The 10 Scariest Horror Books of All Time, According to Goodreads
You won’t agree with this. The person writing about this doesn’t agree with this. But being scared by something that doesn’t really frighten someone else… it happens. Different works of horror work for different people, and sometimes, the scariest stories don’t exclusively (or even partially) belong to the horror genre, and then there are also great works of horror that aren’t scary (mostly horror-comedy hybrids).
Anyway, a certain number of users have voted on one of many polls on Goodreads, specifically one for the “Scariest Books Ever Written,” and that’s the one drawn from here. The books below got the most votes, and there are a fair few usual suspects, alongside some head-scratching omissions, but again, this is a subjective thing and a limited sample size, so perhaps approach with a saltshaker. Plenty of grains in there, one would assume.
10
‘Dracula’ (1897)
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It feels natural for Dracula to show up whenever the topic at hand involves groundbreaking horror books or notably scary novels. It is more or less the vampire story to which all others are compared, because even if Dracula didn’t invent the idea of the vampire, it did a lot to recontextualize and further develop such a monster, all the while proving creepy and clever in ways beyond just being about a monster.
Like, Dracula is also an interesting read thanks to its structure, with it being one of the best-known – and also one of the best – epistolary novels. You’ll likely know the basics of the story, or at least some of what to expect, if you’ve seen your fair share of vampire movies or read other vampire books before getting to Dracula, but it’s still a rewarding and maybe even necessary read if you’re into horror, and definitely so if you’re interested in the history of horror, as a genre.
9
‘Ghost Story’ (1979)
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Image via Coward, McCann and Geoghegan</figure>
Peter Straub collaborated with another iconic horror author (he will be mentioned a lot below) on The Talisman and its sequel, Black House. If you like those, or if you just like horror in general, then some of Straub’s solo books are also inevitably going to be worth seeking out, with Ghost Story possibly being the best place to start, since it’s his most iconic/essential book.
You do know what you’re in for, with that title and also with Straub’s reputation, but to be a bit more specific, it’s about a writer making startling discoveries about his recently deceased uncle, and he also ends up finding a group of people dangerously obsessed with ghost stories. It’s not really explosive, and maybe parts of Ghost Story also feel somewhat old-fashioned, but it’s still a significant supernatural horror story, and it did at least rattle a fair few people who voted on the Goodreads poll in question.
8
‘Lord of the Flies’ (1954)
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Image via Faber and Faber Limited</figure>
You could really only say that Lord of the Flies is almost a horror novel, rather than directly one, or at least a survival story that manages to be horrific at times. Still, a book doesn’t have to be full-on horror to be one of the scariest ever written, and Lord of the Flies is certainly unsettling, with some of the scare factor potentially being because people tend to read this when they’re young, since it’s often studied at school and all.
The basics: it’s about a group of young boys getting stranded on an island, and things get bad more and more as everything goes on, with groups formed and conflict unfolding. Lord of the Flies does quite a lot with a simple premise, and remains compelling for its commitment to realism, and its ability to be dug into and analyzed if you’re into doing that (of course, if you’re reading it at school, you’ll be made to do that whether you’d like to or not).
7
‘Carrie’ (1974)
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Carrie is a good place to start with Stephen King, since it’s definitely one of his slimmest books, and it’s also his first published novel. It’s also not a book that messes around or ever gets the chance to drag, and so it’s an easy read in terms of length and readability, but with the content, things are definitely more upsetting and not really describable as easy or breezy, but for good reason.
It’s about a teenage girl who has a horrible home life and faces bullies during most of the time she spends at school, and so the telekinetic powers she has, that are growing in intensity, threaten to explode and cause destruction should she be pushed too far. And it is more a case of when she’ll be pushed too far, rather than if, owing to the way Carrie is structured. Though fantastical with the telekinetic abilities, Carrie might well be scariest with the more mundane horrors alongside that out-there stuff, owing to the way it unflinchingly explores bullying and abuse among family members.
6
‘The Haunting of Hill House’ (1959)
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Image via Viking Press</figure>
The Haunting of Hill House is an absolutely essential work of 20th-century horror, and so it feels like it’s earned the right to be considered among the scariest books of all time. Like Ghost Story (obviously), it is technically a ghost story, doing the whole supernatural thing, but it finds interesting ways to play with those potentially familiar genre elements, doing more than just supernatural horror, in the end.
Shirley Jackson understood how to blend a few different kinds of horror together for sure, and The Haunting of Hill House has remained influential as well as timelessly scary (look at the well-received miniseries adaptation that didn’t come out too long ago in the overall scheme of things). The Haunting of Hill House is also pretty lean, at a bit under 250 pages, so it’s not a hard book to get into and appreciate, packing a good many unsettling things into what is ultimately a fairly effortless reading experience.
