Another book that truly frightened me – even though I was an adult when I read it – was Salem’s Lot. Vampires hovering outside windows at night asking to be let in, and so on. But I agree about The Shining, especially certain scenes. Wasn’t there one involving a bathtub?
In Cold Blood scared the crap out of me. I think it traumatized me. To this day, when I’m sleeping alone at my house or my lake house, I can get really freaked out by noises. That’s the main reason I have a dog, lol. He seems to be able to tell the difference between normal house sounds and actual people.
When I was a teenager, I tried reading Daphne du Maurier’s Jamaica Inn, after reading Rebecca and liking it. A chapter or two in, I became so scared by the book that I had to abandon it. (It even disturbed me to look at the innocuous cover!) I persuaded my mom to read it and tell me what the all dreadful gloomy foreboding had been about.
I remember reading Jamaica Inn but I cannot remember anything about the story except that I was creeped out. Was there a shrunken head in there somewhere??? Seriously…was there?
I don’t know, musicamusica. I never did read Jamaica Inn! My mom told me it was about wreckers – people who cause shipwrecks in order to steal the cargo.
When I mentioned the disturbing scariness of the book in a post on another website, somebody responded, “Oh goody, it sounds like a book for me!”
Read it once in high school and once in college. Never could appreciate Heart of Darkness.
… the horror
Have most people read only Heart of Darkness and no other Conrad? I’ll admit that that book is unpleasant and rather murky. Conrad is great, though. He’s become one of my favorite authors.
If you have only read (and disliked) Heart of Darkness, maybe try dipping into a book of Conrad’s short stories, like Tales of the East and West sometime and see what you think. The Secret Sharer, a short piece which is sometimes included with Heart of Darkness in the same volume, is a terrific story.
lololu…I am so glad to know that at least one other person on earth read Giants in the Earth…even if you liked it (wink)!
Hated “As I Lay Dying” by William Faulkner. And I am probably the only one who can’t stand “The Great Gatsby”.
Hey, I read it and liked it also.
Re Conrad, Lord Jim isn’t bad. Anything but Nostromo! B-)
I used to put another book on top of the scary one on the nightstand, lest the disturbing vibes leak out and infest my dreams.
I saw about 3 minutes of the movie of The Shining and was so terrified I demanded they turn it off. When I was a kid, I saw Hush, Hush Sweet Charlotte, and had nightmares for years. I do not do horror at all well.
I’m another one who did not like The Great Gatsby. It just annoyed me. Same with Catcher in the Rye.
OK… I’ll give Conrad another chance, maybe try a short story. I probably have something on my basement bookshelves. 
Catcher in the Rye was banned at my junior high school–so of course I read it. Didn’t like it at all. Picked it up again as an adult. Still didn’t like it.
For kid’s books: hated The Giving Tree, and Love You Forever. Barely tolerated Bearenstein Bears. DS liked the Magic Treehouse books, but they were strictly for him to read to himself. I also hated a book called (something like) A Monster under the Bed, which a well meaning day care teacher read to his class–before hearing that book, the thought that there might be a monster in his room had never crossed his mind.
The Total Woman , Marabel Morgan
Celestine Prophecy
The movie thread reminded me–“The World According to Garp”–despised that book!
Sorry, hated any book that gave our kids nightmares or new fears. When S was in preschool, he started crying and had to leave the room to be consoled when the teacher read “3 Billy Goats Gruff.” He was also upset at 4 when she read James & the Giant Peach. He didn’t like the idea of the parents being killed and mean aunt. The teacher told me I had to “toughen” him up. I liked him just fine as he was! The good thing about being sent from the room was he got to hang out in the air-conditioned office and read the great selection of books there, which made him happier than enduring books he found frightening.
I forgot about “Julius, Baby of the World.” Before reading that, D2 happily ate raisins (and she was a picky eater, so I was glad about that). For the past 15 years or so since hearing this line in the book, she chants, “A raisin tastes like dirt” whenever she is offered a raisin or things with raisins in them (really only at home, just politely tries to avoid them at other places). Hasn’t eaten a raisin since to my knowledge. Stupid book.
Such an entertaining thread… read it all!
Couldn’t recall a book that I hated until someone mentioned Billy Budd… And, remembered Bartleby the Scrivner … since then, Melville-- I prefer not to …
When D was small H bought a copy of "the Little Match Girl’. An absolutely horrible children’s book.