Scariest story you've ever read? (suggestions)

If you intentionally sought out horror fans to tell them you think their genre is lame, then I'm not surprised anyone got offended. Anyway, on to scary stories, admitting it's all subjective and people can have completely different reactions, maybe try Sineater by Elizabeth Massie.

To answer the original question, the scariest book I ever read was "The Amityville Horror." Now admittedly, it may be because I was around 13 years old when I read it, but the vivid pictures that book painted in my head kept me up more than one night.

'The Conqueror Worm' by Stephen R. Donaldson?

Yikes.

kobold said:

'The Conqueror Worm' by Stephen R. Donaldson?

Yikes.

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'The Conqueror Worm' by Poe didn't exactly suck either. Although that was a poem, not a story.

I haven't really been scared by anything I've read since I was a child and even then it was rare for me.

It may have had something to do with reading an unabridged version of Grimm's Fairy tales, complete with gory water colour illustrations at the age of about seven or eight. Most films don't scare me either, although the really good ones startle or keep me in suspense.

That said, the last story I found scary was when I was around 12 or 13 and ironically it was by Stephen King - a short story called The Bogeyman. And I was not a kid who'd ever been afraid of creatures lurking under the bed or in partially opened closets...

I don't think any book ever really scared me (except Pet Sematary, but not because of the horror elements), but I found The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson to be really unsettling. It's short and pretty subtle. No gore, no obvious monsters, but the writing is so atmospheric it drew me right in, even though it was a bright sunny morning when I read it.

asroc said:

I found The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson to be really unsettling. . .

. . .even though it was a bright sunny morning when I read it.

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I also found it unsettling (to put it mildly) when I read it on a sunny morning. I think she was that good. . .

The pounding like cannonfire in the corridor. . .

Yikes.

Thirding The Haunting of Hill House.

I'd also recommend Jack Ketchum's novellas Right to Life and Weed Season. Warning--he's not for the faint of heart .

Also, John Connolly's The Killing Kind. Great, well-written horror.

What King books did you read? They're not all scary but The Shining deeply scared me as a youth as did Pet Semetery and a few others.

I recently embarked on the same endeavour as you, because I hadn't been genuinely scared by a story in many years. I did a bunch of research into the scariest books ever and ended up reading a bunch. These were my top two scariest:

Hell House by Richard Matheson. Was a scary book and a good read, it creeped me out but by no means did it make me hide under the covers, have nightmares or anything so extreme. I don't know if I'll ever experience that again.

Phantoms by Dean Koontz. Again, more unsettling and disturbing than actually terrifying. Still, was more unsettling than most books I've read and did a great job of building up a suspenseful atmosphere.

I also noted Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson frequently in my research, I just haven't read it yet. It's next on the list. The other that I saw frequently that was pointed out in this thread is I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream by Ellis.

The interesting thing for me is that books blow movies out of the water as far as horror goes. I have way higher hopes of reading a scary story than watching one. I think it's because horror writer's know what makes the genre scary - character, build-up, real organic tension and deeper psychological themes. Not just gore porn.

Arcadia Divine said:

What is the scariest story you ever read? I ask because I want to read a story that actually kind of scares me but I want to know from your point of view what story scared you the most. I don't care about length. As long as it scared the hell out of you.

I'll say right now that I find Stephen King's books to be rather lame so I wouldn't bother suggesting anything by him. What stories I actually read of HP Lovecraft didn't scare me at all either (can't remember which ones though). I just found them to be imaginative.

I find Horror in general to be kind of lame because of all the crap I've been through and am now actually used to considering most of it still happens. If enough people inquire about my reasons for thinking Horror is a lame genre, I'm more than happy to explain my reasons but I won't if it'll offend more people than I feel it's worth. Trust me, people have gotten offended before.

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Gee, I wonder why people have been offended?

Quite frankly, I don't care why you think horror is a lame genre. I love it, and your opinion of the genre means pretty much nothing to me.

I'll admit, I'm easily scared - especially suspenseful horror. Hitchcock scares the pants off of me.

I'll agree with the poster above who said Dean Koontz's "Phantoms" was scary.
Stephen King's "IT" had me afraid to go near any sink or drain - especially after dark.

I never found Lovecraft scary, more just disturbing.

"The Haunting of Hill House" is so much creepier and more unnerving than either of the movies made from it. *shudder*

Arcadia Divine said:

I will be honest and say I don't know why people were offended. Unless I'm told by the people that I've offended, all I can do is guess.

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The answer's pretty clear, if you'd think about it, AD. You came into the horror forum, a place where people who write in the horror genre hang out, and you called our genre lame. Not once but twice. Nonetheless, a number of people tried to answer your question despite that. But we're done now.