spooky specials

 

The next Reader’s Advisory Roundtable meeting will be Wednesday, December 14th and I’m changing the start time from 9am to 9:30am to give folks a bit more room to settle into the day.  The topic up for discussion is biography, autobiography, and memoir.

Today, RART met to discuss all things paranormal/occult.  It was a small but mighty meeting!

In attendance:
Holley W, O’Neal Library
Holly P, Vestavia
Maura D, Trussville
Samuel R, Springville Road
Nicole, Tarrant

One meeting participant mentioned they’d joined in specifically to ask for advice on horror reader’s advisory as it is not a genre in which they are entirely comfortable. 

Holley recommends:

“When patrons approach me and ask for a scary book, my very first question is always, “well, what scares YOU?”  That question is going to be answered differently by each person.  It could be anything from true crime to Hocus Pocus and you certainly don’t want to simply offer them something you find scary or disturbing without knowing a little about the patron first.  I am no purist when it comes to horror, so I want to know what they find horrifying before proceeding.  A great follow up question to this, especially if they are uncertain about what they want, is what films they find scary or disturbing.  There is great insight to be found there in crafting reading suggestions.  Pro tip: this is a decent strategy for sci-fi/fantasy recs too.  I also the movie question frequently for teen suggestion seekers, as well as asking about their gaming preferences, though I am not nearly as conversant with those.”

 

What advice would you offer?

Personally, I (Holley W) can never settle on just one or two titles in this topic as it is one of my absolute favorites, so I have a list of authors I particularly enjoy.

These authors offer more contemporary and (often) violent tales:

Paul Tremblay

A favorite of mine: Head Full of Ghosts

The lives of the Barretts, a normal suburban New England family, are torn apart when fourteen-year-old Marjorie begins to display signs of acute schizophrenia. To her parents’ despair, the doctors are unable to stop Marjorie’s descent into madness. As their stable home devolves into a house of horrors, they reluctantly turn to a local Catholic priest for help. Father Wanderly suggests an exorcism; he believes the vulnerable teenager is the victim of demonic possession. He also contacts a production company that is eager to document the Barretts’ plight. With John, Marjorie’s father, out of work for more than a year and the medical bills looming, the family agrees to be filmed, and soon find themselves the unwitting stars of The Possession, a hit reality television show. When events in the Barrett household explode in tragedy, the show and the shocking incidents it captures become the stuff of urban legend.

Stephen Graham Jones

A favorite of mine: The Only Good Indians

From New York Times bestselling author Stephen Graham Jones comes a novel that is equal parts psychological horror and cutting social commentary on identity politics and the American Indian experience. The novel follows the lives of four American Indian men and their families, all haunted by a disturbing, deadly event that took place in their youth. Years later, they find themselves tracked by an entity bent on revenge, totally helpless as the culture and traditions they left behind catch up to them in a violent, vengeful way.

These authors offer more gothic atmospheric tales, with a bit less gratuitous violence:

Laura Purcell

A favorite of mine: The Silent Companions

When Elsie married handsome young heir Rupert Bainbridge, she believed she was destined for a life of luxury. But pregnant and widowed just weeks after their wedding, with her new servants resentful and the local villagers actively hostile, Elsie has only her late husband’s awkward cousin for company. Or so she thinks. Inside her new home lies a locked door, beyond which is a painted wooden figure—a silent companion—that bears a striking resemblance to Elsie herself. The residents of the estate are terrified of the figure, but Elsie tries to shrug this off as simple superstition—that is, until she notices the figure’s eyes following her. A Victorian ghost story that evokes a most unsettling kind of fear, The Silent Companions is a tale that creeps its way through the consciousness in ways you least expect—much like the companions themselves.

F.R. (Frank) Tallis

A favorite of mine: The Voices

In the scorching summer of 1976—the hottest since records began—Christopher Norton, his wife Laura and their young daughter Faye settle into their new home in north London. The faded glory of the Victorian house is the perfect place for Norton, a composer of film soundtracks, to build a recording studio of his own. But soon in the long, oppressively hot nights, Laura begins to hear something through the crackle of the baby monitor. First, a knocking sound. Then come the voices. For Norton, the voices mark an exciting opportunity. Putting his work to one side, he begins the project of a lifetime—a grand symphony incorporating the voices±—and becomes increasingly obsessed with one voice in particular. Someone who is determined to make themselves heard . . .

