HWA's Horror Reading List

Members of the Horror Writer's Association picked their 40 favorite horror books in 1996.  There is no ranking in the list.

	Algernon Blackwood. Best Ghost stories of Algernon Blackwood Great stories by foremost British 20th-century supernaturalist.
	William Peter Blatty. The Exorcist A powerful presence has taken possession of the 12-year-old daughter of a film star. The ensuing battle between a doubt-ridden priest and the unspeakable horror within the girl is a classic war of good versus evil.
	Ray Bradbury. Something Wicked This Way Comes Three hours after midnight, one week before Halloween, Cooger and Dark's Pandemonium Shadow Show rolls into Green Town, Illinois. A carnival like no other, it feeds on the dreams and weaknesses of those drawn to its eerie attractions, destroying every life touched by its strange and sinister mystery. Two boys--best friends Will Halloway and Jim Nightshade--are about to learn the secret of its smoke, mazes and mirrors as they confront a nightmarish evil that will change their lives forever.
	Poppy Z. Brite. Lost Souls In Missing Mile, North Carolina, in search of supple young flesh and thirsting for blood, three beautiful vampires--Molochai, Twig, and Zillah--follow vampires Nothing and Ann on a mad, illicit road trip south to New Orleans.
	Ramsey Campbell. The Hungry Moon Located on the moors of northern England, the town of Moonwell has kept Druid ritual alive into the late 20th century. American right-wing evangelist Godwin Mann and his fanatical followers are intent upon changing that. As luck would have it, Mann and his Christian zealots awaken an ancient Druid god. Death and destruction follow with the people of Moonwell suffering the most.
	Tananarive Due. The Between A features writer and columnist for the Miami Herald electrifies the literary world with her brilliant first novel. Hilton's grandmother drowned trying to save his life. Thirty years later, he's beginning to suspect that he was never meant to survive the accident--and that dark forces are working to rectify that mistake.
	Dennis Etchison. Darklands
	Charles L Grant. Raven
	Nancy Holder. Dead in the Water
	Shirley Jackson. The Haunting of Hill House The four visitors at Hill House-- some there for knowledge, others for adventure-- are unaware that the old mansion will soon choose one of them to make its own.
	Shirley Jackson. The Lottery and Other Stories "The Lottery" will remain with you forever. Jackson reveals the hidden evils of the human mind in this compelling collection.
	Henry James. Turn of the Screw A neurotic governess, believing that the two children in her care are being haunted by malevolent ghosts, seeks to exorcize them.
	The Ghost Stories of M.R. James
	K.W. Jeter. Dr. Adder
	Franz Kafka. The Metamorphosis and Other Stories As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect. So begins Kafka's The Metamorphosis, the most subtly disturbing story in modern literature.
	Stephen King. Pet Sematary Dr. Louis Creed and his wife Rachel chose rural Maine to settle their family and bring up their children. It was a better place than smog-covered Chicago--or so they thought. But that was before Louis became acquainted with the old pet burial ground located in the backwoods of the quiet community of Ludlow.
	Stephen King. The Shining Past horrors and evil lurk in Colorado's Overlook Hotel, threatening winter season caretakers Jack Torrance, his wife Wendy, and their young son, Danny. Gifted with "the shining", a clairvoyant Danny must battle the darkest evil in the remote hotel in an attempt to save his family from its influence.
	Stephen King. The Stand A classic study of the battle between good and evil in a future world, where virtually the entire planet's population has been wiped out by a deadly flu virus--accidentally unleashed by a Defense Department accident.
	Kathe Koja. Skin Eager to grow and transform, Bibi, a guerrilla performance artist, begins ritual cuttings and scarrings of her own body, and not even her metal sculptor friend, Tess, can stop her.
	Tanith Lee. Dark Dance
	Fritz Leiber. Conjure Wife
	Ira Levin. Rosemary's Baby Rosemary and Guy Woodhouse, an ordinary young couple, settle into a New York City apartment, unaware that the elderly neighbors and their bizarre group of friends have taken a disturbing interest in them. But by the time Rosemary discovers the horrifying truth, it may be far too late!
	Thomas Ligotti. Songs of a Dead Dreamer
	Richard Lortz. Lovers Living, Lovers Dead
	H.P. Lovecraft. The Dunwich Horror and Others
	H.P. Lovecraft. At the Mountains of Madness
	Arthur Machen. The Hill of Dreams
	Arthur Machen. Tales of Horror and the Supernatural
	Elizabeth Massie. Sineater The sineater is a dark figure in the night, condemned to live alone in the woods. He devours food from the dead to absorb their sins into his own soul. To look upon the face of the sineater is to see the face of evil. But in a small town, the sineater has a family of his own. With the violated taboo comes a rash of horrifying events. But does the evil emanate from the sineater or from an even darker force? eBook.
	Richard Matheson. I Am Legend
	Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. Relic A female graduate student and an FBI agent trace a series of brutal murders in New York's Museum of Natural History to artifacts shipped to the museum from an ill-fated expedition.
	Mary Shelley. Frankenstein A monster assembled by a scientist from parts of dead bodies develops a mind of his own as he learns to loathe himself and hate his creator. Includes illustrated notes throughout the text explaining the historical background of the story.
	John Skipp and Craig Spector. Book of the Dead
	Michael Slade. Ghoul The bodies were all the same--stripped, drained of blood, and heartless.
	S.P. Somtow. Vampire Junction
	Robert Louis Stevenson. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde In Stevenson's famous supernatural story of good versus evil, meet the well-intentioned, wealthy physician Dr. Jeckyll who, through the use of drugs, unleashes the dark side of his nature, the hideous Mr. Hyde.
	Bram Stoker. Dracula Nosferatu, vrolok, demon--for centuries he has ruled armies of wolves, hordes of rats, legions of the undead. Six people have faced his horror--and lived. And now these mortals dare to hunt him, dare to risk their lives and souls--to challenge the evil of Dracula.
	Theodore Sturgeon. Some of Your Blood
	Thomas Tessier. Phantom
	Andrew Vachss. Sacrifice What--or who--could turn a gifted little boy into a murderous thing that calls itself "Satan's Child"? In search of an answer, Burke travels from a festering welfare hotel to a neat frame house where a voodoo priestess presides over a congregation of assassins.