Halloween Stories & Top Rated Horror Books

Halloween Stories and Top Rated Horror Books

Halloween Stories and Top rated Horror Books

On the 31st October several countries around the world celebrate Halloween. It is tough to be the night when ghosts, vampires and witches are especially active.. Halloween is largely commercialised in America and Canada where it was brought by mainly Irish immigrants and today is the second largest commercial holiday after Christmas. It is mostly associated with orange and black colours and activities include trick or treating, wearing witches and vampire costumes, scaring people, telling ghost stories and watching horror movies.

But how did Halloween start and why do people actually celebrate this day?

Halloween has a fascinating history dating back thousands of years.

It goes back in the time of the Celts. The Celtic people believed that with the end of summer and harvest, ghosts and evil powers came to earth to destroy their crops. On the 31 October they celebrated the festival of Samhain when they built huge bonfires to burn some crops and animals as sacrifices so they send the bad spirits away. They also wore scary costumes with animal heads.
During the years, due to the Roman rule in the Celtic territories and the influence of the Christian church, a few other festival customs have intertwined with Samhain. On the 1 November the Christian church celebrated All Saints Day, also called All Hallows and the 31 October was called All Hallows Eve eventually renamed to Halloween.


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A Guide to Horror Books

Halloween is the time for scary stories, those of ghosts, vampires, haunted houses and alike. There are many screamers- horror books that will set up the mood for this spooky holiday.

Top horror writers

Stephen King-Undoubtedly the most important figure in horror fiction for the past thirty years. King sells millions of copies of his books, he has won numerous books and film awards and many of his works have been turned into films or other media. It all began with his novel Carrie which was published in 1974. Since then he has produced masterpieces like IT, The Shining, The Stand, Christine and many more.

Dean Koonitz appeared on the horror fiction scene with his ultimate success novel Whispers. Many of his works were adapted into film and TV some of which include Watchers, Hideaway and Demon Seed.

Stephanie Mayer is well known among teenagers after her production Twilight hit the shelves of bookstores. Twilight adaptation into a film turned into an incredible success.

Clive Barker, Richard Matheson and Ramsey Campbell are among other successful writers of horror fiction.

Top rated horror books

Stephen King's,IT- Seven children are being terrorized by a child-killing malevolent entity, IT, which primarily appears as a clown, calling itself "Pennywise the Dancing Clown." Years later, all grown- ups, return to their home town, determined to kill the monster and once and for all free the town from the cruelty of IT.

Dean Koonitz's, Watchers- A boy takes in a stray dog, later finding out that it's an ultra-intelligent runaway from a genetic research lab.

Stephanie Mayer, Twilight has turned into the most successful horror teen book since a very long time. It has sold more than 70 million copies, has won numerous awards and has been translated into 37 languages.

Among other recommended books are Clive Barker's Books of Blood, Robert Swindells' Room 13, Anne Rice's The Vampire Lestat and Jonathan Maberry's Ghost Road Blues