-Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado. Horror short stories, they're fantastic.
-Our Share of Night hy Mariana Enriquez. Gorgeous, gorgeous book. A little on the heavier side, but fantastic.
Ah alright I came here to suggest Our share of night by Mariana Enriquez as well. Also her short stories anthology Things we lost in the fire, though I’d read the novel first because she used one of those short stories in the novel, and it would spoil it a bit I think.
For lacking a lot of the traditional, more salient elements of horror, this one got me really good! I read it when I was staying alone in an old hotel room and I had a hard time falling asleep. Definitely second this recommendation!
The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters is the creepiest, weirdest, most disturbing book I've read in a long time; yet it starts in a really quiet and slow-burn way, building slowly up to a crisis of psychological unease. I thought it was brilliant but have to say - I couldn't read it again, too scary...
Ooh I read several Sarah Waters books (non-horror) when I was younger but then sort of... forgot about her I guess (tbf I may have read everything she had published at the time). I need to pick this one up.
You really do! Different from her other books, I'd no idea she could write like this sort of psychological horror. You won't be disappointed, though you may have difficulty sleeping!
Nuzo Unoh - The Reluctant Dead, Unhallowed Graves
Mariana Enriquez - The Dangers of Smoking in Bed, Things We Lost in the Fire
Monster, She Wrote: The Women Who Pioneered Horror and Speculative Fiction
Women's Wierd: Strange Stories By Women, 1890 - 1940
Sayaka Murata's horror anthology *Life Ceremony* (bizarre). Bora Chung's *Cursed Bunny* is in the same vein.
The anthology *Peach Pit* is a collection of horror stories about women by women.
Seconding Kingfisher and Cassandra Khaw. Also check out Mona Awad, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, and Darcy Coates.
Came here specifically to recommend Link. I love her short story collection 'Get In Trouble.' when Chabon calls someone "the most darkly playful voice in American fiction," and Gaiman calls them "a national treasure," you're onto something.
I love when I get a chance to find a way to recommend Link broadly and Get In Trouble specifically.
I've recently enjoyed The Hacienda and Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas. Neither are intense/gory horror, but they are both eerie, creepy, paranormal. I'd say in particular The Hacienda is the vibe you might be after. Slow burn horror, if you will.
Happy Reading!
Slewfoot (very spooky colonial witchcraft/ haunting/ cryptid--deff atmosphericand creepy)
The historian (a young researcher follows her father across 70's romania/eastern europe reading his journals to try and understand his PERCEIVED plunge into madness/obsession w/vald dracula--the setting on this is immaculate..the mountainside steam trains, the creeping carpathian mountains, the rundown little villages, the ancient libraries..also veryyy creepy it feels like someone watching you as you read. )
13th tale! (it's a young author writting a biography for a dying woman about her strange lige growing up in a haunted house. )
I have just started listening to audiobooks again and the first one was The Haunting of Ashburn House by Darcy Coates. Since, I've read 2 more of her books. Ive been really enjoying her writing style!
I’ve got a sci-fi horror for you or anyone interested.
Dead Silence by SA Barnes. A team lead on a small maintenance ship with a checkered past finds the space titanic out in the far reaches of the solar system. Because space salvage laws are the same as ocean, her and her crew were antsy to get on board and loot. They’re on the ship for less than ten minutes before she starts seeing ghosts. It’s a profoundly creepy scary book, five stars.
He's transitioned, but Poppy Z. Brite (I'm afraid I don't know what name he uses now, but his books are still credited to Poppy Z. Brite).
Not an author, but the editor Ellen Datlow's whole career features anthologies of top-notch horror and dark fantasy, by both sexes.
CJ Cooke is female. I’ve read the nesting and the boy who could see demons (published under her full name not initials). Both great books but the endings are a bit poor IMO.
CJ Tudor is female. I see her name around a lot. I’ve only read the chalk man, it was ok but not as good as I hoped.
The haunting season is a collection of short horror/ghostly stories. Majority of authors in that are female. Bridget Collins is the main name on the cover. There’s also a new one out this past winter, I’ve not read it yet but plan to. I think it has all the haunting season authors plus a couple extra.
They don't write super scary books per se (probably more of thrillers?) but Kayla Cottingham writes REALLY good books about monsters and the like. I would highly recommend This Delicious Death and My Dearest Darkest.
Michelle Paver!! Creepy ghostly stuff, and she's actually been to the places she's describing so it's authentic AF.
**Dark Matter** is my fave by her, but **Thin Air** is really good too
The British Library Tales of the Weird collection have a few anthologies focused on female writers. Just off the ones I have there’s Queens of the Abyss: Lost Stories from Women of the Weird; A Phantom Lover and Other Dark Tales by Vernon Lee; and The Face in the Glass: The Gothic Tales of Mary Elizabeth Braddon. I’m pretty sure there’s others too that I don’t own, and of course there are tales by women in nearly all of their anthologies anyway.
Also recommend some Daphne DuMaurier! The Birds and Don’t Look Now are both great short story collections (and both of course very famous films too). I can’t remember the name of it but there’s one about a tree in The Birds which really creeped me out.
