Line #8 NightmareFuel/NeilGaiman


1	[[quoteright:250:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/3254513713_e478b76009_b_3946.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:250:"What is there to be scared of about buttons?"]]
3	* ''Literature/{{Coraline}}'' has [[{{NightmareFuel/Coraline}} its own page]].
4	* And ''NightmareFuel/{{Neverwhere}}''.
5	* The [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQC0QVXa33o "Koumpounophobia"]] video made to tie in with [[WesternAnimation/{{Coraline}} the ''Coraline'' film]], in which Gaiman talks about buttons and a fear of them. In the video includes a surprisingly creepy clip from the beginning of WesternAnimation/{{Coraline}} where a doll gets [[EyeScream its button eyes removed]] and its mouth unsewn. The scariest part is at the end, where Gaiman puts [[BlackEyesOfEvil buttons over his eyes]] and then [[PsychoticSmirk smiles]].
6	* The short story "[[Literature/TheProblemOfSusan The Problem of Susan]]" is an interesting read, discussing the importance of children's stories and the rather cruel treatment of [[Literature/TheChroniclesOfNarnia Susan]] in the Narnia books. Then, at the end of the story, we are treated to a {{Squick}}ily allegorical dream sequence involving someone getting eaten by a lion, but still living, thus having to watch their siblings get eaten before their very eyes. And then there's bestiality. Seriously.
7	** Oh, there's so much worse. All of Susan's body has been eaten by Aslan except for her head. She's dead but still [[AndIMustScream aware]], and, having died with her eyes opened, she's ForcedToWatch as Aslan slowly eats her sister. As for her brothers, all that's stated is that the White Witch takes them but exactly what she does to them is [[NothingIsScarier never elaborated on]]. It's only said that they end up as some twisted... thing. Aslan then performs oral sex on the Witch. Susan's torment only ends once Aslan devours her skull.
8	** There's also the shock factor of [[BigGood Aslan]] suddenly committing [[FaceHeelTurn betrayal]] and brutality. You'll never see him the same way again...
9	* The short story ''Keepsakes and Treasures'' describes the narrator's rendezvous with a prostitute, with whom he deals gently and considerately... initially. So far, so... surprisingly unsquicky. Then everything promptly takes a bullet train to hell when you find out that she was nine years old.
10	** That's not to mention the narrator talking about his backstory (mother institutionalized on probably trumped-up accusations by her own father kills herself, leaving the narrator in a sucky orphanage and with a drive for revenge on whoever his father was...) and his casual description of his current job as "troubleshooter."
11	* "Babycakes", a little piece written for PETA. One day, all the animals in the world disappear. At first, people have no idea what to do... then someone suggests using babies for everything we used to use animals for. [[EatsBabies Food]], product testing, clothing... after all, "Babies can’t talk. They can hardly move. A baby is not a rational, thinking creature." And so life goes on as normal... until one day, all the babies disappear too. The short story ends there, but the comic adaptation ends with an old woman being experimented on, implying that humanity has moved on to using the elderly. Gaiman himself said it was the only thing he wrote that really scared him.
12	* How about ''Literature/AmericanGods''. Let's see, there's the bit at the end of the first chapter where a prostitute literally devours a john with her vagina; the dream sequence detailing the life of a boy raised specifically to be sacrificed; the perverse descriptions of the ''new gods'' (who are all based on seemingly innocent aspects of modern life); a description of the utterly horrible and terrifying life of a slave in the Caribbean; oh, and there's Laura's first hand account of what it's like to be one of the walking dead.
13	** Don't forget Hinzelmann. And the car under the lake...
14	* ''Interworld'' contains another bit of disturbing imagery. One evil empire wants to boil down the protagonist's body until only his soul's left to power their spaceships; the other wants to drain out his energy over the same period while keeping him in cold storage. In my opinion, each method is a worse way to die than the other.
15	* "Feeders and Eaters" from his short story collection "Fragile Things." It's based on a nightmare he had when he was twenty, he says in the introduction, and that ought to give you a hint that nothing good will come of it. Involves a half-eaten live cat and an air of overwhelming ickiness. The man telling the story lived next door to an old woman. One day, he finds her bedridden and incredibly weak. She requests some meat to eat to get her strength back. He brings her sirloin but it's later revealed she's been eating the missing cat that belongs to the family who rents her, her room. The cat's been half-eaten, the bones on its lower half having been picked clean, [[FateWorseThanDeath but it's still alive and in pain]]. When the narrator found the cat he [[MercyKill mercy killed]] it by stomping on it to death. Having been feeding off the cat to keep herself alive, she begins feeding on her neighbor to take the cat's place. Formerly handsome and muscled, the man now looks emaciated and dead as the woman slowly devours him alive. Small scraps of meat are still on his bones, like what you see on half-eaten chicken wings. What's worse is that the man clearly wants to die, but for some unexplained reason he's in the, now young, woman's thrall. The apparent indifference of the protagonist to his old friend's situation only makes it more disturbing.
16	* For anyone living in Portsmouth, where Gaiman grew up, "Queen of Knives" is fairly nightmare-inducing in its familiarity.
17	* Just a word to the wise: do not read ''The Hidden Chamber'' late at night.
18	* His story 'Down Among the Dead Men' published within the book ''Zombie Apocalypse! Fightback'' — when he [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srTh3SMrE4o narrates it]], it's even more terrifying.
19	* [[http://holdinghandswithhades.edublogs.org/seven-deadly-sins-part-7-the-others-by-neil-gaiman/ 'Other People']] contains a unique, and utterly terrifying, depiction of Hell. "Time is fluid here."
20	* [[http://thebusyteacherspage.com/wp-content/teaching/Language%20Arts/Short%20Stories/Dont%20Ask%20Jack%20-%20Neil%20Gaiman.pdf ''Don't Ask Jack'']], three pages about a ScaryJackInTheBox in which nothing particularly bad actually happens, but manages to be utterly chilling regardless. Listen to Gaiman himself narrate it [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ScaryJackInTheBox here]].
21	* ''Click-clack the Rattle Bag'' is narrated by a young man who's babysitting for his girlfriend's little brother. The little boy tells him about click-clacks, which hang around in old houses and strip you out of your skin, then leave it hanging. They then possess other people's bodies. The narrator takes the little boy's hand and they climb up to the bedroom at the top of the house, going up the creaky old stairs as they do. At the top, they see one door left open, with ''things'' hanging inside. The little boy pushes him in, and the door slams shut.
22	* One short story gave a focus on a Duke who was TheStoic and was described as a borderline [[TheSociopath sociopath]] who struggles to understand concepts of compassion and love before undertaking to "save" a queen only for his own understanding of said concepts in a ''very'' unnatural MindScrew journey. The Duke in question? ''[[Music/StationToStation The Thin White Duke]]''. Yes, Neil wrote an origin story for Music/DavidBowie's character! And it is as horrifying and unsettling as the character and what [[LostInCharacter Bowie himself became for a short period of time]].
23	* His very short (as in, only ten lines long) story titled "Nicholas Was..." which portrays SantaClaus as actually being a slave of the "dwarfish natives of the Arctic caverns" who is forced every year to deliver their creations in "Endless Night" (implied to be a night frozen in time). Notably, Nicholas sees his existence as even more torturous than the fates of Prometheus, Loki, Sisyphus, and Judas...and since his condition is explicitly described as a 'punishment', the reader can only wonder what he did to be sentenced to such a fate.

Context NightmareFuel / NeilGaiman