UKC

I read Monster Love by Carol Topolski over the weekend. It's not a great work of fiction, by any stretch of the imagination, but it's one of the most disturbing books I've ever read - it's about a couple who have a child that they don't want, and what happens to their child and then to them.

as disturbing as American Psycho in its own way.

what's the most disturbing book you've ever read?

In reply to Removed User:

Wasp Factory has to be right up there.

In reply to Removed User:

Filth by Irvine Welsh was pretty disturbing. THe wasp factory by ian banks has it's moments too.

In reply to Removed User:

I found De Sade's Juliette and Justine both quite disturbing (and very boring at the same time)

In reply to Rockmonkey680:

Ditto that.

"Haunted" by Chuck Palahniuk has it's moments and I found "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy disturbing in a bleak, eerie sort of way.

In reply to Chewie:

I've had The Road mentioned to me before as being particularly disturbing for its bleakness.

I don't recall being particularly troubled by The Wasp Factory - perhaps I should read it again.

One Moonlit Night by Caradog Prichard (sp?), and God Boy by Ian Cross, both about troubled young boys, lingered in my mind.

In reply to Chewie:
The Road, Outer Dark and Child of God are all pretty disturbing and all by the same guy.

50/50 Killer, Still Bleeding and Cry for Help by Steve Mosby are quite bleak/disturbing as well.

In reply to Removed User:

'Something Happened' by Joseph Heller - the 'something' that happens is so unexpected and overwhelmingly awful, I had to re-read the chapter to check if I'd misunderstood it.

'Marabou Stork Nightmares' by Irvine Welsh is just nasty & one of the few books I've ever regretted reading.

In reply to Removed User:


The baby on a kite sketch sticks out as one memorable highlight.

In reply to Removed User:

"The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas" was pretty disturbing

And "The Last Blue Mountain" as the tragedy of this true mountaineering expedition disaster unravels it becomes more and more disturbing and unbelievable

In reply to Removed User:

La Nausée, Sartre. Not a barrel of laughs.

Read 30 odd years ago so may partly be down to a formative age thing, but the disclocation from reality and isolation sticks. Not sure if this was the author's intention but then I've not read any criticism. I've no great desire to re read it.

In reply to Removed User:

All Quiet on the Western Front. More recently, Irvine Welsh's Marabou Stork Nightmares made a huge impression on me, and I still rate it as a brilliant book, despite its almost plagiaristic similarity to Iain Banks' The Bridge.

In reply to Bimblefast:

I read Marabou Stork Nightmares years ago and it didn't leave a lingering impression, though I remember feeling rather unpleasant afterwards.

Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo - very troubling.

In reply to Removed User:

Also "Last Letters Home"

I was crying before I'd read the first page. I couldn't carry on with the book. Too upsetting.

In reply to Removed User: When I was a child I read The Water Babies by Charles Kingsley, it remains the most disturbing book I have ever read. If LSD had been invented he was on it, so I guess it was Opium.

In reply to Removed User:

Another vote for All Quiet on the Western Front - awful.

Some freakish stories by Poppy Z Bright as well were pretty nasty although I can't remember their names, I don't think I want to!

In reply to Removed User:

Can I also nominate 'The Power and the Glory' by Grahame Greene for the best case of expectant doom? I couldn't wait for that one to end!

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Butcher Boy by Patrick McCabbe. The first person perspective IMHO, made it pretty easy to acknowledge the slide into madness. Quite a frightening book.

In reply to Matt Rees:

ohhh, I meant to read that a while ago - I'll add it to the list.

in a general 'madness' vein, I found Asylum by Patrick McGrath quite troubling.

In reply to Removed User:

Enderby - Sebastian Faulks (don't we all)

The first chapter can stand alone as a hugely funny and hugely intelligent piece of writing that gets you completely on side with the narrator. And then... Oh dear.

In reply to Removed User:

The Koran by the prophet Muhammad (pbuh).

In reply to Removed User:
The Wasp Factory was the first name in my head, but maybe just because it can be summed up by the word 'disturbing', i.e. it is not much else (ok, it is entertaining too).
I agree with others that Cormac MacCarthy has some shocking and disturbing moments in most of his novels, and these are not necessarily the best moments.
I recall that the Somme scene in Birdsong was both horrifying and superb. The same goes for some of the more brutal scenes in Catch-22.

In reply to Removed User:

Did you read "House of Leaves"?

Like you, I didn't find The Wasp Factory "disturbing", just a bit entertaining.

In reply to Removed User: The Eagle of the Ninth

In reply to winhill:

I'd go with the Bible by many diiferent authors. A masterpiece of brainwashing.

Andy F

In reply to Blue Straggler:

House of Leaves is still on the pile. I've had to reorganise the pile, and now have a list of 30 books to wade through before I get to the rest of the pile. Unfortunately books keep sneaking in there. I read three books this weekend. God's Own Country by Ross Raisin is next on the pile - malevolence in the Yorkshire countryside... lovely stuff. I'm still rather nervous about reading House of Leaves. I'm such a gurl.

With the Wasp Factory, it's more that I can't remember it as I read it so long ago.

