Really scary books please.

[ohyouBadBadkitten]

Pretty much housebound in the short term and last time I asked for book recommendations you lot were fab!

Just finishing up the Shining. read it yonks ago and it is still v. good. So something like that please but not too high brow. Thanks :)

Scuse typoes - you've astonished me too much for coherent thought!

Thats him, only its sexytime with Polly Chalmers (Dickensian name if ever I heard one) in Needful Things. Will seek it out and give you page number, possibly tommorrow. It is a woeful sex scene, made worse because one of her loafers sails off her feet and lands in the kitchen as he is 'swinging' her. Such is the ecstasy.

Polly - not Sally! Doh!

If you can remember if it's beginning, middle or end I will go and scan it now - I can't remember any swinging. :)

Well, how about that then? I found it within 30 seconds of picking up the book. So he catches a falling glass quickly; she gets amazingly turned on by watching him catch said glass; he picks her up and rocks her on his arm and she finds Heaven in about 3 swings. Blimey. I'm exhausted!

I have to say I don't think I have ever, ever read anybody who is 'good' re sex. King is bad and I prefer it when he doesn't go there - then again, I prefer it when any writer leaves me at the bedroom door. I'm not interested in reading about sex: I'd rather have it later and meanwhile read about something else!

I think you're right that King has said that re female characters but I disagree - I think he creates some great female characters who are very fully realised: Beverley (?) in 'It' and Susannah in The Dark Tower for example.

It is an odd scene but I certainly don't see it as rape.

I think, 'The Dark Tower' is his finest work ever. It even beats 'The Stand' for me, nowadays.

I think any man writing about a girl's first period would want a female viewpoint on it before trying to write it, unless they were spectacularly arrogant.

The Shepherd by Ethan Cross, still makes me shudder to think about it

Don't remember noticing much sex in King as a teen tbh - but that scene in 'The Fog' clearly stood out because I've not read that since I was about 14 and I still remembered the shear thing. Ugh.

King would be delighted (and v amused) at the idea of him being for, 'Proper Writing.' :)

I never really got into JH - read about three and couldn't like them. Plot, shock and horror and no characters (King's biggest strenght when at his best).

Anyway - must go to bed! I hope we haven't killed the thread with our hijack.

Sorry Kitten. :)

Richard Montanari is pretty good and has a half decent back catalogue. More crime then horror but his murders are pretty gristly.

I've only ever read one James Herbert book that I cannot for the life of me remember the name of but the basic crux was weird mutant creatures being kept to make fetish porn? And yet it started off like any other crime novel.

That's the badger beertricks. hours of my life I'll never get back.

Can I offer "The Terror" by Dan Simmons (apart from the last 100 or so pages), and 'The girl who loved Tom Gordon" by King...

...and also ask aficionados of short horror and ghost stories if they have ever come across one story in a collection of short stories (I think they were ghost/horror, but I'm not sure) that featured a walk up One Tree Hill in SE London, and a change in time from present to past (with accompanying weirdness) as the walker moved up the hill? I live near the spot, read the story in the library one day, and could Never Find The Book Again*. woooo-ooooo, cue spooky music.

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*It's probably been transferred to Catford library.

Mmmmm. I'm a big fan of Neil Gaiman's stuff, so I suspect I'd have remembered/noticed if it was one of his.
I'll go check out Michael Marshall Smith, though. Thanks for the tip!

The House of Lost Souls by F G Cottam.

It's a really good story and terrified me but I couldn't put it down. It's frightening in a psychological way which is much more disturbing imo than gory stuff which doesn't appeal to me.

I know it's technically sci-fi, but I thought Peter Hamilton's REality dysfunction trilogy was pretty scary in places. Think it's actually described as sci-fi/horror.

I was recommended "Come Closer" by Sarah Gran by another Mumsnetter on a similar thread. It's not keep-you-up-at-night scary, but it's a great read - a sort of thoughtful horror story.

(I reviewed it here if you'd like to see what I made of it.)

Now re: The House of Lost Souls by F G Cottam - is it you I've talked to about this before? I hated it and thought it was really silly, cliched (can't do accent thingie) and completely unscary but if it wasn't you, somebody else on MN found it terrifying too. I was disappointed, as I thought it seemed a perfect book for me on picking it up. It reminded me of 'The haunting Of Hill House' which I also really hated.