Teen/Yound Adult Horror Short Story Collection

[Wryan]

Okay,

I can't think of these for the life of me and I'm hoping someone else had them or heard of them.

When I was younger, my brother and I bought a series of books that were collections of short stories, all horror-based. And when I say horror, I mean way more graphic and gruesome than mothers of today would allow on the shelves. I'm talking decapitations, hangings, hauntings, spiders and insects crawling over people's faces and eyeballs, severed limbs, the works. I remember them so distinctly because they were genuinely scary, at least for me at that age. They were medium-sized books and usually featured black and white covers with black and white sketches on both the cover and throughout the book. The sketches were also horrifying and sometimes featured a dash of red for blood or for effect. I think we had four of the books. I could almost swear that they had a very "Are You Afraid of the Dark" kinda name but I can't friggin remember them.

Hoping someone remembers these so I can track them down and see if they still freak my nuts off or if my mind was exaggerating them.

Thanks for any help.

[megladon8]

I know what you're talking about, and I have them at home.

I shall report back later today.

[Kurosawa Fan]

My sister and I have a series of three books call "The Scariest Stories You've Ever Heard". They have them on Amazon but they only have cover art for part III:



Not sure if that's what you're looking for, but they scared the shit out of us when we were kids, and were unlike any other horror books we'd read.

[Kurosawa Fan]

I also had these, which were also good:


Here's one of the individual covers:


This sounds more like what you were looking for.

[megladon8]

OK these are the ones that I have...




EDIT: Oh, KF beat me to it.

The ones I posted are the covers I have, though.

The artwork creeped the hell out of me as a kid.

[Wryan]

AHHHHHHHHHHH! That looks almost exactly right. Lemme track down pictures of the others to see if they are the right ones.

. . .

YUP! Goddamn look at these covers:







Seriously, what kind of psycho pre-teen shit is this!? These killed me when I was younger. Gah so scary.

THANK YOU ALL. CHILDHOOD MEMORIES.

LOL boxed set of the books. I'm gonna have to track em down.

[Wryan]

Funny how the latter editions have reprinted covers that aren't really as scary or The Cell-esque psychotic. The original covers are just......../shivers

[number8]

I, uh, I still have the entire Goosebumps series. Every single book.

[Wryan]

I, uh, I still have the entire Goosebumps series. Every single book.

I had the entire thing up to a certain point. I can't remember but I had almost 70. Good series, frankly, even if the stories were derivative and repetitive.

[Wryan]

LOL wiki page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scary_s...ll_in_the_dark

"Beyond the stories themselves, the books have two notable features: exhaustively researched and annotated notes and sources sections, and disturbing and evocative illustrations by Gammell."

"Also, as the title implies, the stories are intended to be read aloud to an audience. Several of the stories come with "stage directions" that the reader can follow in order to enhance the scary subject matter of the stories, thereby generating a more visceral response from the listening audience."

STAGE DIRECTIONS I remember that lol!

"The level of gruesome detail in the illustrations and overall sinister and violent content of the stories is sometimes seen to be excessive for the members of the series' target audience. The sinister nature of the illustrations and the frightening subject matter in the series caused it to be repeatedly challenged for inclusion in libraries throughout the 1990s. It eventually topped the list of challenged books of the 1990s by the American Library Association [1]. Recently, the series has been the sixth most challenged in 2006 for "occult/Satanism, unsuited to age group, violence, and insensitivity."

Haha. No wonder my brother bought em.

[Dukefrukem]

OK these are the ones that I have...




EDIT: Oh, KF beat me to it.

The ones I posted are the covers I have, though.

The artwork creeped the hell out of me as a kid.

Oh man! This brings back memories!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[megladon8]

I, uh, I still have the entire Goosebumps series. Every single book.

Me too. Also "Animorphs".

Anyone else ever read "Animorphs"?

[Wryan]

I went out and bought them. For the 25th anni, they reprinted the covers with this horrid faux-holographic rainbow cover, basically to diminish the gruesome power of the cover art. Otherwise they're all intact, hellish and insane as ever.

/cuddles books