Here are 86 books that The Death of Mrs. Westaway fans have personally recommended if you like
The Death of Mrs. Westaway.
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I was twelve years old when I first read Jane Eyre, the beginning of my love for gothic fiction. Murder mysteries are fine, but add a remote location, a decaying old house, some tormented characters, ancient family secrets, and I’m all in. Traditional Gothic, American Gothic (love this painting), Australian Gothic, Mexican Gothic (perfect title by the way), I love them all. The setting in gothic fiction is like a character in itself, and wherever I travel, I’m drawn to these locations, all food for my own writing.
So much so that I’ve read it several times since I first encountered it as a teenager. (Plus watched both movie versions, twice each.)
The first line, "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again," drew me in and refused to let go. I wanted to return to Manderley. I wanted to find out what dark secrets would be revealed there. The unnamed, naive young heroine is haunted by the all-pervading presence of her husband’s first wife, Rebecca… and so was I.
And although some of the social attitudes are jarring to a 21st-century reader, and although I know the plot by heart now… I will still return to it.
* 'The greatest psychological thriller of all time' ERIN KELLY * 'One of the most influential novels of the twentieth century' SARAH WATERS * 'It's the book every writer wishes they'd written' CLARE MACKINTOSH
'Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again . . .'
Working as a lady's companion, our heroine's outlook is bleak until, on a trip to the south of France, she meets a handsome widower whose proposal takes her by surprise. She accepts but, whisked from glamorous Monte Carlo to brooding Manderley, the new Mrs de Winter finds Max a changed man. And the memory…
The Victorian mansion, Evenmere, is the mechanism that runs the universe.
The lamps must be lit, or the stars die. The clocks must be wound, or Time ceases. The Balance between Order and Chaos must be preserved, or Existence crumbles.
Appointed the Steward of Evenmere, Carter Anderson must learn the…
An avid reader, I began a project in 2012 to read one short story a week in supernatural mysteries, ghost stories, and quiet horror genres. I began with the classic authors: Poe, MR James, Lovecraft, Shelley, Stoker, du Maurier, etc. I began a blog, Reading Fiction Blog, and posted these free stories with my reviews (I’m still posting today). Over the years, it turned into a compendium of fiction. Today, I have nearly 400 short stories by over 150 classic and now contemporary authors in the blog Index. I did this because I wanted to learn more about writing dark fiction and who better to learn from than the masters?
I adore reading atmospheric adventures of mystery, supernatural, and ghostly powers; this book has these values in abundance. Noemi’s alluring character is smart, savvy, and admirably vulnerable. Loved her. At High House in the Mexican countryside, Noemi discovers ghostly entities repeatedly forming blisters across the walls. How mysterious and threatening; I was fascinated.
The best part of the novel for me was the emotional intelligence of the characters because their behavior is both suspiciously rational and heart-stopping clever. Gripping as all heck. This family was obsessed with a relentless desire to rule and control their destiny at all costs via Otherworld powers. Absolutely compelling. I was breathless along with Noemi at every step as she was drawn into the dangers and treacherous family secrets that threatened to kill her.
The award-winning author of Gods of Jade and Shadow (one of the 100 best fantasy novels of all time, TIME magazine) returns with a mesmerising feminist Gothic fantasy, in which a glamorous young socialite discovers the haunting secrets of a beautiful old mansion in 1950s Mexico.
He is trying to poison me. You must come for me, Noemi. You have to save me.
When glamorous socialite Noemi Taboada receives a frantic letter from her newlywed cousin begging to be rescued from a mysterious doom, it's clear something is desperately amiss. Catalina has always had a flair for the dramatic, but…
I was twelve years old when I first read Jane Eyre, the beginning of my love for gothic fiction. Murder mysteries are fine, but add a remote location, a decaying old house, some tormented characters, ancient family secrets, and I’m all in. Traditional Gothic, American Gothic (love this painting), Australian Gothic, Mexican Gothic (perfect title by the way), I love them all. The setting in gothic fiction is like a character in itself, and wherever I travel, I’m drawn to these locations, all food for my own writing.
