15 Ghost novels Archives

Unlikely Animals

by Annie Hartnett

This contemporary fiction includes wild game, complex family relationships, and an interesting narrator experiencing the highs and lows of life. Annie Hartnett is a master at combining the heavy with the light. There are serious topics: dementia, depression, death, abduction, and the opioid crisis affecting New Hampshire where this is set. But it’s light tone overall. Hartnett said she was raised to find humor in difficult or dark situations and that’s the case here.

Silver Nitrate

by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

A 2023 Summer Reading Guide selection: Movies cast magic spells in this unique and darkly humorous thriller set in 1990s Mexico City. Montserrat and Tristán are childhood friends who once bonded over classic horror films. Now, nearing forty, she’s an under-appreciated disabled sound engineer and he’s a washed-up telenovela star. When they cross paths with a legendary director, he persuades the two to help him complete an unfinished horror film from the 30s, the script for which was written by a Nazi occultist. The director claims that bad luck has plagued everyone who worked on the film, but completing it will break the curse and bring their trio prosperity. But instead of luck, their interference unleashes something dark and deadly in Mexico City. Surprising, sharp, and smart.

The Hotel Nantucket

by Elin Hilderbrand

Hilderbrand’s beach reads are always enjoyable but this one is notable for introducing me to a new favorite pen. The titular hotel’s Gilded Age glory days are long gone: it’s a real dump (and in a fun plot twist—haunted!) when London billionaire Xavier Darling buys it sight unseen. The new owner hires local restaurateur Lizbet Keaton to make his hotel the best property on the island, if not the whole Eastern seaboard. And that means The Hotel Nantucket has to wow Shelly Carpenter, the influencer who’s become a national obsession for her blog Hotel Confidential. The influential critic regularly reviews hotels for her eighteen million followers and awards each property anywhere from one to five keys. The staff is energized by this audacious goal, because no hotel has ever earned five keys from Shelly Carpenter. To earn the coveted fifth key, they’ll have to do everything right. Super fun, and I especially enjoyed the ghost story element!

Cemetery Boys

by Aiden Thomas

In Thomas’s debut YA Fantasy, Yadriel decides he doesn’t need his family’s approval or acceptance of his gender in order to become a brujo and decides to perform the ritual himself. But instead of summoning the ghost of his recently deceased cousin, he summons the ghost of bad boy Julian who demands Yadriel find his killer. The more time they spend together, the less Yadriel wants Julian to leave. But what kind of happily ever after can you have with a ghost? This magical novel remains grounded thanks to the LA setting, Latinx culture, and fantastic cast of secondary characters.

Lincoln in the Bardo

by George Saunders

This is a story about Lincoln, America's 16th president—kind of. The "bardo" of the title is a Tibetan concept: it's a spiritual landscape—a kind of in-between place—where we are sent between physical lives. When Lincoln's son Willie was 11, he died of typhoid, plunging Lincoln into deep grief. Saunders uses this real event as a jumping-off point to explore the near-unbearable grief of an individual, linking it to the disarray of the country he leads, at the height of its Civil War, and imagines how Lincoln's despair changed the outcome of the war. I just finished this book, and whoa, was it strange. Interesting and experimental, but definitely strange. Pro tip: if you want to read it, do so on paper, not on Kindle.

Anita de Monte Laughs Last

by Xochitl Gonzalez

Olga Dies Dreaming author González returns with a fiery, campus-y novel set in the worlds of academia and fine art. In 1985, artist Anita de Monte falls to her death during a nasty fight with her husband, the prominent artist Jack Martin, whose fragile ego is threatened by Anita’s burgeoning success. Jack calls it an accident and carries on like nothing happened, but Anita is determined to make him pay. Flash forward to 1998, when Brown art student Raquel is preparing to launch her senior thesis on Martin, but gets sidetracked when she learns of Anita’s forgotten art—and suspicious death. Raquel admires the work and feels a kinship with its creator, another outsider in the art world. Raquel may hang with the white and rich Art History Girls, but as a first generation Puerto Rican college student, she can’t—and doesn’t want to—be mistaken for one. Plus the ways her own aspiring artist boyfriend’s actions resemble Jack’s are deeply unsettling. Smart and sophisticated (and more than a little sweary), this scintillating sophomore effort was everything I hoped for and more. Bianca Bosker’s nonfiction work Get the Picture would make a fascinating flight pick.

Beloved

by Toni Morrison

Morrison delivers one of the most unsettling, haunting, and macabre stories in the American canon. The story begins in a haunted Ohio home where we meet Sethe, a woman who escaped slavery and fled north. Followed around every corner by the ghost of her baby, Sethe’s attempts to begin a new life are thwarted at every turn—most of all when a young woman shows up at her door bearing the same name as the ghost baby's headstone: Beloved. Since Toni Morrison narrates her own iconic work, I enjoyed simultaneously listening to the audiobook and reading the physical copy, simply to catch the brilliance of the author’s craft. Content warnings apply.

