My Favourite Horror Books [2025 Version]

Again, it's a short one. has a really good message while being horrific.

I keep saying I want to reread this and maybe this is the year.

I feel like the horrors of this are more conceptual, so don't expect like big horror moments or to feel frightened by this. I mean, depending on your personality. I don't know. It was so good for me.

I have some darker fiction that I almost included, but I don't know if most people would call them horror, but Ripe by Sarah Rose Eder and Brat by Gabriel Smith. Loved these ones.

This is just pretty high up there, though. It's got a lot of self-aware pretentiousness and if you view it with a satirical lens, it's very fun, but also equally like gory and uncomfortable.

I just think the structure of it is really fun. There are horrifying experiences she has at home. , and there's a lot of bullying that she encounters at school. It's objectively horror because of all those things beyond just like what she does on prom night.

I think it has this just very unsettling gothic vibe to it that I think a lot of horror readers can enjoy. ... it was a good time for me.

And this is definitely a slower book that has a lot of side plots. I should have an entire coin for just like maybe I do, of characters just going on random tangents and it just being very stream of conscious. That's something that I gravitate towards. and she'll just you'll be reading a scene for many pages about her just having tea with somebody and it seems not imperative to the plot and for that I loved it.

it's just it's a little strange, dark, weird. Love it.

I think that in itself and the psychological torment of not knowing if you're losing your mind is just a terrifying thought. So, I had a good time with this one.

I think for such a short novela, it's just incredibly unsettling. especially when she starts to question the rules and why she's not allowed to go in her own basement.

I had such a good time with it obviously because it's in my favorites.

and Gothic, Elegy for the Undead by Matthew Vesley, which is zombies, but it's more just like a queer love story.

There are plenty of novelas and short horror that I've liked. ... Einhol by Tim McGregor if you're looking for something Frankensteiny.

It's strange. It's uncomfortable. And I think it's great.

I just found it like for how short it is, a pretty great exorcism friendship story.

Oh, also another short one that was really good, Green Fuse Burning by Tiffany Morris.

it was one of my favorite books of anything that I read of like 270 things last year.

it gets really super weird at the end and I thought it was really fun. I am a Paul Tremble fan girl. This is his like second lowest rated book and now is my second favorite.

Alexis Henderson is one of my favorite writers as far as her actual pros. It's very lush. It's atmospheric. It exudes a certain claustrophobia.

this is my favorite thing because it has all the elements that we talked about. It's very mixed media. It's very exhausting to read and that is what makes it self-aware because I think it's intentionally a labyrinth to read.

I am obsessed with this. It's in my top five for sure. It's just such a unique take and I could gush about it for hours.

It was such an incredible opener and then it goes into so many different things and gets so much slower, but that night of horror that she witnesses is so good. ... And that's the kind of book that I love.

This is one of only a handful of horror science fiction tandem books that I've given five stars. ... it was a really unique story. So, love that.

And then these were four stars, but they have an impact on me. They've left one that makes me want to mention them, and that's Mayfly by CJ Lead and The Handyman Method by Nick Cutter and Andrew F. Sullivan.

It's so good. It's super queer. It has a lot of cultural significance and yeah, a definitely memorable one.

it's definitely unsettling. There's a sense of dread as it's the middle of winter and it's about survival but surviving the elements as well as each other.

It is one of the slowest burns. , but the action and the horror, though I know some people will say this isn't horror, really takes off at the end, which is just the best payoff from somebody who's like already enjoying being in this mind hearing about all of my favorite movies.

It's very campy and fun and self-aware and it really is a story about friendship and the lengths that you will go to save your friend.

Definitely horrifying for the family, uneasy for the reader, and it's got some good reveals at the end.

it just feels dark and ominous the entire time and like it's just a looming dread that I loved.

It's very high action, very little subtlety, and a pretty simple story. ... there's not a lot of like substance in here, which I don't know, just worked for me.

There are plenty of novelas and short horror that I've liked. ... Night of the Mannequins by Steven Graham Jones...

It has a lot of political messaging and it's a kind of magical realism infused horror that really worked for me despite its length because I don't always love a long horror either. I like something that's usually shorter and punchier. This one was for me.

It was pretty emotional to read and I was uneasy and felt another like sense of dread the entire time.

I think it's just a really well done book even though it doesn't necessarily fit into the genre that people expect it to.

There are plenty of novelas and short horror that I've liked. Pocket Knife Kitty by Shannon Riley...

This one is like the perfect embodiment of getting the coin of people saying this isn't horror because it wasn't marketed in the right way. But I don't think you can deny that there are many horrific things happening to these characters throughout the book.

There are plenty of novelas and short horror that I've liked. ... Rest Stop by Nat Cassidy...

It packs a lot in this short nolla. Extremely different from the last pick. This is high plot, low ambiguity. It has a lot to say. It says it very clearly.

I have some darker fiction that I almost included, but I don't know if most people would call them horror, but Ripe by Sarah Rose Eder and Brat by Gabriel Smith. Loved these ones.

I just adore River Solomon's writing.

So, of course, this has like the societal commentary I was talking about and the kind of futuristic setting, but also something that I like is what I find most unsettling as a reader is when the characters themselves aren't recognizing what's unsettling.

I absolutely love books where characters are losing their sense of reality. whether it's like mental health or an evil entity. So, this was this was an interesting read.

It's slow. There's just a lot of arguing and it's a big story about fear that I just really appreciated.

I think her commitment to finding out the truth and also her just love her child and it being a story about motherhood really worked for me. And when you bring in this idea of this generational curse, it's just a very interesting story.

It was such a good time.

I found this main character to be extremely well written, have a lot of clear motivation and intent and when she finds that the house is being haunted she enlists the help of a local priest and with some magical things they try to dispel the spirit from the house. Good pace, good plot, even a little bit of romance. A good time.

This is so campy, and I don't think enough people appreciate that.

This is a cozy cosmic horror is what I would call it. ... I would just I would recommend this for like fans of fun horror.

It does not hold back with its gory scenes, with its true slasher energy, but it also has so much interesting conversation. I think you would say this is Steven Graham Jones most successful book as far as pace and what he wanted to accomplish with the story.

It's a longer one, and at first when I read it, I thought maybe it could lose 100 or 200 pages. But in hindsight, I gave it a five in the moment anyway.

This one didn't quite make my list, but we have like sexism and toxic masculinity and racism discussed, but that's not the main plot.

I understand why this doesn't work for some people, but it was in my favorites list last year, I think.

It's really just a book full of dread. Like the entire time I was super uneasy. I but I didn't know why. ... and I think by the end it just has some really beautiful things to say and it's fascinating all of the conversations that it brings to light.

it the pros is beautiful. There's the perfect amount of angst. Loved it.

It is exhausting. It's frightening. But also again there could be a larger conspiracy going on. And that is the interesting part about getting to read this and uncovering everything.

I'm so glad it worked out for me. ... And this is one of the only horror books that has actually unsettled me. Like I felt really creeped out by certain things that were happening. So big success there.

the slow but intentional development of gentrification and this neighborhood being taken over and then suddenly everything is different and you don't recognize anything around you and it's all super fast moving all of a sudden. ... I thought it was great.

there's definitely a kind of slow burn, but to this very action-packed and horrorheavy revenge mission that these ghosts are on.

Most definitely ambiguous and a little unsatisfactory for many. I just had a really good time. Action-packed queer girls. It was a win.

I really love the main character in here. I adored the writing. It set itself up well for a sequel, but I don't know if we're ever going to get one, but it does resolve itself enough by the end.