As a writer, I find it scarily good. Not only does it have a compelling plot that kept me turning pages, but it’s sooo beautifully written, with unique, complex characters and a story that bends and twists through their lives, surprising me over and over.
Like all good gothic fiction, it includes a decaying mansion, mysterious disappearances, an eccentric old lady, stories within stories, and it also has twins!
'Simply brilliant' Kate Mosse, international bestselling author of Labyrinth
***
Everybody has a story...
Angelfield House stands abandoned and forgotten.
It was once home to the March family: fascinating, manipulative Isabelle; brutal, dangerous Charlie; and the wild, untamed twins, Emmeline and Adeline. But the house hides a chilling secret which strikes at the very heart of each of them, tearing their lives apart...
Now Margaret Lea is investigating Angelfield's past, and its mysterious connection to the enigmatic writer Vida Winter. Vida's history is mesmering - a tale of ghosts, governesses, and gothic strangeness. But as Margaret succumbs to the power…
Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!
On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…
As an author of experimental and genre-bending books, I evangelize people not only to read more books but to read books outside of their comfort zone. And while it doesn’t take much work to get adult readers to consider Young Adult titles, getting them to read Middle-Grade books has been a much greater challenge, which is a shame because middle school has a lot to offer. Some of the best and most life-changing books exist within the Middle-Grade category. My own Middle-Grade books were written with readers of many age ranges in mind.
It’s quite possibly the scariest book ever written. Much scarier than most adult horror books. Adult horror books rely on cheap shock value to elicit cheaper scares. It provides the same (or greater) level of unease without resorting to the gratuitous.
I cannot fathom how this book managed to pull that off. But I can say that this book has more to offer adults than it can give to children. An adult can see the subtext of a story where a child disappears because a stranger offers them candy and toys, as well as the implication that such strangers may not be entirely human.
And I can’t tell you what makes it so great without spoiling the whole story. I was so engrossed in this story that it practically kidnapped me. I can’t recommend it enough.
"Sometimes funny, always creepy, genuinely moving, this marvellous spine-chiller will appeal to readers from nine to ninety." - "Books for Keeps". "I was looking forward to "Coraline", and I wasn't disappointed. In fact, I was enthralled. This is a marvellously strange and scary book." - Philip Pullman, "Guardian". "If any writer can get the guys to read about the girls, it should be Neil Gaiman. His new novel "Coraline" is a dreamlike adventure. For all its gripping nightmare imagery, this is actually a conventional fairy story with a moral." - "Daily Telegraph". Stephen King once called Neil Gaiman 'a treasure-house…
As a writer, I consider myself lucky to be born and raised in the Deep South. Although I currently live near Los Angeles, I continue to draw upon the region’s complex history, regional color, eccentric characters, and rich atmosphere for inspiration. I also love to read fiction set in the South, especially mysteries and thrillers—the more atmospheric, the better!
Before her mega-hit Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn penned this diabolical noir set in the deep South. It’s an edgy story, presenting a gallery of disturbed characters—including the deeply troubled protagonist, a journalist who returns to her hometown to report on the murders of two young girls.
Some books I forget a week or two after reading, others just stick with me for a year or more, and some leave bootprints in my mind forever. This is one of the latter.
NOW AN HBO® LIMITED SERIES STARRING AMY ADAMS, NOMINATED FOR EIGHT EMMY AWARDS, INCLUDING OUTSTANDING LIMITED SERIES
FROM THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF GONE GIRL
Fresh from a brief stay at a psych hospital, reporter Camille Preaker faces a troubling assignment: she must return to her tiny hometown to cover the murders of two preteen girls. For years, Camille has hardly spoken to her neurotic, hypochondriac mother or to the half-sister she barely knows: a beautiful thirteen-year-old with an eerie grip on the town. Now, installed in her old bedroom in her family's Victorian mansion, Camille finds…
I’m Julia Buckley, a passionate lifelong reader, English teacher, and mystery writer. I gravitated toward mystery as a child when my mom read all the greats of 20th Century Mystery and Romantic Suspense and then passed them on to me. When I became an English teacher, I had the privilege of teaching some of the great Gothic classics like Jane Eyre, Rebecca, and The Castle of Otranto. Teaching these great works and researching the way that all Gothic literature stemmed from Horace Walpole and Ann Radcliffe, I realized that MANY of the books I read are tinged with the Gothic.
