Horror Books to Read Now (End of 2023)

The Strangers Upstairs – Lisa M. Matlin

As someone who “blogs,” I love reading books that feature bloggers. Add in a haunted house, and I’m ready to read it.

Official Blurb

Sarah Slade is starting over. As the new owner of the infamous Black Wood House—the scene of a grisly murder-suicide—she’s determined that the fixer-upper will help reach a new audience on her successful lifestyle blog, and distract her from her failing marriage.

But as Sarah paints over the house’s horrifying past, she knows better than anyone that a new façade can’t conceal every secret. Then the builders start acting erratically and experiencing bizarre accidents—and Sarah knows there’s only so long she can continue to sleep in the bedroom with the bloodstained floor and suffer the mysterious footsteps she hears from the attic.

Vampires of El Norte – Isabel Cañas

From the author of The Hacienda comes another horror book set in Mexico!

Official Blurb

As the daughter of a rancher in 1840s Mexico, Nena knows a thing or two about monsters—her home has long been threatened by tensions with Anglo settlers from the north. But something more sinister lurks near the ranch at night, something that drains men of their blood and leaves them for dead.

Something that once attacked Nena nine years ago.

Believing Nena dead, Néstor has been on the run from his grief ever since, moving from ranch to ranch working as a vaquero. But no amount of drink can dispel the night terrors of sharp teeth; no woman can erase his childhood sweetheart from his mind.

Rouge – Mona Awad

A culty story set in the beauty industry!

Official Blurb

For as long as she can remember, Belle has been insidiously obsessed with her skin and skincare videos. When her estranged mother Noelle mysteriously dies, Belle finds herself back in Southern California, dealing with her mother’s considerable debts and grappling with lingering questions about her death. The stakes escalate when a strange woman in red appears at the funeral, offering a tantalizing clue about her mother’s demise, followed by a cryptic video about a transformative spa experience. With the help of a pair of red shoes, Belle is lured into the barbed embrace of La Maison de Méduse, the same lavish, culty spa to which her mother was devoted. There, Belle discovers the frightening secret behind her (and her mother’s) obsession with the mirror—and the great shimmering depths (and demons) that lurk on the other side of the glass.

Ghost Tamer – Meredith R. Lyons

Her friendly ghost helps her fight another demonic spirit following her. This book sounds so cool!

Official Blurb

Death is one thing, it’s what you do afterward that matters.  Aspiring comedian Raely is the sole survivor of a disastrous train wreck. While faced with the intense grief of losing her best friend, she realizes that someone is following her―and has been following her all her life. Trouble is, no one else can see him. For a ghostly tag-along, Casper’s not so bad. He might even be the partner Raely needs to fight the evil spirit hell-bent on destroying her. Raely and her friend must learn why this demonic spirit is haunting Raely and how she can stop him before he destroys her life―and her soul. Which, much to her chagrin, means she needs the help of a psychic (although she’s sure they are all charlatans) and must rid herself of the pesky ghost hunter who’s interested in exploiting her new abilities. For readers who enjoy Leigh Bardugo’s Ninth House and Clay McLeod Chapman’s Ghost Eaters .

Black Sheep – Rachel Harrison

I don’t think I would trust this invitation, but I’d be interested to see what happens.

Official Blurb

A cynical twentysomething must confront her unconventional family’s dark secrets in this fiery, irreverent horror novel from the author of Such Sharp Teeth and Cackle.

Nobody has a “normal” family, but Vesper Wright’s is truly…something else. Vesper left home at eighteen and never looked back—mostly because she was told that leaving the staunchly religious community she grew up in meant she couldn’t return. But then an envelope arrives on her doorstep.

Inside is an invitation to the wedding of Vesper’s beloved cousin Rosie. It’s to be hosted at the family farm. Have they made an exception to the rule? It wouldn’t be the first time Vesper’s been given special treatment.

My Darling Girl – Jennifer McMahon

Sounds spooky, like the mother is possessed!

Official Blurb

Alison has never been a fan of Christmas. But with it right around the corner and her husband busily decorating their cozy Vermont home, she has no choice but to face it. Then she gets the call.

Mavis, Alison’s estranged mother, has been diagnosed with cancer and has only weeks to live. She wants to spend her remaining days with her daughter, son-in-law, and two granddaughters. But Alison grew up with her mother’s alcoholism and violent abuse and is reluctant to unearth these traumatic memories. Still, she eventually agrees to take in Mavis, hoping that she and her mother could finally heal and have the relationship she’s always dreamed of.

House of Roots and Ruin – Erin A. Craig

Spooky love story – I love it.

Official Blurb

In a manor by the sea, one sister is still cursed.

