HorrorBraille
About this list
The titles in this booklist are just a selection of the titles available for loan from the RNIB National Library Service.
Don’t forget you are allowed to have up to 6 books on loan.
If you would like to read any of these titles then please contact the Customer Services Team on 0303 123 9999 or
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Booklist
Andrews, Virginia
Flowers in the attic. 1980. 8v.
(Sequel 2)
The four children have perfect lives in a happy, golden family. Suddenly their father dies and the children now live alone, hidden in an airless attic. Their mother promised they would stay only long enough for her to inherit the fortune but gradually she forgets how much she adored them. The children, now cared for by a vengeful grandmother, survive only because of their overwhelming love for each other.
Sequels also available.
Ashe, Rosalind
Dark runner. 1984. 5v. (Interline)
When Lucinda Morland moves as a temporary tenant in to a London flat she finds herself gradually, almost imperceptibly, drawn into its intrinsic evil. From the start the flat is disturbing. The decor is weird and overpoweringly exotic. There is rotting food in the kitchen and a sticky sweet smell pervades the place. And an oddly-assorted band of strangers start to close in around her.
Banks, Iain
The wasp factory. 1990. 4v.
Sixteen year-old Frank has already killed three people, but was it just a stage he was going through? Death and blood and gore fill the pages of this novel, lightened by dark humour and surreal touches. The private world of Frank, just sixteen, is unconventional to say the least. 'Two years after I killed Blythe I murdered my young brother Paul... Then a year after that I did for my young cousin Esmerelda, more or less on a whim. That's my score to date. Three. I haven't killed anybody for years, and don't intend to ever again. It was just a stage I was going through’.
(Contains violence)
Barker, Clive
The damnation game. 1985. 7v. UK Loan only.
Chance had ruled Marty Strauss' life for as long as he could remember. Now at last luck was turning his way. Paroled from prison, he becomes bodyguard to Joseph Whitehead, one of the richest men in Europe. But Whitehead has also played with chance - an ancient game which gave him vast power and wealth, in exchange for his immortal soul. Now the forces he played against are back to claim what's theirs. Terrifying forces, with the power to raise the dead; and Marty is trapped between his human masters and Hell itself, with just one last, desperate game left to play.
Brite, Poppy Z.
The Lazarus heart. 1998. 5v. (Interline)
Jared Poe is on Louisiana's Death Row condemned to die for killing his lover. Can he clear his name and find the real killer in time? No. For we are in the dark realm of The Crow, and Jared must feel the cold shudder of death before proving his innocence.
Brite, Poppy Z.
Lost souls. 1992. 8v. (Interline)
Gay punk vampires on drugs and booze create mayhem across the American south - and help bring two young rock musicians to an awareness of their homosexual love for each other.
Carrere, Emmanuel
Class trip. 1997. 2v. (Interline) UK Loan only.
Nicholas is away from home for the first time on a school trip. Suddenly, he becomes embroiled in a mystery after a local child vanishes. As he attempts to solve the disappearance he is forced to confront a reality that is more sinister and atrocious than anything he had first imagined.
Collins, Wilkie
The haunted hotel: a mystery of modern Venice. 1889. 4v. UK Loan only.
The Countess Narona feels a sense of foreboding when she meets Alice Lockwood, the woman jilted by her husband-to-be. When the Countess and her husband Lord Montbarry move to Venice, he becomes a recluse and falls fatally ill. The fate of the Countess and Agnes become intertwined thereafter in this tale of mystery and suspense set in Venice. One reader described this book as deliciously spooky!
Dahl, Roald
Kiss Kiss. 1960. 5v. (Interline) UK Loan only.
Eleven spine-tingling short stories each with a sting in the tail, from one of the most popular writers of the macabre. A flock of pheasants in a baby's pram, a taxidermist landlady who stuffs her guests, a solitary eye blinking in a white dish - unpredictable, shocking and amusing.
Dale, Celia
A dark corner. 1971. 2v. (Interline)
Mrs Didcot offers a stranger a room for the night. A chilling story of horror in a deceptively cosy setting.
Dickens, Monica
Closed at dusk. 1990. 4v.
The Sanctuary is a big old country house, the home of William and Dorothy Taylor. But when Josephine arrives, their safe and happy life begins to crumble. There have never been ghosts at the house, so what could bring about the hideous death of a helpless old woman? Mystery and hatred have invaded the Sanctuary - and Josephine is always there.
Erskine, Barbara
Midnight is a lonely place. 1994. 10v.
Kate, Alison and her elder brother find their lives overturned as a disturbing episode in East Anglia's violent past thrusts its way into present reality. In her lonely cottage, Kate is terrorised by these mysterious forces. What do these ghosts want?
(Contains swear words).
Forsyth, Frederick
The phantom of Manhattan. 1999. 3v. (Interline)
The story of the Phantom after he has escaped to New York, where he begins his new and secret life. He carves out a kingdom of fortune and power, and realizes his dream to build the most glittering opera house in the world - a perfect place to lure Christine, the victim of his obsessive love.
