...a believable plot-line. "Realistic horror", so to speak.

Let me explain what I mean by 'realistic horror' ;

-Something that compels the reader to believe in the occult, no matter how much of an atheist / realist he may be.

• Where the horror affects the daily lives of the characters, and which makes them doubt everything they believed in prior to that experience.

In other words, I want a manga which has a level of horror that sticks in you mind and makes you see things, hear voices etc. NOT a story where the horror is just a device to make a run-of-the-mill, recycled plot-line seem more interesting.

And now, the catch;

• Please note that I do not want manga with graphic promiscuity, rape etc. This of course includes adult, hentai, smut, yaoi, yuri, shotacon and lolicon. However, I am fine with any other form of violence (excluding rape).
  Also, please do not recommend ecchi or harem / reverse harem manga.

• If you are going to suggest romance, shounen-ai etc., please try to keep the sappiness to a minimum. The love story must NOT be the main focus of the manga. The main theme HAS to be horror.

• It doesn't matter if it's a series, a single volume, or a one-shot, any length is fine.

Pretty good examples for what I want would be;

Skyhigh and its associated sequels.
Fuan no Tane - For more urban-legend type horror.
Uzumaki - Sort of; despite the fact that it is not really all that realistic, it still stuck with me.
Sugiru 17 no Haru - Rather childish but still very nice.

Example for stuff I don't want;

I Can't Sleep Alone - A couple of the stories were pretty nice, but most were too cliched.

• Manga where the characters have supernatural powers, but there is no actual horror element involved.

My lists are public, so please don't recommend anything on my complete or reading lists. (And no, they're not long ones ^^)

Thank you in advance for your help!

Jisatsu Circle

Thank you for the suggestion! I'll be sure to check it out.

But...is that it? Wow- I never knew horror manga were so unpopular! (Or maybe it's just that there are none that fit my specifications?)

Oh- well; any other recommendations would be greatly appreciated!

Fuan no Tane
Zashiki Onna
L∞P

[color=green]"Officially, this machine doesn't exist, you didn't get it from me,
and I don't know you. Make sure it doesn't leave the building."[/color]

@Toto-

I appreciate your taking the time to reply, but as you can see from my first post, I've already read Fuan no Tane. I gave it as an example for the type of manga I'm looking for. 🤣
Thanks anyway.

Sorry I'm tired.

Anyways I'm still working on it.
And it's been so long that someone has had their lists public that I'm a little jaded.

Psycho Knocker or is it too cliché...
Yubikiri Hime

Fat?

Look Me in the Eyes When You Talk

And you should read Ultra Heaven... though, it only seems like there might be a horror series... it could easily just end up being a moral story.

[color=green]"Officially, this machine doesn't exist, you didn't get it from me,
and I don't know you. Make sure it doesn't leave the building."[/color]

I didn't mean to sound ungrateful- I hope you weren't offended.

Thank you for the recommendations! They all look pretty good! 😀

I want to read Ultra Heaven...but I'm waiting on that for a while until a couple more volumes are scanned. Since it's about drug-addiction and all, it might get really lewd eventually (happened with a lot of psychological + seinen manga I started reading)...and I hate having to drop manga 'cause of rape scenes and suchlike after I've already gotten interested in the plot. 😐 So...better safe than sorry.

Kiben Gakuha, Yotsuya Sensei no Kaidan maybe o.o

Doubt (TONOGAI Yoshiki)

dragon head its actually pretty beleivable o.o and sorta scary

goth

[img]http://i718.photobucket.com/albums/ww187/D_dragon/omfgpudding-1.jpg[/img]

I think the reason why very few people ever reply to your posts is because you flat-out reject smut, yaoi/yuri, ecchi and even normal romance. Most of the manga that get scanned into English have one or more of those elements; non-romance (straight or otherwise) will never have a fan base, so scan groups think it's a waste of time scanlating them.

