Previously: 15 Dark Boarding School And Creepy Campus Books.
Today, some reading recommendations — a sort of “What’s In My Bookshelf” thing, albeit one with a highly specific focus: Friends, let’s talk about horror novels about horror movies.
I don’t mean reference books or academic works about horror movies (although I do love me a good piece of scholarly research). I also don’t mean horror books that were adapted into horror movies. I mean pieces of literary fiction of the horror persuasion which tell stories about horror movies — usually also fictional, though considered real within the reality of the narrative.
[Like what you read? Check out Dangerous Games To Play In The Dark, available from Chronicle Books now!]
There’s something fascinating about using one medium to tell stories about something happening in another medium, isn’t there?
This list was born out of the realization that my 2023 Halloween reading recommendations list featured rather a lot of horror novels about horror films; as such, you’ll see a few repeats from that list here. It turns out that “horror novels about (usually but not always fictional) horror movies” is, uh, quite a specific subgenre — something a bit more niche than, say, haunted house stories, or creature features, or what have you.
And although some of the same themes and motifs might pop up time and time again, each and every one of these 16 picks — plus a few bonus suggestions at the end — does their own thing, putting their own spin on the ideas and all ultimately standing apart from each other, unique even with their similarities.
(No affiliate links here, by the way; they’re all just regular ol’ links to where you can find these books, because they all deserve a spot in your TBR pile. I’ve noted when I’ve received ARCs courtesy of the publishers, but opinions are aaaaaall my own, as always.)
Ready?
And —
Action.
1. Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
One of my Halloween reading recommendations from 2023, Silver Nitrate taps deeply and directly into what I love so much about cinema-centric horror stories: The sense that, for all its glamour, the world of movies — the world of movie-making — is something of an illusion, gilded with gold but tarnished and tinny underneath.
I was fortunate enough to have received an ARC of this one prior to its July 2023 publication. Here’s what I had to say about it over at NetGalley at the time:
“For a certain kind of person, there’s a kind of magic to cinema — the magic that builds a whole world outside of your own, to which you can escape for an hour or two simply by sitting in a darkened room and letting a flicker of light play across a screen. This is true both for those who watch, and for those who make — but in Silver Nitrate, that magic becomes reality.
But magic can be dangerous — and this particular magic is as dark as it gets.
Set not in modern-day Hollywood, but in Mexico City’s film industry in the 1990s, Silver Nitrate follows Montserrat, a talented sound editor constantly fighting against the boys’ club nature of the business, and her fading soap star best friend Tristan as they uncover the mystery of auteur filmmaker Abel Urueta’s lost film Beyond The Yellow Door — a film Urueta, who unexpectedly becomes Tristan’s new neighbor, claims was made as a kind of spell, but which left its participants cursed after it went unfinished.
One of Moreno-Garcia’s particular strengths is her ability to write characters who may not necessarily be likeable, but who we still care about. Montserrat is prickly and abrasive; Tristan is self-absorbed and frequently focused only on himself; but they are both deeply complex individuals who, despite their foibles — or perhaps because of them — are uniquely suited to pulling out the threads of this story.”
I’ve read quite a lot of Moreno-Garcia’s work at this point, and although I’ve thoroughly enjoyed all of it, Silver Nitrate might be my favorite.
Get it here.
2. Burn The Negative by Josh Winning
Burn The Negative manages to cover both the more traditional “this book is about a horror film” and the newer “this book is an updated version of the whole ‘this book is about a horror movie’ thing” bases, which I find highly enjoyable.
In a nutshell:
Journalist Laura Warren has just arrived in Los Angeles from the UK for a set visit. She’s on assignment to cover the making of It Feeds, an upcoming television series based on an allegedly cursed horror film from the ‘90s called The Guesthouse.
The Guesthouse was plagued not just by production problems, but also by deaths — real ones. In the years following the film’s release, numerous cast and crew died in ways that seemed, eerily, to imitate the fates of the film’s own characters. The Guesthouse has become legendary since, both for its effectiveness as a horror film as for its gruesome true history.
