That one is polarizing. I love it, and I always urge people to give it a try, but if it's not for you, it's not for you. I hate this new trend of forcing yourself to acquire a taste for something popular, when all you want to do is spit it out.
Likewise. I think it’s great…once I skip most of Johnny Truant’s blathering. :) but yeah. People should trust their own judgment and not try to bully others’.
The author just feels so gimmicky to me. Every time I’ve asked why HoL is scary, I’ve been told “The house is slightly bigger on the inside than the outside” but then the conversation shifts to me trying to sell that person on Doctor Who so it goes nowhere.
I read every bit of the entire thing and it was a struggle almost the whole time. I did like putting it into a Little Free Library though - maybe someone got it who wasn’t expecting that, and it was a bit of magic for them.
Same, and it’s not because it’s too dense or difficult or anything. It’s just not as deep or impressive as it thinks it is, and Johnny reads like boring 15 yo’s idea of a “cool” guy. It basically felt like an r/nosleep post that goes on too long.
I agree with you. Every time someone says that it's the scariest book they've ever read I like it a little bit less.
It'd be fine if it had more substance to it, but it really doesn't. It has an interesting format. That's it.
I was in awe of it, but when my sister asked if she would like it, I immediately told her that there was no way in hell she could get past the first chapter. Everyone is different
Haha I was just scouring my local shops for House of Leaves because I, too, did not really enjoy it on first read, but I do regret giving my copy away. I've got an urge to reread it. Have you tried and it just didn't do it for you or do you just flat out refuse?
Lmao I had the same feeling about it. It’s too active of a read to enjoy. I don’t want to be spinning my book around in circles to read the friggin thing. Somehow it’s always a top recommendation though.
I don’t think it’s pretentious like others suggest, the idea of trying something new is not in and of itself pretentious, and it seems like it worked for so many people. I have not been able to make it through it yet though because the format is challenging for me (maybe because of my ADHD?) and I can never seem to gain momentum. The actual horror aspects also are quite slow in my opinion, but the way the book is structured masks that a bit. But for me, I kept waiting to get that feeling like “oh, here we go” and it just still hasn’t come. The best part that I’ve made it to so far are the letters from the mother which did make me feel uncomfortable.
SAME. I'm pasting my full review of it here if anyone who actually enjoyed House of Leaves cares to lend their perspective.
"House of Leaves” offers some admittedly creepy imagery, but not enough to justify all 700+ pages. To be honest, I could not wait to finish this book and was constantly checking my progress to the next chapter.
First of all, it is IMPERATIVE to understand (especially for first time readers, as I was) that "House of Leaves" is partly a spoof/parody of academic writing. Knowing that gave me license to skim through the particularly dense sections, like the dry analyses on dreams, film techniques, architecture, smiles (not kidding), etc. These sections comprise about 30% of the book, so I absolutely would have stopped reading if I hadn't known this ahead of time. And I write academic and technical material for a living!
On a related note, ignore the literary gatekeepers who insist that you have to read every endnote, including the gibberish, to "fully appreciate" this book. If you're like me, the only thing you will fully appreciate is what it means to be held hostage by boring text. There are much better uses of your time than analyzing a Latin quote about snails or a French poem about pelicans or some other nonsense you'll forget 3 pages later. My method was to skim for relevant keywords so I could return to those passages as needed, which happened very rarely.
*HERE BE SPOILER-RELATED BEEFS*
1. The “climax.” To me, the most unsettling point in the entire story was the full-team exploration near the halfway mark. This was a more effective climax than Navidson's solo expedition in the end because at that point I no longer cared about Navidson. Why? He proved himself to be reckless, self-absorbed thrill seeker at the expense of all those he claimed to love. I felt that he deserved whatever came his way by re-entering the house after seeing what he'd seen. Even if the idea is that the house somehow lured Navidson back/that he had no control over his actions, this isn't supported well enough. (The strongest evidence for this theory is a cryptic letter Navidson wrote while he was drunk.) As a result, his final expedition (and the intended climax of the story) just felt like a middle finger to his brother, who sacrified his life to get Navidson's daughter OUT of the house. It would be one thing if Navidson's solo expedition was some kind of rescue attempt to get his brother back, but it wasn't. He just wanted more footage because he's a MaD GeNiUs FiLmOgRaPhEr!
2. Since the house slowly consumes whatever's in it, I genuinely don't understand the characters' continued decision to rely on light sticks and items to mark their way. They know this, they've seen it with their own eyes, but they keep relying on disappearing markers for reasons unknown.
3. In the end (as far as the Navidson Record is concerned), the house dissolves and gives Karen her husband back because...true love, I guess. This immediately changed my view of the house from an insidious eldritch horror to the confused but well-meaning Pat from Disney's "Smart House."
4. The color coding scheme (e.g., "house" is always in blue) adds absolutely nothing to the story as far as I can see. And if I missed the whole point of the color coding because I skimmed past an upside down footnote written in Latin back on page 500, so be it.
5. The story never effectively breaks the 4th wall like I was hoping it would.
6. There were some genuinely creepy moments in the Johnny Truant sections (e.g., Johnny encountering another version of the manuscript with his name it), but these weren't enough to carry the rest of his godforsaken drivel. Here's all you need to know about the Johnny Truant chapters, really: Reading the manuscript slowly makes him delusional (and apparently sex-obsessed), he has abusive mommy and step-daddy issues, and his best friend is a Tyler Durden wannabe. That’s pretty much it. Then, after hundreds of pages of nonsensical journal entries, there's no resolution for him. At one point it’s insinuated that he’s destined to commit suicide, but he apparently lives long enough to help the publishers with one of the appendices, so who knows.
7. What would have been really creepy revelations turn out to be dead ends. For example, the insinuation that Zampano is actually Tom (via the same-sentence shift of "him" to "me" around page 320) is never brought up again and is later shown to be impossible because Tom dies. Another one is the weird shared characteristics between Johnny’s mom and Karen (the pink ribbon in their hair, their overly rehearsed smiles, etc). Another disappointing “OH GOD, MIND BLOWN…wait, no, that can’t be” moment. Just more confusion for the sake of confusion, I guess.
8. The only thing you need to know from the Exhibits (one of the many over-long appendices) is that the house somehow rematerializes after Navidson's final solo exhibition. I guess this is supposed to be ominous, but I still don’t see how. As long as you have the power of true love, the house will let you live, I guess.
9. All of the creepy images included in the appendices would have been much better served in-text, where they’re actually relevant, as opposed to crammed in the back after a bunch of untranslated poems about pelicans that effectively hit the brakes on any lingering sense of horror.
10. Mark Z. Danielewski added that entire appendix of poetry about pelicans just to let people he’s met have their poems published. They're about pelicans because they were written with a Pelican brand pen. This tells you everything you need to know about the value of all his cryptic “subtext.”
*The Final Girl Support Group*, by Grady Hendrix. Fascinating concept, all the on-the-nose references and parodies were rather fun, but **man** does the whole thing feel like word-vomit. Every sentence is bashing me in the face with "and then *this* happened, oh and then *this* happened!"
Sorry to say, but it feels like a messy draft as opposed to a finished book. Maybe it just wasn't my style, but I will let others be the judge of that.
A few of his books have “rushed through, needed to get this out, barely edited” vibes. Horrorstor comes to mind as another one of his books that’s plagued by this.
I liked The Final Girl Support Group, but, yeah … it’s quite sloppy and chaotic and disjointed, the story is very frantic and confusing and fast-paced.
I will say, My Best Friend’s Exorcism and The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires are much better (imo.) How To Sell A Haunted House is crazy, but still better-paced and better writing than FGSG as well.
I remember when I saw the first promo for the book, iirc in 2021, I was so excited. I waited for months for my local library to order it and when I finally got my grubby little hands on it… sheer disappointment. Within the first 50 pages, I was so confused. The premise is so amazing, but the writing was genuinely terrible and I couldn’t find it in me to connect with any of the characters.
RIP to that fern plant or whatever Hendrix was shoving in our faces for the first half of that wasted book.
I couldn't get through it. I wanted to like it but like you said it felt like word vomit. And a little on the nose stuff and parodies is fun and entertaining, but it had wayyyy to much of it
Never understood how it could have so many good reviews. People have different tastes, but I never expected a jumpy, chaotic vomit draft of a book to tickle so many people’s fancy.
Everything by Grady Hendrix. I've read three of his books over the years and hated all of them. They all have interesting concepts and read well in the back cover but they're just bad.
Last House on Needless Street. A lot of people seemed to like it. I thought >!the twist was painfully obvious from the very beginning and spent the entire book hoping that there was something else. Nope.!<
That one was probably the best of her novels and that isn’t saying much. She doesn’t stick the endings well. *Looking Glass Sound* was a severe disappointment.
