The October Boys – Adam Millard
Halloween horror
Halloween, 1988: A gang of twelve-year-old boys is trick-or-treating in London. In the distance, they hear the discordant chimes of an ice-cream truck.
It seems strange to hear on a cold autumnal night, but their thoughts of maximizing their candy haul soon dismissed its incongruous melody, until they saw the rusting hulk idling in the shadows at the end of the street, its driver a faceless shadow.
That was the night he took one of them.
October, 2016: Halloween is fast approaching and Tom Craven is still haunted by the events of that dark night, especially the fact that their friend was never found.
Increasingly plagued by horrific visions, Tom returns to the place where it all began, only to discover he’s not the only one who can feel it. His friends have already arrived and are preparing for a battle which could get them all killed.
The Ice Cream Man is back… and he’s come for the ones that got away.
“The sound of an ice cream truck off in the distance…was how it all began.”
Helloween – Duncan Ralston
Halloween horror
On October 31st, 2001, five teens set out to make a horror film for a school project at a Halloween haunt in the small town of Crooks Corner.
When all hell breaks loose, a powerful entity emerges, able to control inanimate objects and use them to kill. The carnage is swift and deadly, a vicious attack that quickly overwhelms the town and its citizens.
Fighting for their lives, the teens, along with their teachers and the local sheriff, must use all of their skills and wit to survive the night and possibly even save the world.
…Or die trying.
“The day before Halloween was another miserable day, and the last she would spend above ground.”
The Girls of October – Josh Hancock
Halloween horror
A young woman develops a strange fascination with John Carpenter’s Halloween, believing that somewhere within the 1978 horror classic lays the truth behind an arcane force that has terrorized her since her childhood.
As an escape from a world that has not always been kind, film student Beverly Dreger takes comfort in spooky urban legends, horror movies, and monster magazines.
When a string of bizarre murders draws her closer to the folkloric entity known as “the bogeyman,” Beverly must unravel the mystery of her past and confront an ancient evil.
“In the days after her birth, Beverly Dreger witnessed bizarre behavior from her parents…”
Prank Night – Kristopher Rufty
Halloween horror
In Autumn Creek, Halloween is no longer a harmless holiday of make-believe for children. It’s a night of survival.
The onslaught starts with a brutal murder of a woman. Cars are vandalized, stranding the residents, rendering them vulnerable to the looming chaos. With no chance of escape, the town becomes a battleground as one by one, the residents fall prey to Prank Night.
Terror will flow through the quaint village, flooding the streets with blood.
“Her hand was reaching for the curtain when she heard the faint thump of knocking.”
Unholy Blood – Ian Gielen
Halloween horror
A hidden cave. A Halloween party. A nightmare waiting to unfold.
While exploring off-trail on Coon Mountain in the breathtaking Adirondacks, college seniors Jack and Mason stumble upon a mysterious cave, concealed behind a curtain of tangled vines. Excited by the discovery, they return days later with their friends for a once-in-a-lifetime private Halloween party in its shadowy depths.
But beyond the laughter, booming music, and crackling campfire, something stirs. Something ancient. Something ravenous. Their arrival has awakened a presence that has waited in the shadows for years, hungry for its favorite meal.
This Halloween, the party ends when the screaming starts.
“One cavern stands apart in the secluded twists and turns of the cave system…”
Harvest Home – Thomas Tryon
Halloween horror
After watching his asthmatic daughter suffer in the foul city air, Theodore Constantine decides to get back to the land. When he and his wife search New England for the perfect nineteenth-century home, they find no township more charming, no countryside more idyllic than the farming village of Cornwall Coombe. Here they begin a new life: simple, pure, close to nature, and ultimately more terrifying than Manhattan’s darkest alley.
When the Constantines win the friendship of the town matriarch, the mysterious Widow Fortune, they are invited to join the ancient festival of Harvest Home, a ceremony whose quaintness disguises dark intentions.
In this bucolic hamlet, where bootleggers work by moonlight and all of the villagers seem to share the same last name, the past is more present than outsiders can fathom, and something far more sinister than the annual harvest is about to rise out of the earth.
