  Horror/Scary
This week: Edited by: W.D.Wilcox  
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Reluctant Heroes
In the deep, dark of the night, an unspeakable horror pounds and scratches at the door as it attempts to break into a small mountain cabin. Five people, the only survivors, are barricaded within hoping beyond all hope to stay alive until morning. It’s time for the hero to step forward and saved them from a fate worse than death. But…who will it be?
Sometimes when all Hell breaks loose, and people are dying around you left and right, the so-called ‘tough guy’, the beefy football jock with the awesome abs, breaks down and begins to cry like a baby.
What’s up with that?
This is the guy you would have expected to keep calm in the face of insurmountable danger; the guy you would have thought to be the most likely to step-up and take control of the situation, the guy who always gets the chicks: the Classic Hero. Instead, he falls apart, and then the little whimpy dude with the coke-bottle glasses, the most unlikely fellow of all, turns out to have the internal fortitude, the MacGyver know-how, all the right-stuff, to save the day.
This is the Reluctant Hero, the Unsuspected Hero of the story. And this is also the most interesting character of all.
Not because of his popularity and conquests, his deeds on the football field, or even the number of friends and girlfriends he’s got, but because of what’s inside his head, his heart. His life is probably filled with torment and anguish, striving to be viewed as normal by his peers; trying to just fit in like everybody else. And that’s what makes him so damn appealing to readers. He’s a misfit, a nerd, the down-trodden, the common man. He lived an abusive life; maybe he was teased all through his childhood, but the fact remains, he endured and kept going. The horror outside is nothing compared to what he’s been through. He’s a survivor.
The Classic hero is what we all aspire to be, but the Reluctant hero is who we really are. Reluctant heroes possess most of the good qualities of the Classic heroes, except they are humanized. In a sense, we as readers prefer this category of heroes simply because they are more realistic and believable. These characters are more likely to occur in real life than let’s say Superman. Reluctant heroes appeal to both our adult conscious as well as our inner repressed child with their ‘don’t-fit-in’ attitudes, which is the main reason they are currently so popular in books, movies as well as TV shows. Another feature these heroes possess is the obvious room to grow, to better themselves and perhaps achieve the status of Classic heroes as we read their stories.
My all time favorite reluctant hero is Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever.
The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever is a trilogy of fantasy novels by Stephen R. Donaldson. It was followed by The Second Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, also a trilogy, and The Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, a planned tetralogy.
The central character is Thomas Covenant, a bitter and cynical writer afflicted with leprosy, shunned and despised by society, who is destined to become the heroic savior of an alternate world- or, perhaps, only of his own sanity. Through six novels published between 1977 and 1983, Covenant struggles against the evil Lord Foul "The Despiser" who intends to break the physical universe to escape its bondage and wreak revenge upon his arch-enemy, "The Creator." Many of the story elements correspond to those in Richard Wagner's epic "Ring Cycle", but with inverted values.
Now here is a hero I can sink my teeth into. He’s a writer, AND, he has leprosy—sheer creative genius. When I read the very first book, I was hooked. Everybody hates him—hell, he’s a leper, that’s gotta be worse than carrying AIDS around with you—he hates everybody because of how they treat him. Now, let’s throw this character into an alternate world of Giants and Wizards where he has got to step-up and saved the day while doubting his sanity the whole time—it’s classic ‘out-of-the-box’ thinking.
So, the next time you create a hero for your story, be creative. Reluctant Heroes can be anyone of any gender; hell, they can even be a kid like Harry Potter.
Until next time,
billwilcox
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Stories From Underground
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A diner somewhere in the USA, a murderous storm and a reckoning.PLSE R&R! I NEED FEEDBACK!
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Vicious Feedback
Bluesman 
Submitted Comment:
Great newsletter WD! I enjoyed it thoroughly.
Joshiahis
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HAHA!
This newsletter made me howl! Great, great job. The stories were excellent picks too.
~Lee
drifter46
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Ok ok, now I'm sorry I missed this when it was first posted, but I have to hand it to you, Santa, you are one funny fat white guy. Congrats on a terrific letter FROM Santa. After all, turn about is fair play.
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Horror/Scary: January 14, 2009 Issue [#2826]
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