Terrifying Quotes

“Say what you will about the sweet miracle of unquestioning faith, I consider a capacity for it terrifying and absolutely vile.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Mother Night

“...repeated trauma in childhood forms and deforms the personality. The child trapped in an abusive environment is faced with formidable tasks of adaptation. She must find a way to preserve a sense of trust in people who are untrustworthy, safety in a situation that is unsafe, control in a situation that is terrifyingly unpredictable, power in a situation of helplessness. Unable to care for or protect herself, she must compensate for the failures of adult care and protection with the only means at her disposal, an immature system of psychological defenses.”
― Judith Lewis Herman, Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence - From Domestic Abuse to Political Terror

“Great. Abducted by aliens. She’d never live this one down. She wondered if they would dissect her. Maybe grab a steak of the tender parts and cook her up. Any sex stuff was too weird and horrible to think about, though it had been awhile. What the hell did she know? Brad Pitt. Surely, he wasn’t entirely human. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.”
― William Kely McClung, LOOP

“No foot, but strapped to his thigh was what looked like a wooden table leg. It looked ridiculous; the idea was completely idiotic. A naked pirate who couldn’t even afford a proper peg leg.”
― William Kely McClung, LOOP

“A freshman congresswoman was demanding an investigation into whoever hacked her Flat Earth support group. It could spell the end of the entire flat planet if the FBI, Homeland Security, and her hometown library couldn’t track the subversive bastards down.”
― William Kely McClung, LOOP

“Psychological trauma is an affliction of the powerless. At the moment of trauma, the victim is rendered helpless by overwhelming force. When the force is that of nature, we speak of disasters. When the force is that of other human beings, we speak of atrocities. Traumatic events overwhelm the ordinary systems of care that give people a sense of control, connection, and meaning.… Traumatic events are extraordinary, not because they occur rarely, but rather because they overwhelm the ordinary human adaptations to life.… They confront human beings with the extremities of helplessness and terror, and evoke the responses of catastrophe.”
― Judith Lewis Herman, Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence - From Domestic Abuse to Political Terror

“Time is in charge here, not me, and that's terrifying”
― Holly Jackson, Good Girl, Bad Blood

“You’ve lost your mind,’ he sneered.‘Maybe. So you should be terrified.”
― Holly Jackson, As Good As Dead

“If you wish to serve me, as you have bloodsworn yourself to do, you must do so with honor. And that does not include introducing yourself by name to people like my mother in order to terrify them into submission.”
"Kem'falla—" Gaelen protested.
"Don't bother to deny it," she snapped.”
― C.L. Wilson, Lady of Light and Shadows

“You are kind of terrifying.'

'Thank you.”
― Rebecca Yarros, Fourth Wing

“As I fall asleep in his arms, I wish I hadn’t resisted him all those weeks. Even though on some level I realize it’s because of exactly this; that I knew how much I could feel for this man. That our chemistry both inside the bedroom and out would be like nothing I’ve ever felt. It both excites me and terrifies me in equal measure. I close my eyes and hope for the best.”
― Melanie A. Smith, Never Date a Doctor

“Cardan gazes at a rosebush with petals so black and glossy they look like patent leather. 'It was terrifying,' he says, 'watching you fall. I mean, you're generally terrifying, but I am unused to fearing for you. And then, I was furious. I am not sure I have ever been that angry before.'

'Mortals are fragile,' I say.

'Not you,' he says in a way that sounds a little like a lament. 'You never break.'

Which is ridiculous, as hurt as I am. I feel like a constellation of wounds, held together with string and stubbornness. Still, I like hearing it. I like everything he's saying all too well.

That boy is your weakness.”
― Holly Black, The Queen of Nothing

“If it’s true, I have the absolute right to terrify you with it.”
― Dorothy Allison

“The thing looked around vacantly with its one eye, as if it had lost her. Finally it saw her, and, as if making a great effort, it opened its mouth once more and said in a wet, urgent voice, 'Run, child . . . She is pushing pushing me so hard to hurt you. I cannot fight her.'
'You can, said Coraline. 'Be brave.'

