The movie that comes to mind is Ursula LeGuin’s “Lathe of Heaven”. This is where the protaganist’s dreams come true.
If he dreams about something…it becomes a reality. It’s a real mind-bender.
I have to add this on. I screwed up. This was a novel before it was a movie. Sorry, didn’t mean to muddy the water
A book called “Farie Tale” by Raymond Fiest. Most horror books don’t really scare me, but this one got the better of me. Fiest really knows how to use dread in his story telling.
The Little Engine That Could. Boy, a talking train with motor problems! Shivers me jeepers!
I started watching horror movies when I was five, was reading horror fiction by the time I was twelve.
The Amityville Horror rattled my cage pretty good. I read the entire book in a single evening. Couldn’t put it down.
I think the all time freakiest book I’ve read was the Illuminatus trilogy. I borrowed it from my then BF, it was a single bound volume. I read the first two books in about a week, then laid the trilogy aside.It was another full week before I screwed up the nerve to read the third. I was afraid that either it would prove anti-climactic and dissapointing, or that I would be so blown away by it that it would cause me irreversible psychological damage.
Not exactly horror, but, whew.
Horror fiction is consists of two kinds: Things that could happen (King’s Misery and the Hannibal trilogy being the best examples) and things that couldn’t happen (a lot of other ones).
IMHO< the best combination of the two is Ira Levin’s Rosemary’s Baby. It just seems so real. I’ve written an annotated version of it, and I keep finding new things.
Thomas Harris, “Silence of the Lambs”.
I read the book before I saw the movie
and it was scaryer.
Try these:
Hannibal by Thomas Harris
The Case of Charles Dexter Ward by H.P. Lovecraft
Conjure Wife by Fritz Leiber I think the final line of Chapter 14 will lift you right out of your seat.
Any of Michael Slade’s books about the RCMP: Headhunter, Ghoul, Cutthroat, Ripper, Evil Eye and Primal Scream.
I second the motion for Clive Barker’s Books of Blood
Although I have not read all of his books, I find you can rarely go wrong with Ramsey Campbell if you want shudders.
yeah that one DOES feel real. The people in the book seem like people you could meet. And all of Rosemary’s reactions feel like the way an average person’s…so dead on.
Zoggie! Get your butt over to the Guess the Book thread, okay? We’re running out of Ira Levin titles.
Did you ever finish Stinger? How’d you like it? Up for more McCammon?
Someone said that movies made from books were never good. I have to disagree. The movie Fight Club was made from a book, and I found it more enjoyable than the book. (It’s not scary, but still worth seeing.)
As far as scary books go, there is a fairly new book out called My Favorite Horror Story. It is a collection of short horror stories chosen by horror authors. There are some great ones in there.
afireinside – here’s the link to a recent thread discussing that book. It’s one of the better collections published lately, I agree.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=46178
Have you read “The Chair”? Shudder. My Laz-Y-Boy doesn’t feel quite the same since.
I’ll second the votes for Lovecraft. Start with Charles Dexter Ward first. It’s his most accessible. Try the Dunwich Horror next or The Haunter in the Dark.
My reccomendation would be for anything by Kathe Koja. The most disturbing one is called Scars (I think).
Enjoy,
LabRat
AuntiePam- Do you mean the last story in the book? I really enjoyed that one. Loved the ending. “The Animal Fair” was also great.
IT, by Stephen King, was the first book I read that out-and-out scared the holy living crap out of me. I’m with Ankh-Too on the fear of cleaning drains - King also wrote a short story about a man who one day finds an index finger poking up out of his drain and pointing at him one day - which doesn’t help a whole lot with that. He also tapped into the whole collective soul fear of clowns.
Wow…someone actually commanded me to do something. Damnit, I call sexual harassment on that, though! ::looks around, and then rubs butt:: Hmph. 
Um…not quite…:o
Lovecraft is a horror god. Herbert West: Reanimator is just plain wrong. It’s also pretty short and quite accessible for people who have never read Lovecraft.
For guys who think they have seen or read it all, may I recommend something slightly different. Ian Banks, ‘Walking on Glass’. Some guidance follows, but no spoilers.
It’s a very strange novel with three separate story threads, like a literary layer cake. The first 3 chapters kick off three (seemingly) unrelated stories, then chapter 4 picks up where chapter 1 left off to continue that story, and so on. I’m referring here to story 1, so if you want to save time you can read Ch 1 and every third chapter after that (and bypass the other two story threads altogether).
This first story starts off as a fairly routine boy meets girl tale. But the way it unfolds… well, all I will say is that I think it constitutes the ultimate nightmare for any male reader, and Banks has depicted the whole thing with a deliciously literary savagery. I have recommended this book to many male friends, and all have agreed that the moment when Banks reveals his grand design is very powerful, very sickening, and unforgettable. I’ve read a lot of supposedly scary stuff, but this, for me, is the most sickening and scary of all - all the more so for being firmly rooted in reality and real possibility. What happens to the guy in the story could very easily happen to you.
As far as Iain Banks goes, the maggot scene in The Wasp Factory was pretty bad.
And a second vote for Hanibal. The ending just creeped me out big time.
I started to read one of Iain Banks’ books (I think it was A Song Of Winter or something like that) and found his writing style a little boring. Are all of his books like this?