It’s spooky season.
Enjoy Halloween season with these great books, from the scariest to the not-so-scary. Find more teen horror reads on our Teen Horror booklist!
Teen
House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland
Something happened to Iris Hollow and her two older sisters Grey and Vivi when they were children, something they can’t quite remember but that left each of them with an identical half-moon scar at the base of their throats. When Grey goes missing under suspicious circumstances, Iris learns just how weird her life can get: horned men start shadowing her, a corpse falls out of her sister’s ceiling, and ugly, impossible memories start to twist their way to the forefront of her mind. As Iris retraces Grey’s last known footsteps, it becomes apparent that the only way to save her sister is to decipher the mystery of what happened to them as children.
What Big Teeth by Rose Szabo
Eleanor Zarrin has been estranged from her wild family for years. When she flees boarding school after a horrifying incident, she goes to the only place she thinks is safe: the home she left behind. But when she gets there, she struggles to fit in with her monstrous relatives, who prowl the woods around the family estate and read fortunes in the guts of birds. Exquisitely terrifying, beautiful, and strange, this fierce gothic fantasy will sink its teeth into you and never let go.
The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein by Kiersten White
Elizabeth Lavenza hasn’t had a proper meal in weeks. Her thin arms are covered with bruises from her “caregiver,” and she is on the verge of being thrown into the streets . . . until she is brought to the home of Victor Frankenstein, an unsmiling, solitary boy who has everything–except a friend. Victor is her escape from misery. Elizabeth does everything she can to make herself indispensable–and it works. But her new life comes at a price.
The Taking of Jake Livingston by Ryan Douglass
Jake Livingston is one of the only Black kids at St. Clair Prep, one of the others being his infinitely more popular older brother. It’s hard enough fitting in but to make matters worse and definitely more complicated, Jake can see the dead. In fact he sees the dead around him all the time. Most are harmless. Stuck in their death loops as they relive their deaths over and over again, they don’t interact often with people. But then Jake meets Sawyer. A troubled teen who shot and killed six kids at a local high school last year before taking his own life. Now a powerful, vengeful ghost, he has plans for his afterlife–plans that include Jake.
The Good Demon by Jimmy Cajoleas
It wasn’t technically an exorcism, what they did to Clare. When the reverend and his son ripped her demon from her, they called it a “deliverance.” But they didn’t understand that Clare and her demon–known simply as Her–were like sisters. She comforted Clare, made her feel brave, helped to ease her loneliness. They were each other’s Only. Now, Clare’s only comforts are the three clues that She left behind: Be nice to him; June 20; Remember the stories. Clare will do anything to get Her back, even if it means teaming up with the reverend’s son and scouring every inch of her small, Southern town for answers. But if she sacrifices everything to bring back her demon, what will be left of Clare?”
Middle Grade & Chapter Books
Scary Stories to Tell In the Dark by Alvin Schwartz
There is a story here for everyone—skeletons with torn and tangled flesh who roam the earth; a ghost who takes revenge on her murderer; and a haunted house where every night a bloody head falls down the chimney. Stephen Gammell’s splendidly creepy drawings perfectly capture the mood of more than two dozen scary stories—and even scary songs—all just right for reading alone or for telling aloud in the dark.
Where the Woods End by Charlotte Salter
Twelve-year-old Kestrel lives in a seemingly endless forest, and in order to escape she will need to defeat her Grabber, a creature that builds its body to reflect her greatest fear. No one has ever defeated their Grabber once attacked, and those that die from accidents or other creatures are considered “lucky.” Kestrel has been tasked by her mother, a powerful and controlling spell-caster, to hunt down the Grabbers in an effort to protect their village in the forest. But her own Grabber is creeping ever closer, and nothing in this forest is what it seems… including her mother’s true motivations.
Finders Creepers: Half Past Peculiar by Derek Fridolfs
Twins Atticus and Esmeralda Fetch are the best pet finders in Thorns Hollow — a town where people have a lot of pets, and those pets often get lost. But when a lost dog leads them to an old, Victorian house on the edge of town, the twins find their world turned upside down. This creepy house contains a portal that leads to a whole other world — a world where mythical creatures like trolls, fairies, and dragons are real. The secrets this mythical world contains are bigger than these kids could ever imagine. Secrets that could threaten to destroy the world as we know it. Now, Minerva, Atticus, and yes, their canine companion will have to work together if they want to save our world, and the world beyond the portal!
Scary Stories for Young Foxes by Christian McKay Heidicker
The haunted season has arrived in the Antler Wood. No fox kit is safe. When Mia and Uly are separated from their litters, they discover a dangerous world full of monsters. In order to find a den to call home, they must venture through field and forest, facing unspeakable things that dwell in the darkness: a zombie who hungers for their flesh, a witch who tries to steal their skins, a ghost who hunts them through the snow . . . and other things too scary to mention.
Beneath the Bed and Other Scary Stories by Max Brallier
The kids at school dare John to visit the old house on the hill at night, and when he and his sister go in they find dusty dishes set on the table, a book open like it is waiting for a reader, and something hiding under the bed in the attic–and that is only one of the five scary stories with unexpected twists that are included in this collection.
Picture Books
The Dark by Lemony Snicket
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Laszlo is afraid of the dark which lives in the same big, creaky house as him, until one night the dark pays him a visit.
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Poultrygeist by Eric Geron
After meeting his demise crossing the road, Chicken comes back as a noisy troublemaking ghost, and knowing that scaring people is bad, decides to transform himself into a friendly ghost.
The Spooky Box by Mark Gonyea
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After viewing scary things that might slither, slice, or slide their way out of a creepy black box, the reader is asked to lift the top to reveal its contents.
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The Good, The Bad, and the Spooky by John Jory
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When Bad Seed cannot find an amazing costume for Halloween night, he postpones trick-or-treating for everyone else until he finds the perfect one.
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Boo! Baa, La, La, La by Sandra Boynton
The littlest book-lovers and their families will enjoy following the gentle cow as she ventures out into the moonlit night, trying to discover who it was that replied to her ‘BOO‘ with a ‘BAA.’ The surprise ending is certain to delight everyone–young or old, feathered or furry. Told and illustrated with Sandra Boynton’s celebrated charm and pizazz, Boo! Baa, La La La! is a wonderful, not-scary treat, with all the markings of a Halloween classic. BOO!