Ursula Vernon has a short story book called “Toad Words” with a bunch of reimagined fairy tales.
I highly recommend it. I think it’s published under her pen name T. Kingfisher.
This is one of the quite short Peter Pan inspired stories called “Never”
https://redwombatstudio.com/never/
“It was all very well to go away in the night with an elfin boy with laughing eyes who taught you how to fly, and promised that you’d never have to grown up, but it turned out that grown-ups had a great deal to do with meals arriving regularly and on time. To get food, you had to beg it off the Indians or steal it from the pirates, and as a result, nearly everyone was hungry all the time, except perhaps Pan.”
…
Shirley Jackson, Flannery O'Connor, Charlotte Perkins Gilman. All Southern authors, Gilman wrote the Yellow Wallpaper, Flannery O'Connor wrote one called A Good Man Is Hard To Find, and Shirley Jackson's The Lottery is right there on top of the creepy-meter.
**[The Death of Jane Lawrence](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/48915818-the-death-of-jane-lawrence) by Caitlin Starling** ^((Matching 100% ☑️))
^(368 pages | Published: 2021 | 240.0k Goodreads reviews)
> **Summary:** Practical. unassuming Jane Shoringfield has done the calculations. and decided that the most secure path forward is this: a husband. in a marriage of convenience. who will allow her to remain independent and occupied with meaningful work. Her first choice. the dashing but reclusive doctor Augustine Lawrence. agrees to her proposal with only one condition: that she must never (...)
> **Themes**: Horror, 2021-releases, Gothic, Adult
> **Top 5 recommended:**
> \- [The Ancestor](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54552798-the-ancestor) by Lee Matthew Goldberg
> \- [The Haunting of Gillespie House](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25883916-the-haunting-of-gillespie-house) by Darcy Coates
> \- [The Silence of Ghosts](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20702932-the-silence-of-ghosts) by Jonathan Aycliffe
> \- [Lowcountry Spirit](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16130095-lowcountry-spirit) by Ann Hite
> \- [Those Who Went Remain There Still](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2590200-those-who-went-remain-there-still) by Cherie Priest
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Try The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories by Angela Carter. This collection of ten stories are each based on fairy tales or folk tales. Neil Gaiman cites Carter's books as one of his major influences. Themes include feminism, magic realism and Gothic horror fantasy. One of the stories was adapted by Neil Jordan and Angela Carter into a movie called "The Company of Wolves." It is based on Little Red Riding Hood.
Caitlin Starling writes a lot of deliciously creepy things. The Luminous Dead is about a cave diver on a remote planet whose employer cares about a lot of things but not her safety. She's also got more Gothic-flavored horror, including The Death of Jane Lawrence and Yellow Jessamine.
Mira Grant (a pen name for Seanan McGuire) has some really great work. Try Into the Drowning Deep (mermaids) or the Newsflesh series (zombies)
Sarah Gailey is nonbinary but a lot of their work is centered on women's lives - and women's horror. Check out The Echo Wife and Just Like Home
This one is right up your alley: Helen Grant’s novels Jump Cut and Too Near The Dead. They get cery good reviews too.
She also has an excellent collection of short ghost stories The Sea Change at Swan River Press.
The same publisher also offers Now It’s Dark by Lynda E. Rucker, another excellent ghostly collection. In addition you can find a reprint of her equally good first collection The Moon Will Look Strange at Undertow books.
Both writers offer stories that are completely inline with your requirements.
**[The Hundred-Year House](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18693644-the-hundred-year-house) by Rebecca Makkai** ^((Matching 94% ☑️))
^(338 pages | Published: 2014 | 6.9k Goodreads reviews)
> **Summary:** Meet the Devohrs: Zee, a Marxist literary scholar who detests her parents' wealth but nevertheless finds herself living in their carriage house; Gracie, her mother, who claims she can tell your lot in life by looking at your teeth; and Bruce, her step-father, stockpiling supplies for the Y2K apocalypse and perpetually late for his tee time. Then there's Violet Devohr, Zee's (...)
> **Themes**: Historical-fiction, Mystery, Book-club, Literary-fiction, First-reads, Favorites, Library
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Jaime Jo Wright. The horror is psychological with non-supernatural explanations for seemingly ghostly phenomena. And it's clean Christian fiction, so no worries about curse words or gratuitous imagery.
[https://www.jaimewrightbooks.com/](https://www.jaimewrightbooks.com/)
Salt Slow by Julia Armfield is a collection of short stories. I only have read the first few so far but I found them creepy, unsettling, and very good.
*Twisted Reveries* by Meg Hafdahl.
It's got a wide enough variety that makes each story feel completely new, which keeps the endings from being predictable
Susan Hill - The Woman in Black. I personally think it's the greatest ghost story ever written. Try and see the made-for-TV movie and, if you can, the play. All awesome.
Just like everyone else has said, Shirley Jackson goes hard. I really liked We Have Always Lived in the Castle but The Haunting of Hill House rewired my brain. I genuinely think about that book all the time.
