As far as holidays go, Halloween easily has the strongest literary game. Oh, Thanksgiving brings cookbooks, sure, and we’ll all revisit A Christmas Carol and How the Grinch Stole Christmas come December, but Halloween celebrates an entire genre of work. While we here at The Writer read horror all year long, we admit there’s something particularly special about cracking the spine of a chilling new novel as we near All Hallows’ Eve. Listed in chronological order, here are our picks for the classic horror books you should be reading (or re-reading) this fall.
Complete Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe
We’re kicking things off with the OG master of the macabre, Edgar Allan Poe. Though the author died in 1849, his works deal with themes that still terrify us today: Illness. Being buried alive. Losing our loved ones long before their time. And, sure, gloomy talking ravens (non-talking birds in the house are unpleasant enough as it is). If you only have time for one Poe story this season, we recommend “The Fall of the House of Usher” to get you started.