Laura, unfortunately, doesn’t find out what It Feeds’ source material is until it’s too late — until she’s already on the ground on the Universal lot. Why “unfortunately?” Because Laura, you see, hasn’t always been Laura Warren.
Once upon a time, Laura Warren was Polly Tremaine, a child actor whose last film was — you guessed it — The Guesthouse.
She’s spent her entire life since then trying to erase the past, but now, there’s no running from it… and the set of It Feeds? It’s starting to look a lot like history repeating itself.
The narrative here is fairly straightforward, although I’m always appreciative of stories that intersperse (fictional) primary documents throughout — script pages, articles from fictional news outlets, comments from those articles, and so on and so forth. Burn The Negative uses these kinds of primary document interstitials to great effect. If your tastes for horror tend towards cursed or haunted people, places, and things, this one is a great one to pick up.
Get it here.
3. Horror Movie by Paul Tremblay
Another one I was fortunate enough to receive an ARC for, Horror Movie came on vacation with me last spring — and I devoured it in a mere two days.
The setup will be familiar to anyone who has ever engaged with fictional horror media about fictional horror media:
In 1993, a small and scrappy crew of filmmakers commenced production on an independent experimental horror film titled, simply, Horror Film. The film was ultimately never released, its production marred by an all-too-real dose of blood and tragedy — which, of course, led to both the film itself and the stories of its making becoming not just cult, but legendary.
In the decades since, numerous attempts have been made to remake the film, to tell its seemingly cursed story again, and the story of its seemingly cursed production, none of which have ever come to fruition… until now.
In the present, the one remaining participant in the original film — the non-actor cast to play the character known only as the Thin Kid — has agreed not only the let the remake happen, but to appear in it himself. And as the new version of Horror Movie goes into production… well. Things go right according to plan… and also, they don’t at all.
Although the setup may be familiar, however, Horror Movie absolutely stands on its own and sticks with you long after it’s over.
One of the things I always look forward to the most about a Tremblay book is the structure — rarely a straight-forward, linear narrative, it’s more often a puzzle box, with many threads to untangle and layers to uncover before the truth of the matter is finally, ultimately revealed. Such is the case with Horror Movie, which features nesting narratives told both in the past and in the present, excerpts from the fictional film’s screenplay, and an untrustworthy narrator truly worthy of the label.
I’ve long considered Head Full Of Ghosts my favorite Tremblay, but this one? It may have kicked it out of the top spot. It was one of my Halloween reading suggestions in 2024, although — as with every piece of media I’ll ever suggest or recommend — it’s good at any time of the year. All horror, all the time.
Get it here.
4. Night Film by Marisha Pessl
Marisha Pessl’s sophomore effort is still my favorite of her books (although don’t get me wrong — they’re all worth reading, and somehow all feature areas of focus that are Absolutely My Jam, every single time). To be fair, Night Film is more about an enigmatic filmmaker and his entire, equally enigmatic body of work than one, specific film — but, eh, semantics.
To sum it up briefly: Investigative journalist Scott McGrath has something of a history with reclusive cult filmmaker Stanislas Cordova — and when Cordova’s 24-year-old daughter, former piano prodigy Ashley Cordova, turns up dead, McGrath has the sense that something here is not what it seems. As his investigation proceeds, though, things get much, much weirder than even McGrath had anticipated they could get, and as the lines begin to blur between fiction and reality… well, to say that McGrath finds himself in over his head would be something of an understatement.
A twisting, turning, constantly surprising work, Night Film is what I might describe as a bit of a rollercoaster of a read — the kind that keeps barreling forwards, pulling you along for the ride.
Get it here.
5. Flicker by Theodore Roszak
I picked this one up purely on a whim years and years ago — probably a few decades now, come to think of it; it was first published in 1991, and I think I read it sometime in the early 2000s — while I was browsing the shelves of an actual, brick-and-mortar bookstore… and it has, as they say, lived rent-free in my head ever since.
