Reading List
Featured books from Southern Gothic Festival speakers and guests.
Stay on the Line (2024). After a hurricane devastates a small Southern coastal town, survivors gather around a long out-of-service payphone hoping to speak with lost loved ones, only for it to begin ringing on its own. “This book is a literary punch to the heart.” –New York Times After a small coastal town is […]
Chris Panatier
Ben is not a genius, but he can spout facts about animals and wristwatches with the best of experts. He just can’t explain how he knows any of it. He also knows about the Chime. What it is or why it’s important he couldn’t say. But this knowledge is about to get him in a whole heap of […]
Scott Peeples
A study of the controversy-filled scholarship on Poe from the time of his death to the present. Controversies abound in studies of Edgar Allan Poe. From the time of his death well into the twentieth century, partisans debated the issue of his character: was he an alcoholic? drug addict? pathological liar? necrophile? In the1920s and […]
Andy Davidson
Ever since her father was killed when she was just a child, Miranda Crabtree has kept her head down and her eyes up, ferrying contraband for a mad preacher and his declining band of followers to make ends meet and to protect an old witch and a secret child from harm. But dark forces are […]
Robert Gwaltney
The Cicada Tree (2022). A Southern Gothic novel set in 1956 Georgia, following young piano prodigy Analeise Newell as racial tensions, family secrets, and supernatural events erupt alongside the emergence of a massive cicada brood. WHEN AN ELEVEN-YEAR-OLD, WHISKY DRINKING, PIANO PRODIGY ENCOUNTERS A WEALTHY FAMILY POSSESSING SUPERNATURAL BEAUTY, HER ENSUING OBSESSION UNLEASHES FAMILY SECRETS […]
Jason Mott
The Crossing (2018). When a deadly pandemic spreads across the globe, two siblings face the ultimate choice: Stay and die, or run and survive. From the New York Times Bestselling author of A Hell of a Book, A READ WITH JENNA TODAY SHOW BOOK CLUB PICK! When a deadly pandemic spreads across the globe, two siblings face the ultimate choice: […]
Andy Davidson
“The Hollow Kind seeps into your subconscious and waits for you in your nightmares.” —S. A. Cosby, bestselling author of Razorblade TearsAndy Davidson’s epic horror novel about the spectacular decline of the Redfern family, haunted by an ancient evil. When Nellie Gardner learns that she has inherited a turpentine estate from her long-lost grandfather, she throws everything she […]
Karen White
The Tradd Street series, a popular mystery/supernatural novel series, set in Charleston, South Carolina, follows psychic realtor Melanie Middleton as she deals with ghosts and historical secrets in old houses. The series includes seven novels: The House on Tradd Street (2008), The Girl on Legare Street (2009), The Strangers on Montagu Street (2011), Return to Tradd Street […]
Michael Wehunt
The Inconsolables (2023). A collection of ten literary horror stories, featuring characters confronting personal desires and supernatural terrors, with illustrations by Trevor Henderson. The book explores the cracks between the ordinary and the extraordinary, with stories like the Shirley Jackson Award-nominated “Vampire Fiction” and “The Pine Arch Collection,” and is noted for its poetic, resonant, […]
David Joy
The Line That Held Us (2018). A story of friendship and family, this novel is a tale balanced between destruction and redemption, where the only hope is to hold on tight, clenching those you love. From a writer whose stories are “like a pull from a bottle of Appalachian moonshine: smooth and elegant
Scott Peeples
How four American cities shaped Poe’s life and writings Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849) changed residences about once a year throughout his life. Driven by a desire for literary success and the pressures of supporting his family, Poe sought work in American magazines, living in the cities that produced them. Scott Peeples chronicles Poe’s rootless life […]
Michael Wehunt
The October Film Haunt (2025). A Bram Stoker Award®-nominated meta-horror novel about a haunted cult film and the woman reluctantly pulled into its sequel. The story examines fandom, viral trends, and the line between fiction and reality, blending elements of classic occult horror with modern paranoia in the mountains of Vermont.
