Horror Books Quotes & Sayings

I never - when I go into a project, I don't think too much about if there's a lot of other sci-fi books out there or horror books or whatever. I just tell the stories I want to tell, and I think that is evident on the page. — Jeff Lemire

Meeting writers is usually disappointing, at best. Writers who write sexy thrillers aren't necessarily sexy or thrilling in person. Children's book writers might look more like accountants, or axe murderers for that matter. Horror writers are very rarely scary looking, although they are frequently good cooks. — Kelly Link

Prepare yourself for some bad news: Ronald Reagan's library just burned down. Both books were destroyed. But the real horror: He hadn't finished coloring either one of them. — Gore Vidal

These friends - and he laid his hand on some of the books - have been good friends to me, and for some years past, ever since I had the idea of going to London, have given me many, many hours of pleasure. Through them I have come to know your great England; and to know her is to love her. I long to go through the crowded streets of your mighty London, to be in the midst of the whirl and rush of humanity, to share its life, its change, its death, and all that makes it what it is. — Bram Stoker

One of the things I wanted to do with my own books was bridge the gap between 'Goosebumps' and adult horror. — Darren Shan

The best horror novels open up, It was beautiful summer day and the smell of flowers emanated throughout the air. — Justin Alcala

A silent Library is a sad Library. A Library without patrons on whom to pile books and tales and knowing and magazines full of up-to-the-minute politickal fashions and atlases and plays in pentameter! A Library should be full of exclamations! Shouts of delight and horror as the wonders of the world are discovered or the lies of the heavens are uncovered or the wild adventures of devil-knows-who sent romping out of the pages. A Library should be full of now-just-a-minutes and that-can't-be-rights and scientifick folk running skelter to prove somebody wrong. It should positively vibrate with laughing at comedies and sobbing at tragedies, it should echo with gasps as decent ladies glimpse indecent things and indecent ladies stumble upon secret and scandalous decencies! A Library should not shush; it should roar! — Catherynne M Valente

I have 20 or 30 books completely plotted out in my mind - mysteries, thrillers, horror, romance, science fiction. You name it. — Christopher Paolini

The biggest difference between writing a movie and writing a novel? No one ever tries to sleep with me to get into one of my novels. — Mylo Carbia

My pappy told me, 'When you read horror, it's best to read with the lights on.' I found it helps for most other kinds of books too. — P.K. Vandcast

To dive in the darkness, I should dive in the truth, then in images of the world..., then facts, then in books, then listening, then in short stories... that's how I write the horror. It's very complicated. — Deyth Banger

I was asked in an interview once: You're writing another book with a female lead? Aren't you afraid you're going to be pigeonholed? And I thought, I write a team superhero book, an uplifting solo hero book, I write a horror-western, and I write a ghost story. What am I gonna be pigeonholed as? Has a man in the history of men ever been asked if he was going to be pigeonholed because he wrote two consecutive books with male leads? — Kelly Sue DeConnick

The thing, whatever it was - and no one was ever sure afterwards whether it was a dream or a fit or what - happened at that peculiar hour before dawn when human vitality is at its lowest ebb. The Blue Hour they sometimes call it, l'heure bleue - the ribbon of darkness between the false dawn and the true, always blacker than all the rest of the night has been before it. Criminals break down and confess at that hour; suicides nerve themselves for their attempts; mists swirl in the sky; and - according to the old books of the monks and the hermits - strange, unholy shapes brood over the sleeping rooftops.
At any rate, it was at this hour that her screams shattered the stillness of that top-floor apartment overlooking the Pare Monceau. Curdling, razor-edged screams that slashed through the thick bedroom door. ("I'm Dangerous Tonight") — Cornell Woolrich

Accepting ourselves, okay I like such type of girls, I like watching porn, I like such kind of music, okay I like such kind off books like horror and sci-fi, I like deathstep as a music... It should be find I should accept myself people should accept me as the guy who I am truly, people should accept themselfs also. — Deyth Banger

I'd love for readers to read what books are about so that if they are expecting happy endings in dark horror novels, they won't reach for the Vallium or something worse! — Carole Gill

