Juliet Blackwell’s The Séance Garden is a paranormal mystery that builds its horror through accumulated unease rather than cheap shocks. Set in Monterey and centred on a skeptical historian of the occult, this Gothic-tinged supernatural suspense novel asks what happens when the past refuses to stay buried.
Horror Book Reviews
Ginger Nuts of Horror has been reviewing horror books for 18 years. Here you will find reviews of new horror novels, novellas and short story collections, from small indie presses to the big imprints, across folk horror, gothic, cosmic, psychological horror and everything in between. Every review is free, independent and honest.
In These Gilded Ghostly Hearts by Gwendolyn Kiste: Gatsby’s Ghosts Won’t Let Go
Bram Stoker winner Gwendolyn Kiste delivers a haunting queer horror retelling of The Great Gatsby in In These Gilded, Ghostly Hearts, following Daisy Buchanan’s daughter as she confronts her mother’s ghost and the still-grasping fingers of Jay Gatsby. This sapphic Gothic novella explores grief, legacy, and the hunger of a house that feeds on unfulfilled love.
Humanity in the Face of Horror: The Undiscovered Country by Teel James Glenn
The Undiscovered Country delivers horror noir thrills as Adam Paradise, Frankenstein’s creature turned PI, battles Ku Klux Klan necromancy in 1930s New Orleans. Teel James Glenn crafts a supernatural thriller that examines humanity’s capacity for organised hatred while celebrating compassion as the ultimate act of heroism.
Jockula by Gayle Ramage: Scottish Vampire Horror with Bite and Laughs
Jack Rushton is a thirty-nine-year-old vampire who just wants to be left alone with his Radio 4 comedies and his unrequited crush. Instead, he’s been blackmailed by a six-hundred-year-old vampire queen, hunted by a clueless anti-vampire collective, and his teenage sister is developing migraines that might be something far worse. Gayle Ramage’s Jockula is a darkly comic Scottish vampire horror that earns both halves of that descriptor.
The Turn by Rachel Feder: A Contemporary Gothic Review
Rachel Feder’s The Turn is a contemporary Gothic novella that reimagines the classic governess narrative for the pandemic era. This unsettling literary horror explores the monstrous bond between caregiver and child, the politics of care, and the terror of having your own memory rewritten. A precise, slow-creeping piece of vampire fiction that earns every scare.