Flicker follows film critic, academic, and cinephile Jonathan Gates’ lifelong obsession with German expressionist filmmaker Max Castle — who, it turns out, had more going on in his body of work than just effective filmmaking techniques. I’d go so far as to call this one a sprawling epic, spanning many years and delving deep into cults (actual cults, not the cinematic variety), religion, the Second World War, doomsday prophecies, and much, much more.
In some ways, Flicker feels sort of like a precursor to Night Film; both have a mysterious, reclusive, and possibly vanished cult filmmaker at their cores, and a mystery, and loads of twists and turns. It’s… a lot weirder, though, and maybe a little less approachable, with sharper edges and a bit more of a nihilistic bent. Again, though, I’ve been thinking about this one for years, so if that’s not an indication that it’s worth picking up, I don’t know what is.
Get it here.
6. The Lost Village by Camilla Sten
Who says documentary can’t be horror? Not me. After all, what’s scarier than the horrors of real life?
At the center of The Lost Village is not a director of fictional features, but a documentarian, Alice Lindstedt, whose latest subject is one close to her soul: What, precisely, happened to the inhabitants of the small Swedish mining town Silvertjarn — known locally as the Lost Village — in 1959? Where did they go? Because that’s all that anyone does know: That they all just… disappeared — including Alice’s grandmother’s entire family.
Along with her small crew, Alice makes the trek to Silvertjarn, intending to carry out a six-day shoot investigating the town and its mysterious history. Things, naturally, start to go wrong very quickly, and it soon becomes apparent that Alice and the crew are not alone in the Lost Village.
What’s not clear, however, is just what might be there with them — and what it wants.
Eerie and atmospheric, The Lost Village will probably strike your fancy if you’re a fan of Alma Katsu (hi, hello, it’s me!), or if you still think of the original Blair Witch Project with a certain degree of fondness (also me!). This is good one to read in the winter, especially.
Get it here.
7. The Remaking by Clay McLeod Chapman
Yet another one of my Halloween 2023 reading recommendations, The Remaking remains my favorite Clay McLeod Chapman book. It scratches the same sort of itch that Horror Movie does, although the story is told quite differently — and, of course, they are far, far from the same story in the first place. (It is worth noting, though, that when paired together, they do make a nice double feature, so to speak.)
The Remaking involves trauma handed down through generations, explorations of what happens when truth becomes first legend, and then something, and how stories and histories and sort of… mutate with each successive iteration.
We begin in the 1930s, with a single mother and her daughter accused of witchcraft and burned at the stake. By the 1950s, this piece of history has become, instead, simply a story — which then becomes a legend, and then a local obsession. In the 1970s, an attempt the bring the story to film is made, to disastrous, possibly cursed result. In the 1990s, a remake of that film is on the table — and so, too, is the continuation of the curse. And then, in the 2010s, we enter podcast territory, and, well… it goes about as well as you’d think.
I loved this one. The narratives don’t nest here; rather, they build on each other, with each iteration getting both further from and closer to the truth at the same time. Just gorgeous, and so, so effective.
Get it here.
8. The Devil’s Playground by Craig Russell
Unlike a lot of the stories on this list, The Devil’s Playground reaches back a bit further into Hollywood history for its horror — to the silent era. 1927, specifically.
That’s the year that The Devil’s Playground, said to be the greatest horror film ever made, went into production. It’s also the year its star, famed Hollywood great Norma Carlton, wound up dead. And, subsequently, it’s the year that Mary Rourke, the resourceful fixer for the studio behind the film, found herself with her hands rather full, indeed.
But although the film — called cursed by many — was completed, it’s lost media, with all prints and copies of it having gone missing, one way or another… allegedly. Which is where our second narrative comes in: 40 years later, film historian and journalist Paul Conway is seeking to hunt down a copy of The Devil’s Playground — a journey that will take him places he never thought he’d go.