He shrunk more and more from the realities of life and above all from the society of his day which he regarded with an ever growing horror,
a detestation which had reacted strongly on his literary and artistic tastes; he refused, as far as possible, to have anything to do with pictures and books whose subjects were in any way connected with modern existence. — Joris-Karl Huysmans

But there's also the fact that in my experience most of my readers are first and foremost plain old-fashioned readers. Good readers. They're not looking for cozy brand-name output and that means I don't have to give it to 'em. They're not lazy and have little patience with pre-fab beach-bag books or Oprah's opine du jour. They're questers.
They know that every now and then you're gonna get lucky and pure gold like King and Straub's Black House will simply drop into your lap at the local supermarket but after that, if your bent is horror and suspense fiction, you're gonna have to get your hands dirty and root around for more. Find a Ramsey Campbell or an Edward Lee. They expect diversity and search it out. They want what all good readers want - to be taken somewhere in a book or a story that's really worth visiting for a while. Maybe even worth thinking about after.
If that place happens to scare the hell out of you all the better. — Jack Ketchum

With frightening suddenness he now began ripping the pages out of the book in handfuls and throwing them in the waste-paper basket.
Matilda froze in horror. The father kept going. There seemed little doubt that the man felt some kind of jealousy. How dare she, he seemed to be saying with each rip of a page, how dare she enjoy reading books when he couldn't? How dare she? — Roald Dahl

The villains were always ugly in books and movies. Necessarily so, it seemed. Because if they were attractive - if their looks matched their charm and their cunning - they wouldn't only be dangerous.
They would be irresistible. — Nenia Campbell

For the best part of my childhood I visited the local library three or four times a week, hunching in the stacks on a foam rubber stool and devouring children's fiction, classics, salacious thrillers, horror and sci-fi, books about cinema and origami and natural history, to the point where my parents encouraged me to read a little less. — David Nicholls

Great horror stories of books and movies have seemingly come from some aspect of real-life events, and human behavior. This is evident as far back as Alfred Hitchcock's movie, Psycho. The movie was based on a serial killer named, Ed Gein in Wisconsin. — Chris Mentillo

The advantage of horror books is to take the reader and cut him out of the pack and work on him one on one. It has its advantages because the people that are there in the movie theater really are a mob. If you get one guy alone you can do a more efficient job of scaring him. — Stephen King

I grew up on all sorts of horror - Hammer Horror and Vincent Price's 'Theatre Of Blood.' I loved the hidden, scary layers, but there wasn't that much around for youngsters in terms of horror books. I can remember reading Stephen King's 'Salem's Lot' and 'Cujo,' but I thought there should be more for teenaged horror fans. — Darren Shan

Ty laughed, a carefree, boyish sound, and glanced to his side, distracted by what he saw. "You moved the rug."
"I kitty-cornered it."
"Why would you do that?" Ty asked, aghast.
"To see you lose your shit when you got home." Zane leaned closer, grinning evilly. "There are other things out of order too. Books not alphabetized. Coffee mug handles facing different directions." He lowered his voice to a whisper as Ty's eyes widened in horror. "The closet isn't color coded."
"You're just watching the world burn, huh?"
Zane laughed.
"God I missed you." Ty said in a rush of breath. — Abigail Roux

Joey glanced at his alarm clock and saw it was just before midnight. His eyes drifted to his bookshelf. Lined up in a row, in the order of their publication, were all of the Spook Boys books, a series of kids' books about two adventurous brothers who were constantly getting into mischief as they explored haunted houses and spooky old castles, or tried to solve mysteries involving missing diamonds or stolen paintings. Joey envied the characters in those books - he wanted his own life to be made up of such exciting, implausible adventures. But maybe his imagination had gotten carried away. Maybe his mind, saturated with such fictional tales, was more than willing to play tricks on him when it came to houses like the one on Creep Street. — The Blood Brothers

I discovered news of old horrors in old books; read intelligence of old atrocities in old periodicals; always in the back of my mind, every day a bit louder, I heard the seashell drone of some growing, coalescing force; I seemed to smell the bitter ozone aroma of lightings-to-come. — Stephen King