Elizabeth Hand

A favorite of mine: Wylding Hall (Hoopla eaudiobook only)

After the tragic and mysterious death of one of their founding members, the young musicians in a British acid-folk band hole up at Wylding Hall, an ancient country house with its own dark secrets. There they record the classic album that will make their reputation but at a terrifying cost, when Julian Blake, their lead singer, disappears within the mansion and is never seen again. Now, years later, each of the surviving musicians, their friends and lovers (including a psychic, a photographer, and the band s manager) meets with a young documentary filmmaker to tell his or her own version of what happened during that summer but whose story is the true one? And what really happened to Julian Blake?

Another title for this niche: Starve Acre by Andrew Michael Hurley (not in the JCLC, request via Interlibrary Loan)

The worst thing possible has happened. Richard and Juliette Willoughby's son, Ewan, has died suddenly at the age of five. Starve Acre, their house by the moors, was to be full of life, but is now a haunted place. Juliette, convinced Ewan still lives there in some form, seeks the help of the Beacons, a seemingly benevolent group of occultists. Richard, to try and keep the boy out of his mind, has turned his attention to the field opposite the house, where he patiently digs the barren dirt in search of a legendary oak tree. Starve Acre is a devastating new novel by the author of the prize-winning bestseller The Loney. It is a novel about the way in which grief splits the world in two and how, in searching for hope, we can so easily unearth horror.

A viewing recommendation:

Extraordinary Tales (Hoopla streaming video only)

Five of Edgar Allan Poe's best-known stories are brought to vivid life in this visually stunning, heart-pounding animated anthology featuring Sir Christopher Lee, Bela Lugosi, Julian Sands, Roger Corman, and Guillermo del Toro. Murderous madmen, sinister villains, and cloaked ghouls stalk the darkened corridors of Poe's imagination, as his haunting tales are given a terrifying new twist by some of the most beloved figures in horror film history.

Samuel R recommends these authors:

Simone St. James

Simone St. James is the award-winning author of The Haunting of Maddy Clare, which won two RITA awards from Romance Writers of America and an Arthur Ellis Award from Crime Writers of Canada. She wrote her first ghost story, about a haunted library, when she was in high school, and spent twenty years behind the scenes in the television business before leaving to write full-time. She lives in Toronto, Canada with her husband and a spoiled cat.

Thomas Tryon

Tom Tryon was an American film and television actor famous as the Walt Disney television character Texas John Slaughter (1958-1961), as well as author of several science fiction, horror, and mystery novels.

From this author, Samuel recommends:

Harvest Home

After watching his asthmatic daughter suffer in the foul city air, Theodore Constantine decides to get back to the land. When he and his wife search New England for the perfect nineteenth-century home, they find no township more charming, no countryside more idyllic than the farming village of Cornwall Coombe. Here they begin a new life: simple, pure, close to nature—and ultimately more terrifying than Manhattan’s darkest alley. When the Constantines win the friendship of the town matriarch, the mysterious Widow Fortune, they are invited to join the ancient festival of Harvest Home, a ceremony whose quaintness disguises dark intentions. Credited as the inspiration for Stephen King’s Children of the Corn, Thomas Tryon’s chilling novel was ahead of its time when first published and continues to provoke abject terror in readers.

and Holley recommends

The Other

Holland and Niles Perry are identical thirteen-year-old twins. They are close, close enough, almost, to read each other’s thoughts, but they couldn’t be more different. Holland is bold and mischievous, a bad influence, while Niles is kind and eager to please. The Perrys live in the bucolic New England town their family settled centuries ago, and as it happens, the extended clan has gathered at its ancestral farm this summer to mourn the death of the twins’ father in a most unfortunate accident. Mrs. Perry still hasn’t recovered from the shock of her husband’s gruesome end and stays sequestered in her room, leaving her sons to roam free. As the summer goes on, though, and Holland’s pranks become increasingly sinister, Niles finds he can no longer make excuses for his brother’s actions. Thomas Tryon’s best-selling novel about a homegrown monster is an eerie examination of the darkness that dwells within everyone.

