The Shining

This was the book that turned Stephen King from a promising writer into the name horror fans reach for first. It's his third novel, and the one that made him a bestseller in hardcover, which in the world of horror paperbacks was no small thing.

King wrote it not long after a stay at a real hotel that stuck with him, and by his own account it was shaped by his struggle with drink at the time. You can feel that honesty running underneath the dread, the sense that something ordinary and human is unravelling as much as anything supernatural.

It's a slow burn rather than a jump scare, the kind of unease that settles in over a long evening rather than startling you and moving on. Good for a night when you want to be properly unsettled without needing the lights off, though I'd still keep a hot drink close.

It's been adapted twice for the screen since, a film in 1980 and a miniseries in 1997, so there's no shortage to argue about once you've finished it.