Best Horror short story

[Morgana the Fey]

We all have our favourite novels but in the horror genre, what would be your favourite short story?
Here are a few of mine -

H.P.Lovecraft The Rats in the Walls
Bram Stoker The Squaw
F.Marion Crawford The Dead Smile
Stephen King Suffer the Little Children
Nigel Kneale The Pond
Ambrose Bierce The Damned Thing
Clark Ashton Smith The Seed from the Sepulchre
Terry Tapp The Invaders

[dragondrool]

Anything by Caitlin R. Kiernan.

[AuntiePam]

Good question! There are so many. Sometimes I forget titles and authors and just remember what happened. There was one about a woman, a mother -- her husband was keeping her prisoner in their basement, starving her, and worse. I think that the word "stick" is in the title, but I'm not positive.

Tehama by Bob Leman is a new favorite. I just got his collection last summer, and IMHO every story is a treasure, and especially this one.

T. M. Wright has a nice one in the latest issue of Cemetery Dance magazine -- it's called The Marybell Women.

I like a couple you mentioned -- The Squaw and The Damned Thing -- not familiar with the others.

Haven't heard of The Invaders or of Terry Tapp. Where could I find that one?

Other favorites are The Mangler, The Boogeyman and The Reach by Stephen King, and several by Joe Lansdale -- can't think of the titles right now though.

[Eurytus]

Pretty much anything by MR James although with particular kudos to "Whistle and I'll come to you", "The Ash Tree" and "Wailing Well".

I've never come across anything better.

The Woman in Black is probably short enough to be considered almost a short story so maybe that too.

The Tell Tale Heart, by Poe.

[Morgana the Fey]

Auntie Pam, if you look up the Locus Index to Science Fiction, a few of his stories are listed there.

Also loved " The Pit and the Pendulum" Edgar Allen Poe

[AuntiePam]

Morgana, thanks, I'll do that.

[LUKEDAWG]

I always thought "The Cask of Amontillado" by Poe was fantastic, as well as "Young Goodman Brown" by Nathaniel Hawthorne.

[Iskaral Pust]

Without a doubt Details by China Miéville. An absolutely fantastic story.
Second: Mr Chub and Mr Chuff by Peter Straub. Ohh, shivers just writing.

[Clarkesworld]

I'd have to say that Thomas Ligotti is one of my favorites when it comes to short stories... though it's incredibly difficult to pick one story over the other.

-Neil

[kahnovitch]

I've read some good horror shorts by Clive Barker in the "Books of Blood" and there were some tasty ones in "The Skeleton Crew" by Stephen King too.
So long ago though I can't remember that many except "The Yattering and Jack" (Barker) and "The Jaunt" sort of sci-fi/horror by King.

[Wen147]

I always loved "The Mist" by Stephen King

Got to agree with Morgana the Fey on H.P.Lovecraft The Rats in the Walls

There's so many good short stories out there. It's kind of hard to pick a favorite.

[Baylen]

"I Am Legend" by Richard Matheson is one of the best vampire short stories I've ever read. Highly recommended.

[projectpulp]

"Slipping" by David B. Silva in the Borderlands 2 Anthology (ed. by Thomas F. Monteleone). Quite easily the only horror short story that's ever managed to genuinely frighten me.

Jon

[AuntiePam]

Jon, I think I have that one. Thanks, I'll check it out. Silva doesn't produce a lot, compared to some, but it's all high quality, from what I've seen so far.

Boy, did that sentence have qualifiers or what?!

[Beleg]

'The Masque of the Red Death' by Edgar Allan Poe.

Over the years I have read more tranlastions of horror stories then reading them in the native tongue so I don't always remember the names of stories which I read.
One such story concerned a London infested with rats which ate people and were as big as bucks. They attacked schools and it took the locals great effort to weed them out. Even then a female who had just given birth to a score of young rats was overlooked in the approximity of the place from where the horrors began.

I found it a shockingly horrible and disturbing read.