This Halloween, Enjoy Spine-Chilling Reading from the Comfort of Your Armchair
Halloween is approaching! Today, we share a selection of books that will make the spooky season a treat for you—from the safety of your living room.
If you like a creepy book with much imagination, Shadows in the Asylum by D.A. Stern is a blend of chills and mystery. It’s an addictive puzzle that comes together at a perfect pace, and the picture doesn’t reveal itself until the very end.
If you want to know more about the book, check out this blog post by Ryan Jacobson. Ryan loves good horror stories, such as those found in Monsters of the Midwest by Jessica Freeburg and Natalie Fowler. We know you will too! Ryan has penned a few Halloween ghost story books himself: Ghostly Tales of Michigan and Ghostly Tales of Wisconsin. He had so much fun that he also wrote a collection of stories for his home state of Minnesota. In this blog post, New House Nightmare, he shares a story from his Minnesota Hauntings book with us.
Though the books in our Ghostly Tales series are typically written for grown-ups, Ryan also thinks they can be appropriate for young readers—at least for those interested in things that go bump in the night. If your children are fascinated with the frightful, AdventureKEEN’s horror offerings make excellent October titles for teens.
Ghostly Tales of Iowa, by Ruth D. Hein and Vicky L. Hinsenbrock, is a collection of 24 chilling stories about encounters with the supernatural in Iowa. With a mysterious ghost that communicates by knocking, the spirit of a witch that tries to lure children into the basement of an abandoned home, a love triangle that ended with three tragic deaths, and one tormented ghost—Iowa is one of the most haunted states in America. Dive into the most surprising tales from the Hawkeye State!
Ghostly Tales of Mississippi, by Jeff Duke, is a collection of 14 terrifying accounts from the Magnolia State. Find out about a graveyard where the dead do anything but rest peacefully, a haunted bridge that was the site of unspeakable violence, the ghost of an ancient witch who roams the dark woods, and much more!
Here are suggestions from our America’s Haunted Road Trips series for more hair-raising reading. America’s Haunted Road Trip is a one-of-a-kind series of haunted travel guides. Each book profiles 30-100 haunted places that are open to the public. From inns and museums to cemeteries and theaters, the author visits each site, interviewing people who live and work there. Books also include travel instructions, maps, and an appendix of 50 more places the reader can visit.
Ghosthunting Colorado, by Kailyn Lamb, is home to ghostly hotels, city parks, and some of the best mountain viewing. The eyes of paranormal enthusiasts have long been on the Centennial State due to the fame that Stephen King’s The Shining brought to the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park. The Stanley, however, is not the only haunted hotel in Colorado. Multiple inns and hotels (some of them brothels) in Denver alone have histories as sites of deaths that make their victims decide to stay in their beloved rooms forever.
In Ghosthunting Ohio, author John B. Kachuba bravely visits more than 25 haunted places in Ohio to give readers firsthand frights. For readers who are curious―and courageous―enough to “hunt” on their own, maps and travel information are provided for every haunted location.
Ghosthunting Oregon takes readers on a guided tour of some of the Beaver State’s most haunted historic locations. Local author Donna Stewart researched each area thoroughly before visiting, digging up clues for the paranormal aspect of each site. Stewart takes readers to some of the spookiest haunts across the state, including Oaks Park in Portland, where visitors have reported seeing a ghostly apparition of a child in a 1920s- or 1930s-style dress; the O’Kane Building in central Oregon, where people have reported seeing “ghostly smoke” and strange lights; and Pioneer Park in Pendleton, where some have reported seeing apparitions and hearing voices.
San Antonio has a rich haunted history, settled by Spanish explorers more than three centuries ago. Ghosthunting San Antonio, Austin, and the Texas Hill Country, by local author Michael O. Varhola, covers 30 haunted locations in and around the cities of San Antonio and Austin and throughout the region known as the Texas Hill Country.
Ghosthunting Illinois takes readers searching for spirits in the Land of Lincoln! Lock the doors, draw the curtains, and light a candle as you join author John B. Kachuba on a guided tour of Illinois’s most terrifyingly haunted places.
I like to prepare for Halloween with recipes from the dearly departed. Mary Ann Winkowski, the original ghost whisperer, offers more than 100 recipes in her book Beyond Delicious: The Ghost Whisperer’s Cookbook: More than 100 recipes from the Dearly Departed.
Mary Ann Winkowski was one of the inspirations behind—and a consultant for—the CBS hit television show Ghost Whisperer. Over the course of her work as a paranormal investigator, Mary Ann’s reputation has spread. She has appeared on numerous TV and radio news programs and has spoken at countless lectures.
People have always been afraid of things they don’t know much about. If we don’t see or understand something, we often make up stories about it. This is common in our nocturnal critters, such as bats. If you are interested in how essential bats are, check out Bat Basics by Karen Krebbs. We need bats to eat mosquitoes, pollinate plants, and more. Bat Basics helps separate fact from fiction in a fascinating, fun guide that includes a section on natural history, a field guide, and interactive activities.
Finally, the name Halloween comes from the fact that November 1st is All Saints Day; therefore, October 31st was the “hallowed eve” before the holiday.
If you like creepy books with a blend of chills and mystery, we have just what you need. Check out our shop, and search by state for all our ghostly tales. For more stories about all of our titles, sign up for our newsletter now!
