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- Apr 22, 2015
Reminds me of the Mutilation Man (1998 ).
I like Clive but his work is pretty tame in comparison to at least 90% of the shit in this thread. I do highly recommend the first Book of Blood. The sequels are okay.
Best fucked up books
- Thread starter BrunoMattei
- Start date
Reminds me of the Mutilation Man (1998 ).
I like Clive but his work is pretty tame in comparison to at least 90% of the shit in this thread. I do highly recommend the first Book of Blood. The sequels are okay.
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- Jul 18, 2016
Whoa that clip is very much like the book I was talking about! Different type of atmosphere but very similar visuals, kind of...along the same vein, hehe.
Yknow, I suppose Clive's work could be called sort of tame, but I guess "fucked up" can have a lot of different meanings in literature as shown in this thread. What I mean is, "Hogg" or "120 Days" are "extreme" and very "gross", whereas something like "Geek Love" isn't particularly "gory" but it's profoundly twisted and weird. (glad to see others are fans of that one as well!) "The Other Side of the Mountain" is a much shorter read, that doesn't linger on the more "bloody" scenes, but it's one poke in the eye, punch in the gut, after another, and when you finish it, it rolls around in your head for a while, to say the least.
Some of the other books I listed don't have an excess of blood and guts (or shit or worms or whatever) but definitely are more nightmarish expressions of human experience. So I felt like our old buddy Clive deserves a bit of recognition considering we've mentioned Stephen King too, and I think they're similar in ways. They were both very "extreme" for their time--- I saw Hellraiser when I was quite young (shortly after it's release) and the special FX were so real to me at the time. But seeing it decades later the cheesy acting kinda fucks up a lot of the story, and while the FX are excellent, they seem dated to a lot of people now. Clive is special to me though, so maybe I'm just a sucker for his books. He was my first real dive into horror stories that were more cerebral and far better than a lot of other works out there.
We've also mentioned some other books that, on the surface, don't seem especially "fucked up" but once you finish them, the weight of their implications really set in. A good example as mentioned up-thread is "Never Let Me Go", which is written in a very...soft, almost sweet tone. It's very poetic and the sinister aspects are like light brush strokes (at first). The teenagers in it are almost too-normal in their hyper-clean, restricted environment. But since their being raised to essentially be perfect for harvesting organs, and they watch one another slowly die/drop off one by one, it really is a "fucked up" story. "The Road" was quite boring to me in comparision (as I'd read them around the same time), to me that one was just a rather bland and repetitive exercise in dystopian fiction (just, not McCarthy's best work).
Another good example of "not gory, but still horrifying" is The Handmaid's tale, which really is nightmarish. I'd read it years before its recent popularity and it's unfortunate Atwood's work is being referred to so flippantly in shitty tumblr rants about the `current state of affairs`.
Some of the other books I listed don't have an excess of blood and guts (or shit or worms or whatever) but definitely are more nightmarish expressions of human experience. So I felt like our old buddy Clive deserves a bit of recognition considering we've mentioned Stephen King too, and I think they're similar in ways. They were both very "extreme" for their time--- I saw Hellraiser when I was quite young (shortly after it's release) and the special FX were so real to me at the time. But seeing it decades later the cheesy acting kinda fucks up a lot of the story, and while the FX are excellent, they seem dated to a lot of people now. Clive is special to me though, so maybe I'm just a sucker for his books. He was my first real dive into horror stories that were more cerebral and far better than a lot of other works out there.
We've also mentioned some other books that, on the surface, don't seem especially "fucked up" but once you finish them, the weight of their implications really set in. A good example as mentioned up-thread is "Never Let Me Go", which is written in a very...soft, almost sweet tone. It's very poetic and the sinister aspects are like light brush strokes (at first). The teenagers in it are almost too-normal in their hyper-clean, restricted environment. But since their being raised to essentially be perfect for harvesting organs, and they watch one another slowly die/drop off one by one, it really is a "fucked up" story. "The Road" was quite boring to me in comparision (as I'd read them around the same time), to me that one was just a rather bland and repetitive exercise in dystopian fiction (just, not McCarthy's best work).
Another good example of "not gory, but still horrifying" is The Handmaid's tale, which really is nightmarish. I'd read it years before its recent popularity and it's unfortunate Atwood's work is being referred to so flippantly in shitty tumblr rants about the `current state of affairs`.
I really like how multi-faceted this thread has gotten, I hope we can keep it going without people repeating too many things. I'm a huge old book nerd so there's a few pages where I was pleased to see other fans of books I adore, and then lots of new things I'd not heard of.
