About scary books
Ian Stewart of Upper Fort Stewart ask about what scary books we (I) have read.
I remember reading Stephen King’s ‘Carrie’. I took it to be a paranormal (she called down the meteor shower on her house) .. adventure? Then I saw the movie, and lost interest in Stephen King. Yuck. Years later a roommate watched ‘Firestarter’ with Drew Barrymore. I stumbled on the book – that was OK.
But I really don’t read horror.
In recent years many fantasy stories have strayed into demons, fallen angels, vampires, zombies, etc. Which seems a stretch. So I found Anne Bishops’ ‘Black Jewels’ series, of the three rings of Hell and the demons that live there, etc. A fun read.
For a month the local Hastings store mis-shelved some Kelley Armstrong books about ‘Ladies of the Underworld’ – Haunted, Dime Store Magic, Industrial Magic, and other titles, Bitten, Stolen, etc. A good author and very good read.
A favorite author, Robin McKinkley wrote a recent Vampire book – ‘Sunshine’ – our heroine is chained in a room with a starving vampire as the sun is coming up .. Another good story.
Scary stories, though. Maybe ‘Deerskin’, Robin McKinley? It was certainly disturbing, even the second time through. Maybe some of Mercedes Lackey’s ‘Serrated Edge’ stories of elves helping modern day abandoned and neglected kids on the street.
For the most part, I guess I see most stories as adventures. They either tell an entertaining story about some characters, or the author has wandered off into something that doesn’t seem entertaining. Just stupid.
Mercedes Lackey did write a ghost story, I guess. The Lark & The Wren is a coming-of-age story (I do like those!) about a girl that dares herself to fiddle for the local ghost – that has killed everyone that wandered onto a certain stretch of road for many years. But, like Lois McMaster Bujold’s ‘Diplomatic Immunity’, where Miles spends a good part of the last third of the book dying of an incurable military disease (and survives) while solving the puzzle and avoiding a needless war and saving a not-quite-enemy, I just see a good adventure story.
Patricia Briggs started doing some ‘underworld’ vampire/werewolf/walker stories. Moon Caled and Blood Bound are two *very* good books. Just more about adventure than scary, at least for me.
I mean, Stuff Happens. Does anyone dwell on the horrid things that happened to Forrest Gump, or do they remember the chocolates and haircut? The movie there was OK, but the book was a different story – at least as good as the movie, just different. In the book Momma runs off with Protestant instead of dying, etc.
Sorry, Ian, but I don’t recall reading scary books and thinking, ‘wow, that was scary’. I just read (and remember and re-read) good books.
But that’s good! I really wish I hadn’t read any of the horror I’ve read. Well, with the exception of ’84. Most of what I read was read at the wrong time too. I didn’t even mention all the Bigfoot/UFO books I read when I was a kid. For some odd reason my school library had tons of books on Bigfoot. Heck, I’m still scared of Bigfoot!
And Morlocks. Definitely still scared of Morlocks.
Ian,
Thanks for the kind words – sorry I take so long to respond. There is always ‘Little Fuzzy’ and the sequel ‘Fuzzy Sapien’ by H. Beam Piper, the fuzzies are aliens, safely far away, and for the most part – small and cute.
Then there is a comic space opera, ‘McLendon’s Syndrome’, by Frezza. You will never think of Scandinavian space-going vampires the same way again. Just hide the Tiger brand soy mild, and the chocolate chip cookies. I still don’t get the ‘Bucky Beaver’ stories..
For a more visual distraction, there is the Bigfoot cameo in ‘The Erotic Witch Project.’ The review I saw claimed that of the adult movie ripoffs of ‘The Blair Witch Project’ – this was the first. I don’t know if I have seen the whole movie, there isn’t much plot to worry about missing. The flip side of the CD, ‘making of the Erotic Witch Project’ is quite entertaining, though, and I have seen .. ahem .. most of it several times.
I read Aliens (Alan Dean Foster), and didn’t find it that engrossing. C. J. Cherryh’s ‘Pride of Chanur’ and the three sequels and the ‘Chanur’s Heritage’ spinoff, though, have a creepy alien race – I like her treatment of the differences between species, and how she handles a lone human stranded among an alien community bound together by trade.
I guess I just *really* don’t focus on horror. For me the story either works as a fantasy or paranormal or pschic adventure, or science fiction, or it is just another of the “90% of everything is crap” heap, at least at my house.
My folks watched ‘Alfred Hitchcock’ TV shows. I wonder if that let me see the horror, as just another 1/2 hour of TV? Hmm.