"What Scary Book Are You Reading Now" Walks Again

Cruel Winter by Anthony Izzo. Id's put on the border between okay and good.

I own that one, but I've been real hesitant about starting it, because of its 2.5 rating. Glad it was ok/good. :)

I finished Now We Are Sick: An Anthology of Nasty Verse edited by Neil Gaiman & Stephen Jones a couple days ago. It has some good names involved--Ramsey Campbell, Robert Bloch, Terry Pratchett, James Herbert, etc--but I wasn't too crazy about it, probably because I don't really like poetry. On the plus side: it's very short (right around 100 pages). My rating: 3/5 (not really recommended, unless you're a fan of one of the authors).

Btw, thanks for starting a new thread, quartzite! :)

Marking the thread. So good to see this topic back - thank you quartzite!

Hey everyone!!

After a couple years of dormancy due to relocations, I'm finally settled, in a house with a library and ready to get back in the swing of LT! ;P

Finished Doctor Sleep last week--exceeded expectations!!

Just got my Amazon order in! 4 out of 5 are Bumpworthy!

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson--tore into it and on Chapter 3. I work overnight, and am not taking anything in, so I made myself put it down until I get a nap!

Hangsaman--loving Mrs. Jackson!

The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath--I don't know why it took me so long to finally buy this!

How to Make Friends With Demons by Graham Joyce--trying to complete my Joyce collection. He's amazing! If you haven't read anything of his, start with Tooth Fairy.

#3: I agree: it's nice to see this thread still active. :)

#4: Wow, quite a few reads! :) (And welcome back from relocating, settling in, etc.) I'm glad you liked Doctor Sleep. I keep getting mixed reactions to it. We Have Always Lived in the Castle has been on my wishlist for awhile. Thanks for reminding me about it! As has The Bell Jar. Hangsaman and How to Make Friends With Demons I'm not familiar with, but I'll keep an eye out for them. Thanks for the recs! :)

#4 I was confused for a moment and on investigation I discover I am less confused, but possibly at a higher level.

I see that the touchstone for How to Make Friends With Demons by Graham Joyce brings up a book I have called, Memoirs of a Master Forger by William Heaney.

Is this a book brought out with different titles on either side of the Atlantic, and also with different author names?

I see that you suggest starting with Tooth Fairy. Would I be missing much if I started with the one I have?

Finished Under a Graveyard Sky by John Ringo. Ringo has previously been considered a Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Action or Soft Core Porn Writer, depending on who you talk to. Now he has tried his hand at Horror with this Zombie Appocalypse series. As with his other books of all genres there is a lot of violence and a certain amount of attention given to weaponry and munitions. If you like Ringo (which I certainly do for the most part-have taken a pass on the action/soft-core porn stuff) you will dig this latest yarn.

An amazing read that I found both gory and unputdownable was The Summer I Died by Ryan C Thomas and a superb study in madness from Darkfuse Corrosion by Jon Bassoff

I'm listening to the audio book of Joe Hill's NOS4A2, with Kate Mulgrew doing the narration.

I'm reading Broken Angels by the wonderful Graham Masterton

Hey, everyone! Glad to see the thread back up and running! I've been off the grid for awhile, but it's nice to be back! I had no idea that Kate Mulgrew read the audiobook of NOS4A2. That makes it a must listen. Now I'll plan to get the audio book instead of the text!

Recently finished Kin by Kealan Patrick Burke; riveting tale of revenge.

Kate Mulgrew's performance is fantastic. Are you enjoying it #9 tymfos? It was a bit weird to hear her classy self voice some quite sick and deranged characters, but she put everything into it.

I thought Kate did an excellent job! There was a short bit of comment at the end of the audio by the author, and he said he was thrilled to have her narrate the audio book. Apparently she had narrated one of his stories in an anthology at an earlier time, and he had been impressed then.

I just finished Bleeding Season. Heading into Doctor Sleep when it gets here.

The Terror by Dan Simmons. Read it during the winter, which added to the atmosphere, and it is VERY atmospheric. Not perfect by any means but it has stayed with me.

