Author Nesseth delves into why we love horror, especially horror films, why we get off on the jump scares, the thrills, the reveals, the camera angles, the creatures, the sensations, the terror, the build-ups, and so much more.
Terror is where the tension lives. Although there are titles that examine why we love horror, some from more pop culture lenses for lay readers, others more academic, this one falls into the academic realm but is written with the accessibility of a popular culture text so it doesn't feel like one big snooze, or study after study of subjecting people to scary things and looking at the outcomes.

The book really explores the psychology of fear, the effects on trigger threats, peripheral vision, thousands of years of brain wiring and so on. She cleverly explores notions of fight, flight, or freeze with examples from the cannon of horror cinema, which enhances the text and makes it more fun to read. She also explores jump scares, disgust, and other common horror cinema tropes. Although it's well-worn territory, the author's delivery is fresh and her writing style is very engaging. Highly recommended. She also goes into that hotly contested/debated of terms, "quiet horror" while also providing societal and historical contexts for why some films scared other folks more than most, why some scares stick with us more than others, the impact of violence/blood/gore, etc, or if some films deliberately enforced a fear of the Cold War or other things.

Any horror fan would love to have a book like this and it's essential for the shelves of any horror lover. Film and cinema buffs will love it as well.

An exceptionally thorough and engaging dive into the horror genre. Nesseth paints a vivid picture of the correlations between real -world events and how they inspired the horror genre. She delves into the psychological aspect of fans and those who dislike it completely. The only trouble I had was with some of the psychological studies, because of my lack of knowledge of the field. Nesseth does her best to lay it out in mostly layman's terms as much as possible. The section breaking down the Sensation Seeking Scale is a must read for anyone who enjoys horror or thrills.

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan-Tom Doherty Associates for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

THE PREMISE--
This book starts off with the classic Scream line, “Do you like scary movies?” The analysis of that classic horror film scene caught my attention right from the start. The book itself is divided into 8 chapters, each targeting a different aspect of horror movies. This is Your Brain on Horror explores the chemical reactions that happen in your brain while watching horror movies. Putting Fear in Your Ears discusses how sounds and music are used to enhance emotions during horror movies scenes. Violence and Mayhem analyses the difference between the horror genre and action genre, which are very different experiences despite both leaning on chaotic violence.

The result is a well-rounded analysis of horror films, what we get out of them, how our bodies react to horror, and the last appealing of horror movies.

BEST PARTS--
Horror film buffs will absolutely eat up the many analyses of specific horror film scenes through a scientific lens. I knew almost all of the references within the book because I’ve spent most of my life devouring horror movies. It’s really cool to take a scene that you know so well and love out of the context of the film and read about the scientific implications of it. Plus, if you haven’t seen too many horror films, you might get some great recommendations from the book. Warning though, you might run into some spoilers!

CRITIQUE--
I’m not a big science nonfiction reader, but I do have the capacity to enjoy scientific books that are well-cited like this one. That being said, I think it’s ultimately important to strike a good balance between being scientific and being interesting. Each chapter of this book starts off really interesting with plenty of movie examples and some cool scientific tidbits. Unfortunately, I found the scientific parts ran off the rails more often than not.

What I mean by that is the writing starts to get more and more into the scientific weeds as the chapter progresses, which admittedly made me lose focus and interest more than once while reading this book.

OVERALL--
I found the book to be an above average read overall on this specific subject. All of the references made me want to go on a horror film binge watch, and in fact, I did rewatch some of the movies that were referenced here. I do think Nesseth could have done a better job of balancing the entertainment aspects with the scientific theory aspects, but overall this was a fun read and I think most horror lovers will feel the same!

From brain chemistry and genetics to history and society, Nesseth covers all the bases for Nightmare Fuel. Each chapter is a deep dive into one of the reasons horror movies scare us and why we keep coming back for more.

I fully expected the historical commentary, an overview of how fear works in the brain, and what, in theory, makes a good horror movie. This book went way beyond my expectations! Nesseth brought up every point I’ve ever made and issue I’ve ever had when discussing horror and fear in these contexts that I keep seeing sorely lacking outside of small discussions. I was first wowed by how encompassing the section was on types of fear. Sure, there’s fight or flight response but Nesseth also covered the lesser known freeze and “fright” aka Tonic Immobility (something I’m quick to discuss when this topic comes up because these are my initial and general responses to fear).
Later, I had a huge grin on my face when I read Nesseth’s anecdote about being 13 and arguing with the video store/rental about horror being mixed into the action section. I have had that same argument.
Lastly, Nesseth says she finds watching horror somewhat cathartic. She clarifies that there’s no evidence of horror being cathartic but if it makes you feel better, then there’s no harm in it
Nesseth quotes Wes Craven, “if you scream and everyone else in the audience screams, you realize that your fears are not just within yourself, they’re in other people as well, and that’s strangely releasing.” Perhaps it is also strangely releasing when you see your aggravations and thoughts shared by someone else on a genre you’re a fan of.

