Ten Dark Fall Reads
I love Halloween and all things scary. R.L. Stine introduced me to the horror genre in my elementary school library, and by the time I graduated high school, I’d read every Stephen King book in our public library. Now, I find myself more enticed by eerie and atmospheric books rather than strictly horror. For me, there is no better time to curl up with a good creepy book than fall.
Here are my suggestions for my favorite spooky reads.
10. The Whisper Man by Alex North
“Over the years I’ve told you many times that there’s no such thing as monsters.
I’m sorry that I lied.“
Why I loved it:
I don’t scare easily, but this book was so unsettling. It will make you double check if your doors are locked and check on your kids in the middle of the night. Mystery/suspense meets police procedural with a tinge of horror. The character development was fantastic, and I loved the multiple viewpoints. And the author’s note at the end about what inspired the book was perhaps the creepiest part of all.
About the book:
After the sudden death of his wife, Tom Kennedy believes a fresh start will help him and his young son Jake heal. A new beginning, a new house, a new town: Featherbank.
But Featherbank has a dark past. Twenty years ago, a serial killer abducted and murdered five residents. Until Frank Carter was finally caught, he was nicknamed “The Whisper Man,” for he would lure his victims out by whispering at their windows at night.
Just as Tom and Jake settle into their new home, a young boy vanishes. His disappearance bears an unnerving resemblance to Frank Carter’s crimes, reigniting old rumors that he preyed with an accomplice. Now, detectives Amanda Beck and Pete Willis must find the boy before it is too late, even if that means Pete has to revisit his great foe in prison: The Whisper Man. And then Jake begins acting strangely. He hears a whispering at his window
9. Daisy Darker by Alice Feeny
“Families are like fingerprints; no two are the same, and they tend to leave their mark.”
Why Ioved it:
I love books that begin with a map of an old home. Seaglass house and the island it sits on (with tides making it impossible to leave at certain times) made the most perfect setting for a locked room mystery ever. This book is certainly a nod to And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie. Like all Feeny novels, the big twist (which had nothing to do with who the killer was) was completely brilliant and unexpected. I’d really like to read the book again now that I know the truth and see what all I missed.
About the book:
After years of avoiding each other, Daisy Darker’s entire family is assembling for Nana’s 80th birthday party in Nana’s crumbling gothic house on a tiny tidal island. Finally back together one last time, when the tide comes in, they will be cut off from the rest of the world for eight hours.
The family arrives, each of them harboring secrets. Then at the stroke of midnight, as a storm rages, Nana is found dead. And an hour later, the next family member follows…
Trapped on an island where someone is killing them one by one, the Darkers must reckon with their present mystery as well as their past secrets, before the tide comes in and all is revealed.
With a wicked wink to Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None, Daisy Darker’s unforgettable twists will leave readers reeling.
8. Chapel Street by Sean Paul Murphy
“In the back of my mind, I hoped whatever drew me to the grave would release me once the pictures were taken. That wasn’t the case.”
Why I loved it:
Chapel Street is a truly chilling book by a fellow TouchPoint Press author, Sean Paul Murphy. I was interested in this book well before it came out after learning the history of the true haunting it was based on. This book is so atmospheric and creepy. Betty not only followed Rick from that graveyard; she followed me too. I also really enjoyed the elements of spirituality interwoven within the narrative. A deeper story with far more layers than most horror stories I’ve read.
About the book:
Rick Bakos never had a chance at happiness. After enduring the tragic death of his father in a car accident, Rick grew up to helplessly watch both his older brother Lenny and his mother Agnes succumb to madness and suicide. Nor were they the first members of his family to kill themselves. Suicide has steadily stalked the Bakos family since they first arrived in Baltimore from Bohemia at the turn of the 20th Century.
Turning to genealogy to better understand his self-destructive family, Rick works as a volunteer for the website RestingPlace. After photographing the grave of Betty Kostek for the webpage, Rick finds himself drawn into a maelstrom of horror. Each night he finds himself inexorably drawn closer to self-destruction.
Rick’s only ally is a fellow volunteer named Teri Poskocil. She, too, has fallen under the suicidal spell of the late Betty Kostek. The couple soon discovers their pairing wasn’t a coincidence. Their great-grandparents were next door neighbors on Chapel Street nearly a century earlier. So were Betty’s grandparents.
Together Rick and Teri must solve the mystery of Chapel Street before they find death at their own hands.