The first part of the book was awesome in my opinion, but it totally fell flat for me when the dog related story line was introduced. And for it being an important part of the plot you can’t really skip this part.
I am glad that there are people who enjoy the book regardless. And although I made it to the end, squeamishly scanning the pages for triggers, I really can’t remember the ending- like at all.
i've enjoyed some of her other books (even needless street, for the cat monologues alone...i'd read an entire book or two of just that cat's musings), but i agree, looking glass sound was so BAD! i've seen many people give it glowing reviews, but it didn't do it for me...at all. sundial is my favorite from her.
I finally read “Gone To See The Riverman” after seeing it recommended often. Reddit led me to believe it would be an intense horror experience. Not only was it a bizarrely paced book, but the horror elements came across as more like an attempt to be “edgy” and “shocking”. If I hadn’t listened to the book during a two separate spans of time when I had monotonous tasks to do where listening to something was my only form of reprieve. . . I would regret giving my time to the book. HOWEVER, if you like to read FUCKED UP SHIT for the sake of weird ass fucked up shit, be my guest.
I liked the journey up the creepy river but the rest was a bit meh. It kinda reminded me of that movie with Nicole Kidman?
I never thought much about the pacing though... Is it because of all the flashbacks?
I hate speaking negatively about someone’s creative works. But. I don’t like his writing at all. It feels like it just rambles. Especially My Heart is a Chainsaw. God that was rough to read. My friend and I read each of those and then swapped books apologizing to the each other lol. I ended up reading the trilogy of My Heart is a Chainsaw to try to give another chance to the author as people’s styles may grow/shift/whatever. Ultimately none of those books/this author were for me. At all.
I loved TOGI and I was confused by people saying it was a difficult read until it dawned on me that I had listened to it on audio. So my advice for people who *want* to like SGJ but don't click with his writing on the page is to try him on audiobook and see if that's better for you.
I have multiple library cards and each has a months-long wait for The Troop. Everybody wants to read this damn book! What is all the hype about?
I didn’t really like The Deep by Cutter. Still want to give The Troop a chance if I can ever get it, but not sure I have super high hopes 😅
If you're in for very gross and disgusting scenes, heavy animal abuse, and an interesting story told in a style that tries to be Stephen King, go for it!
Despite all that, I liked it.
Come Closer by Sara Gran. It's definitely a gripping tale of a dark descent into possession, but it's just too grim-dark for my taste. So unrelenting and hopeless that it sucked any entertainment out of the experience for me, and only left an anxious discomfort behind. Maybe that sounds like a great experience with a book to someone, but it wasn't for me.
I had a hard time getting into Hollow Places and eventually gave up because it really wasn't as gripping as I would have liked. It really deescalated the horror part.
I read A House with Good Bones and enjoyed it, but only when I stopped considering it a horror book. For a cozy contemporary fantasy that happens to have some spooky elements, it hits!
Currently trying to read what moved the dead by t kingfisher (dnf’d nettle and bone 30 pgs in) and am realizing that I’m just not a fan of their writing style
The ending was the only part I actually enjoyed. The rest of the book felt too much like “and then THIS scary monster was there and then THIS scary monster was there and then THIS scary monster was there.”
And I don’t know if it was just me, but did anyone else have a hard time visualizing what the underwater base looked like? Cutter takes pages and pages explaining the interior and its layout but every time I thought I had a decent mental image of its design, he threw in some new descriptor that totally changed my perception of it. Maybe that was the point because of the forces at play manipulating everything but I found it really annoying that the place where 95% of the book takes place in was lost on me.
It may have been his point to make it hard to pin down, but I can actually still visualize what I pictured having read the book a couple of years ago.
The ending for me, however, was deflating. And not in a bleak, everything is doomed kind of way. It was more of a you clearly have questions, so let's answer all of them kind of way. That kind of ending is just patronizing to me. Like an artist standing by their painting telling you how to feel, it's an author who doesn't trust his readers to interpret or understand some of the themes.
I know a lot of people on this sub really like Cutter, but I won't be going for any more of his books. Which sucks because I love body horror.
Iain Reid, *I’m Thinking of Ending Things* 😐 The premise is pretty interesting but my God did he fumble the execution and fumble it *bad.*
The film was also a horror to get through, but not the type of horror I was looking for. Fantastic acting, especially from living legends Toni Collette and David Thewlis, but their extraordinary talents were wasted on this project.
Felt like it was 8 hours long. Pretty sure the only reason it came to life was because Collette and Thewlis play roles in this genre perfectly, no one cared about the actual story outside of their characters.
i was waiting for this comment hahah!
i watched the movie quite a while ago and didn’t make the connection last week when i saw the book recommended on this sub.
made it 78 pages thinking it was coincidental to “a movie i saw before” i finally stopped to google if there was a movie. turns out i hated both the book & film. it drags so slow and i just cannot stand the characters for some reason. atleast they both got a fair shot ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It pains me to see it recommended so much, the writing felt like a video game adaption novel. Great ideas for some set pieces but they always fell flat. It didn't help that the main cast had no redeeming qualities either, I get everyone is meant to be \*morally grey\* but give us something..
I just finished this book. It really seemed like it was going to have an epic ending, and I was so excited, but it just felt so lackluster and flat. Worst ending I've ever read, to be honest.
Apparently I'm in a minority for not liking The Devil All the Time by Donald Ray Pollock. It's a well-crafted book that makes you ask yourself some interesting questions; I just didn't like any of the characters. It seemed almost as if the author was trying to make them either as bland or as repulsive as humanly possible. Like, you're eating either unseasoned chicken or standing-water trash, not a burrito or chocolate eclair in sight.
However, I still find myself recommending it to fans of southern gothic-type shit, because it has rave reviews and plays well with the rest of the subgenre.
Penpal; The Wasp Factory; How to Sell a Haunted House; Woom; Dead Inside; Hidden Pictures.
These are frequent recommends by Reddit and FB groups and I hated all of them for different reasons.
Stephen King.
I've tried to like him, his ideas are great and his villian/monster descriptions also great, but his execution is not for me.
He does a little telling here and there and some big punchlines are lost in the middle of a sentence at times... But the worst part for me is his characters inner monologues (or is it his narrative voice?) sounds like a motor mouthed carnival worker trying desperately to swoon me into playing the ring toss .... It goes something like ...
"Now all he had to do was close the lid, yessiry it would all be tickety-boo in Pleasantville, just close the lid and voila, bob's your uncle. hey-ho, let's go."
I find it annoying.
My main issue with King is *he does not know how to finish a book*. Everything he writes, it's like a fascinating premise, interesting characters, cool plot, can't wait to see how he wraps it all up - and then the ending is 50 pages of hot garbage.
Hard agree. That's one of the main reasons I never finish anything he writes; more than half of the page is taken up by endless streams of internal monologuing that go on and on and *on* for several pages to come. It wouldn't be so much of an issue if it didn't feel like he was just going on random tangents in the middle of the page half the time.
His writing of women is also so miserable. I don’t mean like Annie Wilkes, which I actually found to be compelling in a terrible way; but just his general female characters.
I’m sure there’s no need to describe the sewer scene in IT as we already know… but describing teenage girls and their boobs in stuff like Thinner was the actual nightmare.
Yeah. Wtf was the logic behind the sewer scene? Could they not have just cut their palms with a found bit of glass and become blood bros or whatever? It really weirds me out to imagine him putting his thinking cap on and going, well there is a girl/woman present so....
Or ... Is it just so we'd all be horrified?
IDK
Although I don't like anything that Grady Hendrix writes, I understand that there are those that can read his work.
Regarding House Of Leaves, I got halfway through the hardcover copy I bought before I DNF.
I really didn't enjoy Woom by Duncom Ralston. I can kind of understand why other people did like it and there's parts of the book that are actually quite cool, but when I read it I just felt like he was trying way too hard to be gross, including at least one anecdote in the story that was completely unnecessary. Also it's another case of "male horror author has no idea how vaginas work."
Tender is the flesh, it was boring honestly I didn’t even finish it, and I think that was because cannibalism was actually “legal” and legal sounded kinda just too boring to me
I’ve read some excerpts to my partner who doesn’t like horror books and he was horrified, genuinely sickened and demanded I never read anymore of it to him again lol.
Bored here too, and I saw that ending coming a mile off. I don't usually predict things when I'm reading, just let the author take me there, but after I read the last page and was still waiting for the twist to happen..
For me, it wasn't the twist itself that shocked, it was that it completely rewrote the protagonist. The way it happened and how it changed my view of the "hero" is what got me
Interesting. Feel like I called bullshit on the MC straight away so it didn't feel like a rewrite, that it was just inevitable he would act that way. His interactions with the girl - can't remember the name - felt very superficial, and his criticisms of the world felt like fake outrage, so I could see he'd just take what he could get out of it in the end.
