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The Sword and Laser discussion
Has there been a book that made you feel physically sick not just cry?

Created by Christos, Apr 11, 2017 250 views
Christos In the Comic Book Walking Dead when Lori and the baby got shot and died I felt like I was about to throw up I had to stop reading. When I was listening to the Audiobook of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix my hand started hurting pretty badly just listening to the Narrator describe the torture Harry was going through during the magic pen scene.
Baelor Perhaps you should add spoiler tags?

Probably the closest I came was with Bridge to Terabithia.
terpkristin Also some of the scenes in Joe Abercrombie's First Law series made me nauseous. Really, anything with torture, particularly physical torture or abuse.
Malaraa Robopocalypse

Tried to skim past the first gory section, hoping it would be OK, hit another one by surprise, still a very short way in, and said nope! All done.
deleted user The Traitor Baru Cormorant
Affinity
Code Name Verity

All three of these have tragic events that were like a punch to my gut!
John (Nevets) Nevets Yea, torture will do it for me. Why I stopped reading "The song of Ice and Fire" series, oddly enough I still enjoy the TV series.

The two times I remember feeling truly visceral reactions that made me queasy were with Scalzi's The God Engines for the above reason. And the other one was for quite a different reason, it was in American Gods when (view spoiler) That one is more odd, and I can't quite explain why I had that reaction. But in a similar scene in Neal Stephenson Quicksilver trilogy I had a similar reaction, just to a much less extent. (Bit of a spoiler for both, but more about me) (view spoiler)
Darren terpkristin wrote: "The Jungle"

I was thinking of that one, too.

Any time I've ever read true crime. Also, since becoming a parent, anything involving cruelty to children I find much more visceral than I ever did before, and am WAY more likely to just walk away from such books.
Christos The act of torture doesn't usually bother me when reading or listening even the ASOIAF books didn't bother me personally, it's just the way that JK Rowling described the torture that got to me it was so detailed.
Dara The first book to come to mind was Horns by Joe Hill. You can read my review to know more but basically I hated the way Hill treated the women in this story.
Leesa The Family: The Story of Charles Manson's Dune Buggy Attack Battalion disturbed me a great deal, made me feel sick, and gave me very weird dreams.

The Witching Hour had a very similar effect on me--all consuming and disturbing.

Lasher made me so physically ill and sqwicked i had to stop reading.

I read horror and can handle very graphic stuff in prose, but wow.
Jocelyn Less Than Zero was incredibly difficult to read. It made me sick to my stomach for sure, and it stayed with me.
John (Taloni) Taloni Hasn't happened to me. I don't know if that's because books don't affect me that way, or if I avoid books like that.

I lemmed Night Circus ten pages in due to subject matter, so maybe that would have done had I persevered. Certainly some books have had me shaking my head. Heinlein's Friday comes to mind. Opening sequence, Friday gets tortured. Why, Bob, why? And then the end: Friday is fulfilled because her supercapable self now can do something she thought barred to her: become a mommy! Barf, barf, barf.
Sandra When I read The Night Guest it made me very uncomfortable. Just that slow build up of something bad about to happen feeling.
Rod I found The Library at Mount Char a very unpleasant read due to its extremely graphic depictions of torture and violence. It turned my stomach.
Kev I read a space opera book a few years ago that had a scene of torture in it that bothered me. Oddly, it didn't bother the first time I read the book a few years before that. The second time I was all "I don't remember this" and put the book down.
Kristina American Psycho.. I quit reading it.
Tassie Dave Kristina wrote: "American Psycho.. I quit reading it."

and all the reviews made it sound like a light fun read ;-)
Albert Dunberg Kristina wrote: "American Psycho.. I quit reading it."

Second that one.
I finished it but put it down many times in pure disgust.
William Saeednia-Rankin In Peter F. Hamilton's Night's Dawn, there is a scene that is described as a "reverse crowning".

Gah....just....blah!

If I hadn't been stuck on a 38 hour bus journey, that would have been it for me and Mr Hamilton.

He's got some pretty grim scenes in the rest of his work, but nothing got to me like that
Keith I'm reading The Crow Girl right now, and while there's no one thing in it, it is relentlessly horrific throughout. Even in the realm of Scandinavian crime fiction, where the best thing that ever happens to anyone is something that is merely horrible, this one has given me pause a time or two.
Joe At the end of The Deed of Paksenarion when she is raped and tortured by the dark elves (?) I was shook up. It took me months to pick the book back up and finish it.
Rob Washam I can't believe no one mentioned the Stephen R. Donaldson Gap Series. I finished it many years ago but it still haunts me to this day.
Sebastian Rob wrote: "I can't believe no one mentioned the Stephen R. Donaldson Gap Series. I finished it many years ago but it still haunts me to this day."