I was that weird kid that checked out all of the non-fiction paranormal studies books from the library. I've always been fascinated by the supernatural, particularly movies and TV shows that manage to blend humor with the horror - 'Supernatural', 'Buffy', 'Angel.' — Molly Harper

What was always interesting about Thomas Harris' books is they were a wonderful hybridization of a crime thriller and a horror movie. — Bryan Fuller

This guy sounds like all the bad guys from the last ten years of murder movies all rolled into one. Like he might be the worst of those books you have there. If he was real, and really like that, then I should arrest him, right?" Matthew asked, hoping he could show the boy that he would protect him, and he could tell him the truth now.
"No, Deputy. Because he is real, and he is really like that, and you should run. — Dennis Sharpe

I've never really been a genre fan. I never grew up reading comic books or was a horror buff. — Chad Lindberg

I write what I want to write. Period. I don't write novels-for-hire using media tie-in characters, I don't write suspense novels or thrillers. I write horror. And if no one wants to buy my books, I'll just keep writing them until they do sell
and get a job at Taco Bell in the meantime. — Bentley Little

It was sort of like being in one of those love-and-horror supernatural novels, the kind Mrs. Robinson in the school library sniffily called "tweenager porn." In those books the girls dallied with werewolves, vampires - even zombies - but hardly ever became those things. It was also nice to have a grown man stand up for her, and it didn't hurt that he was handsome, in a scruffy kind of way that reminded her a little of Jax Teller on Sons of Anarchy, a show she and Emma Deane secretly watched on Em's computer. — Stephen King

I can't get why people are afraid of books or films which are horror. What's the scary of the film "Cube 1,2,3" - Yeah it was brutal I get scary, but after an hour I'm fine. I just continue to live my life. I check out "Saw", the most brutal film ever watched, yeah I could have some kind a bad thoughts and other stuff about the film. Like to think that this guy "Saw", is there with the bike, but after few days everything it went on the right path. I had chance to see what is the real face of the killers - "Saw" and what does goverment do "Cube"!

GreenMile was a sad story, I still can't believe that Stephen King has written it! — Deyth Banger

Horror. I can't manage it. I become
well
horrified. Self-help books have a similar effect.
When asked, "Any literary genre you simply can't be bothered with?" - (By the Book: Writers on Literature and the Literary Life from the NYT Book Review, by Pamela Paul) — Emma Thompson

[M]y mother read a horror novel every night. She had read every one in the library. When birthdays and Christmas would come, I would consider buying her a new one, the latest Dean R. Koontz or Stephen King or whatever, but I couldn't. I didn't want to encourage her. I couldn't touch my father's cigarettes, couldn't look at the Pall Mall cartons in the pantry. I was the sort of child who couldn't even watch commercials for horror movies - the ad for Magic, the movie where marionette kills people. sent me into a six-month nightmare frenzy. So I couldn't look at her books, would turn them over so their covers wouldn't show, the raised lettering and splotches of blood - especially the V.C. Andrews oeuvre, those turgid pictures of those terrible kids, standing so still, all lit in blue. — Dave Eggers

Your tills are talking to me and want me to take them home. Does this often happen? — Steven Poore

A true god surely cannot have been born of a girl, nor died on the gibbet, nor be eaten in a piece of dough ... [or inspired] books, filled with contradictions, madness, and horror. — Voltaire

My first six books were horror, I think because when I was young I loved Stephen King. John Wyndham, Daphne Du Maurier, and it's natural to try and emulate the books you first loved. — Sarah Pinborough

No one stepping for the first time into a room made of books can know instinctively how to behave, what is expected, what is promised, what is allowed. One may be overcome by horror
at the cluster or the vastness, the stillness, the mocking reminder of everything one doesn't know, the surveillance
and some of that overwhelming feeling may cling on, even after the rituals and conventions are learned, the geography mapped, and the natives found friendly. — Alberto Manguel

There are the people who read my horror novels - the first two of them - and they found them scary or whatever, and then there are some people who are maybe not entirely stable who think that they're real, who think that they're being stalked by the same demons or ghosts that are mentioned in the books. — David Wong