Despite dreams of adventures far beyond the Salann shores, seventeen-year-old Verity Thaumas has remained at her family’s estate, Highmoor, with her older sister Camille, while their sisters have scattered across Arcannia.

When their sister Mercy sends word that the Duchess of Bloem—wife of a celebrated botanist—is interested in having Verity paint a portrait of her son, Alexander, Verity jumps at the chance, but Camille won’t allow it. Forced to reveal the secret she’s kept for years, Camille tells Verity the truth one day: Verity is still seeing ghosts, she just doesn’t know it.

Together We Rot – Skyla Arndt

This book is literally sitting on my coffee table. A love story where his family leads a cult, and they want to sacrifice him. Her mom is missing; his family might be to blame. They’ll work together to figure it out!

Official Blurb

Wil Greene’s mom has been missing for over a year, and the police are ready to call the case closed–they claim she skipped town and you can’t find a woman who wants to disappear. But she knows her mom wouldn’t just leave…and she knows the family of her former best friend, Elwood Clarke, has something to do with it.

Elwood has been counting down the days until his 18th birthday–in dread. It marks leaving school and joining his pastor father in dedicating his life to their congregation, the Garden of Adam. But when he comes home after one night of after a final goodbye with his friends, already self-flagellating for the sins of drinking and disobeying his father, he discovers his path is not as virtuous as he thought. He’s not his father’s successor, but his sacrifice. For the woods he’s grown up with are thirsty, and must be paid in blood.

Strange Unearthly Things – Kelly Creagh

A Jane Eyre retelling, but make it more horror.

Official Blurb

Eighteen-year-old Jane Reye is a psychic artist. She draws what she sees, and what she sees are spirits and the supernatural. Growing up orphaned, she’s now of legal age and can no longer return to the girls’ school she’s called home for most of her life. Lost and alone after the death of her lifelong friend, she receives an invitation to partake in a study at the English manor Fairfax Hall: an investigation of the property that requires her specific area of expertise. Upon arrival, Jane understands this will be no ordinary study when she meets Elias Thornfield, the elusive proprietor of the estate, a boy her age, roguishly handsome, who dons a mysterious eye patch. During the study it becomes clear that something is amiss–something having to do with Elias and the spiritual activity taking place around the manor. Turning to her art to unravel the mystery, Jane is shocked to find that her talents–and her growing affection for Elias–could be the key to saving him from a horrible fate.

The narrow – Kate Alice Marshall

A deadly river and a prep school. What happens when you survive, just to be haunted afterwards?

Official Blurb

Everyone has heard the story of the Narrow. The river that runs behind the Atwood School is only a few feet across and seemingly placid, but beneath the surface, the waters are deep and vicious. It’s said that no one who has fallen in has ever survived.

Eden White knows that isn’t true. Six years ago, she saw Delphine Fournier fall into the Narrow—and live.

Delphine now lives in careful isolation, sealed off from the world. Even a single drop of unpurified water could be deadly to her, and no one but Eden has any idea why. Eden has never told anyone what she saw or spoken to Delphine since, but now, unable to cover her tuition, she has to make a her expenses will be paid in return for serving as a live-in companion to Delphine.

Their Vicious Games – Joelle Wellington

A deadly game to get her life back on track – Ivy League bound. I want to know more!

Official Blurb

A Black teen desperate to regain her Ivy League acceptance enters an elite competition only to discover the stakes aren’t just high, they’re deadly, in this searing thriller that’s Ace of Spades meets Squid Game with a sprinkling of The Bachelor.

You must work twice as hard to get half as much.

Adina Walker has known this the entire time she’s been on scholarship at the prestigious Edgewater Academy—a school for the rich (and mostly white) upper class of New England. It’s why she works so hard to be perfect and above reproach, no matter what she must force beneath the surface. Even one slip can cost you everything.

All That Consumes Us – Erica Waters

Dark academia society setting with supernatural hauntings!

Official Blurb

Everyone knows the students in Corbin College’s elite academic society, Magni Viri, have it all—free tuition, inspirational professors, and dream jobs once they graduate. So when Tara is offered a chance to enroll, she takes it.

But once she’s settled into the gorgeous Victorian dormitory the academy calls home, something strange starts to happen. She finally has the chance to write, but her stories are dark and twisted. When she’s not sleepwalking, she’s dreaming about being trapped in a coffin, buried alive. And she’s starting to feel an unseen presence stalking her through the halls of her dorm.

As Tara slowly loses her grip on everything she’s ever known, she discovers a terrible secret at the heart of Magni Viri, one that just might turn her dreams into nightmares, one that might destroy her before she has a chance to escape.