I studied psychology in college and am fascinated with the human mind. The psyche holds so many joys, wonders, and the deepest horrors imaginable, all compact and functioning within our skulls. My love for psychology grew into the horror realm, where I read and watched anything revolving around the character study of an individual driven to the brink. Now, I write stories about the morality of actions taken by those who have found themselves in a peculiar position. I believe there is more to the clean-cut view of right versus wrong regarding the decision-making of one’s self-preservation.
This book stressed me out. What starts as the tale of a married couple dealing with a death in the family devolves into something chaotic. I couldn’t stop reading because I was desperate to see where this downward spiral would take me next.
I resonated deeply with the main character and her quest to be so perfect that it drove her to the brink. I, too, sometimes focus on perfectionism so hard that I feel the subtle whisper of insanity. I love it when stories relate to the darker thoughts we keep hidden inside.
'A gruesome, blackly funny, utterly original feminist horror story' New York Times, Notable Book of the Year
'A buzz-worthy and ferocious horror comedy from one of the genre's most promising voices' Buzzfeed
Abby Lamb has done it. She's found the Great Good in her husband, Ralph, and together they will start a family and put all the darkness in her childhood to rest. But then the Lambs move in with Ralph's mother, Laura, whose depression has made it impossible for her to live on her own. She's venomous and cruel, especially to Abby, who has a complicated understanding of motherhood…
I was a wild card in the industry heavy town where I was born and raised, destined to burn out my days early in a factory or steel mill. But I worked my way through college, survived several close calls in Vietnam and bull headed my way into a series of jobs that pushed me toward Hollywood assignments as a writer, producer and director.
I liked this hundred-year-old novel because it explores some darker doubts and concerns I have always had about “the hidden heart of mankind unrestrained.” What’s more, the theme of Heart Of Darkness is reflected in the movie Apocalypse Now, with stark modern-day observations on the wounds the violence of war can inflict on the hearts and minds of humans.
Although Polish by birth, Joseph Conrad (1857–1924) is regarded as one of the greatest writers in English, and Heart of Darkness, first published in 1902, is considered by many his "most famous, finest, and most enigmatic story." — Encyclopaedia Britannica. The tale concerns the journey of the narrator (Marlow) up the Congo River on behalf of a Belgian trading company. Far upriver, he encounters the mysterious Kurtz, an ivory trader who exercises an almost godlike sway over the inhabitants of the region. Both repelled and fascinated by the man, Marlow is brought face to face with the corruption and despair…
My ache for the ancient is a disease. It’s probably safe to say that I am the creator of the world’s greatest range of Egypt-based fiction by a single author. My depth of knowledge comes from a lifetime spent studying ancient Egypt and Egyptian archaeology and making numerous research trips to Egypt. I am fascinated by the mystery of ancient Egypt and its potency and relevance to today’s world. I have written numerous series and stand-alone adventures.
This book was required reading for me as an Egyptophile and mystery thriller writer.
Ancient horror, an archaeological plot to revive the dead Queen Tera, a mummy with extra fingers. What’s not to love? It's an atmospheric genre I just can’t shake.
My passion for small islands began as a child. I spent my summer holidays on the Isles of Scilly, where everyone knew each other, and the sea wiped the landscape clean, leaving it pristine each morning. Since then, I’ve visited dozens of islands, keen to understand the islanders’ survivalist mindset. I worked as an English teacher before becoming a writer. It allowed me to share my love of storytelling, but the tales that linger with me still take place on small islands where the consequences of our actions are never forgotten. I hope you enjoy exploring the ones on my list as much as I did!
I loved this book because it was so gripping. It made me long to be a writer. Although it was written over a hundred years ago, the dark story spoke directly to me.
I read it at the darkest time in my life. I was fourteen, and my alcoholic father had become a terrifying force in our home, just like Dr. Moreau, who rules his island with vicious power. I had never dreamed that a crazed leader could break an entire population, but the idea seems shockingly prescient now.
The book made me realize that I, too, could escape from the trap around me, just like the book’s hero, and learn to use my imagination to tell stories.
