At the risk of being black-listed by The Broke and the Bookish crowd, I’m admitting that I have no real interest in books about vampires. Or witches. Or anything para-normal. Yes, I did read the Twilight series (because I like a book with hype) and I did enjoy it but it hasn’t gone further than that. So I’m likely to fail miserably at this week’s top ten topic – Top Ten Books to Get in the Halloween Spirit.
So whilst there’s nothing terribly ghoulish or fitting for Halloween on my list, here’s the ten books that scared the pants off me (for all sorts of reasons) –
1. Room by Emma Donoghue – imaginative, original and terrifying.
2. The Turn of the Screw by Henry James – a real ghost story.
3. The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold – I felt ill reading this book.
4. Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs – remember folks, this is a memoir, not fiction.
5. Before I Go to Sleep by S. J. Watson – I never saw the twist coming…
6. We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver – I know I include this book in lots of my top tens but it remains the most chilling and one of the most memorable books I’ve ever read.
7. The Dinner by Herman Koch – don’t read reviews that contain spoilers…
8. Flowers in the Attic by V.C. Andrews – before everyone was getting their knickers in a twist about Twilight and The Hunger Games, there was this.
9. Eclipse by Stephanie Meyer – I think it was the scariest in the series.
10. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins – Well Collins certainly knows how to write suspense – I read it in one sitting.