I enjoyed the characters and could keep track of them all. There was a great horror novel in there, with Hickey being a particularly nasty villain. And the masked ball on the ice - amazing.

The feeling of being trapped, the darkness, cold and claustrophobia, really added to the horror.

Unlike a lot of readers, I wasn't bothered by the ending. Not as much as I was by Crozier's psychic abilities. The problem for me came with the difference in tone between the ending and scenes like the masked ball. There were two very different books wrestling with each other in one novel - a creepy, atmospheric tale of endurance in the face of almost certain death, and a straight-up horror with a strong, almost exclusively male cast. The exposition in the dialogue would have been forgiveable in a horror, and the ending would have been more fitting to a more subtle tale of terror. Trying to combine the two weakened each, and led to a very bloated book, but it was certainly ambitious and Dan Simmons can't be faulted for managing to carry it off anyway, after a fashion.

Thanks for posting again, Moomin Mama. I'd actually forgotten about this thread. :) I've always wanted to read The Terror, but it looks so darn big. It's still on my wishlist, though.

Lots of great recs again, everyone! :) Bleeding Season looks pretty good (4.43 rating? wow!). And Kin is definitely on my radar. I don't know if I'll get around to the ebooks, though (are there physical books of Broken Angels, The Summer I Died, etc?). Stephen King is always in my TBR pile, but I haven't started anything by him lately.

Sorry my post if so behind. I honestly don't remember where I left off with my horror reads, but for this year, I've only read Diary of a Creepy-Ass Doll by Stacey Leigh Brooks. It's a super quick read, kind of funny, but nothing you just have to run out and get. I've read some other horror-ish manga/graphic novels (some YA stuff, which I left out), including The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger Born by Peter David, et al., which was really good; beautifully illustrated.

I'll warn you Sara, it was a bit of slog. It's taken me a while to work out if that slog was worth it, but it's certainly left an impression. If you're going to commit to it, be prepared (other members may disagree)!

Good to know, thanks. :) If I had more time, then I'd probably check it out at my library. (I see it there all the time.) However, I have two of Dan Simmons books sitting on my own shelf I should probably tackle first. What're your thoughts on Carrion Comfort and A Winter Haunting, if you've read either one?

Hey Sara jumping in here. Couldn't finish The Terror even though I love Simmons's writing and have enjoyed many of his books. He created great atmosphere but, man-o-man there was a lot of dead time. It is pretty unusual for me to put down a book after 250 pages but I just felt that this one was taking too long to get anywhere.
That being said.... Carrion Comfort is, in a word, awesome. It is one of the first horror novels I recommend to people. Great story, great writing. I highly recommend it.
A Winter's Haunting is part of the Summer of Night arc. Summer of Night is a good, spooky read. The books which follow up on the individual characters from that book however, are not all of the same quality. This is I believe the last of those and follows up on the most prominent of those characters. It is also the only one that I think you probably had to have read Summer of Night previously to really understand. It had it's moments but overall I was kind of disappointed. To explain why would be to reveal too much of the story and I don't want to do that. Of the books that followed characters from Summer of Night I think the best was Children of the Night.

>16 Moomin_Mama: I read The Terror last fall. I had the same kind of mixed reaction, except I really didn't like the ending. One thing it did, though, was get me interested in the Franklin Expedition, and I read a non-fiction book on the subject the following month.

I just finished Not Flesh Nor Feathers by Cheri Priest, third in her Eden Moore trilogy. Zombies in Chattanooga! What's not to like? ;)

#20: Thanks for your recommendations! :) I might put The Terror a little lower on my TBR pile now. And I forgot A Winter's Haunting is part of a series. I usually like to read those in order, so I'll probably start Carrion Comfort instead (if/when I can find my copy). Thanks again. :)

#21: I've heard quite a bit about Cheri Priest. I'll have to try her books sometime.