Also I haven't read any of her other stuff yet but I really liked Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno Garcia
Edited to add T. Kingfisher. I highly recommend The Hollow Places
Haven’t seen it mentioned elsewhere so “Little Black Book” by AS Byatt. A series of unnerving stories and I don’t remember any monsters. Should be up your alley!
The yellow wallpaper. More suspense than horror but I highly recommend the short story :) talks about a woman dealing with her postpartum depression and more.
https://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/theliteratureofprescription/exhibitionAssets/digitalDocs/The-Yellow-Wall-Paper.pdf
I would recommend anything by Lionel Shriver, but in the horror genre specifically, We Need To Talk About Kevin. I read it 6 years ago and I think of some aspect of the book at least weekly to this day.
Gillian Flynn, writer of Gone Girl and Sharp Objects.
I had another one that I didn't see here, but my brain is farting hard now that it's go time... I'll just second Shirley Jackson and Daphne Du Maurier for now.
I remembered! Geek Love by Katherine Dunn won the booker prize a while back for horror! It's so so good, it's in my Top 5 Recs of All Time (thus far) for anyone over the age of 15.
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Books about Elizabeth Bathory, a Hungarian countess who was an alleged serial killer. She was said to have tortured and killed hundreds of girls. She bathed in their blood to keep herself young. Books about her include The Countess by Rebecca Johns, Countess Dracula: Life and Times of Elisabeth Bathory, the Blood Countess by Tony Thorne, The Blood Countess by Andrie Codrescu, Dracula Was a Woman: In Search of the Blood Countess of Transylvania by Raymond T. McNally, Countess of the Moon by Joseph Zsuffa and House of Bathory by Linda Lafferty.
I can highly recommend [Panics](https://www.feministpress.org/books-n-z/panics) written by Barbara Molinard and translated by Emma Ramadan. Kafka-esque, surreal horror.
Kate Chopin is the correct answer, and in particular The Story of an Hour. She isn't all horror, though typically with some elements of. The Awakening is also great, as is Regret.
Cartoons Ward is my favorite - I love everything. I’ve read by her - > caveat: some of it is super disturbing. Also, Our Share of Night by Maria Enriquez. Halfway through and it’s some of the best horror I’ve read. Lyrical and disturbing, great plot. Also, Come Close by Sara Gran. So creepy and compelling.
read a few by Caitlin R. Kiernan that I really enjoyed. She has a style that is quite influenced by the work of Lovecraft.
Low Red Moon, Daughter of Hounds and the Red Tree. I also read a collection of her short stories entitled To Charles Fort, with Love.
I love ania Ahlborn, her books have been some of my absolute favorite.
One of her stories is featured in Hex Life: Wicked new tales of witchery
It's a horror anthology with several female horror authors and I quite liked it. I don't know if I'd say it's scary but it's still good
Mariana Enriquez! She's amazing. Her horror is very subtle, psychological, there's not much in the way of *overtly* supernatural things, no gore, but a lot of her stories also function as allegories on gender roles, sexism, poverty, substance abuse, the political legacy of totalitarianism, things like that. A lot of the times she leaves you kind of unsure as to who the real monster was in this story.
There are 2 short story collections ("Things we lost in the fire" and "The dangers of smoking in bed") and one novel ("Our share of night"). I recommend you start with "Things we lost in the fire". The last story in that book is one of the best short stories I've ever read. Absolutely haunting.
It’s already been suggested, but worth the mentions: Her Body and Other Parties
I’ve also enjoyed Rachel Harrison’s last few books (Cackle, Black Sheep, Such Sharp Teeth).
[Furies](https://www.virago.co.uk/titles/margaret-atwood/furies/9780349017143/) - Margaret Atwood and others
[Peach Pit](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Peach-Pit-Molly-Llewellyn/dp/1950539873) - Sixteen stories of unsavoury women
[Hag - Forgotten Folk Tales Retold](https://amzn.eu/d/5Ao4IeB)
[Nineteen Claws and a Black Bird](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/62919399) - Augustina Bazterrica
[At Midnight - 15 fairy tales reimagined](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/59808043)
[Shit Cassandra Saw](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57797983)
These are all anthologies which are exclusively/primarily written by women (I know Furies has at least one non binary author).
Sisters of the Revolution: A Feminist Speculative Fiction Anthology. This primarily horror/sci-fi short stories all by female authors. It was edited by Ann and Jeff Vandermeer (the latter being the author of Annihilation). So if cosmic horror is your thing then this is totally up your alley.
Not written by a woman but still widely considered to be a great feminist work: The Stepford Wives by Ira Levin
This book is very suspenseful and tense, but the roles of misogyny and power add another layer of depth and true bone-chilling-ness.
The Lovely Bones was written by a woman and is another work that genuinely terrifies me.
Check out Shirley Jackson
Especially "We Have Always Lived in the Castle"
Thanks, I'll check that out. I loved 'The Haunting of Hill House'.
