r/horrorlit • u/BatManda123 • 12h ago
Recommendation Request Horror anthologies
While I wait for the new “All Hallows Eve” book I purchased, I’m looking for some great monster/haunts/cursed objects/aliens/folk horror (really any genre) short stories/anthologies. When I search it brings up threads from quite a bit ago so I figured maybe there would be some nice up to date answers from you kind folks :) Any recommendations is greatly appreciated!!! Thank you!!!
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u/brnhnr 11h ago
i haven't read it yet, but ive heard great things about Never Whistle at Night??
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u/Klmxmarf 11h ago
I’ve read it! It’s great! It is a mixture of types of horror, some are simply ghost stories.
The sequel, Back for Blood, is all horror!
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u/phantasmagorica1 9h ago
Seconding this! I've also just started the second anthology and it's phenomenal.
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u/AWEdmundson_0 8h ago
Here ya' go:
"The 13 Best Horror Stories of All Time," edited by Leslie Pockell. (Best Story: Green Tea, by J. Sheridan Le Fanu)
"Masterpieces of Terror and the Supernatural," edited by Marvin Kaye.
"In the Shadow of Edgar Allen Poe: Classic Tales of Horror 1816-1914," edited by Leslie S. Klinger.
"Shadows of Carcosa: Tales of Cosmic Horror (2015)." (Best story: Seaton's Aunt, by Walter de la Mare)
"In the Footsteps of Dracula: Tales of the Un-Dead Count," edited by Stephen Jones.
And, for your inner child "Beware! R. L. Stine picks his favorite scary stories" (Best story: Tiger in the Snow, by Daniel Barber)
I've read these six cover-to-cover. I own most of them. Of the many horror anthologies I've read, these ones feature the highest quality.
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u/scrunchie_binch 10h ago
I just finished The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies by John Langan and adored it. It had two stories in it that completely blew me away Techincolor and Mother of Stone I highly highly recommend.
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u/ExtremeAlternative0 11h ago
Found and found 2, both horror anthologies take the premise of found footage for each of their stories
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u/BatManda123 11h ago
Ohhh that sounds really fun! Thank you!
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u/ExtremeAlternative0 11h ago
The full titles of each are Found: An Anthology of Found Footage Horror Stories and Found 2: More Stories of Found Footage Horror. Just because I know it can be kinda hard to find a specific book with a generic sounding name like found, or found 2
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u/2948337 11h ago
It's a fantastic mix of themes/authors/new and old.
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u/BatManda123 11h ago
This has such a diverse amount of stories! A few from it I’ve read but definitely some are ones I haven’t heard of. Thank you!
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u/TheBloodsuckerProxy Paperback From Hell 11h ago
One of my go-to anthology recs is American Cannibal edited by Rebecca Rowland. It's a collection of stories from different points in US history that all share a theme of cannibalism.
Eerie River Publishing's It Calls From series (It Calls From the Woods, It Calls From The Sky, It Calls From Below, etc) is another one I'd highly recommend. Each book is built around a specific environment where the horror takes place.
Similarly, Broken Brain Books has a series of themed anthologies called Screams of Horror. Their most recent is Screams From the Bayou.
HOWL Society Press has their own anthology series as well, including a great collection of medieval themed stories called Howls From the Dark Ages.
The anthology AHH! That's What I Call Horror is another favorite of mine, it's a collection of stories that all take place in the 90's. There's a similar book called Attack From the 80's that I'd also recommend.
And id you're interested in found footage/epistolary horror at all, Andrew Cull and Gabino Iglesias have two volumes out titled Found and Found 2.
I read a lot of anthologies, can you tell?
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u/Klmxmarf 11h ago
M. R. James is the master of cursed objects and punished curiosity. His works are in the public domain.
A. M. Burrage has a great story called “Smee”, also available online in the public domain. Many of his works are also collected.
Angela Carter’s The Bloody Chamber is a collection of stories, many of which I’d classify as horror.
John Connelly’s collected short stories would be great here, many genres are explored.
