What’s the most disturbing novel you’ve ever read? Looking to read something really really messed up.
What’s the most disturbing novel you’ve ever read? Looking to read something really really messed up.
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The Night Listener by Armistead Maupin. Brilliantly written but so upsetting and the darkest most sinister thing I’ve ever read. It’s about a late night radio phone in DJ that gets a call from a seriously abused child.
Also Marabou Stork Nightmares by Irvine Welsh (if you’re unfamiliar with him, he wrote Trainspotting).
It’s narrated by a guy in a coma
Marabou Stork Nightmares sounds fascinating. Thanks.
its brilliant and yet so dark. That’s the reason I’ve never re-read it in twenty years
The Mind of Winter
Anything by frank Peretti.
“Lolita” by Vladimir Nabokov. It’s not only disturbing, but the finest novel written in the English language…
The Bible
City of Joy/ Dominique Lapierre. A brief history of seven killings/ Marlon James.
I just mentioned it in another post. “academy” by Bentley Little. Seriously disturbing and messed up. Crazy, sick and after almost 10 years still boggles my mind how someone can come up with this crazy sh… ? (stuff, I mean stuff of course ?)
Added to my list 🙂
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland…
A head full of ghost
Read Butterfly Garden by Dot Hutchison . I couldn’t sleep for a couple of days after. The most disturbing book I have ever read. Ever.
Did you see the second was released
Lets talk about kevin
Yes!!!!!
It’s We Need to Talk About Kevin. ☺
Flowers in the Attic is one. I read one in high school about bankers manipulating global events that I’d like to read again as a “grown-up”, but I can’t find it. Was very upsetting.
The Girl Next Door by Jack Ketchum was pretty disturbing.
I watched the movie ‘American Crime’, which is based on the real story of Silvia Likens. It provided a motif for this novel. I haven’t read it nor do I plan to watch the movie based on this novel, because I was already shocked by the real case. :/
Helter Skelter !!
Lovely bones
Yeah, it was…..hard to digest for me.
Black Dahlia!
American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis disturbed me so much I had nightmares for two weeks after. It’s a little hard to get through the narrators obsession with money and high fashion, but when he starts murdering people, it just flies by.
Let’s talk about Kevin
Room.
Try Consequences series by Aleatha Romig. Thrilling but highly stressful and disturbing. I couldn’t finish the second book and I’m haunted since then. I want to know how the series ends.
This one is currently free on Amazon kindle. I just downloaded it. Thanks for the recommendation. ?
Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood
Have you read Cows by Matthew Stokoe? Great author and writing style but I am not kidding you, it is extremely disturbing and vile, very gruesome and graphic. Not many people have read this book and I think that is probably a good thing for them. I still remember a scene from it now and feel physically ill, though many scenes in it will do that. Good writer, somehow keeps you hooked during this disturbing piece of work but man it is really nasty.
Other disturbing books:
The Cement Garden – Ian McEwan (not super disturbing, but still kind of depraved for the plot)
Almost Transparent Blue – Ryu Murakami (didn’t finish it, kind of a drug induced sort of book with a fair bit of depravity)
The Necrophiliac – Gabrielle Wittkop (very disturbing material, obviously, but holy crap the prose is incredible- the translator did a good job)
House Rules, or Notice by Heather Lewis (both books rather tame compared to most on this list)
120 Days of Sodom by Marquis de Sade (lol this one is on here for obvious reasons)
Child of God or Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy (haven’t read either books myself but I have heard enough to know they are messed up)
Guts by Chuck Palahniuk (it’s part of a book called Haunted, but this story was one that disturbed me)
The Painted Bird by Jerzy Kosinski (never read it but I know it’s messed up)
Tampa by Alissa Nutting (could only get a bit into it, was very disturbing and basically Lolita with the genders reversed, I was grossed out)
Last Exit to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby Jr. (very graphic)
Any of Dennis Cooper’s works, plenty of disturbing material but his style is good. Frisk is one of his most famous novels and likely for the reason that it’s very gruesome and disturbing. I prefer his poetry though. His short stories also good.
I can recommend more if you need it. Just lemme know
The Painted Bird gave me nightmares
Omg guts…. Truly a warped story
@Terry I agree! The images he described are so disturbing, because they were really happening.
Amy, I wonder if you mean McEwan’s The Cement Garden. He is one of my favorite authors and I don’t believe he has a book named Concrete Jungle…
Yes thank you I meant that… On my goodreads I literally have it listed as concrete jungle and there are like 10 other people who also marked it as read! that is so weird… lol
Into the Darkest Corner
The Butterfly Garden
Wetlands.
Who is the author?
Charlotte Roche.
A Little Life
Beloved
Unwind
Salems Lot.
I just started that!
So nasty couldn’t finish it.