>19 saraslibrary:: The Terror was my first Dan Simmons, guess I jumped in at the deep end! I picked up a copy of Lovedeath - I couldn't take another Terror so I'll try some of his short stories :)

>21 tymfos:: I've never been interested in the history of Arctic/Antarctic exploration so didn't realise it had started so far back, and with such early technology. I'm now intrigued and want to read more, especially about the Franklin Expedition. Which book did you read, and what did you think? I really like the sound of On the Proper Use of Stars, another Franklin novel but without the supernatural, and a jseger9000 recommendation.

lol @ guess I jumped in at the deep end!

But at least you didn't give up on him. That's always good. Lovedeath looks very readable! At first I thought it might be erotic horror (by the title and a recommendation: I Shudder at Your Touch by Michele Slung), but maybe not. Let us know how his short stories are.

>23 Moomin_Mama: I read Frozen in Time: The Fate of the Franklin Expeditionby Owen Beattie. My comments about it are posted here:
https://www.librarything.com/topic/161219#4402414

Even those this thread has slowed down a bit (ok, big understatement there :), I just thought I'd mention for next year, there's a group horror read, if anyone wants to join. Here's the schedule:

January: Traditional/classic Gothic works
February: Supernatural
March: Victorian Gothic
April: Graphic novels & short stories
May: Women & non-English
June: Gothic Pulp & weird fiction
July: Hauntings/ghost stories
August: Psychological
September: Southern Gothic
October: Slasher/thriller
November: Light/humorous
December: Contemporary/modern Gothic

>26 saraslibrary:: I'm in - see you there!

Awesome! Definitely; I'll see you there. :)

Oooh! I practically swore I wasn't going to join any challenges in 2015 (except for the 75 Challenge, where I can read anything) but this is really tempting!

I know, isn't it? :) And if I remember right, you don't have to do every category, so there's no real pressure. You'll probably be able to do both challenges easily. Good luck if you join us. :)

I posted this on the above-mentioned group horror read thread as well, but here's a fun horror reading bingo card, if anyone wants to use it. I noticed there were a lot of bingo cards on LT, but none that were horror-related. So enjoy! :)

For anyone who hasn't joined us over at the HorrorKAT challenge, so far I've read:

The Monk (5 stars)
Frankenstein (4 stars)
The Strain (3 stars)
Interview with the Vampire (2 stars)

Didn't realise till I listed them this way that I've liked each one less than the last! It's not been that bad, according to my criteria anything 3 stars or over is enjoyable. It's been a lot of fun so far.

>32 Moomin_Mama: I just now noticed that about your star ratings. So older is better then? ;)

>33 saraslibrary: Older is definitely better, now I'm on the right side of 40 :D

>34 Moomin_Mama: Hear! Hear! From this side of fifty.
:-)

>34 Moomin_Mama: & >35 pgmcc: Right on. :)

>35 pgmcc: Apparently we're a good 10 years younger than the generation before us would have been, which makes us spring chickens.

I'm re-reading The Merciful Women, an ironic version of how The Vampyre was written. It references what is known about the famous stay at the Villa Diodati, as well as Frankenstein and Poe's The Gold Bug. Recommended reading for fans of classic horror.

>37 Moomin_Mama: Oh, man, that reminds me I haven't been keeping up on my horror reads here, so I'll probably just start with my next read. It'd take too long to back-track to....(does a goes glance up)...April 2014?? Holy crap. Bad LTer am I. ;)

>37 Moomin_Mama: Last year I read Robert Aickman's award winning story, Pages from a Young Girl's Journal, which deals with the same topic in a fictional context.

I believe you have piqued my interest in The Merciful Women.

Under the Dome - not one of Stephen King's classics but entertaining none the less, despite some silliness and the length of the book.

>40 Moomin_Mama: Oh, yeah, good luck with that one. :) It's pretty darn huge. So huge I still haven't started it yet.

Kin by Kealan Patrick Burke in fact just finished and added review...

>42 runner56: Thumbed your review! :) That's one I'd like to get to eventually.

