Books
Black Friday Chopping List: Other Goodies
Black Friday is more than just the day after Thanksgiving or an unofficial holiday begging for its own 80s style slasher. No, Black Friday is a huge boon for retailers. In fact, the day got its name (supposedly) for being when stores would go from profits “in the red” to “in the black”. Over the years, it’s also become a massive cluster-fuck of rabid shoppers and disgruntled teenage employees who’d rather be somewhere downing eggnog. More than a few drops of blood seem to get shed annually as well. See? SLASHER – MOVIE. Sometimes, there are amazing deals to be found on the day, but it’s hard to know where to look. Not every store releases their ad paper in advance. For Black Friday 2018, I’m going to try and ease some that stress for you, fiends. I’ve scoured the internet to try and find the best deals, specials, and must have gifts for any horror obsessive this Pagan holiday season (Google it).
Mondo
Mondo has been churning out collectible goodies for years now. Based out of Austin, the company whose origins began as a t-shirt shop tucked away in the unused ticket booth of the Alamo Drafthouse, quickly found their true calling with the creation of gig-style posters to help promote various screenings of classic flicks. Now a new Mondo poster is met with great fanfare and fervent purchasing from their fans. Of course, the brand has extended beyond shirts and posters to include enamel pins, vinyl soundtracks, and even a brand spankingly new and awesome looking board game.
The Thing: Infection at Outpost 31
If you missed out on the Mondo Exclusive Edition of this board game, fear not, a standard edition is already available through retailers (though the website lists the purchase as a “pre-order” currently). The gameplay sounds like a more horror leaning version of the classic Clue. Based on John Carpenter’s The Thing, players must navigate the alien-infested confines of Outpost 31 while attempting to decipher who among them has been taken over by the shapeshifting monstrosity. Retails for $60
The Art of Mondo
Mondo posters can be pricey, especially if you attempt to purchase from a third party seller after a specific print has sold out. That said, a majority of their pieces are works of art in every aspect of the word and deserve to be treated as such. If you happen to be missing a piece from your collection that’s long out of print, The Art of Mondo is your best bet. I was lucky enough to receive a copy, and I’ve got to say it’s genuinely a beauty to behold. Over 300 pages of large, glossy poster art collected chronologically is a delight to flip through. Follow along as the art of Mondo evolves from the simple designs to help promote a film and music festival to licensed and fully realized works that celebrate your favorite cinema classics. The book is currently on sale at Amazon for only $50.72, though a special Deluxe Edition will be released on Black Friday!
Last but not least, in conjunction with Death Waltz Records you can nab Box of Souls – A Nightmare on Elm Street 8XLP Box Set. The set contains the original soundtracks from each of the 8 films from the series. The packaging makes this a piece well worth display in your collection, resembling Freddy’s bare chest with the faces of fallen souls by the hand of the nightmare demon screaming to break free.
While Mondo typically holds a sale on archived prints for Black Friday, this year their aim instead will be releasing new items. Of note for BD readers will be a Paranorman enamel pin.
Apparel
Cavity Colors
All “Cyber Hell” will break loose this Thursday at 5 PM EST! That’s because the appropriately christened company Cavity Colors will be launching their massive annual event, Cyber Hell. Everything storewide will be on sale between 35% – 75% off. The sale will continue through to Monday at 11:59 PM, though, patrons can save a little by shopping during the first 24 hours. Shipping in the US will be free for the first day.
There will be a number of enamel pin restocks including several from the Evil Dead collection as well as leftover stock from certain limited releases, including our very own Bloody Disgusting tee…which I don’t even have one yet! To grab these you will likely need to act fast as stock and size options are low.
Fright Rags
Right now on the Fright Rags homepage, a banner at the top reveals a countdown with the the line “Our biggest sale of the year is coming!” From Creepshow, Trick ‘r Treat, and even Goosebumps, Fright Rags has something special for every horror fanatic on you Holiday shopping list. I’ve been informed that all socks, pins, and box sets will be sold 50% off come Black Friday. While it doesn’t seem like all the shirts sitewide will carry the steep discount, I was promised that a “ton” of them will be half off. You’ll even be able to nab a “Tee of Mystery” for only nine buckaroos.