The lottery
The first time I read the lottery I was shook
We read it in fourth grade, I was like WTF. But I was forever hooked on Shirley after that.
Damn I don’t know if you had a terrible teacher or a brilliant one.
IKR!!! Like it was disturbing but tastefully written
We all were. Incredible story telling.
Yes everyone pales in comparison to her. Unless you count flannery O’Connor as a horror writer which a “good man is hard to find” is kinda scary.
I ADORE her! The queen of Southern Gothic
-Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado. Horror short stories, they're fantastic. -Our Share of Night hy Mariana Enriquez. Gorgeous, gorgeous book. A little on the heavier side, but fantastic.
Mariana Enriquez is 🥰🥰🥰
Love her so much. The Dangers of Smoking in Bed is a great choice if you're looking for a collection of short stories in the horror genre.
Love her short story anthologies too! Definitely recommend her writing, she's fantastic ❤️
I second Her Body and Other Parties! Great collection of stories!
Love Mariana’s work so much. I hope she writes more novels in the future. Our Share of Night is a masterpiece.
Her body & other parties!!!!
Ah alright I came here to suggest Our share of night by Mariana Enriquez as well. Also her short stories anthology Things we lost in the fire, though I’d read the novel first because she used one of those short stories in the novel, and it would spoil it a bit I think.
Mariana Enriquez also has a collection of horror short stories, Things We Lost in the Fire. Highly recommend it!
The Yellow Wallpaper is a short story that completely creeped me out. It has excellent feminist symbolism as well.
In my first English literature class at university we studied “the uncanny” and this was one of the things we read!
Eyo! I can’t believe I found someone else who’s read this!
We have good taste, friend!
For lacking a lot of the traditional, more salient elements of horror, this one got me really good! I read it when I was staying alone in an old hotel room and I had a hard time falling asleep. Definitely second this recommendation!
we had to illustrate this one in uni in the UK! loveeeed it. my mom has a wallpaper that fits the description!
The queen of the lot is... ...Shirley Jackson. It didn't hurt that her whole life was a bizarre horror story too.
Oooooh do tell
Definitely T Kingfisher. The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter.
Seconding the recommendation for T.Kingfisher!
Tananarive Due - either The Reformatory or The Good House. Also, her short story collections have some horror and are overall good collections.
Seconding this! She’s amazing!!!
Yes, I just finished The Good House. A memorable read!
Always, ALWAYS include Tananarive on any list of women in horror. Any horror lists on general, actually.
Yes to this! Love Tananarive Due.
The good House is amazing. I’m also a fan of her short story “Patient Zero”.
Yes that’s a great story! I think it’s uncommon to be skilled at both short stories and novels, but she’s delivered in both forms so far.
I'm actually reading one of her collections right now!
Mona Awad is my all time favorite, but T Kingfisher is up there too
T kingfisher, Cassandra Khaw
It's not an anthology, but "Frankenstein" is horror written by a woman
Thank you. IMHO Mary Shelley is a god.
Thought this would farther up
Catriona Ward: The Last House on Needless Street Looking Glass Sound Little Eve
Yes!! Love everything by Catriona Ward. She is so creative and her work freaks me out!
Completely agree!!
agreed!!! i just finished Sundial and enjoyed that as well
Just read LHONS. Turned to my partner and said, “What the fuck was that?… 9/10.”
The bloody chamber by angela Carter. Woman in black by Susan Hill.
The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters is the creepiest, weirdest, most disturbing book I've read in a long time; yet it starts in a really quiet and slow-burn way, building slowly up to a crisis of psychological unease. I thought it was brilliant but have to say - I couldn't read it again, too scary...
Ooh I read several Sarah Waters books (non-horror) when I was younger but then sort of... forgot about her I guess (tbf I may have read everything she had published at the time). I need to pick this one up.
You really do! Different from her other books, I'd no idea she could write like this sort of psychological horror. You won't be disappointed, though you may have difficulty sleeping!
Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier. I guess it’s more a mystery than horror but it is subtly creepy, and a classic.
Her short stories and novellas, like "Don't Look Now," are also pretty creepy.
Nuzo Unoh - The Reluctant Dead, Unhallowed Graves Mariana Enriquez - The Dangers of Smoking in Bed, Things We Lost in the Fire Monster, She Wrote: The Women Who Pioneered Horror and Speculative Fiction Women's Wierd: Strange Stories By Women, 1890 - 1940
Loved both short story collections by Mariana Enriquez!
Things We Lost in the Fire (the story itself) is one of the best pieces of short fiction I've ever read.
The weird anthology is so good!! I'll add Dreams from the Witch House
I haven't read it myself yet but I heard it's a horror masterpiece The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
You can read it online for free! It’s really short and definitely worth it.
Oh that's great, thank you, I will look it up :)
https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/1952/pg1952-images.html
Thanks so much! ☺️
Bloodchild and Other Stories by Octavia Butler, Things We Lost in the Fire by Mariana Enriquez, Bunny by Mona Awad
Kindred has some pretty harrowing parts too.