The novel took me by surprise. It was sitting on my Kindle for an age before I started reading and, initially, I struggled with Blatty’s style. It felt all over the place at first, overwrought and with more semicolons per page than I’ve used in total over the course of writing more than twenty books. It took me a while to get into the rhythm, but once I’d got it I was hooked. The narration felt detached, oddly remote from the unbearable emotions of a parent watching her child go through an appalling ordeal, powerless to help. It felt almost matter of fact in the way Regan’s possession was described, and I think that’s why it had such an impact. The grotesque things the spirit makes the child do and say are described without unnecessary histrionics, and that added an unexpected layer of realism to impossible scenes.
Father Damien Karras: 'Where is Regan?' Regan MacNeil: 'In here. With us.'
The terror begins unobtrusively. Noises in the attic. In the child's room, an odd smell, the displacement of furniture, an icy chill. At first, easy explanations are offered. Then frightening changes begin to appear in eleven-year-old Regan. Medical tests fail to shed any light on her symptoms, but it is as if a different personality has invaded her body.
Father Damien Karras, a Jesuit priest, is called in. Is it possible that a demonic presence has possessed the child? Exorcism seems to be the only answer...
I’ve always been fascinated by books that explore the slow, painful unraveling of the human psyche. In part, I think because it’s something so many more of us either fear or experience (at least to some degree) than anyone really wants to admit—but it’s also just such rich material for literary unpacking. I also love books with strong, angry female protagonists who fight back against oppression in all of its forms, so books about pissed-off madwomen are a natural go-to for me. Extra points if they teach me something I didn’t know before-which is almost always the case with historical novels in this genre.
I love this book first and foremost because it is essentially the OG of madwomen narratives. Written in 1892, it is a super-creepy, sensory, trippy exploration of one woman’s sanity slowly being shredded by male medical “expertise”—in this case, a doctor’s prescription for postpartum depression: utter isolation in a bedroom with no intellectual stimulation... in order to alleviate postpartum depression (?!). Unsurprisingly, rather than “recovering,” the heroine drags readers down a terrifying rabbit hole of hallucination, self-destruction, and—ultimately—murder.
It’s a masterful, Hitchcockian deep dive into psychosis written over a half-century before Psycho. But it’s also an extremely satisfying example of feminist revenge-writing; Perkins not only drew on her own experience after suffering this “treatment” but sent a copy directly to her practitioner after its publication. Pow!
The Yellow Wallpaper (original title: "The Yellow Wall-paper. A Story") is a 6,000-word short story by the American writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman, first published in January 1892 in The New England Magazine. It is regarded as an important early work of American feminist literature, illustrating attitudes in the 19th century toward women's health, both physical and mental.
Presented in the first person, the story is a collection of journal entries written by a woman whose physician husband (John) has rented an old mansion for the summer. Forgoing other rooms in the house, the couple moves into the upstairs nursery. As…
A cult author who has survived by the skin of her wits. Nina has spent her adult years in London though many believe she is from New York, which sounds like a lot of travelling for someone who has spent the majority of her life in the dream land of writing. What does being a cult author entail? It is to be a literary Will o’ the Wisp, possessing a gem like glimmering in a mist of obscurity, loved by the rarified few. After writing many critically acclaimed books on various nefarious rock n’ rollers, her ardor dimmed with the passing years as those she had loved were no more and so she returned to her first love, which is the strange and supernatural.
The Hill of Dreams will appeal to anyone who has struggled to gain creative acceptance. Welsh-born Machen who was admired by Lovecraft spins a wondrous if tragic tale of a faun-like country boy, Lucian who moves to London, hoping to write a novel based on a pagan vision but loses his way in the course of setting magic to paper.