Personally, my eyes are locked in on the “Vintage Halloween Collection” which features Samhain boogeymen heavy-hitters Sam and Michael in retro styled tees. There’s also the Monstervision shirts, because who wouldn’t want Joe Bob Briggs’s mug plastered across your chest?
Hopefully, I’ve given you a few good gift ideas, whether those special ones in your life are art lovers or simply never leave the house in anything other than jeans and a t-shirt. Still, if you’re left with a few more names on your list – maybe this group will point you in the right direction.
Horror Candles
Every year around this time I get into a craftsy, Martha Stewarty mood. It begins simple enough with cooking around Halloween as I tear through as many pumpkin recipes as I possibly can. By the time Christmas has come and gone my kitchen looks like a Hobby Lobby has imploded in on itself. I make candles for gifts. Mostly they’re for those I appreciate but don’t feel like spending any real money on. That’s not to take away from the gift itself as candles are a good deal of work and the process of crafting them can be somewhat therapeutic. I even concoct the aromas and names based off a number of horror films. “Norma” smells like fresh baked cookies, “Swamp Thing” like moss and patchouli, and “Pumkinhead” smells like the rotten sweetness of pumpkin pie with hints of dirt. All this to say, I have no Etsy shop…yet. But, I truly believe candles can make a perfect gift for a horror fan. Who doesn’t like their shit to smell nice? Even better if you can tie them into the receivers own interests. Below are a couple I was able to track down online.
Cavity Candles
Again, our friends at Cavity Colors come through! Their candles are all hand-poured, 100% soy wax (which means they won’t emit carbon soot like regular paraffin candles). Bonus, each jar candle comes with a colorful decorative label that perfectly matches with the Cavity Color brand. Catch them in “Mystery Scent”, “Re-agent” and more! Hopefully, these won’t be left out of the sale this year.
Horror Decor
The site, Horror Decor, offers a wide array of oddball homegoods for lovers of the macabre. You can easily marry your obsessions with design and decay by clicking through their offerings. On the flickering flame front, they have “An Offering to Krampus” scented candle and wax melt that promises a ” blend of mistletoe, frankincense, myrrh, and a subtle hint of pine.” The idea of a pleasant fragrance with the added benefit of warding off Christmas’s most evil demonic force is super, but even cooler are these VHS wax melts complete with “Be Kind, Rewind” smiley faces! The cassettes smell like soda while the smileys contain the buttery aroma of popcorn. Pop these in your wax warmer and throw in a Vinegar Syndrome blu and prepare to get whisked away to your childhood evenings spent at the video store.
At the end of the day, horror is big business and retailers have finally started to take notice. Even Wal-Mart carries a seasonal t-shirt with Freddy and Jason chilling by the Christmas Tree! So, no matter how you plan to spend your Black Friday, rest easy knowing your loved ones have plenty of options when it comes to scrambling to find a gift just right for you. And as our very own frequent commenter Creepshow has pointed out, if you don’t like it – there’s always those trusty gift receipts.
There’s a lot of reading left to do in 2026, between the glut of summer releases and the approach of fall, when horror titles get a special push from publishers, but this has already been an incredible year for horror literature.
Some of the biggest names in the genre have turned in outstanding work, rising stars have made their mark, and we’re only halfway through the year.
To celebrate the midway point of 2026, with plenty of horror books still to come, we’re taking a look back at the best horror books we’ve read this year so far, listed alphabetically by author.
If you missed any of these books earlier in the year, consider this your reminder to catch up.
Japanese Gothic by Kylie Lee Baker
A student running from a crime he may or may not have committed escapes to his father’s country home in Japan, only to find himself haunted by strange apparitions, while in the past, a young samurai tries to find salvation for her family and finds a door to the future instead. Kylie Lee Baker’s Japanese Gothic begins with this dialogue between past and present, and then blossoms into so much more, a cross-time ghost story about old wounds and what it really takes to finally heal them. I got so happily lost in this one that I would have read at least 200 more pages.
