EDWARD DEGEORGE
Seeking the Darkness
EDWARD DEGEORGE is the producer/lead writer for the Web series Sombras. His horror fiction has appeared in anthologies such as Hell in the Heartland, Día de los Muertos, and Spooks!
Writing horror is about bringing fear and dread to the reader as though you were Prometheus. It is your gift to the world. A terrible, terrible gift.
Fear can be found in many places. The most primal of these is in darkness. Picture man at his earliest, huddling in caves, building fires to hold back the night. Could he be certain the sun would rise to banish the dark? Where light symbolizes good, darkness is synonymous with evil. The things of darkness seek to harm you and can make you afraid.
Because we depend so on our sight, we fear being unable to use our eyes. What we cannot see, we cannot identify. It is the unknown. It is every worst monster our imaginations can conjure, forces against which we are helpless.
I remember many dark-night walks home from a friend’s house. The short path took me off suburban sidewalks and through an innocent field, but a deserted place. The light at night, from the moon, from the stars, it lends everything an unnatural pallor. Is the field shunned? Does something lurk in the tall grasses? Is something about to reach out and touch me with icy hands?
As Grandma would say, “Nothing good ever happens after midnight.” Children understand. They fear things that hide under the bed, where your only protection is to pull the covers up to your chin. I remember that chilling scene in THE GRUDGE where the young woman found out that even the last refuge of her bed was no longer a safe haven.
Closing your eyes won’t approximate the feeling. You need to immerse yourself in utter darkness, your eyes wide open, but making not a whit of difference.
I recommend not a writing exercise per se that involves paper and pencil, but experiences to write about later. Commit these experiences to memory. Use your imagination to stoke your fear. If you can frighten yourself, it may help you to frighten your reader.
EXERCISE
1. Take a walk in the dark. No, I don’t mean at nine-thirty. Venture into the true dark after midnight, when the streets are deserted and the neighboring houses unlit. In the dead of night you can even find fear in your own backyard. How many steps away from the safety of your home is one step too many? Summon fear. Remember the sensations: your breath, your heartbeat, your body temperature.
2. Crawl under the bed. Imagine being buried alive. The sound of the dirt as it hits the coffin lid. The entire weight of the earth presses down on you. Every breath diminishes your supply of life-giving oxygen. Paralysis grips you. And something is in there with you, crawling at your feet.
3. Hide in the closet. Imagine your hunter stalking you. Feel the tension of being someone or something’s prey. It’s only a matter of time. Something draws closer. And you are trapped.
Scare yourself. Feel fear, nurture it, then write something that will terrify your readers.
LISA MORTON
The Setting in Horror
LISA MORTON is a screenwriter, Halloween expert, and the author of dozens of short horror stories published in books and magazines like Dark Delicacies, Cemetery Dance, and Zombie Apocalypse! She won the Bram Stoker Award for First Novel with The Castle of Los Angeles and her first fiction collection, Monsters of L.A., was published by Bad Moon Books.
Think about your favorite horror stories in literature, and I’m betting that a place will figure prominently somehow. Bram Stoker’s Dracula? It made Transylvania an iconic horror locale. Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot? Heck, the setting is so important that King chose it for the title. How about all the haunted house novels, short stories set in graveyards, or the books in which a middle-aged narrator must return to battle evil in the small town where he was born?
Horror is successful when it disturbs or frightens the reader, when it creates both an overall atmosphere and provides quick shocks, and choosing a setting is one of the best ways to provide a mood underlying the whole piece. It would be difficult, for example, to create a prolonged, sinister feeling for a story set in a sunny meadow . . . but move that same tale to an isolated, moonlit street with only one empty house at the end, and your eerie quotient has just been turned way up.
A great horror setting can serve to make your reader instantly uncomfortable, before you’ve even mentioned a monster or a murder. Look, for example, at David Morrell’s award-winning Creepers, about a group of urban explorers who decide to tackle the Paragon Hotel, a once-great art deco structure now falling to ruin. Morrell has taken the typical haunted house and removed the ghosts; even without the supernatural inhabitants, old buildings carry their own unnerving charge. But Morrell isn’t content to just let his setting sustain a low-key mood; throughout the novel, he also uses the location to surprise, as when part of it suddenly gives way or creates another danger for the group. In this case, the setting is the monster.
Sometimes a horror location can carry an entire series of stories. H. P. Lovecraft’s fictitious town Arkham, Massachusetts, appeared in a number of his classic works, including “The Colour Out of Space” and “The Shadow Over Innsmouth.” Lovecraft not only created a history for the town, but used it as the home for other recurring elements from his mythos, including Miskatonic University (and Lovecraft’s creation of Arkham was so skilled that it was used by other authors after Lovecraft’s death, and even provided the name for a publishing company, Arkham House). More recently, Gary Braunbeck’s Cedar Hill, a non-existent town in Ohio, has been home to dozens of short stories and novels; Braunbeck has so carefully mapped every detail of the town’s history and layout that it’s hard to believe it doesn’t exist. (But given how much terror has happened in that burg, I think you’ll agree that it’s a good thing it isn’t real!)