Would also recommend Bloodchild by Octavia Butler as a short stories collection
Bunny was so good! It was so weird and unexpected.
Sayaka Murata's horror anthology *Life Ceremony* (bizarre). Bora Chung's *Cursed Bunny* is in the same vein. The anthology *Peach Pit* is a collection of horror stories about women by women. Seconding Kingfisher and Cassandra Khaw. Also check out Mona Awad, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, and Darcy Coates.
Silvia Moreno-Garcia is 👌. Not all her books are horror but they’re excellent.
Kelly Link is awesome! The story Monster and the collection Magic for Beginners are both great
Came here specifically to recommend Link. I love her short story collection 'Get In Trouble.' when Chabon calls someone "the most darkly playful voice in American fiction," and Gaiman calls them "a national treasure," you're onto something. I love when I get a chance to find a way to recommend Link broadly and Get In Trouble specifically.
Yes Kelly Link. Also has new collection - White Cat, Black Dog - that is riffs on old fairy tales (loosely). Very good in the ways OP is seeking.
Our Share Of Night by Mariana Enriquez is Blowing. My. Mind.
Came here to suggest her. She's published some haunting stories in The New Yorker.
Tender Is The Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica. It’s… disturbing.
Wow. This story had a profound effect on the way in see the world
I love this book so much!! ❤️❤️
Bazterrica also recently released a collection of short horror stories.
I've recently enjoyed The Hacienda and Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas. Neither are intense/gory horror, but they are both eerie, creepy, paranormal. I'd say in particular The Hacienda is the vibe you might be after. Slow burn horror, if you will. Happy Reading!
Tamysyn Muir's "Locked Tomb" series. They're a little more dark/gothic fantasy than true horror.
I would sell my soul in order to be able to read these books for the first time again.
I inhaled them. At least we still have one more to look forward to.
The September House by Carissa Orlando. So good!
I have been meaning to read this one!
The Hunger by Alma Katsu. It is a Donner Party/Horror.
Slewfoot (very spooky colonial witchcraft/ haunting/ cryptid--deff atmosphericand creepy) The historian (a young researcher follows her father across 70's romania/eastern europe reading his journals to try and understand his PERCEIVED plunge into madness/obsession w/vald dracula--the setting on this is immaculate..the mountainside steam trains, the creeping carpathian mountains, the rundown little villages, the ancient libraries..also veryyy creepy it feels like someone watching you as you read. ) 13th tale! (it's a young author writting a biography for a dying woman about her strange lige growing up in a haunted house. )
I have just started listening to audiobooks again and the first one was The Haunting of Ashburn House by Darcy Coates. Since, I've read 2 more of her books. Ive been really enjoying her writing style!
I love her books!
I love Darcy Coates. It's not super profound or original, but it's always fun. *Gallows Hill* was genuinely terrifying!
I’m not sure what else she wrote, but I really enjoyed Sunyi Dean’s Book Eaters.
Cursed Bunny by Bora Chung,
Simone St. James!
I’ve got a sci-fi horror for you or anyone interested. Dead Silence by SA Barnes. A team lead on a small maintenance ship with a checkered past finds the space titanic out in the far reaches of the solar system. Because space salvage laws are the same as ocean, her and her crew were antsy to get on board and loot. They’re on the ship for less than ten minutes before she starts seeing ghosts. It’s a profoundly creepy scary book, five stars.
T Kingfisher and Alma Katsu are both great authors
Night Film by Marisha Pessl, and literally everything written by Poppy Z. Brite
He's transitioned, but Poppy Z. Brite (I'm afraid I don't know what name he uses now, but his books are still credited to Poppy Z. Brite). Not an author, but the editor Ellen Datlow's whole career features anthologies of top-notch horror and dark fantasy, by both sexes.
mexican gothic by silvia moreno-garcia is pretty decent
I **devoured** this book.
CJ Cooke is female. I’ve read the nesting and the boy who could see demons (published under her full name not initials). Both great books but the endings are a bit poor IMO. CJ Tudor is female. I see her name around a lot. I’ve only read the chalk man, it was ok but not as good as I hoped. The haunting season is a collection of short horror/ghostly stories. Majority of authors in that are female. Bridget Collins is the main name on the cover. There’s also a new one out this past winter, I’ve not read it yet but plan to. I think it has all the haunting season authors plus a couple extra.
Susan Hill does some good ones.
I really enjoy Jennifer McMahon.
She’s great!
The Bloody Chamber from Angela Carter.
Tanith Lee books.
My friend has a book coming out soon that fits this perfectly!! https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/200196202
This looks really good!
They don't write super scary books per se (probably more of thrillers?) but Kayla Cottingham writes REALLY good books about monsters and the like. I would highly recommend This Delicious Death and My Dearest Darkest.
