What book traumatized you as a kid?

[Apache]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

I shall have to give this one some thought. Nothing jumps out at me. But perhaps I've just forgotten a horror.

That is what I was thinking too.
Apache

[drofgnal]

The only one I remember that raised my eyebrow as a kid was "The Five Chinese Brothers".

[gmw]

I suspect this is not what the OP was looking for, but...

I had not read Ian Fleming's Casino Royale since my mid-teens, I think, but when we watched the 2008 James Bond movie a particular scene was instantly recognisable (all the men in the audience cross their legs and cringe). I figure that qualifies as lasting trauma. Wikipedia tells me some of the scene was omitted from the movie released in Britain, Germany, U.S. and China - lucky people.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by drofgnal

The only one I remember that raised my eyebrow as a kid was "The Five Chinese Brothers".

Hah! I loved that and I don’t think it bothered me at all. I was obviously a cold-hearted little thing.

[doubleshuffle]

Originally Posted by drofgnal

The only one I remember that raised my eyebrow as a kid was "The Five Chinese Brothers".

Originally Posted by issybird

Hah! I loved that and I don’t think it bothered me at all. I was obviously a cold-hearted little thing.

Had to google that one. Seems a bit harsh on the poor boy who drowned, but Wikipedia quotes one Selma G. Lanes, who wrote about the book: "I cannot remember a tale during my childhood that gave me a cozier sense of all being right with the world." So it seems the drowned boy was just a minor issue (at least to girls)

[doubleshuffle]

Originally Posted by gmw

I suspect this is not what the OP was looking for, but...

I had not read Ian Fleming's Casino Royale since my mid-teens, I think, but when we watched the 2008 James Bond movie a particular scene was instantly recognisable (all the men in the audience cross their legs and cringe). I figure that qualifies as lasting trauma. Wikipedia tells me some of the scene was omitted from the movie released in Britain, Germany, U.S. and China - lucky people.

Why, this absolutely hits the spot...

[issybird]

Originally Posted by doubleshuffle

Had to google that one. Seems a bit harsh on the poor boy who drowned, but Wikipedia quotes one Selma G. Lanes, who wrote about the book: "I cannot remember a tale during my childhood that gave me a cozier sense of all being right with the world." So it seems the drowned boy was just a minor issue (at least to girls)

There was the distinct sense that he deserved his fate, heightened by the Kurt Weise illustrations. The first brother held back the sea as long as he possibly could.

[Catlady]

Hans Christian Andersen was terrible, even in my early picture books with the stories prettified. The one that most traumatized me, though, was "The Fir Tree"; I related to that more than to the stories of children, maybe because those old-timey children weren't real to me, but a Christmas tree sure was. The story horrified me and still does.

Reading Black Beauty was also traumatic--again, even in a child's picture book version. When I read the full story some years later, I was retraumatized; some scenes are still in my head all this time later.

[ekbell]

Originally Posted by Catlady

Reading Black Beauty was also traumatic--again, even in a child's picture book version. When I read the full story some years later, I was retraumatized; some scenes are still in my head all this time later.

Black Beauty was intended to be at least somewhat traumatic as it was written to convince hard-headed adults to treat horses better not to be a children's book.

I remember reading a number of books by the author of Watership Down (slightly disturbing) as a kid and The Plague Dogs stands out as a thoroughly disturbing example of this sort of book.

The book that most disturbed me, however, was a book of Canadian Folklore which contained a section on urban legends.

[JSWolf]

I don't have a book that traumatized me and no movie either. Horror stories never bothered me.

[4691mls]

When I was about 12 I read a book of short horror stories - I think they were written for young/teenage readers so they probably were not that scary by adult standards, but I learned then and there that the horror genre was not for me! I get stressed out enough by everyday life - don't need to add unnecessary scares.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by 4691mls

When I was about 12 I read a book of short horror stories - I think they were written for young/teenage readers so they probably were not that scary by adult standards, but I learned then and there that the horror genre was not for me! I get stressed out enough by everyday life - don't need to add unnecessary scares.

When I was little, I had one rule about horror/monster movies. As long as the monster didn't fit under my bed, it was A-OK.

[hobnail]

I wouldn't say that it traumatized me but it sure scared the heck out of me: The Exorcist by Blatty. I couldn't stop until I finished it which was about 3 AM.

[uels]

I remember reading Stephen King's The Stand when I was 11, maybe 12 years old. Not a particularly scary book but can be quite disturbing especially to someone so young.

There is a part where a character does something with a gun to another character that made me disgusted.

[gmw]

I don't remember reading much real horror as a child, but one of my cousins did, and on their relatively rare visits he would sit his younger cousin (me) down and recite stories with body-shaped bloodstains on blocks of masonry in the ceiling and a myriad other gory details. I remember finding the tales vaguely fascinating, but that's about all.