I've read the following books - March is Victorian Gothic month over at the HorrorKIT challenge:

Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and other stories (Vintage Classics) (4 stars)
Tales of Mystery and Imagination (4 stars)
Sweeney Todd or The String of Pearls (4 stars)

Sweeney Todd was the surprise here - it's not as well known as the other two but I liked it just as much. Todd is frighteningly convincing, a really chilling personality, completely manipulative and conniving. The book itself is quite a page-turner. I read a free online PDF version, available here:

http://halfpennydreadfuls.com/wp-content/uploads/The-String-Of-Pearls-aka-Sweene...

>44 Moomin_Mama: Three great books there.

I loved The String of Pearls. Sweeney Todd is my candidate for the purest antihero. There is absolutely nothing redeeming about his character, his motivation, or his methods. Not many people know that the story of Sweeney Todd was originally called The String of Pearls.

Finished the The Boy Who Killed Demons. Wasn't labeled as such but was YA. Reminded me of I Am Not A Serial Killer sort of. Not as good.

>46 tjm568: I'll keep both books in mind. Thanks! :) I've been waiting to find a copy of I Am Not a Serial Killer so I can start reading that series. I'm weird like that; I like reading books in order. ;)

sara I am with you a hundred percent. And that series for sure. I just realized there are two more that I haven't read in the series; The Devils Only Friend and Next of Kin. Apparently Next of Kin is a novella. I may have to reread the entire series.

Oh, and The Devils Only Friend doesn't come out until June.

>48 tjm568: & >49 tjm568: Cool! Thanks for keeping me up-to-date on that. :) Do you know if the novella will be printed or in ebook form? I know sometimes authors do that, where it's only available online for a limited time, which drives me nuts. Btw, my mom got me some I Am Not a Serial Killer chapstick from some of Dan Wells publicists. Pretty cool! :) She thought I had already read the books and told them I just loved them. LOL! I'm sure I will love them...once I start them. The "Buy My Merchandise" link doesn't seem to work on his site: http://www.fearfulsymmetry.net . *shrugs* Maybe he sells them that way? Anyway, thanks again on all the info! :)

Oooooo, two more Dan Wells! I've loved them so far.

About 3/4 of the way through The Deep by Nick Cutter. Pretty creepy. Eager to see how it ends. Was looking for The Troop but the library was still in-processing it.

>52 tjm568: I'd be happy to send you our copy of The Troop. ;) It's just sitting on our shelf, gathering dust. :(

I'm glad The Deep is working out for you. I haven't read anything by Nick Cutter, so I'll have to keep him on my radar. Thanks! :)

>52 tjm568: >53 saraslibrary: I borrowed The Troop and 1/4 through the body horror element was pretty off-putting. I got half-way through and had to return it and might have to go re-borrow it but I'm not in a hurry!

> 54 wifilibrarian: Actually I went looking for Nick Cutter because of your post of the short list for the James Herbert Award in another thread. Also picked up Bird Box but haven't started it yet. Trying to track down The Girl with All the Gifts. Always looking for good new horror authors, so thanks for the post.

>53 saraslibrary: saraslibrary: I have 4-5 average-to-very-good libraries within a 15 minute drive from which I can borrow, and The Troop will soon be available in at least one of them. Unfortunately, noone seems to have The Girl with All the Gifts. Don't know if I should just buy it.

>55 tjm568: good to know it was a useful post. I just updated it with the winner, which ended up being The Troop.

I see The girl with all the gifts has been nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke award, http://www.clarkeaward.com/ Of the nominees I've read First fifteen lives of Harry August, but hadn't heard of the other nominees. The best parts of Girl are the characters, the plot has holes if you look to closely.

I wondered if you'd read The passage and it looks like you didn't enjoy it? Carey's book has a much tighter story and more likable characters, but I did see some similarities.

I have liked the Felix Castor books that I have read by Mike Carey so I suspect I will like The Girl with All the Gifts.
My biggest problem with The Passage was the excessive wordiness. It felt about two hundred pages longer than it needed to be. The Fact that the girl is a tighter story is good news.

>57 tjm568: I felt the same way! The writing was good but the story could have been told in far fewer words. Then to get to the end to only find out it's just the first in a series!