Nesseth points out the many fallacies and limitations in many studies done on horror, which is satisfying to see pointed out. There is, of course, the obvious fallacy of the study touted by those who continuously bring up their moral panic about on screen violence leading to violent actions in real life (said study led by Karen Hennigan et al – of course a Karen ran this study…).
She also points out the issues in trying to pin point demographics in horror – that the subgenres of horror movies referenced are often limited, that the divisions are often between cis-gendered men and women (that leaving out trans, non-binary, agender, and gender fluid people is limiting these studies), the research is often too localized (not global), and that often the data is dominantly or entirely self-reported.

The bibliography for this book is extensive. Even more exciting is the list of movies referenced. You could easily turn this into a To-Watch List or challenge. It certainly looks like Nesseth did the homework.
Speaking of homework, I filled a few pages of my reading journal with quotes, facts, trivia and more. I felt like I was taking a college class in horror or back in my psychology classes. I would have loved to have had this book on my syllabus in those days.

The only complaint I have about the book was the lack of spoiler warnings. At the time of reading this book, I hadn’t watched a couple of the movies referenced (Martyrs, The Slumber Party Massacre, or Raw) and now I know quite a bit about them. I am, thankfully, pretty spoiler friendly. That said, I know a lot of my fellow horror fans are not, so be sure to look at the movie list in the back of the book and take note if there are any you don’t want to be ruined on just yet. Nesseth doesn’t go in depth on all of them but, the risk is there.

I recommend Nightmare Fuel for any hardcore horror fan, anyone interested in learning about what makes us scared, and anyone who has ever had to argue with family or other “concerned” citizens about the “dangers of watching horror.” You will definitely learn something.

A perfect companion read for Horror enthusiasts, writers, and film makers. This book explores the science, evolution, and history of the Horror Genre, and even touches on research conducted related to horror.

not the biggest fan of this one. really wanted to like it more, but it felt like more of the same. Not the worst, but not the best.

this book provides a comprehensive, fascinating look into the psychology behind horror. I recommend this to all horror fans and I think it would make a great gift for lovers of the genre.

Interesting but not really my cup of tea. Well written I just personally couldn’t get into the story. My fault for not truly knowing that’s the book would fully be about. Predictable and honestly it was a struggle to keep my interest. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

In this house we are huge horror fans. Movies are usually the way we consume horror, but we do read horror books from time to time. I do not remember watching a lot of horror as a kid or even a teenager, although I did read horror, Poe was a favorite and I read true crime which could be considered horror. As an adult, that's where my horror journey really started. My husband is a huge horror movie fan, B movies being one of his favorites to make me watch. We even took my then 6-year-old son to see 30 Days of Night, a pretty gory vampire movie, in the theater. He loved it and I think it helped spark his love of horror.

With chapters like, This Is Your Brain on Horror, A Brief History of Horror, How to Make a Monster, Putting Fear in Your Ears, Why Some Scares Stick with You, Violence and Mayhem, Blood, Gore and Body Horror, and Horror's Long-Lasting Appeal, you would think that this would be a book any horror fan would want to read.

I can definitely see that the author went into a deep dive on all thing's horror. This book not only looks at the real science of how our brains and bodies react to horror but also advice on how to recover from watching a horror movie. This book seeks to not only explain why we love horror so much but also what is happening to us as were watching and/or reading horror. Throughout the book there are excerpts from interviews about certain films and anecdotal, real-life experiences from the author herself.

As huge horror movie fans in this house, I really wanted to like this book. However, it just wasn't for me. I really liked the parts where the book talked about movies, however, this book is very scientific. If you're really into reading a science book, then this is the book for you. The writing is good and it is solid, the author is clearly passionate about horror and science. I would recommend this book to any horror fan with a cautionary note about the science lingo. I received this book free from NetGalley for an honest review.

Really interesting concept for a book about horror. It's a different angle to the well-covered area around horror movie discussion.

Interesting book if you are interested about learning more about the science behind fear and horror fascination.

I enjoyed the book, though it was much more focused on science than I thought going into it. The author is clearly passionate about the subject, and the writing is good - I can actually feel like it would be a fun book to listen in audio, as it has a very podcasty feeling (not sure if this is a thing lol). I feel like a learned a lot about fear and the science behind it, and how horror directors use it to their advantage.

