Best horror or suspense books that have a creepy carnival or circus theme:
📚Something Wicked This Way Comes – Ray Bradbury
This is a 1962 dark fantasy novel by Ray Bradbury, and the second book in his Green Town Trilogy. It is about two 13-year-old best friends, Jim Nightshade and William Halloway, and their nightmarish experience with a travelling carnival that comes to their Midwestern home, Green Town, Illinois, on October 24. In dealing with the creepy figures of this carnival, the boys learn how to combat fear. The carnival’s leader is the mysterious “Mr. Dark”, who seemingly wields the power to grant the townspeople’s secret desires. In reality, Dark is a malevolent being who, like the carnival, lives off the life force of those it enslaves. Mr. Dark’s presence is countered by that of Will’s father, Charles Halloway, the janitor of the town library, who harbors his own secret fear of growing older because he feels he is too old to be Will’s father.
📚The Ring – Hanna Delaney
The Ring is a Gothic Horror novel set in late-Victorian Liverpool. Eager to prove himself detective material, Constable Lacey investigates the disappearance of a local thief. Enquiries soon lead him to the new circus in town, where he meets the mysterious ringmaster Ezra Fontini and his devoted performers. Dazzled by the magical world of the circus, Lacey becomes infatuated with one of Fontini’s charming young aerialists, Ellen French.
The show is welcomed by the locals until Fontini’s headline performer is found dead. Overwhelmed with witness accounts that can’t be explained by logic, the police call on Inspector Daniel Muldoon to find out what’s keeping people from leaving their homes after dark.
📚Circus Of The Dead – Kimberley Loth
Circus of the Dead is book one in Kimberly Loth’s horror series that follows a young teen as she finds herself in a situation that could be the death of her. Her mother sends her to Louisiana to stay with her Uncle Luke for the summer. She was told that he called and needed her help, so her mother sends her. This is a Southern Gothic Horror novel.
📚The Night Circus – Erin Morgenstein
This is a dark fantasy romance novel about Le Cirque des Rêves, a mysterious, magical circus that appears unannounced and operates only at night, serving as the arena for a dangerous magical duel between two young illusionists, Celia Bowen and Marco Alisdair, who were trained since childhood by rival mentors to compete until only one survives, but their escalating, love-fuelled rivalry and creations within the circus threaten to destroy it and everyone involved, forcing them to find a way to end the game and save themselves and the circus’s devoted followers
📚Cique du Freak – Darren Shan
This is a horror-fantasy novel about an ordinary boy who becomes a vampire’s assistant. After attending a forbidden, grotesque freak show, Darren steals a deadly spider from a vampire, Mr. Crepsley, leading to a desperate, life-saving pact that plunges him into a dark, supernatural world.
Each of these books features a supernatural or creepy circus/carnival.
Have you read any of these circus-based horror books?
Read a free sample of The Ring now.
The Ring is an occult detective novel set in late-Victorian Liverpool and features supernatural detective Daniel Muldoon. The Ring is a standout in Delaney’s Muldoon Mysteries series, and it is a 5-star read for fans of Gothic crime hybrids. Whether you’re drawn to its historical depth, supernatural twists, or razor-sharp pacing, this book delivers and leaves you eager for more.
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