I began reading Grimes in the 80s, but her books still hold up today, and this one establishes all of the cozy/Gothic things I love. Grimes has a gift for ironic humor, so even though she sets her books in a very cozy English village called Long Piddleton, she tends to satirize the residents and the narrow-mindedness of the provincial town.
In this way, she is similar to Agatha Christie, except that Grimes is much funnier. In this small town, Melrose Plant, a Lord by inheritance who has thrown off his title and tries to live a quiet life in the family manse, is a long-suffering, sane person in an often chaotic existence. He is continually terrorized by his “Aunt Agatha,” an American who married his uncle and refers to herself as “Lady Ardry,” although her late husband had no title. Their relationship is a source of great humor, but…
At the Man with a Load of Mischief, they found the dead body stuck in a keg of beer. At the Jack and Hammer, another body was stuck out on the beam of the pub’s sign, replacing the mechanical man who kept the time. Two pubs. Two murders. One Scotland Yard inspector called in to help. Detective Chief Inspector Richard Jury arrives in Long Piddleton and finds everyone in the postcard village looking outside of town for the killer. Except for one Melrose Plant. A keen observer of human nature, he points Jury in the right direction: into the darkest…
A Duke with rigid opinions, a Lady whose beliefs conflict with his, a long disputed parcel of land, a conniving neighbour, a desperate collaboration, a failure of trust, a love found despite it all.
Alexander Cavendish, Duke of Ravensworth, returned from war to find that his father and brother had…
I’ve been fascinated by how people behave and how in-group bias can change who they are. That interest led me into computational sociology (I study human behavior for a living), with my work appearing in The New York Times, USA Today, WIRED, and more. But my deepest fascination has always been with people’s propensity for the horrific. I LOVE the liminal space where fear, secrecy, and belonging collide. Being neurodivergent, living in a small Virginia town with my wife and our neurodivergent, queer son, I see how communities can both shelter and suffocate. That tension is why I’m drawn to stories saturated in dread, beauty, and what lives in the shadows.
This is the book that taught me how powerful loneliness can be.
Every time I return to it, I feel one character’s ache settle into me, that desperate want to belong somewhere, even if it’s a house that doesn’t love you back. I recommend it because it still feels as if I’m attempting to figure out what is happening alongside the characters, the way only great writing can.
Jackson makes you realize that the scariest hauntings aren’t in the walls, they’re the ones we carry within us.
Part of a new six-volume series of the best in classic horror, selected by Academy Award-winning director of The Shape of Water Guillermo del Toro
Filmmaker and longtime horror literature fan Guillermo del Toro serves as the curator for the Penguin Horror series, a new collection of classic tales and poems by masters of the genre. Included here are some of del Toro's favorites, from Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and Ray Russell's short story "Sardonicus," considered by Stephen King to be "perhaps the finest example of the modern Gothic ever written," to Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House and stories…
I’ve read crime fiction since I was a kid, starting with Nancy Drew and the mystery magazines—Alfred Hitchcock, Mike Shayne, and Ellery Queen. While in elementary school, I wrote mystery short stories, which my sister illustrated, and we sold them on the street corner for 25 cents apiece. In the nineties, I devoured novels by Patricia Highsmith, Ruth Rendell, and P.D. James. The 2000s introduced another generation of favorite authors, including Belinda Bauer, Chris Whitaker, and Tana French. I love too many to name! My current passion is for novels that I can really sink my teeth into, with complex characters hiding dark secrets.
