About this list

The Quietus, 25 Books

This list is The Quietus’s curated chart of the 25 best pieces of horror fiction of the 21st century so far, produced to showcase notable novels, short stories and graphic novels that exemplify the range, influence and strangeness of contemporary horror rather than to reflect sales figures; choices were made by a small panel of experts who each submitted ranked top tens and whose submissions were aggregated to produce the final ranking, with a one-author/one-work rule in place and an explicit note that judges did not vote for their own work. The piece is written for The Quietus (tQ) by Sean Kitching with input from tQ writers and invited genre figures, and the methodology — six judges contributing ranked lists which were combined to form the top 25 — is clearly described in the article.

Who Voted: 6 people voted -- Catriona Ward, Michael Cisco, Greg F. Gifune, Leila Taylor, Mat Colegate, Sean Kitching

This list was originally published in 2025 and was added to this site 7 months ago.