13 Canadian books to rattle your bones this Halloween
Spooky season is upon us, which means it's the perfect time to curl up with a chilling read. Check out this list of 13 horror and mystery books to get you into the Halloween spirit.
William by Mason Coile
William follows an engineer named Henry who creates an artificially intelligent consciousness in his house called William. Henry has agoraphobia and stays working on the half-formed robot in the attic but doesn't tell anyone that it exists — not even his pregnant wife Lily.
But when Lily's co-workers show up, Henry decides to introduce them to William and things go very wrong.
Mason Coile is the pseudonym of Toronto writer Andrew Pyper. Pyper is the author of novels including Lost Girls, which won the Arthur Ellis Award for best first novel in 2000, The Demonologist, The Only Child and The Homecoming.
Cicada Summer by Erica McKeen
Cicada Summer is a short story collection. The connected narrative is about a woman who quarantines with her grandfather and his ex-lover at his remote lakeside cabin, Husha mourns her mother's recent death. It's the summer of 2020, and the heat wave has brought with it a brooding swarm of cicadas.
While cleaning her mother's house, Husha discovers a strange short story collection, the last message left by her mother. As the stories, teeming with unsettling, crawling imagery begin to seep into the cloistered life at the cabin, the inhabitants must each reckon with loss, longing, and what it means to truly know somebody else.
Erica McKeen is a writer from London, Ont. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, longlisted for the Guernica Prize and shortlisted for The Malahat Review Open Season Awards. Her first novel Tear won the 2023 Rakuten Kobo Emerging Writer Prizes for literary fiction.
The Plus One by S.C. Lalli
When a successful couple is murdered in their villa the day before their lavish wedding in the novel The Plus One, unwanted plus one Shaylee "Shay" Kapoor is unconvinced by the police's theory of a drug cartel hit. She must unravel the true reason of their murder before her own secret agenda comes to light.
S.C. Lalli is the author of Are You Sara? which was a bestseller and named one of NPR and Apple's Best Books of the Year 2022. She has also written five romance novels under her full name Sonya Lalli, including Jasmine and Jake Rock the Boat, A Holly Jolly Diwali, Grown-Up Pose and The Matchmaker's List. She lives in Vancouver.
A Guest in the House by Emily Carroll
A Guest in the House is a haunting graphic novel about Abby, a newlywed to a recently widowed dentist. But the more she learns about her new husband's first wife, the more suspicious she becomes that she may not have died of natural causes. A Guest in the House won the 2024 Doug Wright Award for best comic book.
Carroll is a Stratford, Ont.-based artist whose books include Through the Woods, a collection of horror comics, and Speak, an adaptation of Laurie Halse Anderson's YA novel, and When I Arrived at the Castle.
Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Silver Nitrate is a Gothic horror novel set in the 1990s film scene of Mexico City. It follows Montserrat, a sound editor desperate for her big break who has been in love with her best friend Tristán since childhood.
When Tristán discovers his neighbour is the legendary horror director Abel Urueta, they must team up to help Urueta finish the film he claims is cursed. Trying to lift the curse, they become entangled in a magical mystery revolving around the occultist who doomed Urueta.
Silvia Moreno-Garcia is a Canadian author, who was born and raised in Mexico. She has written several speculative fiction novels, including Gods of Jade and Shadow, Velvet Was the Night and The Daughter of Doctor Moreau. Her novel Mexican Gothic was championed by Tiktok creator Tasnim Geedi on Canada Reads 2023.
False Bodies by J.R. McConvey
False Bodies tells the story of monster hunter Eddie "The Yeti" Gesner as he travels to Newfoundland to make sense of a mass death on an offshore oil rig. People are saying that it could be the work of a kraken and Eddie is determined to get to the bottom of it. When he discovers an antique diary, his grasp of reality is called into question and he must face an undersea power that he could have never even imagined.
J.R. McConvey is a writer and documentary producer from Toronto. His debut short story collection, Different Beasts, was published in 2019 and won the 2020 Rakuten Kobo Emerging Writer Prize for speculative fiction. CBC Books named him a writer to watch in 2020. In 2016, McConvey made the longlist for the CBC Poetry Prize.
The Black Hunger by Nicholas Pullen
The Black Hunger is a horror novel that explores human impulses, desires and history. It follows John Sackville who is stuck in a London cell and knows he's about to die. Reeling from the death of his secret lover and desperate to tell their story before it's too late, John sets out to write his last testament. Journeying from mystic ruins in Scotland to the soaring mountains of Mongolia and Tibet, John reveals his own story and the ancient horrors that haunt it.