The Fox Wife

by Yangsze Choo

This lyrical historical novel and sophisticated detective tale is very much in the vein of Choo’s previous works The Ghost Bride and The Night Tiger, inspired by Japanese fox folklore. In 1908 Manchuria, a young girl's mysterious death brings together a servant, a detective, and a wealthy family. Gradually the reader comes to understand the vast world of fox folklore, the terror of a family curse, the reasons a mother is bent on revenge, and the stakes for all involved. This was lovely on audio, narrated by the author, but because the plot is intricate I had to pay close attention, occasionally even rewinding to re-listen to certain passages.

Bellewether

by Susanna Kearsley

This dual timeline novel alternates between 1759 Long Island, NY during the Seven Years War when captured French soldiers are brought into Lydia Wilde’s home, and the present day, where Charley becomes the new curator at the Wilde House Museum and encounters the house’s ghost: Lydia’s French-Canadian lieutenant. Lydia and Jean-Philippe’s star-crossed romance has become legend over the years. As Charley investigates Lydia and Jean-Philippe’s story, she discovers the truth is much more complicated than she ever could have imagined.

The Cliffs

by J. Courtney Sullivan

Sullivan’s provocative latest is the story of a purple Victorian and the land on which it sits, overlooking the ocean in Maine. The story begins in the present, when a disgraced Harvard archivist retreats to her hometown after torching her marriage and career in one foolish act. The house’s owner asks her to research its history; she’s convinced it’s haunted and wants to get to know her ghosts. Jane’s research uncovers the female artist who lived and worked there in the 1960s and the former Shaker who worked there as a hired girl in the 1850s, and ultimately takes her back to the time when the Wabanaki people lived on the land. The present day storyline doesn’t hold the same allure as the past dramas, but this juicy summer tale remains immersive, nuanced, and oh-so-discussable.

The Widow of Rose House

by Diana Biller

Young widow Alva has two priorities: restoring a dilapidated Hyde Park mansion so she can write her interior design book and moving past the death of her abusive husband. Only one problem: the house is haunted and the workers refuse to come near the house. Enter scientist and ghost hunter Sam. Alva can’t afford any complications in her life, nor does she want to risk her heart. But Sam wants nothing more than to prove she deserves her very own happily ever after. As soon as he figures out how to get rid of the ghost, that is. An enjoyable, humorous historical romance set during the Gilded Age.

A Witch’s Guide to Magical Innkeeping

by Sangu Mandanna

This enchanting escape features grounded fantasy, found family, engaging romance, and all the welcoming vibes. Sera could have been the most powerful witch in all of England but she lost her magic many years ago when she cast a forbidden spell. Now Sera desperately needs to get her magic back to save her great-aunt’s magical inn. To do so, she must cast an impossible spell, something she can only do with assistance from her friends and the dashing, grumpy magical historian Luke. This whimsical tale is at once action-packed and extremely cozy. (Briefly open door.)

The Glass Hotel

by Emily St. John Mandel

Emily St. John Mandel's latest novel is completely different from Station Eleven in terms of plot and tone, but her signature storytelling style that connects characters across seemingly unrelated events remains the same. I wasn't sure what to expect when I found out that one of my favorite authors was writing about a Ponzi scheme, but I certainly enjoyed it. Part classic noir, part ghost story, and part mystery—this atmospheric novel does feel like winter. The absorbing audiobook version is narrated by Dylan Moore.

City of Ghosts

by Victoria Schwab

Schwab’s middle grade ghost story is a fun, spooky tale. Cass’s ghost-hunting parents might be filming the next season of their TV show in Edinburgh but Cass can really see ghosts, including her best friend Jacob. Once there she befriends a girl who not only sees ghosts but also helps send them permanently beyond the Veil. There’s a sinister presence haunting the city and no good can come from allowing it to stay. Cass is a part of this fight, whether she wants to or not.

The Dead Romantics

by Ashley Poston

Set in the world of publishing, this delightful novel gives “ghostwriting” a double meaning. Florence Day makes her living writing bestselling romance novels that are published under somebody else's name; only one person knows the truth behind her facade as a personal assistant. This puts her in a tricky spot when she tries to tell her handsome new editor that she—er, her boss—won't be able to meet her deadline. She doesn't tell him the true problem: after a bad breakup, she doesn't believe in love anymore, so she sure can't write about it. Before she can force words on the page, her father dies. When she returns home for the first time in a decade she finds the family she loves (and the funeral home they run) the same as they've ever been, even though her father is gone. She also finds a ghost standing at the funeral home front door who looks remarkably like her editor, who seems to have died with unfinished business that's somehow connected to Florence. This open door ghost romance sounds bonkers, but it's sweet and fun and—as far as the audiobook was concerned—compulsively listenable.

15 Ghost novels

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summer reading starts May 16th