13 Horror/Thriller Books

With Halloween coming up in just a few weeks, everyone has the creepy, spooky, and scary on their mind.  Take a break from your horror movies to try one of these thrilling, scary, or creepy YA reads!

*Ghosts & Hauntings*

In the Shadow of Blackbirds by Cat Winters (YA HIS WIN)

In San Diego in 1918, as deadly influenza and World War I take their toll, sixteen-year-old Mary Shelley Black watches desperate mourners flock to séances and spirit photographers for comfort and, despite her scientific leanings, must consider if ghosts are real when her first love, killed in battle, returns.

~ Fantastic ghost story with dramatic historical backdrop. 

~ Enough twists to make me gasp in shock while reading 

~ Very suspenseful, a bit gory in parts, somewhat violent. 

Anna Dressed in Blood by Kendare Blake (YA PAR BLA)

For three years, seventeen-year-old Cas Lowood has carried on his father's work of dispatching the murderous dead, traveling with his kitchen-witch mother and their spirit-sniffing cat, but everything changes when he meets Anna, a girl unlike any ghost he has faced before.

~ The plot of this book is quite dark and has its moments of creepiness but it lightens up whenever Cas puts in a thought or two (his humor really is quite good). 

~ This is definitely not your average ghost story! It's so much better!

~ Oh yes, this was a pretty scary one, especially when I was reading it at 2am and had to go to the kitchen for a snack break. 

The Girl from the Well by Rin Chupeco (YA PAR CHU)

Okiku has wandered the world for centuries, freeing the innocent ghosts of the murdered-dead and taking the lives of killers with the vengeance they are due, but when she meets Tark she knows the moody teen with the series of intricate tattoos is not a monster and needs to be freed from the demonic malevolence that clings to him.

~ Wow this was an incredibly gripping and engaging horror novel; I could not put this book down. Parts of this horror book are very graphic and gory, so just a heads up. 

~ A deliciously creepy, but horrifyingly amazing, spook to keep you up into the wee hours!

~ An incredibly creepy and chilling paranormal/horror novel that weaves both ghost story and Japanese legend.

Insanity by Susan Vaught (YA PAR VAU)

The intertwining stories of three teenagers who find themselves haunted beyond imagining in the depths of a Kentucky mental institution.

~ When I was reading at night, and the creepiest villain of the bunch appeared, I could not stop shivering. 

~ A quick, dark, paranormal read

~  I found myself reading into the night to see what happened to the characters, only to stop reading for fear of what might invade my dreams from reading right before bed.  

*Fear & Murder*

Welcome to the Dark House by Laurie Faria Stolarz (YA ACT STO)

Seven super fans have won the trip of a lifetime to meet the master of horror, legendary film director Justin Blake. But things quickly go from delightfully dark to dangerously deadly, when Ivy, Parker, Shayla, Natalie, Frankie, and Garth find themselves trapped in an abandoned amusement park. To earn a ticket out, they must face their darkest demons one ride at a time.

~ Lock your doors, turn on all the lights and leave yourself a an escape route before you start this one!

~ It was a mash-up of all my favorite things horror and left me with chills.

~ This is one book that is all kinds of messed up and in a good way. It’s scary, strange and engrossing all in one...

This Dark Endeavor by Kennth Oppel (YA SFF OPP)

When his twin brother falls ill in the family's chateau in the independent republic of Geneva in the eighteenth century, sixteen-year-old Victor Frankenstein embarks on a dangerous and uncertain quest to create the forbidden Elixir of Life described in an ancient text in the family's secret Biblioteka Obscura.

~ The story itself isn’t gruesome exactly, but is quite dark and has a fairly grim ending.

~ 304 pages of dark, adventurous and gothic goodness. 

~ If you love dark and twisted tales, then this one is for you. 

Shadowlands by Kate Brian (YA ACT BRI)

Rory, a girl in witness protection, thinks the serial killer she turned in has found her and is killing people around her. But as she investigates, she discovers a dark, disturbing truth about her new hometown.

~ Whoa. This is different. And scary. 

~ I finished this in one day, because I simply didn’t want to put it down.

~ For the first ninety pages or so I was absolutely terrified and almost stopped reading because I wasn’t sure I could handle it. 

Ten by Gretchen McNeil (YA ACT MCN)

Ten teens head to a house party at a remote island mansion off the Washington coast . . . only for them to picked off by a killer one by one.

~ I was sucked into reading this book, and couldn't put it down until I finished and learned who the killer was.

~ Both thrilling and pretty frightening when it had to be.

~ Reading Ten was kind of like reading a horror movie in book form.

I Hunt Killers by Barry Lyga (YA MYS LYG)

Seventeen-year-old Jazz learned all about being a serial killer from his notorious "Dear Old Dad," but believes he has a conscience that will help fight his own urges and right some of his father's wrongs, so he secretly helps the police apprehend the town's newest murderer, "The Impressionist."

~ A rather graphically violent story with plenty of psychological thriller to it.

~ Dexter fans will love it!

~ This is not a story for the faint of heart. 

*Monsters & Demons*

The Diviners by Libba Bray (YA HIS BRA)

Seventeen-year-old Evie O'Neill is thrilled when she is exiled from small-town Ohio to New York City in 1926, even when a rash of occult-based murders thrusts Evie and her uncle, curator of The Museum of American Folklore, Superstition, and the Occult, into the thick of the investigation.

~ There are parts of this book that are extremely creepy where you feel like screaming at the characters “No! No! Don’t go down into the creepy basement cellar.”