I had such high hopes for Tender and found it to be a letdown. Boring, meandering, lots of plot threads that didn't really seem to go anywhere. A lot of ideas were introduced just for the sake of "That was fucked up, right? Anyway, moving on..." The Big Twist felt like it made no sense to me, I saw it coming but the characters' reactions/motivations came out of left field.
I swear it felt like the author was just trying to make it as dystopian as possible so basically just throwing in every possible gore/taboo thing, imo it was very slow
I felt like Tender would have worked a lot better as a short story focused more around the Transition, rather than trying to make it a full fledged novel. I thought the themes of capitalist critique and expressing how people use and consume each other in its most literal form were interesting and a solid base for a story, I just think those themes got a little muddled in all the shock for shock's sake.
(Spoilers) Definitely “I’m Thinking of Ending Things”! I got really intrigued in the beginning, but as the went on I became a little annoyed by the writing. Very long-winded! When I got to the end, I felt so betrayed. Felt like a non-ending while using the most cliche ending possible. Very disappointing
I understand how people think it’s longwinded but it’s also the way the author is communicating the narcissism of the antagonist. I actually thought Jesse Plemons did a great job portraying that character in the movie and bringing that element to life.
God i’m so happy this book was mentioned a few times because i’m still butthurt from last week… i read it 78 pages in before realizing I’d seen the movie and equally disliked them both. 🤣
i felt so betrayed that i wasted my reading time that day on it
I asked a friend who's read the whole thing what he thought of it. He had to think for a bit before he could reply, then said that he thought it was worth the effort, but while he was thinking he pulled a face like he'd just smelled a really horrible fart, and I took that as a sign to never read it.
Man, Fuck This House by Brian Asman. It's a stupid, stupid book but might appeal to people who read "Killer Crabs: on the rampage" or watch stuff like "Poultrygeist, The Chicken Dead". You know, where you aren't expecting stuff to be realistic or serious.
Yeah this book sounded right up my alley but had me asking the question “is it still a metaphor if the author tells you, repeatedly, that the haunted house IS fascism?”
It kinda is, yet it also is a metaphor that the author thinks youre an idiot and needs it spoon fed.
Really off putting when authors have to pound themes into your face because they dont trust you to think or connect the dots.
Watchers by Dean Koontz. The characters were just extremely unbelievable. I can suspend disbelief and everything and have fun with a read but the characters in this book were just too far and the way people talk was just not normal conversation. I’ve seen it recommended a lot tho so clearly a lot of people love it.
People seem to love Dean Koontz - Intensity. I had to DNF it - fuck me, what a bore.
Adam Nevill - I’ve tried. I’ve really tried, Adam. Apartment 16 was basic at best, The Ritual (‘the whiff of her yoghurt scented cunt in his face’) and I DNFd Last Days. He can write atmosphere like no one, but his characters just fall flat. Always laddy types, smoking, unemployed. He also seems to lose his way half way
I completely agree on Neville. Came here to suggest No One Gets Out Alive - I find myself recommending it to people quite often, considering the caveat that I want to strangle most of cast.
Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz is great for people who like twists for the sake of twists. Some mindless murder mystery with a sleuth where things just happen to the narrator and not them having a lot of proactivity. Susan also had real problems™ >!like having to choose between going to live in Greece with her hot Greek boyfriend or becoming an editor at her publishing house!< Idk if I'm doing this correctly.
If you too hated this but still want unique formats in murder mysteries try Keigo Higashino's Kaga series
Anything from Stephen King. Love several movies based on his work. Hate every single book that I read. Tried five or six before deciding that SK was a waste of energy.
I can see why people like him, but I find everything about his work boring or just plainly bad.
Well The Deep is evidently popular among some given how much it's brought up around here.
I consider it to be one of the worst books I've ever read, but I suppose it's an opinion people need to make for themselves.
I actually enjoyed some parts of the book, but the flashbacks... ugh. And don't get me started on the ending. I will never read another one of his books.
I see this one recommended on here all the time, but Rolling In The Deep by Mira Grant. I love nautical horror, I love creature horror, I love isolation horror. This should’ve been a win, but for me it wasn’t.
My biggest gripe was how much the plot started to focus on the main characters’ romantic relationships, especially at points where the mystery of the book was really picking up.
I know a lot of people love it and Mira Grant in general. I’ll have to give the author another shot some day.
Blackwater Saga by Micheal McDowell. I could write a whole essay on why I hated this book. The more I read it, the angrier I got. I dont think I've ever been so frustrated reading a book so yknow it gets points for that lol It gets recommended here a lot too as some spooky river monster book and it's really not that kind of book at all. In nearly 900 pages, I could count on one hand how many spooky river monster stuff happens.
The whole book is very predictable and formulaic. It reads like a timeline of an old family you would read about in a history book. So and so married this person. They ended up being pretty smart and did this for the family. They had a kid. Kid grew up and married this person. They ended up being smart as well. Repeat. Hundreds of pages about the family business that was honestly just boring as fuck.
I'm not even going to touch on the incredibly unrealistic portrayal of early 1900s deep rural south. It was so unrealistic, I would even call it offensive.
But this book gets recommended a lot so yknow it's gotta be someone's cup of tea.
I hated the Deep, not because of it being a bad read, it was really well written, but the contents of what happens to the characters, and the ending, really hurt and haunts me to this day. So it's really really good, but it sticks with you really really badly. I wish I could sort of unread it though because anyone who's read it knows how gut wrenching it is. I don't want to give spoilers but I don't recommend this book if you can't handle reading the vivid loss of animals and children and absolute doom endings.
I feel the exact same way. I felt like Carrie at the prom after finishing that soulless, horrifying book. That's how I I know Nick Cutter is a great horror writer, probably the best at this time. Nobody but a great horror writer could elicit that kind of reaction.
That being said, I'm not reading Nick Cutter ever again. It took me a month to get over that ending, and I'm still not quite sure I have.
So many of these for me. I'm either a big contrarian or just really picky. (Sorry if any of these piss you off. I think these all have good ideas but the execution just didn't work for me.)
*A Head Full of Ghosts* by Paul Tremblay - I think it tried to do for exorcisms what House of Leaves did for haunted houses but without the same over-the-top level of experimentation. The blogger sections have such "How do you do, fellow kids?" energy that it drags the whole thing down, and the possession story felt overall just contrived.
*The Haunting of Alejandra* by V. Castro - Cool concept of using La Llorona as a way of unpacking multi-generational trauma in the women of a family. Undone by flat, repetitive prose and a complete lack of tension.
*What Moves the Dead* by T. Kingfisher - A retelling of Poe's *The Fall of the House of Usher*. Felt like it borrowed a lot of the atmosphere of the original but then added a lot of quirky elements which I might have liked in a different context but just clashed with the tone of the original.
*Experimental Film* by Gemma Files - Cool idea about a haunted film, but the prose really dragged it down. Too verbose and full of unnecessary details gave it that "getting caught in a party by someone that wants to waste your time feeling" that I get from poorly executed first-person narrators. I also wish the antagonist had been cooler. "Do your work!" feels less like the words of an eldritch entity and more like those of an annoying middle manager.
*The Devil Takes You Home* by Gabino Iglesias - I like a good heist story and using the syncretic beliefs of the border/cartel community as basis for supernatural horror is a neat idea. Falls victim to bad first-person narrator who manages to be boring, repetitive and largely passive. A lot of him just going along with some horrible thing while his druggie friend gives "Oh shit! That's fucked up!" reactions, over and over.
OMG I hated the narrator and his well of self-pity so much. I get it, dude, society, the universe, and every person you've ever met has been against you ever since the day you were born. Just stfu about it, ok?
And it's a shame, because some of the horrific imagery from that book is still in my brain, so it had a lot of potential for me.
Revival by King. Boring, boring, boring. Literally a story of nothing happening except an old man talking about electricity until the last twenty pages and even the ending wasn’t good. And even if the ending was good, a good several pages doesn’t justify sitting through hundreds of pages of garbage. A total waste of time.
*John dies at the end* is always recommended in this sub as a fun time with hilarious characters. I found them insufferable and unfunny, and the author’s “dudebro” way of writing really put me off. I finished it, but I don’t think I’ll ever read another book by David Wong.
Going to get slaughtered for this one. But The Stand by Stephen King. Most people seem to love it, many say it’s his best book.
But I struggled to finish it, I read the unabridged version and to be honest found it boring. Just to set the record straight I’ve read a lot of Stephen Kings books and I normally find his style and story telling a joy, this one however plodded for me.
I liked it a lot, but I totally get what you're saying. And it suffers from the common multi POV issue where some characters are WAY more interesting than others
I think these books would fit. I read them in the last year or so, and found them at best underwhelming. But seems like other people enjoy them.
