Book picks similar to
Necessary Evil by Shaun Hutson


horror
shaun-hutson
fiction
horror-thriller

Death Day


Robert Neville - 1986
    The author also wrote "Assassin", "Spawn" and "Slugs".

Carrie / The Tommyknockers


Stephen King - 1988
    CarrieTo be invited to the Prom Night by Tommy Ross is a dream come true for Carrie White - the first step towards social acceptance by her high school colleagues. But events will take a decidedly macabre turn on that horrifying and endless night as she is forced to exercise her gift on the town that mocks and loathes her...The TommyknockersComing back to Haven, Maine, has been like walking into a nightmare for Jim. It all looked the same, the house, the furniture, the woods. But it was in the woods that his friend Bobbi had stumbled over the odd, nearly buried object, had felt a peculiar tingle as she knelt down and brushed the soft earth away. And looking back, that had been the start of a terrible, terrifying transformation of an unremarkable place into something alien and hideous. A place of unrest and insane powers.

The Haunting of Goldville Cemetery


Carrie Bates - 2020
    The cemetery caretaker mysteriously vanished, never to be seen again.Becca, her husband and sons are thrilled to move into their new house. But the shack at the edge of their property leaves Becca feeling unsettled. When she investigates, voices are heard but no one is there. A cold hand grips hers, leaving Becca running in fear.When her sons defy orders to stay away from the shack, the evil is unleashed. For Becca's youngest son has taken something that belongs only to the dead; and they want it back. When a man haunts their dreams, all too soon, Becca's family realizes that he's not in their dreams at all. Can the family fight back against the evil before it's too late? Or, will they spiral into a nightmare that they can never escape from?

Val McDermid 3-Book Thriller Collection: The Mermaids Singing, The Wire in the Blood, The Last Temptation (Tony Hill and Carol Jordan)


Val McDermid - 2016
    1 bestselling crime series featuring clinical psychologist Dr Tony Hill, hero of TV’s much loved WIRE IN THE BLOOD.THE MERMAIDS SINGINGUp till now, the only serial killers Tony Hill had encountered were safely behind bars. This one’s different – this one’s on the loose.Four men have been found mutilated and tortured. As fear grips the city, the police turn to clinical psychologist Tony Hill for a profile of the killer. But soon Tony becomes the unsuspecting target in a battle of wits and wills where he has to use every ounce of his professional nerve to survive.THE WIRE IN THE BLOODYoung girls are disappearing around the country, and there is nothing to connect them to one another, let alone the killer whose charming manner hides a warped and sick mind.Dr Tony Hill, head of the new National Profiling Task Force, sets his team an exercise: they are given the details of missing teenagers and asked to discover any possible links between the cases. Only one officer comes up with a theory – a theory that is ridiculed by the group … until one of their number is murdered and mutilated.For Tony Hill, the murder becomes a matter for personal revenge and, joined by colleague Carol Jordan, he embarks on a campaign of psychological terrorism – a game where hunter and hunted can all too easily be reversed.THE LAST TEMPTATIONA twisted killer targeting psychologists has left a grisly trail across Europe.Dr Tony Hill, expert at mapping the minds of murderers, is reluctant to get involved. But then the next victim is much closer to home…Meanwhile, his former partner DCI Carol Jordan is working undercover in Berlin, on a dangerous operation to trap a millionaire trafficker. When the game turns nasty, Tony is the only person she can call on for help.Confronting a cruelty that has its roots in Nazi atrocities, Tony and Carol are thrown together in a world of violence and corruption, where they have no one to trust but each other.

In This Skin


Simon Clark - 2004
    From Vaudeville, through the big bands and up to the hottest rock acts, the Luxor had them all. It's closed now, a boarded-up relic, standing alone in a run down industrial part of town. But the old dance hall isn't empty. A hideous presence lives there, a monstrous evil that has the ability to invade people's fantasies and nightmares . . . and bring them to life. Three strangers will soon learn the extent of the dance hall's power. As their lives become more and more entangled in its inescapable web, they will come to see that what haunts the Luxor is far worse than any ghost.