“The house, Mrs. Dodd explained before unlocking the front door, was one of the oldest in the village.”
Harvest Moon – James A. Moore
Halloween horror
Once upon a time there was a town called Beldam Woods, where all of the people lived happy, carefree lives and no one wanted for anything. All of the children at the schools studied hard and learned their lessons. All of the adults were true to their spouses and everyone was content.
At least that’s what the travel brochures say.
They don’t tell you about the puddle of blood found inside the local veterinary clinic, or about the old librarian found torn to pieces inside his house. They don’t mention the troubles the police are having with their investigations into local crimes, or about the petty jealousies that have grown between the students attending the local public school and the kids going to the upper crust private academy.
Those brochures fail to mention the odd vegetation growing in the woods not far from the town, or the reasons that everything in the Witch’s Hollow is poisonous to eat or even to touch.
None of the literature written about Beldam Woods talks of human sacrifices or the desecration of new graves; there’s not a word written down about the monsters that allegedly lived there in the past, or what the townsfolk did to them.
And most importantly, there’s no mention of what happens when the monsters come back to put paid to some old debts.
“She slept and in her dreams she was not the same woman, but another…”
Apartment Five is Alive – Russell Atwood
Halloween horror
Spanning six decades, this book tells the story of a small apartment in the Lower East Side of Manhattan with BIG ideas a, especially when it comes to HALLOWEEN.
“This is not a ghost story. As far as the Apartment knew, ghosts did not exist.”
The Pumpkin House – Chad P Brown
Halloween horror
Every Halloween, Charles Keenan’s farmhouse, dubbed the Pumpkin House, is the main attraction for at least fifty miles in every direction. Mr. Keenan decorates his front yard with hundreds upon hundreds of jack-o’-lanterns in order to protect the good souls of Smith’s Grove from a monster known as Old Notch-foot.
Ronnie Lancaster volunteers at the Pumpkin House to escape from his own monster at home, his mother’s boyfriend Rick. While volunteering, he meets a girl named Sarah Bowen, who still carries the haunting memories of a monster from her own past.
As Halloween night approaches, friendships are formed, secrets are revealed, and the physical abuse Ronnie’s mother endures from Rick comes to a head. Now, Ronnie must decide whether the legend of Old Notch-foot is true.
“…old Mr. Keenan likes to carve a jack-o’-lantern for each soul in Smith’s Grove.”
Red Harvest – Patrick C. Greene
Halloween horror
Every year at harvest time, something strange and wonderful happens in the sleepy farm community of Ember Hollow. It comes alive.
Truckloads of pumpkins are sent off to be carved into lanterns. Children scramble to create the creepiest, scariest costumes. Parents stock up on candy and prepare for the town’s celebrated Pumpkin Parade.
And then there is Devil’s Night.
But this year, something is different. Some of the citizens are experiencing dark, disturbing visions. Others are beginning to wonder if they’re losing their minds, or maybe their souls. One newly sober singer with the voice of a fallen angel is tempted to make a deal that will seal his fate. And one very odd boy is kept locked in a shed by his family, for reasons too horrible to imagine.
Whatever is happening to this town, they’re going to make it through this Halloween. Even if it kills them.
“Trick or treat! Rotten meat! That is what we want to eat!”
All Hallow’s Dead – Bryan Smith
Halloween horror
It’s Halloween week in Willow Springs, TN, and a mad slasher is on the loose!
Twenty-five years ago, a group of local boys did a very bad thing. Now a masked killer is leaving a trail of corpses and bloody pumpkins all over town.
Brutal vengeance against his former tormentors and thirty-one dead for Halloween are the madman’s demented goals.
As the body count mounts, local law enforcement scrambles to track down the seemingly unstoppable killer and bring the carnage to an end.
“Lloyd’s family had been operating the pumpkin stand at this same roadside location for generations.”
