Never read a book, looking for suggestions
 

While it may sound hard to believe I am 23 years old and have never read a book in my life other than early days in school when it was Dr. Seuss. Anyways I decided after all these years to finally open up a book. What brought this upon me is the fact that I'm quite frankly getting tired of horror movies. It's the same old thing one after another with nothing new or refreshing. I always hear the book is better than the movie and while I find it hard to believe that a book can scare you I'm willing to try it.

My question is being that I have no knowledge in books and the only authors I know are Stephin King and Clive Barker I'm completely clueless where to start. To give you an idea for suggestions I am into hauntings/ghosts more than anything. I cling to realism rather than complete fiction. After some web browsing I created a list of what seemed to appeal to me the most. What would you suggest out of these books or if you have any other suggestions I'm open ears.

The Shining by Stephen King
The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty
It by Stephen King
Ghost Story By Peter Straub
Amityville Horror by Jay Anson
Salem's Lot by Stephen King
The Girl Next Door by Jack Ketchum
Pet Sematary by Stephen King

For someone who has never read a book, thats some pretty hard reading first up.

I suggest easing into it first. Read some Hardy Boys, Perry Mason, Ellery Queen, Agatha Christie. Once you get a gist of that very fertile area of the mind called "imagination of the inner eyes", go for King, Barker et al.

I just want to make sure it will be a book I can get into and these sparked my interest. I've never heard of any authors you mentioned, what book would you suggest from them?

Id go for some sort of collection of ghost/horror short stories to whet your appetite. There are plenty out there and alot are by mainstream authors which will help you find where your tastes lie.

Is it *just* horror movies you're into?
What other kind of movies or stories do you like?
I may be able to suggest a few, but yeah...tastes don't always match and all.

No, I love Suspense/Thrillers and Comedies. I would love to get into reading but I just don't see it happening. I went to the library today and I had three books in mind and they didn't have any so I had no choice but to get Stephen King because that's all I knew. I grabbed Pet Semetary because it was shortest and I tried reading it a little while ago and my mind wanders so much I have to read sentences over three times before I take in whats going on. Between reading sentences over and over and than dazing off it took me 10 minutes to read the first page.

Definitely. King's Nightshift is a good one and there are a lot of treasuries of classic short horror fiction.

Check out "Vertical Run" by Joseph Garber.
Not overly long or wordy but a pretty good action/thriller title. If you've seen Bourne movies, it's a little bit along those lines?
One of my favourite books.

Murderland Part 1:h8
by Garrett Cook

it's suppose to be pretty good.

I read The Shining and Salem's Lot when I was 14, though I was already a lover of the horror genre.

Peter Straub is amazing, though he is what I would consider to be the writer's writer of horror (ie he's a bit tougher to get into).