Yes! One of the most viscerally gory and quease-inducing series I've read. It's also damn good space opera. He doesn't get enough credit for it, sadly.
Mike I made the mistake of starting The Stand, when I stayed home sick from school with the flu. The flu made me feel sick, the book made it worse.

Mike
Poonam Sandra wrote: "When I read The Night Guest it made me very uncomfortable. Just that slow build up of something bad about to happen feeling."

I agree. I was struggling through it.
Fresno Bob The Painted Bird did it for me, two specific scenes in general....
Kristina American Psyco... I quit reading it.
Lorie Some parts of the Malazan Books of the Fallen are pretty gruesome.
Ok, most of it is.

I am almost ready for my second read through. It's so good!
Peter Cleary For me it was Consider Phlebas by Ian M Banks. There is some nasty stuff in there.
Margaret So true. I still remember reading along and thinking what an awesome book it is, and then hitting that nasty stuff. Not the only one of his books that does that to you, as far as I remember.
Alan Consider Phlebas did that to me too - the scene on the island made me physically queasy.

Of the other books mentioned up top, The Jungle probably hit me the hardest while I was most upset with Donaldson (but it was Lord Foul's Bane, I haven't read the Gap Series).
Mike The Road by Cormac McCarthy.
Lena For me it was The Sparrow:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Has anyone here made it through Cows? I haven't tried. I put on too much weight every time I go vegetarian.
Mark Lawrence I think if a torture scene doesn't do this to you then the author has failed or you are very desensitized.
David Mark wrote: "I think if a torture scene doesn't do this to you then the author has failed or you are very desensitized."

Funny you should say that Mark...there are some things in your books that could definitely make someone queasy, but it never really got to me. The whole nail thing definitely made me stop reading and go, "wow, okay, wow, he's...yup, that's super messed up in a fresh hellish way I did not see coming," but it didn't make me feel sick at all. I've gotten that from movies a couple of times (it's why I'm not a fan of the Saw movies), but don't think I have from a book yet. You're definitely not a failure though, I'm desensitized af.
Viola A song of Ice and Fire series on several occasions. I finished the 3rd book and just walked away.
The Steel Remains.
Dream London, don't read this one.
Mark Lawrence David wrote: "Mark wrote: "I think if a torture scene doesn't do this to you then the author has failed or you are very desensitized."

Funny you should say that Mark...there are some things in your books that c..."

To my mind the Saw movies, while distasteful, are not really high impact. To truly resonate it has to be made to matter, whether that's through the characters or the situation. But just showing (or describing) the viscera and making more elaborate tortures doesn't make something that will stick with the audience. You can get more impact with a bully twisting someone's arm if it is done right.
Jennifer OH yes, The Steel Remains. I never read the next in the series.

The Road, but that just ripped my heart out and stepped all over it. It is one the best books I have read.

The End of Alice it fucking horrific.
David Mark wrote: "David wrote: "Mark wrote: "I think if a torture scene doesn't do this to you then the author has failed or you are very desensitized."

Funny you should say that Mark...there are some things in you..."

Well, that brings up an interesting discussion then. Is queasiness really an important factor at all, then? That's what the topic is about, not, "which torture scene stuck with you the most?" Saw makes me a little queasy, but because I don't care about the characters or the writing, nothing about the scenes sticks me with, it's just a purely physical reaction to unpleasant visual stimuli of gratuitous self-harm that happens in the moment. I have never spent time thinking about it afterwards. The stuff in Broken Empire stuck with me and I still think about it sometimes, but it didn't make me queasy or produce a physical reaction of any kind, probably because I read it instead of seeing it visually, which makes it far easier to intellectualize and deal with.
Casey American Psycho made me pretty darn uncomfortable.
Nick Assassin's Quest by Robin Hobb left me feeling incredibly sad/upset. I read it when I was quite a bit younger though so maybe I was just really sensitive.

Not a book but the movie Never Let Me Go is based on a book and that gave me nightmares for weeks.
John (Taloni) Taloni Nick wrote: "Assassin's Quest by Robin Hobb left me feeling incredibly sad/upset. I read it when I was quite a bit younger though so maybe I was just really sensitive. "

As I think about it, the cat's impending death at the end of The Door into Summer saddened me to the point of tears. I was ten.