Has anybody ever written a horror pop-up book? The center of the book pops up and opens the gate to the elder gods. Of course you'll want to shrink wrap these books because you want people to buy them before they get sucked into another dimension. — Neil Leckman

This was like watching murder. Defilement. And it was something worse than either of those things. Even among his family, black trade as they were, books were holy things. — Rachel Caine

Suddenly, she heard a loud bang, a thump and a scream that caused her to jump from the bed. The hair on the back of her neck stood straight up and her body became one big goosebump. — Evangeline Duran Fuentes

Books - the closeness of them, their contact, their smell, and their contents - constitute the safest refuge against this world of horror. They are the most pleasant and the most subtle means of traveling to a more compassionate planet. How will Boualem go on living now that they have separated him from his books, his most invigorating nourishment? He is like a plant that has been torn from the soil, separated from liquid and light, its two vital necessities. He has been excluded from the life of books. He has been exiled from all the landmarks of his childhood: values trampled, symbols corrupted, spaces disfigured and wrecked. — Various

Nowadays the thing which is going to help us in hard times are the books/films... movies.... series... they are filled with such tragedy and horror and everything which you are going to see in real life. — Deyth Banger

Rebecca uttered a low dry laugh, not facetiously, but more like a stitch coming apart at the seam. A wound opened. Her eyes were opening to a world she had denied for so long. She looked up at Frank and knew, just like in the books, hatred, real hatred is a Gollum that hides under the mountain of our hearts. It buries itself deep underground where no light can touch. And it waits. Rebecca thought of Tolkien and Bilbo and Frodo and that old grey wizard, she thought that maybe they were right. Perhaps "there are older and fouler things in the deep places of the world - in the deep places of our hearts." And as she sat on the floor with Tom Johnson's Glock aimed at her husband's head, Rebecca looked into the space where his eyes should have been. She looked at what was now only darkness and felt something on the other side, something not her husband, looking back. — Thomas S. Flowers

Good horror is written by people who understand that fear is one of the cardinal passageways into the core of humanity. Good horror is generally written by folks who grew up on horror; books, movies, etc. You can't simply decide to write - in any genre - if you don't first have an understanding of the topic and a strong mental backlog of reference. — Alistair Cross

grew up reading books where vampires were scary. This novel is an attempt to make them scary again. When I thought of the premise that became DRACULAS, I knew it needed to be a group project. Take four well-known horror authors, let them each create their own unique characters, and have them fight for their lives during a vampire outbreak at a secluded, rural hospital. This is NOT a collection of short stories. It's a single, complete novel. And it's going to freak you out. If you're easily disturbed, have a weak stomach, or are prone to nightmares, stop reading right now. There are no sexy teen heartthrobs herein. You have been warned. — Blake Crouch

She had been seized with a sudden existential horror. The house had white carpets and white furniture and, most significantly, no books. — Alexander McCall Smith

Spooky Twisties:

All things Spooky, here begin
They lay and wait, in books within.
They sometimes pass, in open space.
Then leave and go, without a trace.
Some appear on the spot.
Some we know, others not.
Sometimes we are afraid to say,
"leave us now", or beg to stay.
At times they leave a sign beyond,
A gentle breeze, or note from song.
Be not afraid, to read story's close.
For in the dark, your spirit goes. — Terri Bertha

If something was worth writing down, it was worth writing down in full. And she had a horror of lists
grocery lists, Christmas card lists, and most grisly of all, to-do lists. Lists, like appointment books, were nails driven into the future. She knew this was an odd objection to be raised by a person whose daily life was utterly predictable, who never threw caution, or anything else, to the winds, who never packed light, because she never packed at all. Still, the future was a sleeping monster, not to be poked. — Jincy Willett

How I get inspired?? (Good question!)
I just read stuff which make me to get inspired, like horror, like facts, like books which give me the chance to look over the goverment...
However I watch films like The Den, Truth or Die, Unknown 2011, Unknown 2015, You can't kill Stephen King, Dreamscapes and Nightmares, Breaking Bad, Monk and many others this series, films put me in Different situations and I just need to solve them...
My life the whole is just an example what I mustn't do and somehow this make me inspired! — Deyth Banger

