Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

Previous Top Ten Tuesday Topics

• 5th September: Books That Defied My Expectations
• 12th September: Books Awaiting Reviews
• 19th September: Books on My Fall 2023 To-Read List
• 26th September: Secondary/Minor Characters Who Deserve Their Own Book
• 3rd October: Reading Goals I Still Want to Accomplish Before the End of the Year
• 17th October: Books with Weather Events in the Title/on the Cover
• 24th October: Atmospheric Books

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It is in fact Hallowe’en today! And I do love Hallowe’en!

There is something delicious about giving into the spookier elements of life, reminding ourselves that there are more things in Heaven and on Earth than are dreamed of in our philosophies (to misquote Shakespeare). A time when it is ok to acknowledge and to revel in some of our primal and atavistic fears – whether that be werewolves, witches or vampires.

And alongside the date, as the clocks fell back an hour last weekend, and the nights are drawing in, the weather turning unsettled and stormy and the river beside which our house sits swells and threatens to break its banks again, we are really in autumn – that season of mists and mellow fruitfulness.

This week’s TTT theme is a Hallowe’en Freebie and I have certainly been casting my net around for chilling books to read – it seems a long time since I read a really chilling ghost story so I am genuinely looking forward to perusing your recommendations.

The book that I have read most recently and which has inspired this post is T. Kingfisher’s What Moves The Dead, her re-telling of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher. I found her treatment of the Poe story hugely readable – even if I don’t feel the need for characters to explain fully how and why the inexplicable happens. Isn’t that what makes the Poe story so enduring, that the inexplicable remains inexplicable? But I loved the hares in it, ranging through the woodland along the tarn and so oblivious to the people around them that the locals believe them to be demonic. When Easton shoots one, or when the corpse of a hare was autopsied, there were some delicious jump scares!

So for the first part of this post I wanted to focus very specifically on books featuring spooky hares because hares have a long association with witches – whether as familiars or as a shape-shifting alternative form – and the supernatural: for Celts, the hare was (I believe) connected deeply with the Otherworldly…

Books Featuring Spooky Hares.

What Moves The Dead, T Kingfisher

When Alex Easton, a retired soldier, receives word that their childhood friend Madeline Usher is dying, they race to the ancestral home of the Ushers in the remote countryside of Ruritania.

What they find there is a nightmare of fungal growths and possessed wildlife, surrounding a dark, pulsing lake. Madeline sleepwalks and speaks in strange voices at night, and her brother Roderick is consumed with a mysterious malady of the nerves.

Aided by a redoubtable British mycologist and a baffled American doctor, Alex must unravel the secret of the House of Usher before it consumes them all.

Hare House, Sally Hinchcliffe

Hare House is not its real name, of course. I have, if you will forgive me, kept names to a minimum here, for reasons that will become understandable . . .

In the first brisk days of autumn, a woman arrives in Scotland having left her job at an all-girls school in London in mysterious circumstances. Moving into a cottage on the remote estate of Hare House, she begins to explore her new home. But among the tiny roads, wild moorland, and scattered houses, something more sinister lurks: local tales of witchcraft, clay figures and young men sent mad.

Striking up a friendship with her landlord and his younger sister, she begins to suspect that all might not be quite as it seems at Hare House. And as autumn turns to winter, and a heavy snowfall traps the inhabitants of the estate within its walls, tensions rise to fever pitch.

Starve Acre, Andrew Michael Hurley

The worst thing possible has happened. Richard and Juliette Willoughby’s son, Ewan, has died suddenly at the age of five. Starve Acre, their house by the moors, was to be full of life, but is now a haunted place.

Juliette, convinced Ewan still lives there in some form, seeks the help of the Beacons, a seemingly benevolent group of occultists. Richard, to try and keep the boy out of his mind, has turned his attention to the field opposite the house, where he patiently digs the barren dirt in search of a legendary oak tree.

Midwinterblood, Marcus Sedgwick

What would you sacrifice for someone you’ve loved forever? Winner of the Michael L. Printz Award, MIDWINTERBLOOD is a dark, breathtaking and cleverly crafted paranormal love story like no other, beautifully told in seven parts and spanning ten centuries.

Have you ever had the feeling that you’ve lived another life? Been somewhere that has felt totally familiar even though you’ve never been there before, or felt that you’ve known someone even though you are meeting them for the first time?

Eric and Merle loved and lost one another, and have been searching for each other through time ever since. This novel comprises seven short stories and travels in time, from 2073 back to the days of Viking sagas. Across the different tales, the two souls appear as lovers, mother and son, brother and sister, and artist and child as they come close to finding each other before facing the ultimate sacrifice . . .

