Horror books
Nothing keeps you up at night like a good horror book - partly because you'll be too scared to go to sleep until you've finished it. If you're looking for horror books that unsettle, surprise and endure, we've got plenty to choose from, spanning Bram Stoker's Dracula to Shirley Jackson's We Have Always Lived in the Castle, and more modern reads by Josh Winning and Marcus Kliewer. From gothic classics and ghost stories to folk horror, psychological suspense and modern supernatural fiction, Penguin’s horror collection brings together the books, authors and series that define the genre.
The best horror books
Our horror recommendations
Explore horror subgenres
Horror is about more than jump scares and haunted houses. From gothic classics and eerie folk tales to psychological suspense, body horror and cosmic dread, there are plenty of variations of the genre, each evoking a different kind of fear. If you're looking for a new spine-chilling title to add to your reading pile, here's our recommendation of where to begin based on your favourite horror tropes.
A guide to Gothic literature
Introducing the Penguin Weird Fiction series
Blending horror, fantasy and science fiction, weird fiction is in a category of its own. This new collection is a must-have for the subgenre’s fans and newcomers alike.
Halloween books
Halloween might be the highlight of spooky season, but you can enjoy these terrifying reads any time of the year.
Classic horror books
Many of today’s most unsettling stories build on ideas established by earlier horror writers: haunted houses, uncanny doubles, forbidden experiments, vampires, ghosts and monsters that refuse to stay buried. So, if you love modern horror, we recommend browsing the classics.
Penguin Shop
Discover gifts and exclusive bundles to delight book lovers.
The best horror books to give you the chills
From classics like Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein to Colson Whitehead’s modern pandemic tale Zone One, these are the best horror books.
Sign up to the Penguin newsletter
By signing up, I confirm that I'm over 16. To find out what personal data we collect and how we use it, including for our recommendations, please visit our Privacy Policy.
Articles to inspire
Ghost stories, opium and rain: the doomed holiday that inspired Shelley’s Frankenstein
Mary Shelley's nightmare in the Alps is the stuff of literary legend. But the truth about her trip to Geneva with Percy and Byron – which includes volcanic eruptions, a monkey and a peacock - is even stranger. This is the real story of the birth of Frankenstein.
Horror books for children
Our spotlight horror authors