In reply to Removed User: The Naked Lunch by William Burroughs. Actually gave me nightmares! This book was banned when first published and I found it the most bizzare and disturbing peice of fiction i have ever read.

Strange question, Clare. Is 'disturbing' good, in your book?

I read The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas and thought "That's really sad". I read The Wasp Factory, and even more A Song Of Stone, and thought "Urghh, Mr Banks, I'm not sure I'd want to have a head like yours". I'm not sure I'd say I found them disturbing. They just made me think "What a weirdo the author must be".

In reply to andy farnell:

hah, when I started the thread I wondered how long it would take people to mention the Koran and the Bible.

In reply to Tim Chappell:

no, it's not necessarily good. Some books that trouble me are great. Some are just... troubling.

In reply to Anglesey Pete:

You'll have to say more than that!

In reply to Removed User:

American Psycho and Lolita were both really disturbing, if brilliant.

Shake Hands with the Devil about the Rwandan genocide was truly harrowing

In reply to Removed User:


Fiction: Perfume, Patrick Süskind
Non-fiction: Into that Darkness: from Mercy Killing to Mass Murder (a study of Franz Stangl, the commandant of Treblinka), Gitta Sereny

The second was by far the most disturbing thing I have ever read; it's hard to imagine how anything could be more disturbing.

In reply to Removed User:
>

I've got a copy you can have if you're ever back up visiting in Inverness.

I'll second the comments about Marabou Stork Nightmares, I can't say I enjoyed it as such.

Somebody told me that they thought American Psycho was disturbing, I just thought it was shite! I thought he was trying too hard to be shocking and I just got bored in the end and never finished it.

In reply to Tim Chappell:

I've read everything Iain Banks (and Iain M Bsnks come to that), has written, apart from his book on whisky which I bought my father. I find his ouvre entertaining, hardly disturbing. Though I guess Complicity wasn't that nice.

I've read everything Irving Welsh has written too, as it goes for the same reason. So I guess I'm either impervious to being disturbed or am disturbed.

In reply to winhill:

The Book of Mormon is pretty disturbing too. Especially if it is prefixed by the history of its writing by Joe Smith (think that was his name). Amazing that a religion could spring up abot this after the middle ages.

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Fiction: The Road, Cormac McCarthy
Non-fiction: All Quiet on the Western Front

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Roald Dahl's short stories- in particular Royal Jelly. *Shudder*

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Unfinest hour: Britain and the destruction of Bosnia by Brendan Simms.

In reply to Removed User: American Psycho - the bit with the eyeballs.


Shudder

LD

In reply to vahill21:

I remember that on 'Tales of the unexpected' when I was a kid, absolutely terrifying.

In reply to Moacs:


I've heard many reviews saying its brilliant and know the basic storyline. Have read some pages in book shops but decided not to buy it as it will upset me too much. Have tried to stop watching post-apocolyptica movies as well, mainly after going to the various civil protection conferences and hearing a Cabinet office official talk about how close London came to being flooded two autumns ago. He came up with the immortal comment of "we're better organised post-foot and mouth for civil contingencies, but currently we only have 20,000 body bags ready." Children of Men and 28 Days Later aren't so much fun after hearing those kind of discussions.

I found American Psycho disturbing - I think the mix of sex and violence is very unnerving. Non-fiction: "We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will be Killed with Our Families" by Gourevitch about Rwanda is awful in content if very well written.

In reply to fried:


It is a good read and important book, but is it that disturbing? "A Safe Area" by David Rohde is more personal and upsetting about the same war.

In reply to TobyA:

that's my 'book for in the car' at the moment - it's very very good, and definitely beneficial in compensating for the 'ache of middle class indulged introspective Clareness' that wafts over me from time to time. <ahem>

In reply to Removed User:
Non-fiction wise... I read a book called something like "The Challenge of Pain" which is about pain: what causes pain, how pain is felt and described, its physiological and psychological basis, how it can (and sadly, sometimes, can't) be ameliorated. There are long and eloquent passages in the book that describe the pathology of various diseases which are amongst some of the most uncomfortable things I've ever read.

In reply to johnjohn: Iain Banks is quite a dark author, but the only one I've really found disturbing is song of stone, which I suppose reflects it's subject matter, but is still an extremely bleak book, with no sign of light at the end.

In reply to Removed User: It's ages since I read it, but he didn't think a lot of French policy did he?!

In reply to Removed User: the "wheres wally" books scare the shit out of me the freaky little bespectacled git sneaking up on folk like that

In reply to Removed User:

Sounds a bit like "We need to talk about Kevin", which I thought was well written but thoroughly depressing, to the point where I evn advised a complete stranger in a book shop not to buy it, at least not if you wanted some light summer reading !

As to the other books mentioned here - am I the only Iain Banks fan who thinks the Wasp Factory is extremely overrated ? It's thoroughly unpleasent but in a pointless way, unlike American Physco (brilliant) or even Maribou SN (OK, but not a patch on The Bridge). It's always quoted as the must-read Banks book, but The Bridge, Crow Road, Espedair Street and Complicity are so much better.

