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[malingenie]

It fucked me up more than anything I have ever read. Good universe, too.

 

[Escape Goat]

 

[Jokab]

Freaked the shit out of me.

 

[RepairmanJack]

I think I have to pick this up. Read a little of the wiki and it sounds very interesting. Is it a good book overall? Or is it just a good scary book? Just asking, I'm probably checking it out regardless.

 

[bengraven]

I need to read that soon. I read Horns a few months ago and adored it.

 

[Carcetti]

Thriller genre: Neuropath by R. Scott Bakker. Thought it was both scary and depressing.

 

[Slappers Only]

I think I have to pick this up. Read a little of the wiki and it sounds very interesting. Is it a good book overall? Or is it just a good scary book? Just asking, I'm probably checking it out regardless.

The author will tell you that it's a love story, and it holds up as such. But it's also unnerving on a primal level so long as you can -- and a lot of internet people struggle with this -- avoid perceiving the author's wordery as some kind of challenge to your own intellect. One of the central characters is kind of a douche, and he comes across appropriately.

It scared me when I read it years ago, and you could say that it's still scaring me these days.

 

[meyers5j]

I have to admit, I read Guts and it made me really queasy and dizzy afterwards.

Yeah same. Just thinking about Guts makes me a bit queasy. It's not scary, though, just disgusting.


Also, I will second House of Leaves and Heart-Shaped Box. They are both great books. House of Leaves is more disturbing than scary, but I still loved it.

 

[Edmond Dantès]

The Terror by Dan Simmons.

 

[magicstop]

I think I have to pick this up. Read a little of the wiki and it sounds very interesting. Is it a good book overall? Or is it just a good scary book? Just asking, I'm probably checking it out regardless.

No summary does this book any justice. It's fascinating on an intellectual, academic level, as it's got a LOT of meta narrative going on, huge emphasis on symbols (and thus it's called "a semiotician's love story"), complex interweaving of narratives creating an absolutely postmodern approach to the idea of authoring, etc.
But then it's got some truly disturbing and chilling story action going, some of which is very subtle and initially unapparent. In addition, the liberal handling of typography and the art with which Danielewski wields formatting and layouts creates its own horror and reinforces the insanity occurring in the book.
It's got a lot more than that going on for it as well, but it's truly a book that you should just go buy and begin. Really take your time with it, read deep, look things up, flip back to reference things, and just enjoy the process. It's rewarding.

 

[Zombie James]

you know what forget lovecraft, king, etc, just read this:

Free on the Kobo store, thanks!

 

[Dynamite Ringo Matsuri]

I think I have to pick this up. Read a little of the wiki and it sounds very interesting. Is it a good book overall? Or is it just a good scary book? Just asking, I'm probably checking it out regardless.

I read House of Leaves a few years back, so it's kind of hazy, but it's not an easy book to read by any means. If you do pick it up, try to find the hardcover, as it's the definitive version. The reason I say this is because the book is quite unlike any book out there. Without spoiling too much, its formatting is really trippy and schizophrenic to mirror the impossible spatial nature of the house it describes. The ending is a letdown since it ends with not a bang, but a whimper. But it's a worthwhile read as there is simply nothing else quite like it. Just be prepared for crazy appendices, scribbles in margins and tons and tons of metastories.

And I remember reading parts of Haunted while at Midway waiting for a flight to CA. Disgusting is right :l

 

[siaoliao]

No summary does this book any justice. It's fascinating on an intellectual, academic level, as it's got a LOT of meta narrative going on, huge emphasis on symbols (and thus it's called "a semiotician's love story"), complex interweaving of narratives creating an absolutely postmodern approach to the idea of authoring, etc.
But then it's got some truly disturbing and chilling story action going, some of which is very subtle and initially unapparent. In addition, the liberal handling of typography and the art with which Danielewski wields formatting and layouts creates its own horror and reinforces the insanity occurring in the book.
It's got a lot more than that going on for it as well, but it's truly a book that you should just go buy and begin. Really take your time with it, read deep, look things up, flip back to reference things, and just enjoy the process. It's rewarding.

As much as it can, I'd say this summary does justice, or at least says all that I would say about the book. I'm a sucker for meta narratives, though.

 

[RepairmanJack]

Yup going to pick up House of Leaves soon. The style alone sounds interesting enough to get it. Sort of reminds me of Raw Shark Texts with the typesetting and things like that, but that book was a piece of shit.

 

[Aske]

Ghoul - by Michael Slade

Parts of it are pretty feaky anyway.

