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The most disturbing work of fiction that you have ever read


Oblomov

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  • 2 months later...

A nasty little book I read once called 'Let's Go Play At The Adams'

by Mendal Johnson. That one stayed with me ever since. I looked

the author up online,and apparently he was a very disturbed sort

of individual anyway,so no wonder the book gave me the creeps.

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  • 2 months later...

Recently read The Auschwitz - Can't remember the author..a very very strong handed book. Incredibly confronting. A very informing read, but also very very disturbing! What's more disturbing is, everything that is described in the book is true? They don't tell you this kind of stuff in school..

 

 

Shelfy

Edited by BookShelfy91
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  • 1 month later...

A nasty little book I read once called 'Let's Go Play At The Adams'

by Mendal Johnson. That one stayed with me ever since. I looked

the author up online,and apparently he was a very disturbed sort

of individual anyway,so no wonder the book gave me the creeps.

 

I really want to read this but it seems to be out of print everywhere.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Not sure whether I have mentioned this or not...I read not so recently "Aushwitz" (I think that's how it's spelt) a very informative and amazing read while also being incredibly disturbing, horrifying and just very very sad.

 

Shelfy

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  • 1 month later...

Reading Edgar Allen Poe really disturbed me and so did Lovecraft. EAP's Metzengerstein disturbed me even though it was gothic satire. The Fall of the House of Usher and others. Glad I dont read stuff like that anymore. Some Philip K. Dick stuff really was sad. A Scanner Darkly and VALIS really messed with me. Especially what I had been going through when I read it

Edited by Psalmist
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I had to abandon A Clockwork Orange when I read it years and years ago aged 19 - I found the violence too upsetting (unbearable in fact). I haven't read 1984 mainly because I've always suspected that I would find it depressing and worrying.

 

I didn't even know the movie A Clockwork Orange was based on a book. I loved that movie....maybe its time I give the book a try :)

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  • 1 year later...

I always found a lot of James Herbert novels quite disturbing, not entirely sure exactly why, but he could be very explicit, and seemed able to create very convincing scenarios, the same could be said of Clive Barker, in my opinion.

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  • 1 month later...
On 3/15/2009 at 11:54 AM, Genevieve said:

William Golding and Claudia Durst Johnson wrote each a book that still disturbs me, much, very much.

 

Golding wrote Lord of the Flies, we had to do a paper on it, and I felt like I was having a breaking down of my nerves as I read it. Truly upsetting.

 

We had also to read To Kill A Mockingbird by Johnson and that too made me churn in my stomach.Who gives the right to decide that any person or race must be treated less than animals? I shivered and shook when I read it and so many of the characters just upset me.

 

Perhaps I am misunderstanding your post, but Harper Lee wrote To Kill a Mockingbird. Literary scholaClaudia Durst Johnson wrote what is widely considered the best critique of that book in: To Kill a Mocking Bird: Threatening Boundaries (1992).

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The book I've found most disturbing may actually be a novella. I'm not going to research which because I still get a little freaked by it.  The Stranger by Mark Twain. Ladies and gentlemen, this is not your childhood Mark Twain.  I read it once, it freaked me out and I want nothing to do with it ever again.

 

 

I read it decades ago when I wasn't nearly as jaded as I am now; nevertheless, that's one book I'd go a long way to avoid. Right now, I'm a little frightened around the edges just thinking about it.

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  • 7 months later...

The most disturbing book I've read was Animal Farm by George Orwell. His satire of Russia and the European countries in his novel struck hard - especially because of the absurdity of the pigs and the humans. However, the most disturbing story I have ever read was the short story "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson. She proved the point that humanity will follow traditions without remembering nor caring why these traditions were created in the first place. It also showed how quickly one can turn on a neighbor. Both stories make you say, "that's ridiculous!" before looking up and realizing "wait, they're making a legitimate point..."

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  • 4 weeks later...

The book that disturbed me the most, and affected me more than any other, was And the Band Played On by Randy Shilts. However, it's non-fiction....it's an account of how the AIDS epidemic spread across America and how the government did nothing to stop it because it didn't care about the people who were dying. The descriptions of the deaths and the truth that is revealed (basically the homicidal indifference of the American government) has stayed with me since I first read it 20 years ago.

 

For fiction, I guess I was disturbed the most by Monster by Jonathan Kellerman, due to the description of one of the villain's most horrible crimes. Other than that, I read a lot of horror and psychological thrillers, and I'm not really disturbed by them.

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 08/06/2018 at 2:22 AM, sasireader21 said:

The most disturbing book I've read was Animal Farm by George Orwell. His satire of Russia and the European countries in his novel struck hard - especially because of the absurdity of the pigs and the humans. However, the most disturbing story I have ever read was the short story "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson. She proved the point that humanity will follow traditions without remembering nor caring why these traditions were created in the first place. It also showed how quickly one can turn on a neighbor. Both stories make you say, "that's ridiculous!" before looking up and realizing "wait, they're making a legitimate point..."

I agree with The Lottery its been months since I read it and it still gives me the creeps when I think about it. 

 

I would also say Ten Thousand Sorrows by Elizabeth Kim. The fact this is non fiction makes it much worse.  

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  • 3 months later...

I think I'd say American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis. I actually thought it was an amazingly well written book, but it disturbed me a lot. It was the one and only time that I actually read another book at the same time (well, not at the exact same time obviously, but I never normally have more than one book on the go at once), because I lived on my own back then, and often used to read in bed. There was no way I was going to read American Psycho in bed though! I would like to reread it sometime, because it was also a very clever and funny book.

 

Also, Dead Man Walking by Sister Helen Prejean, and Schindlers Ark by Thomas Keneally - but both very disturbing for entirely different reasons to any fiction novel.

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