Recently arrived horror fiction
The horror genre ranges from gore-fests and splatterpunk to psychological, witchy, feminist and grimdark. Here are our picks for recent arrivals.
The Starving Saints by Caitlin Starling
Aymar Castle has been under siege for six months, the inhabitants on the brink of starvation. When a group of "saints" and their leader, the Constant Lady, mysteriously arrive they offering endless feasts and salvation. But this apparent miracle quickly devolves into a bacchanalian nightmare of madness and cannibalism and three women trapped in the castle—a disillusioned war hero, a paranoid nun-turned-sorceress, and a servant seeking vengeance— must navigate the horrors unfolding within the castle walls. Complex, morally ambiguous characters and the sapphic relationships that develop between them, add layers of desire and betrayal to the already tense plot.
The Militia House by John Milas
Marine Corps veteranCorporal Loyette and his unit, bored and restless during their deployment in Kajaki, Afghanistan become fixated on a nearby, abandoned Soviet-era barracks, dubbed 'the Militia House',rumoured to be haunted after a historic massacre. Despite warnings, they secretly explore the house and return deeply unsettled. Soon unexplainable occurrences begin to plague Loyette and his marines, the Militia House acting as a focal point for their existing anxieties, blurring the lines between the supernatural and the psychological toll of war.
Cursed Daughters by Oyinkan Braithwaite
The Falodun family women are supposedly afflicted by a curse that prevents them from having successful romantic relationships. Three women - from Monife, whose tragic death fuels the family fear to her cousin, Ebun and Ebun's daughter, Eniiyi, who is born on the day of Monife's funeral and uncannily resembles her leading the family to believe the baby is Monife reincarnated, destined to repeat her fate. Is their heartbreak due to a supernatural curse or the crippling legacy of intergenerational trauma and self-fulfilling prophecy? Braithwaite blends modern Lagos life with magical realism, ultimately asking if Eniiyi can break the painful pattern and forge her own, autonomous path.
Sarah makes her living growing mushrooms but becomes desperate after a bad harvest. Lured into the notoriously dangerous and eldritch Pamogo forest to hunt for a rare, potent hallucinogen known as the King's Breakfast a mushroom that supposedly grants users cosmic understanding and communion with forgotten gods, her journey descends into a gory, wild nightmare of cosmic horror and botanical terror. Blending splatterpunk nastiness with a hilarious and heartfelt exploration of queer identity and community, and a complex, realised trans heroine, Moonflow is a grotesque, comedic, and strangely profound psychedelic trip.
What Stalks the Deep by T. Kingfisher
Summoned by their friend, Dr. Denton, Alex and their assistant Angus reluctantly travel to the US to investigate an abandoned, supposedly haunted coal mine in West Virginia. Denton's cousin has vanished there after sending increasingly frantic letters describing a strange glowing red light and unsettling noises from the deep tunnels. As the group descends into the mine, they encounter bizarre biological and Lovecraftian entities, prompting a mix of genuine dread and Alex's characteristic witty, deadpan humour. Kingfisher continues to hold the 'soft horror' genre flag high.
We Are Always Tender With Our Dead by Eric LaRocca
In the isolated community of Burnt Sparrow, New Hampshire family of faceless entities commits an unspeakable horror on Christmas Day. The town's eccentric, purple-clad elders decide on an unprecedented response: the bodies are to be left untouched on Main Street, and a young man named Rupert Cromwell and his father are drafted as "preservers" to guard and tend to the corpses. This is a book for those who like their horror with a claustrophobic, hopeless atmosphere - one that blends visceral gore with high literary prose.
Vera is a former statistics professor shattered by the Low-Probability Event (LPE), a global catastrophe where nearly eight million people died in bizarre, statistically impossible ways (e.g., fish raining from the sky, attacks by chimpanzees with typewriters). Four years later, government agent Layne approaches Vera, believing the LPE is connected to a statistically improbable, always-winning Las Vegas casino called the Great Britannica. Vera, who previously studied the casino for its impossible odds, reluctantly joins the investigation to find logic in a world now ruled by chaos. In typical Tingle style, this is a work of absurdist existential horror, blending gory, Final Destination-style horror with sharp critiques of societal resilience and features a compelling queer protagonist.
The Witch of Willow Sound by Vanessa F. Penney
A moody, feminist gothic mystery about Fade Luck, who returns to a remote Nova Scotia forest to find her missing aunt Madeline who has long ostracised as a suspected witch. As Fade explores her aunt’s abandoned, decaying cottage and clashes with a fearful, superstitious village, she unearths layered secrets, local prejudice, the stories people tell to justify fear, and the violence done to those deemed “other.” This is a slow-burning atmospheric read that interrogates how communities rewrite history to hide their guilt.
