87 Books Like Blood Communion

Due to the financial success of The Exorcist film, a sequel was ordered (The Exorcist II: The Heretic) which had no involvement from the original writer and director and was universally panned. William Peter Blatty then wrote a screenplay for what would have been a sequel to the original film that ignored the second entry. William Friedkin, the director of The Exorcist, was attached but backed out. Blatty turned his inactive script into what became the novel, Legion, which he eventually re-adapted and directed in 1990. The majority of the book is dialogue, so it’s easy to see its origins as a screenplay, but that does not make it any less effective.

This story takes a minor character from the original novel, Detective Kinderman, and chronicles his confrontation with a patient in a mental institution claiming to be possessed by the spirit of a dead… show more.

This is a book that lingered in my memory long after I finished reading it. I could identify with the challenging behavior of a teenage daughter and also with the fraught preparations involved in creating the perfect Christmas dinner. From the opening page, I was totally engrossed in the interaction between Holly and her daughter, yet filled with uneasiness as the often banal exchanges between them gave way to a darker, more sinister reality involving Tatiana’s adoption.  

This book chilled me as much as the snow that fell throughout that dreadful Christmas Day but also consumed me until the very last page.

You’re soon going to notice that I like clever variations on a common theme.

This book is a really fun mishmash of possible ways for possession to happen: a person can be possessed by a friendly ghost, a malevolent demon—or both at once! The heroine travels back in time (unusual for fantasy) and possesses the ghost when she was still alive. Two good guys can occupy the same body without surrendering their autonomy; but one can also take over when the other’s strength fails.

I also like the interweaving of the protagonist’s adventures in both the past and the present with chapters from a thousand-year-old journal. The temporal complexity works well with the way the characters fold into each other.

Dostoevsky’s central character is Nicholas Stavrogin, a Russian aristocrat, around Hamlet’s age. He has the aura of the mysterious stranger, arriving from beyond, haunted, solitary, fearless, and living outside all normal social bounds and conventions. He carries direct Christ allusions, stavros meaning ‘cross’ in Greek. Everybody from his own generation is in love with him, male and female. A few years earlier, adoring disciples travelled the world with him. He taught them that if it could be mathematically proved that the truth excludes Christ, he would choose Christ.

But Stavrogin lost his faith, and thereafter plunged into a life of violence and debauchery, seducing a number of women in the town, even, it is rumoured, raping a twelve-year-old girl. Without faith, he is equally without passion. Having lost the one indispensable thing, he kills himself.

I’ve spent much of my adult life searching for media that gives me the same feeling as sitting down to my favourite Halloween movies as a kid. The gorgeous, autumnal crunch of Hocus Pocus, the spooky-but-not-scary atmosphere of Tim Burton’s 90’s offerings, the magic and adventure of Willow and The Dark Crystal. It was a big, specific ask, and yet I found it so perfectly in Frances Hardinge. 

My favourite of her books (so far) is A Skinful of Shadows. A twisting, turning, spooky adventure about a girl harboring the spirit of an abused circus bear who must save herself, her doofus brother, and said bear from being hollowed out and used as hosts by their horde of ghoulish ancestors. It’s cozy, clever, spectral perfection.

I’ve read countless books set in New York City or its boroughs, and I’m going to confess that sometimes they can feel a little generic. Not A Girl's Guide to Love and Magic.

The plot in this book is driven by Cicely’s quest to save her aunt through a scavenger hunt of sorts that is all tied into the excitement and action of the West Indian Parade on Labor Day in Flatbush, Brooklyn.

I also love how while this is technically a young adult book (Cicely is a sophomore in high school), it can be a great read for most older middle-grade readers, especially those who want to read up.

I love The Host because it has two female heroes, but one is a parasite inside the other. When a parasitic alien race, the Souls, invades earth, Wanderer is placed in the body of Melanie Stryder. When implanted, Souls are supposed to completely subsume the host, but Melanie Stryder won’t give up her mind or her body that easily. Melanie is a hero because of her strength and willingness to sacrifice anything to maintain her autonomy. Wanderer is a hero because of her empathy and willingness to defy the construct of her society and forge a new path. The book is the most interesting portrayal of the capacity for sentient beings to develop empathy against all odds that I’ve ever read. It’s also a remarkable portrayal of a most imaginative female bond.

The Bloodwrath is basically Berserkergang, not possession, right? It affects badgers almost exclusively. What a bummer to be a badger and bear a burden that no one else has!

But it’s a bit more like possession in this book. Lady Cregga has the Bloodwrath more strongly than anyone has ever observed before; her personality seems to reflect this, as she’s impatient, brusque, and aggressive (even for a badger). She’s wounded and loses her sight, and the Bloodwrath goes away.

Even though her personality appears to be tied up with her madness, the Bloodwrath must be something external, since it can leave her without destroying her. Is it an inborn quality or an effect brought about by her personal choices, an appetite that can be satiated, or something else?

Even though Daisy and Brittney are the POV leads of this tale, Ivy – a character without a POV – is the reason I added this book to the list. All three girls are complex leads that seem to wind up tighter before the book delivers a gory, emotional gut-punch of an ending. It's like the embodiment of "they had me in the first half, I'm not gon' lie."

I still feel a swell in my chest when I remember the ending of this book. The feelings of unease I felt as I crept deeper into this haunted house story are just as memorable as the utter relief that ripped through me throughout the epic finale.

I cried, I screamed, and most importantly—I felt a LOT.

Greek tragedy is similar to fantasy except for matters of form (e.g. the chorus). Euripides was a startlingly modern playwright, especially when it comes to psychology.

Heracles can be portrayed as a monstrous monster-slayer (I’m looking at you, Sophocles), but in Euripides he’s noble, brave, and domestic. He performs his labors because he’s the kind of guy to use his powers for good.

Hera, being a jealous jerk, drives him mad; Madness herself is unenthusiastic about the whole affair, recognizing that Heracles has made the world a better place.

But insane Heracles knows that he’s murdering innocent people. Is that who he really is? Is it all Hera’s fault?