This is a magnificent book. Pulpy cop thriller-mystery-horror with all the classic tropes, all wrapped around an intelligent and convoluted plot that climaxes into one of the most satisfying conclusions I've ever had the pleasure of reading.

I've not been a fan of Slade's recent novels, but Ghoul, Ripper, Cutthroat and to a lesser extent Headhunter are all fantastic. Ghoul is the best of the bunch though, and seeing this post makes me want to read it again.

 

[Slappers Only]

I read House of Leaves a few years back, so it's kind of hazy, but it's not an easy book to read by any means. If you do pick it up, try to find the hardcover, as it's the definitive version. The reason I say this is because the book is quite unlike any book out there. Without spoiling too much, its formatting is really trippy and schizophrenic to mirror the impossible spatial nature of the house it describes. The ending is a letdown since it ends with not a bang, but a whimper. But it's a worthwhile read as there is simply nothing else quite like it. Just be prepared for crazy appendices, scribbles in margins and tons and tons of metastories.

And I remember reading parts of Haunted while at Midway waiting for a flight to CA. Disgusting is right :l

It's only a whimper if you consider the physical last page of the book to be where the story actually ends. At any rate, you talk about an ending when recommending that someone check something out? You're spot on with your comments about formatting and such. It's a story that's mapped to utilize the analog properties of the medium like no other.

 

[Aske]

you know what forget lovecraft, king, etc, just read this:

I've never heard of this, and it sounds fantastic. Free on Feedbooks too (my go-to source of public domain ebooks, because they take great care with their formatting). Can't wait to check this out.

 

[LOCK]

Came to post this!

 

[Kyleripman]

you know what forget lovecraft, king, etc, just read this:

I've read "The Ghost Pirates" and "The Boats of the Glen-Carrig" by him. They were both excellent.

 

[lightless_shado]

I was waiting for this.

 

[rocksteady1983]

I've read "The Ghost Pirates" and "The Boats of the Glen-Carrig" by him. They were both excellent.

It seems alot of his books are free to download, I already got the house on the borderland downloaded to ibooks. Excited to give it a read. I've had an iphone for a long time and just now downloaded ibooks. Just never thought to check it out. They have a lot of the classics like Frankenstein and Bram Stokers Dracula all free to download. I guess they are public domain now?

 

[Anticitizen One]

HP lovecraft stories don't scare me at all. Frankly I find them rather boring

Rats in the walls for example was just a 20 page biography on some rich old dude and his cat named N-word man.

 

[The Lamonster]

Stephen King's "The Shining" is the only book that ever managed to give me the creeps.

Edit: And by creeps, I mean hesitant to open the bathtub curtain for about a week.

Came to post this book.

 

[Lord Error]

Is it really that intense? Seem's a bit extreme.

Guts is one of the very few written things that has made me physically sick while/after reading it. So yeah, I do not doubt the authenticity of that quote. I honestly think reading it will make you a bit worse person, because only thing you can take out of it, is some loss of faith in people.

 

[Imbarkus]

I believe this to be Stephen King's most frightening book:

Scared me, anyway.

EDIT: Twice beaten. Well at least there is some consensus.

 

[Machine]

The Shining was the most effective King book for me. Lovecraft is worth reading but I don't know that scary is the word I would use. I think some of the best horror tales I've read were the early Clive Barker short stores (Books of Blood).

 

[3N16MA]

When I was ten this book freaked me the fuck out, more then any other goosebumps book. The only one in the entire series that actually scared me.

Good choice but this was scarier.

I think they have a few books on him.

 

[AlberichMX]

Freaked the shit out of me.

Good option or anything else of Lovecraft or you can read Ithaqua of A. Derleth in a windy night!.

 

[The Technomancer]

Good choice but this was scarier.

http://i.imgur.com/UJTHd.jpg[IMG]

I think they have a few books on him.[/QUOTE]
Nah, the dummy never got me. The mask terrified me because of the scene where she tries to take it off and its attached to her face. That...powerlessness, feeling of being trapped inside it, more then anything else, got to me as a kid.

 

[googoomuck22]

The Exorcist

seriously man this book scared me silly

 

[depward]

House of Leaves isn't horrifying but it definitely has a big creepy factor.

 

[Jagxyz]

A pretty good thriller (not supernatural). There's also a movie on it, with John C. McGinley.

 

[partime]

Book is hard to understand, couldn't wrap my head around it

 

[Cymbal Head]

Freaked the shit out of me.

I haven't read a huge amount of Lovecraft, mostly just his shorter stories, but this is one I definitely remember freaking me out. I kind of want to read it again, now.