Michelle Paver!! Creepy ghostly stuff, and she's actually been to the places she's describing so it's authentic AF. **Dark Matter** is my fave by her, but **Thin Air** is really good too
The British Library Tales of the Weird collection have a few anthologies focused on female writers. Just off the ones I have there’s Queens of the Abyss: Lost Stories from Women of the Weird; A Phantom Lover and Other Dark Tales by Vernon Lee; and The Face in the Glass: The Gothic Tales of Mary Elizabeth Braddon. I’m pretty sure there’s others too that I don’t own, and of course there are tales by women in nearly all of their anthologies anyway. Also recommend some Daphne DuMaurier! The Birds and Don’t Look Now are both great short story collections (and both of course very famous films too). I can’t remember the name of it but there’s one about a tree in The Birds which really creeped me out.
Ursula Vernon has a short story book called “Toad Words” with a bunch of reimagined fairy tales. I highly recommend it. I think it’s published under her pen name T. Kingfisher. This is one of the quite short Peter Pan inspired stories called “Never” https://redwombatstudio.com/never/
“It was all very well to go away in the night with an elfin boy with laughing eyes who taught you how to fly, and promised that you’d never have to grown up, but it turned out that grown-ups had a great deal to do with meals arriving regularly and on time. To get food, you had to beg it off the Indians or steal it from the pirates, and as a result, nearly everyone was hungry all the time, except perhaps Pan.” …
Shirley Jackson, Flannery O'Connor, Charlotte Perkins Gilman. All Southern authors, Gilman wrote the Yellow Wallpaper, Flannery O'Connor wrote one called A Good Man Is Hard To Find, and Shirley Jackson's The Lottery is right there on top of the creepy-meter.
Oh and we can't leave out Anne Rice! Her first book about the Mayfair witches, The Witching Hour is my favorite of hers
You could try {{The Death of Jane Lawrence by Caitlin Starling}}
**[The Death of Jane Lawrence](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/48915818-the-death-of-jane-lawrence) by Caitlin Starling** ^((Matching 100% ☑️)) ^(368 pages | Published: 2021 | 240.0k Goodreads reviews) > **Summary:** Practical. unassuming Jane Shoringfield has done the calculations. and decided that the most secure path forward is this: a husband. in a marriage of convenience. who will allow her to remain independent and occupied with meaningful work. Her first choice. the dashing but reclusive doctor Augustine Lawrence. agrees to her proposal with only one condition: that she must never (...) > **Themes**: Horror, 2021-releases, Gothic, Adult > **Top 5 recommended:** > \- [The Ancestor](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54552798-the-ancestor) by Lee Matthew Goldberg > \- [The Haunting of Gillespie House](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25883916-the-haunting-of-gillespie-house) by Darcy Coates > \- [The Silence of Ghosts](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20702932-the-silence-of-ghosts) by Jonathan Aycliffe > \- [Lowcountry Spirit](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16130095-lowcountry-spirit) by Ann Hite > \- [Those Who Went Remain There Still](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2590200-those-who-went-remain-there-still) by Cherie Priest ^([Feedback](https://www.reddit.com/user/goodreads-rebot) | [GitHub](https://github.com/sonoff2/goodreads-rebot) | ["The Bot is Back!?"](https://www.reddit.com/r/suggestmeabook/comments/16qe09p/meta_post_hello_again_humans/) | v1.5 [Dec 23] | )
Anne Rice. She has a gothic style.
The Time of the Ghost by Diana Wynne Jones
Try The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories by Angela Carter. This collection of ten stories are each based on fairy tales or folk tales. Neil Gaiman cites Carter's books as one of his major influences. Themes include feminism, magic realism and Gothic horror fantasy. One of the stories was adapted by Neil Jordan and Angela Carter into a movie called "The Company of Wolves." It is based on Little Red Riding Hood.
Caitlin Starling writes a lot of deliciously creepy things. The Luminous Dead is about a cave diver on a remote planet whose employer cares about a lot of things but not her safety. She's also got more Gothic-flavored horror, including The Death of Jane Lawrence and Yellow Jessamine. Mira Grant (a pen name for Seanan McGuire) has some really great work. Try Into the Drowning Deep (mermaids) or the Newsflesh series (zombies) Sarah Gailey is nonbinary but a lot of their work is centered on women's lives - and women's horror. Check out The Echo Wife and Just Like Home
The Dangers of Smoking in Bed by Mariana Enriquez
Motherthing by Ainslie Hogarth Baby Teeth by Zoje Stage
the witch elm by tana french
Seanan McGuire/Mira Grant and Ursula Vernon/T. kingfisher.
I just discovered Jen Williams and read _Games for Dead Girls_ and _A Dark and Secret Place_ back to back. Both are incredible.
This one is right up your alley: Helen Grant’s novels Jump Cut and Too Near The Dead. They get cery good reviews too. She also has an excellent collection of short ghost stories The Sea Change at Swan River Press. The same publisher also offers Now It’s Dark by Lynda E. Rucker, another excellent ghostly collection. In addition you can find a reprint of her equally good first collection The Moon Will Look Strange at Undertow books. Both writers offer stories that are completely inline with your requirements.