In reply to Chris the Tall:

I started reading that a couple of months ago but had to stop. I think it was more to do with me at that moment than the book, mind. Similarly with They F*ck You Up by Oliver James (though that's not fiction).

In reply to Removed User: I thought, if you paid proper attention to the end, 'The Road' was one of McCarthy's more uplifting books, and a dismissal of teh survivalism school of thought in America. However if you want disturbing, try his 'Child of God', which keeps hitting long after you thought you'd reached the end.
As a father, Ian McEwan's 'A Child In Time' is also pretty disturbing and, though it's a bit of a one trick pony, 'The Comfort of Strangers' by him has it's own shock value.

In reply to Chris the Tall:

It's a first book, and it shows, I think. Not so much over rated, as a signpost for where he was going with his later stuff. I also reckon Espedair St is better than High Fidelity, but that's just me.

In reply to toad:
I think Song of Stone was influenced by evenets in former Yugoslavia - how quickly on veneer of civilization can crumble at the hands of a few warlords

In reply to Removed User: The Book of Bunny Suicides. Mainly because the kids found a copy at mine that someone had given to me as a present, they made me explain it and all the pictures too them!!! i will never be able to get them a bunny as a pet.

In reply to OMR:
Seconded. That's some pretty alarming stuff.

In reply to Removed User:

Three book I've regretted reading:

American Psycho
Marabou Stork Nightmares
The War of Don Emmanuel's Nether Parts (for the torture/murder scene)


Really enjoyed WaspF, didn't particularly like Filth or Porn.

In reply to Removed User:
Have you read "Never Let Me Go" by Kazuo Ishigiri ?

Not disturbing in the sense of the other books mentioned here, but certainly unsettling and the most though provoking thing I've read for a few years

In reply to TobyA:

Maybe not the correct word, but I found the politcal cynicism displayed in this book more disturbing than other more personal books I've read on similiar subjects. man's inhumanity to man just doesn't shock or disturb me anymore, just leaves me kind of sad.

In reply to Removed User: 1984 and fahrenheit 451

In reply to ChrisJD:

Excellant piece of writing, putting something so brutal into an otherwise fairly lighted hearted book, really brings home the evilness of the cocaine trade. Or am I thinking of Señor Vivo and the Coca Lord ? Or are you ?

In reply to Removed User:

I would go with

Roland Howard, The Rise and Fall of the Nine O'Clock Service
Nicky Gumbel, Questions of Life
Nicky Gumbel, Searching Issues
The Bible and allied publications (Qu'ran, Torah etc.)
and another vote for Johnny Got His Gun...

In reply to Chris the Tall:

Quite possibly.

It was a long long time ago, but the torture scene where the contract killer cuts up his wife/gf piece by piece and leaves the bag of bits at his door is still vivid & upsetting

In reply to Removed User: A bit obscure, but The Master Mariner by Nicholas Monsarrat.

It's the only book in the house (we've got 1000s) that as soon as I read it wanted to - ahem - discourage Sam from discovering. The author describes sadism and rape - and the effects on their victims - by pirates in the 16th C with just too much relish - you get the impression he truly enjoyed writing the scenes.

In reply to Removed User:

Marquis de Sade's "Philosophy in the Boudoir"... though anything of his is pretty disturbing/eye opening. Problem with me is that in addition to finding the book disturbing it was also arousing...

In reply to Removed User: Cancer Ward - solzienit..... something. i found it more disturbing than the gulag archipelago. I doubt if I'll read either again.

In reply to Rockmonkey680:

just what i was thinking

In reply to winhill:

Have you actually read it? I would say that more disturbing is the number of people with very strong opinions about the Koran who have not even read it. (apologies if you have.)

Staying on topic, i found Sadie Jones' The Outcast very moving and really quite bleak...not sure if that's quite the same as disturbing however.

In reply to Removed User: 'wasp factory' springs to mind.
(Prob because I haven't read any fiction in years.)

In reply to Rob Exile Ward:

Can't remember that at all.

I found Perfume unsettling

In reply to graeme jackson:

Hmm, I enjoyed the gulag archipelago, but gave up on the cancer ward, just could not get into it.

One flew over the cuckoo's nest is a disturbing book, far more (to me) so than American Physco

Another vote for Iain Banks - The Wasp Factory and for Irvine Welsh - Filth.

In reply to Removed User:
The Room by Hubert S Selby probably my No.1
Also just finished Notes from the Underground by Dostoyevski (sp?) which has its moments

In reply to Removed User: The Tin Drum by Gunter Grass.

In reply to Removed User: "Tears of blood" by Mary Craig. If you are even remotely interested about the Chinese activities in Tibet, this is a must - you have been warned, it's not exactly a comedy.

In reply to Removed User:

And the Ass Saw the Angel by Nick Cave just twisted, my copy flew out the window on a hairpin of an alpine pass. I let it go in the hope that it would disturb someone else

The Story of O by Pauline Reage. The thought that anyone could be so submissive is pretty disturbing.

In reply to wcdave:

As in disturbing that he kind of failed to mention during all those years of adulation that he happened to have served in the SS?