The dual narrative structure is, again, familiar — it is especially common for this subgenre — but here, the 1967 narrative functions as more of a framing device for the 1927 one; there are also a few pitstops elsewhere in history, which flesh things out in some tantalizing ways. Exhaustively researched, The Devil’s Playground taps into that shiny-yet-seedy vision of Old Hollywood for a gripping tale that’s hard to put down.
Get it here.
9. Experimental Film by Gemma Files
I do love a good ghost story, and luckily, Experimental Film is more than up to the challenge. Even better: There’s footage. It is found. And it is this found footage which is haunted. So many of my favorite things, all wrapped up in one glorious package!
Experimental Film centers around Lois Cairns, struggling film critic, who follows the trail of a tiny piece of silent film footage to Iris Dunlopp Whitcomb — a spiritualist and gatherer of fairy and folk tales who, by the time Lois arrives on the scene, has been missing for a century. That tiny piece of film leads Lois to an idea she hopes will revive her flagging career: That Whitcomb was, in fact, the first female Canadian filmmaker. But as she sets out to find further evidence, she ends up finding more than she bargained for.
Canadian cinema somehow remains highly underrated, despite having given us so many greats — particularly in horror: Cube; Ginger Snaps; Pontypool; the list goes on. As such, it’s a delight to have at least one tale here that’s focused on the Canadian film industry, rather than the U.S. one. A fun find, and resonant for so many reasons.
Get it here.
10. Memento Mori: The Fathomless Shadows by Brian Hauser
Here’s an interesting question: How do you do found footage in a literary format? It’s a question a not-insignificant number of books have attempted to answer — and a question which some do answer in respects, even if it’s not necessarily a question they sought to answer in the first place.
But Memento Mori: The Fathomless Shadows offers perhaps one of the most satisfying answers as it explores the story of underground filmmaker Tina Mori, known as much for her experimental body of work as she is for her unexplained disappearance in the 1970s.
Here, we get to read letters, zines, memoirs, and scraps and bits, layer by layer, piece by piece, all trying to get to the heart of what happened to Tina Mori — and whether the world she depicted in her films may have been more real than anyone ever knew.
Knowledge of Robert Chambers’ The King In Yellow is useful going into this one; luckily, since The King In Yellow was originally published in 1895, it’s now in the public domain and therefore available to read for free in a number of places. Project Gutenberg is a good place to start for the text, or you can head to Librivox for an audio version.
Get it here.
11. Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth
I’ve recommended Plain Bad Heroines before, although when I first highlighted it back in 2022, it was in a feature not about cinema-based horror novels, but in a dark academia-focused one. Here’s what I had to say about it at the time:
“In 1902, Clara and Flo, students at Brookhants School for Girls in Rhode Island, fall in love with the work of queer feminist author Mary MacLane, and with each other — only to meet an untimely end in the apple orchard near the school. In the five years between their deaths at the hands (or, more accurately, stingers) of a fleet of yellowjackets and the school’s closing, three more lives are lost, giving rise to rumors of Brookhants being both haunted and cursed.
In the current era, a book has been written about the school’s dark history, and a movie is now being made based upon it. Brookhants itself is to serve as the shooting location — but as production begins, the cast and crew discover that Brookhants’ reputation may be more than just rumor.
Describing itself as Picnic At Hanging Rock meets The Blair Witch Project with lesbians, Plain Bad Heroines employs dual narratives, both told by a mysterious narrator, to great effect — and with roots in both gothic literature and classic horror cinema with a healthy dose of ‘cursed movie set’ lore thrown in, it’s sure to tick a lot of boxes for lovers of spine-chilling stories.”
I stand by that assessment; there’s a lot here to love, and if all of that sounds like a good time to you, then this one is absolutely worth picking up.
Get it here.
