# Books that traumatized you as a child **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 24, 2009, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200 "2009-02-24T15:42:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![GoodOmens](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d26b3c/32.png) [@GoodOmens](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GoodOmens)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/41 "2009-02-24T19:47:51Z")
I had a book of spooky stories when I was 8 or so. Most didn’t phase me at all, but there was one about a little kid who liked to bounce a red rubber ball on his basement steps, and the ball took on a mind of its own and bounced away so the kid chased it into the dark corner and died or something and after that his parents always heard the ball bouncing on the steps. I don’t remember it very well, I was 8. But I remember laying in bed, unable to sleep, hearing that ball bounce. And my house didn’t even have a basement. ---
**Author:** ![Time\_Like\_Tears](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/df705f/32.png) [@Time\_Like\_Tears](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Time_Like_Tears)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/42 "2009-02-24T20:02:42Z")
[Miss Hickory](http://www.amazon.com/Miss-Hickory-Carolyn-Sherwin-Bailey/dp/014030956X). I was maybe 4 years old when I read this one, and it freaked me right out at the end, when poor Miss Hickory went through all that trouble only to have her head eaten by a squirrel. ---
**Author:** ![carlotta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/898d66/32.png) [@carlotta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carlotta)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/43 "2009-02-24T20:13:16Z")
Oh come one, nobody else was traumatized by _Bridge to Terebithia_? My mom had read about this book and thought it would be so great for me because it had a character who was a girl from Washington DC who moved to rural Virginia, just like we were about to do (we really were moving from DC to rural VA and I was horribly resentful) It was a great book for me because things turned out SO WELL for that girl. It’ll be a cold day in hell before I hand one of my kids anything that won the frickin Newberry Medal. And I still wished we’d never moved from DC. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/44 "2009-02-24T20:19:40Z")
> [@fiddlesticks](#): > > I had a big hardcover Richard Scarry collection that I loved…except for one particular page which was a true-to-life but larger-than-life drawing of insects in a grassy field. One of the bugs was a dragonfly, a kind with black spots on its wings that sorta give the impression of eyes. For whatever reason, it was the scariest thing EVER! It was like looking at pure evil. Thankfully dragonflies were a rare backyard visitor in my neck of the woods or it would have been even more traumatic for me. Heh, I loved Richard Scarry too … and so does my kid. BUT The thing that always bothered me was the fact that a family of cats had, for some reason, a worm living with them. Named “Lowly Worm”. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![The\_Devil\_s\_Grandmother](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/74df32/32.png) [@The\_Devil\_s\_Grandmother](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Devil_s_Grandmother)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/45 "2009-02-24T20:34:55Z")
I don’t remember which book in particular it was, but when my friends and I went thought a phase of reading scary books (about 10-13 years old) I became permanently frightened of mirrors. Bad things come out of mirrors, especially in the dark. I can’t have any in my bedroom, and would really rather not have any in the house. Needless to say, staying in hotels is always a little troublesome. ---
**Author:** ![Waffle\_Decider](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/77aa72/32.png) [@Waffle\_Decider](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Waffle_Decider)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/46 "2009-02-24T20:45:17Z")
I don’t know what book it was, but I remembered reading a vivid description of an Inca human sacrifice ritual when I was little. I was quite disturbed, to say the least. ---
**Author:** ![Arglefraster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3bc359/32.png) [@Arglefraster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arglefraster)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/47 "2009-02-24T20:52:36Z")
The Little Prince, when I was maybe 8 or so? I absolutely loved the cartoon on Nicalodeon, and my mom bought me the book. The cartoon was pretty light and fun, and I was expecting more of the same from the book. That book broke my heart, it did. Great book, though. ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/48 "2009-02-24T20:52:58Z")
I was the kind of kid who grooved on the scary stuff, so if I found a book that disturbed me, I’d check it out of the library twenty more times. However… [My Mama Says There Aren’t Any Zombies, Ghosts, Vampires, Creatures, Demons, Monsters, Fiends, Goblins, or Things](http://www.amazon.com/Zombies-Ghosts-Vampires-Demons-Monsters/dp/0689712049/ref=sr_1_36?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1235507737&sr=8-36) by Judith Viorst, was another matter. Not so much the text as the illustrations by Kay Chorao. _shudder_ It was like drawings of my nightmares. As far as scary reading, probably the most disturbing was [A Candle In Her Room](http://www.amazon.com/Candle-Her-Room-Knight-Books/dp/0340253398/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1235508439&sr=1-1), by Ruth Arthur. The title is so forgettable, it took me forever to find this book again as an adult. It’s about an evil doll, but the part that upset me most was a dream the little girl had about a kitten on a hot stove. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/49 "2009-02-24T20:53:45Z")