7. The Death of Mrs. Westaway by Ruth Ware
“Never believe it, Hal. Never believe your own lies.”
Why I loved it:
I adore every book Ruth Ware writes, but this one was her best. I’m drawn to books that deal with dark family secrets. Add in a dark creepy house, and a menacing gothic atmosphere, and you’ve got a book I’m guaranteed to love. It was so cleverly plotted with hints of Jane Eyre and Rebecca. Ware is a master of setting tone and of slow burning suspense.
About the book:
On a day that begins like any other, Hal receives a mysterious letter bequeathing her a substantial inheritance. She realizes very quickly that the letter was sent to the wrong person—but also that the cold-reading skills she’s honed as a tarot card reader might help her claim the money.
Soon, Hal finds herself at the funeral of the deceased…where it dawns on her that there is something very, very wrong about this strange situation and the inheritance at the centre of it.
6. Rebecca by Daphne Du Mauier
“The road to Manderley lay ahead. There was no moon. The sky above our heads was inky black. But the sky on the horizon was not dark at all. It was shot with crimson, like a splash of blood. And the ashes blew towards us with the salt wind from the sea.”
Why I loved it:
“Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again…” is one of the more famous first lines from literature, and it sets the tone for a perfect gothic suspense novel. Rebecca is the original domestic noir that I appreciate more each time I read it. It’s a story dominated by memory, so much so that we never even learn the name of our main character. The tension builds as the walls close in. The strong imagery and lyrical writing transported me to another place and time. No wonder so many of us find ourselves returning to Manderley.
About the book:
Ancient, beautiful Manderley, between the rose garden and the sea, is the county’s showpiece. Rebecca made it so – even a year after her death, Rebecca’s influence still rules there. How can Maxim de Winter’s shy new bride ever fill her place or escape her vital shadow?
A shadow that grows longer and darker as the brief summer fades, until, in a moment of climatic revelations, it threatens to eclipse Manderley and its inhabitants completely.
5. The Family Upstiars by Lisa Jewell
“It’s very strange, looking back, how accepting children can be of the oddest scenarios.”
Why Ioved it:
I love gothic fiction and psychological suspense, and this book blended them perfectly. The story and characters were dark and creepy, but fascinatingly so. Twisted doesn’t even begin to describe this family. I loved the three points of view and thought they were used expertly to weave the story together. I worried this thriller was going to be wrapped up too neatly, but then Jewell threw in an implied ending that I thought was perfection.
About the book:
Soon after her twenty-fifth birthday, Libby Jones returns home from work to find the letter she’s been waiting for her entire life. She rips it open with one driving thought: I am finally going to know who I am.
She soon learns not only the identity of her birth parents, but also that she is the sole inheritor of their abandoned mansion on the banks of the Thames in London’s fashionable Chelsea neighborhood, worth millions. Everything in Libby’s life is about to change. But what she can’t possibly know is that others have been waiting for this day as well—and she is on a collision course to meet them.
Twenty-five years ago, police were called to 16 Cheyne Walk with reports of a baby crying. When they arrived, they found a healthy ten-month-old happily cooing in her crib in the bedroom. Downstairs in the kitchen lay three dead bodies, all dressed in black, next to a hastily scrawled note. And the four other children reported to live at Cheyne Walk were gone.
The can’t-look-away story of three entangled families living in a house with the darkest of secrets
4. We Are All the Same in the Dark by Julia Heaberlin
“Loving dark men is a seesaw. They never tell you everything. You always wonder if the tiny red spot on a shirt is really from a spaghetti dinner like they claim. But then they put a bird back in a nest. They pull a drowning kid out of the water. And that’s all it takes. The spaghetti is not blood.”
Why I loved it:
A slow burning, twisted Texas mystery that is disquieting, creepy, and a bit morbid. This book is dark and ominous from beginning to end, and the tension builds page by page. I loved the eloquence of the writing, the grittiness and depth of the characters, and the truly stunning twists. I found a new favorite author in Heaberlin and rushed to buy her backlist after finishing this one.
About the book:
It’s been a decade since Trumanell Branson disappeared, leaving only a bloody handprint behind. Her pretty face still hangs like a watchful queen on the posters on the walls of the town’s Baptist church, the police station, and in the high school. They all promise the same thing: We will find you. Meanwhile, her brother, Wyatt, lives as a pariah in the desolation of the old family house, cleared of wrongdoing by the police but tried and sentenced in the court of public opinion and in a new documentary about the crime.
