Stories and Novels that Made You Uncomfortable

Sorry, not sure if these are on the list you linked (I couldn't follow it).
I've loved most of Torey Hayden's books but the content does often leave one feeling uncomfortable. Ghost Girl stands out as covering topics that are particularly taboo.

Trafficked by Sophie Hayes.
Ma, He Sold Me for a Few Cigarettes by Martha Long.
Blue Genes by Val McDermid.
The Blood Doctor by Barbara Vine.
Fingersmith by Sarah Waters.
The Ice Cream Girls by Dorothy Koomson.

JustKia said:

Sorry, not sure if these are on the list you linked (I couldn't follow it).
I've loved most of Torey Hayden's books but the content does often leave one feeling uncomfortable. Ghost Girl stands out as covering topics that are particularly taboo.

Trafficked by Sophie Hayes.
Ma, He Sold Me for a Few Cigarettes by Martha Long.
Blue Genes by Val McDermid.
The Blood Doctor by Barbara Vine.
Fingersmith by Sarah Waters.
The Ice Cream Girls by Dorothy Koomson.

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Aw, I can see why you say it, certainly, it just makes me sort of sad to think of Torey Hayden as making someone feel that way. I love her books so. It's interesting too - I could look through every book in here, pondering which might fit the OP's request, and I don't think I'd ever think to name hers, but it's first on your list. People are so interesting.

I dunno - my answer before I read the above post was going to be along the lines of 'this one time, I dropped The Stand on my foot...' as I couldn't really think of anything that made me uncomfortable. Now I'm wondering.

There's someone who goes by Anais Ninja. Very underground. Very disturbing. Seriously, you asked for shocking and taboo, so don't get mad at me if you find yourself repulsed.


http://www.asstr.org/~eBook_Erotica/anais_ninja.htm

Don't know if these are too well known, but Joyce Carol Oates's recent short story collection Faithless is pretty disturbing, particularly the set of stories in the last half. They largely deal with obsession of one kind or another.

Austrian writer Elfriede Jelinek's 1983 novel The Piano Teacher is a very dark, disturbing piece that examines the intersection of madness, sexual violence, and identity against the very "civilized" backdrop of the Viennese classical music scene.

Mo Hayder's The Treatment disturbed me.

Probably too well known, but Stephen King's Gerald's Game made me so uncomfortable I had to skip part of it. And I love gory horror books.

Also, Graham Masterton's Ritual (novel) and The Secret Shih-Tan (short story).

When I was a teenager many years ago, Whitley Strieber's Communion weirded me out so much I couldn't finish it. No idea if it would have the same effect now.

cornflake said:

Aw, I can see why you say it, certainly, it just makes me sort of sad to think of Torey Hayden as making someone feel that way. I love her books so. It's interesting too - I could look through every book in here, pondering which might fit the OP's request, and I don't think I'd ever think to name hers, but it's first on your list. People are so interesting.

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I love her books and I've read most of them. But, no matter how much I loved them I can't see that sexual abuse of a child most probably by her parents/family for cult/ritual purposes isn't in some ways uncomfortable to read. Yet, I didn't stop reading that book or any others of TH.

Dragonwriter said:

Probably too well known, but Stephen King's Gerald's Game made me so uncomfortable I had to skip part of it. And I love gory horror books.

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I have to agree there are parts of Gerald's Game that are uncomfortable. However, I couldn't skip them or stop reading.

I'm beginning to think I have some sort of compulsion to keep reading when something gets a bit uncomfortable.

Scott Heim's In Awe. I loved Mysterious Skin, but In Awe was...oh man. I needed brain bleach for that one.

The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things messed me up for a bit, too. I like dark stories, but those two...those two were a bit much for me.

Caitlin R. Kiernan disturbs me, but in a good way. Threshold and Low Red Moon made me twitchy...but I liked it.

Ursula Le Guin's story "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas."

It makes me feel both uncomfortable and guilty, because while I would really like to think of myself as being able to walk away, I know I would also want to stay.

"Suburban Legend" by Donald J. Bingle. It's a short story in an anthology titled Imaginary Friends.

"Salvage" by Orson Scott Card. It's a short story found in an anthology titled Wastelands.

"The Screwfly Solution" by James Tiptree, Jr.

Maybe some of y'all when you hear about repressive laws against women think of The Handmaid's Tale; me, I think of "The Screwfly Solution."

Emermouse said:

"The Screwfly Solution" by James Tiptree, Jr.

Maybe some of y'all when you hear about repressive laws against women think of The Handmaid's Tale; me, I think of "The Screwfly Solution."

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I will have to check that out.

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

bearilou said:

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

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I second this one. I can't believe I forgot about it.

"In the hills the cities" by Clive Barker

Two tourists witnessing a local custom going horribly wrong.

Auto da Fé, by Elias Canetti.

Probably the most misanthropic book I've ever read. So many despiceable characters. Such a casual, petty cruelty. So hopeless about the possibility of human connection.

(And, just for the sake of comprehensiveness, although I suspect that's not the kind of thing that you're looking for, since it's hardly obscure:

Wuthering Heights.)

The Amityville Horror left me very disturbed, even when I found that it was a mostly sensationalized account of events that never really happened. The creep factor was off the scale. The Lord of the Flies depressed and shocked me because of how real it could be in such a circumstance.

triceratops, The Lord of the Flies disturbed me also. The ugliness of the group of kids--ugh.

Two books I read at a much too young age, around 12, that scarred me: Alive (about the soccer team stranded in the Andes after their plane went down) and Helter Skelter about the Manson murders. Horrifying nonfiction.

Edogawa Rampo, Japanese horror/crime/suspense author. Off the top of my head, I recommend his short stories The Human Chair, The Hell of Mirrors, and The Caterpillar, but he specialized in the disturbing. You can hardly go wrong with any of his works if you want to walk away with a lingering creepiness in your nerves, a sense of having seen something you shouldn't, and a sincere wish that you could stop thinking more and more deeply about what you just read.

Same recommendation for the short stories of Gerald Kersh, especially, again off the top of my head, Busto is a Ghost Too Mean to Give Us a Fright, Men Without Bones, and The Queen of Pig Island. The first of those, by the way, is strong stuff, deeply emotionally disturbing. Having a box of tissues handy and watch something frivolous on tv before going to bed.

Finally, same for Ambrose Bierce's Civil War stories. I don't remember the title, but there's one in particular about a small child chasing a rabbit and running into the war itself, but really, Bierce + Civil War = Disturbance so just about any title should do.

ETA: You might also try Peter Straub's novel Ghost Story, which is a disturbing story concept all-round and includes some very unnerving, but emotionally deep and intelligent elements.

A couple Ketchum stories, but can't recall their titles. One was a novella about a girl "giving" her sister to her boyfriend, drugged, and him raping her.

The Cormorant by Stephen Gregory

For some unknown reason, I read two of Natsuo Kirino's books. The first one I read, Grotesque, disturbed me plenty. Then I picked up Out and had to go hug a puppy until the bad thoughts went away.

Lil' pony, you sure you wanna go down this route?

The Bone Parade, Mark Nykanen. Beyond the pale.

The Bachman Books by Stephen King writing as Richard Bachman. Particularly the first story, Rage, though they're all of pretty dark and disturbing subject matter. Rage is about a kid who has a psychotic break and holds his fellow students hostage after killing the teacher, so it's very trigger-tastic, particularly considering the incidents at Sandy Hook, Columbine, etc.

I'm sure I can think of more if I give it a bit of a think, but that was the first to come to mind.