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Original poster

Can anyone help me find a very very scary book?

124 replies

Bishalisha · 23/08/2019 14:04

Hey! I’m struggling to find what I’m after. I am very fussy though

  • Id like to to be ‘can’t open my eyes in the night in case there’s a ghost/demon standing next to me’ kind of scary
  • set in current time period +\- 20 years
  • not sci fi, post apocalyptic or dystopian
  • easy to read
  • doesn’t involve violence or torture against children (I liked the sound of Naomi’s House until I read an Amazon review that said it was a bit much)

Thank you

OP posts:
Redannie118 · 23/08/2019 16:41

This reply has been withdrawn

The OP has privacy concerns, and so we've agreed to take this down now.

JAPAB · 23/08/2019 16:53

@multivac The Jaunt still gives me shivers!

Intellectually scary rather than creepy scary., but has to be one of the most intellectually horrifying ideas in a story I have ever read.

Much rather be stuck alone in the sewers with Pennywise any day of the week, than Jaunt..

As for Everything's Eventual, The Man In The Black Suit also gave me the creeps.

Aquamarine1029 · 23/08/2019 16:56

I really loved Intensity by Dean Koontz.

TheSultanofPingu · 23/08/2019 17:16

I found a book called 362 Belisle Street by Susie Moloney pretty unnerving.

HeyMonkey · 23/08/2019 17:32

Last days of Jack Sparks
The Ritual
Suicide Forest
House of Leaves
Reiko

I spend my life trying to find something to scare me but I'm pretty desensitised. I've done all Stephen King. Nothing scares me anymore Sad

I watched a few horror films recently that actually freaked me out, but I think I've exhausted novels!

ginyogarepeat · 23/08/2019 18:41

@BeyondMyWits - Desperation was my absolute favourite book in my late teens. Picked it up recently in a second hand bookshop but found it hadn't aged well, or I've changed too much.....struggled to finish it 20 years after I first loved it so much!

SmellMySmellbow · 23/08/2019 18:52

Not horror, but the most unnerving book I have read is Enduring Love by Ian McKewan. About a stalker. Really deeply uncomfortable.

MrsW85 · 23/08/2019 18:54

The ghosts of sleath by james herbert. I had to sleep with the light on for days

SymphonyofShadows · 23/08/2019 18:56

I read James Herbert’s Magic Cottage when we were staying on a farm in a holiday let in the middle of nowhere, that was a bit chilling.

There’s an old thread here in ‘adult fiction’ called Urban Myths or Urban Legends that messed me up for days too

BrunettesDoItBetter · 23/08/2019 19:00

I dont want to hijack the thread but can anyone give me a very scary film recommendation?
Me and dh have done all the obvious ones and many more besides.We like psychological horrors as well as traditional

dementedma · 23/08/2019 19:00

Ooh, was just coming on to say Magic Cottage by James Herbert. It seriously scared me so much I had to sit up with the lights on all night. It’s the one which always comes to mind when people ask for scary books

Original poster
Bishalisha · 23/08/2019 19:30

Trying to sort into a list in case anyone wants to copy:

  1. Pet semetary by Stephen king
  2. Marianne Dreams by Catherine Storr
  3. The Girl next door by Jack Ketchum
  4. Dean R Koontz (Winter Moon, Night Chills, Whispers, the Strangers
  5. James Herbert (Moon, Lair, The Dark)
  6. Stephen King - 1408
  7. Algernon Blackwood - The Empty House
  8. Michael McDowell - The Elementals
  9. Pig Island mo Hayder
10. Ash James herber 11. Geralds Game (Stephen King) 12. The Shining (Stephen King) 13. N by Stephen King 14. What Happens When You Wake Up in the Nightby Michael Marshall Smith 15. That Feeling, You Can Only Say What It Is in French by Stephen king 16. Intensity by Dean Koontz. 17. Last days of Jack Sparks 18. The Ritual 19. Suicide Forest 20. House of Leaves 21. Reiko

  1. Salem’s lot by Stephen king - ‘I wouldn't read it if I was in the house alone, or after dark’

  2. Doing harm- kelly Parsons ‘It's filled with a horrible, nagging dread and sense of impending doom’

  3. Stephen King (The Stand - even though it is post apocalyptic, Desperation - a scary book that is so good you can't put it down, yet so good you ALSO want to string out the reading of the last chapters...)

  4. Rosemary's Baby- ‘I couldn't sleep for ages after’

  5. The Girl next door by Jack Ketchum- ‘was gripping and horrifying, he also wrote Off Season which is gory, scary and horrible.’

