Gross, Creepy, Downright Terrifying: Six Books To Make You Question Reality

1. Lost Souls and Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z Brite
Yes, right off the bat, I'm giving you a two-for-the-price-of-one entry. Can't help it. I can't pick just one book from her, but I can pick two. (Drawing Blood is also fantastic.) Poppy has such intensely beautiful command of the language. Lost Souls gives me chills every time I read it and I can't enjoy Dexter (the books or the show) without thinking about Andrew and Jay. (If you want to directly support the author, you can visit the Poppy Z. Brite eBay page.)

2. My Life with Corpses by Wylene Dunbar
The only entry on this list that is just creepy and disturbing, this novel is entirely underrated and under-appreciated. I haven't met anyone else who has read it and that makes me sad. It's such a good book. Funny, weird, beautiful, and thought-provoking, this novel is less horror and more existential, but it still makes the air feel a little colder.

3. American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
This is my favorite modern American novel. Yes, it's about a serial killer. Yes, it's about excess and self-indulgence. It. Is. Amazing. The first time I read it, I thought I was going crazy. That is, until I got to the first explicit murder scene. Then I realized that it wasn't me, it was Patrick, and holy shit this guy is fucked up. If you have the stomach for it, this is the sort of novel that will drag you bodily from your real world and throw you unceremoniously into the world the author has created. 

4. Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs
If American Psycho grabs you and drags you into Patrick Bateman's world, Naked Lunch bashes you in the head, knocks you out, and forces you to wake up cold, alone, and scared in the world Burroughs created. I've never done acid, or any other hallucinatory drug, but I imagine it can't be much different from reading this book. 

5. Splatterpunks II: Over the Edge edited by Paul M. Sammon
All right, this one isn't a novel, it's a short stories collection. "A mosaic of viscera, excrement, sex, and degradation whirls before our eyes in this anthology of stories and essays that run the gamut from lame and pretentious to genuinely stunning." Reading this book is a lot like being suckerpunched repeatedly.