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ObamaPhone posted:Is Carrion Comfort better than Song of Kali?
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Aug 2, 2016 00:13
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Blood Meridian because it made me believe in the existence of satan
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Aug 4, 2016 16:03
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narrowing it down to one is hard. It also depends a lot on my mood at the time. But the stuff that jumps out from memory is the various stories Laird Barron has written in the Children of Old Leech world. Barron has flaws as a writer but his mix of noir and horror works really well here. A lot of his stories also play with the animal parts of our brain - a lot is written in this kind of dreamscape primitive man, before the advent of language, might have resided in in terms of their subjective existence. I don't really care for it, since it makes the narrative incoherent. In the Leech stories it's there but used much better, and is usually tied to actual events.
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Aug 9, 2016 06:36
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A human heart posted:The Very Hungry Caterpillar
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Aug 9, 2016 11:17
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These may not hold up for everyone, but Algernon Blackwood's "The Willows" and "The Wendigo." Fear isn't really the right word - more like a sense of dread and isolation that continues to grope your brain even after you're done reading. Definitely something that's never been replicated for me, and I read a ton of horror short stories and weird fiction.
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Aug 9, 2016 17:38
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Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark I read this in third or fourth grade and it hosed me up. It's not scary to me now, and I've certainly read horror books that are better by all appreciable measures in the intervening years, but that is the only book that ever made me lose sleep.
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Aug 9, 2016 19:18
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Ornamented Death posted:Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark Hey, I totally agree. The illustrations by Stephen Gammell is what made the books so scary. Guillermo del Toro is slated to bring Scary Stories to the big screen. If he can keep it true to its roots, especially the illustrations, it will be one hell of a creepy flick. ARTICLE: Guillermo del Toro's 'Scary Stories' Moves Forward With 'Lego Movie' Writers Dan and Kevin Hageman MeatwadIsGod posted:These may not hold up for everyone, but Algernon Blackwood's "The Willows" and "The Wendigo." Fear isn't really the right word - more like a sense of dread and isolation that continues to grope your brain even after you're done reading. Definitely something that's never been replicated for me, and I read a ton of horror short stories and weird fiction. Ironically, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark has a story called "The Wendigo" too. I like the folk tale it's based on and and will sure give the book you recommended a shot. ObamaPhone fucked around with this message at 00:45 on Aug 10, 2016 |
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Aug 9, 2016 21:33
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I can't wait for Del Toro's movie to be not made like every other project his name is attached to. Maybe he should use a nom-de-plume.
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Aug 10, 2016 11:14
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Inspector Gesicht posted:I can't wait for Del Toro's movie to be not made like every other project his name is attached to. Maybe he should use a nom-de-plume. I would have preferred him for The Hobbit films, that's for sure.
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Aug 10, 2016 16:52
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I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream by Harlan Ellison. The worst possible reality impeccably visualized in text. I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon by Philip K. Dick. Subconscious neurosis turns a man's happy memories into a personal hell as he dreams for 13 years. My Work Is Not Yet Done by Thomas Ligotti Hard to pick one of Ligottis. Favorite horror authors are like that.
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Aug 15, 2016 00:47
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Fiction. Blindsight, Peter Watts Terrifying on an existential level. It's sort of a more hard sci fi version of Rendezvous With Rama, with a precise focus on the mechanics of consciousness itself and the amount of garbage in our brains we assume we have control over. It takes a rather dim view of the utility of the self. This book hosed me up for months, possibly permanently. Watts is very impressed with some of his own creations and it drags the book down a bit -- I'm not a huge fan of the vampires but they at least serve a good purpose in the story. Just finished the sequel a week ago and I didn't think it was nearly as good, but I recommend Blindsight to people just because the territory it covers is so interesting and relatively unexplored. Oh, and here's the whole thing on the author's website. Creative commons licence. NmareBfly fucked around with this message at 18:14 on Aug 16, 2016 |
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Aug 16, 2016 18:08
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Horror is my wheelhouse, as I'm always in search of something that can bother me. Most of the time, I'm unsuccessful, but House of Leaves is a standout from the past few years. I'm reading through all of Laird Barron's work, as he's entertaining, if not terrifying. Stephen King is the master of course, and I'd recommend The Shining, IT, and Pet Semetery.
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Aug 17, 2016 20:18
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Talmonis posted:Horror is my wheelhouse, as I'm always in search of something that can bother me. Most of the time, I'm unsuccessful, but House of Leaves is a standout from the past few years. My favorite book by Stephen King, ironically, is On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft. Half memoir, half how-to guide, and 100% nonfiction. ObamaPhone fucked around with this message at 02:51 on Aug 20, 2016 |
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Aug 20, 2016 01:34
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ObamaPhone posted:My favorite book by Stephen King, ironically, is On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft. i don't even think that much of stephen king's writing and i still thought this was good. i love writers writing about writing. all kinds of writing. i'm a lawyer, and i really started to think about it after starting to work in a government agency where most of my time i spend poring over applications written into us by law/big accounting firm partners on well over $1m/year. most of them write atrociously. the accountants tend to be worse. one application i read had 22 initialisms and acronyms in the first 12 pages, and every time you came back to it you'd have to reread the first few pages to refresh yourself. but i digress. as i say, sometimes writers i don't think that good have good insights on writing. charles stross writing about the similarities he saw between cosmic horror and cold war fear of nuclear oblivion was cool. dan simmons writing about what he found horrifying in the foreword to carrion comfort was also cool, and i find him terribly variable. how to write is cool and interesting and learning it will probably help you in all but the most menial of jobs.