I also found "Pickman's Model" to be very memorable, if conventional.

 

[Tacitus_]

So many good stories.

The Lurking Fear is one of my favourite stories.

God knows how many there were - there must have been thousands. To see the stream of them in that faint intermittent lightning was shocking. When they had thinned out enough to be glimpsed as separate organisms, I saw that they were dwarfed, deformed hairy devils or apes-monstrous and diabolic caricatures of the monkey tribe. They were so hideously silent; there was hardly a squeal when one of the last stragglers turned with the skill of long practice to make a meal in accustomed fashion on a weaker companion. 0thers snapped up what it left and ate with slavering relish. Then, in spite of my daze of fright and disgust, my morbid curiosity triumphed; and as the last of the monstrosities oozed up alone from that nether world of unknown nightmare, I drew my automatic pistol and shot it under cover of the thunder.

Shrieking, slithering, torrential shadows of red viscous madness chasing one another through endless, ensanguined condors of purple fulgurous sky... formless phantasms and kaleidoscopic mutations of a ghoulish, remembered scene; forests of monstrous over-nourished oaks with serpent roots twisting and sucking unnamable juices from an earth verminous with millions of cannibal devils; mound-like tentacles groping from underground nuclei of polypous perversion... insane lightning over malignant ivied walls and demon arcades choked with fungous vegetation... Heaven be thanked for the instinct which led me unconscious to places where men dwell; to the peaceful village that slept under the calm stars of clearing skies.

 

[UrbanRats]

because its coming true

Click.

 

[besada]

I picked up Heart-Shaped Box and Horns on the recommendation of this thread. You better not be wrong.

 

[coldvein]

The Terror by Dan Simmons.

i already posted that, bromosexual.

 

[Deleted member 47027]

The Demonologist. Horrifying.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/0595246184/?tag=neogaf0e-20

Couldn't sleep at night for nearly a week when I read it. It's not a big deal as you read it, it's yknow, whatever, spooky enough.

Then you lie there and you think about it...and shit just goes wild in your brain.

 

[bengraven]

I picked up Heart-Shaped Box and Horns on the recommendation of this thread. You better not be wrong.

Just FYI, Horns isn't scary. It's badass and dark, but it's not scary. It's more of a twisted revenge story with a really well done but simple tragic love story at it's core.

I still recommend it completely though. As Neil Gaiman told Joe Hill on Twitter a few months ago that Horns is "perfect" with not a single "wasted word".

 

[LocoMrPollock]

I picked up Heart-Shaped Box and Horns on the recommendation of this thread. You better not be wrong.

Don't read Heart Shaped Box before bed. Put it in the freezer and read it only during daylight hours.

 

[Tralfamadore64]

I believe this to be Stephen King's most frightening book:

Scared me, anyway.

EDIT: Twice beaten. Well at least there is some consensus.

Me four. About a year ago this rekindled a long dormant love of Stephen King. He's had some serious misses, but neither this nor It are among them. This book really does have some unsettling moments.

 

[Imbarkus]

Me four. About a year ago this rekindled a long dormant love of Stephen King. He's had some serious misses, but neither this nor It are among them. This book really does have some unsettling moments.

Totally. The fire hose in the hallway springs to mind. I set the damned thing down and had to come back later. My wife described a similar experience she had reading the Shining alone in her college apartment. She went out onto the porch just so she could have signs of life in the world around her as she read.

I don't think King has ever topped it, in terms of pure scariness.

 

[Bread]

made me shit myself

Not even his scariest work, I couldn't sleep for weeks after reading Afterbirth.

 

[B_Rik_Schitthaus]

made me shit myself

Slicer was way more effecting.
'In a hazy cloud of blood-dumb pain, McGregor felt the blade work its way forwards, through the knot of his adam's apple and on towards the base of the chin. Then, slowly, it began to turn skywards. Och, no, he thought before the end, not ma brain... not ma brain... anything but ma brain...please don't slice ma brain... no, no... not the brain...och, no...'

 

[Discotheque]

Wait...did they actually release Garth Merenghi books?!

 

[Slayven]

Whats your tolerance? Are you looking for "boo" scary or do you want "oh my god how is it legal to write this" scary?

 

[Hilbert]

Whats your tolerance? Are you looking for "boo" scary or do you want "oh my god how is it legal to write this" scary?

Oh man, if we are going into the latter group, I have some suggestions....

 

[Slayven]

Oh man, if we are going into the latter group, I have some suggestions....

Lee? Ketchum?

 

[Hilbert]

Lee? Ketchum?

Lee and Carlton Mellick came to my mind first thing.