When Wyatt finds a lost girl dumped in a field of dandelions, making silent wishes, he believes she is a sign. The town’s youngest cop, Odette Tucker, believes she is a catalyst that will ignite a seething town still waiting for its own missing girl to come home. But Odette can’t look away. She shares a wound that won’t close with the mute, one-eyed mystery girl. And she is haunted by her own history with the missing Tru.
Desperate to solve both cases, Odette fights to save the lost girl in the present and to dig up the shocking truth about a fateful night in the past–the night her friend disappeared, the night that inspired her to become a cop, the night that wrote them all a role in the town’s dark, violent mythology.
3. The Shining by Stephen King
“Monsters are real. Ghosts are too. They live inside of us, and sometimes, they win.”
Why I loved It:
What kind of list would this be without a book by the master of horror, Stephen King? The Shining is a classic haunted house story that has captivated readers for almost fifty years. Though many of King’s stories have made me lose sleep, none more so than The Shining. I love books with a building sense of unease, and nobody writes better suspense than King. Beyond the horror of the story, there is fantastic characterization and underlying emotional content that makes it stand out from most books in the genre.
About the book:
Jack Torrance’s new job at the Overlook Hotel is the perfect chance for a fresh start. As the off-season caretaker at the atmospheric old hotel, he’ll have plenty of time to spend reconnecting with his family and working on his writing. But as the harsh winter weather sets in, the idyllic location feels ever more remote…and more sinister. And the only one to notice the strange and terrible forces gathering around the Overlook is Danny Torrance, a uniquely gifted five-year-old.
2. Rock, Paper, Scissors by Alice Feeny
“The reason why a person lies is almost always more interesting than the lie itself.”
Why I loved it:
Alice Feeney makes the list a second time for my favorite of her novels, Rock Paper Scissors. I was duped by this book in the best possible way. I love unreliable and cunning characters, and the twist was mind blowing. There was so much building tension in this thriller that I couldn’t put it down. And really, is there a more terrifying question than, “How well do you really know the one you love?”
About the book:
Things have been wrong with Mr and Mrs Wright for a long time. When Adam and Amelia win a weekend away to Scotland, it might be just what their marriage needs. Self-confessed workaholic and screenwriter Adam Wright has lived with face blindness his whole life. He can’t recognize friends or family, or even his own wife.
Every anniversary the couple exchange traditional gifts – paper, cotton, pottery, tin – and each year Adam’s wife writes him a letter that she never lets him read. Until now. They both know this weekend will make or break their marriage, but they didn’t randomly win this trip. One of them is lying, and someone doesn’t want them to live happily ever after.
Ten years of marriage. Ten years of secrets. And an anniversary they will never forget.
Lock Every Door by Riley Sager“That can be said of certain places. The closer you get to them, the uglier they become.”
Why I loved it:
Riley Sager is one of the leading names in modern horror, and Lock Every Door is his best book in a line of great ones. Modern gothic suspense with an eeriness that was palpable. I couldn’t stop reading. This smart thriller went in a direction I never could have predicted. The twist was so bizarre and brilliant, and I find myself thinking about it often. I can’t imagine this book ever being topped in my mind when I think about truly spooky reads.
About the book:
No visitors. No nights spent away from the apartment. No disturbing the other residents, all of whom are rich or famous or both. These are the only rules for Jules Larsen’s new job as an apartment sitter at the Bartholomew, one of Manhattan’s most high-profile and mysterious buildings. Recently heartbroken and just plain broke, Jules is taken in by the splendor of her surroundings and accepts the terms, ready to leave her past life behind.
As she gets to know the residents and staff of the Bartholomew, Jules finds herself drawn to fellow apartment sitter Ingrid, who comfortingly reminds her of the sister she lost eight years ago. When Ingrid confides that the Bartholomew is not what it seems and the dark history hidden beneath its gleaming facade is starting to frighten her, Jules brushes it off as a harmless ghost story…until the next day, when Ingrid disappears.
Searching for the truth about Ingrid’s disappearance, Jules digs deeper into the Bartholomew’s sordid past and into the secrets kept within its walls. What she discovers pits Jules against the clock as she races to unmask a killer, expose the building’s hidden past, and escape the Bartholomew before her temporary status becomes permanent.
What about you? What are your favorite dark and spooky books?