Persona by Aoife Josie Clements
In this tale of shut-ins, sex workers, artists, and the horrors they both summon and recoil from, Aoife Josie Clements weaves something that feels less like a story to be experienced and more like a psychic wound to be endured, and I mean that in the most complimentary way possible. Evocative in its prose and nightmarish in its imagery, Persona is a story of the masks we wear, and the understanding that not all of our masks are particularly pretty or even easy to breathe through. It’s a dense, literary, unnervingly vicious book, and while it’s already attracted an audience, it deserves a much bigger one.
Dead First by Johnny Compton
Johnny Compton’s latest novel opens with a throwing down of the gauntlet, a sequence that made me instantly think “How on Earth is he going to top this?” It’s a story that begins with a billionaire hiring a private investigator to determine why, despite trying in many brutal ways, he cannot die. That premise, and the scene which sets it all off, is so alluring and delightfully gruesome that you almost can’t believe it’s the way a book begins, and then Compton just keeps going, delivering a supernatural mystery that I could not put down.
Make Me Better by Sarah Gailey
A woman grieving for the life she wanted visits a mysterious island renowned for the healing salt its residents harvest and sell, seeking renewal and relief. What she finds instead is a strange cult with a twisted history with surprising resonance in her own life, and a people who are more than willing to grant the relief she wants, for a price. Laced with beautiful prose and moments of profound realization alongside folk and even cosmic horror, this is vintage Sarah Gailey.
Partially Devoured by Daniel Kraus
If you love horror film history and analysis, Partially Devoured is an essential. Written by Pulitzer Prize-winner Daniel Kraus, the book is a deep dive into his favorite movie of all time, George A. Romero‘s Night of the Living Dead, complete with exhaustive research into the making of the film and passages of deeply moving memoir woven in. If you’ve ever wanted to know what the eerie music that opens the film is called while also bursting into tears at how horror movies can save your life, this is a must-read.
Wretch by Eric LaRocca
Our reigning King of Extreme Horror, Eric LaRocca weaves books of uncommon beauty out of the most nightmarish parts of humanity, and Wretch is no exception. The story of a grieving man who longs for relief and searches for it amid a strange support group that might be a cult, Wretch is a brutal journey into the darkest part of us all, and explores what salvation we might find when we get to the rotten core of the world and peel back its layers. LaRocca’s on a tear of great work right now that few other genre writers can match.
Headlights by CJ Leede
A mystery, a serial killer horror show, a tribute to Stephen King‘s The Shining. All of these things describe CJ Leede’s Headlights, and yet they don’t begin to cover the full breadth of horror awaiting you in this novel. The story of a former FBI agent drawn back into the cold case that haunts him most, it’s a shocker brimming over with vivid moments that’ll live behind your eyes. CJ Leede has now published three novels, and they’re all bangers, so it’s time to get on board if you haven’t already.
It Came From Neverland by Cynthia Pelayo
Cynthia Pelayo has been one of our finest genre writers for years now, but It Came From Neverland is my favorite thing she’s written, and it’s not even close. A dark take on Peter Pan from the perspective of an adult Wendy Darling living in World War I-era London, Pelayo’s book works as both a satisfying horror narrative and a rich exploration of what it really means to never grow up. The horror never loses its potency, but it’s the search for the meaning behind the Peter Pan phenomenon in our own lives, and what we can do about it, that sticks with me most.
Filth Eaters by Ito Romo
Ito Romo’s Filth Eaters is a slim volume, one you can read in just a couple of hours if you’ve got the inclination, but it has the feel of a generation-spanning epic. The story of a breed of vampires born in Central America, the European vampires who encounter them, and the offspring they eventually produced, it spans centuries and packs loads of juicy lore into its pages while never losing its grip on character and narrative drive. I would read hundreds more pages of this world, but I’ll settle for this uncommonly grand-scale novella for now.
Dead But Dreaming of Electric Sheep by Paul Tremblay
A former pro gamer gets a job at a tech company to pilot a brain-dead human body across the country, and so Paul Tremblay’s sci-fi-horror juggernaut begins. Indebted to Philip K. Dick, the primal snarl of Harlan Ellison, and the quirky comedy of The Big Lebowski, and yet wholly original, this is a towering and ambitious novel by one of horror’s most respected voices. What starts as a high-concept tech thriller soon becomes a startling meditation on the value of stories, who gets to tell them, and what happens when we cede too much control to machines we don’t understand. It’s a stunner.
You must be logged in to post a comment.