Book picks similar to
Annabelle by Ruby Jean Jensen


horror
paperbacks-from-hell
fiction
horror-thriller

The Hollow Ones


Guillermo del Toro - 2020
    A rookie FBI agent in dangerous, uncharted territory. An extraordinary hero for the ages.Odessa Hardwicke's life is derailed when she's forced to turn her gun on her partner, Walt Leppo, a decorated FBI agent who turns suddenly, inexplicably violent while apprehending a rampaging murderer. The shooting, justified by self-defense, shakes the young FBI agent to her core. Devastated, Odessa is placed on desk leave pending a full investigation. But what most troubles Odessa isn't the tragedy itself-it's the shadowy presence she thought she saw fleeing the deceased agent's body after his death. Questioning her future with the FBI and her sanity, Hardwicke accepts a low-level assignment to clear out the belongings of a retired agent in the New York office. What she finds there will put her on the trail of a mysterious figure named John Silence, a man of enormous means who claims to have been alive for centuries, and who is either an unhinged lunatic, or humanity's best and only defense against unspeakable evil.

The Dead Path


Stephen M. Irwin - 2009
    These uniquely ter­rifying apparitions lead him on a thrilling and suspenseful ride to confront a wicked soul, and will leave an indelible mark on lovers of high-quality suspense and horror alike. Nicholas Close has always had an uncanny intuition, but after the death of his wife he becomes haunted, literally, by ghosts doomed to repeat their final violent moments in a chilling and endless loop. Torn by guilt and fearing for his sanity, Nicholas returns to his childhood home and is soon entangled in a dis­turbing series of disappearances and  murders—both as a sus­pect and as the next victim of the malignant evil lurking in the heart of the woods. Stephen M. Irwin is the kind of debut author that readers love to discover—and rave about to all their friends. His electric use of language, stunning imagery, and suspenseful pacing are all on full display here. The Dead Path is a tour de force of wild imagination, taut suspense, and the creepiest, scariest setting since the sewers in Stephen King’s It.

Stolen Tongues


Felix Blackwell - 2017
    High up on the windswept cliffs of Pale Peak, Faye and Felix celebrate their new engagement. But soon, a chorus of ghastly noises erupts from the nearby woods: the screams of animals, the cries of children, and the mad babble of a hundred mournful voices. A dark figure looms near the windows in the dead of night, whispering to Faye. As the weather turns deadly, Felix discovers that his terrified fiancée isn’t just mumbling in her sleep – she’s whispering back. Originally a contest-winning story on reddit.com’s horror community NoSleep, Stolen Tongues has received widespread acclaim and is now being adapted into a feature film.

The Fisherman


John Langan - 2016
    Steep-banked, fast-moving, it offers the promise of fine fishing, and of something more, a possibility too fantastic to be true. When Abe and Dan, two widowers who have found solace in each other's company and a shared passion for fishing, hear rumors of the Creek, and what might be found there, the remedy to both their losses, they dismiss it as just another fish story. Soon, though, the men find themselves drawn into a tale as deep and old as the Reservoir. It's a tale of dark pacts, of long-buried secrets, and of a mysterious figure known as Der Fisher: the Fisherman. It will bring Abe and Dan face to face with all that they have lost, and with the price they must pay to regain it.

The Lost Boy


Noel Hynd - 1999
    For Ellen Wilder, editor of the local newspaper, the gruesome killing is as disturbing as the irrational fears that have suddenly woven themselves into her mind and left her doubting her own sanity. For state police detective Michael Chandler, whose haunting near-death experience has left him with an uncanny way of sensing things, the murder is only a hint of what is to come.But nothing could have prepared either of them for the return of Franny Corbett. A hulking child of a man and the blackest sheep in a family of black sheep, his eerie presence may have ushered in all of these bizarre and frightening events. Soon the town of Wiltshire will be shaken again. For in a car sunk beneath the surface of a glimmering blue lake, floats another body. And the killing has just begun....

The Good House


Tananarive Due - 2003
    Working to rebuild her law practice after her son commits suicide, Angela Toussaint journeys to the family home where the suicide took place, hoping for answers, and discovers an invisible, evil force that is driving locals to acts of violence.

The Search for Joseph Tully


William H. Hallahan - 1974
    One of the few buildings still standing amid the rubble is the Brevoort House, older than memory. Its only remaining tenant is Peter Richardson. Abandoned. Menaced. Alone. The Brevoort has become an unbearable burden for him. Houses, like people, can go bad, and the Brevoort emanates an evilness, an undefined terror, aimed directly at him. The house—something in the house—is telling Richardson of his impending death. In another part of Brooklyn, solicitor Matthew Willow arrives from London seeking a man who may not exist. He has one clue, the name of the wanted man’s ancestor: Joseph Tully. Willow’s search takes him into the fascinating world of the genealogical detective—and uncovers a relentless pursuit and quest for vengeance through centuries of reincarnation . . .