12. House Of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
I realize this one is somewhat divisive — people seem either to love it or hate it, and whichever it is, they feel very, very passionately about that stance — but even setting aside the fact that I am a person who loves it, I couldn’t really put together a list of fictional books about fictional horror films without including House Of Leaves. It looms large in this particular landscape, and, well… here we are.
I’ve written about House Of Leaves a number of times, so for expediency’s sake, here’s how I described it waaaaaay back in 2016:
“The book is kind of like a nesting doll: It’s a story within a story within a story. At the very center of it is a documentary called The Navidson Record, in which a Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist moves his family to a house in Virginia in an attempt to repair their fracturing relationships — only to find that the house is bigger on the inside, but not in a good way.
We don’t see The Navidson Record, though; instead, we read about it second-hand in a lengthy piece of film criticism written by a blind man living in Los Angeles known only as Zampano. Zampano’s footnotes reveal his own story even as he details the story of The Navidson Record… and by the way, he’s dead. After he died, his manuscript was discovered by Johnny Truant, a young would-be tattoo artist, whose own footnotes reveal a troubled past and present of his own.
Oh, and as far as Johnny can tell, The Navidson Record doesn’t actually exist.”
I’ll confess that my personal favorite narrative is the one told directly within The Navidson Record; like many, I do find Johnny’s own narrative a little grating at times. But oh, how that house got under my skin the very first time I read this one — even though I was living in a teeny tiny Brooklyn apartment at the time, I still found myself occasionally… concerned about the dimensions of my space.
Also of note: I was introduced to this one by my then-partner/now-spouse (Reader, I married him!), who is expressly not a horror person, nor even really a person who gravitates towards novels as his reading material of choice (he’s more of a non-fiction fella) — but who nonetheless considers House Of Leaves one of his favorite books ever. Which, y’know, I do think is saying something.
Get it here.
13. Curse Of The Reaper by Brian McAuley
Love a good slasher? How about a self-referential story? Something sort of meta-with-a-lowercase-m? Like things that do the thing while also subverting or satirizing the thing? Then, my friends, I am happy to point you towards Curse Of The Reaper.
In the 1980s, Howard Browning made a name and a career for himself in the horror franchise Night Of The Reaper — as (of course) the aforementioned Reaper. In the present, things are… a little less than rosy for Browning — all the more so when the series is set to be rebooted without him, instead hiring Trevor Mane, a former child actor battling his own demons who is attempting to reboot his own career, as well.
The Reaper, by the way, is also not terribly pleased that Browning has been replaced. And, well… things get real weird, real fast. And also very, very bloody.
The satire is strong in this one; so, too, is the fun. It’s simultaneously a popcorn movie and a pointed skewering of Hollywood, with tons of depth waiting beneath its movie snack surface.
Get it here.
14. Universal Harvester by John Darnielle
I might be cheating a little bit including Universal Harvester here; it’s not about a horror movie, per se, but about regular movies whose VHS tapes, when rented from a specific video store in a small town in Iowa in the 1990s, seem to have something… else spliced into them. Or on top of them. Or just… hidden in there somewhere, through a mechanism that may or may not be entirely clear.
These strange images on these otherwise mundane video tapes are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg, though, and as a collection of disparate characters attempt to get to the bottom of the mystery… well, the point of the story isn’t necessarily the mystery itself. It’s very much a meditation on loss and grief and how we do and don’t cope with the traumatic things that can happen to us in life.
As I imagine might be the case for many, I was familiar with John Darnielle’s work as a songwriter and musician first (shoutout to my buddy from grad school who first introduced me to the Mountain Goats); he’s an excellent storyteller, so when I later learned that he was also a novelist, it was pretty much a no-brainer for me to pick his stuff up — and all the more so because all three of his novels have… slightly weird bents to them.
Universal Harvester is definitely one of those books that maybe isn’t for everyone — which is fine! There are plenty of books I’ve read that many people love, but which I ultimately found just aren’t for me. This one, though, I do find super interesting, even if it’s a little difficult to parse. If you’re the kind of person who likes to follow meandering threads, even when it seems like they aren’t going anywhere or seem as if they’ve just been cut with no warning, then you might also find it interesting.
