10 Spooky Romances to Read This October
By: Kara Skinner
Tags: Books, Romance Novels, Historical Romance, Novels, Halloween

October is officially here and it’s now the perfect time for ghost stories and Halloween romances. Here are 10 romances to get you in the Halloween spirit.

1. Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen

For those who love a little bit of classic literature, Northanger Abbey is the perfect classic October romance novel (yes I realize that’s a very specific category).

Northanger Abbey is about a woman named Catherine Moreland, a young woman entering society for the first time, where she gets into scrape after scrape as she looks for mystery and conspiracy like those she enjoys in gothic novels while falling for Mr. Tilney, a handsome and charming flirt.

A parody of gothic novels, Northanger Abbey is both funny and excellent for October.

Get Northanger Abbey through your local bookstore.

2) A Gift of Ghosts by Sarah Wynde

One little paragraph about spirit energy ruined Akira’s career as an academic professor. Now she has two options: get a job at General Directions, a mysterious company in Florida that wants to interview her for some reason, or teach high school physics.

She’d rather work in Hell than teach high school physics.

Luckily, General Directions offers her a job that includes a salary increase and also the freedom to research whatever she wants as long as she signs a two-year contract.

What she doesn’t know is they don’t want her for her scientific research. They want her because she sees ghosts. Her boss, Zane, and the company’s CEO (and Zane’s dad), Max, want her to contact Zane’s mother and nephew, who passed, but may still be in the ghost world.

Now Akira is living in a town full of psychics where she has a haunted car and a haunted house– luckily, only friendly spirits. Her boss, Zane, is more of a friend than a manager. Which is all right with her, because she can’t help but be incredibly attracted to him.

But when Akira finds out that Zane’s mother has turned into an evil spirit, tensions rise. How can she make Zane understand that she can’t talk to his mother because the mother might kill Akira in the process?

A Gift of Ghosts is free on Smashwords.

3) The Cottage on Pumpkin and Vine by Kate Angell, Jennifer Dawson, and Sharla Lovelace

Welcome to Moonbright, Maine…Where the scents of donuts and cider waft through the crisp night air…with just a hint of magic.

It’s time for the annual Halloween costume party at the cottage on Pumpkin and Vine, the perfect place to celebrate the pleasures of the season. Guests return to the picturesque B & B year after year to snuggle up in its cozy rooms, explore the quiet, tree-lined streets and enjoy all the spooky fun of the holiday. But local legend whispers that it’s also a place where wishes have a strange way of coming true.

For three unsuspecting revelers, it’s going to be an enchanted weekend of candy corn kisses and midnight black kittens, along with some real Halloween surprises — the kind that make your heart skip a beat — for many more celebrations to come…

Get The Cottage on Pumpkin and Vine at your local bookstore.

4) Full Moon Rising by Keri Arthur

A rare hybrid of vampire and werewolf, Riley Jenson and her twin brother, Rhoan, work for Melbourne’s Directorate of Other Races, an organization created to police the supernatural races–and protect humans from their depredations. While Rhoan is an exalted guardian, a.k.a. assassin, Riley is merely an office worker–until her brother goes missing on one of his missions. The timing couldn’t be worse. More werewolf than vampire, Riley is vulnerable to the moon heat, the weeklong period before the full moon, when her need to mate becomes all-consuming.…

Luckily Riley has two willing partners to satisfy her every need. But she will have to control her urges if she’s going to find her brother….Easier said than done as the city pulses with frenzied desire, and Riley is confronted with a very powerful–and delectably naked–vamp who raises her temperature like never before.

In matters carnal, Riley has met her match. But in matters criminal, she must follow her instincts not only to find her brother but to stop an unholy harvest. For someone is doing some shifty cloning in an attempt to produce the ultimate warrior–by tapping into the genome of nonhumans like Rhoan. Now Riley knows just how dangerous the world is for her kind–and just how much it needs her.

Get Full Moon Rising at your local bookstore.

5) Forever Charmed by Rose Pressey

Halloween Laveau is descended from a long line of witches. Yes, her name is Halloween. The cosmic universe is definitely playing some kind of sick joke on her. She’s the ultimate witch cliché, complete with a black cat and spooky house. Thank heavens she’s missing the warts and flying broom.

When Halloween inherits her great-aunt’s manor, she decides to put the house to good use as a bed-and-breakfast. Her first guest is the sinfully good-looking Nicolas Marco, but he’s not here for the continental breakfast. Halloween discovers a ratty old book in the attic. It’s written in an unfamiliar language, and unknown to her, the tome is cursed.

Halloween soon learns there’s a link between the book and her newfound talent as a necromancer. But her new skills come with a catch: the reanimated dead aren’t as cupcake-sweet as they were when they were alive. When a rival witch comes after the book, Halloween doesn’t know who to trust–the sexy vampire who says he wants to save the day, or the warlock who says he can destroy the book once and for all.