5
‘The Exorcist’ (1971)
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Even if you’re someone who’s not read or watched a ton of horror, you’re still likely to have heard of The Exorcist. It’s one of those all-timers within the horror genre, particularly demonic possession and religious horror, whether you’re talking about the book or the movie version. The premise is the same either way, because it’s about a young girl who starts showing signs she might be possessed by a demon.
Her mother doesn’t want to entertain that as a possibility at first, but things very slowly get worse, and so eventually, there is indeed an exorcism. But the build-up to that is also quietly unnerving, with more of the outward terror coming toward the end of the whole story. It is extremely well-paced, in any event, and also, come on: it’s The Exorcist. Of course it’s effectively horrifying, and naturally, it well and truly has scared a ton of readers over the years.
4
‘Pet Sematary’ (1983)
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From this point on, Stephen King absolutely dominates the Goodreads list being pulled from, so apologies in advance if you’re not keen on King. Take it up with the users of Goodreads. So, the first of the top 4 (all King) is Pet Sematary, which might well be the heaviest Stephen King novel, so even if all its attempts at horror fell short, it would still be uncomfortably effective at unnerving owing to how tragic it all is.
Pet Sematary is pretty horrifying in ways both expected and unexpected, and the rawness here makes it easy to appreciate and somewhat difficult to recommend.
The premise here involves a cemetery that seems to bring the dead back to life, but at a cost, because of course there’s always a cost, which is something Stephen King also explored in Needful Things, to some extent, and then went all-out in exploring with Revival, which is easy to recommend to those who liked Pet Sematary. Anyway, Pet Sematary is pretty horrifying in ways both expected and unexpected, and the rawness here makes it easy to appreciate and somewhat difficult to recommend, at least compared to a few of the more broadly entertaining Stephen King horror novels (and the ones that aren’t quite as depressing, maybe).
3
‘Salem’s Lot’ (1975)
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Compared to what came later, Salem’s Lot was pretty slim and not too out-of-control in terms of how many pages it went on for, but if you want to compare it to what came before, it’s a lot more epic in scope. It’s longer and more ambitious than Carrie, and it marked the first time Stephen King went ahead and did quite a lot to populate a whole town of characters, also doing so effectively in the previously-mentioned Needful Things, and doing mostly effectively in Under the Dome.
Salem’s Lot is about vampires slowly taking over a small town, and there’s mystery and a slow build to the whole thing that might’ve meant it would’ve been a spoiler, once upon a time, to mention vampires as being a part of the whole thing, but it’s fairly well-known now that this is King’s vampire book. You can know that and still find a lot to be surprised by here, with the whole novel being continually eerie and entertaining, and that loose/unpredictable nature of the plot also making it quite addictive to churn through rather fast.
2
‘The Shining’ (1977)
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The Shining isn’t quite as claustrophobic as Misery, which didn’t enter the poll being looked at. Though there is another poll for the “Scariest books of all time,” versus the “Scariest Books Ever Written,” and it was on the former poll. Oh well. The Shining does have a few more characters than Misery central to its narrative, but still not too many central characters, in the overall scheme of things. It’s famously about a struggling writer who becomes a caretaker at a mysterious hotel during its off-season, and he brings his wife and young son along with him.
He’s dealing with personal demons and writer’s block, with a certain psychological unraveling happening, and then all that stuff’s exacerbated by the supernatural horror side of things, too. The blend is done quite effortlessly, and The Shining also manages to be one of King’s most immersive novels, for better or worse (you do come to really know the Overlook Hotel, even if you might not want to understand a place that cursed).
1
‘IT’ (1986)
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Image via Viking</figure>
There is a ton of variety to the horror found in IT, with it being about a whole lot more than just one frightening clown, even if everyone does know/remember the frightening clown. The titular villain can shapeshift into forms that it believes will most terrify the people it chooses as victims, and so the clown is just one of its forms, with the other maybe being a little harder to depict visually, but just as terrifying when you’re reading IT and have to imagine all the horrible sights and situations for yourself.
But IT is entertaining and there are moments of triumph and catharsis here alongside shocking sequences and some really unpleasant stuff. It plays out across two periods of time, since the central antagonist here re-emerges every 27 years, with the same core group of characters fighting It first as kids, and then later on, as adults. Further, you get a ton of world-building and numerous great characters in IT, so if it’s got the most horror of any Stephen King book, all the while also feeling so central to his body of work, then it feels fair for it to top a poll like the one that’s just been covered.
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