Good Books to Read - Horror
Horror Fiction is a genre of literature, which is intended to, or has the capacity to frighten its readers, inducing feelings of horror and terror. Horror can be either supernatural or non-supernatural.
There are many good horror stories and many fine movies have been derived from them.
We've considered all the best Horror novels and below are our 10 classics and latest recommendations:
There are many good horror stories and many fine movies have been derived from them.
We've considered all the best Horror novels and below are our 10 classics and latest recommendations:
10 Classic horror novels
|
|
Dracula by Bram StokerWhen Jonathan Harker visits Transylvania to help Count Dracula with the purchase of a London house, he makes a series of horrific discoveries about his client. Soon afterwards, various bizarre incidents unfold in England: an apparently unmanned ship is wrecked off the coast of Whitby; a young woman discovers strange puncture marks on her neck; and the inmate of a lunatic asylum raves about the 'Master' and his imminent arrival. In Dracula, Bram Stoker created one of the great masterpieces of the horror genre, brilliantly evoking a nightmare world of vampires and vampire hunters and also illuminating the dark corners of Victorian sexuality and desire.
|
|
|
Frankestein by Mary J ShelleyObsessed by creating life itself, Victor Frankenstein plunders graveyards for the material to fashion a new being, which he shocks into life by electricity. But his botched creature, rejected by Frankenstein and denied human companionship, sets out to destroy his maker and all that he holds dear. Mary Shelley's chilling gothic tale was conceived when she was only eighteen, living with her lover Percy Shelley near Byron's villa on Lake Geneva. It would become the world's most famous work of horror fiction, and remains a devastating exploration of the limits of human creativity.
|
|
|
Rosemary's Baby by Ira levinRosemary Woodhouse and her struggling actor husband Guy move into the Bramford, an old New York City apartment building with an ominous reputation and only elderly residents. Neighbours Roman and Minnie Castavet soon come nosing around to welcome the Woodhouses to the building; despite Rosemary's reservations about their eccentricity and the weird noises that she keeps hearing, her husband starts spending time with them. Shortly after Guy lands a plum Broadway role, Rosemary becomes pregnant and the Castavets start taking a special interest in her welfare, and as the sickened Rosemary becomes increasingly isolated, she begins to suspect that the Castavets' circle is not what it seems...
|
|
|
The haunting of Hill House by Shirley JacksonThis novel is the classic haunted house story, suspenseful and genuinely terrifying. Dr. John Montague, a paranormal investigator, obtains permission from the owner of Hill House, a young man named Luke, to invite a number of individuals to the house for an experiment. Only two women accept: Eleanor and Theodora. These four--Dr. Montague, Luke, Eleanor, and Theodora--stay in Hill House as long as they can despite the immediate occurrence of paranormal events, which grow to be terrifying and ultimately, for Eleanor, disastrous.
|
|
|
The Shining by Stephen KingDanny is only five years old, but he is a 'shiner', aglow with psychic voltage. When his father becomes caretaker of an old hotel, his visions grow out of control. Cut off by blizzards, the hotel seems to develop an evil force, and who are the mysterious guests in the supposedly empty hotel?
|
|
|
The Exorcist by William BlattyFather Damien Karras: 'Where is Regan' Regan MacNeil: 'In here. With us'. The terror begins unobtrusively. Noises in Regan's room, an odd smell, the displacement of furniture, an icy chill. Easy explanations are offered. Then frightening changes start in the eleven-year-old girl. Medical tests shed no light on her symptoms, but it is as if a different personality has invaded the child. Father Damien Karras, a Jesuit priest, is called in. Is it possible that a demonic force is present in the child? Exorcism is the only answer...
|
|
|
The Turn of the Screw by Henry JamesThe Turn of the Screw tells the story of a young governess sent to a country house to take charge of two orphans. Unsettled by a sense of intense evil in the house she soon becomes obsessed with the idea that something malevolent is stalking the children in her care.
|
|
|
Something Wicked this Way Comes by Ray BradburyIt's the week before Hallowe'en, and Cooger and Dark's Pandemonium Shadow Show has come to Green Town, Illinois. The siren song of the calliope entices all with promises of youth regained and dreams fulfilled . . . And as two boys trembling on the brink of manhood set out to explore the mysteries of the dark carnival's smoke, mazes and mirrors, they will also discover the true price of innermost wishes . . .
|
|
|
At the Mountains of Madness by H.P. LovecraftLong acknowledged as a master of nightmarish visions, H. P. Lovecraft established the genuineness and dignity of his own pioneering fiction in 1931 with his quintessential work of supernatural horror, At the Mountains of Madness. The deliberately told and increasingly chilling recollection of an Antarctic expedition s uncanny discoveries and their encounter with untold menace in the ruins of a lost civilization is a milestone of macabre literature. This exclusive new edition, presents Lovecraft s masterpiece in fully restored form, and includes his acclaimed scholarly essay ''Supernatural Horror in Literature.'' This is essential reading for every devotee of classic terror.
|
|
|
The HellBound Heart by Clive BarkerThe Hellbound Heart is one of his best, one of the most dead-frightening stories you are likely to ever read, a story of the human heart and all the great terrors and ecstasies within. It was also the book behind the cult horror film, Hellraiser. In a quiet house on a quiet street Frank and Julia are having an affair. Not your ordinary affair. For Frank it began with his own insatiable sexual appetite, a mysterious lacquered box- and then an unhinged voyage through a netherworld of imaginable pleasures and unimaginable horror! Now Frank- or what is left of Frank -waits in an empty room. All he wants is to live as he was before. All julia can do is bring him her unfulfilled passions!and a little flesh and blood!
|
Our latest Horror Recommendations
. .
Photo from twm1340