Sometimes a setting is designed to serve as a sort of stand-in for a typical American location. Green Town, Illinois, for example, doesn’t exist anywhere but in Ray Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes (and several of his other works), but Bradbury plainly intended the town to serve as a classic American small town, instantly recognizable to anyone who has even driven through one. Because Green Town is an “everytown,” when it is invaded by horrifying elements (Mr. Dark’s carnival in Something Wicked), we almost feel as if our own hometown is in immediate danger.
Even a small setting can be used to generate suspense and discomfort. Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s classic story “The Yellow Wallpaper” is about a woman going mad in a single room, one where the walls are covered in “a smouldering unclean yellow.” Richard Matheson’s 1950 short story “Born of Man and Woman” is set entirely in a claustrophobic basement, emphasizing the gloomy captivity of its pathetic narrator, a deformed child caged by its parents.
Real locations are found less often in horror, but can be equally effective, if used correctly. For example: Anne Rice’s use of New Orleans as the setting for parts of Interview with the Vampire underscores the age, style, and decadence of her eternal bloodsuckers. Sometimes an existing place’s reputation can be put to good use as well: Goethe, for instance, played on folklore beliefs surrounding the Brocken (a mountain in Germany) when he chose to set a wild witches’ revel there in Faust.
In my own novel The Castle of Los Angeles, I created a fictitious building—the Castle—and set it in a real place—downtown Los Angeles. The Castle is based in part on the real-life Los Angeles artists’ community known as the Brewery; but of course had I chosen to set my story within the real Brewery, I would have not only possibly run afoul of legal action (I’m sure the Brewery’s owners would rather not perpetuate the notion that murderous ghosts haunt its halls), I would have risked raising the eyebrows of everyone who had ever visited the Brewery and knew quite well that it was not in fact haunted. Creating the Castle also allowed me to control the geography of the story—it was important to me that the building have a huge celebrity penthouse, wh
ich the real Brewery doesn’t. Setting my Castle in virtually the same area where the Brewery resides, however, allowed me to suggest that the Castle—and its spectral residents—certainly could be real.
EXERCISE
Think about your own home and the neighborhood where you live. Is there an area reputed to be haunted? Or someplace where something dreadful happened, perhaps a place that has since been abandoned as a result? If you don’t know much about the history of your town, you might try checking out the local library or talking to friends who’ve delved into the area’s folklore. Exploring online can be helpful too; most towns now have Facebook groups or discussion boards for people who are interested in the town’s provenance.
Once you’ve found or decided on an area, visit it in person, then write a detailed description. Note as much about it as you can—the streets, other buildings, even plants, architectural details, or furnishings.
Now imagine characters in that area, how they’d move around it, what they’d think of it. Would it initially present a nice place, somewhere they’d like to stay? Or is it a spooky place right from the start, but some other part of the action compels them to stay there? Does it present possibilities for shocks—branches that can suddenly snap, pavement that might cave in, structures that could collapse?
A word of caution: As much as description can add to the terror, don’t overdo describing your setting to the point where you begin to slow down your pace. After visiting and researching your location you’ll probably have plenty of notes, but you should pick just a few of the most evocative bits to lay out your setting for the reader. Several carefully chosen items—just a rotted step and a broken window, for example—will usually work better than filling up pages with every small observation catalogued in detail.
JAN KOZLOWSKI
Bringing Horror Home
JAN KOZLOWSKI first fell in love with horror in 1975 when the single drop of ruby red blood on the engraved black cover of Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot hypnotized her into buying it. Her short stories appear in Hungry for Your Love: An Anthology of Zombie Romance and Fang Bangers: An Erotic Anthology of Fangs, Claws, Sex and Love. Her novel—Die, You Bastard! Die!—debuted in 2012 as part of the new horror imprint, Ravenous Shadows.
I’m a big fan of Stephen King. As my bio says, it was the paperback version of his second book, Salem’s Lot, that turned me on to horror back in the mid-seventies. Why King, though? Why not Lovecraft or Poe or any of the dozens of other paperback/pulp horror writers who filled the revolving wire rack at the local drugstore? Why didn’t any of those other guys (and they were all guys in those days) hook me the way King did?
The answer, for me anyway, has always been that not only did Stephen King’s best stories scare the hell out of me; they did it by proving that horror is not something that just happens in creepy Transylvanian castles or in far-off alien worlds. King’s horror happened to people just like me, who were suddenly plunged into terrifying situations as they went about their normal, everyday lives.
I realize that this type of story might not be everyone’s cup of tea. Perhaps you prefer evil government agencies running amok, jet-setting serial killers, or sparkly vampires, but personally, King’s style of “suburban horror” is not only the kind of story I’m willing to plunk down money to read, it’s the type of story I prefer to write myself.
The exercises below are ones that I use when I’m trying to generate plot and character ideas. Thanks to Ray Bradbury and his fabulous book Zen in the Art of Writing: Essays on Creativity for showing me the value of using word association lists as writing tools.
EXERCISE
1. Make two lists. First, write a list of places you go or things you do on a regular basis, like picking up the dry cleaning, dropping off the dog at the groomers, or getting stuck in traffic on the Arrigoni Bridge.
