Ginger - I posted some of my favorites back in 2012. Here they are again with some additions!
For Adults:
The Halloween Tree - Ray Bradbury
Something Wicked This Way Comes - Ray Bradbury
Dracula - Bram Stoker
Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow - Washington Irving (check out some of his other tales, as well)
The Turn of The Screw - Henry James
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - Robert Louis Stevenson
The Invisible Man - H.G. Wells
The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde (not really Halloween, but creepy)
Rosemary's Baby - Ira Levin (it takes a while to get into this one, but worth it in the end)
The Phantom of the Opera - Gaston Leroux
Ghost Story - Peter Straub (one of my dad's favorites)
The Haunting of Hill House - Shirley Jackson (of The Lottery fame)
I Am Legend - Richard Matheson (far superior and very different from the movie of the same name)
The Exorcist - William Peter Blatty (while a truly horrifying, i.e., "awesome" movie, I am still partial to the book)
The Historian - Elizabeth Kostova (vampire novel)
Just about anything by Edgar Allan Poe - Fall of the House of Usher, Tell-Tale Heart, etc. (really, any Halloween fan should have a copy of his "complete" works - you can't go wrong)
Salem's Lot - Stephen King (most of his novels could make this list, but I often hate his endings...this one is a classic if you like Vampires)
Let the Right One In - John Ajvide Lindqvist (vampires)
The Witches of Eastwick – John Updike
A Discovery of Witches – Deborah Harkness
The Witching Hour (Lives of the Mayfair Witches) – Anne Rice
Interview with the Vampire, etc. - Anne Rice
For Kids - We have MANY since my boys LOVE Halloween, but our favorites are:
Ten Timid Ghosts - Jennifer O'Connell (I can recite this from memory)
Room on the Broom - Julia Donaldson
Scary, Scary Halloween - Eve Bunting (wonderful twist at the end)
Five Little Pumpkins - Dan Yaccarino
Goodnight Goon: A Petrifying Parody - Michael Rex
Ghosts in the House - Kazuno Kohara
Can You See What I See: On A Scary Night - Walter Wick (My boys LOVE all of his books - basically an advanced Eye Spy with beautiful detailed pictures...the adults love it too. I think this one is my all time favorite)
Enjoy!
