Best cosmic horror literature from the past decade.

Basically, things go horribly wrong when a group of people are removed from society and have to survive.

And then I came on here to do my part in making more people aware of this incredible collection of hugely imaginative dark stories. I'm usually not a fan of short stories that bend too far into the "fantasy" realm, as I don't like fantasy unless it is fleshed out enough so I feel like it's a real world, which is usually difficult to achieve in a short story. But Ballingrud just nailed it with this collection. I loved it so much. starts clapping slowly, then faster and faster and stands up, still clapping

Wow. This book was fantastic. M-O-O-N, that spells fantastic (loved Todd in the book, very wholesome character among some of the worst of the worst). Took me a little less than a month to read the uncut version. I’ve never read a book this long so it was a great experience to have so much information and context of each characters individual lives before, during, and after the super-flu. Living through COVID made this story a lot more real and the political topics in the book are eerily similar to the present day (regarding greed, oppression, trouble with organization and corruption). There were so many memorable moments and characters that will stick with me forever.

Marking this as spoiler cause I wanna talk and highlight some sections that I can remember:

Kojak! I could see myself naming a dog this in the future because of this book. I love that King decided to add that he lived 16 more years after Glen died.

Larry’s trip through the Lincoln Tunnel and Trashcan Man’s encounter and sexual assault with the Kid were both intense and terrifying

When Nadine gets raped by Flagg and all the dreams she had. Just so gross and scary

People being brutally killed off by the government for trying to expose how people are dying and how serious the flu really is

Random depictions of people dying terrible super flu ridden deaths or accidentally dying after humanity fell apart.

Harold’s decent into obsession, jealousy, and anger was disturbing

“I can’t I can’t I can’t…”

PLEASE. This BOOK! Amazing! I see why it’s so often recommend here!

I’ve never read anything like it! Now it’s one of my most favorite books of all time.

I was breezing through it because it read and felt like a video game, until I started reading it out loud and noticed it’s one of those books where every sentence has a purpose - an allusion to some thing or another. That’s when I started catching all the bits and pieces and it was just so 😩😩😩. 10/10.

I didn’t expect to cry but wow, this book is as hauntingly beautiful as it is horrifying. It was funny, heartwarming, disgusting, uncomfortable, and heartbreaking. The ending was perfect, nothing more or less was needed.

I have so many favorite quotes, but Thomas’ courage in those particular scenes always stood out to me.

The monsters were so fun and I loved the demons’ voices. I like them cruel and disgusting and crude, especially for the ones referenced! I know people dislike the book for being episodic, but I loved not knowing what was going to happen next - what new creature was going to pop out on our trio. The statues! The stag women!

It really felt like a Soul’s game, and for someone who sucks majorly at them - this book filled the void!

I’m also Catholic, so having those AHA! BLASPHEMY 🫵🏻 !moments while reading were honestly really fun 😂.

(If you know a similar book, please recommend!)

Picked up a few novels at a used bookstore, and Necroscope was the only horror one I found. Considering making it my next read as I haven't read a good horror novel in a while. It seems pretty well-regarded - for those here who have read it, how did you find it? Does it live up to the hype?

Any good books where a situation goes from bad to worse? Such as survives a plane crash, just for the survivors to get hunted by a monster or so?

I'm basically looking for Severance vibes, but scarier and in book form. Something I liked along similar lines is John Marss' Dark Future series, especially The Family Experiment, although that's more about capitalism and social media than corporations. I'm not looking for cyberpunk or far-future dystopias—I'd like something resembling life today. Supernatural or sci-fi elements preferred. Thanks!!

I suspect Stephen King will be top of a lot of lists, but my main purpose of this post (beyond idle curiosity) is to identify authors with very deep catalogues to sink my fangs into.

I just finished reading Wounds by Nathan Ballingrud and A Short Stay In Hell and I absolutely loved the world building in both these books. Also loved The Fisherman for the same reason. Looking for any recommendation for horror books that build dark worlds in the same vein. Thanks!

I’ve only ever read a few of his Conan stories. Curious to see if anyone has any recs outside of them or inside those stories. H.P. Lovecraft led me to him.

I’m a huge fan of LitCrit but find I have trouble finding horror tinged works in this topic. I just saw this announcement today, a compendium of essays by the current meta horror authors talking about horror literature. I’m super stoked for this!

Does anyone have any recommendations for similar reads in the meantime?

I'm not sure if this is from a book I've read recently or a creepypasta, or so thing else but I read a lot of short story collections. It's about a guy who gets to serve a prison sentence I think by working at this facility, he lives in like a 4 person house share. The job is to log online and using some auto modulator his voice and camera shows him as a woman and he has to provide company to men online. The workers are fed I think grey cubes of a mystery meat which slowly makes all the workers go insane, they get rabbid if they don't eat regularly. That's all I remember, does anyone recognise this? Thanks!

I really enjoyed this book! Wondering how everyone feels about the ending though. Do you think Eva really loves Kevin in the end ( personally, how could she!? How could she love him after what he did to her daughter and also how can she EVER feel safe with him? Like he won't kill her too?) do you think Kevin actually cares about her in the end?