Finished Bird Box this morning. Pretty good, creepy scenes late in the story. Would have liked to learn more about the baddies.

I started reading The Beetle today. I am enjoying it.

Started Thicker than Water.

Reading The Troop by Nick Cutter.

My April (Graphic Novels and Short Stories) reads for the Horror KIT challenge:

Swamp Thing, first four books of Volume 2 - early Alan Moore comics, scary and very clever, 5 stars.

Simpson's Treehouse of horror: Spine-Tingling Spooktacular and Fun-filled Frightfest - as good as the tv episodes, but with different stories by different writers and artists. Liked the variety and the horror references, good fun, 4 stars.

Teatro Grottesco - Weird, skewed dreamlike scenarios set in obscure places and filled with odd characters, with terrifying appearances of things like puppets on strings, macabre carnivals, and crawling heads. Sheer madness, 4 or 5 stars, will probably settle on a 5.

We're halfway through our reading challenge over at the 'Horror!' group - it's a very open challenge and people can still join in. A number of us are thinking of doing it all again next year, too:

HorrorKIT Reading Challenge

>63 Moomin_Mama:

Teatro Grottesco is a great collection. The title story if very good. I am a fan of Ligotti's work.

>65 pgmcc: I've never read any of his work before, although I've been hearing good things for years. I can now see what all the fuss is about and I will definitely read more in the future. He's made quite an impression on me, I can't stop thinking about his stories.

>66 Moomin_Mama: His work has been expensive and hard to find until recently. In October there is a Penquin Classics edition coming out that includes two of his collections, "Song of a Dead Dreamer" and "Grimscribe".

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0143107763?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=o...

>67 pgmcc: I'm very much looking forward to it :)

>67 pgmcc:

Awesome news, thanks!

>68 Moomin_Mama: & >69 paradoxosalpha:

I am happy to have been the bringer of glad tidings.

>68 Moomin_Mama: & >69 paradoxosalpha:

Another author of "Strange Tales" whose work has been hard to come by but is now becoming readily available is Robert Aickman. I do not see him listed in either of your Author clouds so perhaps you have not come across him to date.

His work is well worth a toe-in-the-water. Faber & Faber have brought out reasonably priced editions of some of his collections.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_2?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keyw...

>71 pgmcc: Another author I've heard good things about but never read. I'll be stocking up for next year's horror read and Robert Aickman is a good choice.

Finished 20th Century Ghosts by Joe Hill. Nice little collection of stories. None of them really all that horrifying, but entertaining.

>71 pgmcc:

I've only read one Aickman story: "The Hospice" -- for an LT discussion. It was really good; I'd gladly read more.

>74 paradoxosalpha: If I were asked which Aickman collection to read first I would say, Cold Hand in Mine. "The Hospice", which is a great story, is in that collection.

I'm reading Out of Tune, a short story collection edited by Jonathan Maberry. It contains creepy stories inspired by folk ballads. Each story is followed by a bit of info about the song that inspired the author to write his or her story for the volume. I'm finding the quality a bit uneven, but it's an interesting premise. Some of the authors really pushed the boundaries of what the songs were about, though.

More from my horror read-a-thon:

May: Women & non-English:

Grotesque - Not strictly horror but certainly a horrific novel about the murder of two prostitutes who knew each other in school, plus women's place in society, and how increased competition and opportunity has only increased unhappiness. Apparently the author's Out was more of a horror. 4 stars.

White is for Witching - Again, not really a horror, but a story of mental health, identity, and haunting, very much in the tradition of ambiguous, psychological ghost stories written mostly by, or about, women. Very interesting, multi-layered, with some genuinely creepy moments. 5 stars.

The Yellow Wallpaper - Short, feminist story about a woman with mild depression being confined to her room 'to rest'... very creepy, and a classic. 5 stars.

Hauntings - Beautifully eerie tales of history, mythology and music. 5 stars.

