History NightmareFuel / PaulJennings

* The book series ''Wicked!'' is [[UpToEleven even worse]], detailing the spread of a new virus that transforms normally harmless animals and objects into monstrous plague-spreaders: swarms of giant [[PickyPeopleEater innards-eating maggots]], smart sheep with steel wool and rather [[SlasherSmile psychotic grins]], cannibalistic frogs, and apple-head dolls that shockingly sprout kilometre-long strangling creeper vines! And that's nothing compared to [[BodyHorror what it also does to humans...]]

* In one story a boy had to go inside a dead whale to retrieve an important item. While he didn't find the item, he ''did'' find [[spoiler:ambergris]]. Still, the idea of going inside a dead whale is...

* You know what makes a good kids story? What about a literal trip to hell, that oughta put smiles on their faces!In the short story Unhappily Ever After a school headmaster that enjoys beating his students far too much gets sucked into a whirlpool and is forced to watch images of people doing to others what those others do to them. [[spoiler: This drives him to suicide and when he wakes up in his office you expect it was a dream. Nope! Now he's dammed to an eternity of the beatings he so enjoyed subjecting others to while he was alive.]]
* "Shadows" is all about a hall of mirrors that house villainous doppelgangers inside them. The protagonist meets his and figures out that his reflection wants to switch places with him.

** A jam seller harvests a tree that produces blue plums. Business booms, but only because the blue jam is highly addictive. When the tree runs out of plums, the locals go mad and try to eat ''him'' instead.

* A particularly [[UpToEleven disturbing]] one is "Clear as Mud", in which the protagonist steals a rare insect from a lab, gets bitten by it, and soon finds that [[BodyHorror his skin is gradually turning ''transparent'']] to reveal his own bones and innards, just like an X-Ray. He flees a terrified but horribly fascinated public, and lives as a desert hermit for ''over ten years'', keeping the beetle in a glass jar. Then it bites him again and [[MagicAIsMagicA his skin is restored to normal]]. However, there's a rather horrible twist: [[spoiler: the protagonist's condition has spread to ''the rest of the world'': they're now all completely transparent, and hence he's still a hideous freak...]] All this in barely ''ten'' pages!

* A particularly disturbing one is "Clear as Mud", in which the protagonist steals a rare insect from a lab, gets bitten by it, and soon finds that [[BodyHorror his skin is gradually turning ''transparent'' to reveal his own bones and innards, just like an X-Ray]]. He flees a terrified but horribly fascinated public, and lives as a desert hermit for ''over ten years'', keeping the beetle in a glass jar. Then it bites him again and [[MagicAIsMagicA his skin is restored to normal]]. However, there's a rather horrible twist: [[spoiler: the protagonist's condition has spread to ''the rest of the world'': they're now all completely transparent, and hence he's still a hideous freak]]. All this in barely ''ten'' pages.

* A particularly disturbing one is "Clear as Mud", in which the protagonist steals a rare insect from a lab, gets bitten by it, and soon finds that [[BodyHorror his skin is gradually turning ''transparent'' to reveal his own bones and innards, like an X-Ray]]. He flees a terrified but horribly fascinated public, and lives as a desert hermit for over ten years, keeping the beetle in a jar. Then it bites him again and [[MagicAIsMagicA his skin is restored to normal]]. However, there's a rather horrible twist: [[spoiler: the protagonist's condition has spread to ''the rest of the world'': they're now all transparent, and hence he's still a hideous freak]]. All this in barely ''ten'' pages.

* "Noseweed" is about a boy who is forced to consume cod-liver oil at the will of his grandfather, but he refuses to swallow it, which causes a plant to grow out of his mouth and envelop his head.

* In "Souperman" a boy is caught in a trash compactor. The titular superhero is within rescuing distance...but he's completely powerless until he drinks some soup and he can't find the tin opener.

*** The story also has a particularly disturbing description of the yapping corgi he killed by making it put on so much weight that it couldn't move, and eventually its heart couldn't take the strain.

** An overweight boy discovers a spellbook that allows him to transfer his excess body fat to anyone he wants. He uses this to get back at everyone who has ever wronged him, before eventually going mad with power and casting the spell for increasingly petty reasons, such as getting back at a girl who rejected him and eventually just doing it for laughs. Far too late he finds out that the spell is a double-edged sword; for every ounce of fat he dispensed, ''he'll get it back!''.

* "Noseweed" is about a boy who is forced to eat a breakfast his grandfather prepared, which causes a plant to grow out of his mouth and envelop his head.

* You know what makes a good kids story? What about a literal trip to hell, that oughta put smiles on their faces!In the short story Unhappily Ever After a school headmaster that enjoys beating his students far too much gets sucked into a whirlpool and is forced to watch images of people doing to others what those others do to them. [[spoiler: This drives him to suicide and when he wakes up in his office you expect it was a dream. Nope! Now he's dammed to an eternity of the beatings he so enjoyed subjecting others to while he was alive.]]

