Scariest Book You've Read

**Milossarian sez:

**

To this day, I try to explain to Mrs. C. that this is the absolute most horrifying thing I have ever read. The way the story is told, and the idea behind it make for instant gooseflesh. The last line of the story was possibly the best possible ending. I can’t think of a better one!
This, if done properly, could make one of the most scary movies ever. All they would have to do is keep it from getting campy.

Oooh! I just thought of another one in the Stephen King collection! The Long Walk. THAT one was scary.

For those of you who are not familiar with it, here’s the premise.

There is a government contest in which 100 boys, early teens all IIRC, line up in a single row. At the sound of the pistol, they start walking. And they walk. They must maintain a speed of at least 4 miles per hour. If they slow, they get a warning. A second warning. If they continue to lag behind the pace…they are shot dead.

The last one walking gets the Grand Prize.

A horrible, awful story, and I absolutely love it.

I agree with a lot of the above – I’m a big Lovecraft and King fan. But…

One of the scariest stories I’ve read is Alan E. Nourse’s “The Bladerunner”, because I could see this happening. Nourse was a doctor who wrote science fiction novels, mostly “space opera” types. But Bladerunner was different (Ridley Scott liked the title so much he used it for his adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?”. If you look close at the end credits you can see his acknowledgment to Nourse).

The premise: In the future there are too many people with conditions like hemophilia. In an earlier age they would die of their conditions, but medical science is now keeping them alive. Result: too many people with unwanted conditions. Natural selection isn’t weeding them out. They threaten to overrun the medical services. The chilling solution: a form of eugenics. Anyone can come into a hospital for free treatment. But the price is sterilization. An black market in medical services develops. Clandestine medical suppliers are called “bladerunners”.

Scary nough. But the real threat s a disease that strikes that looks like a common cold in its earliest stages. No ne wants to go for treatment for a cold if the price is sterilization. So it spreads like the bubonic plague and becomes a major problem, especially to a society that doesn’t want to acknowledge it or change the rules.

There’s a lot more to it than that, but the concept seemed so logical and plausible that it scares me in a deep philosophical (rather than a look-over-you-shopulder) kind of way.

It is probably the overall scariest for me. Some others I have been totally creeped out on are:

Pet Sematary

Julia - by Peter Straub. Story is about a woman who keeps seeing this little girl who looks like her daughter (who, if I am remembering correctly, is dead). Little girl, who isn’t necessarily still of this world, turns out to be not all sugar and spice. Anyone who reads this will never look at baby birds and bicycle wheels without thinking of the horrible little monster in this story.

The Other - by Thomas Tryon. A boy and his twin brother alternately charm and terrorize their family and the residents of the small town in which they live. It’s not until the end of the book that you will realize that something weird has been going on with these two boys the whole time - great surprise twist.

The Dark Secret of Harvest Home - also by Thomas Tryon. Family moves to idyllic small Connecticut town. They slowly realize the town harbors some kind of dark secret, but the wife and daughter don’t find too much problem with that, since the benefits outweigh the cost. The husband can’t let it alone, though, and the town makes sure he will never have the opportunity to tell any outsiders their little secret.

Interesting note about Thomas Tryon’s books: I think most or all of them are based in CT; he disguises the names of the towns but not their geography, so if you are familiar with the area you can easily figure out where he is talking about. The Other is supposed to be either Willimantic or Wethersfield (can’t remember which), and Harvest Home is supposed to be the Ledyard/North Stonington area. I grew up around there, so this made the story even more creepy for me.

He’s mostly thought of as a science fiction writer, but his Fevre Dream, a novel about vampires on a Mississippi steamboat in the 19th century, is sublime, exquisite, and the scariest thing I’ve ever read.

See also Nightflyers, about a haunted spaceship, complete with mysterious captain seen only by hologram and passengers being gruesomely picked off one after another. ::hair stands up on the back of Myron’s neck::

Forget about the movie, though. It sucked.

Include me in on the S. King bandwagon for fiction. It, Salem’s Lot and the short story The Jaunt.

The Jaunt scared the beejeezus out of me. That poor kid!

When I was 11 I read The Excorsist. I couldn’t sleep for a month and kept imagining I was levitating off the bed.

Non-fiction: Buried Dreams. This is the story of John Wayne Gacy the serial killer. I couldn’t finish it.

missbunny - I grew up in that area also. I never knew that “The Other” was set there. No wonder I found it creepy. I haven’t read the other one yet. I’ll have to track it down.

Ohh, ohh, thought of another one!

The Girl in the Swing by Richard Adams. Yeah, he of Watership Down, with the bunnies.

Without giving too much away, it’s the story of a guy who finds his true love and a whole lot more than he bargained for… suffice it to say that the above mention of Julia reminded me of it.

Sssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!

Don’t give away the store, AuntiePam! If the Teeming Millions were to acquire copies of the above title, plus its brother and sister volumes, H.R.F. Keating’s CRIME AND MYSTERY: THE 100 BEST BOOKS and James Cawthorn/Michael Moorcock’s FANTASY: THE 100 BEST BOOKS, it would spell the end of some of the most entertaining threads in this forum!

