It’s been another massive year for horror, whether we’re talking about film, TV, or books. On that note, the literary world is teeming with spine-tingling graphic novels, nonfiction books, and unsettling novels to keep you busy this Halloween season and beyond.
Whether you’re looking to catch up on new reads or fill your final days of October with the spookiest offerings, this guide offers something for everyone. From Nick Cutter’s graphic and gory teen horror tale to official movie novelizations and beyond, these books are worth snatching up.
Here are just ten 2024 horror books you need to seek out…
Beneath the Trees Where Nobody Sees, written and illustrated by Patrick Horvath, letters by Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou
Filmmaker Patrick Horvath (Southbound) spins a delightfully disturbing story in a graphic novel that looks cute and cuddly but has sharp teeth. Described as “Dexter meets Richard Scarry’s Busy, Busy Town,” this twisted tale follows adorable brown bear Samantha Strong, an upstanding citizen who also happens to be a serial killer. Samantha’s cozy life gets upended when a rival killer begins wreaking havoc in town, unleashing Sam’s sociopathic nature. It’s not just the storytelling that intrigues here, but the evocative contrast between the quaint setting and its adorable inhabitants against disturbing bursts of violence and horror. The shocking imagery sticks with you.
David Cronenberg: Clinical Trials by Violet Lucca
Violet Lucca’s monograph, featuring a foreword by Academy Award nominee Viggo Mortensen, doesn’t just reflect back on David Cronenberg’s expansive filmmaking career. The author frames his work through a Freudian and Jungian lens. In other words, it’s a thematically fitting, fascinating, and almost dreamlike drift through Cronenberg’s body of work. It offers new angles to familiar titles that include Videodrome, The Fly, Naked Lunch, and Crash. Lucca’s accessible prose makes the academic approach more easily digestible, further helped by a gorgeous layout and illustrations. It’s a fantastic read for Cronenberg fans and film lovers alike.
Horror Movie: A Novel by Paul Tremblay
The author behind The Cabin at the End of the World and A Head Full of Ghosts gives his spin on the cursed film concept through a rather inventive format designed to sustain readers in immersive dread. The nonlinear novel jumps between the past and present, unfurling the fateful events that created a cursed film piecemeal. In the past, young aspiring filmmakers set out to create an unforgettable horror movie in 1993. The present picks up the pieces with the sole survivor of the film’s production enlisted for a modern remake of the never-released film that forever captured the curiosity and attention of Hollywood and horror fans alike. It’s a horror movie within a novel, with the screenplay pages furthering the cinematic quality to this creepy novel. Using Texas Chain Saw Massacre as a loose blueprint, Tremblay manages to capture the unsettling eeriness of Sinister‘s 8mm clips on the page, ensuring an atypical read that gets under your skin the more elusive and dangerous the almost cosmic brand of horror becomes.
House of Bone and Rain by Gabino Iglesias
The author behind 2022’s stellar The Devil Takes You Home is back with another gripping and grim genre-bender. It follows a group of friends in Puerto Rico as they seek vengeance for the murder of one of their mothers. Like Iglesias’ last novel, expect the supernatural to pervade this dark story, melding realism with the occult in inventive and shocking ways. The backdrop provides fertile ground for new folklore, but it’s rage that drives this unique coming-of-age crime thriller. House of Bone and Rain is viscerally violent and its characters richly rendered, making for a propulsive page turner that’s destined for movie adaptation status.
I Was a Teenage Slasher by Stephen Graham Jones
Horror novelist and slasher expert Stephen Graham Jones gives a delightful take on the quintessential ’80s revenge slasher after closing out his epic, emotionally rewarding Indian Lake trilogy earlier this year. Of course, Jones gives the setup a distinct and humorous twist. The plot follows Tolly Driver, a high school outcast from a small Texas town in 1989, whose awkward bid to impress at the popular kids’ house party winds up transforming him into a supernatural killer. That’s right; it’s a slasher told from the perspective of its “villain.” It’s a charming coming-of-age story filled with heart, nostalgia, and gruesome slasher kills, but with an infectious self-aware sense of humor reminiscent of Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon. Sometimes, you just want the jerks to get their just desserts, and Tolly, the world’s nicest slasher villain, delivers.
