Wimps Can Enjoy Scary Books Too!

If you're like me and scared of pretty much anything that goes bump-in-the-night, then Halloween might not be your favorite holiday. (But the fact that there's free candy and dressing up saves this holiday from being ranked dead last for me.) I hate being scared, I'm not a fan of horror movies, and I'm terrified of the dark and of spiders (both of which are pretty much synonymous with All Hallows Eve). And yet, I love books that are able to put me on edge. I haven't read many "traditional" horror books, but I have read a fair amount of creepy, thrilling, dark books that make you want to look over your shoulder or check under your bed. I'll call them horror-esque. And while some of them aren't considered horror, they still have that element of gore or scare, or "oh my gosh turn around it's right behind you TURN AROUND!" element to them. So here's a short list of books that I've read and liked (but aren't too scary for those wimps out there like me) that you might want to give a try:

The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey (Aliens invade! But they look like humans.)

The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton (People suddenly die from a mysterious cause.)

Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer (An environmental anomaly consumes all who enter.)

Dark Places by Gillian Flynn (The only survivor of a mass killing tries to find the real killer.)

Day Four by Sarah Lotz (Cruise ship stops dead in the water. Very strange events begin to happen.)

Fiend by Peter Stenson (The only way to stave off the zombie apocalypse is with... drugs?)

Fragment by Warren Fahy (Jurrasic Park + Reality TV show)

The Girl with All the Gifts by M.R. Carey (Young girl wonders why she's hated and why people suddenly smell so tasty.)

The Hot Zone by Richard Preston (Based on real-life events of a close encounter with Ebola in the US.)

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski (Family buys house. House reveals terrifying secrets.)

Let the Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist (Scandanavian child vampire seeks a friend.)

One Second After by William R. Forstchen (Scary-real account of what could happen after an EMP detonation.)

The Passage by Justin Cronin (Epic tale of how an immortality experiment turned most of the population into blood-thirsty killers.)

Robopocalypse by Daniel H. Wilson (Exactly what the title sounds like. AI becomes self-aware. Decides to take over.)

The Three by Sarah Lotz (Three children survive unsurvivable plane crashes. That happen at the exact same time in different parts of the world.)

World War Z by Max Brooks (A "first-hand" account of the survivors of the zombie apocalypse.)

Out of these, I'd have to say that House of Leaves is the scariest one for me. If you've never heard of it, I urge you to go to your nearest bookstore and just take a look at it. It's unique in that there are stories within stories, footnotes that go on for pages, passages that are written in spirals (literally) and more. It takes commitment to read and is certainly not for everyone. It can be very confusing at times and gives the sense of what "going mad" must feel like. It's a book that stays with the reader (I'm getting goosebumps as I think about it) and has a cult following intent on breaking a supposed code that is written within the stories. It may not sound like a horror book from my description, but it leaves you feeling extremely uneasy every time you put it down.

Have you read any of these? What are some of your favorite horror books and why? What is the scariest book you've ever read?