Tower and Town, November 2026 (view the full edition)A Good ReadThe dark nights are here, there’s a chill in the air, the mists are rising and it’s time to close the doors against the Things that wander abroad at this time of year. If you fancy a tale of understated horror and impersonal, creeping, nameless menace - well, ladies and gents, I have just the thing. The Hill in the Dark Grove by Liam Higginson is a really impressive debut novel. The accidental uncovering of a megalithic tomb, a quietly baleful presence on a Welsh hillside, marks the onset of a slowly unfolding story of obsession, possession and - madness? Bewitchment? While the book is probably best categorised as ‘folk horror’ that doesn’t fully do it justice. Weaving through the narrative are a love story and themes of national identity, folklore and myth, the way landscape preserves history, and the transience of things once considered of surpassing significance. And while, as you know, I snort and roll my eyes at ‘beautiful writing’ - this really is beautiful writing, with wonderfully accurate and evocative descriptions of the Welsh mountain landscape. Do read this book. Just maybe not when you’re alone in the house after dark, hmm? More on the theme of creeping, unnameable malice, and Things which wouldn’t dream of being so crass as to actually go bump in night. After Thin Air and Dark Matter Michelle Paver’s Rainforest is another supernatural, psychological, downright creepy story. A jungle expedition, a man trying to escape his past and - as with The Hill in the Dark Grove - ancient knowledge and indigenous shamanic custom defying modern, western, colonial sensibility. It’s weird and unsettling, as is House of Splinters by Laura Purcell, an eerie Gothic tale which returns to the setting of Purcell’s The Silent Companions (which gave me proper chills. Honestly, I don’t like being frightened, I don’t know why I’m doing this to myself.) Now then - have you read Kate Atkinson’s latest, Our Noble Selves? And if not, why not? she demanded, bossily. Set in the offices of the Festival of Britain it’s funny, moving and detailed, a hugely entertaining and vivid recreation of the earnest, energetic eccentricity of the project. With an espionage-y sub-plot, and a cast of characters comic, touching, and in one case wonderfully grotesque, the novel is ideal if you don’t want your flesh to creep this month. Finally for children, Tom Read Wilson’s rhyming picture book Prickle Paper’s Letter Magic about a litter-picking, literate, problem-solving hedgehog, with lovely generous illustrations by Rebecca Bagley, is a delight. Debby Guest |