Grady Hendrix

New York Times bestselling author Grady Hendrix makes up lies and sells them to people. His novels include HORRORSTÖR about a haunted IKEA, MY BEST FRIEND'S EXORCISM, which is basically "Beaches" meets "The Exorcist", WE SOLD OUR SOULS, a heavy metal horror epic, THE SOUTHERN BOOK CLUB'S GUIDE TO SLAYING VAMPIRES, and THE FINAL GIRL SUPPORT GROUP, coming on July 13, 2021. He's also the author of PAPERBACKS FROM HELL, an award-winning history of the horror paperback boom of the Seventies and Eighties. He wrote the screenplay for, MOHAWK, a horror flick about the War of 1812, and SATANIC PANIC about a pizza delivery woman fighting rich Satanists.

Holly P recommends:

Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe was one of the most original writers in the history of American letters, a genius who was tragically misunderstood in his lifetime. He was a seminal figure in the development of science fiction and the detective story, and exerted a great influence on Dostoyevsky, Arthur Conan Doyle, Jules Verne, and Charles Baudelaire, who championed him long before Poe was appreciated in his own country. Baudelaire's enthusiasm brought Poe a wide audience in Europe, and his writing came to have enormous importance for modern French literature.

The Stepford Wives by Ira Levin

For Joanna, her husband, Walter, and their children, the move to beautiful Stepford seems almost too good to be true. It is. For behind the town's idyllic facade lies a terrible secret -- a secret so shattering that no one who encounters it will ever be the same. At once a masterpiece of psychological suspense and a savage commentary on a media-driven society that values the pursuit of youth and beauty at all costs, The Stepford Wives is a novel so frightening in its final implications that the title itself has earned a place in the American lexicon.

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick

By 2021, the World War has killed millions, driving entire species into extinction and sending mankind off-planet. Those who remain covet any living creature, and for people who can’t afford one, companies built incredibly realistic simulacra: horses, birds, cats, sheep. They’ve even built humans. Immigrants to Mars receive androids so sophisticated they are indistinguishable from true men or women. Fearful of the havoc these artificial humans can wreak, the government bans them from Earth. Driven into hiding, unauthorized androids live among human beings, undetected. Rick Deckard, an officially sanctioned bounty hunter, is commissioned to find rogue androids and “retire” them. But when cornered, androids fight back—with lethal force.

The Walking Dead by Robert Kirkman

Robert Kirkman's Eisner Award-winning continuing story of survival horror- from Rick Grimes' waking up alone in a hospital, to him and his family seeking solace on Hershel's farm, and the controversial introduction of Woodbury despot: The Governor. In a world ruled by the dead, we are finally forced to finally start living.

I am Legend by Richard Matheson

Robert Neville is the last living man on Earth...but he is not alone. Every other man, woman, and child on Earth has become a vampire, and they are all hungry for Neville's blood. By day, he is the hunter, stalking the sleeping undead through the abandoned ruins of civilization. By night, he barricades himself in his home and prays for dawn. How long can one man survive in a world of vampires?

If you are looking for suspenseful thrillers but not horror, Holly P also recommends the inspirational fiction authors Dani Pettrey and Dee Henderson.

Dani Pettrey is wife, homeschooling mom and author. She feels so very blessed to write inspirational romantic suspense because it incorporates so many things She loves--the thrill of adventure, nail-biting suspense, the deepening of one's faith and plenty of romance. She is a huge fan of dark chocolate, and is always in search of the best iced mocha, and would love to one day own a little cottage on a remote stretch of beach. She lives in Maryland with her husband and their two teenage daughters.

Dee Henderson is the author of many best-selling novels, including the acclaimed O'Malley series and the Uncommon Heroes series. As a leader in the inspirational romantic suspense category, her books have won or been nominated for several prestigious industry awards, including the RWA's RITA Award, the Christy Award, the ECPA Gold Medallion, the Holt Medallion, the National Readers' Choice Award, and the Golden Quill. Dee is a lifelong resident of Illinois and is active online.