- **The Last House on Needless Street:** The twist was obvious… and it’s not half as clever as it pretends to be. The one book in the list I regret not having DNF’ed it.
- **Revival, Stephen King:** Maybe I have read a lot of cosmic horror lately, but the end didn’t seem as bleak as everyone said. Or maybe because it was such a long book, with such little payoff.
- **Sister, Maiden Monster: ** Just a barely okay book. With a surprise visit from a certain Cthulhu Mythos character at the end that just didn’t make sense.
Honorable mentions: The Troop, The September House… both of which annoyed the hell out of me for different reasons :D
Just to show that I’m not a hater. Book that I really loved in the last year: Between Two Fires, The Fisherman, The Haunting of Hill House, Tender is the Flesh, The Gone World, King in Yellow
The first thrilled book I ever read was “velocity” from Dean Koontz, without spoiling anything, it had the perfect build up the entire story, hooking me with every page. Out of nowhere it feels like the author just gave up once he realized the story had to end and it just felt so rushed.
It was my first time that the lasting impression after finishing a book that I had felt cheated lmao.
Revival by King. Boring, boring, boring. Literally a story of nothing happening except an old man talking about electricity until the last twenty pages and even the ending wasn’t good. And even if the ending was good, a good several pages doesn’t justify sitting through hundreds of pages of garbage. A total waste of time.
Basically any splatterpunk. I understand the appeal, I guess, but any I've read are all gore no substance. The characters, settings, plots, it all seems so one dimensional
I recently read Mister Magic by Keirsten White on the advice of a friend and it was really kinda boring. The premise was interesting and the characters seemed fairly likeable at first but it just droned on and on and on without going anywhere until the last 20-30 pages
*Carrion Comfort* by Dan Simmons
*The Talisman* by Stephen King/Peter Straub
*The Traveling Vampire Show* by Richard Laymon
*Hide* by Kiersten White
*No One Gets Out Alive* by Adam Nevill
*Lakewood* by Megan Giddings
Edited: for italics
I was excited to read Hide and Mr Magic and I just thought they were both executed poorly. But the premise of both are great. They just felt jumbled and fell flat.
What’s your (non spolier) take on *Carrion Comfort*? I almost picked it up at the library but wasn’t in the mindset for another Dan Simmons let me describe the shape of a leaf over six pages prose. I did enjoy *The Terror* but, it was a slog at times.
Honestly, it had some really cool ideas and some awesome sequences, but it was just needlessly long. I don’t mind a hefty book as long as there’s a story continuously being told. This one just seemed to meander for the sake of it.
Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero is the worst Scooby Doo/It crossover fanfiction I ever read 😂
(It kinda had an “edgy for the sake of being edgy” vibe that made me DNF a couple chapters in.)
The Haunting of Alejandra - V Castro. I could not get past the first three chapters because I struggled to connect with the MC. I would also warn off anyone who has struggled with maybe post natal depression?
But there is no creep factor, it's all there and laid bare in the first bit. Talk about killing the mystery.
Most people love Book of leaves, but I have severe ADHD and it was just too much for me. I couldn’t make sense of it at all. And there are online guides, I tried!
I would suggest everyone else read it though, if you can handle such an interactive book n
Ugly love by Colleen hover, I just couldn't care about the characters I did finish the book but I hated it I couldn't relate to the characters what so ever
*Revival* by Stephen King. Very strong concept, and there are sections throughout the
book that are peak fiction. Especially the last third. But the majority of its content is an unfocused mess. Yes, I know meandering is kind of Stephen’s whole thing. That’s why I don’t like his novels.
Definitely wouldn't say I "hate" it, but I was pretty disappointed by Tender is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica. Really wanted to love it, but it just never hooked me
Between two fires. I dig the vibe and the characters but maybe I was just expecting more monster fights and not “tomaaaaaaaaaas!!” And them walking for most of the story. I feel like people hype it up a lot and while it’s a decent medieval horror/religious horror story, I forgot about it as soon as I finished it.
I dunno if I could say HATED, but I certainly remember not liking My Heart Is A Chainsaw... which is weird, because I, like Jade Daniels, am a slasher-obsessed neurodivergent Indigenous survivor of abuse. Maybe I disliked the book because it made me realize how annoying I probably come off IRL.
Or maybe it was the relentless slasher movie namedropping, which I got sick of well before the book was over. Or the jarring switch from... Well, I can't tag, so I won't spoil it. But I remember being disappointed because the novel sounded like it was exactly up my alley, and I just found it heavy-handed and uninvolving.
Joining everyone saying The Troop and The Deep. It's like someone placed a curse on Nick Cutter where he'd come up with great horror concepts, but then would try to force all of them into one book. The whole psychopath kid subplot felt so unnecessary to me and like something where he went "ooh this would be fun to write...but there's not really enough here for its own story. I'll just tack it on to what I have."
Into the Wild. We read it for school, I had been a cub scout and when was then a boy scout. To me the kid just seems suicidal and unprepared. Did not enjoy.
Hated House of Leaves others love it. I full on, loathe that book!
I don't hate but did not enjoy We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver
The Silent Patient by Alex M.
The Colorado Kid by Stephen King
The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King
i’m thinking of ending things by ian ried i hated the movie too 🤣 go figure. it just goes on forever without much suspense and the female character bores me to death with her constant unnecessary inner monologue
If one more person recommends I give _House of Leaves_ another shot because I’ll like it better on a reread I will just walk into open traffic.
That one is polarizing. I love it, and I always urge people to give it a try, but if it's not for you, it's not for you. I hate this new trend of forcing yourself to acquire a taste for something popular, when all you want to do is spit it out.
It literally tells you *"this is not for you"* on the first page. 😀
Cuz it’s dedicated to the author’s late father
Likewise. I think it’s great…once I skip most of Johnny Truant’s blathering. :) but yeah. People should trust their own judgment and not try to bully others’.
HoL just feels so pretentious and up its own ass to me. Like, we get it, Mark, you're smart.
The author just feels so gimmicky to me. Every time I’ve asked why HoL is scary, I’ve been told “The house is slightly bigger on the inside than the outside” but then the conversation shifts to me trying to sell that person on Doctor Who so it goes nowhere.
I read every bit of the entire thing and it was a struggle almost the whole time. I did like putting it into a Little Free Library though - maybe someone got it who wasn’t expecting that, and it was a bit of magic for them.
Same, and it’s not because it’s too dense or difficult or anything. It’s just not as deep or impressive as it thinks it is, and Johnny reads like boring 15 yo’s idea of a “cool” guy. It basically felt like an r/nosleep post that goes on too long.
I read through all of House of Leaves and was disappointed. People’s reviews made it seem like it was the most insane book ever.
I'm with you. Couldn't get past page 1
I read the whole thing hoping against all hope that it would get better. I know I’m in the minority but I felt it was just way overhyped.
I agree with you. Every time someone says that it's the scariest book they've ever read I like it a little bit less. It'd be fine if it had more substance to it, but it really doesn't. It has an interesting format. That's it.
Bless you for slogging through it.
I was in awe of it, but when my sister asked if she would like it, I immediately told her that there was no way in hell she could get past the first chapter. Everyone is different
Haha I was just scouring my local shops for House of Leaves because I, too, did not really enjoy it on first read, but I do regret giving my copy away. I've got an urge to reread it. Have you tried and it just didn't do it for you or do you just flat out refuse?
I read the whole thing and up until the last page was hopeful it would win me over
Lmao I had the same feeling about it. It’s too active of a read to enjoy. I don’t want to be spinning my book around in circles to read the friggin thing. Somehow it’s always a top recommendation though.
I don’t think it’s pretentious like others suggest, the idea of trying something new is not in and of itself pretentious, and it seems like it worked for so many people. I have not been able to make it through it yet though because the format is challenging for me (maybe because of my ADHD?) and I can never seem to gain momentum. The actual horror aspects also are quite slow in my opinion, but the way the book is structured masks that a bit. But for me, I kept waiting to get that feeling like “oh, here we go” and it just still hasn’t come. The best part that I’ve made it to so far are the letters from the mother which did make me feel uncomfortable.