  6. The Fog by James Herbert ‘So scary that I rang in sick rather than go out to work in the early morning fog. Or The Rats by James Herbert’

  7. Apartment 16 or The Ritual by Adam Neville ‘they left me very unsettled’

  8. Flesh and Blood by Graham Masterson ‘Ugh. Awful but great’

  9. Stephen King's short story collection ‘Skeleton Crew, has several absolutely chilling stories in it. Even thinking about them now makes me shiver.’

  10. Empty World by John Christopher ‘Still makes my flesh crawl when I think about it over 30 years since I read it.’

  11. Alias Grace ‘was horrific. On the face of it, it didn’t really have any horror, but I found it left America with a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach all the way through it.’

  12. Walkers and Prey by Graham Masterton ‘Some of his earlier horror stories have stayed with me for a long time now. come to mind.’

  13. Dark Matter by Michelle Paver ‘I had to draw the curtains without looking out of the window just in case there was something there. On the face of it, it is about a polar expedition and is a great story...’

  14. The Woman in Black by Susan Hill ‘I read it once and haven't dared read it again, left me terrified that I might see something in any room with the door open.’

  15. Heart shaped box by Joe Hill ‘i remember reading this on a bus at 10 in the morning with the summer sun streaming through the window and being so scared i wanted to crawl behind the seat.’

  16. Haunted by James Herbert. ‘Utterly terrifying gothic style ghost story. Relentlessly creepy and fantastic twist.’

  17. Amityville Horror ‘The most terrifying book i have ever read- and every person i know who read it agrees. I didnt sleep for weeks after reading’

  18. 362 Belisle Street by Susie Moloney ‘pretty unnerving.’

  19. Enduring Love by Ian McKewan. ‘About a stalker. Really deeply uncomfortable.’

  20. The ghosts of sleath by james herbert. ‘I had to sleep with the light on for days’

  21. Magic Cottage by James Herbert. ‘It seriously scared me so much I had to sit up with the lights on all night.’

OP posts:
Original poster
Bishalisha · 23/08/2019 19:31

I’m going to start with Doing Harm and Haunted I think

OP posts:
Absoluteunit · 23/08/2019 19:40

I was coming on to say Naomi's Room...

Duma Key
The Shining
Intensity

AnyFucker · 23/08/2019 19:51

.

SouthWestmom · 23/08/2019 19:54

The Girl on the Landing

SouthWestmom · 23/08/2019 19:54

Naomi's Room

SouthWestmom · 23/08/2019 19:56

Paul Torbay The Girl on the Landing synopsis:

Synopsis
The novel begins as Michael, a middle-aged man of means, is dressing for dinner at a friend's country house in Ireland. As he descends the grand staircase, he spots a small painting of a landing with an old linen press and the white marble statue of an angel. In the background is a woman clad in a dark green dress. During dinner, Michael comments on the painting to his hosts but they say there is no woman in the picture. When Michael goes up to bed later, he sees that they are correct. This is only the first in a series of incidents that lead Michael to question his grip on reality. His wife Elilzabeth is unsettled by the changes she sees in a man she originally married because he was dependable and steady, not because she loved him. Suddenly she is aware that she has never really known Michael and as he changes, she sees glimpses of someone she could fall in love with. Michael, in the meantime, is disturbed by events at his family's ancestral home in the wilds of Scotland and by a past that he is threatening to destroy everything, and everyone, he has ever loved.

Tidypidy · 23/08/2019 20:07

Either It or Under the Dome by Stephen King. When I was 7 I read Five go to Kirrin Island and it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up! (Might not have same effect on an adult though!)

joystir59 · 23/08/2019 20:09

IT by Stephen King. Dracula by Bram Stoker. The Devil Rides Out by DenisWheatley

joystir59 · 23/08/2019 20:10

The Turn Of The Screw by Henry James

HenSolo · 23/08/2019 20:16

@JAPAB I am a seasoned horror veteran and I have never ever read anything that scared me as much as The Jaunt. It’s the one that comes back to me on those late nights when I can’t sleep

Just wanted to say OP do try again with Stephen King - a lot of his newer stuff is rubbish but when he gets it right he reeeeaaally gets it right Grin. I would echo to check out the short story collections, the older ones. And IT, of course

MangoSpice · 23/08/2019 20:17

Anything by John Saul but choose carefully, he's not very friendly towards children. In one book they end up as nothing more than brains in jars!

Original poster
Bishalisha · 23/08/2019 20:18

How the hell did I miss The Jaunt off the list? Have added it to my notes now!

I will try Stephen King again, I don’t think Fingers Keepers was a reflection of his Horror as it was more crime!

OP posts:
Lwmommy · 23/08/2019 20:24

Just re read you list of things you don't want. DO NOT READ Girl next door, all about kids and horrible things happen!! Sorry, will read the OP more carefully next time!