Nicholas Pullen is a writer based in the Yukon. His short stories have appeared in publications including the Toronto Star, Anti-Heroin Chic and the Copperfield Review Quarterly. The Black Hunger is his first novel.
Cold by Drew Hayden Taylor
Cold follows four independent characters whose paths collide around a murder mystery in downtown Toronto. As we delve into the backstories of these characters, it becomes apparent that something is tracking them down in this thrilling, yet funny novel.
Taylor is an Ojibway playwright, author and journalist from Curve Lake First Nations in Ontario. He has worked on over 17 documentaries examining Indigenous experiences. His other books include Motorcycle and Sweetgrass and Take Us to Your Chief, a collection of Indigenous science fiction short stories.
Mystery in the Title by Ian Ferguson & Will Ferguson
Miranda Abott returns in the sequel to I Only Read Murder, where the actress is finally able to break a dry spell with the lead role in a movie of the week. But this all sounds too good to be true according to Miranda's trusted assistant Andrew, who turns out to be right when her co-star crashes through the hotel window, dead. From Police Chief Ned Buckley and a grumpy bookstore owner to soon-to-be-ex Edgar Abott and Bea of Bea's B&B, the citizens of Happy Rock are enlisted to help solve the case in Mystery in the Title.
Will Ferguson has written humour, travel books and fiction. The Calgary-based writer won the 2012 Scotiabank Giller Prize for his thriller 419. He has won the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour three times: for his novel Generica (now titled Happiness), his Canadian travel book Beauty Tips from Moose Jaw and his travel memoir Beyond Belfast.
Ian Ferguson won the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour for Village of the Small Houses and is the co-author, with his brother, Will, of How to Be a Canadian, which was shortlisted for the Leacock Medal and won the CBA Libris Award for nonfiction. A writer and creative director in the film and television industry, Ian Ferguson lives in Victoria.
Roth by Richard Van Camp, illustrated by Christopher Shy
Richard Van Camp's latest graphic novel follows a local hero named Ross, who is bitten by a Wheetago at his cabin in northern Edmonton. The province of Alberta is crawling with the deadly monsters and Ross must form an alliance with escaped prisoners in order to reach his family, who are trapped in the city.
Half-transformed, Ross holds onto his humanity with the help of his family medicine. But the Wheetago are not discouraged — they've already renamed him "Roth" and wait for him to join their "gruesome crusade."
Richard Van Camp is a Tłı̨chǫ Dene writer from Fort Smith, N.W.T., who has written 30 books across multiple genres. His graphic novel A Blanket of Butterflies was nominated for an Eisner Award and his children's book Little You, illustrated by Julie Flett, was translated into Bush Cree, Plains Cree, South Slavey and Chipewyan.
Christopher Shy is an American artist, book cover designer and film poster artist. His graphic novel work includes Dead Space, I Sleep in Stone and The Mummy.
The Queen by Nick Cutter
The Queen is a horror mystery novel that follows lifelong friends Margaret and Charity. Charity Atwater has been missing for more than a month and is presumed dead when Margaret discovers an iPhone on her doorstep containing a text message from her best friend. Set over the course of one impossible day, Margaret must unravel the real story of what happened. As tragedy and disaster follow her pursuit of the truth, secrets are revealed that paint Charity in a whole new light and show Margaret that she never really knew her best friend after all.
Craig Davidson writes horror under the pen name Nick Cutter. He has written several novels, including Cataract City, which was shortlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize in 2013, Rust and Bone, which was adapted into an Oscar-nominated feature film, The Fighter and Sarah Court. His memoir Precious Cargo was defended by Greg Johnson on Canada Reads 2018.
Chrysalis Anuja Varghese
Chrysalis is a short story collection that centres South Asian women, showing how they reclaim their power in a world that constantly undermines them. Exploring sexuality, family and cultural norms, this collection deals with desire and transformation.
Chrysalis won the 2023 Governor General's Literary Award for fiction and the 2023 Dayne Ogilvie Prize.
Anuja Varghese is a Hamilton, Ont.-based writer and editor. Her stories have been recognized in the Prism International Short Fiction Contest and the Alice Munro Festival Short Story Competition and nominated for the Pushcart Prize. Chrysalis is her first book.
And Then She Fell by Alicia Elliott
And Then She Fell is a horror novel which follows a young woman named Alice struggling to navigate the early days of motherhood and live up to the unrealistic expectations of those around her. And Then She Fell was the winner of the 2024 Amazon First Novel Award.
Alicia Elliott is a Mohawk writer currently based in Brantford, Ont. Her writing has been published most recently in Room, Grain and The New Quarterly. She is also the author of the essay collection A Mind Spread Out on the Ground.
