When you really love Halloween and eerier aspects of autumn, it always feels like Spooky Season is right around the corner, no matter if it’s high summer or the depths of winter. And when it gets to be late August and early September, I start to listen to some of my favorite spooky old radio shows I’ve downloaded over the years, or audiobook short stories that give me the chills. And of course the creepier podcasts that help me get me through the day. We all have some go-to favorites, but if you’re looking for recommendations for something scary to listen to as we enter the best time of the year, these are the five I’d recommend (in no particular order).

Ghosts in the Burbs

I only just discovered this podcast, which began back in 2016, but it hooked me within a handful of episodes. Guised under the premise that a librarian is gathering and recording ghost stories told to her by locals in Wellesley, Massachusetts, the stories are simply too good to be real…unless they are? I listen with that hopeful sense of spooky fun that all these eerie tales of hauntings and possessions are possible, even if they are just well-crafted fictional frights created in a way that turns the toney New England suburb into a Stephen King-like parallel universe where every house holds a frightening secret. The episodes get better as I’m going along too, so it looks like I have a good spooky season ahead of me.

Dark House

This unique podcast explores infamous homes around the country, the famous people who lived there, the people who died there, and what strange hauntings and rumors remain attached to those old houses. I started on Season 2 with the Ackley House episode, and it was fantastic, gave me numerous chills. That house has all kinds of spooky occurrences, from the ghosts to the neighbors and everything in between. What sets this apart from other podcasts that cover similar events are the guests they bring in, from lawyers to ghost hunters to Hollywood ghost tour operators, sharing additional insights from people who know the houses and their eerie histories best.

Faculty of Horror

A longtime favorite of mine, this podcast is hosted by horror journalists/academics Andrea Subissati and Alexandra West, who re-examine horror films through lenses you may have never considered before, breaking down the feminist, class, political, and gender aspects of these horror classics that might highlight new ways to view the films. They often pair some films based on a theme, and I learn so much about the creation of the films, franchises, and characters within. It’s a lot of fun and deeply insightful, plus who doesn’t like to revisit all the best slasher, monster, ghostly, and gory movies we grew up on? This one is a must.

Odd Trails

This one is my guilty pleasure, because it’s interesting but clearly doesn’t lean too heavy on factual examinations of the events. It’s the sibling podcast to Let’s Not Meet, which shares listener-provided tales of close encounters with possible murderers, kidnappers, and other real-world predators (which I believe happens more often than we realize). Odd Trails adjusts the concept and shares listener stories about encounters with the paranormal. Many of the tales on both podcast are eerie and “believable” enough to keep me listening and on edge, but like anything that depends on listener provided stories, there are many that seem implausible or illogical to the point of questioning the validity of all of them, but that’s one of the things about liking spooky stuff this time of year. You want to buy in for the chills. So set aside you BS detector and enjoy the possibility that killers, demons, monsters, kidnappers, and ghosts are real and right around the next corner. At least here, you can hit pause button to escape…

The Yuba County Five

If you want something that follows one eerie story over the course of a dozen episodes, this one might be for you. It’s more true crime, but the story is as bizarre as it is heartbreaking. Some have called the Yuba County Five case the “Dyatlov Pass of the USA,” and for those of you who know that story, you know it’s crazy. In this one, a group of young men in the late 70s go missing, far from where they’re expected to be headed on that particular night. And by far I mean almost 100 miles, and they end up lost, trapped, and later discovered dead in the frozen mountains. What led these people off course? What convinced them to get out of their vehicles and run 20 more miles through the snow-filled forests at night with no proper clothing? And why were some of them never found? Was this an accident? A crime? Something weirdly paranormal? This is the best podcast about this case, and the theories run the gamut. Highly recommended.