The Haunted Stacks

We recently had people list out their favourite top 5 horror and sci-fi books. I weighted the scores (someone’s top favourite gets 5 points, 2nd favourite gets 4 points, 3rd favourite gets 3 points..) and now we have some recommendations for you.

The horrors

Winner and king, loved best by the most:

Monstrilio by Gerardo Sámano Córdova (19 points)

Beautiful, strange, lovely, queer, gorey, full of love and discovery and the most delightful writing. Lots of us had this on our top 5 of all time list and lots of us put it at the top of the list.

This follows a mother who cuts out a piece of her dead son’s lung and does folk magic to it to grow it into a creature. The creature is not the dead son, but he’s not not the dead son. Just fantastic, highly recommend, pick it up today.

Other excellent horrors as voted for by us:

2. The Lamb by Lucy Rose (14 points) – cannibalism, mother daughter relationships, isolated woods, evil Marks and Spencer advert vibes. Pretty much everyone who has read this book in our group has loved it.

3. Bunny by Mona Awad (7 points) – dark comedy on a campus with culty vibes

4. Earthlings by Sayaka Murata (7 points) – goes off the fucking deep end (compliment)

5. Carrie by Stephen King (5 points) – also has some excellent re-tellings if you’re in to that kind of thing (see: The Weight of Blood by Tiffany D Jackson)

6. House of Leaves by Mark Z Danielewski

7. It by Stephen King

8. Needful Things by Stephen King

9. Slewfoot by Brom – pristine autumnal witchy vibes

10. The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King

11. Where I End by Sophie White – fucking fantastic isolated derangement set on an Irish island, disgusting in the most visceral possible way. HORRIBLE!! Compliment.

12. You Weren’t Meant To Be Human by Andrew Joseph White – grotesque, depressing, and massively cathartic with a 10/10 ending.

13. Between Two Fires by Christopher Buehlman – every chapter a new monster or fucked up setting, each one more uniquely horrendous than the last. Made me tuck my chin all the way in to my neck constantly. Several times I had to put the book down just to frown at the wall and whisper ‘what the fuck’.

14. Fever House by Keith Rosson – propulsive action horror with the most agentic protagonists you’ll ever see. Tough lads thinking they can just shoot other worldly monstrosities and it not going well for them. The sequel also slaps.

15. Just Like Home by Sarah Gailey – haunted house vibes, or is it??

16. My Darling Dreadful Thing by Johanna van Veen – Blood on Her Tongue by the same author is also a wonderful gothic sapphic banger.

17. Tell Me I’m Worthless by Alison Rumfitt

18. The Bog Wife by Kay Chronister – we see your dark acadamia and raise you:: dark bog scholarship

19. The Dark by James Herbert

20. The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

21. When the Wolf Comes Home by Nat Cassidy – never look at Roger Rabbit the same way again

22. Boy’s Life by Robert R McCammon

23. Carmilla by Sheridan Le Fanu

24. Come Closer by Sara Gran – shits on other possession stories, this is sick as hell, and it’s like 150 pages long, you can read it in an afternoon.

25. Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz

26. Spoilt Creatues by Amy Twigg

27. Tender Is The Flesh by Augustina Bazterrica

28. The Deep by Nick Cutter

29. The Hunger by Alma Katsu

30. This is Where We Live by Kate Hardie

31. Maeve Fly by CJ Leede

32. The Collector by John Fowles

33. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

34. We Used to Live Here by Marcus Kliewer

35. You Let Me In by Camilla Bruce – this is seductive and strange and mysterious in a way I really love. It’s also really messed up. Hugely underrated in my opinion. To give you an idea of how high we still are on quality, this was a 4.5 star book for me.

36. Misery by Stephen King – the audiobook for this one is really good if you haven’t picked it up already.

37. Natural Beauty by Ling Ling Huang

38. The Auctioneer by John Samson

39. The Exorcist by William Blatty

40. The Hollow Places by T Kingfisher

41. The Reformatory by Tananarive Due – this one had me straight up weeping into my cat, so sad and so expertly done.

The sci-fis

Tied winners and joint god-queens, loved the best by the most:

The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers (9 points)

Cosy and lovely road trip in space as we challenge our assumptions about each other and ourself along the way, super interesting but also very restful. I’d really recommend the audiobook on this one as the narrator is superb

Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (9 points)

Man, I never expected to be so deeply invested in a space spider. Also kind of a road trip in space but not as happy or comfy (understatement) for the most part. Really interesting world that sucks you in. Don’t be intimidated, it is part of a series but works excellently as a stand alone.

Other excellent sci-fis as voted for by us:

3. The Echo Wife by Sarah Gailey (8 points) – this is my favourite book club discussion we’ve ever had, there is so much to think about here in such a short space of time. Absolutely fantastic, hugely recommended. There are clones in it. And clone scientists.

4. Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield (6 points) – strange and entrancing, more vibes than plot (not a criticism, it works beautifully). Sea based, if you’re in to sea.

5. Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card (5 points)

6. FEED by Mira Grant (5 points)

7. Red Dwarf by Grant Naylor (5 points)

8. Remnant Population (5 points) – old lady decides to stay alone on a planet when all of the other colonists are moved out. Gets to experience freedom from societal expectations for the first time in her life. Joyful and melancholic and full of strange delights. A big question in the blurb is ‘but is she alone on the planet after all??’ but the book cover has owl aliens watching her. I LOVED this one, it’s a 5 star book for me.

9. Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut (5 points)

10. To Be Taught, If Fortunate by Becky Chambers (5 points)

11. Dengue Boy by Michel Nieva – this one has such a great sense of place and a fantastic sense of humour

12. Gravity by Tess Gerritsen

13. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

14. On the Beach by Nevil Shute

15. Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir – the movie also rules

16. Spin by Robert Charles Wilson

17. The Chrysalids by John Wyndham

18. Vurt by Jeff Noon

19. Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie – absolutely expansive in scope with very lux world building that I found fascinating. The UK audiobook narrator for this – Adjoa Andoh – is fantastic (she does different accents for different planets which helped me understand plot points I would have otherwise COMPLETELY missed, plus it’s fun to hear a character for the first time and think ah you’re from planet Rowley Regis).

20. Dune by Frank Herbert

21. Illuminae by Amie Kaufman, Jay Kristoff

22. Immaculate Conception by Ling Ling Huang

23. Player of Games by Iain Banks

24. Sea of Tranquility by Emily St John Mandel

25. Everything You Ever Wanted by Luiza Sauma

26. Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes – I think this might be considered a classic but it’s super short and accessible, you’ll cry buckets

27. Girlfriend in a Coma by Douglas Coupland

28. Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C Clarke – this is a masterclass in atmosphere, I re-read it every few years. Again it’s from The Past but also short and easy to get through, plus super rewarding.

29. The Darkness Outside Us by Eliot Schrefer

30. A Closed and Common Orbit by Becky Chambers

31. Foe by Iain Reid

32. The Dark Tower II by Stephen King

33. The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler – this is far down the list but let me assure you it’s fantastic. There’s a group of scientists on an island figuring out super-intelligent-octopus language and some really cool and scary tech taken to its logical conclusions.

34. The Wall by Marlen Haushofer – we just read this one for book club and it was a great one to chat about, woman gets stuck in an invisible bubble on top of a mountain with a cow and a dog for company, learns to be self sufficient.

35. War with the Newts by Karel Capek – ok, I have to show you the cover for this one.. ->

Right, that’s end of list. If you try any of these let us know! And if you want to feed in to the next list, you’ll have to join the book club 🙂 shoot me a message and I’ll send you the details.