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Aug 20, 2016 08:35
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NmareBfly posted:Fiction. Blindsight, Peter Watts blindsight is the only piece of sci-fi media i can think of that has truly alien aliens and i love it for that reason. you also touched on the part i thought made the story weaker which was the whole vampire stuff - though i know why he put it in there i think the story would have been stronger if it had been a bit more straightforward with the crew and earth stuff.
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Aug 20, 2016 13:53
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Neurosis posted:i don't even think that much of stephen king's writing and i still thought this was good. i love writers writing about writing. all kinds of writing. i'm a lawyer, and i really started to think about it after starting to work in a government agency where most of my time i spend poring over applications written into us by law/big accounting firm partners on well over $1m/year. most of them write atrociously. the accountants tend to be worse. one application i read had 22 initialisms and acronyms in the first 12 pages, and every time you came back to it you'd have to reread the first few pages to refresh yourself. I'm not much of a fan of Stephen King's fiction either, but that's probably because I have seen almost all of his movie adaptations countless times. H.P. Lovecraft wrote an excellent essay called Supernatural Horror in Literature that I prefer to At the Mountains of Madness, which is all I have read from HPL so far. Here it is online: http://www.hplovecraft.com/writings/texts/essays/shil.aspx ObamaPhone fucked around with this message at 18:17 on Aug 20, 2016 |
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Aug 20, 2016 18:11
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For my money Lovecraft's best story is "The Colour out of Space" because its alien is also truly alien. "The Case of Charles Dexter Ward" is a close second.
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Aug 21, 2016 01:26
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If you are a kid Empty World by John Christopher is pretty traumatic. Imagine living in a world where your family, everyone you know and virtually everyone in the world dies of a disease that ages you to 100 in the space of a couple of days. Kid siblings on the verge of death looking through the face that is ancient and wizened, knowing that it is going to die..... Then imagine being totally alone.....  I still have my copy somewhere. I don't know if I can face re-reading it. Man, marketing that to kids was really something.
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Aug 21, 2016 09:50
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The Clive Barker story Pig Blood Blues terrified me, especially since my parents have a farm with large pigs.
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Aug 21, 2016 20:49
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Robert McCammon's Mine touched a real raw nerve with me.
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Aug 21, 2016 23:36
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Ever read Cows by Michael Stokoe? I find Stokoe extremely troubling because I genuinely believe him to be truly disturbed and he would probably be dangerous if he wasn't getting wasted at home and writing the foulest books known to man. He's the type of author that seems to be typing with one hand, half railing against, and half getting off to the brutality and perversity of what he's writing. I'd recommend High Life or The Empty Mile first, but Cows is straight up the Scrotie McBoogerballs of literature. So unrelentingly hosed up from start to finish.
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Aug 22, 2016 13:14
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Groovelord Neato posted:blindsight is the only piece of sci-fi media i can think of that has truly alien aliens and i love it for that reason. you also touched on the part i thought made the story weaker which was the whole vampire stuff - though i know why he put it in there i think the story would have been stronger if it had been a bit more straightforward with the crew and earth stuff. Lem's Solaris is good for really alien aliens. Just a great sci fi novel in general. Also, Mievielle's Embassytown. Though the one problem with this one is that the very end the aliens are suddenly much less alien and it kind of deflated the story. It's a great celebration of the metaphor though.
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Aug 23, 2016 14:21
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Just finished Pet Sematary and it was not so much creepy because I have already seen the movie, but very well written and entertaining. It's much better than the movie, especially the end, which included a lot of great stuff that was cut from the film. Next up, I will read The Shining, which I read is different from the movie adaptation too. I never liked the Stanley Kubrick directed picture even though I'm a huge fan of Jack Nicholson.
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Aug 25, 2016 15:26
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Yeah, for me Pet Sematary was the scariest, it just felt pitch black. I also read Song of Kali on a recommendation from a similar thread. I didn't like it much, it just made me somewhat depressed rather than scared (having a small baby myself at the time). I can recommend M.R. James' ghost stories, available for free at project Gutenberg. They're not the scariest ever, but highly enjoyable. Perfect for dark autumn evenings, best enjoyed sitting in a leather armchair with a cup of warm cocoa.
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Sep 14, 2016 08:55
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ObamaPhone posted:I see Penpal by Dathan Auerbach show up a lot on my Amazon page. I read the NoSleep posts it started as. It's okay I guess but I wouldn't spend money on it.
