Creepy Reads for October

I'd love to say that the air is cool and crisp and there are bright leaves crunching underfoot, but it's over 80, I'm sweating constantly, and my sweaters are crying. On the bright side, maybe this won't be one of those years where we have to wear winter coats over our costumes to trick-or-treat.

Even though the weather isn't cooperating, my home is full of glittering pumpkins and all of the skulls. We have our costumes all picked out, and we even already have candy. I just need one more thing: creepy reads.

If you, too, want something spooky for the season, here are a few horror or suspense novels I've read and enjoyed in the last few years. I'm going to give each a gore rating but I also read a lot of horror so my rating might be skewed. While I'm mostly listing fun books, a lot of them feature abuse in some form.

Listen to Your Sister by Neena Viel is about how differently the same trauma can effect siblings. That sounds dark, and it is, but this book is so funny and features one of the most well-written teenagers I've ever read. It's like Schitt's Creek meets Us. Gore: 3/5

Here Lies a Vengeful Bitch by Codie Crowley is a YA ghost story. It's for the alt girls and anyone who's ever felt like a burnout or a loser. There's also a lot of 1950s slang. Gore: 1/5

Undead Girl Gang by Lily Anderson, also YA, follows a girl who brings her best friend back from the dead only to not be specific enough with her spell and also resurrects a gaggle of bullying popular girls. Now this ragtag group of four zombies and an amateur witch have a mystery to solve. Gore 1/5

Anything written by Grady Hendrix, but if I have to pick, I will always pick How to Sell a Haunted House. This book is why I started reading horror. There's a haunted puppet ministry. Yes, that's what I said. A. Haunted. Puppet. Ministry. I nearly died laughing at the climax. Gore 3/5 (one scene really but it's gnarly)

Sign Here by Claudia Lux merges the horrors of hell with the horrors of the office. What's worse, being boiled every day, or having to sit through endless meetings with your disgusting boss? This book has both. Follow two damned souls as they try to condemn others and thus work their way up the corporate ladder of hell. I read this for the lols, but it also has a lot of heart. I think I might have even cried. Gore 2/5

Victorian Psycho by Virginia Feito is exactly what it sounds like. Follow along as an unhinged Victorian governess murders everyone she can get her hands on. It has no right to be laugh out loud funny, but it is. I mean, she kills a baby because she thinks it's looking at her funny, then she steals a baby from the village to replace the rich baby, and she's looking forward to the rumors that will spark as the child grows. And I laughed the whole time. Just read it and we can enjoy hell together later. 4/5

All Hallows by Christopher Golden is not funny like the prior mentions, but it is the most Halloween. It almost entirely takes place on October 31st when something has come through a thin spot and is preying on trick-or-treaters. Gore 1/5

September House by Carissa Orlando might not be as funny as I read it. When I read it, I kept picturing Jennifer Coolidge as the main character. The protagonist lives in a haunted house. She knows this. It's not really a problem until September, when the walls start to bleed, and they have to barricade the basement. What's she going to do? Move in this economy?! Too bad her daughter has insisted on coming to visit in September because there's the little matter of her dad going missing. Gore 4/5

Just Like Home by Sarah Gailey is not a funny book, but it is a horror novel that I think about a lot. A woman has moved back home to care for her dying and verbally abusive mother. She hasn't been back for decades, and it's forcing her to confront her unresolved grief for her father: the only parent who loved her and who also happened to be a serial killer. It's about who we call monsters and the fact that love isn't a switch that can be flipped. Gore 2/5

If you are interested in purchasing any of the books I've mentioned, please consider patronizing Brain Lair Books, a local, black-woman-owned bookstore in my area. (Yes, they ship!) The owner does a ton of community work and curates her store for marginalized voices, yet she somehow doesn't have her own rocket company.