Top Ten Tuesday; Stay Out Of The Woods

It's Tuesday and probably time for a new Top Ten Tuesday courtesy of That Artsy Reader Girl. As it was freebie week in terms of themes, I decided writing a top ten list of horror books where the woods play a role.

Here's my top ten list that just might make people want to stay clear of the woods for a little while.

The Shapeshifters by Stefan Spjut

Description from Goodreads

Summer 1978. A young boy disappears without a trace from a summer cabin. His mother claims he was carried away by a giant. He is never found.

Twenty-five years later, another child goes missing. This time there’s a lead, a single photograph taken by Susso Myrén. She’s devoted her life to the search for trolls, legendary giants known as stallo who can control human thoughts and assume animal form. Convinced that the trolls are real, she follows the trail of missing children to northern Sweden. But humans, some part stallo themselves, have been watching over the creatures for generations, and this hidden society of protectors won’t hesitate to close its deadly ranks.
Mixing folklore and history, suspense and the supernatural, The Shapeshifters is an extraordinary journey into a frozen land where myth bleeds into reality.

The Jack in the Green by Frazer Lee

Description from Goodreads

A nightmare made real.

On Christmas Eve, six year-old Tom McRae witnessed an unspeakable atrocity that left him orphaned, his childhood in tatters. Now in his mid-thirties, Tom still has terrifying nightmares of that night. When Tom is sent to the remote Scottish village of Douglass to negotiate a land grab for his employer it seems like a golden opportunity for him to start over. But Tom can’t help feeling he’s been to Douglass before, and the terrible dreams from his childhood have begun to spill over into his waking life. As murderous events unfold and Tom’s feverish nightmares escalate, he will discover the hideous truth behind the villagers’ strange pagan ritual of The Jack in the Green.

The Cursed Among Us by John Durgin

Description from Goodreads

It has been twenty years since the serial killer known as The Black Heart Killer terrorized the town of Newport in 1979. Life mostly returned to normal after the killer was captured. All the townspeople have to do is stay out of the woods where the bodies were abandoned—their chests ripped open, and their hearts torn out...

Howie Burke and his friends decide rules are meant to be broken. That’s what fifteen-year-old kids do. On a beautiful fall day, they decide to go out in the woods to film a horror movie when they stumble across a mysterious grave. What they don’t know is that they are about to release an evil on the town unlike anything in their home-made movies. They will soon uncover the secrets of the Black Heart Killer, and what it truly means to be cursed.

Suicide Forest by Jeremy Bates

Description from Goodreads

SUICIDE FOREST IS REAL - ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK

Just outside of Tokyo lies Aokigahara, a vast forest and one of the most beautiful wilderness areas in Japan...and also the most infamous spot to commit suicide in the world. Legend has it that the spirits of those many suicides are still roaming, haunting deep in the ancient woods.

When bad weather prevents a group of friends from climbing neighboring Mt. Fuji, they decide to spend the night camping in Aokigahara. But they get more than they bargained for when one of them is found hanged in the morning--and they realize there might be some truth to the legends after all.

Sallow Bend by Alan Baxter

Description from Goodreads

Something old and deadly has awoken.

When two teenagers go missing from the small, rural town of Sallow Bend, the residents come together to search for them. Little do they suspect that finding the wayward girls will be the start of their problems. An ancient evil is rising, and only one man seems to realize that everyone is in danger and this is not the first time it’s happened. With the carnival in town, people want to have a good time, but for many, this will be the worst time of their lives. SALLOW BEND – a tense and frightening folk horror novel from Alan Baxter and Cemetery Dance Publications.

To the Devil, A Cryptid by Hunter Shea

Description from Goodreads

Down in Texas, even the legends are bigger.

Some say the Goat Man is just an old folk tale, meant to scare people from wandering too far into the woods. For a group of Satanists, crossing the infamous Goat Man's Bridge is the first step to appeasing their Dark Lord. When their sacrifice goes wrong, hell is birthed on Earth. What rises from the ashes under a lightning-slashed sky will crave only two things: to bring about chaos, and bathe in the blood of the dead.

An ex-con, pastry chef, paranormal podcaster and terrified teen fight to stay one step ahead of their destruction as the town around them is crushed under the horns of the horrifying cryptid now possessed by demons from hell. The Goat Man has arrived, and it won't leave until there is nothing left alive.

Stolen Tongues by Felix Blackwell

Description from Goodreads

A romantic cabin getaway doesn’t go exactly as planned. High up on the windswept cliffs of Pale Peak, Faye and Felix celebrate their new engagement. But soon, a chorus of ghastly noises erupts from the nearby the screams of animals, the cries of children, and the mad babble of a hundred mournful voices. A dark figure looms near the windows in the dead of night, whispering to Faye. As the weather turns deadly, Felix discovers that his terrified fiancée isn’t just mumbling in her sleep – she’s whispering back. Originally a contest-winning story on reddit.com’s horror community NoSleep , Stolen Tongues has received widespread acclaim and is now being adapted into a feature film.

Boy in the Box by Marc E. Fitch

Description from Goodreads

Ten years ago a mysterious and tragic hunting accident deep in the Adirondack Mountains left a boy buried in a storied piece of land known as Coombs' Gulch and four friends with a terrible secret. Now, Jonathan Hollis and brothers Michael and Conner Braddick must return to the place that changed their lives forever in order to keep their secret buried. What they don't realize is that they are walking into a trap - one set decades earlier by a supernatural being who is not confined by time or place: a demon that demands a sacrifice.

Camp Firwood by Boris Bacic

Description from Goodreads

If the counselors of Camp Firwood send you into the woods, you're as good as dead.

When the rebellious teenager Kevin gets sent to a summer camp by his parents, he initially has no idea what's in store for him. Every two weeks, the camp organizes an event called The Trial. The campers all dread it. They don't want to spend the night in the woods with the Firwood Wraith roaming around. And the more they misbehave, the higher the chances they'll be chosen.

By the time Kevin realizes what Camp Firwood really is, he is trapped - and every week, more and more campers go missing.

The Ritual by Adam Nevill

Description from Goodreads

When four old University friends set off into the Scandinavian wilderness of the Arctic Circle, they aim to briefly escape the problems of their lives and reconnect with one another. But when Luke, the only man still single and living a precarious existence, finds he has little left in common with his well-heeled friends, tensions rise. With limited experience between them, a shortcut meant to ease their hike turns into a nightmare scenario that could cost them their lives. Lost, hungry, and surrounded by forest untouched for millennia, Luke figures things couldn't possibly get any worse. But then they stumble across an old habitation. Ancient artefacts decorate the walls and there are bones scattered upon the dry floors. The residue of old rites and pagan sacrifice for something that still exists in the forest. Something responsible for the bestial presence that follows their every step. As the four friends stagger in the direction of salvation, they learn that death doesn't come easy among these ancient trees . . .