This was something that happened in bad horror movies, and books written by people from Maine. — Chris Philbrook

Read. Read. Read. Just don't read one type of book. Read different books by various authors so that you develop different style. — R.L. Stine

Mr. Norrell did not know a great deal about war, but he suspected that soldiers are not generally your great respecters of books. They might put their dirty fingers on them. They might tear them! They might- horror of horrors!- read them and try the spells! — Susanna Clarke

There were fat cats and skinny cats. The long-tailed and the bobbed. The daring young leapers, and the old windowsill sleepers. Balls of waddling fluff, smooth-coated prowlers, and hairless ones that looked fragile and wise. The tiger-striped, the ring-tailed, and the ones with matching coloured socks and mittens. There were tabbies and calicos. Manx and Persians. Siamese and Bombay. Ragdolls and Birmans. Maine Coons and Russian Blues. There were Snowshoes and Somalis, Tonkinese and Turkish, and many, many more. Brown and beige and orange and grey and black and white and silver cats, each with gleaming eyes of emerald, or sapphire, or amber. A rainbow of precious stones. — Brooke Burgess

People like to pigeonhole. People like to label - not just books and movies, but everything in their life. If people want to call me 'literary horror,' I guess that's fine. What I'm trying to do is be both thrilling and thought-provoking. — Benjamin Percy

If you want your son or daughter to be positive. Like to enjoy life and so on and so on - focus on the positive, nature, birds, quite and fast waterfalls... If you want to be negative which will mean a killer, a slaughter focus on the negative. Kill infront of the eyes a chicken slaughter it, fast and quick... do it often, read scary horror books! — Deyth Banger

All of my chupacabra books are like novelizations of movies that haven't been made yet. — Raegan Butcher

I know that I want to bring sex and horror together as I have been able to in my books. — Clive Barker

There were no horror movies or horror books to speak of in the '40s. I picked the '50s because that pretty well spans my life as an appreciator - as somebody who's been involved with this mass cult of horror, from radio and movies and Saturday matinees and books. In the '40s there really wasn't that much. People don't want to read about horrible things in horrible times. So, in the '40s, there was Val Lutin with The Cat People and The Curse of the Cat People and there wasn't much else. — Stephen King

When it comes to horror there's a strange need to analyze. When "evil children" fad happened, there was The Exorcist and The Other and The Omen. People would say, "What this really means is that Americans don't want to have kids anymore. They feel hostility towards their own children. They feel they're being tied down and dragged down." In fact, in most cases, what those books are about is nice children who are beset by forces beyond their control. — Stephen King

Realisation danced across his face; she saw the hurt in his eyes. And a twisted, darker piece of her almost enjoyed it. The air in the room, stale with blood and sweat, and pure horror, hummed in the aftermath of her words. And finally, Ella knew what had to be done. — Shona Moyce

[Lord Horror] was so unique and radical, I expected to go to prison for it. I always thought that if you wrote a truly dangerous book -- something dangerous would happen to you. Which is one reason there are so few really dangerous books around. Publishers play at promoting dangerous books, whether they're Serpent's Tail or Penguin. All you get is a book vetted by committee, never anything radically imaginative or offensive that will take your fucking head off. Ironically, I think it would do other authors a power of good if they had to account for their books by going to prison -- there are far too many bad books being published! — David Britton

Your fortune teller cursed me. Foul spirits haunt every supermarket I go to. I can't show my face in Morrisons. — Steven Poore

I just know I'm too much of a wuss for Stephen King's books. I'm way too chicken to read horror. — Stephenie Meyer

Sulphurous wind gusted in his wake; the dust of the street swirled and the folds of his black coat flapped against his thin body. — A.F. Stewart

There were others, such as Jack London,who offered their readers such a respite from the miserable horror of existence that their books were like gifts from the gods. (Character of Tristan Sadler in "the Absolutist") — John Boyne

I grew up reading comic books. Super hero comic books, Archie comic books, horror comic books, you name it. — Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa

When I first heard of it, I thought it was a horror film. 'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles' is such a strange name. I wasn't into the comic books at all. — Judith Hoag

