What was the scariest book you've read and why??

[cearbhallain]

Originally Posted by jhempel24

I'll have to check out Legion, is the Exorcist book any better/worse than the movie? Was the movie based on the book? I really don't know, LOL.

I read the Exorcist years before I saw the movie. I was too young for both. I slept with the lights on for weeks after both as well. I haven't read it since, but I am willing to bet that you could get some chills out of it.

The Amityville Horror scared me pretty good too. I was also pretty young when I read that - when it came out. Stephen King's first book came out around the same time, and that scared me too.

[jhempel24]

Amityville was great, I read that a couple years ago. Im going to have to read the Exorcist.

One thing I find fascinating, is that we all remember reading, watching, etc. these things as kids. And its never really left us. You never really foeget your first time I guess.

.....being scared people, get your mind out of the gutter lol.

[hal2814]

"What to Expect When You're Expecting" easily wins in my book. We learned what an episiotomy was. The thought still gives me chills. We read that some kids don't sleep the entire night for up to 6 years. And the "entire night" only means 5 consecutive hours! And when we got to the part telling us my wife was likely to poop during the middle of child birth... scary stuff I tell you.

[jhempel24]

Lol. I remember that book!

[Xanthe]

Anne Rice's "The Witching Hour". There were some scenes in there that just totally creeped me out, and made me ask myself WTF I was doing reading that story alone in the house at 2AM.

[JSWolf]

The Dark Side by Jane Mayer

A dramatic and damning narrative account of how America has fought the "War on Terror" In the days immediately following September 11th, the most powerful people in the country were panic-stricken.

The radical decisions about how to combat terrorists and strengthen national security were made in a state of utter chaos and fear, but the key players, Vice President Dick Cheney and his powerful, secretive adviser David Addington, used the crisis to further a long held agenda to enhance Presidential powers to a degree never known in U.S. history, and obliterate Constitutional protections that define the very essence of the American experiment.

THE DARK SIDE is a dramatic, riveting, and definitive narrative account of how the United States made terrible decisions in the pursuit of terrorists around the world-- decisions that not only violated the Constitution to which White House officials took an oath to uphold, but also hampered the pursuit of Al Qaeda. In gripping detail, acclaimed New Yorker writer and bestselling author, Jane Mayer, relates the impact of these decisions - U.S.-held prisoners, some of them completely innocent, were subjected to treatment more reminiscent of the Spanish Inquisition than the twenty-first century.

THE DARK SIDE will chronicle real, specific cases, shown in real time against the larger tableau of what was happening in Washington, looking at the intelligence gained - or not - and the price paid. In some instances, torture worked. In many more, it led to false information, sometimes with devastating results. For instance, there is the stunning admission of one of the detainees, Sheikh Ibn al-Libi, that the confession he gave under duress - which provided a key piece of evidence buttressing congressional support of going to war against Iraq - was in fact fabricated, to make the torture stop.

In all cases, whatever the short term gains, there were incalculable losses in terms of moral standing, and our country's place in the world, and its sense of itself. THE DARK SIDE chronicles one of the most disturbing chapters in American history, one that will serve as the lasting legacy of the George W. Bush presidency.

I've not finished this book yet. When I get around to finally finishing it, I'll start over.

What makes this book one of the most scariest books out there is not that it is a horror novel. What makes it so scary is that it's true. It's one of the worst times in American history that has ended up screwing up the world. George W. Bush has done more harm to the world then the terrorists he went after.

[wvcherrybomb]

I've never read, or even watched, anything that scared me. I don't think I'm capable of being scared by anything that is not happening in my real life. I keep reading/watching horror and true crime, and although things disgust me, nothing scares me.

I absolutely can't stand Stephen King because he has a thing for making kids and animals the victims. Weirdo. Obviously, most people don't share my opinion judging by how rich and famous he is.

Anything involving aliens, zombies, monsters, or any other made up creatures just makes me say, "Oh, puulleeesse."

Don't get me wrong, I want to be scared by something. I just haven't found it yet.

[cearbhallain]

Originally Posted by wvcherrybomb

I absolutely can't stand Stephen King because he has a thing for making kids and animals the victims. Weirdo. Obviously, most people don't share my opinion judging by how rich and famous he is.

I agree with you here, but I will add that sometimes the kids are the heroes as well. The first time he tragically kills off a child it's shocking, when it's in every single book it's just lazy. I read his books in real time, as they came out, and I stopped at Pet Semitary.

[gmw]

Originally Posted by caleb72

... However, talking about scary, my sister could very effectively scare me. ...

You remind me that I had a cousin that used to tell me scary "true" tales when I was a kid. I don't know where he got them from ... the main one I remember was of some ancient building where the imprint of a squashed human body was on a stone block in the ceiling. Always looked forward to his visits.

[CazMar]

I can see lots of titles in these posts of good scary stories I have read - love a good creepy horror story! But I think the book that really gave me bad dreams was George Orwell's "1984". I think it was the fact that the scary people were real; I know deep down that there are no real vampires or ghosts, unfortunately there are real secret police and ruthless governments.
One thing that puts me off some horror stories is the amount of physical violence, I prefer the unseen horrors of H P Lovecraft to graphic descriptions of people being decapitated by crazed zombies or whatever.

[drofgnal]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

The Dark Side by Jane Mayer



I've not finished this book yet. When I get around to finally finishing it, I'll start over.

What makes this book one of the most scariest books out there is not that it is a horror novel. What makes it so scary is that it's true. It's one of the worst times in American history that has ended up screwing up the world. George W. Bush has done more harm to the world then the terrorists he went after.

+1!!!!!!!!!!

[CO'Neil]

Originally Posted by Rumpelteazer

For me it was a scene in The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson. The scene in the bedroom where the two women share a bed because some unkown thing was in the room.

Yeah, I agree that that was the scariest part of the book (movie, too). Overall, I thought the movie was actually scarier than the book, because it didn't spell out the alternate explanations for events, like steam pipes banging (which do indeed sound just like that one scene).

So, it's not Hill House, but at nine years old The Hound of the Baskervilles was the scariest, up until a few weeks later when I read Lovecraft's The Rats in the Walls, which still holds up as the more scary, but is only a short story.

[ApK]

Gerald's Game by Stephen King. No kids or animals in that one. I was reading certain disturbing scenes while in a near-deserted small airport in the middle of the night. The plane could not get there fast enough for me.

[RolandD]

Originally Posted by CO'Neil

Yeah, I agree that that was the scariest part of the book (movie, too). Overall, I thought the movie was actually scarier than the book, because it didn't spell out the alternate explanations for events, like steam pipes banging (which do indeed sound just like that one scene).

So, it's not Hill House, but at nine years old The Hound of the Baskervilles was the scariest, up until a few weeks later when I read Lovecraft's The Rats in the Walls, which still holds up as the more scary, but is only a short story.

Ooooh! Lovecraft's The Rats in the Walls is extremelllllly creepy.

[gmw]

Originally Posted by ApK

Gerald's Game by Stephen King. No kids or animals in that one. I was reading certain disturbing scenes while in a near-deserted small airport in the middle of the night. The plane could not get there fast enough for me.

Then you should also have had a copy of his short story "The Night Flier",

Spoiler:

the pilot he is following really is a vampire!

(It's in Nightmares and Dreamscapes).