~ This book was full of creeping, brilliant horror, which I was absolutely not expecting.

~ Fantastic combination of horror with historical fiction. 

The Replacement by Brenna Yovanoff (YA PAR YOV)

Sixteen-year-old Mackie Doyle knows that he replaced a human child when he was just an infant, and when a friend's sister disappears he goes against his family's and town's deliberate denial of the problem to confront the beings that dwell under the town, tampering with human lives.

~ Think of the scariest movie you've ever seen, the sadest song you know, and the one fearless leader you've always looked up to. Put them into one book and you'll have Yovanoff's "The Replacement."

~ Awesome...I totally loved it! It certainly had a dark and haunting feel to it. (I mean...look at that cover!) 

~ An eerie book that kept me up late at night.

Rot & Ruin by Jonathan Maberry (YA SFF MAB)

In a post-apocalyptic world where fences and border patrols guard the few people left from the zombies that have overtaken civilization, fifteen-year-old Benny Imura is finally convinced that he must follow in his older brother's footsteps and become a bounty hunter.

~ I picked it up planning to start it, read a chapter or two, and go to sleep at a reasonable time. Then it was 5 a.m. and I was finishing it. 

~ I liked the characters, lots of actions, lots of suspense! 

~  Was on the edge of my seat a lot of the time. I just couldn't stop reading once I got started.

Zom-B by Darren Shan (YA SFF SHA)

When the news starts reporting a zombie outbreak in Ireland, B's father thinks it's a hoax-but even if it isn't, the two of them joke, it's only the Irish, right? That is, until zombies actually attack the school. B is forced on a mad dash through the serpentine corridors of high school, making allegiances with anyone with enough gall to fight off their pursuers. But when they come face-to-face with the ravenous, oozing corpses, all bets are off. There are no friends. No allies. Just whatever it takes to survive.

~ Prepare yourself for a couple of complete surprises and a really good cliff hanger.

~ It's an exciting, entertaining, fast read that is well suited to zombie fans

~ I would recommend to anyone who loves zombies and guts, or anyone who wants a quick read with some action.

**Review tidbits from the LION online catalog and from Amazon.com**

New Books for October ~ Part 7

Provides a comprehensive guide for teenagers to saving, spending, and earning money, and includes information on starting a business, preparing for interviews, opening a bank account, and purchasing car and property insurance.

Greenwich Village, 1970s: Rainey Royal, fourteen years old, talented, and troubled, lives in a once-elegant, now decaying brownstone with her father, a jazz musician with a cultish personality. Her mother has abandoned the family, and Rainey fends off advances from her father's best friend while trying desperately to nurture her own creative drives and build a substitute family. She's a rebel, even a criminal, but she's also deeply vulnerable, fighting to figure out how to put back in place the boundaries her life has knocked down, and more than that, struggling to learn how to be an artist and a person in a broken world. Rainey Royal is told in 14 narratives of scarred and aching beauty that build into a fiercely powerful novel: the harrowing and ultimately affirming story of a young artist.

Fourteen-year-old Mateo and other Caribbean islanders face discrimination, segregation, and harsh working conditions when American recruiters lure them to the Panamanian rain forest in 1906 to build the great canal.

Seven super fans have won the trip of a lifetime to meet the master of horror, legendary film director Justin Blake. But things quickly go from delightfully dark to dangerously deadly, when Ivy, Parker, Shayla, Natalie, Frankie, and Garth find themselves trapped in an abandoned amusement park. To earn a ticket out, they must face their darkest demons one ride at a time...

Miles's little brother Teddy is missing. The police believe he drowned at the beach-the very same day Miles had his first schizophrenic episode. But Miles knows better-Teddy is alive. Kidnapped. There was even a witness! Fueled by guilt, Miles sets off to rescue Teddy. There is so much to overcome, though. The endless pills he must take. The girl who steals his heart and plays with it. The black crows that follow him. As seen through Miles's distorted perception, his world closes around him as he pushes to keep it open. What you think you know about his world is actually a blur of gray, though, and the sharp focus of reality proves startling. 

First new books of 2013 ~ Part 1

Deadly Little Lessons by Laurie Stolarz

Finishing her junior year of high school, Camelia leaves family and boyfriend drama behind to attend a summer arts program in Rhode Island, where she must use her power of psychometry to help find a missing girl.

 Speechless by Hannah Harrington

Everyone knows that Chelsea Knot can't keep a secret-until now, because the last secret she shared turned her into a social outcast--and nearly got someone killed; so now Chelsea has taken a vow of silence and if she thinks keeping secrets is hard, not speaking up when she's ignored, ridiculed and even attacked is worse.

(BTW: the cover of this book is way cool in person!  It's a pretty kind of pearl and the letters of the title are raised.  Neat!)

Hades by Alexandra Adornetto

(Sequel to Halo)

Even the love of her boyfriend, Xavier Woods, and her archangel siblings, Gabriel and Ivy, can't keep the angel Bethany Church from being tricked into a motorcycle ride that ends up in Hell. There, Jake Thorn bargains for Beth's release back to Earth. But what he asks of her will destroy her, and quite possibly her loved ones as well.

 Kiss Me Again by Rachel Vail

Having once shared a kiss with her best friend's boyfriend, Kevin, fourteen-year-old Charlie finds life even more awkward when their parents marry, making Kevin, still her crush, now her stepbrother.

 Beyond by Graham McNamee

Everyone thinks seventeen-year-old Jane has attempted suicide more than once, but Jane knows the truth: her shadow is trying to kill her.