It did seem, though, like the book tried to achieve way to much; it included interviews sections, movies summaries, and a variety of very detailed examples. It would go too much away from the subject, and though I found it interesting I felt like it could go without or as a shorter footnote. Sometimes, to explain how the studies were not significant, it could become too repetitive. And being a bit nitpicking, the constant parenthesis with director and year did not help the flow - I'm all for giving credit where is due, but only saying on the first time the movie was mentioned would be enough.

Anyway, overall, I quite liked the reading and would probably recommend the book to my horror or anyone who enjoys reading about the science behind emotions - specifically fear in this case

There's such an interesting tension between horror and non-horror fans when it comes to understanding and embracing fear. I both did and did not grow up fully a fan until I was a teenager, at which point my life was at its most tumultuous to date - so I thought - and I began, after some unconventional sleepover exposure therapy, to go full tilt into exploring the genre. I had always read horror, though often so wrapped in madness and the antiquated language of the likes of people like Poe and Wilde that I never questioned why one version of horror should be more of a warm blanket than another. I frequented cartoons like Scooby-Doo and Courage the Cowardly Dog far before I ever got the courage to look a horror movie in its face. Now, of course, I frequent both almost daily looking to find all kinds of things. After the passing of one of my grandparents I immediately turned to The Taking of Deborah Logan, though in the moment I couldn't have told you why. In retrospect, of course, it's obvious almost beyond belief, an atmosphere in which I could cope with that kind of loss from the side, without having to think too directly about my own. The Relic, too, was great for it, though much more emotionally impactful and much less frequented at the moment.

For me now, what once was too terrifying to face is a source of comfort I go to almost without thinking. But once I was on the side of those who propose that anyone who turns on a horror movie for fun must have something going on, because what's so great about being voluntarily scared out of your mind?

A lot, as it turns out.

Nina Nesseth's Nightmare Fuel aims to explore not just why we love horror, but what horror is trying to do in the world, and what it does to our brains as we watch. What, chemically and psychologically, is going on when we seek out and experience horror? And why, chemically and psychologically, do we keep returning to it?

When tackling something as complex as why and how horror affects our minds, it's more than a little necessary to pick and choose your examples and dig into only a few rather than dive deep into the whole range of available options, otherwise you'd end up with a never-ending compendium (which I would happily read, personally, but must be a slog to write solo). In light of that, Nesseth weaves together her choices for horror films and scientific studies that have used horror to try and shape an understanding of how we engage with it and the kind of impact it might have on us. Interestingly, she often engages with the studies she chooses through interrogation. Why were there studies seeking to correlate exposure to violence in media with violent behaviors in children and young adults who watched them? How ethically conducted were these studies? And how scientifically?

Given that most of them were studies aimed seemingly specifically at confirming ideas and biases most people and parents already believed, there is some fun to be had in watching Nesseth deconstruct and debunk some of them, ultimately defanging the specter of horror film as manipulative beast and the harmful stereotype that people with mental illness are violent or dangerous.

She also seeks to understand and point out the connections between what kinds of fictional horror were being produced throughout the decades and what real life fears we were facing, culturally, socially, and politically, through each of those time periods. It is (personally) an endlessly fascinating connection that flies directly in the face both of the arguments that horror has not previously been political and that the use of horror to shape our understanding of anxieties is a niche rather than universal experience.

In chapters like "Putting Fear in Your Ears", Nesseth aims to deconstruct the elements of horror film that signal to us when we should feel a spike in our mental and emotional states, who we should be connected to in a story and how, and what it means to strip that away. In one example she explains how Halloween minus its score and sound effects left studio executives hollow and unafraid…until those elements were added in. She also explores films that are aware of the tension-building power of sound and silence, and thus toy with both.

"Blood, Gore, and Body Horror" aims to explore the connection between films that depict or imply violence to the body and how we engage with them - one prescient chapter opening example lands Funny Games on a list of movies "without shock-value violence despite lengthy torture sequences, simply because these acts were off-screen". One of my personal favorite experiments in this regard is watching Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974) with people who have never seen it before, or hearing their stories, as they routinely describe it as far more violent than it ever is simply because it feels like it should be, despite most of the major violence being conducted just around the corner. Nesseth also proposes the ways in which body horror can affect us through its different manifestations in a story, through violence within a body, from without a body, or, as one example from Reservoir Dogs shows, through violence to the body conducted offscreen but implied enough that we believe we saw it happen.

