October has to be my favourite month of the year, and it’s finally come around again! Even though I have no plans for Halloween, I’m already counting down to it because I love the scary/spooky stuff, the dressing up… in a strange way it makes me feel comfortable and safe. Horror films and curry have become my routine whenever I’m ill or down in the dumps, but October is a great excuse to treat myself to the scary stuff my dark little heart desires (not that an excuse is needed).

Does anyone have October recommendations?

Below are a couple of mine, (possibly) more to follow:

Horror/Spooky Films and Series:

- Nosferatu (1922)
- Psycho (1960)
- Alien (1979)
- The Shining (1980)
- Dracula (1992)
- Interview with the Vampire (1994)
- The Blair Witch Project (1999)
- Sleepy Hollow (1999)
- From Hell (2001)
- The Others (2001) (my first spooky film!)
- 28 Days Later (2002)
- 장화, 홍련  / A Tale of Two Sisters (2003)
- Shaun of the Dead (2004)
- Van Helsing (2004) (yes that one, it’s a nostalgia thing, OK??)
- Supernatural (2005)
- El Orfanato / The Orphanage (2007)
- Cabin in the Woods (2011)
- Woman in Black (2012)
- Cargo (2013) (the short film)
- In The Flesh (2013)
- The Conjuring (2013)
- Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell (2015)
- Crimson Peak (2015) (Guillermo del Toro’s work is part of a healthy year-round diet)
- The Witch (2015)
- The Living and the Dead (2016)
- The Autopsy of Jane Doe (2016)
- Stranger Things (2016)
- The Haunting of Hill House (2018)


Cutesy / Family Friendly Films/Series:

- Beetlejuice (1988)
- Courage the Cowardly Dog (1992) (one of my childhood favourites)
- Tales from the Cryptkeeper (1993)
- Casper (1995)
- Practical Magic (1998)
- CreepSchool (2004) (also one of my childhood favourites)
- The Corpse Bride (2005)
- Over the Garden Wall (2014) (this one was an absolute revelation to me and I love it so much!)


Novels:

- Dracula, Bram Stoker
- Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice
- Misery, Stephen King (my favourite Stephen King novel so far)
- The Woman in Black, Susan Hill
- The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Robert Louis Stevenson
- The Book of Lost Things, John Connoly
- Frankenstein, Mary Shelley
- The Horla, Guy de Maupassant
- The Carpathian Castle, Jules Verne
- Contes Cruels (Sardonic Tales), Villers de L’Isle-Adam
- The Sweeper, A.M. Burrage
- The Turn of the Screw, Henry James
- Roald Dahl’s Book of Ghost Stories, Roald Dahl (editor)  (my go-to whenever I was sick as a kid)
- pretty much anything by Edgar Allen Poe
- The Signalman, Charles Dickens


Books for Children / YA: 

- Ghosthunters and the Incredibly Revolting Ghost, Cornelia Funke
- Krabat, Otfried Preussler
- Coraline, Neil Gaiman
- The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman
- Die Erben der Nacht book series by Ulrike Schweikert
- The Lie Tree, Frances Hardinge
- Cuckoo Calling, Frances Hardinge
- A Monster Calls, Patrick Ness
- The Prince of Mist, Carlos Ruiz Zafón


Music:

- Midnight Syndicate
- Nox Arcana
- Cryo Chamber


Video Games:

- 7 Days to Die
- Thief, Deadly Shadows
- Half-Life 2
- Bioshock 1 and 2
- Night of the Rabbit (cutesy and autumny)