10 Best Horror Books Depicting a Terrifying Survival Game!
Look, digesting a multitude of books over the years has led me to stumble upon some genuinely spine-chilling narratives. Stuff that keeps you up at night, heart pounding, goosebumps prickling the skin. You know the ones.
Today, I'm here to introduce you to a select few that really sent my cortisol levels skyrocketing – horror books that revolve around that age-old, adrenalin-inducing premise: the survival game. The cat-and-mouse chases, the unwitting allies, the betrayals, the grotesque versions of 'tag' that people are forced into - it's all seriously nightmare-inducing stuff.
These ten books absolutely nail the genre, painting vivid images of desperate, unlikely heroes and terrifying antagonists. They tread that fine line between sanity and insanity, between life and death. Our protagonists are plunged into a gruesome game of survival, their lives gambled away at the roll of a dice, the turn of a card. Their decisions determine their destiny, and trust me, it's a wild torturous ride to the end.
Whether you're a seasoned horror-book veteran or just dipping your toes into the murky, blood-tinged waters, these novels are guaranteed to keep you on the edge of your seat. So grab your reading glasses, maybe a comforting blanket, and dive headfirst into these terrifying tales. Just make sure to keep the lights on, yeah?
『Into the Pit: An AFK Book (Five Nights at Freddy’s: Fazbear Frights #1)』
Five Nights at Freddy's fans won't want to miss this pulse-pounding collection of three novella-length tales that will keep even the bravest player up at night . . . What do you wish for most? It's a question that Oswald, Sarah, and Millie think they know the answer to. Oswald wishes his summer wasn't so boring, Sarah wishes to be beautiful, and Millie wishes she could just disappear from the face of the earth. But in the twisted world of Five Nights at Freddy's, their hearts' deepest desires have an unexpected cost.In this volume, Five Nights at Freddy's creator Scott Cawthon spins three sinister novella-length stories from different corners of his series' canon, featuring cover art from fan-favorite artist LadyFiszi. Readers beware: This collection of terrifying tales is enough to unsettle even the most hardened Five Nights at Freddy's fans.
Author | Scott Cawthon/Elley Cooper |
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Price | $5.99 |
Publisher | Scholastic Inc. |
Release Date | Dec 26, 2019 |
Source | Google Books |
『Infected: An AFK Book (Piggy Original Novel)』
Mystery, mayhem -- try to survive the terrifying world of PIGGY in this original novel based on the fan-favorite videogame! There is a mystery to be solved, keys to be found, and an evil pig to escape! Welcome to the bone chilling, pulse-pounding world of PIGGY, the survival-horror game that will keep you up at night. Explore a frightening maze full of secrets to unearth and monsters that are out for blood! Can you make it out alive?
Author | Terrance Crawford |
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Price | $4.99 |
Publisher | Scholastic Inc. |
Release Date | Jan 03, 2023 |
Source | Google Books |
『The Ruins』
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Trapped in the Mexican jungle, a group of friends stumble upon a creeping horror unlike anything they could ever imagine in "the best horror novel of the new century" (Stephen King). Also a major motion picture! Two young couples are on a lazy Mexican vacation—sun-drenched days, drunken nights, making friends with fellow tourists. When the brother of one of those friends disappears, they decide to venture into the jungle to look for him. What started out as a fun day-trip slowly spirals into a nightmare when they find an ancient ruins site ... and the terrifying presence that lurks there. "The Ruins does for Mexican vacations what Jaws did for New England beaches.” —Entertainment Weekly “Smith’s nail-biting tension is a pleasure all its own.... This stuff isn’t for the faint of heart.” —New York Post “A story so scary you may never want to go on vacation, or dig around in your garden, again.” —USA Today
Author | Scott Smith |
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Price | unknown |
Publisher | Vintage |
Release Date | Feb 26, 2008 |
Source | Google Books |
『The Ritual』
A horror debut by one of Britain's most celebrated up-and-coming writers, in which four friends get lost in a forest in Sweden, to find their lives are in mortal peril... as something evil lurks.