I don't blame you for not liking that kind of stuff, though. I don't either.
But, actually, horror stories without 'adult content' are pretty difficult to find. Most horror manga have shockingly sickening rape scenes and suchlike... 😐

I get the feeling this is turning into a spam post... 😀

So I'll just suggest something;
Gyo - You'll like this if you enjoyed Uzumaki. (And by the way- I love that one- it's simply awesome!)
Tomie - Uh- this is kind of sick now and then, but there's nothing explicit in it. I think.
I saw Orochi on your wish list - you should read it. The art is rather ugly and all, but the story has a lot of old-style horror I'm sure you'll enjoy.

Well, I'm afraid I'm not a particularly avid reader of horror. I do like well done stories, with engaging plots, but if it's just a story written to scare me then I can't get into it.

The only thing I can think of is Higurashi no Naku Koro ni which is more of a psychological horror than a traditional horror, I think. You might've already heard of it, or even read/watched it since it has a pretty big fanbase. But since no one mentioned it yet and I feel like it fits, I thought I'd throw it out there.

I'm pretty sure it qualifies for everything you mentioned. The author's goal was to pretty much make the readers and the characters question the occult (in my opinion he succeeded), mostly regarding demons and gods. It majorly screws with the various character's heads, and it definitely scared ME, but I'm pretty easy to scare. There's no sex, not even any real romance. All the focus is on the plot, and the character development.

I haven't read the manga myself, so I can't really say much about it. I recommend the original sound novel, and the anime was okay.
Sorry I can't think of anything else 🙁

Hmmm... Drifting Classroom? I read it halfway so far and though it's more about psychological horror.

Hmmm... I'd say that a lot of horror tends to also include relations between the cast that often touches into the "romantic" aspects. That's probably why it's so hard to fulfill your requests. 🤣 Plus a lot of horror usually involves the characters being thrown into some other reality/some unique situation where their daily lives get turned upside down.

And another thing: you might also want to try for psychological(that works as horror) or dark fantasy works besides works with very overt horror elements. Then again, there really isn't much like the stuff you're asking for. Hmmm... 🙂

Now, you've gotta pardon me since it's been so long since I've read it but perhaps this might fit: Semi-Eternal Happy End It does make the main character question certain things at the end.

7 seeds has some light horror elements and I doubt it has much romance so far 'cos everyone is generally struggling to survive. Female lead btw is fairly weak at first but she has very very good character growth. And yes, the "things that happen"(some horrifying, some not) make the characters really question lots of things.

Kisshou Tennyo It has some "sexual" stuff but that's more implied than explicit and if it does have any, I think it gets over it really quickly. And it's psychological horror. Strictly no romance so far and the woman is pretty uhh... screwed up. 😛

Very weird logic if you can buy it, depending on what you define as "reality": Human Clock

Also perhaps Poison Strawberry: sure, it's from the perspective of the main character and there is implied/"glossed over" sexual content only. 😛 In a way, it does make people question their reality.

Prince of Monster: it's been a while since I read this and so, I'm not sure how much romance/sexual content is there? It may or may not fulfill your requests.

Coo no Sekai It's dark fantasy and it's kinda creepy, really. 😛

Limit: Really dramatic so far but somewhat gripping. Psychological tension serves as horror.

Otodama : Perhaps? Maybe/most likely not.

Now, there might be stories in my "Stories Dump" list that might meet your conditions but... mmm... it's been years since I touched most of them. Hmmmm... it's a list of stories I didn't care for/felt nothing for/etc./etc. and if they do, maybe you might like them better than I did.

Well I'll list them anyways:

Line
Mail
Zankoku na Douwatachi

Lore no Mori

@D_dragon -
I've already read Goth and Doubt. I'll be sure to try out the other two. Thank you for your help!

@cyclamen -
Ah- my kindred spirit has returned! 🤣 . I love your suggestions and will be sure to read them all! And yeah- Tomie is sickening, but I kind of like it as well...

Quote from cyclamen

I think the reason why very few people ever reply to your posts is because you flat-out reject smut, yaoi/yuri, ecchi and even normal romance. Most of the manga that get scanned into English have one or more of those elements; non-romance (straight or otherwise) will never have a fan base, so scan groups think it's a waste of time scanlating them.