Dead Water, C. A. Fletcher

AND THE WATER SHALL CALL THEM HOME

A water-borne blight hits a small community on a remote Scottish island. The residents are a mix of island-born and newcomers seeking a slower life away from the modern world; all have their own secrets, some much darker than others. Some claim the illness may be a case of mass hysteria – or even a long-buried curse – but when ferry service fails and phone towers go down, inconvenience grows into nightmarish ordeal as the outwardly harmonious fabric of the community is irreversibly torn apart.

Winterset Hollow, Jonathan Edward Durham

Everyone has wanted their favorite book to be real, if only for a moment. Everyone has wished to meet their favorite characters, if only for a day. But be careful in that wish, for even a history laid in ink can be repaid in flesh and blood, and reality is far deadlier than fiction . . . especially on Addington Isle.

Winterset Hollow follows a group of friends to the place that inspired their favorite book—a timeless tale about a tribe of animals preparing for their yearly end-of-summer festival. But after a series of shocking discoveries, they find that much of what the world believes to be fiction is actually fact, and that the truth behind their beloved story is darker and more dangerous than they ever imagined. It’s Barley Day . . . and you’re invited to the hunt.

My Spooky TBR

And considering that the last two are on my TBR list still – whilst I have read the others – I thought I’d finish off with some of the spooky reads that have piques my interest lately.

The Watchers, A. M. Shine

You can’t see them. But they can see you.

This forest isn’t charted on any map. Every car breaks down at its treeline. Mina’s is no different. Left stranded, she is forced into the dark woodland only to find a woman shouting, urging Mina to run to a concrete bunker. As the door slams behind her, the building is besieged by screams.

Mina finds herself in a room with a wall of glass, and an electric light that activates at nightfall, when the Watchers come above ground. These creatures emerge to observe their captive humans and terrible things happen to anyone who doesn’t reach the bunker in time.

Afraid and trapped among strangers, Mina is desperate for answers. Who are the Watchers, and why are they keeping the humans imprisoned, keen to watch their every move?

The Creeper, A. M. Shine

Superstitions only survive if people believe in them…

Renowned academic Dr Sparling seeks help with his project on a remote Irish village. Historical researchers Ben and Chloe are thrilled to be chosen – until they arrive.

The village is isolated and forgotten. There is no record of its history, its stories. There is no friendliness from the locals, only wary looks and whispers. The villagers lock down their homes at sundown.

It seems a nameless fear stalks the streets, but nobody will talk – nobody except one little girl. Her words strike dread into the hearts of the newcomers. Three times you see him. Each night he comes closer…

That night, Ben and Chloe see a sinister figure watching them. He is the Creeper. He is the nameless fear in the night. Stories keep him alive. And nothing will keep him away…

The Whistling, Rebecca Netley

When Elspeth arrives on a remote Scottish island to become nanny to a young child, she hopes to bond with her. Until she learns that, for reasons no one will explain, Mary has not spoken for months.

And the girl’s silence is not the only mystery.

Hypnotic lullabies drift down empty corridors.
Strange dolls appear in abandoned rooms.
And as the nights draw in, darker questions arise . . .

What happened to Mary’s late twin, William? Why did their previous nanny disappear so suddenly?

And is the whistling Elspeth hears at night just the storm outside?

Or is somebody coming for her . . . ?

You Let Me In, Camilla Bruce

Everyone knew bestselling novelist Cassandra Tipp had twice got away with murder.

Even her family were convinced of her guilt.

So when she disappears, leaving only a long letter behind, they can but suspect that her conscience finally killed her.

But the letter is not what anyone expected. It tells two chilling, darkly disturbing stories. One is a story of bloody nights and magical gifts, of children lost to the woods, of husbands made from twigs and leaves and feathers and bones . . .

The other is the story of a little girl who was cruelly treated and grew up crooked in the shadows . . .

But which story is true? And where is Cassie now?

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Thank you as always for stopping by and please do leave a comment with your favourite spooky books to read, whether involving hares or otherwise!

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Upcoming Top Ten Tuesday Themes

November 7: Book Titles That Would Make Great Newspaper Headlines (Submitted by Cathy @ What Cathy Read Next)
November 14: Mainstream Popular Authors that I Still Have Not Read (Submitted by Rissa)
November 21: Reasons Why I’m Thankful for Books (In honor of Thanksgiving in the USA.)
November 28: Books Set In X (Pick a setting and share books that are all set there. This could be a specific continent or country, a state, in outer space, underwater, on a ship or boat, at the beach, etc.)
December 5: Freebie
December 12: Books On My Winter 2022-2023 To-Read List
December 19: