As you may have heard, we are moving up to Littleton…soon. As soon as Lee’s security clearance goes through, which could be a day or a year, or a year and a day. Nobody knows at this point.
My books are packed, for the most part. And they are uncomfortable and ill-tempered in those boxes out in the shed. Having nightmares.
Anyway, I got to talking to MB Partlow and Shannon Lawrence about horror books–MB started reading the Nightmare Magazine’s Top 100 Horror Books list, and it sounds like a fun project, so Shannon joined her, and now I’m getting sucked in…I was working on another project and found another good list, referred it to MB, and now it’s in the mix, too: ShortList.com’s 30 Scariest Books Ever Written, an arrogant sort of title but a good list.
Here are the books I’ve read and can remember the plot of, from the Nightmare list:
- The Exorcist, William Peter Blatty
- The October Country, Bradbury
- Something Wicked This Way Comes, Bradbury
- Lost Souls, Poppy Z Brite
- Love in Vein, Poppy Z Brite
- Sunglasses After Dark, Nancy Collins
- The Silence of the Lambs, Thomas Harris
- 20th Century Ghosts, Joe Hill
- The Haunting of Hill House, Shirley Jackson
- Bag of Bones, King (Bag of Bones? Really!?!)
- It, King
- Night Shift, King
- Salem’s Lot, King
- The Shining, King
- Skeleton Crew, King
- The Stand, King
- The Call of Cthulu and Other Stories, HP Lovecraft
- Hell House, Matheson
- Interview with a Vampire, Rice
- Vampire Lestat, Rice
- 999, Al Sarrantino (one of my favorite collections)
- Frankenstein
- Dracula
- Ghost Story, Straub
So…only 24 out of a hundred. Eeesh.
From the other list:
- Exorcist
- Dracula
- Handmaid’s Tale
- The Witches, Roald Dahl
- We, Yrweroiwer Zwrlwelekr, I mean, Russian guy whose name I couldn’t spell to save my life.
- Hell House
- The Trial, Kafka
- A Scanner Darkly, PKD
- The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
- Lord of the Flies
- Slaughterhouse-Five
- Naked Lunch
- The Silence of the Lambs (really, I still like Red Dragon better)
- Frankenstein
Much better on this list, with about half of the books read.
The plan is to swap reviews (and books). I’m trying to track down Books of Blood. Anybody in the Colorado Springs/Denver area who has a horror library that isn’t packed…email or FB me, and I’ll trade favors for books. Not those favors. But. You know. Favors.
Update: Another list! This time from Horror Novel Reviews.
- The Exorcist
- The Silence of the Lambs
- Lord of the Flies
- The Haunting of Hill House
- Pet Sematary
- ‘Salem’s Lot
- Psycho (in progress)
- Dracula
- Bubba-Ho-Tep
- Horns
- Edgar Allen Poe, complete tales and poems
- World War Z
- 1984
- Something Wicked, although I think I’ll reread it, because my memories are so hazy
- Let the Right One In
- It
- John Dies at the End
- Jurassic Park
- Flowers in the Attic (yay!)
- Ghost Story
- Hell House
- The Shining
- Joyland
- At the Mountains of Madness & Other Novels
- Red Dragon
- The Stand
- Interview with a Vampire
- NOS4A2
- War of the Worlds
- Grimm’s Fairy Tales
- The Keep (another probable reread, don’t remember much)
- Heart-Shaped Box
- Needful Things
- Invasion (Robin Cook – another possible reread)
- The Collector
- Coraline
- House of Leaves
- The Picture of Dorian Grey
- Dawn (Octavia Butler)
- The Turn of the Screw
- Started Chuck Pahlaniuk’s The Haunting, put it back down. I just kept going “blah blah blah” as I was reading it. I know it’s supposed to be horrifying, and I’ve read a couple of the “people faint at this” stories, and, uh, whatevs. I liked Fight Club but haven’t read anything else of his.
Which makes 41, not an overwhelming majority or anything. Lots of interesting books that I haven’t read yet that aren’t on the other two lists, is the main thing.
Littleton? But…but….
Good luck with the move. The uncertainty about when must be frustrating.
Lucky for us, the interweebs allow us to reach out and touch you. That’s right, just lean a little closer to the screen.
OW MY NOSE!