Influencer by Adam Cesare
Cesare also closed out a slasher trilogy this year with Clown in a Cornfield 3: The Church of Friendo. Cesare’s latest YA thriller introduces a chilling new villain in Aaron Fortin, the sociopathic new kid in town harboring a secret life as an anonymous influencer. Aaron inserts himself into a new friend group, sowing seeds of division, all in service of a terrifying bid for clicks and attention. Like Cornfield 3, Influencer‘s biggest strength lies in Cesare’s ability to pen heartwarming, genuine friendships among even the most unexpected corners of high school archetypes. Whereas Cornfield 3 highlighted the loyal magic of Juggalos, Influencer assembles a motley crew of outcasts around shy but keenly observant Crystal Giordano. Cesare opts for intimate psychological duress and keeps a steady pressure on mounting dread over fast-paced thrills, toggling between multiple perspectives. The dark subject matter is offset by rich friendships that keep you invested.
Actor, writer, and producer Frank Dietz’s memoir of a kid who dreamed of making monsters and found himself starring in horror movies makes for a breezy, charming read. It’s the life of a Monster Kid, chronicling his entire career with horror, from childhood aspirations to enchanting behind-the-scenes anecdotes on our favorite ’80s cult horror movies. This is a must for fans of Black Roses and Zombie Nightmare; Dietz candidly shares everything from special effects makeup mishaps to the scrappy heart poured into making these films. Dietz relays fascinating filmmaking stories with humor and reverence; this is a Monster Kid whose love of the genre never wavered throughout an expansive, tenured career that’s still going.
Pay the Piper: A Novel by George A. Romero and Daniel Kraus
If there’s one thing to know about George A. Romero, it’s that the horror master was prolific in his writing. The University of Pittsburgh Library System’s George A. Romero Archival Collection offers proof of that, with no shortage of Romero’s unproduced or unfinished screenplays and stories. That’s precisely where Kraus found Pay the Piper, an unfinished horror fairy tale nestled deep within rural Louisiana swamplands. The author behind USA Today bestseller Whalefall worked closely with Romero’s estate to bring the horror master’s unfinished novel to light. Pay the Piper infuses the pied piper legend with Southern horror and rural grit, with memorable characters that include a self-appointed Sheriff who mirrors himself after hero John Wayne and a precocious 9-year-old protagonist with nerves of steel.
The Queen: A Novel by Nick Cutter
The author behind the disturbing body horror novel The Troop and unsettling aquatic horror The Deep is back, this time with a sci-fi horror twist to teen horror. Lifelong best friends Margaret and Charity are so close that they share everything and know each other well, save for one dark secret that Charity withheld: she happens to have been subjected to a gene manipulation experiment that’s altered her DNA. Cutter doesn’t hold back when it comes to disturbing, gag-inducing horror imagery here, with insects offering no shortage of inspiration for the twisted author to get graphic. In other words, this is for the sick puppies out there, like me, seeking a gripping page-turner that’s likely to leave you feeling a little queasy while getting the adrenaline pumping. All hail Nick Cutter’s dark mind.
Terrifier 2: The Official Movie Novelization by Tim Waggoner
This official novelization, courtesy of Titan Books and Bloody Disgusting, does one thing the movies haven’t yet – put you in Art the Clown’s head. Waggoner adheres fairly faithfully to the events of Damien Leone’s slasher sequel, but expands on details, characters, and mythology in ways that only a novel could. For those looking for added insight or just a new way to engage with Leone’s epic story and beloved characters, especially final girl Sienna, Terrifier 2 makes for a worthy companion novel from the author of the Halloween Kills and Resident Evil: The Final Chapter novelizations.
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