It Came From the Pumpkin Patch – Chris Heinicke & Kate Reedwood
Halloween horror
Thirteen-year-old Timmy Mantis hates pumpkins and anything to do with them. Growing up in Harvest Creek, the pumpkin-growing capital of Wisconsin, has been a living hell. Especially at Halloween, when the small town becomes obsessed with everything pumpkin at the annual fall festival.
When an accident happens at the local research laboratory and one of the experiments escapes, Timmy realizes he was right to hate pumpkins.
As the festival becomes ground zero for a monstrous invasion of gourds-gone-wild and the body count rises, literally, Timmy must face his greatest fears or become another victim.
Accompanied by a scientist determined to put things right, Timmy uses whatever means he can to save the town and his life.
But how do you kill an undead pumpkin that has revenge on its mind?
“God how he hated pumpkins.”
Carrick Glynn – Tony Urban
Halloween horror
There’s nothing in the world Benji Roth loves more than Halloween. But when his hometown puts an age limit on trick or treating, he’s left without a way to celebrate the best holiday of the year.
Hope arrives in the form of a new girl in town. A girl who tells him about unforgettable Halloween celebrations in a town not too far away.
Benji convinces his best friends to join him on a trip to Carrick Glynn for a holiday they’ll never forget.
But Carrick Glynn has other plans for Benji and his friends. And the town always gets what it wants.
“Eat!” Brighid repeated. And Conal did. As he had before. As he would again.”
Dark Harvest – Normal Partridge
Halloween horror
Halloween, 1963. They call him the October Boy, or Ol’ Hacksaw Face, or Sawtooth Jack.
Whatever the name, everybody in this small Midwestern town knows who he is. How he rises from the cornfields every Halloween, a butcher knife in his hand, and makes his way toward town, where gangs of teenage boys eagerly await their chance to confront the legendary nightmare.
Both the hunter and the hunted, the October Boy is the prize in an annual rite of life and death.
Pete McCormick knows that killing the October Boy is his one chance to escape a dead-end future in this one-horse town. He’s willing to risk everything, including his life, to be a winner for once.
But before the night is over, Pete will look into the saw-toothed face of horror and discover the terrifying true secret of the October Boy.
“The thing they call October Boy drops to the ground.”
War on Halloween – Robbie Dorman
Halloween horror
Laurel City doesn’t celebrate Halloween and Mike Dawson wants to change that.
New in town, he’s going to throw the biggest Halloween party the town has ever seen.
But Reverend David Laurel stands in his way. Laurel is a direct descendant of the founder of the town, and Halloween is more than just a celebration of sin. It is a direct attack on control of his city, and he won’t surrender it without a fight. Mike and his children are drawn into a feud over the holiday, and Mike won’t back down despite pressure from Laurel.
And then the killings start.
The town is thrown into chaos by brutal murders, and Laurel blames them on the sinful holiday. But Laurel has a secret. Deep in his church lies an ancient book, bound in red leather. It contains terrible power, written in an inhuman language. Reverend Laurel will do anything to stop Halloween.
Including summoning demons.
The question isn’t if Laurel City will have a Halloween.
The question is if the town will survive it.
“She opened her eyes, and then she saw something. Something impossible.”
12 Hours of Halloween – Edward Trimnell
Halloween horror
The year is 1980. Jeff Schaeffer, Leah Carter, and Bobby Nagel decide to go out for “one last Halloween” before adolescence takes away their childhood forever.
But this Halloween is different, they soon discover. An outing that was supposed to be light-hearted and fun becomes a battle for sanity and perhaps even survival.
A sinister teenager known as “the ghost boy” declares that Jeff Schaeffer and his friends will endure “twelve hours of trial” on Halloween. The three young people subsequently find their once familiar surroundings transformed into a bizarre and terrifying landscape.
They discover that just beneath the surface of their suburban neighborhood lies a secret realm of haunted houses, demonically possessed trees, and spirits with unfinished business.
One entity, called the “head collector”, stalks through the darkened streets in search of grisly trophies.
“I whirl around, my heart suddenly beating rapidly. The head collector, I think.”