Outside there a lot of powerful stuff, starting from mind movies up to movies like drama, real life, horror, mysteries and many other. Music which makes your day interesting, quotes which change your thought, books which provoke and many other stuff... (So now you know what's everything about, Good Luck with the other Stuff!) — Deyth Banger

When I was a kid, there were these great comic books called 'Tales From The Crypt' and 'The Vault of Horror.' They were gruesome. I discovered them in the barbershop and thought they were fabulous. — R.L. Stine

Dolls, perhaps more than any other object, demonstrate just how thin the line between love and fear, comfort and horror, can be. They are objects of love and sources of reassurance for children, coveted prizes for collectors, sources of terror and horror in numerous movies, television shows, books, and stories. — Ellen Datlow

I was seven," she answered. "In my room, under the bed, I heard something like fingernails dragging across the floor. I got up the courage, hung my head over the side, and looked under."

"You're never supposed to do that," Mila gasped. "Seriously, don't you pay attention to the horror movies? — Lani Brown

I cannot life for life itself: but for the words which stay the flux. My life, I feel, will not be lived until there are books and stories which relive it perpetually in time. I forget too easily how it was, and shrink to the horror of the here and now, with no past and no future. Writing breaks open the vaults of the dead and the skies behind which the prophesying angels hide. The mind makes and makes, spinning its web. — Sylvia Plath

I grew up on the old EC comic books before the Comics Code in North American and with all sort of good-natured fun. I never had nightmares I think because all of the old horror stuff that I was exposed to was well meaning in a certain sense. — George A. Romero

Chill out with Shiver and Fears — A.J. Hard

It was a weird thing for me, because I don't read vampire books. I don't watch vampire movies. I'm not into the horror genre. I'm a wuss, I'm a scaredy cat. — Stephenie Meyer

Here are the stories written on the Book of Blood. They are a map of that dark highway that leads out of life towards unknown destinations. Few will have to take it, most will go on peacefully along lamplit streets, ushered out of living with prayers and caresses. But for a few, a chosen few, the horrors will come, skipping to fetch them off to the highway of the damned ... — Clive Barker

back in the middle ages
they burned unruly women at the stake
and out of the ashes of their bones and flesh
rose the Enlightenment and Reason fresh
and the white men declared
there's no such thing as witches
they're just crazy psycho-bitches
but we certainly can't let them run free
lock 'em up and throw away the key
yeah they said: lock 'em up and throw away the key

cause there's nothing scarier than a woman mad and/or
aware of her own magic
tragic how much violence is done
in the name of science
to ensure our silence

in Victorian times they located suffering in our uterus
in the blood in the soft internal organs
took our pain our righteous rage
they called it 'hysteria'
and then Dr. Freud ignored women's horror stories
herstories of abuse and rape and
took a justified hatred of the penis and called it
envy (he sold more books that way) — Leah Harris

Growing up devouring horror comics and novels, and being inspired to become a writer because of horror novels, movies, and comic books, I always knew I was going to write a horror novel. — Colson Whitehead

We both [with Suzanne Collins ] felt strongly that you wouldn't want to age up the characters, no matter the age of the actors playing the roles. They should be playing the age that they are in the [Hunger Games] books. It would let people off the hook, if you said, "Well, instead of 12 to 18, why don't you make them 18 to 25 or 16 to 21?" If you don't stay true to the horror of the fact that they are 12 to 18, you're not doing justice to the book. — Nina Jacobson

I always loved horror, but I read all sorts of books. My favourite as a child was 'The Secret Garden' which has a big influence on Lord Loss, believe it or not! — Darren Shan

Loads of children read books about dinosaurs, underwater monsters, dragons, witches, aliens, and robots. Essentially, the people who read SF, fantasy and horror haven't grown out of enjoying the strange and weird. — China Mieville

My 'Rot & Ruin' series is a post-apocalyptic adventure for teens. My 'Joe Ledger' novels are science-based action thrillers for adults. My 'Dead of Night' stories are zombie tales for adults; my 'Pine Deep Trilogy' is classic horror for adults, and I've written nonfiction books on topics ranging from martial arts to folklore. — Jonathan Maberry