She looked around: the thing that had once been the other father was between her and the steps up and out of the cellar. She started edging along the wall, heading towards the steps. The thing twisted bonelessly until one eye was facing her. It seemed to be getting bigger now, and more awake. 'Alas,' it said. 'I cannot.'

Coraline had a single heartbeat in which to react. She could only think of two things to do. Either she could scream, and try to run away, and be chased around a badly lit cellar by the huge grub-thing - be chased until it caught her. Or she could do something else.

So she did something else.

As the thing reached her, Coraline put out her hand and closed it around the thing's remaining button-eye, and she tugged, as hard as she knew how.”
― Neil Gaiman, Coraline

“It appears both amusing and terrifying at the same time,
that the majority of the women claim to be the victims of
narcissistic behaviours. I have no doubt that, this is something to
do with the newly introduced gender equality, I called it ‘new’
because it has been put into practice only in the past decades.”
― Mwanandeke Kindembo, Treatise Upon The Misconceptions of Narcissism

“You can’t make homes out of human beings. Someone should have already told you that. And if he wants to leave then let him leave. You are terrifying and strange and beautiful. Something not everyone knows how to love.”
― Warsan Shire

“Madoc would be so proud- his little girl, remembering all her training,' she says. 'Starving off the terrifying possibility of romance.”
― Holly Black, The Cruel Prince

“It's fun searching for the supernatural. If the supernatural comes looking for you, it's anything but fun. It's terrifying and disturbing. Keep it out of your life at all costs.”
― Stewart Stafford

“Sex isn’t hard, but intimacy is terrifying.”
― Tatiana Maslany

“The world's truth constitutes a vision so terrifying as to beggar the prophecies of the bleakest seer who ever walked it. Once you accept that then the idea that all of this will one day be ground to powder and blown into the void becomes not a prophecy but a promise. So allow me in turn to ask you this question: When we and all our works are gone together with every memory of them and every machine in which such memory could be encoded and sotred and the earth is not even a cinder, for whom then will this be a tragedy?”
― Cormac McCarthy, The Passenger

“Faith can be as terrifying as it is reassuring.”
― Stewart Stafford

“Maybe the thought of being found is far more terrifying than the reality of being lost. Therefore, we are quite adept at saying that we want the former, when in fact we’ve repeatedly chosen the latter.”
― Craig D. Lounsbrough

“Dragomir knew he'd never given much thought to love. He'd thought about his lifemate often. He'd been obsessed with finding her for centuries, but he'd never considered what he would feel when he found her. Not love. Not this overwhelming, terrifying feeling that shook him to his core. He hadn't known love could be felt through one's entire body. That it could manifest itself physically.”
― Christine Feehan, Dark Legacy

“Do you know how terrifying it is- waiting for something uncertain?”
― Sajla Anees, Refuge

“It was terrifying and incredible at the same time!”
― Carrie Ryan, The Map to Everywhere

“We form stories about our lives to create meaning out of them- without meaning, they feel shapeless, and without purpose. When something lies beyond the realm of meaning, it's terrifying.”
― C.J. Cooke, The Lighthouse Witches

“There are few things more terrifying than looking a hurting person in the face and having no idea how to help them. But what we forget is that healing is typically not having a solution. Rather, it’s being a friend.”
― Craig D. Lounsbrough

“Nicholas was still afraid; desperately so.

But the only thing more terrifying than the thought of leaving the Library was the thought of staying.”
― Emma Törzs, Ink Blood Sister Scribe

“...what did I believe about truth? That it often could be terrifying, yes. But with truth came power.

And I was never one to hide from the truth.”
― Jennifer L. Armentrout, From Blood and Ash

“It's terrifying,' Effy confessed.

'Most beautiful things are,' Ianto said.”
― Ava Reid, A Study in Drowning