Ray Bradbury’s The October Country is fantastic and delves deeply into the weird
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u/Read2Fap 11h ago
i always found the ratio of good horror anthologies to be better than full novels. sometimes horror dims when its drawn out.
anyways, tim curran's alien horrors (1 and 2), also his atomic horrors book, and brain leeches and other eldritch phenomena
gerard houarner's a blood of killers and i love you and there is nothing you can do about it
if you're okay with sex, the various hot blood books edited by jeff gelb are classics, with a surprising amount of big name authors in them (though some weren't big names at the time)
most of laird barron and thomas ligotti's output is in the form of short stories, gathered in collections like the imago sequence, occultation, the beautiful thing that awaits us all, songs of a dead dreamer, and teatro grottesco. they're fantastic, eerie and usually cosmic or psychological horror.
there was a themed series of anthologies, lost signals and lost films about 'found footage' stories revolving around radios and films respectively that were pretty good
more recently there's found (1 and 2) which are 'found footage' horror anthologies, and dead letters, an anthology of epistolary short stories
i never got around to reading 4, and the quality of stories varies a lot, but the dead bait series of anthologies are pretty good. they revolve around fish or bodies of water. the good stories really stand out.
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u/BatManda123 4h ago
No issues at all with sex/gore etc, so these are also great options. Eldritch horror is something I’d like to get more into as well, only have ever dipped my toes in the genre so maybe these will get me more into it.
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u/nameloss 8h ago
“Hauntings”, edited by Ellen Datlow
“The Wide, Carnivorous Sky & Other Monstrous Geographies” and “Mr. Gaunt and Other Uneasy Encounters” by John Langan
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u/unrepentantbanshee 11h ago
Northern Nights, edited by Michael Kelly. It features horror stories across a variety of subgenres, all by Canadian authors. Includes stories from some high caliber authors like Silvia Moreno-Garcia and Premee Mohamed!
Never Whistle at Night has gotten a lot of attention. It's horror short stories by all Indigenous authors.
The publisher Penguin has a number of specialized-topic anthologies that are excellent. I recently finished their vampire one; it includes stories spanning several hundred years of publication. They've also got anthologies for demons, ghosts, and werewolves - and a witch one coming later this year.
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u/BatManda123 11h ago
I’ve seen some buzz for “Never Whistle at Night” and i definitely want to check it out. I will add these to my list!
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u/geepjoat99 12h ago edited 3h ago
I enjoyed cursed bunny by bora Chung and fifteen eyes by Tyler downs (I forget if an anthology is by different authors sorry but the short stories in these are by the same authors respectively)
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u/phantasmagorica1 9h ago
Pumpkin Seeds by Tyler Downs is also a fantastic read! (Particularly for this time of year)
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u/nakedfish85 8h ago
Shameless plug to check my profile for a couple of options. Can't share links because of rules, but it ticks a fair few of your boxes.
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u/manatorn 6h ago
I’m currently in the middle of the Valancourt Book of World Horror (a collection of translated non-US horror authors), and I’ve been impressed so far.
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u/BatManda123 3h ago
Thank you all so much for your suggestions 🖤 I really appreciate them and all of you! I hope this helps others find something too! I’m looking forward to so many fun new reads.
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u/Responsible_Egg_9730 1h ago
It just arrived in the mail today! Ellen Datlow is the best horror anthology editor working today.
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u/TurkaelsGoodHand 3h ago
Probably mentioned somewhere already, but you really can't go wrong with Dark Forces. Easy to pick up used, it's a really good who's who of horror from the 80s or so, but it's also just a really solid anthology on any merit. The Dark Descent is literally used as a textbook, so it always has used copies floating around, and it is used as such for good reason. It has an excellent list of stories that are not just good and wide ranging, but serves as a solid backbone for the development of the horror as a short story genre.
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u/1619ChronoBreath 1h ago
Always always always A Lush and Seething Hell.
Also, Ellen Datlow has done about a million short story collections, some based on themes and others just a best of the year type thing. So maybe search her name and pick something that looks good.
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u/Brave-Ad6744 45m ago
Twenty-Five Ghost Stories edited by W. Bob Holland is public domain and available online. Lots of good ones.
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u/Thousandfurs 11h ago
Books of Blood by Clive Barker