June: Gothic Pulp & weird fiction:

The House on the Borderland - Has its flaws but what a ride! Strange, creepy horror-adventure tale with a prolonged, mind-blowing 2001: A Space Odyssey 'stargate' trip in the middle. 4 stars.

H. P. Lovecraft Omnibus 3: The Haunter of the Dark and Other Tales - More gruesome, disturbing and earthy than I was expecting, the fear of being driven mad is palpable throughout the stories and I enjoyed the whole mythos, which is a lot of fun. Wish I'd read this in my teens. 5 stars

I've started 20th Century Ghosts. I've only made it a couple stories in. So far I like it...

I have just started Carmilla. Two chapters in and I am enjoying Le Fanu's writing style.

>79 pgmcc: I'm a fan of Le Fanu's short stories - Squire Toby's Will is favourite - but have never read any of his novels. Looking forward to your thoughts on Carmilla.

>80 Moomin_Mama: I have only red a few of Le Fanu's works but I have liked those I have read. I recently finished The Cock and Anchor which was an historical fiction rather than a supernatural story. I found it excellent.

I also like his Green Tea. This is a wonderful piece.

Carmilla is a little gem. It is only about 100 pages long so it can be read quite quickly.

I'm just a short ways from the end of Ramsey Campbell's The Hungry Moon. It's creepy all right.

>81 pgmcc: Carmilla is more of a novella, then - sounds like a good place to start with his longer fiction. I've given your review a thumbs up :)

>83 Moomin_Mama: Thank you!

Just began William Peter Blatty's Legion, which was turned into The Exorcist III. Saw the movie and liked it so much I had to check out the book.

>85 jackball74: One of my favourite films, with some of my favourite scary scenes. I enjoyed Legion, and really liked Kinderman as a character.

I LOVE The Summer I Died. It may be the best extreme horror novel I've ever read. Right up there with Wrath White's The Resurrectionist and JF Gonzalez's Survivor!

Jason

KIN by Burke is another great suggestion! I'd definitely recommend The Turtle Boy, which is still my favorite from him

>tjm568:

The Troop is vastly superior to The Deep, although I liked both

tjm568:

BirdBox is a MUST read!!

I agree. The Troop was much better.

Well, I forgot One Second After, which I had just started, at work. So I started The Summer I Died by Ryan C. Thomas. Ordered this from Amazon after positive reviews in this group.

I'm about 60 pages in to The Hellfire Club, and I'm enjoying its metafictional menace. There's a vivid whodunnit atmosphere, but with an overwhelming number of questions and suspicions.

>92 tjm568: & >93 paradoxosalpha: Cool reads, you guys! :) I haven't been listing my reads here, but probably the more memorable novella I've finished recently was Header by Edward Lee. Disturbing, to say the least. I just bought the movie and the book sequel, so we'll see how those turn out.

So I finished The Summer I Died. Not sure exactly how I feel about it. It was better than the chop-up stories by Jack Kilbourn which, honestly I deleted from my nook lest anyone ever found out I had read them. It was pretty violent though. Way more story than the typical Kilbourn romp, but still pretty disturbing. Can't decide if I will hunt down the rest of the trilogy. I probably will. But not right away.

sara- unfamiliar with Edward Lee. Worth a look?

>95 tjm568: I like Edward Lee, so of course I'd say he's worth trying. ;) He writes splatterpunk, so he's not for everyone; but the few books I have read of his--Flesh Gothic, City Infernal, Messenger, and now Header--were pretty good (I gave them all either 4 or 5 stars). Not to mention, he writes some pretty sick short stories. That's how I cut my teeth on him, with "The Stick Woman" in Darkside: Horror for the Next Millennium edited by John Pelan. The anthology isn't my favorite, but that story still haunts me to this day.

Anyway, if you want, I can loan you Header, Header 2, and/or The Bighead via Amazon. I've never done it before, but there is the option with those 3 ebooks to loan them out for 14 days. Interested?

Hey sara. Thanks for the offer! I am interested but maybe I should follow your lead and start with a short story. Can I get back to you on the loan?

Sure, no problem. :) I agree: short stories are the best way to go. And, of course, you can get back to me whenever.