Halloween had better learn fast. Because when the dead start rising, only a powerful witch can put them back under.

Forever Charmed is free on Smashwords.

6) Undead and Unwed by MaryJanice Davidson

Betsy Taylor–former model, newly unemployed secretary, 30, and still single–wakes up after being flattened by a small SUV in a tacky coffin wearing cheap knock-off shoes. Her mother is glad she is back, albeit as a vampire, but her stepmother is enraged that Betsy has reclaimed her designer-shoe collection. With a wealthy best friend and a newly acquired doctor pal who is not susceptible to her formidable allure, she sets out to right wrongs but is abducted by Nostro, a tacky 500-year-old vampire who rules the undead roost. It seems that Betsy is an anomaly: a vampire who doesn’t burn in sunlight, can fight the urge to feed, and is not repulsed by religious articles, all of which may make her the prophesied Queen of the Vampires. Teaming up with gorgeous vampire Eric Sinclair, who is in her opinion a major pervert, she takes on Nostro and his minions.

Get Undead and Unwed at your local bookstore.

7) Black Cat Fever by Desiree Holt

It’s Halloween, and for two special black cats the night when they must find their mates…or else.

Panther shifter Dea Russo waits each year for Halloween, the only night to search for her mate. As the daughter of the late pack alpha she has the power to pass along to the male she chooses.

But each Halloween passes without success until the night she meets Kyle Donovan, a man who pleasures her senses in every way possible — until mixed breed outcast Dane Maguire tries to stake a claim.

Will Kyle arise from the bed of erotic pleasure to defend the woman who holds his future in her hands?

Black Cat Fever is available on Kobo.

8) The Mark of the Midnight Manazilla by Lauren Willig

In October of 1806, the Little Season is in full swing, and Sally Fitzhugh has had enough of the endless parties and balls. With a rampant vampire craze sparked by the novel The Convent of Orsino, it seems no one can speak of anything else. But when Sally hears a rumor that the reclusive Duke of Belliston is an actual vampire, she cannot resist the challenge of proving such nonsense false. At a ball in Belliston Square, she ventures across the gardens and encounters the mysterious Duke.

Lucien, Duke of Belliston, is well versed in the trouble gossip can bring. He’s returned home to dispel the rumors of scandal surrounding his parents’ deaths, which hint at everything from treason to dark sorcery. While he searches for the truth, he welcomes his fearsome reputation — until a woman is found dead in Richmond. Her blood drained from her throat.

Lucien and Sally join forces to stop the so-called vampire from killing again. Someone managed to get away with killing the last Duke of Belliston. But they won’t kill this duke — not if Sally has anything to say about it.

Get The Mark of the Midnight Manazilla at your local bookstore.

9) To Catch a Spirit by Carrie Pulkinen

Being psychic isn’t as fun as it sounds….

Billionaire businessman Logan Mitchell is an empath. While his talent of reading people’s emotions has come in handy in the business world, it’s about to drive him insane. His ability triggers unbearable OCD attacks that leave him counting and cleaning until he collapses from exhaustion. If his psychic power doesn’t make him crazy, the ghost that’s haunting him soon will.

Psychic medium Allison Gray is drawn to Logan the minute she meets him. She shares his empathic abilities, and she can help him control the constant barrage of emotions. But a harrowing incident from her past has left her terrified of spirits, and the ghost in Logan’s mansion is doing everything in its power to keep her away.

Logan has given up hope of ever having a normal life, until he meets Allison. But the ghost doesn’t want to share him. Even if she can overcome her fears, loving him will mean risking her life.

Get To Catch a Spirit at your local bookstore.

10) Midnight Bayou by Nora Roberts

Declan Fitzgerald had always been the family maverick, but even he couldn’t understand his impulse to buy a dilapidated mansion on the outskirts of New Orleans. All he knew was that ever since he first saw Manet Hall, he’d been enchanted-and obsessed-with it. So when the opportunity to buy the house comes up, Declan jumps at the chance to live out a dream.

Determined to restore Manet Hall to its former splendor, Declan begins the daunting renovation room by room, relying on his own labor and skills. But the days spent in total isolation in the empty house take a toll. He is seeing visions of days from a century past, and experiencing sensations of terror and nearly unbearable grief-sensations not his own, but those of a stranger. Local legend has it that the house is haunted, and with every passing day Declan’s belief in the ghostly presence grows.

Only the companionship of alluring Angelina Simone can distract him from the mysterious happenings in the house, but Angelina too has her own surprising connection to Manet Hall-a connection that will help Declan uncover a secret that’s been buried for a hundred years.

Get Midnight Bayou at your local bookstore.

All of the links in the article, except for the Kobo link and the links to free books, are affiliate links. This means that I get a small commission if you purchase the book through my link, but at no additional cost to you. Half of my affiliate earnings are donated to Trees for the Future. Read more about my affiliate policies here.

What’s your favorite Halloween romance? Let me know in the comments.