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The Most Anticipated Horror Books of 2026 (Add These to Your TBR Now)
If you’re looking for the most highly anticipated horror books of 2026, this list is for you. I picked these upcoming horror and thriller books based on the blurbs and the covers that instantly grabbed my attention.
I’m not a huge horror reader. I also know I can’t really do heavy Stephen King type books. But in 2025, I want to explore more thrillers and sci-fi horror. I read books like We Used to Live Here and The Reformatory, and I also tried a few disturbing books that really stayed with me. They were dark, but they made me curious to read more in this genre.
So this list of horror books 2026 is for readers like me. If you want new horror releases, psychological horror, and highly anticipated thriller books that feel creepy, unsettling, but still readable, these are the ones to add to your 2026 TBR.
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Horror Books of 2026
I Will Kill Your Imaginary Friend for $200 by Robert Brockway
To lonely eight-year-old Kay Washington the worst thing in the world is silence. That’s why Eddie Video makes the perfect imaginary friend. He’s smart, rambunctious, and loves pulling pranks. But most important, he’s never ever quiet.
Forty-something, immigrant Ivanon is a contract killer with an unusual imaginary friends who’ve overstayed their welcome. His only rule, no kids—kids need their imaginary friends.
But when one of Eddie Video’s “pranks” goes too far and lands Kay in the hospital, Ivanon agrees maybe exceptions can be made. After all, rent is due. But Ivanon and Kay will soon learn Eddie Video is no ordinary imaginary friend; he is something much, much darker.
A balance of comedy and catharsis, this dual-narrative tackles both the fear of growing up and the scars our childhood leaves behind.
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Trad Wife by Saratoga Schaefer
A ‘traditional wife’ influencer allows a demonic creature to impregnate her in this unnerving horror novel, perfect for fans of Nightbitch and Mary, from the author of Serial Killer Support Group.
Every #tradwife needs a baby. She’ll get one at any cost.
When Camille Deming isn’t cooking, cleaning, or homesteading in her picture-perfect country farmhouse, she’s posting about her tradwife lifestyle for her online followers. She takes inspiration from other tradwives on social media, aspiring to be like them, but Camille’s missing a key component: a baby. And contrary to what she posts online, things with her husband Graham have been strained. Pressured by her eager followers, Camille fears that without a baby, her relationship will suffer and her social media will never grow out of its infancy.
When Camille discovers a mysterious, decrepit well in the wheatfield behind her house, she makes a wish for a baby. Afterwards, she has unsettling experiences that she convinces herself are angelic in nature, and when she’s visited one night by a strange creature, her wish comes true.
Camille’s pregnancy announcement gets more engagement than anything she’s ever posted—so what if Graham’s reaction is lukewarm? Camille’s life is finally falling into place. Never mind that her pregnancy is developing freakishly rapidly and she’s suddenly craving raw meat. Being a traditional wife is worth it.
Rosemary’s Baby for the digital age, this disturbing horror novel is one you’ll want to devour in just one bite.
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Cruelty Free by Caroline Glenn
For fans of Monika Kim and Rachel Yoder, a twisted debut horror novel in which a disgraced movie star returns to Hollywood 10 years after the kidnapping of her young daughter, intent on seeking revenge.
NOTHING FEELS BETTER THAN REVENGE.
Ten years ago, Lila Devlin was an A-list actress with a movie star husband and a beautiful baby girl, Josie. When Josie was kidnapped out of her home and never seen again, Lila’s previously pristine public image twisted into that of an Unfit Mother. Driven mad by the hungry press, incompetent cops, and relentless true crime–obsessed “fans,” she disappeared into anonymity.
Now, Lila Devlin returns to LA with a grand vision for a radical new skincare brand to reinvent herself and honor Josie’s legacy. She’s prepared to move into the next chapter of her life with forgiveness in her heart, when an encounter with a parasitic blogger ends with him dead. Lila suddenly discovers forgiveness isn’t nearly as satisfying as a body hitting the floor.
With the help of her devoted publicist Sylvie, Lila begins a relentless, blood-soaked hunt through LA. Giving her skincare the edge it needs, they introduce a secret ingredient—revenge-sourced—from the bodies piling up. But as the company’s success skyrockets and Lila begins unraveling the truth behind her daughter’s kidnapping, her murderous side hustle threatens the life she’s painstakingly rebuilt.
Both a striking portrayal of grief and womanhood, and a twisting, cynical satire on celebrity and toxic beauty standards, Cruelty Free is an ambitious debut from a talented star on the rise.
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For Human Use by Sarah G. Pierce
Modern dating is dead.
Sarah G. Pierce’s debut,For Human Use, is a glossy, razor-cut spiral into algorithmic obsession and capitalist absurdity where the dread hits hardest because it reads like a headline you’ve already scrolled past. With darkly funny dialogue and a premise that shouldn’t feel this plausible, Pierce lures you in with laughter, then leaves you staring into the abyss of your own algorithmic despair.
When Liv, a sleek new app that matches users with dead bodies, becomes a cultural obsession, the world doesn’t recoil. It invests. It scales. And it starts asking how many more cadavers can be sourced before Q4.
Tom, a venture capitalist, knows this should be a hard no. But really, who can argue with a spreadsheet? The founder Auden is insufferable and Mara, who knows too much, is just trying to survive this Brave New World of bloodless tech-managed desire.
