Creepy/scary children's books

[Zupanatural]

Some kids books, esp from bygone days, can be absolutely terrifying on account of either the story or the illustrations. Which ones freaked you out in your younger years and why?

The ones that stand out for me (now in my mid-thirties) are the original Moomins books, which were written in Finland by Tove Jansson in the 1940s & 50s. The illustrations are just sinister (lots of darkness, trees & half-hidden creatures) and have always scared the hell out of me.

[Brandi Noelle]

I loved the "Goosebumps" series when I was a kid. I think my favorite scary book was "The Dollhouse Murders."

[Lincolnshirelass]

I was freaked out by 'Struwelpeter' (which I read in the original German and unexpurgated!) but also by some things you may not think - my (much) older brother was into astronomy and I remember one of his books describing how the earth would end and it scared me so much I couldn't even look at the page. I was also one of those children (and I'm not entirely rid of it now) who found anything to do with clowns unsettling.

[JusCally]

Does anyone remember Scary Stories to Read in the Dark? To this day I haven't read anything (fictional) that scared me as much as those stories did back in the day! In my mind is one specific illustration
of a woman's skeletal head, with which my loving sister would ambush me at every opportunity.

[Faees]

I like scary stories because they are interesting especially this book when i read this book that night i wasn't able to sleep properly and cannot concentrate in work but, if you start reading this you won't feel like stop reading.

[Lil Reads]

The Goosebumps series overall was very creepy, for an entirely unexpected reason. The supernatural elements were just the tip of the ice burg. The children protagonists seemed to be the only ones who saw that anything was wrong.

I read one of the books for a class assignment and it had such a creepy undertone. The protagonist was a boy who is experiencing weird physical changes: lots of weird body hair, appetite changes, and more. Some could be attributed to puberty, especially since his classmates are having similar changes, but then it turns out the children are all dogs who a scientist transformed into humans via injection, the children are regressing into their animal forms, and the story ends with the boy in full dog form seeing his parents come home with a new baby that turns out to be the family cat transformed via a similar serum. The entire town is doing similar things - transforming pets into children for a few years then the children reverting so the animals are stuck with their memories as children as their parents get new kids from transforming new animals.

The TV adaptations of the books showed this very well; one episode, titled something like Say Cheese and Die had a set of kids find a magic camera. The magic changes their appearances rapidly, the girl becomes so thin she literally vanishes and the boy gets so fat he goes from thin to morbidly obese; this all takes place over a few days, less than a week and none of the parents are really concerned. The boy's teacher mocks him in front of the other students.

Overall, there was a theme of adults not caring about the kids and how the kids have to deal with supernatural elements on their own.

[Jessica Reehl]

I haven't read many truly scary children's books but I have heard other moms describe Roald Dahl books as being dark/scary. He's my favorite author so that always surprises me. My kids and I love reading all of his books over and over.

[Chayimecel2611]

It seems that most of the people like goosebumps, yes it was scary but i like stories that came from my locality which I going interesting especially at night time

[Vscholz]

Does anyone remember Scary Stories to Read in the Dark? To this day I haven't read anything (fictional) that scared me as much as those stories did back in the day! In my mind is one specific illustration
of a woman's skeletal head, with which my loving sister would ambush me at every opportunity.

I was going to say these books! The stories are creepy enough but then the illustrations make it even more so! Even as an adult, I find them unsettling.

He also has a set of stories in a Learn-to-Read book called In a Dark, Dark Room. They aren't as scary but they are for people who are just learning to read. It has one of my favorite stories in it--"The Yellow Ribbon."

[Vscholz]

Mary Downing Hahn has some really creepy books. Wait Til Helen Comes is one that comes to mind. I don't remember the titles of her other books but I do remember devouring them all when I was in elementary school.

[OloladeO]

As a kid, I wasn't exposed to scary books. The only scary thing I remember is Chucky and it wasn't a book but a movie.

[Writing queen]

I loved reading goosebumps and scary stories to tell in the dark. And I still read them.