Some unusual Christian fiction recommendations from Holley that could fit under the horror umbrella:

Thirsty by Tracey Bateman

"Hello, I'm Nina Parker…and I'm an alcoholic." For Nina, it's not the weighty admission but the first steps toward recovery that prove most difficult. She must face her ex-husband, Hunt, with little hope of making amends, and try to rebuild a relationship with her angry teenage daughter, Meagan. Hardest of all, she is forced to return to Abbey Hills, Missouri, the hometown she abruptly abandoned nearly two decades earlier–and her unexpected arrival in the sleepy Ozark town catches the attention of someone–or something–igniting a two-hundred-fifty-year-old desire that rages like a wildfire.

Madman by Tracy Groot

If there is a way into madness, logic says there is a way out. Logic says. Tallis, a philosopher’s servant, is sent to a Greek academy in Palestine only to discover that it has silently, ominously, disappeared. No one will tell him what happened, but he learns what has become of four of its scholars. One was murdered. One committed suicide. One worships in the temple of Dionysus. And one . . . one is a madman. From Christy Award–winning author Tracy Groot comes a tale of mystery, horror, and hope in the midst of unimaginable darkness: the story behind the Gerasene demoniac of the Gospels of Mark and Luke.

Maura D enjoys horror comedy and recently investigated a readalike list for the show, What We Do in the Shadows. 

Christopher Moore’s Love Story trilogy definitely applies:

Blood Sucking Fiends

Jody never asked to become a vampire. But when she wakes up under an alley Dumpster with a badly burned arm, an aching back, superhuman strength, and a distinctly Nosferatuan thirst, she realizes the decision has been made for her. Making the transition from the nine-to-five grind to an eternity of nocturnal prowlings is going to take some doing, however, and that's where C. Thomas Flood fits in. A would-be Kerouac from Incontinence, Indiana, Tommy (to his friends) is biding his time night-clerking and frozen-turkey bowling in a San Francisco Safeway. But all that changes when a beautiful undead redhead walks through the door...and proceeds to rock Tommy's life—and afterlife—in ways he never thought possible.

You Suck

Being undead sucks. Literally. Just ask C. Thomas Flood. Waking up after a fantastic night unlike anything he's ever experienced, he discovers that his girlfriend, Jody, is a vampire. And surprise! Now he's one, too. For some couples, the whole biting-and-blood thing would have been a deal breaker. But Tommy and Jody are in love, and they vow to work through their issues. But word has it that the vampire who initially nibbled on Jody wasn't supposed to be recruiting. Even worse, Tommy's erstwhile turkey-bowling pals are out to get him, at the urging of a blue-dyed Las Vegas call girl named (duh) Blue. And that really sucks.

Bite Me

Moore’s latest in the continuing story of young, urban, nosferatu style love, is no Twilight—but rather a tsunami of the irresistible outrageousness that has earned him the appellation, “Stephen King with a whoopee cushion and a double-espresso imagination” from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and inspired Denver’s Rocky Mountain News to declare him, “the 21st century’s best satirist.”

To those, I would add barely tangentially-related:

Reluctant Immortals by Gwendolyn Kiste

Reluctant Immortals is a historical horror novel that looks at two men of classic literature, Dracula and Mr. Rochester, and the two women who survived them, Bertha and Lucy, who are now undead immortals residing in Los Angeles in 1967 when Dracula and Rochester make a shocking return in the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco. Combining elements of historical and gothic fiction with a modern perspective, in a tale of love and betrayal and coercion, Reluctant Immortals is the lyrical and harrowing journey of two women from classic literature as they bravely claim their own destiny in a man's world.

Nicole recommends:

Slewfoot by Brom

Connecticut, 1666. An ancient spirit awakens in a dark wood. The wildfolk call him Father, slayer, protector. The colonists call him Slewfoot, demon, devil. To Abitha, a recently widowed outcast, alone and vulnerable in her pious village, he is the only one she can turn to for help. Together, they ignite a battle between pagan and Puritan – one that threatens to destroy the entire village, leaving nothing but ashes and bloodshed in their wake.

