Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Favourite Ghost Stories

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. Each week there is a new topic for bloggers to choose and list their top ten. This week’s theme is a Halloween freebie, so I picked Top Ten Favourite Ghost Stories.

I’m not a massive fan of the horror genre – I had a very scarring experience when I watched Silence of the Lambs, Deep Blue Sea and Final Destination when I was only ten years old – so a lot of these aren’t strictly ghosts stories as much as they’re books that feature ghosts. Honestly though that’s the kind of Halloween I like, settling in with a book that captures the mood of the season without scaring me to death.

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City of Ghosts by Victoria Schwab

This book is the perfect Halloween read. Set in Edinburgh, a city with plenty of ghost stories and urban legends, City of Ghosts follows Cassidy as she discovers more about her ability to travel through the Veil and tries to escape the clutches of the Red Raven.

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My Plain Jane by Cynthia Hand, Jodi Meadows and Brodi Ashton

Granted this wasn’t a favourite of mine, but it wasn’t the ghost-filled plot that let the book down for me. My Plain Jane re-imagines the story of Jane Eyre but gives Jane the ability to see ghosts and adds a sinister mystery to the character of Mr Rochester.

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The Archived by Victoria Schwab

Another Victoria Schwab book for this week’s list, just in case it wasn’t obvious she’s one of my favourite authors. The Archived has a different view of life after death to City of Ghosts, in this book the dead are shelved like books, and it’s when they wake that trouble is caused for Mac.

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Wild Beauty by Anna-Marie McLemore

It’s hard to describe Wild Beauty. It’s a magical realism book by one of my favourite authors and I don’t think I’d ever be able to do it justice trying to summarise the story, but it’s a magically written story, and an appropriate reading if you’re looking for a beautifully haunting book.

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The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater

There’s nothing that says ghost stories quite like The Raven Cycle series by Maggie Stiefvater. The first book opens with Blue in a graveyard where she meets the spirit of Gansey who is going to die at some point in the next year. From that opening it’s a hunt through magical forests for a long dead Welsh King for Blue, Gansey, Adam, Ronan and Noah.

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The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon

The Bone Season series is an all-time favourite of mine. Set in an alternate dystopian version of London Paige is a Dreamwalker, which means she’s committing a crime just by being alive. All clairvoyants have a connection to the spirit realm, which is what makes The Bone Season a perfect pick for this list.

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The Summoning by Kelley Armstrong

Kelley Armstrong was one of my favourite authors a few years ago, and although I haven’t read her Darkest Powers trilogy in a while it’s a great series. Chloe is a necromancer, she can see and control the dead, and if nothing else the way she discovers her ability in the first book is terrifying.

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Love You to Death by Meg Cabot

I can’t do a Top Ten Tuesday topic on ghosts stories and not include the Mediator series. More fluffy and light than scary these were my favourite books growing up, and the subject of so many conversations I had with my friends when I was in high school.

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Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor

The beginning of Strange the Dreamer really sets the tone for the book, opening on a dying blue-skinned girl surrounded by moths. Going back we follow Lazlo and Sarai’s story from beginning to that ending, and along the way meet Minya who can control the ghosts of Weep.

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The Star-Touched Queen by Laini Taylor

This is one of the more beautiful books I’ve ever read, and the world-building is incredible. Maya’s horoscope has always foretold death and destruction, but when she becomes the wife of Amar and queen of Akran she discovers the otherworldly realm is full of ghosts and spirits to be reincarnated.

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So what do you think? Did you take part in this week’s Top Ten Tuesday, if so let me know what you picked for this week’s themed free-for-all, or what ghosts stories you love. Do you like books that scare you to death or do you prefer lighter stories like the kind I featured this week?