American Psycho is a dark psychological horror with deep roots in splatterpunk but it's a fun read. House of Leaves can be trying though, you may not like it but you should at least try reading the first third of it, it's quite an unusual book.

I liked House of Leaves a lot, but it did frustrate me at times. Definitely worth it I think.
I still haven't read American Psycho, have always meant to, and I should because I love the movie (same goes for Fight Club, love the movie yet I have never read the book).

I never really noticed this, but now that I think of it there is a certain smugness in some of his stuff, especially later on. His earlier stuff is classic though. (Success corrupts art, I say)

One instance of King sort of pissing me off (among many) is on Kingdom Hospital. I remember always seeing someone clearly reading a copy of one of his worse novels, and was like "wow, like you really need the exposure"

Yeah, but this is only really Stephen King. Peter Straub does to a small degree. Many effective horror writers posit a question in their work, be is societal, philosophical, personal etc. and explore this question through their writing. King just happens to explore personal issues the most. For example, "The Shining" is about frustrations being a father, "The Tommyknockers" is about drug use, etc.

Agreed, much horror is like this (I'll say again Dean Koontz), and even from respected authors. But there is a lot of great stuff out there that doesn't follow these conventions. Try Peter Straub's early stuff if you haven't already.

Its a matter of opinion, but I thought his novels (the earlier ones, before he became more of a fantasy writer) were some of the best books I have read in a long time. Give them a shot sometime.

I'll be sure to give him a shot then, thank you.