A spooky reading list is as essential to Halloween as the age old traditions of rewatching Hocus Pocus for the 80th time and adding pumpkin spiced flavouring to literally everything.
So, naturally, we had to sprinkle some Halloween energy onto our recommended reads for October.
Discover why these thrilling books need to be on the top of your reading list this week!
Dark and Shallow Lies, by Ginny Myers Sain
When Grey makes her annual visit to La Cachette, Louisiana – the tiny bayou town that proclaims to be the “Psychic Capital of the World” – she knows it will be different from past years: her childhood best friend Elora went missing several months earlier and Grey knows that no one is telling the truth about the night she disappeared.
But surely, in a town full of psychics, no lie can be kept hidden for long.
In this bayou corner of the world, where secrets lurk just below the surface, and where a murderer is on the loose, nobody can be presumed innocent—and La Cachette’s dark and shallow lies may just rip the town apart.
The Last Girl, by Goldy Moldavsky
New girl Rachel Chavez turns to horror movies for comfort, preferring them to the bored rich kids of her fancy New York High School. But then Rachel is recruited by the Mary Shelley Club, a mysterious student club that sets up terrifying Fear Tests; elaborate pranks inspired by urban legends and horror movies.
But when a sinister masked figure appears, Rachel realises that her past has caught up with her. It’s time for the ultimate prank to play out.
A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder series
Steeped in mystery, thrill and true crime podcast energy (plus an incredible family cast and teen romance!), the A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder trilogy is the series everyone is talking about.
The case is closed. Five years ago, schoolgirl Andie Bell was murdered by Sal Singh. The police know he did it. Everyone in town knows he did it.
But having grown up in the same small town that was consumed by the crime, Pippa Fitz-Amobi isn’t so sure. When she chooses the case as the topic for her final project, she starts to uncover secrets that someone in town desperately wants to stay hidden. And if the real killer is still out there, how far will they go to keep Pip from the truth?
Gone, by Michael Grant
In the blink of an eye all the adults disappear in a small town in southern California and no one knows why.
Cut off from the outside world, those that are left are trapped, and there’s no help on the way. Chaos rules the streets. Gangs begin to form. Sides are chosen – strong or weak. Cruel or humane.
And then there are those who begin to develop powers.
Dystopian fiction at its best, the GONE series is a cult classic. Breathtaking, harrowing, and utterly terrifying with a cast of complex characters and moral dilemmas that will delight fans of The Hunger Games, Divergent and The Maze Runner.