The first line had me hooked: “It would be inaccurate to say that my childhood was normal before they came.”
That one sentence fired up my imagination, and the story kept me turning the pages late into the night. Libby, an adoptee, unexpectedly inherits a once-grand mansion in London’s Chelsea, only to discover it comes with a grim family history that’s nothing like the fanciful one she’d imagined.
I’m particularly drawn to novels like this one, with multiple narrators and intertwining timelines.
'I swear I didn't breathe the whole time I was reading it. Gripping, pacy, brilliantly twisty.' CLARE MACKINTOSH
'Creepy, intricate and utterly immersive: an excellent holiday read.' GUARDIAN
'A twisty and engrossing story of betrayal and redemption.' IAN RANKIN ____________________________
FROM THE #1 BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THEN SHE WAS GONE
In a large house in London's fashionable Chelsea, a baby is awake in her cot. Well-fed and cared for, she is happily waiting for someone to pick her up.
In the kitchen lie three decomposing corpses. Close to them is a hastily scrawled note.
Alongside my early career as a children’s writer, I was a consultant to police forces about anti-corruption measures. It gave me a great look inside investigations…but my NDAs meant I couldn’t use any of that information in a mystery story. So, an amateur sleuth it had to be—but one who didn’t do stupid things instead of going to the police! Before that, I worked in children’s television, and I understand the power of the media to get people to talk. I brought those two sides of my work life together to create Poppy, my main character, and put her in Sydney, Australia, the city of my heart.
So, I might be favorably inclined towards archaeologists (I married one, just like Elly Griffith did). When I read the first of the Ruth Galloway series (local archaeologist in Britain), what I liked most was the authenticity of the archaeological sequences.
I’ve also worked with police as a consultant, and the police procedural parts of this series are solid. A great combination! I’m about to start the Ali Dawson series of Griffiths, and I have high hopes for that too—but read these first.
Discover the Dr Ruth Galloway Mysteries, one of the most popular crime series in Britain, with this beautiful special edition.
START THE JOURNEY HERE AND YOU WILL BE HOOKED
Dr Ruth Galloway is called in when a child's bones are discovered near the site of a prehistoric henge on the north Norfolk salt marshes. Are they the remains of a local girl who disappeared ten years earlier - or are the bones much older?
DCI Harry Nelson refuses to give up the hunt for the missing girl. Since she vanished, someone has been sending him bizarre anonymous notes about ritual…
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…
While an adjunct professor at a local Midwestern college, I taught a night course in gothic literature. It was winter and my drive was over an hour to the satellite location. The wintry journey seemed apropos of the gothic’s dark themes, eerie atmosphere, and supernatural world. Though I’d enjoyed gothic novels in the past, this course cemented my love of all things gothic. By teaching the course, I enhanced my understanding of gothic fiction through such stories as, The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Turn of the Screw by Henry James, and Where are you going, where have you been by Joyce Carol Oates.
What I admire about this gothic mystery is how it alternates between three narrators—a high school English teacher, her teenage daughter, and a detective—without losing tension and suspense.
The plot is beautifully interwoven. The English teacher, who’s writing a biography of an author of gothic tales, learns that her best friend is murdered, and that a line from the gothic writer’s story is found near the murder victim. Her diary becomes an outlet for her fears and suspicions, until someone writes in it.
THE TIMES CRIME BOOK OF THE YEAR. THE RICHARD & JUDY BOOK CLUB PICK.
'Utterly bewitching ... a pitch-perfect modern Gothic' AJ FINN, author of THE WOMAN IN THE WINDOW
A dark story has been brought to terrifying life. Can the ending be rewritten in time?
This is what the police know: English teacher Clare Cassidy's friend Ella has just been murdered. Clare and Ella had recently fallen out. Found beside the body was a line from The Stranger, a story by the Gothic writer Clare teaches, and the murder scene is identical to one of the deaths in the…
