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The Best New Scary Books 2020

22 Spooky New Books That Will Put You in a Halloween State of Mind

Sep 21 2020

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Haunted houses, inescapable curses, serial killers, and vampires are just a few of the horrors that populate the best new scary books of 2020. In this unprecedented year, horror may not be the first genre you feel like turning to, but there's plenty of catharsis to be found in tales of book club members turned vampire slayers and teen girls facing off hordes of the undead. The best scary stories are transportive, leading the reader into a nightmarish world full of good scares — you know, the kind that leave you up at night marveling at the writer's cleverness, but still feeling secure in your own bed. These 22 titles do just that, and they'll add plenty of spookiness to your TBR just in time for Halloween, too.

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1. The Anthill by Julianne Pachico

Old wounds reopen when Lina returns to her childhood home of Medellin looking for answers about her past in Julianne Pachico's The Anthill. After being sent away to live in England after her mother's death 20 years prior, Lina returns to find both her friend Matty and her old home unrecognisable. Matty now runs a daycare for children who live on the street, and he has no interest in discussing their shared childhood. However, Lina's arrival sparks a flurry of disturbing events that neither of them can ignore.

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2. The Boatman's Daughter by Andy Davidson

A true Southern Gothic, The Boatman's Daughter by Andy Davidson paints a lush, provocative picture of the bayou as seen through the eyes of Miranda Crabtree. Ever since her father's murder, Miranda has supported herself, an ageing witch, and a mysterious child by transporting contraband for a mad preacher. But the strange rhythm of her life is upended when the preacher makes a dangerous demand that sends Miranda on a dark journey full of supernatural dangers.

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3. Burn Our Bodies Down by Rory Power

Burn Our Bodies Down by Rory Power explores the frightening secrets lurking in a young woman's family tree. When Margot's contentious relationship with her mother inspires her to search for her relatives, she ends up in the town where her mom grew up: Phalene. Unfortunately, there's nothing good waiting for Margot in Phalene. Instead, she finds a place where history repeats itself with terrifying results.

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4. Clown in a Cornfield by Adam Cesare

Like the best kind of '80s slasher movie, Adam Cesare's Clown in a Cornfield is a bloody good time. Set in the dying town of Kettle Springs, the revitalization efforts of the town's adults are undermined by the teens, who just want to have fun until they can leave the small town behind. That leads Frendo, the clown mascot of the now closed Baypen Corn Syrup Factory, to begin picking off the kids one by one as he "culls" the bad crop.

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5. Deathless Divide by Justina Ireland

Deathless Divide, the sequel to Justina Ireland's superb Dread Nation, continues Jane McKeene's journey through an alternate American history timeline where the Civil War is derailed by zombies. This time around, Jane is heading to California to find her mother, but along the way she encounters as many dangers among the living as she does the dead.

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6. The Deep by Alma Katsu

Alma Katsu's The Deep isn't just a haunting ghost story, it's also a riveting historical romance. The story begins on the Titanic where the doomed voyage is plagued by otherworldly incidents, before jumping ahead to the sixth voyage of the Titanic's sister ship the Britannic, where two survivors meet once more and realise the nightmare that began on their first trip together isn't over yet.

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7. Devolution by Max Brooks

Max Brooks, the author of World War Z returns with Devolution, a first-person account of a (fictional) Sasquatch massacre. Told through the journals of a woman named Kate, the book recounts every gory detail of Bigfoot's decimation of a society attempting to live off the grid.

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8. The Haunting of Ashburn House by Darcy Coates

Sometimes when you're in the mood for a scary book, only a haunted house tale will do. Thankfully, Darcy Coates writes amazing stories set in locales full of restless spirits. Her latest novel, The Haunting of Ashburn House, finds a woman named Adrienne regretting inheriting a crumbling mansion once she discovers that its former inhabits are hanging on in the form of potentially malevolent ghosts.

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9. The Hollow Places by T. Kingfisher

Fans of movies like Pan's Labyrinth and The Babadook will love T. Kingfisher's The Hollow Places. When the newly divorced Kara discovers a portal in her uncle's house, she gains access to numerous alternate realities. As you might expect, her discovery comes with a catch — each of these realities is inhabited by creatures that feed on fear.

Out Oct. 8

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10. Home Before Dark by Riley Sager

Riley Sager's Home Before Dark nimbly straddles the line between the thriller and horror genres. Told in chapters that alternate between the past and the present, the story follows the now adult Maggie Holt who grew up in the shadow of her family's infamous midnight flight from Banebury Hall. Her father's famed book about the supposedly haunted house has coloured every aspect of her life, so when she discovers that her father left her Baneberry Hall in his will, she can't resist returning to the house, despite her parents' dire warnings for her to never set foot there again.