My picks: Kingsley’s Amis’s THE GREEN MAN is an effectively eerie novel; the protagonist is an alcoholic innkeeper and modern-day satyr (a strongly realistic portait) who comes into nasty contact with the Other World.

Algernon Blackwood’s “The Willows” and Robert Chambers’s “The Yellow Sign” were two stories that were particular favorites of Lovecraft…both strong on spooky (VERY spooky) atmosphere.

Joe R. Lansdale’s tale “The Night They Missed the Horror Show” is frequently anthologized, and gives you some nice visceral shocks…just in case the above suggestions are too pantywaist for you.

And, not that tomndebb needs any backup, but Lewis’s IT CAN’T HAPPEN HERE is an inspired recommendation. If you want to repeatedly feel the sensation of your heart sinking in your chest, this is the novel for you.

Aftermath, by Levar Burton (Geordi LaForge!) is the most frightening book I’ve read recently. Not because it’s scary. The level of ineptitude is what scares me. It’s written so badly, I can almost believe he wrote it himself.

Actually, that’s not really true. I couldn’t bring myself to read it. I took it to work and abandoned it. Now my boss is reading it. He’ll probably like it.

Trip (don’t) Fall

Milossarian

Skeleton Crew had some freakin’ scary stuff in it!

My vote for the absolute scariest was The Raft. I’m a grown woman and to this day I still get completely creeped out on any kind of slatted wooden dock. {{shivver}}.

The Mist was pretty scary, too.

BigJoe, the Clive Barker book you’re thinking of is Weaveworld. I don’t know what to say about your taste in books though – I thought that book absolutely sucked. :slight_smile:

I guess I’m the only one that likes to scare herself with True Crime books. Reading about serial killers and murderers is scarier to me than fiction.

When I read the story of the Night Stalker I kept getting up and making sure all the doors and windows were locked. Of course I read it when my husband was out of town so every little noise I heard scared the crap out of me.

Dracula, no contest.

That book holds up amazingly well. I recommend it highly to anyone who has not yet had the terror…I mean pleasure…of reading it.

My candidate for all-time scariest book is Carrion Comfort, by Dan Simmons. The plot concerns three elderly people who have the power to control other peoples’ minds at a distance, and for decades they have been playing a ghoulish game of oneupmanship by causing wars and assassinations using unwitting human pawns. The game gets out of control and the last third of the book is absolutely bloodcurdling.

I would also recommend Anno Dracula, by Kim Newman. It’s an alternate history story in which Dracula kills Van Helsing and rules as Prince Consort with a vampirized Queen Victoria. The book isn’t scary, but it’s a top-notch horror novel which cleverly imagines a vampirized London where eminent Victorians, both historical and fictional, rub shoulders.
As far as Stephen King’s works, nothing tops “The Mist”, a novella published in his short story collection, Skeleton Crew. It concerns a small Maine town where something has gone wrong with a mysterious government project, unleashing a mist containing carnivorous Lovecraftian horrors.

I realized I forgot two extremely frightening books: 1984 and The Handmaid’s Tale.

:: shiver ::

All these posts, and nobody has mentioned Thomas
Harris? The Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal.
I can read Stephen King and fall asleep, but
Harris keeps me awake nights.

I do love Misery and The Long Walk (which always
makes me think of the Powerball Lottery).

Scariest books? Let’s see…off the top of my head:

“The Hot Zone” by Richard Preston
“In Cold Blood” by Truman Capote
“In The Heart Of The Sea” by Philbrick (?)
“Isaac’s Storm” by ?
“Death Of Innocents” by ? (Devastating and heartbreaking
account of an alleged SIDS case)
“The Perfect Storm” by Sebastian Junger

As you can probably tell, “scary” fiction simply doesn’t do it for me.

Rhythmdvl – if you like “descent into madness” stories like Crime and Punishment, you might like Toplin by the late Michael McDowell. Straub and duMaurier (as mentioned earlier) have done nice jobs with this theme too.

Toplin is only available in a limited from Scream Press, but Hellnotes has a copy in its sale bin. Illustrations by Harry Morris, who was maybe influenced by J. K. Potter.

And Uke, I didn’t know about the crime and fantasy books. Thanks!

I’ve read most of Stephen King, some James Herbert, “The Silence of the Lambs”, Edgar Allen Poe, “Omen” etc etc. None of these scared me (I think I’m just sick and twisted!). The grossest scene in a book I can remember was in Herbert’s “The Rats” in the cinema when a rat is eating through a guy’s stomach while he’s just sitting there!! I can’t even think of films that have scared me - I tend to laugh - except “Candyman”; it was ages before I could look in a mirror again!

I’ve read most of Stephen King, some James Herbert, “The Silence of the Lambs”, Edgar Allen Poe, “Omen” etc etc. None of these scared me (I think I’m just sick and twisted!). The grossest scene in a book I can remember was in Herbert’s “The Rats” in the cinema when a rat is eating through a guy’s stomach while he’s just sitting there!! I can’t even think of films that have scared me - I tend to laugh - except “Candyman”; it was ages before I could look in a mirror again!