Second, make a list of your fears and phobias. Mine, for example, include a paralyzing terror of natural bodies of water that I was able to plug into for the swamp scene in my novel, Die, You Bastard! Die! Check out The Phobia List at phobialist.com if you need ideas or inspiration.
Once you have the two lists, pick one entry from each and give yourself five minutes to write down everything that comes to mind, no matter how “out there” it may seem. After time is up, read over what you’ve got. Is there a story germ there? A character, setting, or possible plot line that clicks for you? Explore it. If nothing worked, try another pairing.
2. The next time you’re stuck in a line somewhere, instead of sitting or standing around fuming, try imagining what is the worst thing that could happen to you right now. The Hindu demon Rakshasa laying waste to your local coffee shop? A flaming tractor-trailer barreling down on you as you’re stuck in line at a tollbooth? A serial killer lurking in the movie theater restroom? Let your fears and phobias come out to play, then write it all down, paying particular attention to the emotions that crop up.
BUILDING WORLDS
“I didn’t think; I experimented.”
—ANTHONY BURGESS
“We’re not in Kansas anymore . . .”
—DOROTHY, IN THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ, BY L. FRANK BAUM
E. E. KING
Fact into Fiction
E. E. KING is the award-winning author of Dirk Quigby’s Guide to the Afterlife (Exterminating Angel Press) and Real Conversations with Imaginary Friends (27th Dimension Publishing). Her newest novel is The Card Game, which was serialized at IsotropicFiction.com. She has received international writing, biology, and painting grants and worked on various biology projects around the world.
I remember the first time and place I did it consciously. It was in Bucyrus, Ohio. I had just written a perfect “flash.” Flash fiction is usually defined as fiction under 1,000 words. When I am reading aloud, performing what I refer to as literary stand-up, I prefer 200 words. That way, if the piece isn’t going well at least it’s over quickly.
Publishing however is a different matter. My favorite length of fiction is too long to tweet and too short to story. If you sell by the word, it’s a starvation diet.
When I was invited to share an exercise I use when writing, I did not want to create one. I desired to share an insight. Something I do, each and every time I write. When I write, even micro-flash fiction, I use fact and I research, the longer the piece, the more extensive the research.
The following is the story that made me conscious of what I was doing.
THE SANDS OF TIME
In the sands of time, which lie between the past and memory, a small boy travels. He’d begun the journey an unpleasant, snot-nosed brat. By the time he arrives in his mother’s reminiscences, he has turned into a prince, handsome, smart, and valiant. In the distance between reality and his father’s recollections, he has become obedient, loving, and a fabulous athlete. Now a man, he listens to his parents’ stories. When the little boy manages to cross the desert to his fully grown self, he remembers his parents’ memories. He had indeed been wise beyond his years—brilliant, altruistic, empathetic, true, kind, and a wonder at sports. His sister Carol however, still remembers him as an unpleasant, snot-nosed brat.
Done! But, though easy to publish, good for resume building, I wanted to expand. I decided to follow Carol. She was obviously unhappy and resentful. Why? She had probably been thwarted. She had ended up in some small, almost certainly unpleasant, oddly named town in the Midwest . . . Ohio possibly . . . I began a search and stumbled into Bucyrus, Ohio, Bratwurst Capital of the World. It’s a real place. In the Roaring Twenties, Al Capone used to stop off in Bucyrus at an underground speakeasy. For decades, the speakeasy was forgotten; a tangled network of underground tunnels weaving twisted roots under the streets of Bucyrus. Now, it is used as a storage space by Cooper’s Cider Mill. They keep apples there, fermenting between walls so thick, even the spray of Tommy gun bullets couldn’t penetrate.
That was when I realized, for me, that
research and fact are where I go for inspiration.
Perhaps it’s because I am a biologist. Perhaps it’s because all good tales, be they fantasy, sci-fi, or horror are constructed on a frame of truth. Truth is not stranger than fiction because it is odd, but because it is true. Ocean reef fish change sex at least once in their lives. Slime molds have more than 750 different sexes.
And biology doesn’t even touch on the relatively recent (pun intended) worlds of quantum theory, infinite realities in the spiraling strings of space. Another reality could be less than a tissue paper’s width apart from the here and now, or even in the same space but upon another dimension. Two paths diverge in a yellow wood; you take them both at the same instance.
Although I love fantasy, I am married to fact. Where does your tale take place? Even if it’s an invented city, or an imagined planet, reality and science will aid you.
EXERCISE
1. First, always write down ideas or lines, even if they wake you at 2:00 a.m., especially if they wake you at 2:00 a.m. You may think you will remember, but you won’t. Ray Bradbury, my mentor, said: “Throw it up in the morning and clean it up in the afternoon.”
Example: “He was a tailor/psychiatrist. He designed suits to keep in all those messy emotions.” This is a jumping off point. Now you have to decide when and where your tale takes place. Maybe it’s in a small town on Mars? Research both small towns and Mars, and you will create some very real fantasy.
Now Write! Page 13