Twisted, smart, and disturbingly plausible, For Human Use is for the emotionally exhausted and professionally complicit—perfect for readers who didn’t know they were craving a crossover of Severance and John Marrs’ The One.
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Dollface by Lindy Ryan
Barbie meets Scream with a 90s nostalgia twist in this horror romp from Bless Your Heart author Lindy Ryan.
Horror author Jill has just moved to suburban New Jersey, hoping to fit in with the new PTA moms and maybe not weird everyone out with her Final Girl coffee mug. You know. Make some real friends.
But then a plastic face-masked serial killer begins slashing their way through town, one overly made-up mom at a time. The police are incredulous. The moms are indignant. And Jill is slowly wrapped into a killer’s murderous spree, until she might just be the last woman standing.
A delightfully murderous novel that is equal parts scathing and salacious, Dollface will win you over with its gossip and gore, one body at a time.
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Nothing Tastes as Good by Luke Dumas
The acclaimed author of the “disorienting, creepy, paranoia-inducing” (Paul Tremblay, author of The Cabin at the End of the World) A History of Fear returns with a spine-tingling new thriller about a weight loss treatment with potentially murderous side effects.
Retail worker Emmett Truesdale has never fit the Southern California mold of six-pack, suntanned masculinity. Over three hundred pounds, he carries the weight of his childhood trauma and millennial ennui around his waist and in his soul. After trying every diet under the sun, he remains stuck—in his dead-end job, in love, and in his body.
Desperate for help, he enrolls in a clinical trial for a new weight loss product called Obexity. The treatment is as horrifying as the results are miraculous and as Emmett sheds pounds at superhuman speed, every part of his life improves overnight.
Unfortunately, Obexity comes with some killer side effects, including lost stretches of time and overwhelming cravings. Worse, people who were cruel to him have started disappearing and when the police warn of a cannibalistic killer on the loose, he fears that Obexity is turning him into a monster. But how can he give it up now that people are finally starting to treat him like he’s human?
Nerve-racking, sinister, and at times surreal, Nothing Tastes as Good is an unputdownable thriller that combines The Substance with the best of Stephen King and keeps you guessing until the final page.
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The Caretaker by Marcus Kliewer
Follow the Rites…
Nothing less than the survival of humanity is at stake.
From Marcus Kliewer, a new “titan of the macabre and unsettling” (Erin A. Craig, #1 New York Times bestselling author), comes a supernatural horror about a young woman who accepts a caretaking job from Craigslist, only to discover the position has consequences far greater—and more dangerous—than she ever could have imagined.
EXCITING OPPORTUNITY:
Caretaker urgently needed. Three days of work. Competitive pay. Serious applicants ONLY.
Macy Mullins can’t say why the job posting grabbed her attention—it had the pull of a fisherman’s lure, barbed hook and all—vaguely ominous. But after an endless string of failed job interviews, she’s not exactly in the position to be picky. She has rent to pay, groceries to buy, and a younger sister to provide for.
Besides, it’s only three days’ work…
Three days, cooped up in a stranger’s house, surrounded by Oregon Coast wilderness.
What starts as a peculiar side gig soon becomes a waking nightmare. An incomprehensible evil may dwell on this property—and Macy Mullins might just be the only thing standing between it, and the rest of humanity.
Follow the Rites…
Follow the Rites…
Follow the Rites…
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Molka by Monika Kim
molka (n): the Korean term for spy cameras secretly and illegally installed, often to capture voyeuristic images and videos
Dahye can’t believe her luck when she finds herself in a whirlwind romance with handsome, charismatic Hyukjoon, the heir to a multi-million dollar fortune.
But then a shocking revelation threatens: the couple has been caught on a spycam amid Korea’s growing molka epidemic, and the video is all over the internet. When Hyukjoon flees the country to avoid the intense public scrutiny, Dahye is left to grapple with the ramifications on her own; and the demons from her childhood, long dormant, begin to surface.
Amid the chaos, she catches the attention of Junyoung, a nerdy, introverted IT tech at work. Junyoung harbours a dark secret: he has been spying on the women at work with his own hidden cameras. As Dahye’s life begins to unravel, she unknowingly becomes the sole target of Junyoung’s perverse obsession.
When the facts surrounding the invasion of her privacy come to light, Dahye is faced with the humiliating truth. Her pain and hurt turn to rage as she faces her past. Her desire for vengeance is insatiable, and she will not rest until the men who have wronged her have paid in blood.
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Japanese Gothic by Kylie Lee Baker
October, 2026: Lee Turner doesn’t remember how or why he killed his college roommate. The details are blurred and bloody. All he knows is he has to flee New York and go to the one place that might offer refuge—his father’s new home in Japan, a house hidden by sword ferns and wild ginger. But something is terribly wrong with the house: no animals will come near it, the bedroom window isn’t always a window, and a woman with a sword appears in the yard when night falls.
October, 1877: Sen is a young samurai in exile, hiding from the imperial soldiers in a house behind the sword ferns. A monster came home from war wearing her father’s face, but Sen would do anything to please him, even turn her sword on her own mother. She knows the soldiers will soon slaughter her whole family when she sees a terrible omen: a young foreign man who appears outside her window.
One of these people is a ghost, and one of these stories is a lie.
Something is hiding beneath the house of sword ferns, and Lee and Sen will soon wish they never unburied it.
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Stephy George
