Books that feature haunted houses really creep me out – and I love ’em! Each story offers its own blend of ghostly encounters and eerie atmospheres, luring readers into narratives that linger long after the final page is turned. Below you’ll find 3 of my favorite haunted house #WickedGoodReads.
The Haunting of Hill House, Shirley Jackson
If you read any classic horror at all, let it be this gem from Shirley Jackson. First published in 1959, The Haunting of Hill House is a story of four seekers who arrive at the notoriously “unfriendly” Hill House looking for solid evidence of a haunting. The author did a great job of making it known that the house – or something in it – affected any weak minds that entered, and Eleanor, with her passive-aggressive personality was the perfect victim … “a friendless, fragile young woman well acquainted with poltergeists.” The book itself is not very scary, but the imagery is so very vivid and atmospheric that the tension keeps ratcheting up, building and building until the end.
The Shining, Stephen King
Jack Torrance’s new job at the Overlook Hotel is the perfect chance for a fresh start. As the off-season caretaker at the atmospheric old hotel, he’ll have plenty of time to spend reconnecting with his family and working on his writing. But as the harsh winter weather sets in, the idyllic location feels ever more remote…and more sinister. And the only one to notice the strange and terrible forces gathering around the Overlook is Danny Torrance, a uniquely gifted five-year-old.
Just the setting alone – an isolated house in the middle of nowhere – is ominous enough, and being cut off from the rest of civilization for months at a time because of Winter is quite the recipe for disaster. Stephen King is a master at characterizations, and building suspense and terror, and in The Shining, he does it so well. It’s a good, creepy book to read – and the hotel that inspired the book is open for tours – anybody else think that’s oh so wrong?! King published this book back in 1980, so it’s basically a classic now. Save this for when you’re home alone … and read it in the dark. It’s extra … fun … if you’re in a home that makes “night noises.”
Slade House, David Mitchell
Down the road from a working-class British pub, along the brick wall of a narrow alley, if the conditions are exactly right, you’ll find the entrance to Slade House. A stranger will greet you by name and invite you inside. At first, you won’t want to leave. Later, you’ll find that you can’t. Every nine years, the house’s residents—an odd brother and sister—extend a unique invitation to someone who’s different or lonely: a precocious teenager, a recently divorced policeman, a shy college student. But what really goes on inside Slade House? For those who find out, it’s already too late.
Starting out in 1979 and ending up in present time, Slade House spans several decades. I normally don’t care for books that span a long period of time, but it is done brilliantly here and an integral part of the story. The enigmatic Slade House mysteriously appears every nine years for a day. The book has five sections, and each section is narrated by a person who visits the house, and each has a distinctive voice. The house is only accessible only to certain people. And those who visit it are never seen again. I finished this in just a few days because I couldn’t put it down. The characters who visited the house tugged at my heart as they got caught up in it.
These novels are suspenseful and coupled with the themes of fear and isolation, they have become classics in the haunted house genre. What books have you read that featured a haunted house? Would you buy a house that was rumored to be haunted?
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Can you believe I’ve still never read a Stephen King book?!