As it recurred again and again, it set me thinking of what my architect's books say about the custom in early times to consecrate the choir as soon as it was built, and that the nave, being finished sometimes half a century later, often did not get any blessing at all: I wondered idly if that had been the case at St. Barnabe, and whether something not usually supposed to be at home in a Christian church, might have entered undetected, and taken possession of the west gallery. I had read of such things happening too, but not in works on architecture.
("In The Court Of The Dragon") — Robert W. Chambers

I will come,' the priest answered, 'for I have read in old books of these strange beings which are neither quick nor dead, and which lie ever fresh in their graves, stealing out in the dusk to taste life and blood. — Francis Marion Crawford

Many of my readers are women and some of them email me their thoughts about the stories I've written. Almost all of them find a delicious pleasure in being totally frightened by the strange and dark side of life. Perhaps it's because horror books are an escape from our sometimes-mundane lives? Or could it be that many of us actually do have a private darker side that we like to explore secretly through books, movies and music? — Sara Brooke

I was starting to recognize a corner I was driving myself into: that all writing could do was refer to things that had already been written. I'm making the margin, but the margin of a book that already exists. I was having this exhilaration at, but at the same time horror of this recognition that I'd driven myself into the world of only books. This is a world of the previously written, and maybe I don't have to add to it, maybe all I can do is measure it. — Vito Acconci

From an early age I loved horror movies. I read books about horror, cops, firemen and military. Over the course of the years I started to see that there's a reality to this. The first movie I was really conscious of seeing was THE EXORCIST and I don't know if any of you have seen that but it scared the sh*t out of me. It really frightened me. — Ralph Sarchie

If you talk about genres - I don't care if you're talking about war, Westerns, science fiction, horror, fantasy, humor, romance - anything you can find, strolling the aisles of a Borders or a Barnes & Noble, I can bring you many comic books representing each genre. — Michael Uslan

The horror genre is my personal favorite. But then again, I was the kid who read coroner books for fun. — Candace Kita

Always just a brainstorm away from our next disaster ... — Birgit Pratcher

To make the best dicision for a book first check out the title, second check out the cover, third to check out the category what type is it - is it a horror or thriller or it's a psychology - it's important this. Then for sure check out little what's about the book. By openning it and reading the first 3 pages or as much as possible to make your decision! — Deyth Banger

When I was growing up, I always read horror books, while my sister read romance novels. — Dorothy Allison

As for genre, my adult books are usually filed under science fiction / fantasy, although some stores put them into romance, and few have stuck them into horror. I consider all my books a mix of steampunk and urban fantasy. — Gail Carriger

Miss Millick wondered just what had happened to Mr. Wran. He kept making the strangest remarks when she took dictation. Just this morning he had quickly turned around and asked, "Have you ever seen a ghost, Miss Millick?" And she had tittered nervously and replied, "When I was a girl there was a thing in white that used to come out of the closet in the attic bedroom when you slept there, and moan. Of course it was just my imagination. I was frightened of lots of things." And he had said, "I don't mean that traditional kind of ghost. I mean a ghost from the world today, with the soot of the factories in its face and the pounding of machinery in its soul. The kind that would haunt coal yards and slip around at night through deserted office buildings like this one. A real ghost. Not something out of books." And she hadn't known what to say. ("Smoke Ghost") — Fritz Leiber

I had an idea for a medical conspiracy thriller. Since it was non-horror, I didn't want the publishers and editors bringing a lot of baggage - my history as a genre writer in the SF and horror fields, for instance - to the novel when they read it. I wanted them to consider the book solely on its own merits. So I called myself Colin Andrews. I was tired of seeing my books at floor level. Not that Herman Wouk and Phyllis Whitney and William Wharton are bad company, but I wanted to be up at eye level for a change, where people with bad backs could get a chance to see my books. — F. Paul Wilson

In a word, many flattering things were said of them. But there was some criticism. People spoke with horror of the number of books they had read. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Great work doesn't make me jealous; it makes me want to work. — Glen Hirshberg