Stephen King's Favorite Horror Books, Part I

On Saturday and Sunday, I gave you the list of Stephen King’s favorite horror movies from the year’s 1950 to 1980. That list was first published in Appendix I of King’s 1981 non-fiction book, “Danse Macabre,” which is King’s take on horror fiction in print, on the radio, in movies and in comic books and his feelings about how horror fiction has influenced popular culture.
Also, included in the back of that book is Appendix II: The Books, which is a list of King’s favorite books from 1950 to 1980. Here’s what King has to say about this list.
“Below is a list of roughly 100 books – novels and collections – which span the period we have been discussing. They are listed alphabetically according to author. As with my list of films, you may not find all of these to your taste, but all seem – to me, at least – important to the genre we have been discussing. Once again, I’ve marked with an asterisk (*) books which I felt were particularly important.”
Without further ado, here’s the first part of the list, which, as King noted, is arranged alphabetically by each author’s last name.
- Richard Adams. The Plague of Dogs; Watership Down*
- Robert Aickman. Cold Hand in Mine; Painted Devils
- Marcel Ayme. The Walker through Walls
- Beryl Bainbridge. Harriet Said.
- J.G. Ballard. Concrete Island*; High Rise
- Charles Beaumont. Hunger*; The Magic Man
- Robert Bloch. Pleasant Dreams*; Psycho*
- Ray Bradbury. Dandelion Wine; Something Wicked This Way Comes*; The October Country
- Joseph Payne Brennan. The Shapes of Midnight*
- Frederic Brown. Nightmares and Geezenstacks*
- Edward Bryant. Among the Dead
- Janet Caird. The Loch
- Ramsey Campbell. Demons By Daylight; The Doll Who Ate His Mother*; The Parasite*
- Suzy McKee Charnas. The Vampire Tapestry
- Julio Cortazar. The End of the Game and Other Stories
- Harry Crews. A Feast of Snakes
- Roald Dahl. Kiss Kiss*; Someone Like You*
- Les Daniels. The Black Castle
- Stephen R. Donaldson. The Thomas Covenant Trilogy (3 vols.)*
- Daphne Du Maurier. Don’t Look Now
- Harlan Ellison. Deathbird Stories*; Strange Wine*
- John Farris. All Heads Turn When the Hunt Goes By
- Charles G. Finney. The Ghosts of Manacle
- Jack Finney. The Body Snatchers*; I Love Galesburg in the Springtime; The Third Level*; Time and Again*
- William Golding, Lord of the Flies*
- Edward Gorey. Amphigorey: Amphigorey Too
- Charles L. Grant. The Hour of the Oxrun Dead; The Sound of Midnight*
- Davis Grubb. Twelve Tales of Horror*
- William H. Hallahan. The Keeper of the Children; The Search for Joseph Tully
- James Herbert. The Fog; The Spear*; The Survivor
- William Hjortsberg. Falling Angel*
- Shirley Jackson. The Haunting of Hill House*; The Lottery and Others*; The Sundial
- Gerald Kersh. Men Without Bones*
- Russell Kirk. The Princess of All Lands
- Nigel Kneale. Tomato Caine
- William Kotzwinkle. Dr. Rat*
- Jerry Kozinski. The Painted Bird*
And, I’ll stop right there for tonight. Visit the site tomorrow for the rest of King’s list.
In the end, let me know if you’ve read any of the above books and what you thought about them. I’ve read a handful of them over the years, and those that I’ve read are pretty good, especially “Something Wicked This Way Comes,” “The Haunting of Hill House” and “The Lottery and Others.”