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11. If It Bleeds by Stephen King

Stephen King's reign as the master of modern horror continues with If It Bleeds. The collection of four novellas — "Mr. Harrigan's Phone," "The Life of Chuck," "Rat," and the titular "If It Bleeds" — is by turns frightening, wry, and full of shocking twists.

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12. Malorie by Josh Malerman

Josh Malerman's sequel to Bird Box, Malorie, is just as intense and unforgettable as its predecessor. This time around Malorie must balance the risk of forgoing her rules of survival in hopes of reconnecting with someone she thought she had lost, or keeping her blindfold firmly on in hopes of maintaining the small sense of safety she's carved out for her and her children.

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13. Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Set against the backdrop of 1950s Mexico, Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia is an atmospheric read with shades of Rebecca and Jane Eyre. When her newly married cousin sends her a concerning letter, Noemí heads to a manor tucked away in the Mexican countryside to check on her relative. What she finds is a house full of secrets and a dark past that seems to be seeping into her dreams.

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14. The Midnight Lullaby by Cheryl Low

What happens when a ghost hunter falls for a ghost? That's just the beginning of the wonderfully strange and creepy The Midnight Lullaby by Cheryl Low. This short, but unforgettable tale sees a young man named Benedict Lyon returning home for the matriarch of his family's funeral only to encounter a restless spirit and long buried secrets that could prove to be deadly.

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15. My Mother's House by Francesca Momplaisir

My Mother's House by Francesca Momplaisir is one of 2020's most essential reads. The book, which is told from the perspective of a house watching the evils occur within it, is as much a story of the immigrant experience in America as it as a horror novel. The story follows a family of Haitian refugees who set about making a new life for themselves in New York, only to find that the house they've moved into is silently judging them.

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16. The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

Stephen Graham Jones's The Only Good Indians is so intense it doesn't pause to let you catch your breath from one haunting page to the next. When a traumatic incident from their childhoods comes back to haunt four American Indian men they find themselves in a battle for their lives against a relentless supernatural foe.

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17. Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth

Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth is a story within a story within a story. Luckily, every branch of this tale of doomed love, curses, and Hollywood's eagerness to turn tragedies into blockbusters is captivating. The connective tissue between the story's disparate strands is an all girls boarding school plagued by a curse after two teen girls' romance ends in tragedy.

Out Oct. 20

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18. The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires by Grady Hendrix

If Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Steel Magnolias had a baby it would look an awful lot like Grady Hendrix's The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires. This story of a '90s era group of suburban housewives facing off against a dangerous vampire is exhilarating, empowering, and much scarier than the whimsical title suggests.

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19. The Sun Down Motel by Simone St. James

Alternating between the past and the present, The Sun Down Motel by Simone St. James is a thriller-horror hybrid where the ghosts aren't nearly as scary as the living. After her mother's death, Carly takes a break from college to follow in her long presumed-dead Aunt Viv's footsteps by taking a job at the rundown Sun Down Motel. As she digs into her aunt's past, Carly discovers the disturbing reason why the motel's spirits can't find peace.

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20. Survivor Song by Paul Tremblay

Survivor Song by Paul Tremblay is an eerie story of a rabies like pandemic with a short incubation period. Within an hour of being bitten by an infected person, people go mad. When a pregnant woman is bitten while trying to help her husband, she and her pediatrician friend must race against the clock in order to get her to the hospital in time to receive a vaccine before she and her unborn child succumb to the virus.

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21. Wonderland by Zoje Stage

Continuing the grand tradition of city dwellers naively moving into picture perfect and definitely haunted secluded houses in the countryside, Wonderland by Zoje Stage is downright harrowing. Orla and Shaw Bennett move their family to the mountains for a fresh start, but it doesn't take long for them to realise there's something evil lurking in the woods. Now only Orla can save her family from the darkness that's coming for them all.

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22. The Year of Witching by Alexis Henderson

The Year of Witching by Alexis Henderson is a bold story of a woman finding her power in a restrictive society. Because her father is an outsider of a different race, Immanuelle Moore's very existence is considered blasphemous. While she tries to be pious, one day Immanuelle is led into the woods surrounding her society of Bethel, and there the spirits of four slain witches help her discover her true power, as well as her destiny.

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