• Books

New Book Releases for August 2025

Craft stores and candle makers may have the populace at large convinced that spooky season begins under the blanketed heat of August, but horror fans (including you, dear reader) know that every day is ripe for burning a pumpkin spice three-wick and flipping through new books. This month’s collection includes a novelization of an ‘80s classic and a complementary anthology to one of Stephen King’s finest.

All Trap No Bait
Joseph Worthen
Tortoise Books
August 5th – Pre-order Now

All Trap No Bait is both a gripping book about a hapless detective, and a Southern Gothic novel for the cyber age—something like the bastard love child of Flannery O’Connor and The Big Lebowski. Hilarious and harrowing, a chronicle of its depressing time and an immensely entertaining escape from ours, it’s a landmark work and an incredible debut by a major new talent.

Lucky Day
Chuck Tingle
Tor Nightfire
August 12th – Pre-order Now

Four years ago, an unthinkable disaster occurred. In what was later known as the Low-Probability Event, eight million people were killed in a single day, each of them dying in improbable, bizarre ways: strangled by balloon ropes, torn apart by exploding manhole covers, attacked by a chimpanzee wielding a typewriter. A day of freak accidents that proved anything is possible, no matter the odds. Luck is real now, and it’s not always good.

Your Favorite Scary Movie
Ashley Cullins
Plume
August 19th – Pre-order Now

Entertainment journalist Ashley Cullins examines the making and impact of the Scream films with behind-the-scenes insight from cast, creators and crew, as well as sharp analysis on how the movies’ special blend of gruesome violence and humorous self-awareness rewrote the horror playbook. This intimate and thorough history includes brand-new interviews from Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, David Arquette, Kevin Williamson, Skeet Ulrich, Matthew Lillard, Jack Quaid, Parker Posey, Hayden Panettiere, Jasmin Savoy Brown, Mason Gooding, Radio Silence, Roger L. Jackson and so many more.

The End of the World as We Know It
Various Authors
Gallery Books
August 19th – Pre-order Now

For the first time, Stephen King has fully authorized a return to the harrowing world of The Stand through this original short story anthology as presented by award-winning authors and editors Christopher Golden and Brian Keene. Bringing together some of today’s greatest and most visionary writers, The End of the World as We Know It features unforgettable, all-new stories set during and after (and some perhaps long after) the events of The Stand—brilliant, terrifying and painfully human tales that will resonate with readers everywhere as an essential companion to the classic, bestselling novel.

Sleepaway Camp: The Novelization
B. R. Flynn
Encyclopocalypse Publications
August 26th – Pre-order Now

For Angela Baker, Camp Arawak is supposed to be a fresh start—a place to meet new friends, enjoy summer days and leave behind the shadows of her past. But the ghosts of her trauma are never far behind. Quiet, withdrawn and painfully misunderstood, Angela doesn’t fit in among the loud, often vicious campers.

But something else lurks beneath the surface of Camp Arawak—a darkness that stretches beyond Angela’s fragile world. And as tensions rise and bodies fall, Angela begins to change. Something inside her is stirring…

Visit RUE MORGUE on Bookshop.org for a comprehensive list of August’s new horror releases and other curated lists of book recommendations. 

*Purchases made through any included links will directly benefit independent bookstores and could result in compensation for RUE MORGUE. Release dates are subject to change.

Read More

Get The Grim Reader.
Rue Morgue's free newsletter.
Editor's notes.
Cultural insight.
Curated horror across film, books, music, and art.
First looks.
Select previews.
No algorithms.
Join Free

Advertisement

In Print Since 1997

Issue 231

Rue Morgue #231 Jul/Aug 2026

Plus

Inside Rue Morgue #231 – Summer Slasher Issue FEATURES Filmmaker Jane Schoenbrun’s TEENAGE SEX AND DEATH AT CAMP MIASMA guts the slasher formula from the inside out, turning it into a romance about the horror of becoming who you were always meant to be. Plus! GILLIAN ANDERSON and HANNAH EINBINDER unpack Schoenbrun’s radical dismemberment of…

Issue 230

Rue Morgue #230 May/Jun 2026 – RARE

Plus

Inside Rue Morgue #230 FEATURES Filmmaker Curry Barker transforms a simple wish into a spiralling nightmare of love, possession, and bloodshed in his breakout feature OBSESSION. Plus: The story of Barker’s found-footage shocker MILK & SERIAL, which turned a micro-budget experiment into a viral horror breakout. Hollywood made it a monster. History tells a different…

Issue 229

Rue Morgue #229 Mar/Apr 2026

Plus

Inside Rue Morgue #229! FEATURES A nerve-shredding found-footage thriller built around sound, UNDERTONE signals the arrival of a terrifying new voice in Canada’s booming independent horror scene. Plus! Meet the new breed of independent Canadian horror filmmakers behind DREAM EATER, SWEETNESS, HANGASHORE, THE LAND OF NOD and THE CURSE OF GHOST ISLAND. Part post-punk, part…

Issue 228

Rue Morgue #228 Jan/Feb 2026

Plus

Inside Rue Morgue #228! FEATURES He fascinated audiences in 2001 with the French period martial arts horror film BROTHERHOOD OF THE WOLF. Then he followed it up in 2006 by bringing the eerie world of SILENT HILL to cinematic life. Now, visionary director CHRISTOPHE GANS unleashes his latest nightmare with RETURN TO SILENT HILL. Plus!…