"The Diamond Age" - Neal Stephenson "The Left Hand of Darkness" - Ursula Le Guin "Queen of Angels" - Greg Bear The "V.A.L.I.S." trilogy - Philip K. Dick The "Illuminatus" trilogy - Robert Anton Wilson / Robert Shea "The Mote in God's Eye" - Larry Niven / Jerry Pournelle "The Martian Chronicles" - Ray Bradbury [edit] I'm adding Harlan Ellison's "Deathbird Stories"; it's a short-story collection, not a novel, but there's some great writing in there.
The Martian Chronicles is the last book I remember that utterly terrified me. I don't remember it being especially scary though, and even when I read it, I couldn't point to a specific part that disturbed me, but the sheer eeriness of most of the sections gave me a sense of terror I couldn't escape.
We actually read it in (English) class, and nobody except me liked it. Maybe it was its melancholy? Sadly, we didn't talk about the reasons for their dislike all that much (or I just do not remember)
This may be an unpopular opinion, but I thought that Radio Free Albemuth was much better than VALIS.
According to this : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VALIS_trilogy there's more than one version of "VALIS trilogy". The version I read included 'Timothy Archer"; I don't think I've read "The Owl in Daylight". Apparently some say "Radio Free Albemuth" belongs in the set.
That explains why Timothy Archer is so much different than the other two books. Hmm.
Have not read that, thanks for the suggestion. I like PKD in general, but VALIS has some really mind-bending sections in it that put it in the realm of genius, for me. Must re-read (so little time!)