Get it here.
15. Smile For The Cameras by Miranda Smith
Smile For The Cameras has a few things in common with Horror Movie, Burn The Negative, and, to some degree, The Remaking: Like these other picks, it’s concerned with the making of a cult classic horror film and the revisiting of it by the people who made it many years later; it unfolds in dual narratives, one in the past and one in the present; and at the heart of the whole thing is something tragic that occurred on set all those decades ago, and which has remained buried ever since.
In this case, we’re concerned with Ella Winters, once poised to become the Next Big Thing before she bowed out of the industry after making a huge splash in cult classic slasher Grad Night. Years later, there’s a Grad Night reunion in the works — and although Ella has, in the aftermath of the loss of her mother, wanted to dip her toe back in the industry, she absolutely didn’t want to do it like this.
She may not have a choice, though; if she wants to get back in the game, her agent tells her, this is the best — and possibly only — way to do it.
But once Ella has arrived back at the place where it all began, things start to go south with alarming speed — because, well… the things you try to bury? They won’t stay that way forever.
I’ll admit that ultimately, I found this one more a thriller than a horror novel — but then again, the line between the two is often blurred, and how a work reads in relation to them frequently depends on the individual reader. It’s still an enjoyable read, and worth picking up if you’re looking for something with a few twists and turns.
Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC prior to its June 2025 release!
Get it here.
16. We Eat Our Own by Kea Wilson
Okay, so technically, this one isn’t about a wholly fictional film; We Eat Our Own very clearly takes its cues from the absolutely real and highly controversial film Cannibal Holocaust and its equally controversial production process. It is, however, a fictionalized version of Cannibal Holocaust — here, it’s called Jungle Bloodbath — and, well… I think there’s enough here to consider it of a piece with the rest of the books on this list. Ergo: We Eat Our Own.
This one makes the unusual choice of utilizing the second person in one of its intertwining narratives, putting the reader into the shoes of its protagonist, an unnamed struggling actor who, in the 1970s, books a role in an Italian arthouse flick shooting in Colombia.
You accept the role knowing very little about it, or the filmmakers, or even about the film itself — only that it will be shooting in the rainforest, and that you’re taking the place of another actor who dropped out.
The production is troubled.
Very troubled.
Jungle Bloodbath, you see, isn’t just the name of the film.
Although it probably helps to have some knowledge of Cannibal Holocaust — both the film itself and its production — to get the full punch here, you don’t necessarily have to know anything about it. Heck, maybe We Eat Our Own might inspire you to go find out more about its inspiration. Just… make sure you’re ready for what you’ll find; it’s stomach-churning, and very real.
Get it here.
…Plus A Few More:
The eight (well, nine, if you include one additional one tucked away even further in there) options below are kind of bonus picks — the extra features on the DVD that is this list, if you will. They all feel like they belong with the 16 books on the main list; they’re just… not specifically about horror movies, or they’re not novels, or they’re simply out of print and a challenge to track down. They’re still worth your time, though, so I figured I’d point you toward them if you’re willing to play a little faster or looser with the theme here.
Found volumes one and two, edited by Andrew Cull and Gabino Iglesias
This pair of volumes — a matched set — aren’t novels; they’re short story collections. But boy, are they fun! Centered around the theme of found footage, this anthology set features stories so creative in both form and content that I keep coming back to them again and again.
Here’s how I described how the found footage concept works here when I recommended the original Found volume back in 2023: “Some of them are straightforward narratives about how such footage comes into existence, or what happens when the footage is, in fact, found. But others? They are the footage — rendered unexpectedly.”
Found 2, meanwhile, hit shelves just in time for Halloween 2024, and it’s just as fun as the first one. A-plus, no notes.
Get Found here and Found 2 here.