* A Paul Jennings anthology has a story about a boy who drowned after he fixed his boat with some shoddy glue.

* You know what makes a good kids story? What about a literal trip to hell, that oughta put smiles on their faces!In the short story Unhappily Ever After a school headmaster that enjoys beating his students far too much gets sucked into a whirlpool and is forced to watch images of people doing to others what those others do to them. [[spoiler: This drives him to suicide and when he wakes up in his office you expect it was a dream. Nope! Now he's dammed to an eternity of the beatings he so enjoyed subjecting others to while he was alive.]]
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* A story had a boy with no middle fingers because he stuck them [[spoiler:''under a mower'']] [[TooDumbToLive while it was still running]]. He finds a way to regenerate them by his pet drop-tail Gecko, but the problem is his new fingers keep ''dropping off''! [[spoiler: This also leads to a nightmarish gross out scene at the local supermarket.]]

* One story had a florist boy (called Gerald) jump from a train before the narrator's eyes. This wouldn't be so bad if a few days later [[spoiler: the flowers didn't suddenly sprout from the narrator's hands, all with Gerald's sad face on them]] afterward.
* Another story ''No Is Yes'' is about a guy who meets a MadScientist who has trained his poor [[MadWomanInTheAttic daughter]] Linda the opposite words to ''everything'' in an attempt to understand human language. The scientist keeps all the opposite words in a book. The horrified guy feels pity for Linda and tries to rescue her from her dad, but suddenly a house fire breaks out, it is implied that the MadScientist was caught in the blaze. The NightmareFuel comes when the fire brigade asks Linda if there is anyone else in the house. Her own answer? [[spoiler: "No."]]
* Another story involved a ''headless'' chicken that ''scares'' two bumbling crooks who are robbing a pub, they are making a ''robot replica'' of that same chicken to scare the owner into giving them money. [[spoiler: They are literally scared to death- and end up drowning into the pub's local river... Their ghosts are seen frantically rowing in row-boat, all while the ghost of the chicken sings "The Wild Colonial Boy" to them forever.]]

The short stories of Australian children's writer PaulJennings are often laden with NightmareFuel.

* A story had a boy with no middle fingers because he stuck them [[spoiler:''under a mower'']] [[TooDumbToLive while it was still running]]. He finds a way to regenerate them by his pet drop-tail Gecko, but the problem is his new fingers keep ''dropping off''! [[spoiler: This also leads to a nightmarish GrossOut scene at the local supermarket.]]

* A story had a boy with no middle fingers because he stuck them [[spoiler:''under a mower'']] while it was still running. He finds a way to regenerate them by his pet drop-tail Gecko, but the problem is his new fingers keep ''dropping off''! [[spoiler: This also leads to a nightmarish GrossOut scene at the local supermarket.]]

* A story had a boy with no middle fingers because he stuck them [[spoiler:''under a mower'' while it was still running]]. He finds a way to regenerate them by his pet drop-tail Gecko, but the problem is his new fingers keep ''dropping off''! [[spoiler: This also leads to a nightmarish GrossOut scene at the local supermarket.]]

* Another story involved a ''headless'' chicken that ''scares'' two bumbling crooks who are robbing a pub, they are making a ''robot replica'' of that same chicken to scare the owner into giving them money. [[spoiler: They are literally scared to death- and end up drowning into the pub's local river... Their ghosts are seen frantically rowing in row-boat, all while the ghost of the chicken sings "The Wild Colonial Boy" to them forever.]]

* The book series ''Wicked!'' is even worse, detailing the spread of a virus that transforms normally harmless animals and objects into monstrous plague-spreaders: swarms of giant [[PickyPeopleEater innard-eating maggots]], sheep with steel wool and [[SlasherSmile psychotic grins]], cannibalistic frogs, and apple-head dolls that sprout kilometre-long strangling creepers! And that's nothing compared to [[BodyHorror what it does to humans...]]

* One story had a florist boy called Gerald jump from a train before the narrator's eyes. This wouldn't be so bad if a few days later [[spoiler: the flowers didn't suddenly sprout from the narrator's hands, all with Gerald's sad face on them]] afterward.

* One story had a florist boy called Gerald jump from a train before the narrator's eyes. This wouldn't be so bad if a few days later [[spoiler: the flowers didn't suddenly sprout from the narrator's hands, all with Gerald's sad face on them]] afterward.

* A particularly disturbing one is "Clear as Mud", in which the protagonist steals a rare insect from a lab, gets bitten, and finds that [[BodyHorror his skin is gradually turning transparent to reveal his bones and innards]]. He flees a terrified but horribly fascinated public, and lives as a hermit for ten years, keeping the beetle in a jar. Then it bites him again and [[MagicAIsMagicA his skin is restored to normal]]. However, there's a rather horrible twist: [[spoiler: the protagonist's condition has spread to the rest of the world: they're all transparent, and hence he's still a hideous freak]]. All this in barely ten pages.

* A Paul Jennings anthology has a story about a boy who drowned after he fixed his boat with some shoddy glue.