Horror literature/movies

[MR. Macabre 666]

Horror isn't the genre for me.  Psychological thrillers are sometimes interesting.

When I was a teenager the book "The Exorcist" came out.  I was at my regular babysitting gig that often lasted late in the night, if not the wee hours of the morning.  The house was, at that time, at the end of that part of town so there were no houses across the street, little traffic, and little light...nighttime was very, very dark.  After the kids were asleep I was sitting in the breezeway reading the book.  It was getting scarier and I was reading faster and faster when suddenly Pepper started barking outside and a man yelled, "Shut up you son of a bitch!".

That was it for me for reading horror.  I nearly needed to be scraped of the ceiling after that, my heart may still be pounding a bit from it, I remember it so clearly.

It doesn't matter that I later learned it was a neighborhood guy a couple years older than me who was trying to walk of some of the night's partying before going home to his parents' house.

Speaking from experience The Exorcist is not a good choice for a teenage dates.

I have to admit that the book did kind of creep me out. I read it as a teenager living in a catholic household.