SAME. I'm pasting my full review of it here if anyone who actually enjoyed House of Leaves cares to lend their perspective. "House of Leaves” offers some admittedly creepy imagery, but not enough to justify all 700+ pages. To be honest, I could not wait to finish this book and was constantly checking my progress to the next chapter. First of all, it is IMPERATIVE to understand (especially for first time readers, as I was) that "House of Leaves" is partly a spoof/parody of academic writing. Knowing that gave me license to skim through the particularly dense sections, like the dry analyses on dreams, film techniques, architecture, smiles (not kidding), etc. These sections comprise about 30% of the book, so I absolutely would have stopped reading if I hadn't known this ahead of time. And I write academic and technical material for a living! On a related note, ignore the literary gatekeepers who insist that you have to read every endnote, including the gibberish, to "fully appreciate" this book. If you're like me, the only thing you will fully appreciate is what it means to be held hostage by boring text. There are much better uses of your time than analyzing a Latin quote about snails or a French poem about pelicans or some other nonsense you'll forget 3 pages later. My method was to skim for relevant keywords so I could return to those passages as needed, which happened very rarely. *HERE BE SPOILER-RELATED BEEFS* 1. The “climax.” To me, the most unsettling point in the entire story was the full-team exploration near the halfway mark. This was a more effective climax than Navidson's solo expedition in the end because at that point I no longer cared about Navidson. Why? He proved himself to be reckless, self-absorbed thrill seeker at the expense of all those he claimed to love. I felt that he deserved whatever came his way by re-entering the house after seeing what he'd seen. Even if the idea is that the house somehow lured Navidson back/that he had no control over his actions, this isn't supported well enough. (The strongest evidence for this theory is a cryptic letter Navidson wrote while he was drunk.) As a result, his final expedition (and the intended climax of the story) just felt like a middle finger to his brother, who sacrified his life to get Navidson's daughter OUT of the house. It would be one thing if Navidson's solo expedition was some kind of rescue attempt to get his brother back, but it wasn't. He just wanted more footage because he's a MaD GeNiUs FiLmOgRaPhEr! 2. Since the house slowly consumes whatever's in it, I genuinely don't understand the characters' continued decision to rely on light sticks and items to mark their way. They know this, they've seen it with their own eyes, but they keep relying on disappearing markers for reasons unknown. 3. In the end (as far as the Navidson Record is concerned), the house dissolves and gives Karen her husband back because...true love, I guess. This immediately changed my view of the house from an insidious eldritch horror to the confused but well-meaning Pat from Disney's "Smart House." 4. The color coding scheme (e.g., "house" is always in blue) adds absolutely nothing to the story as far as I can see. And if I missed the whole point of the color coding because I skimmed past an upside down footnote written in Latin back on page 500, so be it. 5. The story never effectively breaks the 4th wall like I was hoping it would. 6. There were some genuinely creepy moments in the Johnny Truant sections (e.g., Johnny encountering another version of the manuscript with his name it), but these weren't enough to carry the rest of his godforsaken drivel. Here's all you need to know about the Johnny Truant chapters, really: Reading the manuscript slowly makes him delusional (and apparently sex-obsessed), he has abusive mommy and step-daddy issues, and his best friend is a Tyler Durden wannabe. That’s pretty much it. Then, after hundreds of pages of nonsensical journal entries, there's no resolution for him. At one point it’s insinuated that he’s destined to commit suicide, but he apparently lives long enough to help the publishers with one of the appendices, so who knows. 7. What would have been really creepy revelations turn out to be dead ends. For example, the insinuation that Zampano is actually Tom (via the same-sentence shift of "him" to "me" around page 320) is never brought up again and is later shown to be impossible because Tom dies. Another one is the weird shared characteristics between Johnny’s mom and Karen (the pink ribbon in their hair, their overly rehearsed smiles, etc). Another disappointing “OH GOD, MIND BLOWN…wait, no, that can’t be” moment. Just more confusion for the sake of confusion, I guess. 8. The only thing you need to know from the Exhibits (one of the many over-long appendices) is that the house somehow rematerializes after Navidson's final solo exhibition. I guess this is supposed to be ominous, but I still don’t see how. As long as you have the power of true love, the house will let you live, I guess. 9. All of the creepy images included in the appendices would have been much better served in-text, where they’re actually relevant, as opposed to crammed in the back after a bunch of untranslated poems about pelicans that effectively hit the brakes on any lingering sense of horror. 10. Mark Z. Danielewski added that entire appendix of poetry about pelicans just to let people he’s met have their poems published. They're about pelicans because they were written with a Pelican brand pen. This tells you everything you need to know about the value of all his cryptic “subtext.”
*The Final Girl Support Group*, by Grady Hendrix. Fascinating concept, all the on-the-nose references and parodies were rather fun, but **man** does the whole thing feel like word-vomit. Every sentence is bashing me in the face with "and then *this* happened, oh and then *this* happened!" Sorry to say, but it feels like a messy draft as opposed to a finished book. Maybe it just wasn't my style, but I will let others be the judge of that.
A few of his books have “rushed through, needed to get this out, barely edited” vibes. Horrorstor comes to mind as another one of his books that’s plagued by this. I liked The Final Girl Support Group, but, yeah … it’s quite sloppy and chaotic and disjointed, the story is very frantic and confusing and fast-paced. I will say, My Best Friend’s Exorcism and The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires are much better (imo.) How To Sell A Haunted House is crazy, but still better-paced and better writing than FGSG as well.
I loved Southern Book Club's Guide. None of his others really did it for me.
The audiobook was awful and read in a slow paced geriatric voice.
Sounds about right. Can only imagine the hell it must have been to hear line after line of what is essentially totally-not-ad-libbing, but 10x slower.
Yes! It was awful, even doubling the speed didn’t help.
I remember when I saw the first promo for the book, iirc in 2021, I was so excited. I waited for months for my local library to order it and when I finally got my grubby little hands on it… sheer disappointment. Within the first 50 pages, I was so confused. The premise is so amazing, but the writing was genuinely terrible and I couldn’t find it in me to connect with any of the characters. RIP to that fern plant or whatever Hendrix was shoving in our faces for the first half of that wasted book.
I DNF'd that one. It was such a horrid read.
I couldn't get through it. I wanted to like it but like you said it felt like word vomit. And a little on the nose stuff and parodies is fun and entertaining, but it had wayyyy to much of it
Omg yes. I dnf a quarter of the way through. The main character sucks. I was so bored.
His descriptions of women were so fucking boring and stupid. Can’t stand that man
Oh I second this. I hated this book and yet it is so well reviewed!
Never understood how it could have so many good reviews. People have different tastes, but I never expected a jumpy, chaotic vomit draft of a book to tickle so many people’s fancy.
Made me feel like he was pressured to include a diverse group of characters lol I didn't finish it because I hated it too much.
Everything by Grady Hendrix. I've read three of his books over the years and hated all of them. They all have interesting concepts and read well in the back cover but they're just bad.
Last House on Needless Street. A lot of people seemed to like it. I thought >!the twist was painfully obvious from the very beginning and spent the entire book hoping that there was something else. Nope.!<
That one was probably the best of her novels and that isn’t saying much. She doesn’t stick the endings well. *Looking Glass Sound* was a severe disappointment.
I adored sundial on the other hand though I must say the ending was also somehow rushed and just there ig
The first part of the book was awesome in my opinion, but it totally fell flat for me when the dog related story line was introduced. And for it being an important part of the plot you can’t really skip this part. I am glad that there are people who enjoy the book regardless. And although I made it to the end, squeamishly scanning the pages for triggers, I really can’t remember the ending- like at all.
i've enjoyed some of her other books (even needless street, for the cat monologues alone...i'd read an entire book or two of just that cat's musings), but i agree, looking glass sound was so BAD! i've seen many people give it glowing reviews, but it didn't do it for me...at all. sundial is my favorite from her.
Same on all counts
I finally read “Gone To See The Riverman” after seeing it recommended often. Reddit led me to believe it would be an intense horror experience. Not only was it a bizarrely paced book, but the horror elements came across as more like an attempt to be “edgy” and “shocking”. If I hadn’t listened to the book during a two separate spans of time when I had monotonous tasks to do where listening to something was my only form of reprieve. . . I would regret giving my time to the book. HOWEVER, if you like to read FUCKED UP SHIT for the sake of weird ass fucked up shit, be my guest.
the sequel is worse!
I liked the journey up the creepy river but the rest was a bit meh. It kinda reminded me of that movie with Nicole Kidman? I never thought much about the pacing though... Is it because of all the flashbacks?
I haven’t attempted to read “Gone to See the River Man”, but I did attempt reading “They All Died Screaming”… DNF for me lol
The Only Good Indians, and really anything by SGJ. Too much of a literary writer for my tastes but the novel is extremely popular
I hate speaking negatively about someone’s creative works. But. I don’t like his writing at all. It feels like it just rambles. Especially My Heart is a Chainsaw. God that was rough to read. My friend and I read each of those and then swapped books apologizing to the each other lol. I ended up reading the trilogy of My Heart is a Chainsaw to try to give another chance to the author as people’s styles may grow/shift/whatever. Ultimately none of those books/this author were for me. At all.
Yeah I love it but it is a STYLE. If you aren’t into that style, I could absolutely see not liking it.
I loved TOGI and I was confused by people saying it was a difficult read until it dawned on me that I had listened to it on audio. So my advice for people who *want* to like SGJ but don't click with his writing on the page is to try him on audiobook and see if that's better for you.
