BY: Nyla Stanford
Published 3 hours ago
Spooky season has arrived! And while some of us prefer the physical frights of the haunted houses or the visual depictions of gore on television, others like the quiet suspense of flipping through a book.
We devised a list of the best chilling books to grab, but this isn’t a straight party. Queer readers deserve to get spooked too (and not just with the rattling American administration). This horror book list is to oblige the readers who want to see themselves in the characters they become attached to, even if they are terrifying blood-sucking vampires. So, we’ve come up with the best queer horror books to read this October season that will make you want to keep the lights on. Let’s dive in!
1. “Hell Followed With Us” by Andrew Joseph White
White’s debut book follows a teenage transgender boy, Benji, who’s running from the cult that raised him. The cult is desperately trying to get him back because he’s infected with the bioweapon that will continue to help them bring Armageddon and decimate the remaining population. Thankfully, he’d taken refuge with the Acheson LGBTQ+ Center. However, the center’s leader, Nick, has conditions for managing Benji’s powers and protecting the center that are more about his own impure intentions.
2. “Wilder Girls” by Rory Power
Young sapphic love rules this horror book by Power. The plot is set at Raxter School for Girls, an island boarding school in quarantine to contain an infection spreading across the island. Known as “The Tox,” it has taken the teachers, students, and eventually locked them away from the rest of the world. The main protagonist, Hetty, attempts to cope with the changes until someone special, Byatt, goes missing. Hetty decides to break quarantine and take her chance in the woods, only to be met with the actual destruction from The Tox on the outside world.
3. “Carmilla” by J. Sheridan Le Fanu
There is nothing as horrifically delicious as discovering that the original vampire story is actually queer. “Carmilla” predates Dracula by 26 years, written in 1872. Fanu depicts a lonely woman, Laura, isolated in a castle with only her father for company. That is, until a beautiful and mysterious woman, Carmilla, arrives. The erotic connection between the two women, once steamy and inescapable, slowly devolves into a volatile obsession. Only this obsession leaves Laura with inexplicable nightmares and with a continuous feeling of weakness.
4. “Our Wives Under the Sea” by Julia Armfield
Not all horror has to be outright. Sometimes the suspense is built in the development of the characters and what they mean to the reader, and that’s precisely what Armfield did with “Our Wives Under the Sea.” The story centers on a married couple, Miri and Leah. Leah is a marine biologist who returns from deep-sea exploration, only for it to go horribly wrong. Miri can’t help but notice a change in Leah’s behavior when she’s back home, and the troubling changes begin to panic Miri. She knows her wife is not the person she used to be. This story showcases a dual narrative of torment from both wives’ perspectives.
5. “Her Body and Other Parties: Stories” by Carmen Maria Machado
Maybe a whole novel isn’t the way you want to take in your queer horror, but in short, disturbing bites. Machado makes that possible with her horror short story collection, offering eight stories (most of which are queer) to provide a variety of ways to shock the reader. She blurs the lines between psychological thriller, fantasy, gore, and horror to recount numerous ways in which life itself delivers the most unsettling experiences.
6. “Camp Damascus” by Chuck Tingle
Tingle uses the life experiences of a queer person to bring realistic horror to the forefront. Set in a small, extremely religious town with a gay conversion camp that has a 100% success rate, the readers follow Rose. She loves her city and faith, but begins to experience strange occurrences such as vomiting flies and horrifying imagery when any hint of same-sex attraction perturbs her. While beginning to lose touch with reality and what is real or not real memories, Rose becomes tethered to the conversion camp and what it really did to her.
Which books are you excited to read? Do you have any other queer horror books you’ve taken a bite out of? Comment Below!