I don't blame you for not liking that kind of stuff, though. I don't either.
But, actually, horror stories without 'adult content' are pretty difficult to find. Most horror manga have shockingly sickening rape scenes and suchlike...

Sigh I know, right? Nothing I want to read ever seems to get scanned. 'Guess it's because most of them don't have a romance aspect at all...Which is the reason why I've resolved to learn Japanese so that I can read them on my own. But that's gonna take a long, long time... 😢

@imp4ever -
Oh yes- the Higurashi series! I've been wanting forever to read it, but because of its structure, I'll have to wait until (if ever) all the question, answer and side-story arcs are completely scanned.
Thank you for the reply!

@VampireBanana -
Drifting Classroom, Kisshou Tennyo, Semi-Eternal Happy Ending, Coo no Sekai, Human Clock and Limit look pretty good.

I thought the plot synopsis of Otodama was cool, though a bit cliche...But the problem is, that mangaka seems to specialize in yaoi- hopefully, this won't turn out that way. (Keeps fingers crossed that, if anything, it'll just be shounen-ai ^^) But for now, I'll leave it on my wish list.

Poison Strawberry - maybe, but probably not.

7 Seeds is great, but I have to wait until more has been scanned. I don't want to start a series (and a long one at that) which might never be completed by the scanlators.

Prince of Monster- nope, since it's yaoi.

As for Lore no Mori- it was good; and Line wasn't too bad either.
I didn't like Mail or Cruel Fairytales, though.

Thank you very much for all the recommendations!

As for Otodoma, it's published for now in Wings which contains shoujo series that sometimes have "shounen-ai". It had some nice atmosphere and very cool drawings, though... but I'll agree that the "serial killer" aspects made it somewhat flashy and corny. 🤣

Glad that you like many of the recs. 😛

That said... there are just so many horror stories(manga, manhwa, manhua, novels), etc. with romance in it. I remember reading 1 novel written by some gay dude about some straight couple set amidst some setting and that too, had romance in it. Gods... 😛

And too bad about Prince of Monsters. It's really dark... shrugs

Also, maybe Suna no Ue no Rakuen might fit? It's been a long time since i touched that, though.

Also, Shoujo Kidan Makora might fit a little though the girl's house is pretty strange already.

well i think youmight have noticed already but judge (TONOGAI Yoshiki) its like doubt o.o i think same concept and mangaka so.... hope it helps XD

[img]http://i718.photobucket.com/albums/ww187/D_dragon/omfgpudding-1.jpg[/img]

Quote from VampireBanana

As for Otodoma, it's published for now in Wings which contains shoujo series that sometimes have "shounen-ai". It had some nice atmosphere and very cool drawings, though... but I'll agree that the "serial killer" aspects made it somewhat flashy and corny.

That said... there are just so many horror stories(manga, manhwa, manhua, novels), etc. with romance in it. I remember reading 1 novel written by some gay dude about some straight couple set amidst some setting and that too, had romance in it. Gods...

And too bad about Prince of Monsters. It's really dark... shrugs

Also, maybe Suna no Ue no Rakuen might fit? It's been a long time since i touched that, though.

Also, Shoujo Kidan Makora might fit a little though the girl's house is pretty strange already.

Good- then maybe I will be able to read Otodama. As far as I know, Wings has never done a yaoi series, so it probably won't start now. But then again, the manga could just get transferred to another magazine...

That endless harping on romance, romance, romance is the very reason I've pretty much given up reading books or watching anime / movies with love story aspects. It's getting so freaking old; I can barely stand it anymore!

Yeah- it is a pity about Prince of Monster...I thought it looked interesting too. (Probably the only yaoi other than Mirage of Blaze and Sleeping Moon which I thought I'd like to read, if it hadn't been so explicit.)

Your new recommendations look nice as well.
Thanks again!

@D_dragon -
I'm waiting until Judge gets to a couple of volumes or so until I start reading it. Hopefully, it won't have a let-down ending like Doubt did.
Thank you for your reply!