It’s disgusting.
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. Very disturbing, knowing her outcome.
Blood Games by Lamon
The Association by Bentley Little
A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess.
One of my all-time favorite books.
Carrie….maybe? But at least, it casts me with the topic to think about, regarding bullying and forceful religious acts.
But I also found ‘Tommyknockers’ greatly disturbing.
Following
Never Let Me Go.
The Dice Man by Luke Rhinehart
Nick Cave “And the Ass Saw an Angel” – try this one! That’s the strangest book I’ve ever read!
Forbidden by Tabitha Suzuma
A clockwork orange, book is better than movie!!
Agreed, but the movie is great as well.
My absolute Darling.
My husband says Pet Cemetery!
You mean, when SK walks you through little Gage Creed’s funeral day, minute by minute, almost? When I read it, I felt nearly as shell-shocked as the boy’s parents seemed to . . . never imagined I’d be living the experience myself, 27 year later . . . . yeah, I’d agree with your hubby, Kerri.
@Cass do you mean you have lost a child? If so I am so terribly sorry for your loss!
@Kerri, Yes, my daughter passed in ’08, and is now forever 25. She’s very busy in her afterlife, but visits me occasionally in the Dreamtime. Thanks for the kind words; most days are beautiful for her memory.
I cant fathom that type of loss! My heart goes out to you!!
Stephen King, from his novella ‘The Mist’: “No one can know true fear, until they’re a parent.”
very very true!!!!
The girl before by Rena Olsen.
The child called it ??
Pig Island by Mo Hayder
Birdman too.
The Painted Bird by Jerzy Kosinski although A Child Called It is also disturbing
Behind Her Eyes by Sarah Pinborough! Twists and turns all the way to the end…you think you know what’s going on, but NOPE!
The Lake of Dead Languages by Carol Goodman. It’s not super messed up, but it definitely bothered me. It was the first book I purposely threw away.
The Bible.
You. By Caroline Kepnes
We Need to Talk about Kevin
We Need To Talk About Kevin Very disturbing insight into a mentally ill teen and his relationships.
Prince of Tides. I almost gave up reading novels for good. I hated that book. 30 years later and I got past the experience but will never forget how filthy/creepy I felt after reading the disgusting book. So now if a book is disturbing to me I will not keep reading it. I am not a prude just sometimes stories seem wrong to read. I feel sorry for people that need to write such horrible experiences about characters. Seemed too real.
Pat Conroy who wrote The Prince of Tides is one of the greatest authors in the world. The Prince of Tides is one of my favorite books of all time.
I feel like pet sematary was pretty disturbing
“The Lottery” is a short story by Shirley Jackson that terrified me when I first read it in high school.
I think I have the lottery !! Probably stick way back in my pile !!!
Same here. Total shock. I’d also like to read the Haunting of Hill House, I think it is.
Whispers by Dean @JoAnn
Red Dragon or The Silence Of The Lambs by Thomas Harris.
Any and all of Jon Saul’s books
Touched by the T-rex
.
I am reading this. It is a great book, but very disturbing at the same time.
The Dogs of Babel
Jack Ketchum. The Girl Next Door
Child of God, Cormac Mcarthy. Guy finds a dead body in a car crash, hides it in a cave, rapes it until it becomes too manky then starts to add to his collection
OMG!!!
Invisible Monsters Remix by Chuck Palahniuk
What’s the difference between the remix and the normal one?
The Omen
American psycho by Brett Easton Ellis
American Psycho
Some scary as crap novel by Chelsea Cain. Just tossed it in trash was so freaked out.
The Lord of the Flies
Birdman by Mo Hayder. Dark dark Dark! And plenty messed up!!
brave new world
A light disturbing read. Twisted retelling of Peter Pan.
Room.
The same one i chose. I have no wish to see the film after I read the book a few years ago ?
Clive barker’s finale Hellraiser. couldn’t finish it. visceral
Demon Camp: A Soldier’s Ecorcism by Jennifer Percy. True story about a reporter who interviews amd follows soldiers suffering from PTSD. Some soldiers believe they return with demons attached to them and that is what causes their terrors and PTSD. The author wrote how she started to be freaked out….it gave me totally creepy and bizarre nightmares. Ive given copies to people, because it is a fantastic book, but refuse to keep a copy myself…just in case. Lol
American Psycho. I couldn’t finish it.
I suggested this also. I finished it but had nightmares for two weeks after.
Yep, hated that one.
Lolita. Can’t even finish it
American Psycho. Also Hell House by Richard Matheson was disturbing in parts.
That would be Helter Skelter !!
I’d have to say:
In Malice, Quite Close by Brandi Lynn Ryder.
Forbidden by Tabitha Suzuma
All the Ugly and Wonderful Things by Bryn Greenwood.