Francis, Clare
A dark devotion. 1997. 9v. (Interline)
Alexandra O'Neill is drawn back to the Norfolk village where she grew up, to help Will Dearden find his missing paragon of a wife. But can any wife be so perfect that she doesn't have secrets? And can a devoted husband have failed to see the truth? Somewhere on the lonely Norfolk marshes lies the clue to a woman's disappearance. A chilling thriller!
Frobenius, Nikolaj
De Sade's valet. 2000. 3v.
In eighteenth-century Honfleur, a child is born with a horrific destiny before him. He is physiologically incapable of feeling pain. Obsessed by his abnormality and fascinated by the mysteries of pain, Latour loses himself in a dark spiral of death, murder and dissection as he attempts to fathom the secrets of the human body. Eventually he meets the infamous Marquis de Sade and becomes his faithful servant and accomplice.
Gaskell, Elizabeth
Gothic tales. 1865. 4v. American Braille. UK loan only.
This collection includes nine of Elizabeth Gaskell's gothic short stories.
Glaister, Lesley
Trick or treat. 1991. 4v. (Interline) UK Loan Only
An unsettling sense of menace and violence link several eccentric characters living in adjoining houses in a seemingly placid English city.
Graham, Winston
Woman in the mirror. 1975. 5v. (Interline) UK Loan only.
When Norah agrees to stay with her friend and act as her secretary, she little suspects the malicious intention behind the invitation.
Harris, Thomas
The silence of the lambs. 1989. 8v.
A killer is attacking women across the United States. Clarice Starling, a young FBI trainee, is assigned to enlist the help of Dr Hannibal Lecter, a brilliant psychiatrist and homicidal genius, now confined in strict isolation in a hospital for the criminally insane. As she matches her wits against his, she is drawn along a path of sheer terror, a descent ever deeper into her own memories and nightmares, towards a discovery of incomparable horror.
(Contains violence).
Herbert, James
Creed. 2001. 7v. (Interline)
Sometimes horror is in the mind and sometimes it's real. Telling the difference isn't always easy, especially for unscrupulous paparazzi photographer Joe Creed. He thought that demons were just a joke - but now he finds that the joke is on him.
Hill, Susan
The woman in black. 1983. 3v. UK Loan only.
When a young solicitor is instructed to attend the funeral of Mrs Alice Drablow, he is not prepared for the strange and terrible events that are to take place.
Hutson, Shaun
Hybrid. 2002. 4v. UK Loan only
Previously a top author, Christopher Ward wanted to be obscenely rich, but success is a thing of the past. Suddenly a mysterious manuscript churns each night from a computer that he's sure he turned off. Secret filming reveals the source.
Hutson, Shaun
Necessary evil. 2004. 5v.
It was to be a routine job. Matt Franklin and his companions would rob the Securicor van. Simple. Until the job turned into a nightmare. Two of them are shot dead and another fatally wounded. But who is trying to wipe them out, killing not just them but their families too? Franklin has to find out. Finally the only one left alive, he tires of being the prey and decides to become the hunter. Like all of us, Franklin was told monsters don't exist. He's about to find out someone was lying.
Irving, John
A prayer for Owen Meany. 1989. 14v. (Interline)
UK Loan only.
In the summer of 1953, two eleven-year-old boys are playing in a baseball game in Gravesend, New Hampshire; one of the boys hits a foul ball that kills his best friend's mother. The boy who hit the ball doesn't believe in accidents - Owen Meany believes he is God's instrument. What then happens to Owen after that is extraordinary and terrifying.
James, Henry
The turn of the screw. 1916. 2v.
A young governess takes charge of two orphaned children, but she soon begins to feel the presence of intense evil.
King, Stephen
Black house. 2001. 15v.
French Landing, Wisconsin, is a solid middle-American town inhabited by solid middle-Americans ... and a serial killer. Three children have been taken by a monster nicknamed "The fisherman". It's all beyond the experience of the local police, whose only hope lies with ex-detective Jack Sawyer.
King, Stephen
Carrie. 1974. 4v.
Carrie is a 16 year-old girl who is repressed by her mother, a religious fanatic. She is humiliated by her classmates for her ignorance of the facts of life. But Carrie is telekinetic and can make things burst into flame at will. After being humiliated once too often, her inner rage erupts.
Koontz, Dean R.
The taking. 2004 4v.
On the morning that will mark the end of the world they have known, Molly and Neil Sloan awaken to the drumbeat of rain. As hours pass they hear news of extreme weather phenomena across the globe. An obscuring fog turns once familiar streets into a ghostly labyrinth. By evening, the town has lost all communication with the outside world. First TV and radio go dead, then the Internet and phone lines. The rain diminishes with the dawn but a moody grey-purple twilight prevails. Within the misty gloom the small band will encounter something that reveals in a terrifying instant what is happening to the world.
Leach, Christopher
Scars and other ceremonies. 1980. 2v.
Twelve short stories with hidden resonances of fear and violence.
Leroux, Gaston
The phantom of the opera. 1911. 2v. American Braille.
UK Loan only.
Under the Paris Opera House lives a disfigured musical genius who uses music to win the love of a beautiful opera singer.
