‘Tis the Season to be… Scary?! The Best Spooky Romances for Halloween Season

It’s October – Halloween season in much of the world! – and the supernatural is as much a part of the season as pumpkins and candy corn. Monsters are also longtime staples of Romancelandia! In the mood for some spooky love stories? Check out some of our DIK favorites featuring some Halloween archetypes!


Zombies:

We do have books under our Zombies tag, but they’re books where zombies exist, not books where someone falls in love with a zombie. Those are out there, but we haven’t reviewed or DIK’d one that I know of.

Vampires:

NOTE: In addition to our vampire tag, you can search for “vampire romance” in our Power Search

Beloved Vampire by Joey W. Hill

This book is natural. It is the highest compliment I can give to a book. It is naturally flowing – the plot, the emotional progression, the dialogue. Read Beloved Vampire, even if you think you’re sick to death of vampires. You won’t regret it. The story is so sensual, so romantic. I’m envious of the fact that I’ll never get that first-time excitement again.

Sunshine by Robin McKinley

Sunshine, like the best fantasy, creates a completely recognizable, but at the same time, completely different world. It’s post-Apocalyptic, that is if the Apocalypse had sharp teeth and arrived in the dark to drain your lifeblood. It’s so amazingly and cleverly written that it’s hard to convey its scope and depth in the course of a few paragraphs. It (pardon the pun) sucks you in with its prose, its alternate reality, and its incredible heroine. Sunshine is, like most of us, a multi-faceted character whose personality isn’t quickly distilled. She is smart, funny, courageous, self-deprecating, and totally and uniquely her.

Ghosts:

Rock ‘N Soul by Lauren Sattersby

This is an unexpected gem; funny, emotional and sexy. Tyler Lindsey is a bellboy at a nice Boston hotel. He has an okay girlfriend, an okay apartment, an okay life. Then one day he enters a wealthy rock star’s suite with his room service, and finds the musician, Chris Raiden, dead on the floor from a heroin overdose. Tyler’s life changes from this point onwards. His girlfriend leaves him and he discovers he is haunted by the …world’s most narcissistic ghost.

Of Midnight Born by Lisa Cach (NOTE: This book has been republished as Phantom Bride)

Local legend has it that Serena murdered her husband and fell to her death on her wedding night. Serena is known to leave women alone but poses a threat to any male who sleeps on her castle’s grounds; this seems borne out when Alex climbs the castle tower to watch a tremendous meteor shower, glimpses Serena, and nearly falls to his death.

The Siren’s Dance by Amber Belldene

The Truss family lived in the Ukraine in the late 1960s when it was still under Communist rule. Anya, a ballerina in training, drowned while running from her family’s pursuers. She became a Vila, a nymph with power over the wind. In her ghostly form she is invisibly tethered to her tattered ballet shoe that sits on the riverbank where she drowned. Anya seeks her ballet master, a cruel and demanding man named Stas Demyan who broke her spirit. Sergey, a police officer, seeks the same man as Anya for his own reasons. Sergey is shocked to come face to face with a ghost. And not only is Anya a spirit, she is also a Siren, her voice and body ensnaring Sergey with her sexual power.

Witches:

Crystal Cove by Lisa Kleypas

Justine is a witch. She rarely practices magic and instead runs a bed and breakfast on San Juan island. When she discovers that a geas has been placed upon her which keeps her from falling in love, she becomes enraged and breaks the geas with no research as to the consequences of her actions. Since all high magic demands some sort of sacrifice the repercussions are huge. Enter the hero, Jason Black, a man born with no soul.

Morrigan’s Cross by Nora Roberts

This is the first title in the Circle trilogy. In the year 1128, on the isle of Eire, the vampire Lillith stole Hoyt’s brother by making him into a soulless blood sucker. Hoyt’s goddess Morrigan sent Hoyt forward to the 21st century to find allies for a great battle. One recruit is a human witch whom Hoyt saw in his dreams before traveling into the future: Glenna Ward, a hereditary witch with formidable powers of her own.

And let’s not forget stories with a spooky tone!

Gothic

NOTE: not all stories tagged “gothic” are romances. The review usually makes it clear.

Whispers in the Woods by Helen R. Myers: Paloma St. John escaped her evil scientist uncle and fled  to an abandoned estate in the woods of northwest Maine. Before long, she begins to sense another presence lurking in the woods outside the estate. She is stunned when it makes telepathic contact with her, in the form of a single terse order, “Leave.” With nowhere to go, she can’t obey. Despite his best efforts to warn her away, Paloma finds herself drawn to the tortured soul she can feel beneath his harsh demeanor and is increasingly determined to know who and what he is.

At time of writing, his novel is available in used paperback only.


Want more supernatural love? Try some of our other tags: mermaid/merman, shifter romance, dragons, fairies, gods and goddesses, Angels, demon, medium

Got some favorites not listed here? Please share!

~ Caroline Russomanno

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