Old book lit by haunting lighting. ()
Halloween is a time for tricks, treats and monster mashing. Grab a nice hot pumpkin spice latte and curl up with one of these 10 creepy, horror, weird, gothic and thriller books set in Europe to help get you in the spooky mood.
Dracula by Bram Stoker (1897). Set in Romanian Transylvania and then in England. This classic tale begins with Jonathan Harker traveling to Transylvania from England to help the odd and reclusive Count Dracula purchase an English estate. What follows includes shipwrecks, brain fevers, encounters with wolfdogs, trances and vampirism.
Such Small Hands by Andrés Barba (2008). Set in Spain. Marina is a young girl sent to live in an orphanage after the death of her parents in a car crash. As an outcast in the orphanage, she creates a game to play with the fellow girls which has violent and horrifying results.
Last Ones Left Alive by Sarah Davis-Goff (2019). Set in Ireland. This post-apocalyptic zombie story follows Orpen, her guardian Maeve and their dog, Danger, as they travel across Ireland to a distant city to find a cure for recently zombie-infected Maeve.
Let the Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist (2004). Set in Sweden. Another vampire tale, and a personal favorite of mine, this tells the story of 12-year-old Oskar and the friendship he develops with the mysterious new girl next door. The body of a young boy in found in the town that Oskar lives in and there is a question whether this new girl is somehow involved.
The Golem by Gustav Meyrink (1915). Set in Czech Republic. This is a story, originally published as a series of periodical articles in 1913 and 1914, that follows the life of a jeweler, Athanasius Pernath, in the ghetto of Prague. What ensues is mayhem and mischief in the form of forged identities, hallucinations and mystical events.
I Remember You by Yrsa Sigurðardóttir (2010). Set in Iceland. Partly based on a true story of the haunting stories of three friends’ attempt to renovate an abandoned house and an elderly woman died by suicide after an obsession with a missing boy. Discover the truth as the relationship between the two stories is revealed.
Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (1818). Set in Germany. Another famous classic novel that really needs no explanation. This tells the tragic story of Frankenstein’s monster that is rejected by its maker and society and what ensues because of the rejection.
Wolf Winter by Cecilia Ekbäck (2014). Set in 1700s Sweden. Newly emigrated from Finland, young Frederika stumbles upon the mutilated body of a neighbor boy while herding goats on a mountain. The locals quickly dismiss the event as a wolf attack, but something more sinister is apparent. A harsh winter forces Frederika and her family to gather with these mysterious locals and no one is sure who to trust.
The October Boys by Adam Millard (2019). Set in England. This novel is set in both 1988 and 2016. In 1988, a group of 12-year-old boys go trick-or-treating and follow the distant sounds of an ice cream truck where one of them disappears forever. In 2016, the boys return to the scene of the disappearance to try and discover the truth of their missing friend.
The Boy in the Suitcase by Lene Kaaberbøl and Agnete Friis (2008). Set in Denmark. A series of promises and events leads to Nina Borg, a Red Cross nurse, to find a three-year-old boy drugged, but alive, in a backpack in a storage locker. What follows is a trek across Denmark to save the boy from whoever is hunting him.
We won’t judge if you have to sleep with the lights on after reading these terrifying tales.
