From not-so-eerie early years adventures to spine-tingling tales for young adults and adults alike, our collection offers a hauntingly good time, just in time for spooky season. Read if you dare!
Happy Halloweenie by Katie Vernon
A loveable hot dog named Weenie gets dressed up for Halloween in this fun and festive board book that will have little ones laughing out loud. Ages 0-5.
I Want To Eat Your Books by Karin Lefranc and Tyler Parker
Hide your textbooks and fairy tales because the little zombie is hungry and doesn't discriminate between genres. Ages 3-6.
The Stars Did Wander Darkling by Colin Meloy
Maybe Archie Coomes has been watching too many horror movies. Suddenly, the most ordinary things have taken on a sinister edge. An ancient, long-buried evil has been unleashed upon the community, and it's up to the kids to stop it before it's too late... Ages 8-12.
House of Ash and Bone by Joel Sutherland
In this YA horror debut by Canadian author (and public librarian) Joel Sutherland, teenager Josephine moves to a new house in Vermont with her family. This book features a haunted house and ghosts and is a supernatural thriller that anyone who read Sutherland's Haunted Canada series will enjoy. Ages 9-12.
It Found Us by Lindsay Currie
Twelve-year-old Hazel Woods, a budding sleuth, secretly joins her brother’s nocturnal cemetery hide-and-seek game to investigate its rumoured haunting. When the game ends, she discovers her brother's best friend, Everett, has mysteriously vanished. Hazel must unravel the eerie disappearance that left him missing without a trace. Ages 8-13.
The Clackity by Lora Senf
To rescue her aunt from the ghost of a serial killer, twelve-year-old Evie Von Rathe embarks on a journey into a strange world filled with hungry witches, ghosts, and a story thief, all while trying to fulfill her deal with the Clackity. Ages 10-12.
Together We Rot by Skyla Arndt
Elwood, who grew up in a cult, joins forces with Wil, whose mother has been missing for over a year. Elwood needs to escape, and Wil needs answers. Creepy but with likeable main characters, this is a great YA horror read for the spooky season. Ages 12+.
She is a Haunting by Trang Thanh Tran
This supernatural horror debut tackles issues like sexuality and the brutality of French colonialism in Vietnam. Jade travels to Vietnam to spend time with her estranged father. But the old French colonial home the family is fixing up has designs on making the reunion of the Nguyen family anything but smooth. Ages 13+.
What Stalks Among Us by Sarah Hollowell
Nothing is creepier than corn fields, as we know from the Stephen King classic short story and subsequent horror series, Children of the Corn. In this YA novel, best friends Sadie and Logan discover a massive corn maze and check it out, getting trapped in the process. Filled with pop culture references, body horror, and thoughtful discussions of myriad social issues, this psychological thriller is sure to excite this Halloween. Ages 13+.
I Feed Her To The Beast And The Beast Is Me by Jamison Shea
Laure Mesny, a black student at the Ballet Academy of Paris, is constantly passed over for centre-stage roles, in favour of white students. She makes a deal with a devil, with violent and bloody consequences. Ages 14+.
Delicious Monsters by Liselle Sambury
Told via two timelines ten years apart, two teenagers attempt to uncover the secrets of a secluded mansion in northern Ontario. Daisy sees dead people and moves to the mansion with her mother from Toronto. Years later, Brittney features the mansion on her web series to expose what happened to Daisy a decade before. Ages 14+.
This Delicious Death by Kayla Cottingham
Ex-zombies attend a music festival in the desert to celebrate their graduation and their being cured from the Hollowing, turning them into flesh-eating monsters. However, things go horribly wrong at the festival, with visceral gore and bloody horror to follow. Ages 14+.
The Hills of Estrella Roja by Ashley Robin Franklin and Nakata Whittle
This debut graphic novel features Marisol, who returns to Estrella Roja after her grandmother’s death, and Kat, a paranormal investigator. The two of them investigate the mysterious lights above the hills every night. While spooky, this graphic novel is not terrifying, making it a nice introduction to horror novel season. Ages 14+.
Gallows Hill by Darcy Coates
The Hull family's generations-old ownership of Gallows Hill Winery turns sinister when Mr. and Mrs. Hull meet a sudden demise. Their daughter, Margot, inherits the family business but is repelled by its grim history and cursed location. Now, she must confront the dark secrets lurking beneath the vineyards as she grapples with the winery's dark legacy.
The Children On the Hill by Jennifer McMahon
In 1978, the acclaimed psychiatrist Dr. Helen Hildreth leads a tranquil life in Vermont while caring for her grandchildren, Vi and Eric. But her world is upended when she takes in a peculiar child, Iris, whose behaviour is far from ordinary. In 2019, podcast host Lizzy Shelley travels to Vermont to investigate a monster sighting and a girl's abduction, driven by her conviction that monsters are real — and one of them is her own sister.
