She’s a Doll – Write on the World

Horror has always been a useful way to examine the things we’re told we should accept as normal. In 2026, feminist horror continues to use the genre to interrogate power, gender expectations, and the structures that shape women’s lives—and sometimes the monsters are the least frightening part of the story. Feminist horror isn’t necessarily horror about women, and it doesn’t have to feature a woman fighting a literal monster. Instead, these novels use horror to expose the ways power operates: inside marriages and families, through cultural expectations, within institutions and communities, and in the roles we are expected to perform simply because of our gender. The supernatural, the grotesque, and the terrifying become ways of making those pressures impossible to ignore.

Spooktober reading list graphic — Spooktober is here, and we’re diving deep into feminist horror. From body horror to domestic unrest, these 12 reads explore power, identity, and the roles society expects us to play. Which ones are on your reading list this month?

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If you’re looking for some feminist horror to catch up on this #Spooktober, these 2026 releases offer plenty to sink your teeth into. From domestic horror and body horror to stories about marriage, motherhood, sisterhood, identity, and the expectations placed on women, these novels demonstrate just how much horror can say about the world we live in.

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What if the creepy haunted doll isn’t the monster in the story—but the victim who has finally come back to make her killer pay? That’s the deliciously dark premise behind Barbara Truelove’s She’s a Doll, a horror novel that takes the familiar haunted-doll story and gives it a very satisfying twist. Instead of an innocent person becoming the target of an inexplicably murderous antique doll, this time the doll has every reason to be angry. Lucy McQuinn was murdered, and now her ghost has taken up residence in an eighteen-inch porcelain body. She may be small, but she has unfinished business with Kyle, the man who killed her.

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There’s something wonderfully subversive about the way Truelove approaches the haunted-doll trope. We’re accustomed to assuming that the doll is the threat. The creepy porcelain face, the old-fashioned clothes, the unnatural movements—everything about a haunted doll is designed to make us wonder what it’s going to do to us.