The Bachman Books


Richard Bachman - 1985
    Omnibus collection of four early Bachman novels (Rage, The Long Walk, Roadwork, The Running Man) and the essay "Why I Was Bachman"

Eternity


Tamara Thorne - 2001
    Tourists and New Agers all talk about the strange energy coming from Eternity’s greatest attraction: a mountain called Icehouse. But the locals talk about something else.The seemingly quiet town has been haunted by strange deaths, grisly murders, unspeakable mutilations, all the work of a serial killer who some say is the same serial killer for over a century. Now as the first snow starts to fall, terror grips Eternity as an undying evil begins its hunt once again…

The Association


Bentley Little - 2001
    Please be aware that we reserve the right to approve your decor, your landscaping, your friends, and your job. All relationships with neighbors should be avoided. Any interference from the outside will not be tolerated. Any attempt to leave will be stopped. Any infraction of the rules could result in severe fines, physical punishment, or death. Please send all other inquiries to the house on the hill. Preferably before dark. P.S. You're being watched. Sincerely, THE ASSOCIATION

John Saul: Hellfire, The Unwanted, Sleepwalk


John Saul - 1992
    This first-ever hardcover edition of three of his most popular books features Hellfire, The Unwanted and Sleepwalk. All three stories explore supernatural mysteries of suspense and horror.Appearences are definitely deceiving in John Saul's world. Stories are set in typical, all-American towns, but well-woven plots reveal an eerie array of characters with deeply hidden secrets. Their unspeakable pasts hide unavenged evils--and warrant terrifying justice. The spine-tingling novels in this volume prove that John Saul's talent for writing suspense fiction stands unequalled.

Superstitious


R.L. Stine - 1995
    Liam is a bachelor professor of folklore and he's incurably superstitious. When people start getting murdered, it seems that Liam's demons are real.

The Jonah


James Herbert - 1981
    Sent to a small coastal town to investigate drug smuggling, Kelso soon found his life—and his sanity—in great danger.

The Door to December


Richard Paige - 1985
    What happened to nine-year-old Melanie during the six years she was subjected to terrifying experiments? And what is the unstoppable power that she can unleash from behind the "Door to December"?

The Voice of the Night


Dean Koontz - 1980
    Colin was so shy; Roy was so popular. Colin was nervous around girls; Roy was a ladies’ man. Colin was fascinated by Roy — and Roy was fascinated with death. Then one day Roy asked his timid friend, “You ever killed anything?” And from that moment on, the two were bound together in a game too terrifying to imagine… and too irresistible to stop.Includes an afterword by the author.

Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King - A 30-Minute Summary


Instaread Summaries - 2014
    Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King - A 30-minute Summary of the Novel Inside this Instaread Summary: Overview of the entire bookIntroduction to the Important people in the bookSummary and analysis of all the chapters in the bookKey Takeaways of the bookA Reader's Perspective Preview of this summary: Part1Chapter 1Down-on-his-luck, Augie Odenkirk helps homeless Janice Cray care for her baby as they wait in the early morning fog for a job fair. A gray Mercedes plows into the crowd. Augie, Janice and the baby are among the victims.Part 2Chapters 1-3About a year after the Mercedes crash, Retired Detective K. William Hodges watches more grubby reality shows, fails to enjoy his beer, and thinks, again, of shooting himself. The arrival of the mail distracts him. A letter, allegedly from the driver of the killer Mercedes, stuns him. The writer brags about killing eight and wounding many. He says that he got off sexually at he drove into the crowd. He wore a condom and used bleach to get rid of any DNA. He wore a hair net under a clown mask for the same reason. He knows Hodges is miserable and hopes the letter cheers him up. He gives Hodges a website where they can talk, including a username: kermitfrog19.Chapters 4-6Hodges wonders if he should turn the letter over to his former partner, Pete Huntley. He believes the writer is the killer because he knows inside information about the condom and the bleach. The idea of using this letter, and chats on line, to catch the killer gives Hodges a reason to live.Chapter 7-9Hodges analyzes the letter and sees that the writer has several identifying traits, including misusing perk for perp and peppering his words with an image of a smiley face. The same smiley face was glued onto the steering wheel of the Mercedes. Hodges calls Pete and makes a lunch date....

The House Next Door


Darcy Coates - 2017
    I began to suspect something was wrong with the gothic building when its family fled in the middle of the night, the children screaming, the mother crying. They never came back to pack up their furniture. No family stays long. Animals avoid the place. Once, I thought I saw a woman's silhouette pacing through the upstairs room... but that seems impossible; no one was living there at the time. A new occupant, Anna, has just moved in. I paid her a visit to warn her about the building. I didn't expect us to become friends, but we did. And now that Marwick House is waking up, she's asked me to stay with her. I never intended to become involved with the building or its vengeful, dead inhabitant. But now I have to save Anna... before it's too late for the both of us.