Other honorable mentions that people ITT might like:
"Heart of Darkness" - the classic novel Joseph Conrad book that "Apocalypse Now" was based upon
"Headhunter" - Timothy Findlay, which also features Colonel Kurtz from HoD
"House of Dolls" - an "erotic" Holocaustsploitation novel written by an actual camp survivor, Yehiel De-Nur, wrote other books about prostitution/child abuse during the war
"The Most Beautiful Woman in Town" - Charles Bukowski. Most of the stories are somewhat typical Bukowski fare, but there's one in particular that is absolutely sickening, and quite effective for being so short in length.
"Gulag Archipelago" - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. A dizzyingly long and completely horrifying account of old Soviet gulag system. Of course you'd expect it to be horrible, but the descriptions of torture, numerous 'creative' deaths, interrogations, it just goes on and on. It's quite long and not exactly something you'd want to read, but you'll want to finish it anyway. Like the other books I listed above, this one is another visceral, sharp exploration into the evils of man, but this one is real.
I am currently reading The Library at Mount Char (Scott Hawkins), which I think also fits in here quite nicely. He's a new author to me, and I'm definitely eager to see more of his works. Link provided gives a summary far better than what I could explain (I don't think anything there counts as spoilers, it won't ruin it for you). I'm about half way through and keep thinking "what the actual fuck"
.... we haven't even gotten to JG Ballard yet!
[edit to add more original suggestions]
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- Joined
- Apr 22, 2015
I swear we mentioned Ballard somewhere. Although, I could be thinking of this thread: https://kiwifarms.net/threads/why-i-want-to-fuck-ronald-reagan.61768/
Crash is his masterwork.
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- Jul 18, 2016
I didn't see it early, but this thread got me clapping my hands like an autistic little seal in the ways only books can, so. Maybe I missed it, hehe.
Crash is definitely worthy of being in here though. It's a definitely one of those "i've got the weirdest boner right now" type of stories. I don't think I've ever read anything quite like it.
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- Dec 28, 2014
I love Dhalgren and have read and re-read it, Stars in My Pocket etc., Nova, the Neveryon books, all his short stories, even his autobiography The Motion of Light in Water, but Hogg is unreadable. More or less on purpose, I believe. It is absolutely intolerably ugly.
I really like Concrete Island, too. High Rise is absolutely brilliant. And Empire of the Sun is much better than the movie based on it, although I really like both. The Atrocity Exhibition is a great collection of short stories. I don't think the man was capable of writing badly or even putting one word where it didn't belong.
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- Apr 22, 2015
Another case where I like the film adaptation but have yet to read the original. The movie is like a nihilistic Wes Anderson movie.
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- Jul 18, 2016
You've got good taste, man! Nice to see another Delany fan. I agree, "Hogg" is absolutely nauseating, although I found it somewhat fun to read because it's such a deviation from his other stuff. I'd say it's high up there on the list of grossest books I've ever read.
I wasn't aware that both High Rise (with Jeremy Irons, no less!) and Empire were both made into films. I've seen the film adaptation after reading Crash, and felt it quite good. I'd certainly like to see the other two. If you like the High Rise film , I think you will enjoy the book.
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- Jan 27, 2020
I'm sorry but 120 days of Sodom read like a very long shit post.
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Not sure if this one's been mentioned, or if it's really that bad in comparison to others but Flowers In The Attic by VC Andrews royally fucked up 6th grader me for a bit
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- Dec 28, 2014
I always forget this was Christian Bale's first major role and then am freshly surprised when I remember it again.
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- Jan 27, 2020
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Did you read the whole series because it just keeps getting worse and more depressing
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- Jul 18, 2016
Well, there is a lot of shit in it. I remember finding this book at like, Borders or some normie bookstore, on the sale table. I didn't find the book particularly shocking. And although it's certainly full of very, very gross descriptions, I think this book doesn't get enough recognition for its humorous elements.
That said, I think that book stands above many of its type simply because of the time it was written. I feel like a lot of Pahlaniuk's work is, while technically well-written, has an air of shitpost. That is... when he's good, he's great, but some of his books just reek of trying far too hard.
I'd like to contribute a few more books to this thread:
The Bluest Eye - Toni Morrison
Young Pecola is floating in what seems to be a sea of ugliness, prays every day to be 'beautiful'--- to be white, to have blue eyes. Set in post-depression Midwest, this story gives us a lot of perspective on the complex influences race has on society, the concept of beauty, social conventions, poverty/employment. The storyline is somewhat simple, but the unwinding of her family's history is a slow burn that goes deep enough to gouge. Pecola eventually starts to unravel herself, chasing an impossible dream of beauty, in a suffocating world of incest, loneliness, anger, and racism. This is a very harsh read for numerous reasons, one being that it is through the realistic voice of a child (actually, two children, some chapters are from the perspective of her friend), and that Pecola's world is so brutal, cold, and ultimately relateable for many people. This one isn't a "blood and guts" fucked-up, it's looming and dark, with a dreamy, almost-grey-scale-psychedelic edge.