Author | Adam Nevill |
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Price | unknown |
Publisher | Macmillan |
Release Date | Feb 14, 2012 |
Source | Google Books |
『The Last One』
Wilderness survival is the name of the game as the line blurs between reality TV and reality itself in this fast-paced novel of suspense in the vein of Yellowjackets. “Taut, tense, and at times almost unbearably real.”—Ruth Ware, author of One by One She wanted an adventure. She never imagined it would go this far. It begins with a reality TV show. Twelve contestants are sent into the woods to face challenges that will test the limits of their endurance. While they are out there, something terrible happens—but how widespread is the destruction, and has it occurred naturally or is it man-made? Cut off from society, the contestants know nothing of it. When one of them—a young woman the show’s producers call Zoo—stumbles across the devastation, she can imagine only that it is part of the game. Alone and disoriented, Zoo is heavy with doubt regarding the life—and husband—she left behind, but she refuses to quit. Staggering countless miles across unfamiliar territory, Zoo must summon all her survival skills—and learn new ones as she goes. But as her emotional and physical reserves dwindle, she grasps that the real world might have been altered in terrifying ways—and her ability to parse the charade will be either her triumph or her undoing. Sophisticated and provocative, The Last One is a novel that forces us to confront the role that media plays in our perception of what is real: how readily we cast our judgments, how easily we are manipulated. Praise for The Last One “[Alexandra] Oliva brilliantly scrutinizes the recorded (and heavily revised) narratives we believe, and the last one hundred pages will have the reader constantly guessing just what Zoo is capable of doing to find her way back home.”—Washington Post “A high-concept, high-octane affair . . . The conceit is undoubtedly clever and . . . well executed, but what makes The Last One such a page-turner is Zoo herself: practical, tough-minded and appealing.”—The Guardian “Oliva takes this (possibly) post-apocalyptic setting, grafts on a knowledgeable skewering of the inner workings of reality television and gives us a gripping story of survival. . . . This is the genius of Oliva’s storytelling. . . . [She] makes a stunning debut with this page turner, and becomes a writer to watch.”—Seattle Times “Oliva delivers a pulse-pounding psychological tale of survival. . . . [She] masterfully manipulates her characters and the setting, creating a mash-up of popular TV genres: Survivor meets The Walking Dead.”—Bookpage
Author | Alexandra Oliva |
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Price | unknown |
Publisher | Ballantine Books |
Release Date | Aug 15, 2017 |
Source | Google Books |
『The Long Walk』
In this #1 national bestseller, master storyteller Stephen King, writing as Richard Bachman, tells the tale of the contestants of a grueling walking competition where there can only be one winner—the one that survives. Against the wishes of his mother, sixteen-year-old Ray Garraty is about to compete in the annual grueling match of stamina and wits known as the Long Walk. One hundred boys must keep a steady pace of four miles per hour without ever stopping...with the winner being awarded “The Prize”—anything he wants for the rest of his life. But, as part of this national tournament that sweeps through a dystopian America year after year, there are some harsh rules that Garraty and ninety-nine others must adhere to in order to beat out the rest. There is no finish line—the winner is the last man standing. Contestants cannot receive any outside aid whatsoever. Slow down under the speed limit and you’re given a warning. Three warnings and you’re out of the game—permanently...
Author | Stephen King |
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Price | unknown |
Publisher | Simon and Schuster |
Release Date | Apr 19, 2016 |
Source | Google Books |
『The Running Man』
A future world game show offers convicts a chance at freedom if they can run to escape hi-tech killers, and Ben Richards is determined to do so.
Author | Stephen King |
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Price | unknown |
Publisher | Simon and Schuster |
Release Date | Apr 19, 2016 |
Source | Google Books |
『The Tournament』
When the feared sultan of the mid-16th-century Ottoman Empire issues a chess tournament challenge to European royals, a young Elizabeth I accompanies England's champion, only to witness a brutal murder amid dangerous court machinations.
Author | Matthew Reilly |
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Price | unknown |
Publisher | Simon and Schuster |
Release Date | Mar 29, 2016 |
Source | Google Books |
『The Cabin at the End of the World』
Paul Tremblay’s terrifying twist to the home invasion novel—inspiration for the upcoming major motion picture from Universal Pictures “Tremblay’s personal best. It’s that good.” — Stephen King Seven-year-old Wen and her parents, Eric and Andrew, are vacationing at a remote cabin on a quiet New Hampshire lake. Their closest neighbors are more than two miles in either direction along a rutted dirt road. One afternoon, as Wen catches grasshoppers in the front yard, a stranger unexpectedly appears in the driveway. Leonard is the largest man Wen has ever seen, but he is young, friendly, and he wins her over almost instantly. Leonard and Wen talk and play until Leonard abruptly apologizes and tells Wen, “None of what’s going to happen is your fault.” Three more strangers then arrive at the cabin carrying unidentifiable, menacing objects. As Wen sprints inside to warn her parents, Leonard calls out: “Your dads won’t want to let us in, Wen. But they have to. We need your help to save the world.” Thus begins an unbearably tense, gripping tale of paranoia, sacrifice, apocalypse, and survival that escalates to a shattering conclusion, one in which the fate of a loving family and quite possibly all of humanity are entwined. The Cabin at the End of the World is a masterpiece of terror and suspense from the fantastically fertile imagination of Paul Tremblay.
Author | Paul Tremblay |
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Price | $8.99 |
Publisher | HarperCollins |
Release Date | Jun 26, 2018 |
Source | Google Books |
『The Road』
WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE • NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A searing, post-apocalyptic novel about a father and son's fight to survive, this "tale of survival and the miracle of goodness only adds to McCarthy's stature as a living master. It's gripping, frightening and, ultimately, beautiful" (San Francisco Chronicle). • From the bestselling author of The Passenger A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don't know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food—and each other. The Road is the profoundly moving story of a journey. It boldly imagines a future in which no hope remains, but in which the father and his son, "each the other's world entire," are sustained by love. Awesome in the totality of its vision, it is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation. Look for Cormac McCarthy's latest bestselling novels, The Passenger and Stella Maris.
Author | Cormac McCarthy |
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Price | $12.99 |
Publisher | Vintage |
Release Date | Mar 20, 2007 |
Source | Google Books |
That's it, folks! Those were my top 10 picks that brilliantly fuse the adrenaline of a ruthless survival game with spine-chilling horror. Each book on this list takes you on a unique and terrifying journey. The characters in these novels are thrown into brutal, deadly games, their lives teetering between a horrific death and the slim chance of making it out alive. Each page turned is a step further into the abyss, making it impossible to put down. Yet, it's not just about the raw fear - each of these books serves up an insightful commentary on the human spirit and its will to survive against insurmountable odds. So, whether you're a seasoned fan of horror, a survival game enthusiast, or just fancy a chilling page-turner that keeps you up at night, these books are the real deal. Brace yourself, though - once you sink your teeth into these, there's no going back. Happy (or should I say horrifying?) reading!
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