25 Must-Read Horror Collections and Anthologies

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My Mother She Killed Me, My Father He Ate Me edited by Kate Bernheimer

This World Fantasy Award-winning anthology contains 40 beloved fairy tales, twisted and retold by specified celebrated writers arsenic Francesca Lia Block, Brian Evenson, Karen Joy Fowler, Neil Gaiman, Hiromi Ito, Ilya Kaminsky, Kelly Link, and Gregory Maguire.

Let’s Play White by Chesya Burke

Sometimes bleak, sometimes gruesome, sometimes shocking, the 11 stories successful Chesya Burke’s 2011 postulation revolve astir cognition — specifically, however good we cognize ourselves and others. The stories present determination betwixt the past and present, and absorption mostly connected Black characters, from an entrepreneurial pistillate surviving successful Depression-era Harlem to a holdout determined to defy the zombie apocalypse that has taken implicit the remainder of town. This is creeping, unsettling-to-the-bone fearfulness astatine its finest.

Through the Woods by Emily Carroll

The fairy tale-esque stories successful Through the Woods person decidedly travel backmost to haunt maine successful the years since I archetypal work Emily Carroll’s postulation of graphic abbreviated fiction. From the viral popularity of “His Face All Red” to the don’t-look-over-your-shoulder chills of “The Nesting Place,” these fearfulness stories propulsion backmost the tegument of your house’s creaky walls and crawl among the maggots within.

The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter

Angela Carter’s prize-winning classical turns a feminist oculus toward your favourite fairy tales. These aren’t the shining, singing, Disney-fied versions you cognize and love, however. (I mean, it’s called The Bloody Chamber for a reason.) Here, Carter remixes “Beauty and the Beast,” “Little Red Riding Hood,” “Bluebeard,” and more. Best of each for fearfulness aficionados, these fables are gruesome capable to marque the Brothers Grimm proud.

Mestiza Blood by V. Castro

From the writer of The Queen of the Cicadas and Goddess of Filth comes this “short communicative postulation of nightmares, dreams, desires, and visions of the Chicana experience.” V. Castro writes from the spot wherever abject fearfulness meets unbridled lust, making Mestiza Blood a must-read short-story postulation for erotic-horror fans.

The King successful Yellow by Robert W. Chambers

No database of must-read fearfulness collections and anthologies could perchance beryllium implicit without The King successful Yellow. Robert W. Chambers was 1 of Lovecraft’s superior influences, and obscurity does his weird fabrication radiance much brightly than successful this novel-in-stories astir a mysterious stageplay that drives readers to insanity and suicide.

Ghost Summer by Tananarive Due

The rubric novella successful this postulation is portion of the Gracetown cycle: 1 of 4 groupings that scope from 2 to 5 stories each. All 3 Gracetown stories instrumentality spot successful a tiny Florida municipality of the aforesaid name, the benignant of spot wherever folks discontinue and invited grandchildren to sojourn each year. But each is not arsenic it seems successful Gracetown, and the Florida sunshine belies the fearfulness that lurks astir each agleam corner.

I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream by Harlan Ellison

I urge the rubric communicative successful this postulation each accidental I get. Harlan Ellison’s sci-fi horror communicative astir a tiny radical of quality “survivors” trapped successful a hellscape pursuing the techno-apocalypse is the nonstop benignant of pulpy, visceral fearfulness that sticks successful your craw agelong aft you’ve closed the cover.

Things We Lost successful the Fire by Mariana Enríquez

The caller past is afloat of bitter memories for those surviving successful modern Argentina. The specter of unthinkable unit shadows galore imaginations. It’s nary surprise, then, that galore of the characters successful Mariana Enríquez’s Things We Lost successful the Fire take to inflict symptom upon themselves alternatively than endure different person’s cruelty. If you’re a instrumentality of magical realism, marque this your adjacent fearfulness read.

Song for the Unraveling of the World by Brian Evenson

Brian Evenson’s 2019 postulation contains much than 20 fearfulness stories, galore of them incredibly brief. Come for the faceless babies, enactment for the spaceship interface that refuses to explicate what you’re seeing betwixt yourself and the bulkhead, and don’t permission until you cognize the each the secrets your favourite cult movie is hiding.

Human Monsters edited by Sadie Hartmann and Ashley Sawyers

You can’t property immoderate of the scares successful this anthology from Dark Matter Magazine to the supernatural oregon paranormal. The stories present are each astir the real-life monsters — the benignant of radical you cognize good capable to cognize you ne'er privation to beryllium near unsocial with.

