Help me scare my sister!

November 29, 2011 11:16 AM

I need a scary book for my sister.... who usually doesnt read such things. I read the other horror threads but none of them are quite right....

So my sister predominately reads chick-lit. We always joke that unless the cover is pink, she won't read it. HOWEVER, I just made her read Summer of Night by Dan Simmons and she loved it. Now she's asking me for more "scary books like that" for Christmas. For those of you who haven't read it, basically there's a bunch of young boys on summer vacation and something evil is stalking their little town (similar to It by Stephen King, or maybe Something Wicked This Way Comes by Bradbury, but REALLY scary and frantic.)

So I guess what I"m looking for are books with real scares in them (not just creepy or suspenseful) that aren't overly cerebral (no House of Leaves-esque stuff, please). But I'd also prefer to avoid real schlocky stuff a la Koontz or Bentley Little. A fast, smart read with scary monsters in it, I guess! Also, it needs to be fairly modern (last 20 years or so).

I read a ton of horror but find very little of it scary, per se. Summer of Night, however, literally made me afraid to walk home alone at night. Pet Sematary also freaked me out when I first read it a million years ago. What else can I scare her with?

posted by silverstatue to Media & Arts (31 answers total)

Anything and everything by Richard Matheson. Start here.
posted by jbickers at 11:22 AM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]

Well, A Winter Haunting is the sequel to Summer of Night and Children of the Night is about one of the main characters from Summer of Night.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 11:22 AM on November 29, 2011

Pet Sematary.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 11:54 AM on November 29, 2011

Peter Straub's Ghost Story might work. Its well written and very scary.
posted by rtimmel at 11:57 AM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]

Oh, and if she considers herself a fan of Simmons, Carrion Comfort is one of his best, and scariest.
posted by rtimmel at 12:00 PM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]

Heart-Shaped Box and other stuff by Joe Hill (who is Stephen King's son, btw) probably fits the bill, and is very recent. Peter Straub is also a good fit, imo.
posted by Tubalcain at 12:01 PM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Thanks for the suggestions so far but I don't think she'd be interested in Matheson or Straub (she'd think it was "too old"). I can't get her any Dan Simmons because that's what she's buying me for Christmas!

I read Heart Shaped Box, but didn't find it scary... l I"m pretty jaded when it comes to this stuff. I've read so much of it!

Please keep them coming!
posted by silverstatue at 12:16 PM on November 29, 2011

The two books that have scared me the silliest, and immunized me from any of the recent craze for vampires:

Bram Stoker's Dracula.

Stephen King's Salem's Lot.
posted by bearwife at 12:17 PM on November 29, 2011

She might like Brian Keene. He's written some great scary books, I'm fond of "The Conqueror Worm".
posted by machinecraig at 12:18 PM on November 29, 2011

I really liked Elizabeth Kostova's The Historian.

I like horror, but like you I am not often really scared by it. The only book that has left me sitting in the corner of my bedroom with the lights on at 3:00AM (so I could see all the doors and the windows and nothing could get in without me knowing) is Stephen King's The Shining. If she wants more recent stuff, King has some short story collections come out recently that are very good. Everything's Eventual, for example, and Just After Sunset.
posted by zoetrope at 12:24 PM on November 29, 2011 [2 favorites]

Best question ever. I love horror but it's so hard to find horror books that aren't about boring vampires these days.

If she loved Dan Simmons, has she read his other book, The Terror? It's a really long book, but it's so good, you just tear through it.

Also, the '70s and '80s seem to have been the heyday of trashy horror novels (some of them quite scary). Check out some thrift stores, they usually have some for super cheap.
posted by Jess the Mess at 12:48 PM on November 29, 2011

Whoops, sorry, didn't see the comment about no more Dan Simmons.
posted by Jess the Mess at 12:49 PM on November 29, 2011

Poe's Children is a terrific book of modern horror short stories, edited by Peter Straub.

Thomas Ligotti's My Work Is Not Yet Done. It's just a novella, but it's very well done, and it's not as pointedly cerebral as his other stuff.

Stephen King's The Shining.

I'm currently reading Pet Sematary, and it's pretty...awesome. I'd never really explored King's novels before, but I'm on a streak now.
posted by Sticherbeast at 1:15 PM on November 29, 2011

Response by poster: I have literally read and/or own every single book recommended here... EXCEPT for Brian Keene. So I will definitely check his stuff out. Anything by Stephen King, Straub, and other "masters" are already in our family library.