While all analytical texts should be taken with a grain of salt no matter the subject, Nightmare Fuel is most interesting in its goal of exploring knowledge and science we already have while proposing ways in which it could improve rather than arguing a certain position of an argument or positioning one kind of horror as superior to another. It's a fascinating, easily digestible and approachable read spliced together with interviews from some of horror's touchstone voices about their experiences with the genre and what scares and excites them about it. And overall, a worthy entry to the pantheon of texts aiming to interrogate the apparent contradiction of diving into fear in a world constantly geared toward throwing more of it at our lives. With supplementary lists at the back for every film referenced in each chapter, Nightmare Fuel is sure to spark more than one genre deep dive among casual, serious, and merely curious fans alike.

Nightmare Fuel releases from Tor Nightfire on July 26, 2022. I would like to thank the author and publisher, and NetGalley for the opportunity to receive an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

NIGHTMARE FUEL contains the following chapters along with forward, afterward, a comprehensive list of every horror and horror-adjacent movie mentioned in the book, and references for further study: This Is Your Brain on Horror, a Brief History of Horror, How to Make a Monster, Putting Fear in Your Ears, Why Some Scares Stick with You, Violence and Mayhem, Blood, Gore, and Body Horror, and Horror’s Long-Lasting Appeal. The book also contains numerous interviews with directors, film editors, film score composes, and other horror movie experts.

I liked how the author used biology, neuroscience, and psychology to explain the physical and mental effects of consuming horror media. The chronology of how horror movies evolved based on current fears was fascinating.

The scope of the book includes everything from final girls to the uncanny valley to what makes a monster to what makes horror movies appealing to how sound is manipulated to increase the fear factor. There’s even advice on how to recover from watching a scary movie and how to minimize the effects while watching, for example, by viewing on a smaller screen, during the day, or with a friend.

One of my favorite parts is in the Blood, Gore, and Body Horror chapter when the author explains how horror has an ideal vehicle in the human body, which is described as a gross, squishy, “fragile meat tube.”

There’s plenty of goodness for horror movie fans, even if they aren’t as into the science-heavy bits, such as deep dives into classic horror films such as Hereditary, The Thing, Alien, Jaws, the Blair Witch Project, the Quiet Place, and more.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Thanks to Tor Nightfire and Tom Doherty Associates for providing an Advance Reader Copy via NetGalley.

I requested this on Netgalley half on a lark, figuring it would tend towards the junkier pop-science books I’ve seen (Science of Superheroes, etc). Instead, this is actually a damned solid book looking at the actual science of how we react to fear, both in real life and on the screen (highlighting the many ways the two are different).

There’s a ton of actual neuroscience here, way more than I’d expected, but it’s at a level that anyone should be able to comprehend. More importantly, Nesseth doesn’t just regurgitate studies; she explains them, notes the potential weakness in them, and in many cases, points out how much “known” stuff has relied on flawed studies (one very gender-conformist study has all kinds of flaws, yet keeps getting cited as foundational).

That said, this isn’t a pure science book; Nesseth throws in examples in nearly every paragraph, and also happily throws in anecdotes from her own lived experience as a horror fan. She also has a lot of fun sidebars diving deeper into specific films, and interviews with other experts in the field. Aside from the intro (which feels, to be frank, like an earnest college newspaper editorial on why people watch horror, and probably can be skipped by anyone who’d want to read this book in the first place), the book feels free of missteps, and is well worth the read.

A great book on the psychology of horror. I absolutely adored this book. It was extremely informative and actually used real whore examples. Highly recommend!

I loved this so much- but that might be because I’m a giant dork and I like pondering the why/how of horror. So if you’re also a horror nerd this should be on your tbr!

I was very excited by this because, well, it's about horror and why we love it. For the most part, it was a very enjoyable read, except that perhaps it gets bogged down sometimes by *too much* science. That, or I'm an idiot that doesn't really get psychology and brain-science stuff as much as I thought I did. Overall, possibly more enjoyable for those with a greater interest in neuroscience than I am, but a solid read in general.

Solid Dragon Age reference in it, though.

I really liked this book for its broad sweep of the impact of horror movies on our psyche and our culture. It does a nice job putting the genre into context (the overview of the history and themes of horror movies is intriguing to think about and really well explored). I think what really impressed me about the book was how many examples Nesseth used in the writing. It would have been easy to generalize and make some points using a few movies, but there is a wide range of horror films that the book utilizes. Everything from main stream to independent films gets a mention, and I appreciate that the quality of films analyzed was not just blockbuster movies..

Perhaps a second edition would include a chapter on the influence of CGI elements in horror movies. I think there's some fascinating research to look at in the common years about whether they have improved or decreased the scare factor of movies. After all, do Syfy channel horror movies really get classified as true horror, or at least, should they be?

If you are a film buff, into pop culture, cultural history, or how those intersect with our psychology, please read the book. You'll gain a few more films to your watchlist as well.