New Horror Books to Help You Kick Off Spooky Season This September

Clay McLeod Chapman, author of Ghost Eaters and Wake Up and Open Your Eyes, is back with a super creepy selection of short stories. If you’ve enjoyed this author’s novels, you will love this collection. Chapman returns to some of the themes he’s known for exploring, such as anxiety around parenthood and American politics. But these takes are fresh, and the horror gets even weirder and more unnerving. That’s really saying something, if you’re familiar with this author’s work!

When a human crew heads to Mars to begin setting up the first colony, they’re surprised to discover their base has been destroyed. One of the bots they sent to set up the colony is missing. The ones left behind have strange stories to tell. Now the bots must be interrogated to determine what happened and what kind of threat is still out there.

You might know Alma Katsu for her historical horror novels, but this time, the author has set her story in contemporary times. The Berisha family has always been told they are “blessed.” The wealthy family runs one of the largest import-export companies in the world, and while their rivals suffer tragedies, nothing ever seems to touch the Berishas. But what happens with the blessing turns out to be a curse, and the family’s carefully structured system begins to fall apart?

Here’s another must-read short story collection coming out this month. Samanta Schweblin, three-time Booker finalist and author of Fever Dream, is giving us six new short stories that are just the kind of wild, unnerving, mind-bending content you would expect from this author. These chilling stories blend magical realism and psychological horror to explore guilt, grief, family trauma, shattered relationships, and more.

This new middle grade novel from Aly Russell, author of It Came From the Trees, follows Mystery James, a 13-year-old girl born in a cemetery and raised in a funeral home. When her family’s funeral home is in danger of being shut down and an important family heirloom goes missing, Mystery James decides it’s up to her to save the family business and find the missing necklace. She’ll do it even if it means coming face-to-face with a sleep paralysis demon, a half-vampire/half-ghost, and even more ghastly things.

From the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Queen of Teeth comes a frightening collection of 13 short stories described as “coming-of-rage” horror. These stories focus on young adults facing the horrors of growing up and self-discovery while also battling evil monsters, angry cops, and murderous ghosts. This collection also includes the novella Benny Rose, the Cannibal King.

What would you say if invited to an all-expenses-paid trip to a luxury wellness resort? If you’re Ariana, a teenage volleyball prodigy dealing with a serious sports injury and a chilly New York winter, you say heck yes. At first, The Dream Resort seems like, well, a dream come true. But then lifestyle guru Juniper Moon introduces some of her more experimental spa treatments. When people start dying, Ariana worries she won’t leave the resort alive.

Did you watch The Thing and think, “I wish this were scarier and sexier?” Then Sarah Gailey’s Spread Me is for you. At a remote research outpost in the middle of the desert, Kinsey and her crew discover a mysterious specimen buried deep in the sand. They do what any scientists would do in this situation and bring the specimen back to their research facility to examine it. But the longer it stays with them, the stranger everyone begins to feel. Strange desires come to the surface, too.

Here’s a new horror novel that will give you serious Midsommar vibes. Sadie might seem like your average 29-year-old. But 17 years ago, she was known as Sabrina, and she witnessed her best friend get brutally murdered. Ever since then, she’s had strange visions and hears a man’s voice in her head. Her therapist tells her these are just symptoms of her PTSD, but when Sadie takes a trip to a cabin in the woods with her boyfriend, the visions and the voices get louder and harder to ignore.

At the end of the month, we’re getting the third novella in T. Kingfisher’s Sworn Soldier series. This story sees Alex Easton heading to America to explore an abandoned West Virginian coal mine that’s said to be haunted. While Alex would rather not trek to America, their old friend Dr. Denton has asked for Alex’s help, and Alex cannot say no. Dr. Denton’s cousin has gone missing, and Alex is the only person who can explore the mysterious coal mine to find out what happened there.