Last Days by Adam Nevill (Macmillan, £12.99)

Laddish Kyle, thirtysomething and yet to make his breakthrough documentary film, is offered the opportunity to make a feature about the 1960s cult known as Sister Katherine and the Temple of the Last Days. Sister Katherine was a psychopathic control-freak whose reign of terror ended with the slaying of half a dozen of her followers and her own beheading, but what starts as a documentary about the crimes soon turns paranormal as Kyle is haunted by the dog-like creatures summoned by Sister Katherine, who might still be dictating events from beyond the grave. Nevill expertly cranks up the tension, as Kyle and his best-friend cameraman Dave trace the cult from London to Arizona, and builds to a brilliant climax. His previous novel was the superb The Ritual, but with Last Days he's gone one better. This is riveting, and Nevill is fast becoming Britain's answer to Stephen King.

Redemption in Indigo by Karen Lord (Jo Fletcher Books, £8.99)
Inspired by a Senegalese folktale, Redemption in Indigo is the perfect antidote to the formula fantasies currently flooding the market. When Paama finally leaves her husband Ansige after 10 years of marriage, he follows her in an attempt to win her back. After a series of humorous, often slapstick episodes in which foolish Ansige gets himself into deeper trouble, only to be extricated by Paama, the watching djombi spirits give Paama the Chaos Stick which allows her to affect chance and probability. However, the Indigo Lord wants the stick back, kidnaps Paama, takes her on a wondrous tour and attempts to impress her with his magic. Précis fails to do justice to the novel's depth, beauty and elegant simplicity. Written from the point of view of an omniscient storyteller in the style of an oral narrative, this is a subtle, wise and playful meditation on life and fate.

Home Improvement: Undead Edition edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni LP Kelner (Jo Fletcher Books, £16.99)
What happens when two bestselling writers edit a horror anthology with the theme of "home improvement" and invite a "dream team" of writers, many of them fellow bestsellers, to contribute? Answer: a collection of 14 mainly mediocre stories which not surprisingly feature a lot of haunted houses. Harris's own effort, puffed on the cover as a "never-before-published Sookie Stackhouse story!", is a trite, forgettable episode in which Sookie and a bunch of friends renovate a house, rouse a ghost and solve an old murder. Far better are "Gray" by Patricia Briggs, a poignant vampire revenge drama; and Stacia Kane's "Rick the Brave", an original take on the ghost-hunting theme. These aside, the anthology is decidedly "horror lite", and as such perfect for teens of all ages.

A Jar of Wasps by Luis Villazon (Anarchy Books, £8.99)
Graham Trevennan is a geologist going through a bad patch. Dumped by his girlfriend before the novel opens, he receives a parcel containing a mysterious stone egg, quickly followed by a visitation from two gunmen who retrieve the egg, shoot an innocent visitor to his house and leave Trevennan running from the law. Meanwhile, volcanoes begin erupting worldwide and crystals of extra-terrestrial provenance rain from the heavens. Trevennan must not only make sense of what's happening, but piece together the apparently random series of events, and save himself and the world into the bargain. It's an oddly stop-start first-person narrative, interspersed with flashback chapters from different viewpoints, as the hero races towards a grim dénouement uncommon in the usually upbeat thriller genre.

 Eric Brown's Ghostwriting is published by infinity plus books.