The Scariest?

Writers, what's the scariest story you've ever read? Ever written?

John L. Taylor: The scariest thing I ever read was probably The Hitchhiker by Christopher Pike (the story and title have nothing to do with each other). Though as an adult, The Russian Sleep Experiment has challenged that. As for scariest thing I've written, it would be "What Gasoline Won't Burn," a YouTube narration that I had written. I did this under a creative commons license, so feel free to adapt (https://youtu.be/1ybpIJw2HBM?si=hUC1owIkxb27vI_V) How scary a book is depends on what age you read it. These days, after spending decades as a CSI, fiction no longer scares me. But way back when, there was Steven King's Pet Semeatary and before that Ray Bradbury's "Something Wicked This Way Comes." As for the scariest story I've ever written, that would be "Choice of Damnation" a Bianca Jones story found in Monsters Among Us.

Danielle Procter Piper: The scariest one I read was a short. Two medical students were getting ready to put their cadaver up after class and one mentioned how cadavers sometimes sit up, groan, and even roll off of things. They walk their cadaver down the corridor into the elevator, enter it to go to the morgue, and while in the elevator there's a power failure. As far as ones I've written...they don't scare me, but my readers would have to vote on which was the scariest. Othy Morris: Brian Keene’s The Rising gave me absolute chills Lucy Blue: For years, my scariest read was Lovecraft's "The Rats in the Walls." But there were scenes in Grady Hendrix's The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires that left Lovecraft in the musty shade for me--Palmetto bug in the ear is all I'm gonna say. <shudders> But there are different kinds of scary--I put down The Silence of the Lambs and never picked it back up again when it first came out in paperback because I didn't need knowledge of that level of inhuman meanness in my head. (If I live to be a hundred, I will never understand the women who think Hannibal Lecter is sexy.) And The Exorcist (book, not movie) haunts me still even though I read it decades ago. I guess The Devil Makes Three is the scariest thing I've published so far. But there are sequences in my WIP that have given me nightmares. Paul Landri: The scariest lately was Revival by Stephen King. That ending had me messed up for days and days. I was home alone for a few days and I'm man enough to admit I slept with the light on. Scariest I think was a story that was a prototype for a character featured in the Crimson Howl series centering on a guy who discovered a mold like substance after a bad thunderstorm. It's a sentient alien organism that turns him into a cannibalistic monster. It ends with him getting his girlfriend pregnant and the twist is that the story is being told from the child's perspective as he is about to devour his mom. Weird Tales Magazine rejected it for publication but the feedback I got from them was great! They loved the premise and the prose was well written but it wasn't what they were looking for at the time.

Scott Roche: Pet Semetary is probably the scariest one I've ever read. The scariest one I've ever written? That would be one of two. "Spiders, All of Them" is a short story I wrote about a dad whose son has a big spider collection of big spiders. And his newest one brings something new out in the boy. The dad isn't a fan. Or, "Let Go" about a dad who is trying to keep his family together during the zombie apocalypse even if it means going out and getting them fresh meat. Anna Grace Carpenter: Read? The Thief of Time by Clive Barker. (Which is shelved as Adult, but really more of a YA.) It sticks with me more than Weaveworld. [Those are the only two Barker novels I've ever read.] Written? Maybe the Southern Gothic novellas. One of my beta readers had nightmares after the first one. Kay Iscah: Erm... I tend to avoid horror as genre. If I'm up for a scare I'll read the news or a science journal. Tape worms...ugh. I enjoy action/creepy, but it doesn't necessarily lodge in my brain as "scary". Likewise I don't *think* I write scary, but may dip into creepy. Chris Riker: Read? Either Salem’s Lot or The Stand. Written: https://chrisrikerauthor.com/news/short-stories/youve-won-a-free-cruise-forget-your-worries-forget-your-life Brian K Morris: The scariest story I ever read was probably I Am Legend by Richard Matheson. It might be because I recall reading it on a hot summer's night in my bedroom. It was hot and we couldn't afford AC so I was minimally dressed. During one scene where the vampires crept up on our hero and was about to attack, a large bug landed on my bare shoulder. My next memory was standing at the foot of my bed, but not putting my legs over the side and walking down there.

B Chris Bell: The Boarded Window by Ambrose Bierce. At the end, and it might take a minute, the hero realizes the unnatural. Then you do. Whoa! Brandon Barrows: Ever read: Kafka's Metamorphosis. Only story that truly freaked me out. Ronald Hanna: “The last man on Earth sat alone in a room. There was a knock on the door ...” -- KNOCK - Fredic Brown John Morgan Neal: I Am Legend by Richard Matheson and The Stand by Stephen King. I got sick when reading them.

Sean Taylor: The two creepiest stories I've read are both diametrically opposites in terms of why they creep me the hell out. "The Empty House" by Algernon Blackwood is perhaps the best use of setting to evoke tension and fright I've ever read. He's a master of that technique and it's on full display in this tale. "N." by Stephen King creeps me out because of how much I identify with the MC. I too and OCD (I used to only each French fries in fours and only listen to my car radio on even numbers, non-Prime levels, but I've weaned myself off those behaviors now thankfully). But, when I saw that it was those exact behaviors that kept out world save from another, that was truly frightening to me, along with the viral aspect that it could be passed on to new "guardians."

As for the creepiest I've written, I'd have to say it's "The Ghosts of Children" in my collection A Crowd in Babylon. It's a time travel warning about how hell hath no fury about a woman scorned. I love to read it at cons, but it always makes me feel icky. No spoilers. Go read it yourself. Despite being a horror fan I've only written one horror story. And that short story was more of a premise for a short film idea. Taco Hell was the title.