Red Eye Blog Tour: My Magnificent Seven Scariest Books by Alex Bell (author of Frozen Charlotte)

And so the nightmares continue....

Yes, the Red Eye blog tour is back at The Book Zone, this time with author Alex Bell telling us about her Magnificent Seven Scariest Books. Alex is the author of Frozen Charlotte, one of the two books released this month by Red Eye, Stripes Publishing's new YA horror imprint. I've just finished Frozen Charlotte and it is very creepy and pretty terrifying on a psychological level. And if you have a phobia about porcelain dolls (which are creepy as hell at the best of times) the you certainly won't want to be reading this one at night time.


And so, over to Alex and her seven scariest books:


1. The Haunting of Toby Jugg by Dennis Wheatley - The first half of this book contains some of the best understated, unnerving horror I've ever read. You definitely feel the terror and helplessness of the main character in this one.

2. The Shining by Stephen King - I read this classic horror tale whilst staying in a very old hotel in New Orleans. As haunted hotel stories go, this has got to be one of the best. It’s a shame the topiary animals were replaced by a hedge maze in the film.

3. The Turn of the Screw by Henry James  - One of my favourite classic ghost stories – this creepy tale has an unreliable narrator and an ambiguous open ending as well as some pretty terrifying encounters in the house and the grounds.

4. This House is Haunted by John Boyne – John Boyne can write anything and excel at it. His ghost story is very much in the Dickensian tradition and contains some of the most bone-chilling scenes I’ve ever come across. A total masterpiece.

5. Florence and Giles by John Harding – I love this re-imagining of The Turn of the Screw. The language is a real treat and like nothing else you’ve ever come across before.

6. Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane – Not a horror book as such but Shutter Island definitely creeped me out with its themes of paranoia, madness and self-destruction.

7. The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson – Another classic ghost tale, this one definitely delivers its fair share of scares.

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Huge thanks to Alex for taking the time to write this for us. The Red Eye Blog Tour is about to come to an end, so please head on over to http://reading-in-between-the-lines.blogspot.co.uk for its final stop.