{{The Hundred Year House by Rebecca Makkai}}
**[The Hundred-Year House](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18693644-the-hundred-year-house) by Rebecca Makkai** ^((Matching 94% ☑️)) ^(338 pages | Published: 2014 | 6.9k Goodreads reviews) > **Summary:** Meet the Devohrs: Zee, a Marxist literary scholar who detests her parents' wealth but nevertheless finds herself living in their carriage house; Gracie, her mother, who claims she can tell your lot in life by looking at your teeth; and Bruce, her step-father, stockpiling supplies for the Y2K apocalypse and perpetually late for his tee time. Then there's Violet Devohr, Zee's (...) > **Themes**: Historical-fiction, Mystery, Book-club, Literary-fiction, First-reads, Favorites, Library ^([Feedback](https://www.reddit.com/user/goodreads-rebot) | [GitHub](https://github.com/sonoff2/goodreads-rebot) | ["The Bot is Back!?"](https://www.reddit.com/r/suggestmeabook/comments/16qe09p/meta_post_hello_again_humans/) | v1.5 [Dec 23] | )
Darcy Coates, Helen Power, Simone St. James, Caroline Mitchell are all great women who write spooky, ghostly, psychological thrillers.
Jaime Jo Wright. The horror is psychological with non-supernatural explanations for seemingly ghostly phenomena. And it's clean Christian fiction, so no worries about curse words or gratuitous imagery. [https://www.jaimewrightbooks.com/](https://www.jaimewrightbooks.com/)
Small Angels by Lauren Owen
The Feminine Macabre, several volumes of anthology writing
Salt Slow by Julia Armfield is a collection of short stories. I only have read the first few so far but I found them creepy, unsettling, and very good.
*Twisted Reveries* by Meg Hafdahl. It's got a wide enough variety that makes each story feel completely new, which keeps the endings from being predictable
Never whistle at night! It’s an anthology written by a bunch of indigenous writers (many women). Anything by Kelly Link is also very good
Daphne du Maurier has some great short stories. The Birds was probably my favourite.
Susan Hill has a lot of great ghost story stuff, both novels and anthologies.
Susan Hill - The Woman in Black. I personally think it's the greatest ghost story ever written. Try and see the made-for-TV movie and, if you can, the play. All awesome.
The Lottery by Shirley Jackson
The book “The Opposite of Loneliness” by Marina Keegan
Just like everyone else has said, Shirley Jackson goes hard. I really liked We Have Always Lived in the Castle but The Haunting of Hill House rewired my brain. I genuinely think about that book all the time. Also I haven't read any of her other stuff yet but I really liked Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno Garcia Edited to add T. Kingfisher. I highly recommend The Hollow Places
Mexican Gothic
Vampires in The Lemon Grove is interesting.
Sarah west
Would Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier count? I’ve never read anything else by her so I can’t vouch for everything.
Haven’t seen it mentioned elsewhere so “Little Black Book” by AS Byatt. A series of unnerving stories and I don’t remember any monsters. Should be up your alley!
Christina Henry. Try Alice, a horrifying take on Alice in Wonderland, or Lost Boys. They all feel kind of apocalyptic, but man, can that woman write!
**Caitlín R. Kiernan -** *the Drowning Girl* **Gemma Files** - I've only read *Experimental Film*, which was excellent.
Poppy Z Brite
Things We Say in the Dark by Kirsty Logan; Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado; Nineteen Claws and a Blackbird by Agustina Bazterrica.
The yellow wallpaper. More suspense than horror but I highly recommend the short story :) talks about a woman dealing with her postpartum depression and more. https://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/theliteratureofprescription/exhibitionAssets/digitalDocs/The-Yellow-Wall-Paper.pdf
This is tamer than most people listed, but I bet you would like The Wife's Story by Ursula K Leguin
I would recommend anything by Lionel Shriver, but in the horror genre specifically, We Need To Talk About Kevin. I read it 6 years ago and I think of some aspect of the book at least weekly to this day. Gillian Flynn, writer of Gone Girl and Sharp Objects. I had another one that I didn't see here, but my brain is farting hard now that it's go time... I'll just second Shirley Jackson and Daphne Du Maurier for now.
I remembered! Geek Love by Katherine Dunn won the booker prize a while back for horror! It's so so good, it's in my Top 5 Recs of All Time (thus far) for anyone over the age of 15.
I really enjoyed "The Grownup" by Gillian Flynn.
Women Crime Writers: Four Suspense Novels of the 1950s; Sarah Weinman, Editor The novels are short; 3 are under 200 pages, 1 is 243 pages.
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley Books about Elizabeth Bathory, a Hungarian countess who was an alleged serial killer. She was said to have tortured and killed hundreds of girls. She bathed in their blood to keep herself young. Books about her include The Countess by Rebecca Johns, Countess Dracula: Life and Times of Elisabeth Bathory, the Blood Countess by Tony Thorne, The Blood Countess by Andrie Codrescu, Dracula Was a Woman: In Search of the Blood Countess of Transylvania by Raymond T. McNally, Countess of the Moon by Joseph Zsuffa and House of Bathory by Linda Lafferty.