In reply to Removed User:

Tim Krabbe's "The Vanishing" is pretty disturbing.

In reply to Removed User:

Deadkidsongs by Toby Litt. That chap is very odd...

In reply to vahill21:

I agree, definately a dark side to the man!

In reply to Removed User: not fiction, but have read some of those True life child abuse books. That was disturbing reading the tortures those kids went through at the hands of parents.

In reply to Removed User:

"Hot Zone" by Richard Preston. It's a factual account of an ebola outbreak in Africa. Scared me so much I actually stopped reading it twice.

In reply to RockAngel:

the book I mentioned in my OP is a fictionalised account of child abuse. I read it because the premise was intriguing, but I've got a very dark stain in my head now.

In reply to Removed User:

Read a Paul Britton book (UK criminal Psycho-analist)

stuff on the Bulger Lad RIP amongst other findings on the crim mind

Not recommended

In reply to Removed User:

Perhaps Gorbachev's memoirs aren't the thing for you then

In reply to Removed User:

The Corpse Garden by Colin Wilson. (the story of Fred and Rosemary west from birth till death really and all the freaky shit in between)

In reply to Removed User:

'The Billy Goats Gruff' - its sick - hooves and all - gobbled up!

In reply to Shandy:

My mention would be for Henry Rollins written word stuff. The ones I have are "The First Five" and "The Portable Henry Rollins".

In reply to Removed User:

I read "Boy A" by Jonathan Trigell & "What Came Before He Shot Her" by Elizabeth George one after the other. The sum of the parts was definitely more than the individual elements. The combination was very thought provoking in a disturbing way.

In reply to Doe: another vote for Shake Hands with the Devil. truly horrific. I also found The Sorrow of War by Bao Ninh quite a disturbing read. In a completely different way, I found The Diceman by Luke Rhinehart disturbing but very funny.

In reply to Removed User: The Filth by Grant Morrison, but in a 'make you sick to make you well' way.

After reading an interview of Hubert Selby Jr by Lou Reed, I got myself a copy of "Last exit to Brooklyn" out of curiosity. Well, it was one hell of a disturbing experience.

In reply to Removed User: Franz Kafka - Metamorphosis. Mental

In reply to Removed User: Fires on the Plain - Ooka Shohei

Woman of the Dunes - Kobo Abe

Also a vote for Last Exit to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby junior.

In reply to Removed User:

Lord of the Flies is a pretty disturbing book!!!

In reply to Removed User:

"We Need to Talk About Kevin" by Lionel Shriver, what a disturbed little boy..

In reply to MelH:

Does anyone ever read it - I mean apart from Olevel English (me) and GCSE English (my son)

I think that for me it is a translation (for kids) of Leif Ericson's Saga.

There's a bit at the very end when the old guy is asking the young guy why he (the young guy) has the door barred, and his sword drawn.

Then it finishes.

Utterly chilling.

Y.

In reply to MelH:

That'd be my choice, my O Level read, nothing has left me with such a feeling of unease at the finish.

In reply to Rockmonkey680:

Absolutely

In reply to Removed User:

Tends to be factual books which changed my perspective and shook my out of a comfortable understanding. Less likely tohappaen now as I grow more worldly and cynical. (I'm a cynical optimist now).

Books about madness and psychotic <sp?> main characters don't disturb any more. Yes they're unpleasant but the protagonists are mad and/or psychotic so they're a minority and don't fit the usual pattern so I expect sordid excess.

"Collapse" by Jared Diamond read recently was disturbing in its analysis and particularly in the analysis of the Rwandan Genocide, the shocking detail and personal perspectives of books referenced above didn't disturb me half so much as the analysis of contributory factors which made it clear that the genocide was a predictable end result of a number of factors and could and will happen anywhere where a similar circumstance exists.

In reply to Wrongfoot: Antony Beevor's 'Berlin' certainly shocked me with the scale of rape carried out by Soviet soldiers on German women.

In reply to Removed User: 1984 and Animal Farn because its happening now here

In reply to rayash:

That's so true - I saw some pigs in trousers only yesterday.

In reply to Removed User:
The Bell Jar by Syvia Plath
not sure if I'd like to go there again

Bell Jar chronicles the breakdown of the brilliant, beautiful, enormously talented, and successful Esther Greenwood, a woman slowly going under -- maybe for the last time. Sylvia Plath masterfully draws the reader into Esther's demise with such intensity that the character's insanity becomes completely real, even rational -- as probable and accessible an experience as going to the movies. Such deep penetration into the dark and harrowing corners of the psyche is an extraordinary accomplishment and has made The Bell Jar a haunting American classic.

In reply to vixen:

this was one of my preferred teen angst tomes. I read it again last year and was... troubled by it.

In reply to Removed User: The Collector by John Fowles is also rather disturbing.

In reply to Removed User:

The Bodhycaryavatara. "A guide to becoming a buddha".

A very emotive book written in verse that describes what it means to be completely honest and responsible, essentially its about what it means to be as human as you can possibly be.


I found it disturbing and settling at the same time. Its also the most inspiring and demoralising book ive ever read!

