Because I haunt (hehe) the horror book quests/forums, a common sentiment that I've been reading around, is this isn't even scary, why is it in a horror book quest. It really made think about how horror is one of the more misunderstood genres, mostly because people expect it to be one very specific thing. People usually picture gore, monsters, slashers, something obvious and extreme. But horror has never really stayed inside those lines. The definitions are actually quite blurry. The genre is meant to provoke feelings of fear, shock, unease, dread, etc. How it does that, changes.

I'm using examples primarily from Whispers in the Walls here, but horror can look like House of Leaves, where the fear comes from disorientation and the slow breakdown of reality. It can look like Rebecca, where nothing is technically chasing, but the atmosphere feels suffocating and wrong. It can look like Mexican Gothic, where the horror is rooted in family, control, and the loss of bodily autonomy. Outside of that quest, I can think of something like The Road, where the real terror isn’t monsters, but the emptiness of the world and what people become to survive it. Even fantasy can hold horror in it which is something along the lines of the fear of losing self, humanity, or a place in the world. That isn't to say every book that makes someone feel these feelings, is horror though. Blurry.

So horror isn’t just about what happens, but mainly the feelings it evokes. The problem with that, is that feeling is different for everyone. Everyone has a different threshold. Different fears. Some people are scared by graphic violence, while others are more affected by psychological dread, grief, isolation, or the idea that something is slightly off but no one else seems to notice. So I’ve read books that didn’t scare me at all, but completely haunted someone else. And I’ve read subtle stories that unsettled me more than any traditional horror novel ever has. It's truly such a personal genre. I've been loving horror since I watched Amityville Horror waay too early in life and even got to study it in university because I was so interested. There's so many interesting studies within horror.

I’m really curious though, is there a book that felt like horror to you, even if it wasn’t marketed that way? Or, has your definition of horror changed over time, are you scared by different things now than you were before?

When I read non-fiction, specifically science related, I always get so anxious about needing to retain the information. Sometimes I just wonder if I can actually say I read that book if I can’t remember any facts straight upfront afterwards. But I also have severe ADHD and not a very good working memory. But then I try to think that even if I can’t remember anything specific from specific books, it (the knowledge) builds up over time the more non-fiction books I read in that area. Do anyone else struggle with this problem and ”internal debate” / ”anxiety”?

I realize that this turned it to sort of a rant and I don’t except anyone to follow my line of thought (cause I can barely do it)