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Sep 14, 2016 22:28
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Oh precious katana posted:I also read Song of Kali on a recommendation from a similar thread. I didn't like it much, it just made me somewhat depressed rather than scared (having a small baby myself at the time). It has a really good premise, which involves the dark secrets of Calcutta being revealed to an intellectual traveler, but Simmons' overall story fell flat. At best, Song of Kali could have been like the film The Serpent and the Rainbow, which is very effective at portraying the horrors of Haiti to a visiting American scientist who is on a quest to find a zombie drug.
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Sep 15, 2016 15:59
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Yeah, the real flaw of that book is that it's written by Simmons. But I'm not a fan of his "horror" in general, it mostly falls flat and boring - the exception being The Terror but as always with him, you just know so much more could've been done with those Inuit legends.
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Sep 15, 2016 17:20
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As with most Dan Simmonds books, you could cut The Terror down by 50% without losing anything from the plot.
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Sep 15, 2016 21:42
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The Damned Thing - Ambrose Bierce The Horror of the Heights - Arthur Conan Doyle Benito Cereno - Herman Melville First two are classic horror short stories that I thought were pretty creepy. If you like them you can get whole collections of classic horror authors if you have a Kindle, Nook, etc... The third doesn't fall in the horror genre per se but it is an extremely tense story.
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Sep 15, 2016 23:32
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The Conspiracy Against the Human Race by Thomas Ligotti. He's pretty famed for his fiction but this is probably the scariest thing he's ever written as it's a rather compelling non fiction book that argues, rather persuasively, that consciousness is an insurmountable horror for humanity and it would have been better had we never experienced it. The central premise is that Life is Not OK and having read it, it's sort of hard to disagree if you're of a certain mindset. Probably not the thing to read if you've ever harboured suicidal thoughts.
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Sep 17, 2016 21:39
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ObamaPhone posted:Next up, I will read The Shining, which I read is different from the movie adaptation too. Anyway, the scariest book I ever read is Bruce Coville's Book Of Nightmares: Tales To Make You Scream:  Specifically, the story "The Fat Man" by Joe R. Lansdale literally gave 8-year-old me nightmares, so mission accomplished, Mr. Coville!
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Sep 18, 2016 02:45
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Ddraig posted:The Conspiracy Against the Human Race by Thomas Ligotti. This. Also, recently finished A Head Full of Ghosts and it totally triggered old fears of losing my mind.
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Sep 18, 2016 05:12
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Juaguocio posted:The Shining is one of the very few cases where I think the film is better than the book. Kubrick made the right decision to remove a lot of the really obvious supernatural stuff and focus on the characters' relationships. I remember Bruce Coville. One of my favorite authors as a kid was Daniel Cohen. He wrote some great supernatural nonfiction for young audiences.
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Sep 19, 2016 02:50
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Oh precious katana posted:I can recommend M.R. James' ghost stories, available for free at project Gutenberg. They're not the scariest ever, but highly enjoyable. Perfect for dark autumn evenings, best enjoyed sitting in a leather armchair with a cup of warm cocoa. Definitely this, they are such cosy reading.
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Sep 19, 2016 15:58
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Lil Mama Im Sorry posted:Also, recently finished A Head Full of Ghosts and it totally triggered old fears of losing my mind. Came here to post this, scariest thing I've read in a long time.
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Sep 19, 2016 19:13
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The Shining, specifically the woman in the bathtub scene.
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Sep 20, 2016 20:59
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Juaguocio posted:Anyway, the scariest book I ever read is Bruce Coville's Book Of Nightmares: Tales To Make You Scream: "Pee-pie."
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Sep 20, 2016 21:35
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Oxxidation posted:"Pee-pie." You swore on a dead cat!
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Sep 21, 2016 02:20
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I'm reading Heart Shaped Box by Joe Hill. It seems pretty solid so far, but it's funny how much it recalls his old man's work. Specifically the aging rock star protagonist and the use of several repeating mantras/phrases. Still, it's starting stronger than anything King has written in awhile. I was hoping for something legitimately scary but it seems like it might be something I enjoy more for its decent character work- which is how I feel about a lot of King. Anybody in here read it?
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Sep 21, 2016 02:25
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JackBobby posted:I'm reading Heart Shaped Box by Joe Hill. It seems pretty solid so far, but it's funny how much it recalls his old man's work. Specifically the aging rock star protagonist and the use of several repeating mantras/phrases. Still, it's starting stronger than anything King has written in awhile. I was hoping for something legitimately scary but it seems like it might be something I enjoy more for its decent character work- which is how I feel about a lot of King. Anybody in here read it? I have not read Heart Shaped Box yet, but if Horns is any indication of the rest of Joe Hill's work, I will never read it. Horns was really, REALLY, boring. Joe Hill has been tremendously helped by his pops in terms of "how to market your books." The mystery of how to make your book a NYT bestseller has been solved for Joe Hill, right out of the gate. poo poo, he even looks like a carbon copy of his old man: 
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Sep 21, 2016 02:39
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