Mat

In reply to Rockmonkey680: funnily enough I'm re-reading the Wasp factory atm and yes it's very dark and disturbing

In reply to Removed User:Slugs Shaun Hutson

In reply to Removed User: Throughout history man has done some truely awful things to his fellow man and any fictional account of these acts does make for some pretty harrowing reading. For me, powerful reading lies in the suggestion of something terrible. Lord of the flies is a book that passes over the heads of most children who read it. Thats not a bad thing because what lies at its heart is a pretty sinister and chilling account of the gradual disintergration of society. The mental collapse of one of the central characters is particularly well written.

In reply to Removed User: The Grapes of Wrath had me not liking the world for a little while, but it opened my eyes to 'what it's all about'. The ending is excruciating. I like all John Steinbecks writing.

In reply to Removed User: The Road by Cormac McCarthy.

In reply to pdufus:

I tried to read that a few years ago and just couldn't get into it. Perhaps I'll try again at some point.

In reply to string arms:

I remember reading it on a beach somewhere in the South of France when I was an angst-ridden teen (as opposed to the angst-ridden adult I've since morphed into), and being horrified by what happened to Piggy.

oh god - so many books to read, and so many to reread too. I reckon we should all have two lives - one to live, and one to read our way through.

In reply to AdrianC:

a few people on the thread have mentioned that. I think I might leave it for the moment...

In reply to Removed User:

Again the Road. Read it afew years ago and still have disturbed moments of recollection. Don't think I want to go back there at the moment.

Think the disturbance was heightened by being a newish parent myself.

In reply to Removed User:

Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown.

Spectacularly altered my rather narrow world view at the age of 12. So in that sense extremely disturbing.

In reply to pdufus:

I thought that was a disturbing account of one man's struggle to overcome haemorrhoids?

T.

In reply to Removed User:

On The Beach, by Neville Shute. Similar to The Road, which I didn't find as bad.

In reply to Rockmonkey680:

I'd rate "Dead Babies" by Martin Amis and "My Idea of Fun" by Will Self as well ahead of Iain Banks's "The Wasp Factory" in the disturbing ranking (disturbing = revolting). Other books by IMB are also very dark at times (e.g. "Use of Weapons").

For really disturbing ( = make you think) I'd nominate "Ape and Essence" by Aldous Huxley for its very unflattering view of mankind.

I found 'Lunar Park' more disturbing than 'American Psycho' - reckon other grim reads might include JT Leroy 'Sarah' & 'The heart is deceitful above all things' and Mark Z Danielewski 'House of Leaves'. It's monstrous. 'Last Exit to Brooklyn' & 'Requiem for a dream' by Hubert Selby Jnr. are pretty heavy going, too.

In reply to climberjamie:

yup- my vote also goes to 'naked lunch'...

In reply to Removed User:Having read lots of "shocking" literature, JT Leroy, "Sarah" DM Thomas "The White Hotel", most of Banks, McEwan, Amis and Welsh, by far the most shocking book I've read is "Never Let Me Go" it broke my Heart.

In reply to Removed User:

I was expecting "An Intimate History of Killing" by Joanna Bourke to be quite disturbing but John Keegan's "The Face of Battle" is the more shocking in this sub-genre of military history.

I appreciate that "disturbing" has been taken to mean gory/morbid rather than conceptually disturbing, but I'm still surprised no one has mentioned David Hume; his Enquiry is extremely disturbing, as are the conclusions about human beings reached by Schopenhauer and Nietzsche.

As an aside, am I alone in pronouncing "disturbed" as "disturved"?

In reply to Removed User:

I'll pitch in 'The Black Dahlia' by James Ellroy.

It's not that shocking or graphic but I found it really drew me into the character's mindset and stayed close all the time I was reading it. As they're obsessed with a gruesome murder it's not the nicest place to be. You don't so much finish the book as come up for air.

In reply to Removed User:

The Stanage Guide from a few years ago. You know, the one that read from left to right but had the route diagrams from right to left. It nearly drove me crazy.

I know, not really what you were looking for but I bet loads of people hated this book like me.

In reply to AdrianC:

This has sat in my "To be read" pile for a while... The blurb on the back hasn't every sufficiently grabbed my attention - it sounds dull rather than disturbing. I may have to re-evaluate, quite a few folk have mentioned it...

In reply to Oceanwall: Genius!

In reply to Removed User: Mine would be the Invisible Man by HG Wells

In reply to Removed User: "I was Dora Suarez" by Dereck Raymond.

In reply to Removed User:

Zola's Therese Raquin... there's a scene where two lovers imagine they are separated in bed by the body of her murdered husband; up there amongst the more memorable cautionary tales of my youth.

In reply to Removed User: the bible

In reply to ritid:

Really?? Or are you just saying this because it sounds good? (Not that it's one book anyway, though it's typically bound into one or two volumes.) I wonder just how much you've read of it? (I would say I've read about 20% of it at the very most.) How can it, seriously, be 'the most disturbing book you've ever read' unless you've read very little else? A lot of other religious books are a lot more disturbing, and many, many great novels are much, much more disturbing again.