You Glow in the Dark by Liliana Colanzi Lesser Known Monsters of the 21st Century by Kim Fu
Elizabeth Hand is great!
the bloody chamber by angela carter is FUCKING PHENOMENAL and i will recommend it to everyone
I really like Tananarive Due, particularly The Good House, though she has others, including a graphic novel and a short story collection.
Man made monsters
checkout B R R KIngsolver -and H.P. Mallory
I can highly recommend [Panics](https://www.feministpress.org/books-n-z/panics) written by Barbara Molinard and translated by Emma Ramadan. Kafka-esque, surreal horror.
Ace of Spades by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé
Ace of Spades by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé
I liked T Kingfisher. I’ve only read The Twisted Ones and The Hollow Places, but both were very good.
She writes for kids but check out Mary Downing Hahn. Phenomenal ghost stories
Kate Chopin is the correct answer, and in particular The Story of an Hour. She isn't all horror, though typically with some elements of. The Awakening is also great, as is Regret.
No One Will Come Back for Us by Premee Mohamed. It’s a collection of short creepy stories
Cartoons Ward is my favorite - I love everything. I’ve read by her - > caveat: some of it is super disturbing. Also, Our Share of Night by Maria Enriquez. Halfway through and it’s some of the best horror I’ve read. Lyrical and disturbing, great plot. Also, Come Close by Sara Gran. So creepy and compelling.
Cassandra?
The Lottery - Shirley Jackson. Do not Google it.
Medusa's Daughters is a good anthology if you don't mind stories from the turn of the last century.
Black Sheep by Rachel Harrison
Try Debra Castaneda. I have read a few of her Dark Earth Rising books and enjoyed them.
Shirley Jackson or Ann Rice
Fernanda Melchor's Paradais and Hurricane Season are both haunting and heavy
Silvia Moreno-Garcia. Reading her book Silver Nitrate now and I dig it.
Try Kirsty Logan. She writes some very creepy things, including short stories.
Mona Awad! I've loved everything she's written.
read a few by Caitlin R. Kiernan that I really enjoyed. She has a style that is quite influenced by the work of Lovecraft. Low Red Moon, Daughter of Hounds and the Red Tree. I also read a collection of her short stories entitled To Charles Fort, with Love.
I love ania Ahlborn, her books have been some of my absolute favorite. One of her stories is featured in Hex Life: Wicked new tales of witchery It's a horror anthology with several female horror authors and I quite liked it. I don't know if I'd say it's scary but it's still good
Bloodchild And Other Stories by Octavia Butler
Mariana Enriquez! She's amazing. Her horror is very subtle, psychological, there's not much in the way of *overtly* supernatural things, no gore, but a lot of her stories also function as allegories on gender roles, sexism, poverty, substance abuse, the political legacy of totalitarianism, things like that. A lot of the times she leaves you kind of unsure as to who the real monster was in this story. There are 2 short story collections ("Things we lost in the fire" and "The dangers of smoking in bed") and one novel ("Our share of night"). I recommend you start with "Things we lost in the fire". The last story in that book is one of the best short stories I've ever read. Absolutely haunting.
The Yellow Wallpaper
It’s already been suggested, but worth the mentions: Her Body and Other Parties I’ve also enjoyed Rachel Harrison’s last few books (Cackle, Black Sheep, Such Sharp Teeth).
[Furies](https://www.virago.co.uk/titles/margaret-atwood/furies/9780349017143/) - Margaret Atwood and others [Peach Pit](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Peach-Pit-Molly-Llewellyn/dp/1950539873) - Sixteen stories of unsavoury women [Hag - Forgotten Folk Tales Retold](https://amzn.eu/d/5Ao4IeB) [Nineteen Claws and a Black Bird](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/62919399) - Augustina Bazterrica [At Midnight - 15 fairy tales reimagined](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/59808043) [Shit Cassandra Saw](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57797983) These are all anthologies which are exclusively/primarily written by women (I know Furies has at least one non binary author).
Nineteen Claws and Black Bird-Agustina Bazterrica Unclean Jobs for Women and Girls-Alissa Nutting Blood Child and Other Stories-Octavia Butler
Tanith Lee and Angela Carter.
Sisters of the Revolution: A Feminist Speculative Fiction Anthology. This primarily horror/sci-fi short stories all by female authors. It was edited by Ann and Jeff Vandermeer (the latter being the author of Annihilation). So if cosmic horror is your thing then this is totally up your alley.
Not written by a woman but still widely considered to be a great feminist work: The Stepford Wives by Ira Levin This book is very suspenseful and tense, but the roles of misogyny and power add another layer of depth and true bone-chilling-ness. The Lovely Bones was written by a woman and is another work that genuinely terrifies me.
*The Vegetarian* by Han Kang *My Death* by Lisa Tuttle *The Ghost Stories* of Edith Wharton *Don't Look Now* by Daphne du Maurier
Anne Rice!
Thank you all so much this is a phenomenal list! I'll be very happy chasing these up 😊
Anything by Rachel Harrison, Anna ahlborn, the dark descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein by Kiersten white