Nothing But Blackened Teeth by Cassandra Khaw

Cassandra Khaw's Nothing But Blackened Teeth is a gorgeously creepy haunted house tale, steeped in Japanese folklore and full of devastating twists. A Heian-era mansion stands abandoned, its foundations resting on the bones of a bride and its walls packed with the remains of the girls sacrificed to keep her company. It’s the perfect venue for a group of thrill-seeking friends, brought back together to celebrate a wedding. A night of food, drinks, and games quickly spirals into a nightmare as secrets get dragged out and relationships are tested. But the house has secrets too. Lurking in the shadows is the ghost bride with a black smile and a hungry heart. And she gets lonely down there in the dirt. Effortlessly turning the classic haunted house story on its head, Nothing but Blackened Teeth is a sharp and devastating exploration of grief, the parasitic nature of relationships, and the consequences of our actions.

These reminded Holley of:

In the House in the Dark of the Wood by Laird Hunt

"Once upon a time there was and there wasn't a woman who went to the woods." In this horror story set in colonial New England, a law-abiding Puritan woman goes missing. Or perhaps she has fled or abandoned her family. Or perhaps she's been kidnapped, and set loose to wander in the dense woods of the north. Alone and possibly lost, she meets another woman in the forest. Then everything changes. On a journey that will take her through dark woods full of almost-human wolves, through a deep well wet with the screams of men, and on a living ship made of human bones, our heroine may find that the evil she flees has been inside her all along.

Silver in the Wood by Emily Tesh

There is a Wild Man who lives in the deep quiet of Greenhollow, and he listens to the wood. Tobias, tethered to the forest, does not dwell on his past life, but he lives a perfectly unremarkable existence with his cottage, his cat, and his dryads. When Greenhollow Hall acquires a handsome, intensely curious new owner in Henry Silver, everything changes. Old secrets better left buried are dug up, and Tobias is forced to reckon with his troubled past―both the green magic of the woods, and the dark things that rest in its heart.

Most all of the libraries represented have Halloween/spooky/suspenseful displays of books and movies up. In particular, O’Neal has dark thrillers, horror short stories (Holley’s TBR from that display is The Ghost Stories of Edith Wharton), ghostly stories from the 133 section of nonfiction, and the PBS documentary series, Secrets of the Dead. 

Some last minute additions via email!

Riana recommends:

Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo is one of my favorites. It's her first adult book, she usually does YA and it is much darker than her usual writing, getting into the occult. 

The Hacienda by Isabel Canas just came out this year and it's fantastic! It's a gothic adult novel set in Mexico around the time of the revolution and get's into ghosts and witches in an old family mansion. 

The Ghost Bride by Yangsze Choo is another of my favorites and even has a great Netflix adaptation! It is partially set in the Chinese afterlife and deals with ghosts and Chinese mythology. It's an adult fiction.

Mongrels by Stephen Graham-Jones is a great adult fiction werewolf book and I love a good werewolf story! This one is a little different than your traditional werewolf fantasy tale, it is more of a realistic view of what a Southern family of Werewolves might be like. It is darkly humorous and had me laughing quite a lot but also feeling a whole range of other emotions. 

Squad is a Young Adult Graphic Novel by Maggie Tokuda-Hall and is another one about werewolves. This time, the werewolves are an all female pack and it gives big mean girls vibes while also being very feminist. The artwork as well as the story is just so good. 

Lobizona by Romina Garber is yet another Young Adult werewolf book I'd recommend. It's another interesting take on the werewolf story, not going in the horror direction, but more fantasy. The main character's family is from Argentina and is currently living undocumented in the U.S. so between that and her becoming a werewolf, there is a lot about belonging. 

House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland is another Young Adult novel that goes in a darker direction and has very spooky vibes great for this time of year. It deals with sisters that after going missing and then turning back up, have a strangeness that seems to have stuck to them. 

 Rebecca recommends:

Cackle by Rachel Harrison for a great lite-spooky book.

Mark recommends:

Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife by Mary Roach is a classic!