Spooky season is officially nearing its fright-filled climax, and if you’ve watched all the horror movies and revisited all the Halloween-themed TV episodes you can possibly stand, maybe it’s time to cut down on your screen time (not to be your mom, but may I recommend Brick? ) and revert to a tried-and-true method of getting in the All Hallow’s Eve spirit: reading a really good, really scary book.

I haven’t always been a fan of horror-lit (I’m basically Joey from Friends hiding his copy of The Shining in the freezer), but the contemporary selections we’ve rounded up aren’t just scary for the sake of being scary; they’re smart, well-crafted, and thoughtful reads relating to the near-apocalyptic darkness of being a person in the world today. Fun, right? Below, find the seven best

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