Oct. 28, 2024 – Horror abounds as Halloween approaches, and the library has plenty of books to send tingles down your spine. Not all of them are books that would conventionally be labeled "horror." Materials Librarian Allison Zordell created a list of books that defy the genre.

"Genre-defying horror blurs the lines between traditional horror and other literary genres, creating a unique and unsettling experience for readers. This approach often incorporates elements of fantasy, psychological thriller, or even literary fiction, challenging our expectations of what horror can be," Zordell said. "'Horrorstor' by Grady Hendrix is an inventive tale set in an IKEA-like store and combines horror with satire, critiquing consumer culture while delivering genuine scares. The story’s unique format — a catalog-style presentation — adds an intriguing twist to the narrative. 'Model Home' by Rivers Solomon mixes horror with speculative fiction to address race, class, and belonging issues. Through its unsettling narrative about a suburban community haunted by the specter of its past, it confronts systemic issues while delivering chilling moments."

Browse the books below, and click the covers to put your next scary story on hold in our catalog.

 

"Horrorstör" by Grady Hendrix

After strange things start happening at the Orsk furniture superstore in Cleveland, three employees volunteer to work an overnight shift to investigate, but what they discover is more horrifying than they could have imagined.

"The Empusium: A Health Resort Horror Story" by Olga Tokarczuk

Set in a sanitarium on the eve of World War I, this novel probes the horrors that lie beneath our most hallowed ideas.

"The Salt Grows Heavy" by Cassandra Khaw

You may think you know how the fairytale goes: a mermaid comes to shore and weds the prince. But what the fables forget is that mermaids have teeth. And now, her daughters have devoured the kingdom and burned it to ashes. On the run, the mermaid is joined by a mysterious plague doctor with a darkness of their own. Deep in the eerie, snow-crusted forest, the pair stumble upon a village of ageless children who thirst for blood, and the three "saints" who control them. The mermaid and her doctor must embrace the cruelest parts of their true nature if they hope to survive.

"Our Share of Night" by Mariana Enriquez

In 1981, a young father and son set out on a road trip across Argentina, devastated by the mysterious death of the wife and mother they both loved. United in grief, the pair travels to her family home near Iguazau Falls, where they must confront the horrific legacy she has bequeathed. For the woman they are grieving came from a family like no other – a centuries-old secret society called the Order that pursues eternal life through ghastly rituals. For Gaspar, the son, this cult is his destiny. As Gaspar grows up he must learn to harness his developing supernatural powers, while struggling to understand what kind of man his mother wanted him to be. Meanwhile Gaspar's father tries to protect his son from his wife's violent family while still honoring the woman he loved so desperately.

"Model Home" by Rivers Solomon

The Maxwell siblings return to their childhood home in the Dallas suburbs after the shocking news of their parents' death. They return to find the house, and the family itself, haunted by strange, inexplicable terrors.

"Haunt Sweet Home" by Sarah Pinsker

On the set of a kitschy reality TV show, staged scares transform into unnerving reality in this spooky ghost story from multiple Hugo and Nebula Award-winning author Sarah Pinsker. "Don't talk to day about what we do at night." When aimless twenty-something Mara lands a job as the night-shift production assistant on her cousin's ghost hunting/home makeover reality TV show Haunt Sweet Home, she quickly determines her new role will require a healthy attitude toward duplicity. But as she hides fog machines in the woods and improvises scares to spook new homeowners, a series of unnerving incidents on set and a creepy new coworker force Mara to confront whether the person she's truly been deceiving and hiding from all along is herself.

"The Reformatory" by Tananrive Due

Gracetown, Florida, June, 1950. Twelve-year-old Robbie Stephens, Jr., is sentenced to six months at the Gracetown School for Boys, a reformatory, for kicking the son of the largest landowner in town in defense of his older sister, Gloria. So begins Robbie's journey further into the terrors of the Jim Crow South and the very real horror of the school they call The Reformatory. Robbie has a talent for seeing ghosts, or haints. But what was once a comfort to him after the loss of his mother has become a window to the truth of what happens at the reformatory. Boys forced to work to remediate their so-called crimes have gone missing, but the haints Robbie sees hint at worse things. Through his friends Redbone and Blue, Robbie is learning not just the rules but how to survive. Meanwhile, Gloria is rallying every family member and connection in Florida to find a way to get Robbie out before it's too late.

"Bunny" by Mona Awad

Samantha Heather Mackey couldn't be more of an outsider in her small, highly selective MFA program at New England's Warren University. A scholarship student who prefers the company of her dark imagination to that of most people, she is utterly repelled by the rest of her fiction writing cohort, a clique of unbearably twee rich girls who call each other 'Bunny,' and are often found entangled in a group hug so tight they become one. But everything changes when Samantha receives an invitation to the Bunnies' fabled 'Smut Salon,' and finds herself inexplicably drawn to their front door.

"The Hunger" by Alma Katsu

Evil is invisible, and it is everywhere. Tamsen Donner must be a witch. That is the only way to explain the series of misfortunes that have plagued the wagon train known as the Donner Party. Depleted rations, bitter quarrels, and the mysterious death of a little boy have driven the pioneers to the brink of madness. They cannot escape the feeling that someone – or something – is stalking them. Whether it was a curse from the beautiful Tamsen, the choice to follow a disastrous experimental route West, or just plain bad luck – the 90 men, women, and children of the Donner Party are at the brink of one of the deadliest and most disastrous western adventures in American history. While the ill-fated group struggles to survive in the treacherous mountain conditions – searing heat that turns the sand into bubbling stew; snows that freeze the oxen where they stand – evil begins to grow around them, and within them. As members of the party begin to disappear, they must ask themselves "What if there is something waiting in the mountains? Something disturbing and diseased ... and very hungry?"

"Ring Shout, or, Hunting Ku Kluxes in the End Times" by P. Djèlí Clark

In this dark fantasy historical novella that gives a supernatural twist to the Ku Klux Klan's reign of terror, "The Birth of a Nation" cast a spell across America, swelling the Klan's ranks and drinking deep from the darkest thoughts of white folk. All across the nation they ride, spreading fear and violence among the vulnerable. They plan to bring Hell to Earth. Standing in their way is Maryse Boudreaux and her fellow resistance fighters, a foul-mouthed sharpshooter, and a Harlem Hellfighter. Armed with blade, bullet, and bomb, they hunt their hunters and send the Klan's demons straight to Hell. But something awful's brewing in Macon, and the war on Hell is about to heat up. Can Maryse stop the Klan before it ends the world?

"Area X: The Southern Reach Trilogy" by Jeff VanderMeer

Area X – a remote and lush terrain – has been cut off from the rest of the continent for decades. Nature has reclaimed the last vestiges of human civilization. The first expedition returned with reports of a pristine, Edenic landscape; all the members of the second expedition committed suicide; the third expedition died in a hail of gunfire as its members turned on one another; the members of the eleventh expedition returned as shadows of their former selves, and within months of their return, all had died of aggressive cancer. This is the twelfth expedition. Their group is made up of four women: an anthropologist; a surveyor; a psychologist, the de facto leader; and our narrator, a biologist. Their mission is to map the terrain and collect specimens; to record all their observations, scientific and otherwise, of their surroundings and of one another; and, above all, to avoid being contaminated by Area X itself. They arrive expecting the unexpected, and Area X delivers – they discover a massive topographic anomaly and life forms that surpass understanding – but it's the surprises that came across the border with them, and the secrets the expedition members are keeping from one another, that change everything.