Lessing, Doris
The fifth child. 1988. 3v. (Interline)
Somewhat out of kilter with the 1960s, Harriet and David Lovatt want only a faithful and loving family life. Children fill their lives and re-united relatives surround their table at Christmas and Easter. Then comes the fifth pregnancy and life turns sour as the baby develops violently, his alien presence wrecking their lives - a contemporary horror story.
Lewis, Matthew,
The monk: a romance. 1796. 9v. (Interline)
Set in the sinister monastery of the Capuchins in Madrid, The Monk is a violent tale of ambition, murder, and incest. The great struggle between maintaining monastic vows and fulfilling personal ambitions leads its main character, the monk Ambrosio, to temptation and the breaking of his vows, then to sexual obsession and rape, and finally to murder in order to conceal his guilt.
Lofts, Norah
Gad’s Hall. 1987. 5v. (Interline)
Norah Lofts presents an unforgettable picture of the Thorley family and the events that transformed their old Suffolk home into a place of evil.
McEwan, Ian
The comfort of strangers. 1981. 2v. UK Loan only.
For Mary and Colin, on holiday in a city where everything is strange to them and they are continually lost both physically and mentally, it is easy to close their eyes to the hidden danger lurking behind Robert's apparent friendliness.
Machen, Arthur
The three imposters. 1964. 3v. (Interline) UK Loan only.
In these eerie and once-shocking stories, supernatural horror is a transmuting force powered by the core of life. To resist it requires great will from the living, for civilisation is only a new way to behave, and not one instinctive to life. Decency prevents discussion about such pressures, so each person must face such things alone. The comforts and hopes of civilisation are threatened and undermined by these ecstatic nightmares that haunt the living.
Mammoth book of best new horror.
Edited by Stephen Jones. 1998. 11v. (Interline)
Stephen Jones has chosen the very best stories and novellas of supernatural terror and psychological fear, by some of the most acclaimed authors in the genre.
Marshall, Michael
The lonely dead. 2004. 5v.
Grotesquely arranged corpses are turning up in remote locations across America: is it the work of a bizarre sect or a solitary serial killer?
Matheson, Richard
I am legend. 1999. 2v.
Robert Neville is the last living man on earth ... but he is not alone. Every other man, woman and child on the planet has become a vampire, and they are all hungry for Neville's blood. By day he is the hunter, stalking the sleeping undead through the abandoned ruins of civilization. By night, he barricades himself in his home and prays for the dawn. How long can one man survive like this?
Morrison, Toni
Beloved. 1987. 7v.
In the troubled years following the Civil War, the spirit of a murdered child haunts the Ohio home of a former slave. This angry, destructive ghost breaks mirrors, leaves its fingerprints in cake icing, and generally makes life difficult for Sethe and her family; nevertheless, the woman finds the haunting oddly comforting for the spirit is that of her own dead baby, never named, thought of only as Beloved.
Omnibus of 20th- century ghost stories.
1992. 7v.
Haunted houses and rooms, demon lovers, children’s visions, ghosts of the self revenge, guilt and love from beyond the grave are the themes of the 20th century ghost story.
Patterson, James
Violets are blue. 2001. 5v. UK loan only.
Alex Cross joins forces with a female San Francisco detective to investigate a pattern of murders occurring across the country that draws him into the bizarre subculture of ritual role-playing and vampirism.
Rice, Ann
Interview with the vampire. 1976. 5v. UK Loan only.
Evokes the horror of the Vampire's world, as he pours out the erotically-charged confessions of his first two years as one of the living dead.
Slaughter, Karin
Blindsighted. 5v. 2001. UK loan only.
The sleepy town of Heartsdale is jolted into panic when Sara Linton, pediatrician and medical examiner, finds Sibyl Adams, a young college professor, horribly murdered in the local diner. Police chief Jeffrey Tolliver then finds a second victim crucified and recognises the work of a serial killer.
(Contains violence).
Stevenson, R.L.
Doctor Jekyll and Mr Hyde. 1886. 1v. UK Loan only.
The story of Dr Jekyll who transforms himself for nights on the town into the bestial body and evil personality of Mr Hyde - first as an experiment, then at will and finally in spite of himself.
Stoker, Bram
Dracula. 1897. 8v. (Interline)
Jonathan Harker, incarcerated in a Transylvanian castle, has an alluring but terrifying dream of three women, eager to prey upon him. His host and jailer is none other than Count Dracula, or Nosferatu, the Un-Dead, controller of the wolves.
Stoker, Bram
The lair of the white worm. 1911. 3v. (Interline)
This extraordinary horror story features an enormous primeval serpent which dwells in a maze of deep caves and which can transform itself into a seductive noblewoman.
Straub, Peter
Magic terror: seven tales. 2000. 5v.
An anthology of chilling horror fiction includes 'Bunny is good bread' in which a future serial killer's childhood is portrayed and the award-winning novella, Mr. Clubb and Mr. Cuff.
Tessier, Thomas
Fog heart. 1997. 3v. American Braille. UK Loan only.
Carrie is alarmed to see her father's ghost; he seems to be warning her about her husband, Oliver. Meanwhile Jan and Charley are tormented by memories of their infant daughter's death. Both couples turn to Oona, a troubled young medium.