13 Dark Cult Classics You Won’t Be Able to Put Down

Rent, Sick Boy, Mother Superior, Swanney, Spuds, and Seeker are lost. Part of the generation forgotten in the name of consumerism, they’ve all turned to drugs to find meaning in their lives. 

In a world that demands the youth of today choose mortgage payments, mind-numbing television, junk food, and rotting away in a mindless existence that tunes out, they’re screaming for you to choose life instead. It’s just how they go about it that might be a little mental.

Alex is a teenage droog, leader of a gang who unleash their violence on society with the rest of the misfits after dark. 

When the government steps in, they attempt to reform Alex by any and all means necessary. Is it possible for Alex to be redeemed? And at what cost would that victory come?

After a long, stressful drive, the last thing Mary Crane needed was a storm. When she sees the neon Vacancy sign for the Bates Motel, she’s relieved that she can finally stop and rest. 

All she wants is a hot shower and a warm bed. Who cares if the room is a little musty and the manager, Norman Bates, seems a little odd? After all, a man who lives with and cares for his mother can’t be that bad. Or can he?

When Vietnam Veteran George Washington Hayduke III comes back from the war, he finds his beloved desert under assault by industrial development. 

He joins forces with a feminist saboteur, a wilderness guide, and a billboard torcher as they set out to stop the incursion in whatever ways that they can. The desert is the kind of place where you lose your heart, so why not lose everything, too?

Dorothy was an ordinary housewife who lived in a quiet suburb. She did chores all day, waiting for her husband to come home from work. Romance never crossed her mind. 

While she’s cleaning her house one day, a strange radio announcement is made that a monster escaped from a place called the Institute for Oceanographic Research. Now, her life just might change forever.

Aoyama is a documentary filmmaker who hasn’t dated in the seven years since his wife died. Everyone is telling him it’s time to move on, including his teenage son. His best friend, Yoshikawa, comes up with the brilliant idea to hold fake film auditions to find a new bride.

Thousands apply, but Aoyama only has eyes for Yamasaki Asami, a beautiful and delicate ballerina with a turbulent past. But by the time Aoyama gets past his infatuation to see her terrifying truth, it just might be too late.

Laura leads a solitary life in an isolated castle in the middle of a forest in Austria. With only her sick father for company, Laura longs for a companion. And then, on a moonlit night, a carriage drops in with an unexpected guest, the beautiful Carmilla. 

A feverish friendship quickly develops. But as Carmilla becomes more erratic and her behavior turns towards the strange, Laura finds that she grows weaker day by day and is plagued by terrible nightmares at night.

Mary and Colin are on vacation, and they are tired of each other. One night, while wandering ancient and winding streets, they meet a stranger named Robert. He’s a bit forceful and insistent, and he leads them through the city. 

But the deeper they go, the further away from their old lives they get. Until they’re so far away they might not ever make it back.

When an insurance claims assessor meets Tyler Durden on an airplane, his life takes an unexpected turn. Soon, he’s drawn into an underground phenomenon, surrounded by other disenfranchised young men seeking meaning in their lives. 

Every weekend, they meet in basements and parking lots to fight each other. On Monday, they go back to work with missing teeth and blackened eyes. But this is just the beginning of Tyler’s vision.

There’s a rumor of a book. A blue-black book that promises the answers people are looking for. It covers every absurd fact, every alternative fact, and every conspiracy theory in the American psyche. 

But it also carries the wisdom that promises a way out of the bleak, unfortunate future that reality offers. And if you believe it, it promises that Adjustment Day is coming.

While recovering from surgery, eighteen-year-old Helen Memel has nothing but time. Rather than think about her parents' upcoming divorce, she thinks about her sexual adventures. 

There is no detail she leaves out, reliving the sensual journey that each encounter left on her body and mind. But what began as a way to fight tedium might lead her to discover exactly how young, vulnerable, and confused she really is.

After a woman is attacked, she gives birth to a baby that just might unleash evil on the world. In the orphanage he’s raised in, they call him Baal. He leads the other children on a violent spree. As an adult, he heads to California, where he ends up the head of a Manson-like cult. 

He even finds himself in Kuwait, where millions heed his call for violence and sexual deviance. Only three men are willing to try to stop him. But whether they’ll be successful remains to be seen.

The suburbs are a paradise for talk show host Gillian Blake. She and her husband are the envy of their neighbors. But behind closed doors, their relationship is anything but ideal. When Gillian finds out her husband has a mistress, she decides it’s only fair that she takes a lover too. 

Only, instead of satisfying her need for revenge, her lust grows. As Gillian goes on the prowl, no man is safe. Written by a group of Newsday reporters, Naked Came the Stranger is one of the greatest literary hoaxes of all-time and remains a wildly entertaining parody.