These horror-adjacent titles, compiled by NYPL's Horror Committee, are thrillers and chillers that skirt the horror genre yet still maintain a Hitchcockian flair that will keep readers on the edge of their seat. The majority are fiction, but there are a few nonfiction titles here because we all know that sometimes truth is scarier than fiction.

Nonfiction

The Witches: Salem 1692 by Stacy Schiff

The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Cleopatra analyzes the Salem Witch Trials to offer key insights into the role of women in its events while explaining how its tragedies became possible.

 

 

 

 

A Season With the Witch: The Magic and Mayhem of Halloween in Salem, Massachusetts by J.W. Ocker

Follows the author's experiences of living in downtown Salem in the fall of 2015, blending an exploration of all the historical sites and attractions with interviews of locals and visitors to create a portrait of the city.

See also: Cursed Objects: Strange but True Stories of the World’s Most Infamous Items, another nonfiction horror lite title by J.W. Ocker.

 

 

Season of the Witch: How the Occult Saved Rock and Roll by Peter Bebergal

Takes readers on a cultural and historical tour of how rock and roll was influenced and shaped by mystic, occult and supernatural traditions, from Elvis Presley and the British Invasion bands, to 1980s metal and modern hip-hop.

 

 

 

Fiction

The Retreat by Elisabeth de Mariaffi

A dancer seeking to escape her past trauma with an ex attends a snowy artist retreat and meets a cadre of artists with their own pasts coming into play.

 

 

 

 

 

Shutter by Melissa Larsen

Betty Roux is a young actress who impetuously joins a remote filming project with a hotshot director whose isolating and off-kilter techniques may be more than mere method acting; or is there more than meets the eye to this film?

 

 

 

 

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier

A young girl becomes the second Mrs. Max de Winter, only to find that she is not the mistress of Manderley. Instead the house and its occupants are dominated by the memory of Rebecca, her predecessor.

 

 

 

 

The House of the Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne

The curse of Matthew Maule descends on seven generations of the inhabitants of an old New England house.

 

 

 

 

 

Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

A reimagining of the classic gothic suspense novel follows the experiences of a courageous socialite in 1950s Mexico who is drawn into the treacherous secrets of an isolated mansion.

If this is too horror-y for you, try Velvet Was the Night, the new crime noir thriller from Silvia Moreno-Garcia.

 

 

 

The Stepford Wives by Ira Levin

After moving to the "ideal" suburban community of Stepford, Connecticut, with her husband and children, Joanna Eberhart is stunned by the subservient and complacent nature of the women of the town as she struggles to establish a women's liberation group, but she soon discovers the terrifying secret behind the women's behavior.

 

 

 

The Monster at the End of This Book: Starring Lovable, Furry Old Grover by Jon Stone

Grover worries page by page about meeting the monster at the end of this book. He'll plead, staple pages together, and build brick walls to get you—the reader—to heed the warning of the title and find something less scary to read.

A children's classic that reminds us all that suspense can be the scariest thing of all.

 

 

 

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Some summaries provided via NYPL’s catalog, which draws from multiple sources. Click through to each book’s title for more.