The history of horror: What are the best books in the genre?
There are certain core texts that must appear on any list of the “best” horror novels ever written. Then what?
Sue Carter on sleepovers, un-ironic humour, and why she’ll never watch The Human Centipede
“I have always been drawn to adrenaline-cranking moments that straddle that delicate space between hysterical fright and laughter.”
The law of unintended consequences: “The Fly” by George Langelaan
The story, which originally appeared in 1957, includes a framing structure that distances the reader from the main action.
Tony Burgess on the most terrifying reading experience of his life
“I thought there were things this book could do to me that were dangerous.”
Joyce Carol Oates on “the psyche’s deepest and most profound revelations”
In a brief survey of some core Western texts, Oates asks the key question, why do we want to experience fear in an aesthetic context?
Terror takes flight: “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” by Richard Matheson
Of all the genre master’s classic novels and stories, none comes close to the sheer paranoid terror of this ruthless chiller.
Christopher Sharrett on neoconservatism in the 1980s and ’90s horror film
Upending the radical vision of much 1960s and ’70s American horror cinema, the following decades saw a reactionary retrenchment, argues the academic and critic.
“The actual worth of the things you make”: “Wolverton Station” by Joe Hill
Hill’s Gothic tale is an exuberant mashup of Warren Zevon, Little Red Riding Hood, and “An American Werewolf in London.”
Nathan Ripley on the intimidation of writing in “the best genre”
The author of psychological thrillers says his respect for the horror genre may explain why he has had difficulty writing in the genre.
“I am a singularity”: “Event Horizon” by Sunny Moraine
The house in the story – a living thing that demands to be fed – is a metaphor for difference and the other.