In reply to Removed User:

The Room, by Hubert Selby Jr is dark. It takes you into the mind of a nameless man in a prison cell, awaiting trial for a crime he claims he did not commit. Humane but harrowing too.

In reply to Removed User: 'Being Dead' by Jim Crace is pretty harrowing. Surprised no one's mentioned The Collected Short Stories of Edgar Allan Poe (I read these as a young teenager and stories like The Tell-tale Heart and The Black Cat still haunt me!)

In reply to Removed User:

It's got to be 1984 for me - the book is completely nihilistic.

In reply to Removed User: The Lorax by Dr. Seuss.

In reply to Yrmenlaf:

I didn't read it at standard grade or higher (Scottish equivalents). I just bought it and read it in my early 20s.

You just reminded me of a disturbing book I read at higher though-

Sunset Song by Lewis Grassic Gibbon.

In reply to LordFlashheart:

the Lorax has the coolest thing ever in it - the thneed! and here, look, someone's made one! http://swissmiss.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/06/25/sqhzotwkzakw7b...

In reply to Gordon Stainforth:
Incest, rape, murder, child sacrifice, genocide, the end of the world, crucifixion, bestiality all get a look in. You don't find that in most contemporary fiction, at least not all at the same time.

In reply to anonymouse:

Primo Levy had a big impact on me. The detail of daily life inside Auschwitz is grim beyond belief.

In reply to Removed User: I'm suprised Great C'Thulu hasn't made an entrance on this thread, although I've always found Lovecraft to be a tedious old fart with some good ideas, rather than an unsettling and disturbing Colour from Beyond Space

I'm still reading about Stalin.

Did you know that in the 1937 purges, towns and districts were given *quotas* for purging people? As in: "Chelyabinsk (or wherever) Politburo: the number of Trotskyite saboteurs that you must have shot is: 65400".

What a world it was. A bad dream. As bad as Nazi Germany.

In reply to Tim Chappell:


(PS And they were praised for their efficiency if they went *over* quota.)

In reply to Chris the Tall:

Indeed.

In reply to pdufus: Half serb myself...

In reply to Removed User:
Some interesting mentions on this thread, despite the unpromising title. It is very easy for a writer to be deliberately 'disturbing' in the popular sense, i.e. to describe some depravity (violent or otherwise) that the reader would not have thought of. But many of the very best books are also disturbing in various ways, and some of these have been mentioned.
Here's a slightly different one (not sure which of the above categories it fits into): Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. Extreme enough to test the moral nerve of even the most hard-headed libertarian Thatcherite b*stard, let alone a wide-eyed social-minded ukc-er.

In reply to thomm:

I haven't read Atlas Shrugged but I did read The Fountainhead a few years ago, and found it hugely troubling.

In reply to thomm:

Explain?

In reply to LordFlashheart:
For example, one of the heroes is a pirate who seizes aid shipments to poor countries, converts the proceeds to gold bars and gives them back to the rich capitalists whose taxes paid for the shipments in the first place. Now I'm so far right of centre that I'm almost falling out of the driver-side window, but even I raised my eyebrows at that...
Oh, and the love scenes are quite disturbing too.

In reply to thomm: not so much disturbed by the book, as by the undue credence given a fairly turgid (I didn't finish it) and dated book by a large number of contemporary influencial American politicos. As they might say, Go Figure...

In reply to Removed User: I read Atlas shrugged awhile ago and it is a good book and there is plenty of elements to it that are disturbing/worrying and reminded me in some ways of Catch 22.

In reply to toad:

Exactly.
Pretty disturbing that anyone could take this shite seriously.
Then again, the phrases "Right Wing" and "Intellectual" are kind of mutually exclusive...

In reply to toad:

I agree with that. Never liked Lovecraft's own writings, but he gave a great gift to the writers that came after him and wrote Cthulhu mythos stuff, such as Ramsey Campbell.

In reply to Rosie A:
Nice call; The scene in the mortuary is incredibly horrible.

In general the books in this thread fall into two loose groups; those that set out to be overtly disturbing eg American Psycho, Last Exit From Brooklyn and those which sort of creep up on you

In reply to Removed User:

I, like many others it seems, found "Maribou Stork Nightmares" so revolting that I vowed never to read Welsh again.

I thought "The White Hotel" (Thomas) was disturbing when I read it as a teenager, but I can hardly remember it at all now.

Hanif Kureishi's "Intimacy" was disturbingly cold.

"London Fields" (Amis) was also chilling.

I think what disturbs me is writing where the narrator (and/or protagonist appears) appears emotionally insulated from important/desperate/horrible things (though others might regard this as a key to objectivity, and therfore a good thing?) I am probably mistaken, but I can't help thinking the Welsh, Kureishi and Amis might each be capable of the pychopathic lack of empathy they invent in their stories.

In reply to Yonah:

Good call - had forgotten about that one...

In reply to thomm:

Hmmm. I must re-read it...

In reply to Removed User: The Bible - the book most sighted by serial killers the world over as their favourite.

In reply to toad:

I found Lovecraft to be the reading equivalent of Hammer Horror; something very much of its time perhaps, but a little dated now.