Machen effortlessly captures the poetic hopelessness expressed by Chatterton, Ernest Dowson, and Lionel Johnson, literary waifs all. An exquisite elegy for romantic outsiders of all centuries, it evokes the fading lilt of Pan’s Pipes at dusk. Although most people consider The Picture of Dorian Gray to be the ultimate expression of Decadent literature, The Hill of Dreams with its morbid beauty and taint of autumnal decay is the equal of Oscar Wilde’s esoteric masterpiece. Machen’s yearning for the ineffable so beautifully expressed in his book was the inspiration for my…
When I was twelve years old, my picture appeared in my hometown newspaper. I was holding a huge stack of books from the library, a week’s reading. All science fiction. I’ve read voraciously for the past seventy years—though much more widely as an adult. I’ve also had a life founding several small companies and writing twenty books. But I’ve continued to read science fiction, and, increasingly, dystopian novels. Why? Because, as a history buff, I think about the big trends that shape our lives. I see clearly that climate change, breakthroughs in technology, and unstable politics threaten our children’s future. I want to understand how these trends might play out—for better or for worse.
The news is full of stories about chilling developments in artificial intelligence.
And you don’t have to venture into the fantasy world of killer robots to be terrified. Already, “chatbots” are blurring the lines between human and machine intelligence.
It’s gotten to the point that you can’t trust what you see or read online—because it may have been created by some AI designed to cheat or scare you into doing something you really don’t want to do.
Ira Levin’s novel, published in 1970, shows us a world ruled by artificial intelligence. It’s dystopia in the truest sense—and it’s likely to frighten you, as it did me.
'Marvellously entertaining. A cross between Brave New World and Doctor Who' Look Magazine
Considered one of the great dystopian thrillers - alongside A Clockwork Orange and Brave New World- Ira Levin's terrifying glimpse into the future continues to fascinate readers even forty years after publication.
Set in a seemingly perfect global society, where uniformity is the defining feature, one man leads the resistance against UniComp - a central computer that has been programmed to keep every single human on the surface of the earth in check. All ethnic groups have been eugenically merged into a single race called 'The Family',…
Scary books and movies hooked me early in life and never let go. I’m fascinated by the themes that are explored in all of the various sub-genres of horror. I’m intrigued by the lore that’s created, and I’m impressed with the imagination of so many horror creators. Horror remains and always will be one of the most popular genres of storytelling.
This book is an endearing and beloved classic, and deservedly so. Here, the marriage of its exquisite prose with black-and-white illustrations from one of the greatest artists who ever lived is truly something to behold. If you’re like me, you’ll spend quite a bit of time gazing in awe at Wrightson’s composition, lighting, and brush strokes.
If all of this wasn’t enough, the book features an introduction by Stephen King!
Few works by comic-book artists have earned the universal acclaim and reverence that Bernie Wrightson's illustrated version of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley's Frankenstein was met with upon its original release in 1983. Twenty-five years later, this magnificent pairing of art and literature is still considered to be one of the greatest achievements made by any artist in the field. Now, Wrightson and Dark Horse Books are collaborating on a beautiful new hardcover edition of the book, published in a larger 9' x 12' format intended to show off the exquisitely detailed line art of one of the greatest living artists in…
Combining fairytale, escapist elements with all-too-real British miserabilism, this shapeshifting collection of 16 horror shorts is united primarily by themes of displacement, alienation and persecution. A number of the stories employ the 'cuckoo in the nest' narrative as an analogy for characters who feel adrift within their own families, whilst those without families are doomed to eke out nomadic existences on the fringes of society, shunned and sometimes feared like a witch in history. Throughout the tales, the author skilfully weaves in moments of shock and tragedy amidst the general air of sombre understatement.
My recommended picks are: 'The Crow Palace', in which loss, disability and neurodiversity lead the narrator to question who is the monster of the story. 'Egg', that views motherhood through the eyes of black magic and examines how emotionally wrenching it can be when children flee the nest. 'The Sunflower Seed Man', a genuinely scary combination…
The debut short story collection from acclaimed U.K. writer Priya Sharma, “All the Fabulous Beasts,” collects 16 stunning and monstrous tales of love, rebirth, nature, and sexuality. A heady mix of myth and ontology, horror and the modern macabre. ‘Priya Sharma explores liminality and otherness with skill and verve in her engaging and haunting stories.’ –Alison Moore, Author of the Man Booker shortlisted ‘The Lighthouse’ “Priya Sharma has been writing and publishing short stories for over a decade, and I’m delighted that she’s finally receiving the recognition her work deserves. She’s extremely skillful in creating characters with whom we can…