> [@Jimmy\_Joe\_Meager](#): > > \*Hi, Fella \*by Era Zistel? > > In addition to it being about a lost, hungry puppy, it had a scene of a wild bobcat caught in a leg trap and trying to chew off its own leg. Seriously. And this was a Scholastic book club choice. > > Fortunately the puppy found a home. Can’t recall the outcome for the bobcat. Thanks for the tip, but I don’t think so. I just read about it on Amazon. The dog in the book I (barely) remember was fullgrown and no bobcat made an appearance. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/50 "2009-02-24T21:00:21Z")
On the topic of nasty things happening to sympathetic animals - how could i forget the great grand-daddy of them all (which my dad read to me as a kid) Wild Animals I Have Known by Earnest Thompson Seaton? > **[Wild Animals I Have Known (Yesterday's Classics): Ernest Thompson Seton:...](https://www.amazon.com/Wild-Animals-Known-Yesterdays-Classics/dp/1599151812)** > > Buy Wild Animals I Have Known (Yesterday's Classics) on Amazon.com ✓ FREE SHIPPING on qualified orders _All_ of his animal heros die. Horribly and traumatically. This was a quite deliberate choice on his part, which he explains in the introduction. He’s a great writer, and the power of his writing makes the inevitable tragedy so much harder to bear. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/51 "2009-02-24T21:13:12Z")
I’ve always liked scary books, and started reading things like Stephen King just as soon as I transitioned to reading adult novels at age ten. None of those scary books really tramatized me. BUT one of the classic for-kids books mentioned in this thread, **Where the Red Fern Grows** , devestated me. We read it for class in the fifth grade. Fifth grade was the year that we finally moved out of apartments for good in favor of a house with our own yard, so I was able to get my long-promised puppy. So, when I started reading this book and the main character gets puppies too, I was easily able to identify with the character. And then his puppies grow up (not that they get very old) and die horribly. :😭: The stray dog book mentioned upthread, could it be one of the **Jessie** books by Christine Pullein-Thompson? Jessie is homeless through most of Please Save Jessie. That series was pretty brutal considering they were meant for kids under the age of 12. **The Devil’s Grandmother,** I don’t know if it was a book or something in a movie or show, but I can’t look at mirrors either when I’ve been frightened by _anything_ - even when the source of the fight isn’t remotely mirror related! ---
**Author:** ![lizardling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f4b2a3/32.png) [@lizardling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lizardling)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/52 "2009-02-24T21:17:13Z")
\*The Dark Half \*by Stephen King. Gave me the \*\*complete screaming meemies \*\*about birth, and to this day the very thought just… makes me twitch. A lot. A book of old folktales about ghosts and other things that go bump in the night. There was an illo of a Black Dog on a road with great glowing eyes that freaked tiny little me out. So I made my parents give away the book since I didn’t want it in the same house I was in. Hmm. I had a thing about human dolls even from a very young age, but reading _The Dollhouse Murders_ by Betty Ren Wright didn’t help. There was another book about dolls whose name I can’t recall. But it involved a lonely girl and larger dolls that lived behind the attic wall or somesuch. She had a friendly uncle that came by from time to time (she was being raised by cold aunties). The dolls were the ancestors who used to live in the house, and they were much nicer to her than the aunties. All very gothic. The ending horrified me, I’ll say that much. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![badbadrubberpiggy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/57b2e6/32.png) [@badbadrubberpiggy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/badbadrubberpiggy)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/53 "2009-02-24T21:19:42Z")
> [@mariposalabrown](#): > > _Wait Till Helen Comes_ made me never want to go to the country or swim in a lake. _Bunnicula_ made me absolutely petrified of rabbits when I was little. \*Wait Till Helen Comes \*scared the crap out of me when I first read it, but then it also compelled me to read it over and over again, so I guess I was a weird kid. On the other hand, I loved _Bunnicula_ and all the books in that series. It made me want a vampire bunny who sucked the juice out of vegetables. ---
**Author:** ![WOOKINPANUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wookinpanub/32/132_2.png) [@WOOKINPANUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WOOKINPANUB)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/54 "2009-02-24T21:26:35Z")
I mentioned this in another thread awhile back. I had a book of short horror stories that I’d ordered through my elementary school when I was eight or so and a few that stand out are the one about the girl with the ribbon around her neck and when her new husband untied it her head fell off:eek: . In another one, I can’t remember very many details but it involved the main character who was home alone and kept hearing a screeeeeeech sound and at some point in the end it was revealed to be the sound of an axe being sharpened. The creepiest though was about a girl who buys a jigsaw puzzle at a thrift shot and as she puts it together the picture is revealed to be of her sitting in her own room with the last piece revealing a horrible face peering in her window \. For really soul sucking disturbing I’d have to go with Shel Silverstein’s “The GivingTree.” Oh how that book sends me into a funk. ---