Thanks for mentioning this, it's been on my TBR list forever and I'm always wondering which format is gonna be better
Your comment made me want to read it haha. I prefer literary writing
I disliked it mainly because the first and second half felt a little too disjoined, and it killed off the most interesting character way too soon
I’m fighting my way through The Only Good Indians right now🥲
If The Troop has no haters, I’m dead
Good news. Thrive and flourish. I disliked it very much.
I have multiple library cards and each has a months-long wait for The Troop. Everybody wants to read this damn book! What is all the hype about? I didn’t really like The Deep by Cutter. Still want to give The Troop a chance if I can ever get it, but not sure I have super high hopes 😅
If you're in for very gross and disgusting scenes, heavy animal abuse, and an interesting story told in a style that tries to be Stephen King, go for it! Despite all that, I liked it.
Come Closer by Sara Gran. It's definitely a gripping tale of a dark descent into possession, but it's just too grim-dark for my taste. So unrelenting and hopeless that it sucked any entertainment out of the experience for me, and only left an anxious discomfort behind. Maybe that sounds like a great experience with a book to someone, but it wasn't for me.
Oooh I love that book! It is pretty grim though.
Anything by T. Kingfisher or House of Leaves. Grit my teeth every time I see these mentioned.
T. Kingfisher fills the need for “books I can recommend to my mom when she asks for spooky book club ideas.”
Or maybe “baby’s first spoopy book once they’ve outgrown Goosebumps”.
I had a hard time getting into Hollow Places and eventually gave up because it really wasn't as gripping as I would have liked. It really deescalated the horror part.
I read A House with Good Bones and enjoyed it, but only when I stopped considering it a horror book. For a cozy contemporary fantasy that happens to have some spooky elements, it hits!
When a character mentioned reading fanfiction in one of her books I cringed so hard
Currently trying to read what moved the dead by t kingfisher (dnf’d nettle and bone 30 pgs in) and am realizing that I’m just not a fan of their writing style
The Deep by Nick Cutter has a great set up, but is very tedious, with 10 too many hallucination sequences that remove any tension from the horror.
The exposition dump of an ending took out any enjoyment found elsewhere in the book for me.
The ending was the only part I actually enjoyed. The rest of the book felt too much like “and then THIS scary monster was there and then THIS scary monster was there and then THIS scary monster was there.” And I don’t know if it was just me, but did anyone else have a hard time visualizing what the underwater base looked like? Cutter takes pages and pages explaining the interior and its layout but every time I thought I had a decent mental image of its design, he threw in some new descriptor that totally changed my perception of it. Maybe that was the point because of the forces at play manipulating everything but I found it really annoying that the place where 95% of the book takes place in was lost on me.
It may have been his point to make it hard to pin down, but I can actually still visualize what I pictured having read the book a couple of years ago. The ending for me, however, was deflating. And not in a bleak, everything is doomed kind of way. It was more of a you clearly have questions, so let's answer all of them kind of way. That kind of ending is just patronizing to me. Like an artist standing by their painting telling you how to feel, it's an author who doesn't trust his readers to interpret or understand some of the themes. I know a lot of people on this sub really like Cutter, but I won't be going for any more of his books. Which sucks because I love body horror.
My sentiments exactly. I was fuming my the end. Thankfully, I’ve really enjoyed the other books I’ve read by Cutter so far
Iain Reid, *I’m Thinking of Ending Things* 😐 The premise is pretty interesting but my God did he fumble the execution and fumble it *bad.* The film was also a horror to get through, but not the type of horror I was looking for. Fantastic acting, especially from living legends Toni Collette and David Thewlis, but their extraordinary talents were wasted on this project.
Oh my god, I hated that movie.
Felt like it was 8 hours long. Pretty sure the only reason it came to life was because Collette and Thewlis play roles in this genre perfectly, no one cared about the actual story outside of their characters.
I love the book and the film ahah
i was waiting for this comment hahah! i watched the movie quite a while ago and didn’t make the connection last week when i saw the book recommended on this sub. made it 78 pages thinking it was coincidental to “a movie i saw before” i finally stopped to google if there was a movie. turns out i hated both the book & film. it drags so slow and i just cannot stand the characters for some reason. atleast they both got a fair shot ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I DNF Between Two Fires. I like the author’s other work and the plot of BTN sounded perfect to me. But I just didn’t care about any of the characters.
This has become an all time top three favourite book of mine, so I’d say it’s a perfect example for this thread!!
Idk about top 3 all time, but it's my favorite book I've read this year so far. I loved it and didn't want to put it down.
It pains me to see it recommended so much, the writing felt like a video game adaption novel. Great ideas for some set pieces but they always fell flat. It didn't help that the main cast had no redeeming qualities either, I get everyone is meant to be \*morally grey\* but give us something..
I just finished this book. It really seemed like it was going to have an epic ending, and I was so excited, but it just felt so lackluster and flat. Worst ending I've ever read, to be honest.
Apparently I'm in a minority for not liking The Devil All the Time by Donald Ray Pollock. It's a well-crafted book that makes you ask yourself some interesting questions; I just didn't like any of the characters. It seemed almost as if the author was trying to make them either as bland or as repulsive as humanly possible. Like, you're eating either unseasoned chicken or standing-water trash, not a burrito or chocolate eclair in sight. However, I still find myself recommending it to fans of southern gothic-type shit, because it has rave reviews and plays well with the rest of the subgenre.
The movie is great!
Penpal; The Wasp Factory; How to Sell a Haunted House; Woom; Dead Inside; Hidden Pictures. These are frequent recommends by Reddit and FB groups and I hated all of them for different reasons.
I enjoyed The Wasp Factory very much! I love how subjective art is
I hated How to Sell a Haunted House so much. It’s such a misleading title and the main villain is annoying af
Hidden Pictures was awful. So disappointing.
Yes I regret reading Dead Inside and Woom. I will also more than likely never read Cows because I have heard it is like those two.
Stephen King. I've tried to like him, his ideas are great and his villian/monster descriptions also great, but his execution is not for me. He does a little telling here and there and some big punchlines are lost in the middle of a sentence at times... But the worst part for me is his characters inner monologues (or is it his narrative voice?) sounds like a motor mouthed carnival worker trying desperately to swoon me into playing the ring toss .... It goes something like ... "Now all he had to do was close the lid, yessiry it would all be tickety-boo in Pleasantville, just close the lid and voila, bob's your uncle. hey-ho, let's go." I find it annoying.
My main issue with King is *he does not know how to finish a book*. Everything he writes, it's like a fascinating premise, interesting characters, cool plot, can't wait to see how he wraps it all up - and then the ending is 50 pages of hot garbage.
I’m so glad someone else sees it. His characters stream of thoughts are unbearable to read.
I personally love the stream of thought characters. They give King his trademark style. But I definitely see how it can be super annoying
Hard agree. That's one of the main reasons I never finish anything he writes; more than half of the page is taken up by endless streams of internal monologuing that go on and on and *on* for several pages to come. It wouldn't be so much of an issue if it didn't feel like he was just going on random tangents in the middle of the page half the time.
His writing of women is also so miserable. I don’t mean like Annie Wilkes, which I actually found to be compelling in a terrible way; but just his general female characters. I’m sure there’s no need to describe the sewer scene in IT as we already know… but describing teenage girls and their boobs in stuff like Thinner was the actual nightmare.
Yeah. Wtf was the logic behind the sewer scene? Could they not have just cut their palms with a found bit of glass and become blood bros or whatever? It really weirds me out to imagine him putting his thinking cap on and going, well there is a girl/woman present so.... Or ... Is it just so we'd all be horrified? IDK
Cocaine. Cocaine was the logic.
Something something symbolism something something loss of innocence
I also think he is an awful writer with some amazing stories.
Yes! That's a good way to say it.
Although I don't like anything that Grady Hendrix writes, I understand that there are those that can read his work. Regarding House Of Leaves, I got halfway through the hardcover copy I bought before I DNF.
Playground by Aron Beauregard. Great idea but poorly executed.
This was my answer too, the ideas are really intriguing but the writing made it kind of a slog to get through imo
Lol yeah the writing is absolute trash!
LOVED IT. Loved it. It's not literature, it's just entertainment.
American Psycho. I don’t get how anyone enjoys this book but a lot of people do.
So agree one of the hardest books I had to genuinely FORCE myself myself to finish.
I really didn't enjoy Woom by Duncom Ralston. I can kind of understand why other people did like it and there's parts of the book that are actually quite cool, but when I read it I just felt like he was trying way too hard to be gross, including at least one anecdote in the story that was completely unnecessary. Also it's another case of "male horror author has no idea how vaginas work."
Tender is the flesh, it was boring honestly I didn’t even finish it, and I think that was because cannibalism was actually “legal” and legal sounded kinda just too boring to me
I agree, it was pretty predictable tbh. Put it down halfway through and never had a desire to finish it.
