Friend, I think the draft of this post has been sitting here for well over a year! So I’m going to take my best attempt at finishing it and I welcome more recommendations from you.

The idea of this post comes from the Hyakumonogatari Kaidankai (百物語怪談会), an Edo-period storytelling game. Essentially, participants sit in a room with a hundred lit candles and each time someone tells a scary story, they extinguish a candle until there’s none left. It’s traditionally played in the summertime because of O-bon and because it’s believed that you’ll get the chills from the stories and thus cool down, but since it’s summer all year round in Singapore, I’m also going to believe it’s summer where you are.

I’m not making it to 100 book recommendations today (and forgive me if not all of them are in the horror genre but they definitely all scared me) but let’s keep count!

Night Film by Marisha Pessl – This book is scary in both content and length (it’s got 118 chapters and 1044 pages on my kobo – are you scared yet?) AND it mentions the Hyakumonogatari Kaidankai, which is why it’s the first book that came to mind. Essentially, Night Film follows the story of Scott McGrath, a disgraced journalists, who gets pulled back into the case that ruined his career when the body of Ashley Cordova is found. Her father, Stanislas Cordova, is a cult film maker known for his increasingly dark horror films – the night films of the title. The book does have a bit of a pacing issue but it’s so weird and I was creeped out and I think it’s worth taking a chance on. (Full review)

Six Stories series by Matt Wesolowski – My review will link to the first book in this series but I highly recommend all six books! Each book follows a “true crime podcast” format with six episodes/chapters that look at one case in detail. Each case may or may not have a supernatural aspect (e.g. the Black Eye Kids) but it definitely reflects the darker parts of society. I enjoyed how the cases, thought separate, were also connected via the podcast host, Scott King. (Full review of the first book)

The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell – I could probably link to any of Laura Purcell’s books because I’ve not met a book of hers that has not scared me (and yet I keep reading them???). The Silent Companions in this book refer to life-size wooden figures that mysteriously move about the house and who haunt the protagonist of this novel (who happens to be in an asylum when we start the book). This book nailed the atmosphere, nailed the characters, nailed the pacing and made me scared. (Full review)

You Let Me In by Camilla Bruce – You all know that I’m fascinated by dark fairy tales, which is why I picked up You Let Me In. Told from the perspective of an author who may or may not have killed her husband and father and who may or may not be haunted by the otherworldly Pepper Man, this dark and entrancing story plays with the reliability of the narrator in such a fascinating way. (Full review)

The Whisper Man by Alex North – This book was hard to book down but also hard to keep reading at night because I was creeped out by it. It’s technically a mystery, which I should be used to by now, but the combination of serial killers and urban legends got to me. I also really enjoyed the characters here; the development of two generations of father and sons (three characters) made the book really stand out. (Full review)

Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark by Guillermo del Toro – I bought this because of the previously mentioned fascination with dark fairytale stuff but never imagined that the combination of story + illustrations would scare me so much that I’ve never touched the movie. Scary stuff, I still own the book and maybe one day I’ll be brave enough to reread it.

Coraline by Neil Gaiman – I’m not sure why a children’s book has scared me so much but it’s probably the buttons for eyes! While the Graveyard Book was generally cosy, Coraline was genuinely creepy and this is one story where I got scared by the movie even though I already knew what was coming!

The Tokyo Zodiac Murders by Soji Shimada – We can’t have a post inspired by a Japanese game and not have a Japanese book, right? While most of the Japanese fiction I read tend to be on the cosier/less scary side, The Tokyo Zodiac Murders is a bit spooky, a bit grotesque (premise involves cutting people into body parts) and expertly plotted. (Full review)

Perfume: Story of a Murderer by Patrick Suskind – Sometimes I wonder why this was in the library of my secondary school because it doesn’t seem appropriate for kids. Like the subtitle says, Perfume follows the story of one man who has an extraordinary sense of smell but who doesn’t have a personal scent. The rejection from people who don’t quite know why they don’t like him (because he has no scent) and his own obsession with capturing scents leads him to try and create an ultimate perfume with extremely disturbing results.

Out by Natsuo Kirino – A long long time ago, before I started blogging, I read Out (and probably Grotesque as well). This book is probably one of the first few Japanese books I read and while I’ve forgotten a lot, I remember that it was disturbing and scary. In fact, Natsuo Kirino immediately came to mind when I thought of this post, which should tell you how big of an impression the books have made on me despite me not remembering anything else.

And it’s with my faulty memory that I end this post.

Total Scary Story Count: 15

There are still quite a few candles lit…