That said, there's an anthology of stories inspired by Lovecraft (I forget the name of the book) which contains a story called 'Black Man with a horn' by TED Klein. Now that is good...

T.

In reply to Removed User:

The Eyes by Jesus Ignacio Aldapuerta.

Rumour and myth suggests he was burnt alive for writing it.

If any of his tales are autobiographical I would prob burn him too.

In reply to Removed User:

Scourge of the Swastica.

Can't remember who wrote it because I read it years ago. It had quite a lot of detail in about the concentration camps etc.

In reply to Knitting Norah: Without Google it was Lord somebody or another, (Liverpool). I swapped my already read book for this in a Youth Hostel in the Lakes. It should be on the shelfs behind me but isn't. He had been a judge in the Nuremburg Trials I think, very disturbing how organised evil can be.

I haven't read the thread, but did anyone else find Ian McEwans "Chiold in Time" disturbing?

In reply to Removed User:

Eyewitness Auschwitz
three years in the gas chambers by Filip Muller

In reply to Dr Sidehead:
Dont know the answer to the question, so many books, so many years.
I have just completed Engleby, Sebastian Faulks and that really was creepy.

In reply to Mark Morris:

Just Googled it, Lord Russell of Liverpool.
I can remember the Eichmann trial. Very evil person and so cold.

In reply to Removed User:

For me it would be that short story in Everythings Eventual by Stephen King about the hotel room that everyone who has stayed there has died in. A film recently?

I also only managed abot 8 pages of The Ring by that Japanese guy. Also a film- that I'm never likely to seek out!!

In reply to Removed User:

Out of curiosity I got "The Road" out of the library. Didn't find anything particularly disturbing in it. I may however look out some of his other books though.

In reply to Removed User:

I don't tend to seek out disturbing books deliberaately, but Ray Bradbury's The Illustrated Man gave me the shivers more than once, especially 'The Veld'.

In reply to Removed User:

I am half way through the Kindly Ones by Jonathan Littell and I am not sure I can finish it. On one level it is the story of the experiences of an intelligent, thoughtful and sensitive SS officer who is a member an Einsatzgruppe who follow the advance of German forces into Russia. He and others learn how to kill Jews on an industrial scale and yet it is small events that stand out. A group of German soldiers, before they shoot a Russian woman, all kiss her. Some tenderly, some on the lips, others on her cheeks. Then they shoot her. Brutal events are sandwiched between pages of history and academic studies. Strange disturbing book.

In reply to Removed User:

1984 wins for me. That there are countries in the world that have similar societies make it all the more disturbing.

Filth is pretty dark but hilarious at the same time!

In reply to Fat Bumbly2:


Yes good book.
Don't know if anyone has mentioned any Steven King but some of his are disturbing, in a tasty sort of way.

In reply to Mike_Watson_99:
To be fair, not every copy has a severed finger bookmark.

In reply to Removed User:

Beatrix Potter by turns revolts and disturbs me - squirrels in clothes yeuchh

In reply to martin heywood: I love S King read all his stuff some underlying disturbing maybe, but the book that really kept me awake at night was Survivor by James Herbert, maybe not the type of disturbing the op was after, but still a scary book

In reply to banana crepe:


Now you remind me...thanks...The Rats scared the living sh*t out of me when I was younger. I used to throw it under the bed and then fish it ou the next night and trepidatiously read a few more pages.

In reply to Bulls Crack: great trilogy, Domain was supreme, had everything except a decent ending!

In reply to banana crepe:

Well I never read the other two.

this thread seems to be turning into a 'who can be less disturbed than who by a book'

Fictionally - The Road and Lord of the Flies are both great `What If' books and are only disturbing if you believe humanity could collapse so quickly

Chuck P, Banks and Welsh, all good but don't feel real enough to be disturbing

Something in the Sea by Yves Bonavero - modern `disturbing' classic

In reply to Removed User:

not disturbing but an excellent book none the less!!

http://www.amazon.com/Old-Tractors-Men-Love-Them/dp/0760301298

try it!

In reply to Removed User:

Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale.

In reply to Removed User: Blood meridian by Cormac McArthy -
What disturbed me about this book was the fact that the characters are without exception loathsome and unpleasant people (albeit charismatic) and so when they eventually meet sticky ends I found myself treating it with the same casual indifference that they showed to their own victims.
The Road on the other hand at least has some semblance of hope in it in the form of human kindness...

In reply to Removed User: No one so far has mentioned "King Lear". Apart from the physical violence ("Out, vile jelly!", etc.) there are really disturbing scenes where every character is either mad or feigning madness.

In reply to Rob Davies:

thought of another one -

The Long Walk by Stephen King (in the Bachman books - think it was done under his nom de plume Richard Bachman)

In reply to Removed User:

one of the most disturbing books ive read recently is Gomorrah by Roberto Saviano as its based on facts & affects the prices of almost everything in Europe but is often overlooked as an important financial factor .mind blowing how much power some of the power yielded by some criminal clans . truly disturbing . also a book called the cocaine wars for similar reasons .