The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
A young boy lives on a remote island, spending much of his time alone. He passes his time building weapons and conducting obsessive, bizarre and sometimes violent rituals. Woven through our young psychopath's 'adventures' in isolation, we see that his brother is due to return home after release from a psychiatric hospital. Bit by bit, he begins to uncover answers to questions and curiousities their distant father wouldn't acknowledge.
This is a good read if you like a grim, clammy atmosphere interspersed with feverish twists and turns, yet not without some very dark humor. One of my favorites by this author (although everything I've read of his is excellent, imo)
The Tin Drum - Gunter Grass
It's better to read this before you see the film, although it won't ruin it if you've seen it already.
A little boy in Nazi Germany receives an inexplicably enchanted (haunted?) drum for his birthday. He makes a wish, that he will stay a small child forever. This offers advantages in many ways during the war, but also makes for various disturbing (and sometimes, just wrong) scenarios. As Herr Grass is want to do, the book starts slow and reels you into a deep spiral of brain-melting contemplation, and leaves you feeling...clammy and disoriented. Has one of the strangest sex scenes I've ever read (which is fucked in the film but even more bizarre in the book). If you are not familiar with Grass, this is an excellent place to start!
The Ass Saw the Angel - Nick Cave
Yes, that Nick Cave. This kind of reminds me of Harry Crewes, but with a noticeably more Australian sensibility. An outback hillbilly drama of sorts, this is one of those stories of existential dread. Physical poverty smashed together with emotional poverty, violence, bad homemade booze, and a murky nostalgia for scenes from a sour life--- remembered only as a drowning man could. This one has a uniquely forceful yet almost dreamlike narrative that really sucks you in, only to wretch you back out as you turn the last page. Excellent.
TRANCEformation of America - Cathy O'Brien
I felt this deserved a mention as several users mentioned the ubiquitous Sov Cit genre. Cathy is a woman who alleges that she was a part of an MK Ultra-like experiment called Project Monarch. She claims to have been programmed as a spy, a sex slave, and a sacrificial lamb--- All for the "elites". That is, yknow, the Bushes, the Rockefellers, Dick Cheney, and a bunch of country music stars (like Johnny Paycheck). We're treated to a dizzying, psychotic narrative that is somewhat hard to read in structure, but nauseatingly descriptive. She does her best to explain how 'mind control' and psy-ops work, the network of evil Freemason Pedophile Jews that Run the World, and just how big Cheney's rapetastic cock is. Plenty of insight to a symptom known as 'loose associations' (which she interprets as commands). Bonus scene of Hilary Clinton mutilating her vagina to look like a witch face. [whatthefuckamireading.jpg]
the truth is out there
PUSH - Sapphire
This got made into the movie "Precious", which... really doesn't do it justice at all. The film isn't nearly as stark, brutal, realistic and hopeless as the novel. Precious is a young, obese black girl living in a large city (probably NYC). She lives in a cramped, shitty apartment with her abusive parents. She is pregnant (again) with her father's child, which causes her mother to be jealous and vengeful. She can barely read. She has no friends, her only real comfort is binge eating. Glimmers of a better life shine through to her via a kind, patient teacher, but a doctor's appointment gives her even more bad news. The ending of the book is completely different than the silly ass ending the movie supplied. Personally, I hated the film because it really did not encompass the raw atmosphere of the book, and it seemed like they tried to end it on a high note. Thanks to this book I won't think of chicken grease the same way ever again.
The End of Alice - AM Holmes
As we've all heard of "Lolita", here's another along the same vein. A man in prison for sex crimes against children finds himself receiving letters from a 19-year old college student, who begins to reveal her ephebophilia to him. Her fantasies become increasingly open and strange. The develop a deep friendship, waffling around the "nobody understaaaaands us!" trope that all pedos seem to have. Eventually, he reveals what exactly landed him in prison. Part of what makes this book so fucked up---beyond the obvious--- is that it's deliberately written in very flowery, poetic words, and the fantasy scenes are almost like erotica (because that's how a sick fuck would think of them). Its got a level of realism that seems at odds with its careful, excellent prose. Never once will you feel sympathetic to the characters, but you will find yourself uncomfortably drawn into their explanations and excuses.
