to telling queer stories, and queer historical stories. As a parent, as a queer Iranian storyteller, as a passionate believer in art as a tool for empathy, these are books I think will both entertain readers and inspire them to love their fellow humans a little more.

Abdi's book list on queer youth to make you laugh, cry, and grow

Abdi Nazemian Why did Abdi love this book?

When I was growing up, there was zero queer Iranian representation to inspire me or guide me.

I felt quite literally invisible in the world, and my own mission has been to flood the world with queer Iranian stories to fill this void. Thankfully, a number of other authors are now doing the same, including Sara Farizan, Arvin Ahmadi, and Adib Khorram.

I chose the sequel to Adibā€™s masterful Darius the Great Deserves Better because I love how it leans into intergenerational family dynamics, which are a particular passion of mine (and of most immigrants who must work to unite the disparate parts of our histories).

By Adib Khorram,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Darius the Great Deserves Better as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 12, 13, 14, and 15.

What is this book about?

Darius Kellner is having a bit of a year. Since his trip to Iran this past spring, a lot has changed. He's getting along with his dad, and his best friend Sohrab is only a Skype call away. Between his first boyfriend, Landon, his varsity soccer practices, and his internship at his favourite tea shop, Darius is feeling pretty okay. Like he finally knows what it means to be Darius Kellner. Then, of course, everything changes. Darius's grandmothers are in town for a long visit while his dad is gone on business, and Darius isn't sure whether they even likeā€¦


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Book cover of Domesticated Magic

Domesticated Magic by Wendy Palmer,

Mateo Taurasi and his family fled their island home when their people turned to sorcery. Mateoā€™s own magic is tame but itā€™s still banned in the Vaeringan Empire...and his family still use it every day in their cosy teahouse. The last thing they need is an Imperial barging in toā€¦

Book cover of Fighting Invisible Tigers: Stress Management for Teens

James J. Crist Author Of What to Do When You're Scared and Worried: A Guide for Kids

From my list on anxiety and stress for kids.

Why am I passionate about this?

Letā€™s face itā€”kidsā€™ anxiety has gone through the roof over the last two years since the start of the pandemic. Not being able to play with friends, participate on sports teams, or even have sleepovers has had an impact. For kids, play is one of their main ways to relieve stress.  Here are my five go-to books for kids dealing with anxiety, worries, and stress. 

James' book list on anxiety and stress for kids

James J. Crist Why did James love this book?

I really like the title of this book because it captures why your brain reacts as it does to fear, anxiety, and stress. Because of the fight-or-flight reaction in response to danger, your brain revs your body up to get ready to fight a tiger or run away. But that reaction doesnā€™t help when your stress is about taking a test, introducing yourself to someone, or handling a rough situation at home. Itā€™s like your brain is reacting to invisible tigers chasing you. Self-care for ā€œtiger bitesā€ is a fun way to think about ways to reduce the impact of stressful situations.

By Earl Hipp,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

Fresh edition of a popular title offers teens straightforward advice on stress management, anxiety reduction, and digital well-being. Untempered stress among teens is approaching epidemic status. Prolonged and intense anxiety can feel like being stalked by a tiger, never knowing when it will strike. Helping adolescents cope with day-to-day stressors like school, friendships, family, and social media can help curb impulsivity and other risky behaviors. Now in its fourth edition, the revised and updated Fighting Invisible Tigers teaches teens proven techniques and stress management skills to face the rigors of growing up. Packed with useful information on how stress affectsā€¦


Book cover of Let the Right One in
Book cover of Cycle of the Werewolf
Book cover of The Thief of Always: A Fable

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