'The Road' literally gave me nightmares, I read it in one go and had a feverish nightmare where I was locked in a room with the baddies smashing their way in, grabbed a steak knife to kill myself before they could get to me... woke up feeling for my jugular. No joke, it was only last week so I'm still a bit traumatised by it all. Have read chick-lit at bed time since.

In reply to Removed User:

The Road is hugely bleak but sparingly beautiful too, in a way. I didn't find it disturbing as such; I'd recommend it.

American Psycho I just couldn't read to the end of - partly the sickening twistedness of it and partly the utter dullness of the rest. I had no interest in it at all.

In reply to Knitting Norah:

The Villa, The Lake, The Meeting by Mark Roseman is chilling

an account of the Wannsee conference where the final solution was formulated.

In reply to Removed User:

Some of Peter Carey's short stories are rather disturbing....Fat Man in History, War Crimes, The Chance in particular

In reply to Removed User:
Non fiction would be The Tenth Circle of Hell about the Bosnian conflict. Can't remember who wrote it as I'm at work but the daily brutality is heart-breaking.

Agree that The Road by Cormac McCarthy has it's moments - especially the cellar 'scene' - I had to re-read it to make sure he'd written what I thought he'd written. Made my blood go cold.

I've just finished the Red Riding quartet by David Peace. Profoundly unsettling but brilliantly done - the way he weaves a fictional storyline around real events of the 70s and 80s is seamless. He pulls together loads of past and current day 'bogeymen' - police corruption and brutality, child abuse and paedophilia, the Yorkshire Ripper murders, sexual abuse within the Church etc. - and to my mind made it so believable it has stayed with me for weeks afterwards. Graphic details and graphic language -not for the faint hearted.

Laters,
Davie

In reply to Removed User:
George Orwells, nineteen eighty four .. when I was about 16. A classic of course but gave me nightmares...really horrible ones. I wouldn't read it again.

In reply to Removed User: American Psycho - I gave up on it 2/3 of the way through, couldn't face any more.

In reply to anonymouse:

melzack and wall?

In reply to Removed User:
The only books that ever really upset me are Revelations and a frank factual account of the effects of nuclear weapons.
Disturbing - not so many - "The Road" got to me a bit, some of PK Dick's stuff - A Scanner Darkly, "The streets of ashkelon" by harry harrison.

In reply to Removed User:

Iain banks "use of weapons"- when it becomes clear the significance of the chair

<shudders>

a lot of iain banks suggestions on this thread. i found "complicity" really rather unpleasant, he seemed to take too much satisfaction in devising unpleasant but apt deaths.

"Complicity" strikes me as Iain Banks doing a Tom Sharpe novel. But Sharpe has a much more gruesome "comic" imagination than Banks - condoms filled with oven cleaner, for example!

In reply to Removed User: Anyone read 'The Iceman'Confessions of a Mafia Contract Killer by Philip Carlo?

A biography of Richard Kuklinski, he is one imaginative killer, I bought the book on the Irish ferry early this year, it was the only readable looking book in the shop, next time I'm buying heat magazine!

In reply to MeMeMe:

I read The Vanishing this weekend. (I also read another book about an abduction. It was clearly 'imagine how it feels to be kidnapped' weekend.)

I didn't think it was particularly disturbing... until the last two pages. The horror of it is gathering momentum inside my head, and I feel rather troubled now.

Thanks for the recommendation!

In reply to Removed User:

A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah. Someone close had been involved in the conflict at one point and I was curious. I still get a lump in my throat thinking about the book.

In reply to Removed User:

Something wicked this way comes by Ray Bradbury had me freaked out for many years after I read it. And most of Du Maurier's books.

In reply to Removed User:

Strange how you mention American Psycho, coz thats mine! Couldnt put it down, but also couldnt wait for it to end! Sign of a good book I suppose!

In reply to Removed User:


I found "The Sparrow" by Mary Doria Russell quite disturbing.

In reply to Removed User:

I'm suprised nobody has mentioned Faulkner. Nobel prize and all that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Faulkner


It always seems to me that Cormac McCarthy is trying to be Faulkner but never quite gets there.

In reply to Removed User:
World War Z. Gave me nightmares like nothing else but I think that's more to do with my vivid imagination.

Having said that I've just been handed a book called Swallow (as in the bird!) which I have been told with disturb me greatly.

In reply to Rockmonkey680:

I found that very disturbing, absolutely fantastic book.

In reply to Removed User:

Go Ask Alice. A book I read whilst still at school. Put me off ever taking drugs.

Also Diary of Anne Frank, which I again read as a teenager.

In reply to Zygoticgema:

The Sparrow, I think you'll find, m'dear.

In reply to DR:

I read '1974' by David Peace last night and this morning. It was on my slowly-diminishing pile of books to read anyway, but it shuffled up the pile after the mention on this thread.

Jaysus. I had a nightmare last night I've not read any crime fiction in a while, and I think that one's going to resonate with me for a good few weeks. 'Visceral' would be a good term for it. One thing though - the chapter near the end about the police brutality and the confession - was that a red herring? It tripped me up a little.

(sorry to bump a dormant thread but I just wanted to mention this book)