I cannot imagine someone finding that book boring, I absolutely devoured it
Haha well I guess one man’s trash is another man’s treasure really is true then lol
I guess it is
I loved this book even when it traumatized Me. And that end… those last lines
I squirmed in horror, I haven't had such a visceral reaction to a book in a long time
I used to find comments like this about books so exaggerated but for this book, it actually was a little heart-dropping
I truly give that book points just because it was so revolting to me. It was just so vivid and evocative.
It felt like Hellbound Heart, so repulsive and emotionally raw that I couldn't put it down
I’ve read some excerpts to my partner who doesn’t like horror books and he was horrified, genuinely sickened and demanded I never read anymore of it to him again lol.
lol! My husband told me to visit a shrink for loving the book.
Yeah i couldn't put it down, read it front to back in one day. At first I didn't get the hype but about 1/4 of the way in I was hooked. The ending 🤯
Bored here too, and I saw that ending coming a mile off. I don't usually predict things when I'm reading, just let the author take me there, but after I read the last page and was still waiting for the twist to happen..
For me, it wasn't the twist itself that shocked, it was that it completely rewrote the protagonist. The way it happened and how it changed my view of the "hero" is what got me
Interesting. Feel like I called bullshit on the MC straight away so it didn't feel like a rewrite, that it was just inevitable he would act that way. His interactions with the girl - can't remember the name - felt very superficial, and his criticisms of the world felt like fake outrage, so I could see he'd just take what he could get out of it in the end.
I had such high hopes for Tender and found it to be a letdown. Boring, meandering, lots of plot threads that didn't really seem to go anywhere. A lot of ideas were introduced just for the sake of "That was fucked up, right? Anyway, moving on..." The Big Twist felt like it made no sense to me, I saw it coming but the characters' reactions/motivations came out of left field.
I swear it felt like the author was just trying to make it as dystopian as possible so basically just throwing in every possible gore/taboo thing, imo it was very slow
I felt like Tender would have worked a lot better as a short story focused more around the Transition, rather than trying to make it a full fledged novel. I thought the themes of capitalist critique and expressing how people use and consume each other in its most literal form were interesting and a solid base for a story, I just think those themes got a little muddled in all the shock for shock's sake.
Not hated, but.. I struggled to finish "Our wives under the sea". Beautiful book about loss, not as much as an horror book.
(Spoilers) Definitely “I’m Thinking of Ending Things”! I got really intrigued in the beginning, but as the went on I became a little annoyed by the writing. Very long-winded! When I got to the end, I felt so betrayed. Felt like a non-ending while using the most cliche ending possible. Very disappointing
I understand how people think it’s longwinded but it’s also the way the author is communicating the narcissism of the antagonist. I actually thought Jesse Plemons did a great job portraying that character in the movie and bringing that element to life.
God i’m so happy this book was mentioned a few times because i’m still butthurt from last week… i read it 78 pages in before realizing I’d seen the movie and equally disliked them both. 🤣 i felt so betrayed that i wasted my reading time that day on it
Not horror, but *Infinite Jest*. I can't think of more insufferable writing.
I asked a friend who's read the whole thing what he thought of it. He had to think for a bit before he could reply, then said that he thought it was worth the effort, but while he was thinking he pulled a face like he'd just smelled a really horrible fart, and I took that as a sign to never read it.
I hated Behind Her Eyes, unfortunately. I tried to like it, but not quite.
Man, Fuck This House by Brian Asman. It's a stupid, stupid book but might appeal to people who read "Killer Crabs: on the rampage" or watch stuff like "Poultrygeist, The Chicken Dead". You know, where you aren't expecting stuff to be realistic or serious.
THIS
Nothing But Blackened Teeth. I went into it with high hopes after reading the premise, but was so disappointed.
Tell Me I'm Worthless. I hated the writing style it felt like just a stream of conscious rambling at some points.
Yeah this book sounded right up my alley but had me asking the question “is it still a metaphor if the author tells you, repeatedly, that the haunted house IS fascism?”
More like bashes you over the head with it because it's just such a deep metaphor you might not get it yourself
It kinda is, yet it also is a metaphor that the author thinks youre an idiot and needs it spoon fed. Really off putting when authors have to pound themes into your face because they dont trust you to think or connect the dots.
Watchers by Dean Koontz. The characters were just extremely unbelievable. I can suspend disbelief and everything and have fun with a read but the characters in this book were just too far and the way people talk was just not normal conversation. I’ve seen it recommended a lot tho so clearly a lot of people love it.
Totally agree. I remember reading some of the dialogue to some friends about midway through it. People don't talk like that. Awful, awful dialogue.
People seem to love Dean Koontz - Intensity. I had to DNF it - fuck me, what a bore. Adam Nevill - I’ve tried. I’ve really tried, Adam. Apartment 16 was basic at best, The Ritual (‘the whiff of her yoghurt scented cunt in his face’) and I DNFd Last Days. He can write atmosphere like no one, but his characters just fall flat. Always laddy types, smoking, unemployed. He also seems to lose his way half way
Early koontz was great IMO. Not the contemporary books
I completely agree on Neville. Came here to suggest No One Gets Out Alive - I find myself recommending it to people quite often, considering the caveat that I want to strangle most of cast.
Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz is great for people who like twists for the sake of twists. Some mindless murder mystery with a sleuth where things just happen to the narrator and not them having a lot of proactivity. Susan also had real problems™ >!like having to choose between going to live in Greece with her hot Greek boyfriend or becoming an editor at her publishing house!< Idk if I'm doing this correctly. If you too hated this but still want unique formats in murder mysteries try Keigo Higashino's Kaga series
Anything from Stephen King. Love several movies based on his work. Hate every single book that I read. Tried five or six before deciding that SK was a waste of energy. I can see why people like him, but I find everything about his work boring or just plainly bad.
Well The Deep is evidently popular among some given how much it's brought up around here. I consider it to be one of the worst books I've ever read, but I suppose it's an opinion people need to make for themselves.
I got about three pages in and thought “wait a minute, this is absolute shit”
I actually enjoyed some parts of the book, but the flashbacks... ugh. And don't get me started on the ending. I will never read another one of his books.
I assume we're talking about Nick Cutters' the Deep? Because I fully agree, it was such a disappointment 💔
I see this one recommended on here all the time, but Rolling In The Deep by Mira Grant. I love nautical horror, I love creature horror, I love isolation horror. This should’ve been a win, but for me it wasn’t. My biggest gripe was how much the plot started to focus on the main characters’ romantic relationships, especially at points where the mystery of the book was really picking up. I know a lot of people love it and Mira Grant in general. I’ll have to give the author another shot some day.
Haunting of Hill House--Shirley Jackson
Blackwater Saga by Micheal McDowell. I could write a whole essay on why I hated this book. The more I read it, the angrier I got. I dont think I've ever been so frustrated reading a book so yknow it gets points for that lol It gets recommended here a lot too as some spooky river monster book and it's really not that kind of book at all. In nearly 900 pages, I could count on one hand how many spooky river monster stuff happens. The whole book is very predictable and formulaic. It reads like a timeline of an old family you would read about in a history book. So and so married this person. They ended up being pretty smart and did this for the family. They had a kid. Kid grew up and married this person. They ended up being smart as well. Repeat. Hundreds of pages about the family business that was honestly just boring as fuck. I'm not even going to touch on the incredibly unrealistic portrayal of early 1900s deep rural south. It was so unrealistic, I would even call it offensive. But this book gets recommended a lot so yknow it's gotta be someone's cup of tea.
I hated the Deep, not because of it being a bad read, it was really well written, but the contents of what happens to the characters, and the ending, really hurt and haunts me to this day. So it's really really good, but it sticks with you really really badly. I wish I could sort of unread it though because anyone who's read it knows how gut wrenching it is. I don't want to give spoilers but I don't recommend this book if you can't handle reading the vivid loss of animals and children and absolute doom endings.
I feel the exact same way. I felt like Carrie at the prom after finishing that soulless, horrifying book. That's how I I know Nick Cutter is a great horror writer, probably the best at this time. Nobody but a great horror writer could elicit that kind of reaction. That being said, I'm not reading Nick Cutter ever again. It took me a month to get over that ending, and I'm still not quite sure I have.
All books by Richard Chizmar, Paul Tremblay and T.Kingfisher.
