83 Books Like Behind the Midnight Blinds

I grew up reading Stephen King, and one of the earlier titles I read by him, is Misery. When I think about isolation, danger, and being trapped in a cabin—this book comes to mind.

Of course, his number one fan, she has different ideas for the protagonist of this book, Paul Sheldon. She wants his novel/s to end differently, a different fate for the characters she has grown to love. And she’ll go to great lengths to get him to change his mind. After his car accident, she ties him to the bed and hobbles him—one of the most intense (and violent) scenes in the book. And who can ever forget her calling him a Dirty Birdie—that phrase will echo in my head forever.

Of course the movie is well done, too—a stellar performance by Kathy Bates. As the wind and ice howl outside the cabin, we are trapped… show more.

A book I’d wanted to read for a long time, but it wasn’t until later in life I was able to get it. When I was just on the early stages of my writing career, my now longtime friend, Marty, said he had a spare copy of Cabal laying around and offered to send it to me. Marty was my writing mentor at the time as he’d been writing horror for many years previous, and his work is inspiring. So, knowing I was getting a book in the mail from my mentor, to whom I hadn’t met in person yet, was very exciting. The book itself was a tired secondhand copy (which I was told it was) yet this gave it more special meaning. Even the cover was a little torn and it was a pocket edition. So, I sat back with this little book, which I still have as… show more.

My first horror read. It is dear to me. I picked it up off the shelf. It was neat and small in my hands, so not too overwhelming for someone who didn’t enjoy reading. However, I wanted to give the genre a try as I had been a hobby horror writer for a year or so beforehand. I liked the cover and blurb on the back, which was more of an excerpt, got me walking quickly to the counter to buy it so I could rush home to find out what was going to happen. This book opened the floodgates to the beauty of horror fiction. The excitement of the characters which had inspired my earlier experiments and still provides insights to this day. This is a wild ride, so grab on tight and let it take you as it had taken me.

I went to the book launch in support of this author and had the pleasure of meeting him in person. I had not known much of his work previously but that has never stopped me from accepting an invitation to attend. I got the book home and made a start and was hooked by his elegant writing style. This is a book of short horror stories, each beautifully crafted, and inspirational as well as enjoyable. Collected works are a hard thing to get right, and Paulsen makes it look easy. 

It’s a funny egg tale. Humphrey has long known the cautionary tale of his grandfather, Humpty Dumpty. Eggs are fragile and bought specifically to be cracked... but what if they don’t want to be cracked and have their own ambitions and goals for life, like becoming a great egg-splorer? Humphrey’s daring and determination to become a great explorer allows him to come up with creative solutions to his problem. His imagination knows no bounds and creates delightful spreads sure to appeal to readers. This rollicking story expands the famous tale of a fragile egg to a new story about bravery, creativity, and forging your own path.

Full disclosure: I was an early reader of this book and have offered it a blurb. But I wouldn’t have done so had it not significantly impacted me.

Aiello’s memoir, though not strictly horror, uses aspects of genre and pop culture—including aspects of horror—to detail their own history with mental illness and the surrounding difficulties and stigmas attached to it. They go to great and much-needed lengths to dissect how mental illness has been made out to be one of the great boogeymen of our lives via its myriad portrayals in culture (as a villain, a threat, a diabolical force, etc.) and detail the damage that’s been done as a result.

This is a powerful book in which I saw myself reflected all too often.

This is the diary Australian writer Helen Garner kept during a difficult period of her life: the period when she was married to (and eventually separated from) her third husband.

The writing is exquisite, which is why I love this book. Garner records the intricacies and intimacies of the marriage in such exacting terms. Her observations about marriage and the world leave me breathless. 

While this book is not aimed specifically at youth, it is a fantastic financial literacy resource for all ages. 

It has clear and concise explanations and case studies to help readers fully understand the complex Australian financial system and how to best make it work for them. The author uses very relatable language, so it feels more like a conversation than a lecture.

I would recommend this book for people in their early to mid-20s and beyond.  

T.W. Neal grows up with parents who opt to live on a sparsely populated Hawaiian island, not wearing clothes, surfing, smoking Marijuana, and eating magic mushrooms. The family lives in a van or in housing with few modern amenities and the author attends school on the island only sporadically. Due to her mother’s mental illness and her father’s alcohol abuse, she at times, has to run the household. With difficulty she connects with relatives and a few teachers and begins to reach for a lifeline to break free from the life her parents chose. She wants to go to college and eventually is able to leave the island and pursue a mainstream life. It is astounding that a person growing up in such circumstances would have the desire and determination to forge a different life.

I didn’t think I could appreciate this memoir of a son searching for his imprisoned father in Gaddafi’s Libya until, suddenly, I did. This book showed me that the bonds between all fathers and their sons transcend things like nationality and religion. It is part of the core of what it means to be human.

I knew from the very first pages that the author would never again see his father, even as he tirelessly spends most of his adult life trying to. By extension, I understood that as much as we want to, we can never really know our fathers.

I raced through the pages.