We are now entering spooky season, as we get close to Halloween and immerse ourselves in the fall spirit. In honour of spooky season, I’ll be sharing a variety of books that could be considered “spooky” either by having supernatural elements or being in the realm of thriller or horror genres. Enjoy!

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For this week, I wanted to share some fiction books with monsters for spooky season.

At first, I was just looking for non-human characters to count as “monsters”. But the more I think about some of these books, the non-human characters are not always the monster in the story.

All these books include non-human or fantastical creatures, but monster may not be the best word to describe them. I only use the word monster because it fits well with the Halloween/spooky season.

Monsters and disability justice

I know monsters in stories have often been used to represent “the other” and there’s a lot to unpack about how monsters have been portrayed and treated within stories.

Nowadays, whenever I see villains or antagonists in media portrayed with an atypical body (even like the orcs in Lord of the Rings), it makes me think about how that fits into disability justice.

It’s also a really common trope that the villain in the story is either “ugly” or “disfigured” or something. I guess it’s a way to show that their inner ugliness has manifested in their outer appearance. But that’s vary rarely the case.

Society’s standards of beauty are rarely a good judge of character, if anything it’s often negatively correlated, with some stereotypically beautiful people being more selfish and mean than the average person.

Having an atypical body isn’t a good or bad thing, it’s just different. It certainly doesn’t make you a bad person.

Nor should we as a society associate those physical attributes with negative character traits. I think it’s dangerous for us to repeatedly see negative portrayals of atypical bodies in our media.

Anyways, all that to say, when I used the word “monsters” it’s open for interpretation on who the monster really is in the story.

Five books with “monsters” for spooky season

Here’s a list of five books with “monsters” for spooky season.

1. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (1818)
2. Dracula by Bram Stoker (1897)
3. Man Tiger by Eka Kurniawan (2004)
4. How to Be Eaten by Maria Adelmann (2022)
5. Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree (2022)

Keep reading to find out more about each one. I’ve listed them in order of when they were published.

Frankenstein (1818)

by Mary Shelley

‘Now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart …’

Obsessed with creating life itself, Victor Frankenstein plunders graveyards for the material to fashion a new being, which he shocks into life with electricity. But his botched creature, rejected by Frankenstein and denied human companionship, sets out to destroy his maker and all that he holds dear. Mary Shelley’s chilling Gothic tale was conceived when she was only eighteen, living with her lover Percy Shelley near Byron’s villa on Lake Geneva. It would become the world’s most famous work of horror fiction, and remains a devastating exploration of the limits of human creativity.

Links:

• You can find out more on:
  • Goodreads
  • Storygraph
  • Poetry Foundation
  • Wikipedia
    • On the author
    • About the book
• You can buy the book here on Amazon.
• Access the book for free here on Project Gutenberg.

Dracula (1897)

by Bram Stoker

When Jonathan Harker visits Transylvania to help Count Dracula with the purchase of a London house, he makes a series of horrific discoveries about his client. Soon afterwards, various bizarre incidents unfold in England: an apparently unmanned ship is wrecked off the coast of Whitby; a young woman discovers strange puncture marks on her neck; and the inmate of a lunatic asylum raves about the ‘Master’ and his imminent arrival.

In Dracula, Bram Stoker created one of the great masterpieces of the horror genre, brilliantly evoking a nightmare world of vampires and vampire hunters and also illuminating the dark corners of Victorian sexuality and desire.

Links:

• You can find out more on:
  • Goodreads
  • Storygraph
  • Author’s Website – with links to free copies of his work
  • Wikipedia
    • On the author
    • About the book
• You can buy the book here on Amazon.
• Access the book for free here on Project Gutenberg.

Man Tiger (2004)

by Eka Kurniawan, translated by Labodalih Sembiring

A wry, affecting tale set in a small town on the Indonesian coast, Man Tiger tells the story of two interlinked and tormented families and of Margio, a young man ordinary in all particulars except that he conceals within himself a supernatural female white tiger. The inequities and betrayals of family life coalesce around and torment this magical being. An explosive act of violence follows, and its mysterious cause is unraveled as events progress toward a heartbreaking revelation.

Lyrical and bawdy, experimental and political, this extraordinary novel announces the arrival of a powerful new voice on the global literary stage.

Links:

• You can find out more on:
  • Goodreads
  • Storygraph
  • Author’s Wikipedia
• You can buy the book here on Amazon.

How to Be Eaten (2022)

by Maria Adelmann

This darkly funny and provocative novel reimagines classic fairy tale characters as modern women in a support group for trauma.

In present-day New York City, five women meet in a basement support group to process their traumas. Bernice grapples with the fallout of dating a psychopathic, blue-bearded billionaire. Ruby, once devoured by a wolf, now wears him as a coat. Gretel questions her memory of being held captive in a house made of candy. Ashlee, the winner of a Bachelor-esque dating show, wonders if she really got her promised fairy tale ending. And Raina’s love story will shock them all.

Though the women start out wary of one another, judging each other’s stories, gradually they begin to realize that they may have more in common than they supposed . . . What really brought them here? What secrets will they reveal? And is it too late for them to rescue each other?

Links:

• You can find out more on:
  • Goodreads
  • Storygraph
  • Author’s Website
• You can buy the book here on Amazon.

Legends & Lattes (2022)

by Travis Baldree

High Fantasy with a double-shot of self-reinvention

Worn out after decades of packing steel and raising hell, Viv the orc barbarian cashes out of the warrior’s life with one final score. A forgotten legend, a fabled artifact, and an unreasonable amount of hope lead her to the streets of Thune, where she plans to open the first coffee shop the city has ever seen.

However, her dreams of a fresh start pulling shots instead of swinging swords are hardly a sure bet. Old frenemies and Thune’s shady underbelly may just upset her plans. To finally build something that will last, Viv will need some new partners and a different kind of resolve.

A hot cup of fantasy slice-of-life with a dollop of romantic froth.

Links:

• You can find out more on:
  • Goodreads
  • Storygraph
  • Author’s Website
  • Wikipedia
    • On the author
    • About the book
• You can buy the book here on Amazon.

Final thoughts

I hope you found something of interest in this list of books.

I’m always looking for more suggestions of books to read. I’d love to know which books you love or that you would recommend. Let me know in a comment below!

Have you read any of these books? What did you think of it?

I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below.