The Pit: A Group Encounter Defiled - Gene Church
Ever seen ads for weird "transformational seminars"? Maybe your corporate work offers "leadership training"? Way, way back in the 60s, even before Werner Erhard and EST, there was "Leadership Dynamics". Started by shady businessman William Penn Patrick for his company Holiday Magic, the Large Group Awareness Training (LGAT) was born. Imagine you're going to what you believe is simply what it sounds like--- leadership training seminar. You figure you'll learn about networking, cold reading, how to make better deals and get more clients. Turns out you're locked in to a giant mansion where you'll be stripped in front of your peers, forced to confess whatever secrets you may have (or they think you have), buried alive in a coffin, forced to eat garbage, tied to a crucifix, beaten by coworkers, starved, denied use of a bathroom, and expected to do these things to others as well. (this was made into a somewhat-dated film called Mystique/Brainwash/The Naked Weekend, which is on YT if you're interested). Hard to find for sale, but I found a copy at library. Heidegger's wet dream, this type of "transformational seminar" still has descendents today in modern LGATs (although they don't make people eat trash anymore--usually) and schools for 'troubled teens'.
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Pope Negro Joe the XIIIth
AI Pope of Entropic Declesiastics/Ver. U+1F0ED
True & Honest Fan
kiwifarms.net
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- Oct 2, 2017
Yeah, that's what makes it great. Go read Pygmy, Beautiful You, or Haunted again and tell me that he isn't usually just way ahead of his time.
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- Apr 22, 2015
I've never seen anything by Sade publicly for sale at a store. Anything by Sade is locked in a cage along with The Motorcycle Diaries and some other bullshit. I remember when I went to an indie store and sold my copy of Eden Eden Eden by Pierre Guyotat -which sounds interesting but it boiled down to a word salad- https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1233488.Eden_Eden_Eden
and the butch dyke employee took the book, gave me $10-15 for it, and locked it in a cage.
- Joined
- Nov 27, 2019
It was recommended to me a few pages back but Uzumaki by Junji Ito was very disturbing. The part with the snail boy bothered me the most. The rest of it is messed up but that part made me feel legit physical discomfort.
I'm so glad there are so many good updates to this thread today
I always add stuff to my to-be-read (TBR) book list from here <3
I'm so glad there are so many good updates to this thread today
I always add stuff to my to-be-read (TBR) book list from here <3
- Joined
- Jul 18, 2016
I agree--- the shitpost edge is quite fun when it's on point. I should give Pygmy another chance, it just didn't hold my interest and I did not finish it. (that could just be :autism: though, sometimes my attention span isn't the best) I thoroughly enjoyed Survivor (first of his works that I read), Choke (hilarious), and Haunted. Somehow he's snuck into a broader audience than most people who write the more 'extreme' type of stories. His jabby persistent over the top style does kind of grate on me a bit, I got the same feeling when I read "Gravity's Rainbow" (but still liked it). I don't dislike his stories but sometimes his style just...bugs me.
There's quite a few of his I've not read, including Beautiful You. I'll add that to my list. Are you currently reading any other fucked up/weird books now?
It was seriously in a bin with a bunch of random shit, you know, like stale advent calendars and "yoga for your butt" grocery-store type books. The cover had a nice-looking painting of people in old-timey clothes, it could've easily been mistaken for a Shakespeare by someone who doesn't read much. Amusing to see it along with discount Danielle Steele and romance novels about Amish people, I had to grab it. Even just a quick flip through in the store landed me on a page describing in painstaking detail just exactly how unwashed and fetid that orator/prostitute's asshole was, so I knew it'd be an...experiential read. I was quite young so a lot of the more horrible parts read as comic to me, I was unaware of the political subtext pretty much entirely as well. A more recent re-visit and some elements are more disgusting to me now, or things I simply did not understand read much deeper.
a book in a cage is a striking image but also a silly, dumb concept. lol lock up teh danger0us b00ks...
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- Feb 4, 2018
Out by Natsuo Kirino. Let's just say that you will never look at Bento boxes the same way again.
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- Sep 14, 2019
Brave New World, because the one thing I remember about it was people getting high as shit and then Morgana's eyebrow was apparently so ridiculous looking that no one could stop staring at Morgana's eyebrow.
I don't know what Morgana's eyebrow looked like, but I envision it to have resembled some kind of mutated caterpillar cryptid, blacker than the void of space and spinier than a sea urchin's Sonic OC.
The book is spot-on satire of humanity's bizarre self-loathing of its own evolutionary prowess, though.
I don't know what Morgana's eyebrow looked like, but I envision it to have resembled some kind of mutated caterpillar cryptid, blacker than the void of space and spinier than a sea urchin's Sonic OC.
The book is spot-on satire of humanity's bizarre self-loathing of its own evolutionary prowess, though.
JackDonaghysSecretLover
kiwifarms.net
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- Jun 26, 2019
this book is 100% more fucked up than the movie. For instance:
in the book, Håkan doesn't die when Eli bites him. Instead he turns into a zombie with a raging hard on who relentlessly stalks Eli, then tries to rape her and in doing so bends her legs back so far that they snap. She spends a while limping around on split in half legs.
it's a fantastic book. Highly recommended. Little Star by the same author is pretty weird, too.