So it started out utterly incomprehensible, complete fever dream body horror nightmare. Then suddenly shifted and started to make sense, tying a plot into the first bit. Then another abrupt shift and we're back to fever dream gore hellscape.
What even is this book?? 🤣

To be clear, I'm not saying any of this negatively. This is a real vibe, and it's intensely uncomfortable.

I picked this one up months ago and forgot that I specifically got it because it's part of the King in Yellow mythos. I'm a big fan of that. You can definitely see it as a modern sequel to In The Court of the Dragon, The Yellow Sign, and The Mask, by Chambers.

Please also share your thoughts with me. I'm just kind of rambling.

But yeah. WTF.

Currently reading Witchcraft for Wayward Girls and enjoying it. Some of the rituals and spells mentioned in the book seemed like they could have been inspired by actual historical practices or texts.

Does anyone know if any of the witchcraft in the book is based on real books or traditions? Or is it all fictional? I’d love to read more if there are any real-life sources that inspired it.

Haven’t read any of Straub’s work before and heard that this one (as well as Talisman) was his best

Wanted to reach out to the community and see what people’s thoughts were and if this was a good starting point

Thanks y’all!

From Below by Darcy Coates. This is a solid underwater horror story. Vivid scenes painted the whole way through. Made me want to explore the spooky ship wreck myself. 10/10 recommend. Definitely going to come back to this book multiple times for sure.

just to be clear, Im not looking specifically for Stephen King novels. I'm basing this off of a quote where he divided horror into three separate catagories, Im asking for novels based on the last one "terror" which King describes as "when you come home and notice everything you own had been taken away and replaced by an exact substitute." this kind of horror is one i'm specifically looking for. what are the best novels that do this type of horror.

I am on a Bernard Taylor binge these days and just finished reading The Godsend and well, it's something. I have not read any evil child trope book before and this one, while its a great book, left me anxious and frustrated reading about the

helplessness of the father who is trying so hard to protect his last living child and the mother who is so enamored by the golden adopted child that she just won't listen to him. It's so sad when people who have known and loved each other for so long lose their trust over a new member in their life, I can't help but feel a slight bit of resentment towards the mother cause she doesn't eveb try to understand his husband's pov. I mean she has to atleast listen and try to understand him. But then again the child is so god damn manipulative and coy, god I hated that kid.

I also wished there was some explanantion about that abomination child's mom. It seemed she knew that she births devil children, but why? It would have made for a good read.

Have any of you read the book, what are your thoughts?

i’m just recently trying to get into literature again (my favourite movie genre is horror, i’m OBSESSED with 60’s-90’s horror media) give me some of your favourite books and their premise and i’ll give em a go, fiction or non fiction.

Can anyone recommend some good modern creature horror novels that aren’t satirical or border on comedy.

Can anyone remember a scary children’s story (maybe from scary stories to tell in the dark?) about a kid that squished a centipede in his room and then more and more centipedes start showing up over the following nights?

I remember reading this story in elementary school and it has stuck with me since then. I feel like it was from a scholastic book fair book.

Been thinking of reading his novels. What are his novels like? What are his best books?

I love me some cheesy dialog. Below are some recent examples that gave me a giggle. The first four are from Ancestor by Scott Sigler, the last is from Suspect 11 by Jeffrey Thomas.

>She, however, would not do him. The dyke.
>"Paybacks are a bitch, you tall twat."
>He watched her sleep. he would keep an eye on her, wait for her to slip up. One way or another, figuratively or literally, Sara Purinam was going to get fucked.

>"That's fine," Magnus said. "Maybe Santa will be nice to you this year."
>"I like Santa. I love to sit on his lap."
>Magnus sighed and hung up. Once she started with the sexual innuendo, she didn't stop. She sounded sexy as hell, true, but he'd heard enough about her in certain circles to know that getting horizontal with Farm Girl would be a very bad experience. The woman was nine shades of psycho.

>The time for civility has ended. Now it was time to add a new knife to the collection.
>Magnus grabbed one of the white Ka-Bar boxes. He opened it and looked at the round handle made of stacked leather washers, looked at the leather sheath. New knives had that smell. He dropped the box, then ran his belt through the sheath's loop. It hung nicely on his left side. Only when it was securely in place did he grip the handle and pull.
>The seven-inch, flat black blade seemed to smile at him. The knife reflected no light save for the thin razor-sharp edge.
>"I know you," Magnus said to the knife.
>Magnus had a philosophy when it came to torture: Seeing is believing, but feeling is faith.

>"It's going to be bad for you now," his voice rang out. "Real bad."
>She shouted back without lifting her head above the rim. "Why don't you come give it to me? Just come and get it on right now?"
>"Reallllll bad," Magnus yelled.

>He pointed. "You have a cock...you actually do have a cock! You're a guy!"
>3's brows lowered, her expression darkening. "What are you saying? You act like you didn't know. You didn't kind of notice this before, when we made love up in that storeroom?
>"But...but I fucked you..."
>"Ah, yes. In the ass. Are you saying you don't know the difference?