13 Perfect Books For Your Spooky Fall TBR

Merricat is 18 and lives with her sister Constance and their invalid Uncle Julian on the Blackwood Estate, the only survivors of a massacre of poisoned sugar berries.  The estate is isolated and Merricat only goes into town twice a week to get groceries and library books.

Soon cousin Charles shows up and becomes Merricat’s nemesis.  He tries to convince Constance, the recluse, to leave the estate and show him the combination to Merricat’s safe to steal her silver coins and get rid of her.  Merricat decides she needs to get rid of cousin Charles, an evil demon, and soon the estate is burning to the ground.

Marion is the newbie, Zoey, the pariah, and Val, the queen bee.  Their stories come together on the island of Sawkill Rock where horses graze in pastures, waves crash against cliffs, and kids whisper legends of an insidious monster.  Girls have been disappearing for decades and these girls are ready to fight this evil.

Ollie only finds solace in books after a tragic loss. When she sees a crazed woman about to throw a book into the river, she steals the book and runs away. As she reads it, she finds a story about Beth and her two brothers who made a deal with the Smiling Man who grants your most tightly held wish. For a price. She is captivated.

The next day, on a school field trip to Smoke Hollow, a farm with a haunting history, where she finds the graves of the very characters she read about.

On the way home, the bus breaks down and the teacher must return to the farm for help. While she’s gone, the bus driver gives the kids some strange advice: “Best get moving. At nightfall, they’ll come for the rest of you.” Her previously broken watch starts a startling countdown with a terrifying message: RUN.

She and two classmates heed the warning and head into the woods with one last piece of advice: “Avoid large places. Keep to small.”

Harper is the new seventh grader in town who needs to face down the ghosts haunting her little brother. She doesn’t trust her new home at all and the rumors are that it’s haunted. She doesn’t believe it until her little brother starts acting strange.

It all feels familiar but she can’t figure out why. The memories she’s blocked will help her get to the bottom of his behavior and the strange sensations she feels in the house, but can she put the pieces together in time?

Iris and her two older sisters are strange. Since they disappeared from a suburban Scotland street as children, showing up a month later with no idea what happened, odd occurrences seem to follow wherever they go. Then they start changing; dark hair to white, blue eyes to black, and an insatiable appetite that never results in weight gain.

Ten years later though, Iris is doing everything she can to fit in and graduate high school but when her sister Gret goes missing, Iris and Vivi are left to follow bizarre clues to bring her home. As they search, they realize they aren’t the only ones looking for her and the story they’ve been told about their past begins to unravel.

When Rhea reaches out to touch the waking forest, looming dark at the edge of her yard, it vanishes. One day, she finds a peculiar boy who offers to share its secrets if she plays a game.

The forest is the witch’s home where she waits for dreaming children to beg her to grant their wishes. One night, a mysterious visitor arrives and asks what she wishes for. She sends him away only for him to return later.

When Rhea’s and the witch’s path collide, treacherous and deadly truths come to light and they need to decide what they’re willing to risk to survive.

Lora thinks growing up sounds terrible. As her friends start to fade away she is determined to still have fun on her own. A tea party with a twist leaves her with Alexa, a ghost that haunts her house and her former imaginary friend! They become best friends but not everything can last forever.

Yasuko is a divorced single mother who thought she finally escaped her abusive husband Togashi. When he shows up to extort money from her, it turns violent and he ends up dead on the floor.

Her neighbor, a high school math teacher, overheard the commotion and offered to help get rid of the body and cover up the crime. When the body is uncovered and identified, Yasuko is under suspicion but Detective Kusanagi can’t find any holes in her alibi even though he knows something is off.

He calls in the help of his old friend and physicist Yukawa, known as Professor Galileo, to help get to the bottom of everything.

Marjorie, a thirteen-year-old, feels like a ghost as she runs the family laundry business. Wendell is a ghost who lost his life much too young.

Their worlds collide as Wendell turns the family laundromat into his midnight playground, appearing as a sheet during the day. As he tries to create a new afterlife for himself, he unknowingly sabotages the life Marjorie is struggling to maintain.

This one is so high on my graphic novel TBR and it sounds so perfect for fall!

Winter didn’t want to be the guardian of the wood but she has no choice when her dad vanishes. She has to protect the travelers who accidentally slip through the portals.

The wood is poisoned though and soon the trees are bubbling inky black. Creatures that live there are becoming bolder and torturing lost travelers. With the help of Henry, a young man from eighteenth-century England who knows a little too much about the wood, Winter must find the truth and hopefully those they’ve lost.

I read this last year and loved it so much! Plus, that cover! This is the perfect fall fantasy book.

Two centuries ago in the town of Sparrow, three sisters were sentenced to death for witchery and drowned in the deep waters outside of the town.

Every summer, the sisters return for three weak-hearted girls to get their revenge, luring boys into the harbor and pulling them under.

Penny has accepted the fate of the town but on the eve of their return this year, Bo, a newcomer, has no idea what he stumbled into. They suspect each other of hiding secrets as mistrust and lies spread through the town but Penny sees what others can’t and she either has to save Bo or herself.

The days of witches have long passed and now, in 1893, if a woman wants any power, she must find it at the ballot box. But when the Eastwood sisters join the New Salem suffragists, they begin to pursue forgotten ways that may turn the women’s movement into the witch’s movement.

Shadows and sickness stalk them as they are hunted by forces who will not suffer a witch to vote, or even live, and the sisters need to delve into the oldest magics to heal the bond between them if they want to survive.

Zee disappeared for a year and no one knows where he went, but now he’s back. But since he’s been back, he’s been different. After he freaks out about his friends playing hide and seek, strange things start to happen. Everyone who played has a mark on their wrist and then they disappear.

They’re pulled into a shadow world ruled by the Seeker, a shapeshifter, and the kid’s worst nightmares. They have to work together to beat the Seeker or be lost in the Nowhere forever.