Coyote Songs by Gabino Iglesias

Today, Gabino Iglesias is champion known for his 2022 novel, The Devil Takes You Home, but delight don’t place his 2018 novel-in-stories. Nominated for the Bram Stoker Award for Best Fiction Collection, Coyote Songs revolves astir a formed of radical surviving successful the American Southwest, wherever aged gods inactive dwell, and legends are precise overmuch alive.

Shiver by Junji Ito

No 1 quiescent balances the gross-out with the macabre rather similar Junji Ito. The 9 stories successful Shiver are Things You Can’t Unsee-levels of grotesque, but it’s the supernatural elements astatine enactment present that volition truly creep you out.

After the People Lights Have Gone Off by Stephen Graham Jones

After the occurrence of The Only Good Indians and My Heart Is a Chainsaw, fearfulness fans are stoked to spot Stephen Graham Jones get the wider appreciation helium deserves. Nominated for some the Stoker and the Shirley Jackson Award, After the People Lights Have Gone Off contains 15 abbreviated stories from the 21st-century fearfulness master.

Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke and Other Misfortunes by Eric LaRocca

First published successful 2021, the rubric novella successful Erica LaRocca’s brand-new postulation — astir a brace of teens and their grisly net romance — took location the 2022 Splatterpunk Award for Best Novella. It joins 2 caller stories — “The Enchantment” and “You’ll Find It’s Like That All Over” — successful this collection.

Death successful the Mouth: Original Horror from People of Color edited by Sloane Leong and Cassie Hart

Edited by the authors of A Map to the Sun and Butcherbird, and billed arsenic “an unthinkable scope of stories and illustrations that observe the voices of those overlooked to amusement you the terrifying and exquisite scope of what fearfulness tin be,” Death successful the Mouth collects the enactment of BIPOC artists and writers who are excessively often overlooked successful the fearfulness space.

Other Terrors: An Inclusive Anthology edited by Vince A. Liaguno and Ann Dávila Cardinal

What does it mean to fearfulness “the other”? That’s the question astatine the bosom of this anthology, which pulls unneurotic enactment from BIPOC and LGBTQ+ authors. Many of the writers featured connected this database reappear here, including Linda D. Addison, Tananarive Due, Gabino Iglesias, and Stephen Graham Jones.

Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado

If “The Girl with the Green Ribbon” truly freaked you retired arsenic a kid, you’re going to emotion the opening communicative of this National Book Award finalist. For fans of Law and Order: SVU, there’s “Especially Heinous”: a reimagining of Benson and Stabler arsenic investigators moving 12 gritty seasons’ worthy of supernatural cases.

Bødy by Asa Nonami

What benignant of fearfulness comes from the body? What benignant tin we inflict upon it? In each of the 5 stories that marque up Asa Nonami’s Bødy, the cardinal quality fixates connected their dissatisfaction with a peculiar assemblage part, lone to find themselves facing a monkey’s paw dilemma erstwhile their privation is granted.

The Push Man and Other Stories by Yoshihiro Tatsumi

In the rubric communicative successful this gekiga collection, a subway idiosyncratic whose occupation is to forcefully battalion commuters into subway cars gets a sensation of his ain medicine erstwhile he’s mistaken for a rider. “The Push Man” is tame compared to galore different tales successful this collection, but possibly the astir horrifying is “Bedridden”: the communicative of a sexually abused pistillate and the men who unit themselves connected her.

Dark Matter: Reading the Bones edited by Sheree R. Thomas

With stories from immoderate of the astir celebrated Black writers moving today, Sheree Renée Thomas’ Dark Matter: Reading the Bones anthology is simply a must-read for anyone looking for an instauration to Black speculative fiction. Its predecessor, Dark Matter: A Century of Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora, is besides good worthy checking out.

The New Weird edited by Ann VanderMeer and Jeff VanderMeer

Plenty of authors are inactive penning weird fabrication today, but the VanderMeers person been instrumental successful introducing the sub-genre to a full caller procreation of readers. This 2008 anthology provides an fantabulous overview of contemporary weird fiction — from what it is to wherever it’s going. Although determination are excessively galore writers of the weird to acceptable into immoderate azygous anthology, readers looking to dive into the sub-genre would bash good to commencement here.