Sorry guys... I know this is a tricky one but please keep trying! (And Sticherbeast, Pet Sematary is responsible for my life-long fear of cats!)
posted by silverstatue at 1:24 PM on November 29, 2011

More modern = more zombies. Infected and Contagious by Scott Sigler might fit the bill, with Infected beignghte more straight up scary of the two. The Strain Trilogy by Guillermo Del Toro might also work, but they didn't really do anything for me. World War Z is a brilliant book, but not a quick scare.
posted by rtimmel at 1:24 PM on November 29, 2011

I don't know if this would be up your sister's alley, but Roland Topor's The Tenant is quite something.
posted by Sticherbeast at 1:29 PM on November 29, 2011

How do you feel about comics/manga? About the only thing that's really stuck with me as scary for the last several years is the work of Junji Ito, particularly Uzumaki and Gyo. It's pretty heavy body horror usually involving some aspect of the past coming back to destroy the present.
posted by Tubalcain at 1:32 PM on November 29, 2011

Junji Ito is made of magic and delight. Check out The Mystery of Amigara Fault.
posted by Sticherbeast at 1:35 PM on November 29, 2011

Best answer: You might want to check out this discussion on Goodreads.

One reportedly very frightening book not yet mentioned is Naomi's Room by Jonathan Aycliffe.
posted by bearwife at 1:39 PM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]

I second the Strain Trilogy, although the quality declines sharply as the books go on. The first one, though, had some fantastic tense moments, and went into some really interesting details about the anatomy of vampires in that world (one of the main characters works for the CDC, and the vampire "outbreak" is initially investigated by them).
posted by sarahsynonymous at 1:44 PM on November 29, 2011

I loved loved loved The Devil All The Time. No monsters but lots of serial killin' and animal sacrifices!
posted by jabes at 2:08 PM on November 29, 2011

The Descent isn't really horror; it's more of a thriller, I guess, but it scared me silly, or at least the first half did. It's difficult to categorize but I would totally recommend it.
posted by mygothlaundry at 5:31 PM on November 29, 2011

The Red Tree by Caitlin Kiernan. It had me eyeing big trees sideways for weeks. Ignore the frightful cover art.

Too bad she needs more modern work, since The Haunting of Hill House is a masterpiece. Come Closer by Sara Gran was good, but short.
posted by Addlepated at 5:45 PM on November 29, 2011

Like your sister, I'm not usually one for horror novels; however, I did enjoy Monster Island by David Wellington. It's a zombie novel that came out in 2006, it's scary, and personally I found the characters to be more 3-dimensional than in what I would typically think of as a horror novel. At any rate, it was pretty fast-paced and engaging - and it's the first book of a trilogy, so if she turns out to enjoy it, you've got at least 2 more gifts you could give her!
posted by DingoMutt at 6:09 PM on November 29, 2011

A few scary-ish books that I liked which aren't Stephen King, Heart-Shaped Box or House of Leaves (which are some of my scariest books):

The Ruins by Scott Smith

Boy's Life by Robert McCammon - maybe not super scary, but some scary parts and I've heard other books by this author are scary as well.

A Secret History by Donna Tartt (may be more of a mystery/thriller)

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson (older, so maybe not)

Also, it's been AGES since I've read her so I can't really remember, but have you checked out Kelly Link?
posted by triggerfinger at 6:13 PM on November 29, 2011 [1 favorite]

Best answer: This is a little different than what you asked for (you specifically didn't want "creepy") but I'm going to say it anyway. Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger, author of "The Time Traveler's Wife." If she likes chick-lit, this starts out relatively light and about the relationship of young twin sisters, and gets progressively darker and more disturbing.
posted by chickenmagazine at 6:26 PM on November 29, 2011

Hellboy comics? They're scary, the art is awesome, and there's a bunch to choose from. I think the books with short, standalone stories are the best intro.
posted by Nibbly Fang at 11:25 PM on November 29, 2011

Communion scared the hell out of me.

It's supposed to be a true story (with poligraph and hypnosis transcripts etc) of the life of the author and his continuous encounters with Aliens.

You can understand how scary this book is only by reading it.
posted by madeinitaly at 12:26 AM on November 30, 2011

Susan Hills' The Woman in Black is a classic. Her later books The Man in the Picture and The Small Hand are also meant to be very good.
posted by permafrost at 4:05 AM on November 30, 2011

my friend the writer of scary books seconds the Shirley Jackson recommendation; his full comment was "it's obviously Shirley Jackson's THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE followed by her WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE followed by her collection of short stories under the most-famous title THE LOTTERY . . . (THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE is the only book that's ever scared me, other than Douglas Preston's non-fiction THE HOT ZONE . . .)
posted by diodotos at 12:13 PM on November 30, 2011

Response by poster: Ok, I went with Her Fearful Symmetry, because it seemed to bridge the gap between chick-lit stuff and horror. So, sounds good for her. But lots of good suggestions here for the future. Thanks everyone!
posted by silverstatue at 6:15 AM on December 5, 2011