Thirteen Storeys


Jonathan Sims - 2020
    Penthouse access is available via the broken freight elevator. Black tie optional.A dinner party is held in the penthouse of a multimillion-pound development. All the guests are strangers - even to their host, the billionaire owner of the building. None of them know why they were selected to receive his invitation. Whether privileged or deprived, besides a postcode, they share only one thing in common - they've all experienced a shocking disturbance within the building's walls.By the end of the night, their host is dead, and none of the guests ever said what happened. His death remains one of the biggest unsolved mysteries - until now.But are you ready for their stories?Jonathan Sims' debut is a darkly twisted, genre-bending journey through one of the most innovative haunted houses you'll ever dare to enter.

Paper Tigers


Damien Angelica Walters - 2016
    While recovering from the trauma, she discovers a photo album inhabited by a predatory ghost who promises to make her whole again, all while slowly consuming her from the inside out.

Hex


Thomas Olde Heuvelt - 2013
    Whoever settles, never leaves. Welcome to Black Spring, the seemingly picturesque Hudson Valley town haunted by the Black Rock Witch, a seventeenth century woman whose eyes and mouth are sewn shut. Muzzled, she walks the streets and enters homes at will. She stands next to children's bed for nights on end. Everybody knows that her eyes may never be opened or the consequences will be too terrible to bear. The elders of Black Spring have virtually quarantined the town by using high-tech surveillance to prevent their curse from spreading. Frustrated with being kept in lockdown, the town's teenagers decide to break their strict regulations and go viral with the haunting. But, in so doing, they send the town spiraling into dark, medieval practices of the distant past. This chilling novel heralds the arrival of an exciting new voice in mainstream horror and dark fantasy.

The Last Days of Jack Sparks


Jason Arnopp - 2016
    No stranger to controversy, he'd already triggered a furious Twitter storm by mocking an exorcism he witnessed.Then there was that video: forty seconds of chilling footage that Jack repeatedly claimed was not of his making, yet was posted from his own YouTube account.Nobody knew what happened to Jack in the days that followed - until now.

The Forest


Michaelbrent Collings - 2020
    Now, twenty years later, the two survivors are going back…For Tricia and Alex, the idea is simple: find and rescue their friend, Sam, from his insane mother. But when they enter the forest, they discover that their idea is anything but simple. Because this forest isn’t like any other. In this forest, a silver mist hangs. In this forest, a simple trip of a few miles can turn into a nightmare. In this forest, the monsters are real.Twenty years later, Tricia and Alex remember nothing of what happened that day they lost their friend. They know only that three kids went in, but only two came out.Now, they are going back. To find their lost memories. To discover what happened to Sam that day.To encounter fear itself.The forest, as Alex and Tricia will discover, is a place where madness reigns. A place where a simple path becomes an ordeal. A place where the past comes to life, and the future is anything but certain.Because the dead don’t stay dead… in The Forest.

The Splendor of Fear


Ambrose Ibsen - 2018
     Penny hates the outdoors, but when her boyfriend, Jared, plans a romantic weekend getaway in the woods, she decides to tag along. The pair drive to a remote Kentucky campground with a strange and sordid history. Within the confines of the Swan Creek State Park are the ruins of a town abandoned under terrifying circumstances in the 19th century. The town of Newsom's Landing had been the site of the last-known witch trial in US history, and the ghost of its defendant, the infamous Ellie Pomeroy, is said to still linger. Arriving on the anniversary of Pomeroy's murder, the pair find they have the entire park to themselves. Or, nearly. Something else is stalking the woods—watching in the night, wandering through the ruins. It brings a plague of hallucinatory terror wherever it goes, and before long, Penny and Jared can't parse reality from nightmare. Lost in the woods, the pair are faced with a choice: Find a way to end the century-long curse, or be consumed by it—body and soul. The Splendor of Fear is a full-length novel of terror by Ambrose Ibsen.

Bedbugs


Ben H. Winters - 2011
    ft., 2BR 2BA, eat-in kitchen, one block to parks and playgrounds. No broker’s fee.Susan and Alex Wendt have found their dream apartment.Sure, the landlady is a little eccentric. And the elderly handyman drops some cryptic remarks about the basement. But the rent is so low, it’s too good to pass up.Big mistake. Susan soon discovers that her new home is crawling with bedbugs... or is it? She awakens every morning with fresh bites, but neither Alex nor their daughter Emma has a single welt. An exterminator searches the property and turns up nothing. The landlady insists her building is clean. Susan fears she’s going mad—until a more sinister explanation presents itself: she may literally be confronting the bedbug problem from Hell.

Lost Boy Lost Girl


Peter Straub - 2003
    A week later, her son -- fifteen-year-old Mark -- vanishes. The boy's uncle, novelist Timothy Underhill, searches his hometown of Millhaven for clues that might help unravel this horrible dual mystery. He soon learns that a pedophilic murderer is on the loose in the vicinity, and that shortly before Nancy's suicide, Mark had become obsessed with an abandoned house where he imagined the killer might have taken refuge. No mere empty building, the house whispers from basement to attic with the echoes of a long hidden true-life horror story, and Tim comes to fear that in investigating its unspeakable history, Mark stumbled across its last and greatest secret: a ghostly lost girl who may have coaxed the needy, suggestible boy into her mysterious domain.