Eight books that will scare you senseless

If you like tales that terrify then look no further. But if one scary story simply isn’t enough at this time of year as the night draws in, then we’d recommend any one of the following bloodcurdling books – all guaranteed to have you cowering under your duvet.

A governess lands a job in an English country house, taking charge of two oddly quiet orphaned children, Miles and Flora. She begins to see a strange man and woman wandering around the estate and, learning from the housekeeper that the previous governess and her lover died, believes them to be ghosts. With growing horror she becomes convinced that the two children are secretly aware of the presence of these phantoms, who she begins to suspect want possession of her young wards. In his chilling novella Henry James creates a pervading and unsettling sense of ambiguity and suspense: are these ghosts a genuine threat to the children, or do the apparitions exist only in the mind of the governess?

2. Carrie by Stephen King

Stephen King’s Carrie is a high school misfit, bullied by her classmates and sheltered by a Christian fundamentalist mother, who discovers a hidden talent: she can move things with her mind. When pupils play a cruel prank, pouring pig's blood over her at the school prom, Carrie is pushed over the edge and uses her newly found powers to exact revenge on her tormentors. She electrocutes pupils and teachers, starts a fire that destroys the school with everyone trapped inside, and unleashes a wave of destruction on the rest of the small town – before finally turning on her own mother. King’s first published novel offers teen angst, telekinetic terror, and lots and lots of blood.

3. The Woman in Black by Susan Hill

In this Gothic ghost story, Arthur Kipps is sent to Eel Marsh House to settle the affairs of a Mrs Alice Drablow. At her funeral he is the only person to spot a sinister woman dressed all in black. During his stay at the house, which is cut off from the mainland at high tide, Arthur is further haunted by strange cries and things that go bump in the night; a locked door is flung open to reveal a nursery filled with old toys and an empty rocking chair in motion. Eventually, a local landowner reveals to the terrified Kipps that every time someone sees the figure – the ghost of Mrs Drablow’s sister – a child dies in a horrific accident. Years later, Arthur’s sees the woman in black once again. Will his own son be safe?

In Kim Newman’s alternate history, Queen Victoria has married the Romanian Prince infamously known as Count Dracula. It’s not long before being “undead” is highly fashionable and various members of the elite are, or are aspiring to be, vampires. The novel follows French bloodsucker Geneviève Dieudonné and Charles Beauregard of the Diogenes Club as they strive to solve the mystery of Jack the Ripper. It’s gory and gruesome but witty to boot, combining classic horror with romance, politics, and a rich array of historical and fictional characters, from Oscar Wilde to Dr Jekyll.

5. The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell

Dummy boards or “silent companions” were life-size, wooden depictions of men, women and children, historically placed around the home for the purpose of amusement and trickery. In Purcell’s Victorian ghost story, Elsie – newly widowed and pregnant – is sent to her late husband's crumbling country estate, The Bridge. Inside her new home is a locked door, behind which the protagonist discovers an ancient diary and a silent companion that bears a striking resemblance to Elsie herself... An isolated, gothic house with eerie wooden figures that move of their own free will? Guaranteed goosebumps.

6. Fledgling by Octavia E. Butler

In her final novel, renowned science fiction author Octavia E. Butler turns to horror as she tells the story of Shori, a young girl who wakes in a pitch-black cave, badly injured and hungry, to discover she's a vampire. Shori, who is black, struggles to gain control of her life in the face of discrimination from other, pure members of her species: Butler’s chilling novel doubles as a commentary on racism, bigotry, otherness, and belonging.

7. Haunted by Chuck Palahnuik

Haunted is a novel about 17 aspiring writers locked away in an unusual, secretive writer’s retreat, which acts as a framework for their 23 short stories. Shut away in a theatre, the writers are told they have three months to each produce a magnum opus, a challenge which soon leads them to descend into a spiral of self-harm and self-sabotage – all in the quest for the perfect story. Palahnuik says his “goal was to write a new form of horror story, something based on the ordinary world, without supernatural monsters or magic.” Haunted contains horrifying, stomach-flipping tales including “Guts”, reputably the most disturbing short story ever written. When Palahniuk read it in public, it caused several members of the audience to faint.

8. The Case of Charles Dexter Ward by H. P. Lovecraft

It is 1928 and Charles Dexter Ward has been certified insane and confined to a mental hospital near Rhode Island. He’s also exhibiting inexplicable physiological changes: disturbed heartbeat and breathing, minimal digestion, and the sudden visage of someone far beyond his 26 years. Three hours after a visit from Charles’s family physician, Dr. Willett, the patient is discovered missing – without a clue to how he escaped. Does the answer lie in Charles’s obsession with his distant ancestor, Joseph Curwen, an alleged alchemist and necromancer? Dr. Willett embarks on a quest to find out, with horrifying results… Stephen King describes Lovecraft as “The twentieth century's greatest practitioner of the classic horror tale.” Not a bad recommendation.