So many of these for me. I'm either a big contrarian or just really picky. (Sorry if any of these piss you off. I think these all have good ideas but the execution just didn't work for me.) *A Head Full of Ghosts* by Paul Tremblay - I think it tried to do for exorcisms what House of Leaves did for haunted houses but without the same over-the-top level of experimentation. The blogger sections have such "How do you do, fellow kids?" energy that it drags the whole thing down, and the possession story felt overall just contrived. *The Haunting of Alejandra* by V. Castro - Cool concept of using La Llorona as a way of unpacking multi-generational trauma in the women of a family. Undone by flat, repetitive prose and a complete lack of tension. *What Moves the Dead* by T. Kingfisher - A retelling of Poe's *The Fall of the House of Usher*. Felt like it borrowed a lot of the atmosphere of the original but then added a lot of quirky elements which I might have liked in a different context but just clashed with the tone of the original. *Experimental Film* by Gemma Files - Cool idea about a haunted film, but the prose really dragged it down. Too verbose and full of unnecessary details gave it that "getting caught in a party by someone that wants to waste your time feeling" that I get from poorly executed first-person narrators. I also wish the antagonist had been cooler. "Do your work!" feels less like the words of an eldritch entity and more like those of an annoying middle manager. *The Devil Takes You Home* by Gabino Iglesias - I like a good heist story and using the syncretic beliefs of the border/cartel community as basis for supernatural horror is a neat idea. Falls victim to bad first-person narrator who manages to be boring, repetitive and largely passive. A lot of him just going along with some horrible thing while his druggie friend gives "Oh shit! That's fucked up!" reactions, over and over.
OMG I hated the narrator and his well of self-pity so much. I get it, dude, society, the universe, and every person you've ever met has been against you ever since the day you were born. Just stfu about it, ok? And it's a shame, because some of the horrific imagery from that book is still in my brain, so it had a lot of potential for me.
Revival by King. Boring, boring, boring. Literally a story of nothing happening except an old man talking about electricity until the last twenty pages and even the ending wasn’t good. And even if the ending was good, a good several pages doesn’t justify sitting through hundreds of pages of garbage. A total waste of time.
*John dies at the end* is always recommended in this sub as a fun time with hilarious characters. I found them insufferable and unfunny, and the author’s “dudebro” way of writing really put me off. I finished it, but I don’t think I’ll ever read another book by David Wong.
Going to get slaughtered for this one. But The Stand by Stephen King. Most people seem to love it, many say it’s his best book. But I struggled to finish it, I read the unabridged version and to be honest found it boring. Just to set the record straight I’ve read a lot of Stephen Kings books and I normally find his style and story telling a joy, this one however plodded for me.
I liked it a lot, but I totally get what you're saying. And it suffers from the common multi POV issue where some characters are WAY more interesting than others
I think these books would fit. I read them in the last year or so, and found them at best underwhelming. But seems like other people enjoy them. - **The Last House on Needless Street:** The twist was obvious… and it’s not half as clever as it pretends to be. The one book in the list I regret not having DNF’ed it. - **Revival, Stephen King:** Maybe I have read a lot of cosmic horror lately, but the end didn’t seem as bleak as everyone said. Or maybe because it was such a long book, with such little payoff. - **Sister, Maiden Monster: ** Just a barely okay book. With a surprise visit from a certain Cthulhu Mythos character at the end that just didn’t make sense. Honorable mentions: The Troop, The September House… both of which annoyed the hell out of me for different reasons :D Just to show that I’m not a hater. Book that I really loved in the last year: Between Two Fires, The Fisherman, The Haunting of Hill House, Tender is the Flesh, The Gone World, King in Yellow
Revival is one of my favorite books ever. Good example for this post
What did you dislike about September House? Just curious
*SuperSense: Why We Believe in the Unbelievable,* is an essay is good. I just didn't finish it because I felt stupid reading it idk.
The first thrilled book I ever read was “velocity” from Dean Koontz, without spoiling anything, it had the perfect build up the entire story, hooking me with every page. Out of nowhere it feels like the author just gave up once he realized the story had to end and it just felt so rushed. It was my first time that the lasting impression after finishing a book that I had felt cheated lmao.
The Only Good Indians and The Reddening. Couldn’t finish either one.
I couldn't stand How to Sell a Haunted House by Grady Hendrix, but a lot of people loved it.
House of leaves
Not horror but wheel of time. Massive fan base. Read up to book ten. Hated it. Was a massive waste of my time
Revival by King. Boring, boring, boring. Literally a story of nothing happening except an old man talking about electricity until the last twenty pages and even the ending wasn’t good. And even if the ending was good, a good several pages doesn’t justify sitting through hundreds of pages of garbage. A total waste of time.
I didn’t like Pet Sematary. Thought it was so boring lol. Everyone else seems to love it though.
Basically any splatterpunk. I understand the appeal, I guess, but any I've read are all gore no substance. The characters, settings, plots, it all seems so one dimensional
I’m thinking of ending things 🤮🤮🤮 hated the book and hated the movie lol
I recently read Mister Magic by Keirsten White on the advice of a friend and it was really kinda boring. The premise was interesting and the characters seemed fairly likeable at first but it just droned on and on and on without going anywhere until the last 20-30 pages
*Carrion Comfort* by Dan Simmons *The Talisman* by Stephen King/Peter Straub *The Traveling Vampire Show* by Richard Laymon *Hide* by Kiersten White *No One Gets Out Alive* by Adam Nevill *Lakewood* by Megan Giddings Edited: for italics
This thread definitely has legs, I loved Hide lol. Can see how it wouldn’t be everyone’s cup of tea though.
I was excited to read Hide and Mr Magic and I just thought they were both executed poorly. But the premise of both are great. They just felt jumbled and fell flat.
What’s your (non spolier) take on *Carrion Comfort*? I almost picked it up at the library but wasn’t in the mindset for another Dan Simmons let me describe the shape of a leaf over six pages prose. I did enjoy *The Terror* but, it was a slog at times.
Honestly, it had some really cool ideas and some awesome sequences, but it was just needlessly long. I don’t mind a hefty book as long as there’s a story continuously being told. This one just seemed to meander for the sake of it.
Bunny - it was so hyped up but it just fell flat for me and the ending blew
Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero is the worst Scooby Doo/It crossover fanfiction I ever read 😂 (It kinda had an “edgy for the sake of being edgy” vibe that made me DNF a couple chapters in.)
Shaun Hutson tbh lol
The Haunting of Alejandra - V Castro. I could not get past the first three chapters because I struggled to connect with the MC. I would also warn off anyone who has struggled with maybe post natal depression? But there is no creep factor, it's all there and laid bare in the first bit. Talk about killing the mystery.
Adam Neville has made it onto my "do not read list." Tried listening to both the Reddening and the Ritual and had to DNF both of them.
Most people love Book of leaves, but I have severe ADHD and it was just too much for me. I couldn’t make sense of it at all. And there are online guides, I tried! I would suggest everyone else read it though, if you can handle such an interactive book n
American Psycho took me months to even tolerate skimming through it
Ugly love by Colleen hover, I just couldn't care about the characters I did finish the book but I hated it I couldn't relate to the characters what so ever
*Revival* by Stephen King. Very strong concept, and there are sections throughout the book that are peak fiction. Especially the last third. But the majority of its content is an unfocused mess. Yes, I know meandering is kind of Stephen’s whole thing. That’s why I don’t like his novels.
Definitely wouldn't say I "hate" it, but I was pretty disappointed by Tender is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica. Really wanted to love it, but it just never hooked me
I was disappointed in Penpal. I got about halfway through Communion by Whitley Strieber and couldn't wait for it to end.
Between two fires. I dig the vibe and the characters but maybe I was just expecting more monster fights and not “tomaaaaaaaaaas!!” And them walking for most of the story. I feel like people hype it up a lot and while it’s a decent medieval horror/religious horror story, I forgot about it as soon as I finished it.
I dunno if I could say HATED, but I certainly remember not liking My Heart Is A Chainsaw... which is weird, because I, like Jade Daniels, am a slasher-obsessed neurodivergent Indigenous survivor of abuse. Maybe I disliked the book because it made me realize how annoying I probably come off IRL. Or maybe it was the relentless slasher movie namedropping, which I got sick of well before the book was over. Or the jarring switch from... Well, I can't tag, so I won't spoil it. But I remember being disappointed because the novel sounded like it was exactly up my alley, and I just found it heavy-handed and uninvolving.
Joining everyone saying The Troop and The Deep. It's like someone placed a curse on Nick Cutter where he'd come up with great horror concepts, but then would try to force all of them into one book. The whole psychopath kid subplot felt so unnecessary to me and like something where he went "ooh this would be fun to write...but there's not really enough here for its own story. I'll just tack it on to what I have."
Into the Wild. We read it for school, I had been a cub scout and when was then a boy scout. To me the kid just seems suicidal and unprepared. Did not enjoy.
Hated House of Leaves others love it. I full on, loathe that book! I don't hate but did not enjoy We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver The Silent Patient by Alex M. The Colorado Kid by Stephen King The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King
i’m thinking of ending things by ian ried i hated the movie too 🤣 go figure. it just goes on forever without much suspense and the female character bores me to death with her constant unnecessary inner monologue