I'm currently reading Horns by Joe Hill. It's pretty weird, but mostly keeping my attention.

>99 Michael333: it is pretty weird but imaginative, I quite liked it. There's a movie adaptation staring Daniel Radcliffe I've been meaning to check out.

>100 wifilibrarian: Same here--I mean, wanting to see the movie version. I haven't read Horns yet, but I hope to before watching the film.

Started The Book of Paul by Richard Long. Ok so far, but reviews are mixed and I am not sure I am going to like it. We'll see.

>102 tjm568: Yeah, I saw the mixed reviews, too, but it still sounds good. I hope it works out for you. :)

I've totally neglected this thread, because I've been busy with the Horror Group here; and to be honest, I haven't been reading a lot of horror books. Horror movies, sure; just not books. *hangs head in shame*

Skipping the end of 2015 (too many to list), here's a quick sum-up for this year:

* The Rats by James Herbert - 3/5 - Too many characters; predictable plot; and I didn't like the animal cruelty (eg, feeding live puppies to the rats). However, the ending did leave my interest piqued for the sequels. Just call me a sucker for "evil" animal books. ;)

* Hideyuki Kikuchi's Vampire Hunter D Manga: Volume 1 by Saiko Takaki - 4/5 - I actually read and finished this one before the novel version (see below). Really good, and very close to the novel.

* Death Jr. #1 by Gary Whitta - 5/5 - It's a kid's graphic/comic book, but I loved the mix of horror and humor. Recommended.

* 2 comic books (both 4 *'s): The Darkness #21: Wyrmwood, Part 1 by Malachy Coney and Helsing #1 by Gary Reed

I'm currently reading Vampire Hunter D by Hideyuki Kikuchi and The Man in the Picture by Susan Hill. Even though the latter book is very small (145 pages), I'm not super intrigued by it yet. *fingers crossed it'll get better* And since I've already read the manga version of Vampire Hunter D, my interest has kind of waned in finishing the novel.

About half way through The Book of Paul. You get thrown into the middle of the story right off the bat with no real sense of who is good and who is bad. All the characters seem pretty screwy and violent. Back stories are developed and you begin to learn more about the characters, but I still don't really know what is driving anybody or what they are trying to accomplish. I read that this is the first in a seven book series. I'm still not sure whether I want to invest that kind of time into this. We will see.

Finished The Book of Paul. Still have a lot of questions, but apparently there are six more books coming to answer them. Not sure I care enough to continue. It will probably be a game time decision.

About to finish Alfred Hitchcock Presents, some creepy stuff in there...

Finished Night Shift by Stephen King
Now reading his IT

I guess this group died...

I went on a bit of a scary book kick this October, as 2017 is already a horror show and why not read a few?

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
Best horror novel ever written, FIGHT ME. Didn’t technically reread it this year, but this is my list and I do what I want. I did, however, read We Have Always Lived In The Castle, which is also very good.
An Unattractive Vampire by Jim McDoniel
Sometimes you have to throw a comedy in somewhere. I picked this up expecting a shallow Twilight/True Blood parody, and I got something completely different and hilarious.
Ballad of Black Tom by Victor LaValle
A literal Lovecraftian Horror novella. If you want to like Lovecraft but can’t stand his racism, this is required reading. Also check out his new novel, The Changeling.
Final Girls by Mira Grant
Someone finally did something interesting with Virtual Reality. Horror really thrives with novellas, they’re just long enough to pack all the characterization and plot in, but they never overstay their welcome.
The Girl With All The Gifts by M. R. Carey
Zombie horror. Interesting zombie horror. Avoids a number of pitfalls of the genre and anything else I’d tell you would be spoilers.

Runner Ups:
Six Wakes by Mur Lafferty
Sometimes, you just need a good sci-fi murder mystery. Even if no one is technically dead. Clue with clones. Not technically horror, but close enough.
River of Teeth by Sarah Gailey
Was recommended to me as horror, but is actually more of an adventure novella. Still, alternate universe with hippos on the Mississippi.