As the cool breeze of fall blows in, pushing away the heat of summer and painting the verdant trees with hues of orange and yellow, the urge to indulge in something scary becomes stronger. For serious horror fanatics, fall is just another day in a never-ending marathon of horror content. For others, however, there’s something about fall that just gets them in the mood to watch or indulge in something scary.
Well, this year, we at the library challenge you…yes, you…to get your fix of the frights from reading. After all, Stephen King’s IT and The Thing (based on the short story “Who Goes There?” by John W. Campbell) were both books before they hit the big screen. So let us introduce you to five scary stories that will hopefully help you have a frightful fall.
Camping can be fun, until the sun goes down and the breaking of branches heralds the coming of much more than a graceful deer. What really lies beyond our tent, or in this case a cabin, after the sun goes down? The Troop, written by Nick Cutter, is a riveting tale about a troop of boy scouts stranded on a remote island faced with the loss of not only their lives, but their innocence. This mesh between The Lord of the Flies and the Wendigo folk tale is sure to keep you on the edge of your seat.
Grief can be hard to handle. Sometimes, it’s so all-encompassing that we may need a moment away from it all, and what better way to get away than with a fishing trip? The Fisherman, written by John Langan, is a novel that explores grief and the desperation to get back what is lost, at any cost. Pick up this book today to discover what Abe and Dan stand to lose when their hooks set on something far more sinister than your average brook trout.
Sometimes the ghost of what we leave behind follows us, no matter how far we run. Pretty easy to catch up when you’ve got four legs. The Only Good Indians is a novel written by indigenous author Stephen Graham Jones that utilizes the supernatural to explore the complicated relationship between indigenous culture and a Western society that is unaccepting of it. Start reading today to find out how a group of Blackfoot Indians fights to find a balance between tradition and assimilation.
We’ve all had that one neighbor who does things we just don’t understand. A person who we watch from our windows or our stoop and wonder: “What are they up to”? Maybe today we’ll go over and ask, but then again, curiosity killed the cat. House of Leaves, written by Mark Z. Danielewski, presents an intriguing tale of suspense and madness similar to that in The King in Yellow. Discover the sinister power of words at your local library.
Out There Screaming is an anthology of horror stories written by Black authors and edited by Jordan Peele and John Adams. Discover tales that masterfully mix the supernatural with everyday life to craft riveting narratives you won’t want to stop reading. Pick up this book today at your local library, and we assure you that you’ll leave having found a new favorite horror author for the season.