**Author:** ![badbadrubberpiggy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/57b2e6/32.png) [@badbadrubberpiggy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/badbadrubberpiggy)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/55 "2009-02-24T21:27:18Z")
> [@lizardling](#): > > There was another book about dolls whose name I can’t recall. But it involved a lonely girl and larger dolls that lived behind the attic wall or somesuch. She had a friendly uncle that came by from time to time (she was being raised by cold aunties). The dolls were the ancestors who used to live in the house, and they were much nicer to her than the aunties. All very gothic. The ending horrified me, I’ll say that much. :eek: I think I might remember this, but I can’t quite place it - did the little girl break her leg and end up bedridden for most of the book? Or am I thinking of something totally different? Stephen King’s _Pet Semetary_ scared me quite a bit, too. I picked up a bunch of his books when I was like 11 at a flea market, and I think that was the one that really got me the most. That cat was CREEPY. ---
**Author:** ![TheMerchandise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b487fb/32.png) [@TheMerchandise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheMerchandise)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/56 "2009-02-24T21:28:40Z")
> [@elfkin477](#): > > BUT one of the classic for-kids books mentioned in this thread, **Where the Red Fern Grows** , devestated me. We read it for class in the fifth grade. I read this in my fifth grade class too. But the thing was, I had already read it before and knew how it ended. So I spent the entire time we read it in agony, because I knew the ending was going to make me cry in front of all my classmates. Traumatizing for a shy kid like me. ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/57 "2009-02-24T23:11:49Z")
> [@badbadrubberpiggy](#): > > I think I might remember this, but I can’t quite place it - did the little girl break her leg and end up bedridden for most of the book? Or am I thinking of something totally different? > > Stephen King’s _Pet Semetary_ scared me quite a bit, too. I picked up a bunch of his books when I was like 11 at a flea market, and I think that was the one that really got me the most. That cat was CREEPY. I KNOW I remember the dolls one… did the little girl start out as kind of a bitch? Something Attic, maybe. ETA - oh, and in seventh grade I read _The Shining_ and I still can’t go into a bathroom without opening the shower curtain before I lock myself in. ---
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/58 "2009-02-24T23:31:55Z")
> [@Zsofia](#): > > I KNOW I remember the dolls one… did the little girl start out as kind of a bitch? Something Attic, maybe. Is it [Behind the Attic Wall?](http://www.amazon.com/Behind-Attic-Wall-Camelot-Books/dp/0380698439/ref=pd_bbs_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1235518270&sr=8-2) ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2009, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/59 "2009-02-24T23:44:32Z")
> [@lizardling](#): > > There was another book about dolls whose name I can’t recall. But it involved a lonely girl and larger dolls that lived behind the attic wall or somesuch. She had a friendly uncle that came by from time to time (she was being raised by cold aunties). The dolls were the ancestors who used to live in the house, and they were much nicer to her than the aunties. All very gothic. The ending horrified me, I’ll say that much. :eek: Behind The Attic Wall. Frickin’ loved that book, but yeah, creepy. At the end, the uncle dies and she hears the voice of a third doll in the attic, presumably the uncle in doll form. We never see him, though; she accidentally burns the place down first. ETA: Durn you, **Shirley**! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![wunderkammer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/ed8c4c/32.png) [@wunderkammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wunderkammer)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2009, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200/60 "2009-02-25T00:03:56Z")
> [@WOOKINPANUB](#): > > …The creepiest though was about a girl who buys a jigsaw puzzle at a thrift shot and as she puts it together the picture is revealed to be of her sitting in her own room with the last piece revealing a horrible face peering in her window \. This reminds me of “Don’t Look Behind You”, which was in an old Hitchcock anthology I snuck out of my grandpa’s office. You know, the one where the criminal narrator talks about making a bet, forging the pages of that very story, binding them into a copy of the anthology, etc… (And he really can’t say what he’ll do next. He might decide to put it in a grocery store, or a bookstore, or a newsstand, and then he’ll have to follow you heaven knows where, and you should definitely not look behind you!) The impact of that one was lessened by the fact that the book had been on Grandpa’s shelf _forever_. What kind of murder would hang around for that long without my nosy grandma catching him? The most disturbing reaction to a book that I ever had was when I was reading _The Giver_. I was ten, and my youngest brother was only two or three days old, and when I read the infanticide scene I felt almost physically ill. Books don’t often do that to me. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-that-traumatized-you-as-a-child/487200.md?page=4)