Lost Films, edited by Max Booth III and Lori Michelle
Similarly, Lost Films is also not a novel, but a collection of short stories. This time, though, the theme is lost — or, in some cases, “lost” — media. Super fun!
Get it here.
Haunt Sweet Home by Sarah Pinsker
Haunt Sweet Home, meanwhile, is a novel, but it’s about a fictional television show, rather than a fictional film. One of my Halloween 2024 reading recommendations, it documents what happens when things get weird on the set of a combination ghost hunting/home makeover reality show. As I commented last October, it’s like this one was written just for me. (I was also lucky enough to have received an ARC for this one; truly, everything’s coming up TGIMM.)
Related: Sarah Pinsker’s Hugo- and Nebula-winning novelette Two Truths And A Lie, originally published in 2020 at Reactor Magazine (then Tor.com), also revolves around a weird TV show. I adored this one the first time I read it — and hey, guess what? It’s available to read for free still; head on over to Reactor to check it out. You can also buy it as a standalone book, too.
Get it here.
Mister Magic by Kiersten White
This one, too, is about a television show, not a film. Also, the show isn’t exactly a horror program; it’s what might often be considered the opposite: A children’s program intended for very young audiences. It is, however, also extremely… unsettling. Another one I was fortunate enough to grab an ARC for, I perhaps didn’t enjoy it quite as much as White’s debut novel, Hide, but it’s still an excellent read.
Mister Magic makes an interesting pairing with Two Truths And A Lie, by the way.
Get it here.
Bury Your Gays by Chuck Tingle
Yet another one about a series — this time, a streaming one — rather than a movie. Tackling the “bury your gays” trope, it’s a terrific skewering of… well, all the things that are wrong with the way so much of television and film is produced these days, with executives demanding that choices be made “for the algorithm” rather than, y’know, for the art and the storytelling. I mean, sure, execs, you can demand writers kill their darlings… but don’t be surprised if those darlings decide not to go down without a fight.
Get it here.
Demon Theory by Stephen Graham Jones
Horror movies and cinema thread their way through lots of Stephen Graham Jones’ work, perhaps most notably in the Indian Lake trilogy; often, though, it’s more from a cinephile perspective than a filmmaking one. Demon Theory is an exception, however, and perhaps the most interesting execution of the idea in Jones’ body of work: It’s presented as a film treatment, with notes and footnotes and other tidbits scattered throughout.
It is, however, unfortunately out of print, which is why I’ve put Demon Theory here in the bonus section instead of in the main list up top. It’s absolutely worth checking out if you can find a second-hand copy of it, although it does tend to be a bit pricey — Abe Books has a few copies, for example, but the least expensive one is still $87.
The Absolution Of Roberto Acestes Laing by Nicholas Rombes
Like Demon Theory, The Absolution Of Roberto Acestes Laing is regretfully out of print. Although the variety of story told here is a type we’ve seen in a few other places—the whole “journalist/historian/critic/cinephile attempts to hunt down a reclusive cult filmmaker to figure out what the heck happened to them” thing — it does it in its own way, playing with form as well as content. A second-hand copy will probably set you back a couple hundred bucks, though.
***
All right. There we are. 16 horror novels about horror movies, plus eight more thematically relevant options if you’re looking for some deeper cuts. That should be enough to keep you occupied for a while, right?
Go ahead. Settle in. Don’t forget to make a stop at the concession stand before you start — or, make a plan to beat the crowds at intermission.
Let’s all go to the lobby.
Let’s all go to the lobby.
Let’s all go to the lobby.
And have ourselves a snack.
And now, our feature presentation…
***
Follow The Ghost In My Machine on Bluesky @GhostMachine13.bsky.social, Twitter @GhostMachine13, and Facebook @TheGhostInMyMachine. And for more games, don’t forget to check out Dangerous Games To Play In The Dark, available now from Chronicle Books!
[Photo via igorovsyannykov/Pixabay]