Chris Panatier
War brought the Harvest. Willa Mae Wallace is a reaper. To support herself and her grandson Isaiah, Willa works for the blood contractor Patriot. Instituted to support the war effort, the mandatory draw–The Harvest–has led to a society segregated by blood type. Hoping to put an end to it all, Willa draws on her decades-old […]
Chris Panatier
The Redemption of Morgan Bright (2024). Named one of Esquire’s Best Horror Books of 2024, this novel follows a woman who checks herself into an asylum to solve her sister’s murder, only to risk losing her own identity and mind. A woman checks herself into an insane asylum to solve the mystery of her sister’s […]
Jason Mott
The Returned (2013). A New York Times bestseller about deceased loved ones mysteriously returning to life, focusing on an elderly couple whose eight-year-old son, dead for 40 years, reappears on their doorstep, this novel explores themes of grief, faith, and societal reaction to the “Returned,” and was adapted into the ABC television series Resurrection. Three […]
Karen White
The Royal Street Series is a paranormal mystery series, set in New Orleans and following Nola Trenholm as she renovates haunted houses, often with contractor Beau Ryan, while dealing with ghosts and family secrets. A spinoff of her Tradd Street novels, the series includes The Shop on Royal Street (2022), The House on Prytania (2023), The Lady […]
Nathan Ballingrud
The Strange (2023). A “space western” set on an alternate 1930s Mars, following a young woman seeking vengeance after her family is attacked, blending sci-fi, western, and horror elements in a dangerous frontier colony.
David Joy
The Weight of This World (2017). A dark, gritty “Appalachian noir” novel about two friends, Thad and Aiden, in rural North Carolina, whose lives are upended after they find a large stash of drugs and cash from a dead dealer, forcing them to confront their traumatic pasts, including Thad’s experiences as a combat veteran and […]
Julia Elliott
At an obscure South Carolina nursing home, a lost world reemerges as a disabled elderly woman undergoes newfangled brain-restoration procedures and begins to explore her environment with the assistance of strap-on robot legs. At a deluxe medical spa on a nameless Caribbean island, a middle-aged woman hopes to revitalize her fading youth with grotesque rejuvenating […]
Jason Mott
The Wonder of All Things (2014). A poignant novel exploring faith, love, and sacrifice. It follows 13-year-old Ava, who develops the ability to heal others following a traumatic plane crash. As her secret gift becomes public, the town’s, and later the world’s, expectations of her threaten her own health and life. On the heels of […]
Tanya Pell
This B Just Won’t Die! (2026). A feminist slasher novel following an aging scream queen working horror conventions, a stalked killer copying her old films, blending celebrity horror with themes of aging, body image, and survival. This humorous, heart-pounding, feminist slasher follows an ageing scream queen as she is pursued by a serial killer impersonating […]
David Joy
Winner of the 2023 Willie Morris Award for Southern FictionWinner of the 2023 Thomas Wolfe Memorial Literary AwardWinner of the 2024 Sir Walter Raleigh Award From award-winning writer David Joy comes a searing new novel about the cracks that form in a small North Carolina community and the evils that unfurl from its center. Toya […]
Clay McLeod Chapman
What Kind of Mother (2023). A NYT Book Review Best Horror of 2023 selection, this supernatural horror and domestic suspense novel explores parental grief and devotion through a dark Southern Gothic lens rooted in rural Southern life.
David Joy
Winner of the 2020 Dashiell Hammett Award for Literary Excellence in Crime Writing Acclaimed author and “remarkably gifted storyteller” (The Charlotte Observer) David Joy returns with a fierce and tender tale of a father, an addict, a lawman, and the explosive events that come to unite them. When his addict son gets in deep with […]
Newsletter
Get author announcements, featured books, schedule notes, ticket reminders, and the next round of Southern Gothic Festival updates.
