4 Novels to Read if You’ve Been Loving the Horror Movie Renaissance
For the past several years, horror movies have been dominating the conversation. Weapons and Sinners both won Oscars, and Obsession recently crossed the $500 million global box office threshold to become the highest grossing original film of the 2020s. While Hollywood continues to churn out sequels and cling to worn out franchises, it feels like the horror genre is one of the few spaces that still embraces innovation and risk-taking. It’s hard to ignore that a low-budget horror movie outperformed a Star Wars film and the new Pixar.
Meanwhile, the literary horror community has been growing and thriving. The 2026 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction went to Daniel Kraus’s groundbreaking novel Angel Down. The story blends horror with historical fiction to explore what drives humans to wage war. The last time a horror novel won the Pulitzer was Cormac McCarthy’s The Road in 2007. At the time, we were in the middle of the Iraq War and staring down the barrel of a financial crisis.
Why would anyone want to fill their heads with disturbing content when the world is already so terrifying? It’s a question I’m often asked as a reader, writer, and lover of the genre, especially now: inflation rates continue to climb while wages stagnate, fascism is on the rise, and we’re on the cusp of climate disaster.
Despite this, many people turn to the horror genre for relief. Few things are more anxiety-inducing than knowing something is wrong, but not knowing how to fix it, or when it will end. For many of us, this kind of terror has become an ambient part of our existence. But stories always have a beginning, a middle, and an end. If you’ve never immersed yourself in subversive fiction, it might sound counterintuitive, but horror offers catharsis. It lets us experience the worst things imaginable and face them head on. When you look at it like fighting fire with fire, it’s no wonder that horror media has been on the rise.If you’ve been loving the horror movie renaissance and you’re interested in dipping your toe in the deep, dark waters of horror literature, consider these recommendations based on your recent favorites.
If you liked Backrooms:
The internet is obsessed with liminal spaces–eerie hallways filled with fluorescent lighting, abandoned office furniture, empty rooms with an echo of nostalgia, etc. Rather than outright terrify, this kind of imagery is designed to unsettle you. A Short Stay in Hell tells the story of a man who finds himself sent to hell, but it’s nothing like he imagined. Hell is an enormous library, filled with books of every possible combination of letters and characters that could ever exist. The only way out is to find the book that tells his life story. Most of the books are gibberish. If he ever finds his life story, it might be told from the perspective of his toenail. It’s not infinite, but it might as well be. If giant unending spaces and existential dread are your thing, look no further.
If you liked Weapons:
If you liked Obsession:
If you want to read a book before it becomes the next big horror movie:
Discover the Author
Years ago, she lost her brother. Now the woods have taken another.
From a powerful new voice, a story that’s at once a haunting southern gothic and a satisfying page-turner, perfect for fans of Stephen King and Liz Moore alike.
“Monstrously satisfying.” ―Nat Cassidy, author of When the Wolf Comes Home
“Beautifully written, with a terrifying secret at its heart.” ―Elizabeth Hand, author of A Haunting on the Hill
Fifteen years ago, Audrey Figg’s little brother, Benny, vanished on a family vacation to Devil’s Den state park, a day that split her life in two. Now, Audrey is a park ranger in the very same woods with expertise in wilderness search and rescue. Audrey has found a rhythm to her days: training new rangers, tending to injured hikers, protecting the backcountry, and still, searching.
When a little girl, Ivy, suddenly goes missing on the trails, Audrey can’t help but notice the similarities to her own brother’s case. As Audrey widens the scope of her search, she begins to believe Ivy wasn’t merely lost; it looks like she was taken by something—and maybe Benny was too. Yet the closer Audrey comes to answers, the more old memories push to the surface. Audrey is haunted not only by her brother’s loss, but a terrible secret from that day. A secret she has never shared with anyone.
Utterly absorbing and disquieting, In the Woods They Wait is an enthralling page-turner, one that asks how far you would go for a sense of closure—and what would you be willing to face to get it.
