  Horror/Scary
This week: What you don't always see~but know Edited by: Kate - Writing & Reading  
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Words have no power to impress the mind
without the exquisite horror of their reality.
Edgar Allan Poe
Welcome to this week's WDC Horror/Scary Newsletter, where we journey into the 'dark' side of writing ~ prosaic and poetic ~ to create a reality that portends the horror to come. What makes us seek horror; what makes us desire to be frightened, mortified; what makes us want to embrace the darkness within ~ and without? Is it a modern-day phenomenon, or older than graveyard dirt? Come join the exploration.
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Greetings, I'd like to share a bit of a story,
Once upon a time, about a year ago, a woman caught a ride to a house where someone waited. She waved goodbye to the driver as the front door opened and her host beckoned her enter the chamber. A year later, she emerged from the chamber a different person - no longer breathing; mere skin and bones. The host was discovered and jailed for his efforts as his guests, eleven in number, one but a skull, are still being untangled. But what of the driver who once dropped her off. Is he the host's servant, or his partner in crime? Or was he just someone who gave her a ride.
The horror of the bodies, as bones and sinew buried beneath attic floorboards and basement cement, and even in the garden behind a nondescript house. The serial killer found, but what of the other? Was there an other, and will he return? What of the skull that still lacks a body? Does the other know where, or how they parted company?
I'm relating the story of a serial killer, who over a year's time disposed of eleven women within the boundaries of his home. The man who dropped one of the women off is likely a red herring, but we don't know yet. The horror of the discovery breeds fear and anger and mistrust. The terror the victims must have felt, trapped somehow, then disposed of like hidden treasure or bounty.
The appeal of horror, as literature and in film, by some is considered a safe release of the innate violence within. By reading and writing and viewing tales of horror, we don't act out the compulsion as the psychopathic killer above did. But what made him do it? Want or need to do it? Haven't you evern felt like taking control and slamming the toll taker to the ground, or wanting to brake check the idiot who cut you off?
Horror also appeals to the morbid in us - the fascination with the grave and the dark mystery of death. as well as a way to satisfy our curiosity about the process of death. We flinch, we shiver, knowing we are safe for now, but maybe not for later.
Readers of horror expect to be entertained by suspenseful dark fantasy. Realistic characters and settings are important props but they're second to the instigation of terror in the characters and their reaction to what causes the terror. Telling the story, alluding to the darkness without showing each stab of a knife, each finger being sliced off, but knowing by the sound of, the scent of, the taste of, the terror that looms just around the corner, can be more horrific than the anatomy lesson showing each sinew in a severed corpse becoming (which has it's place, of course).
The writer also needs to keep just one step ahead of the reader (and victim), doling out just enough information to keep the story intriguing and coherent yet the reader still guessing and in suspense.
Avoid two pitfalls - gore for its own sake, including detailed lengthy descriptions of putrefying viscera; and an obvious ending. The characters' horror has to be believable, so the reader can envision themselves somehow in the story and feel the fear and impending doom or peril. Robert Bloch, the author of Psycho created Norman Bates as a new kind of 'monster,' one that readers had not yet encountered. He got into Norman's head and wove a story incorporating madness and horror, with an ending his readers did not anticipate. We did not see Norman slicing and carving, but the shower curtain, a ring at a time, falling to reveal the blood flowing down the drain. Intense and horrific!
Keep Writing!
Embrace the dark side that resides within us all, and weave a tale of horror in prose or verse to engage your readers and make them wonder just how safe we really are ~ from the horrors that reside without and within.
Kate
Kate - Writing & Reading |
Horror inferred and exposed in the conversation between writer and reader ~ I invite you to share your perceptions with the writers
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A military crew finds a floating ship in space, what they find on board may just kill them
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Now challenge your muse creative to a subtle yet vivid exploration of some inciteful prompts, perhaps with
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Thank you for this momentary safe (I hope) respite in your virtual home. I invite you to tell the story, allude to the horror, and share with us your exploration. You may see it appear for your readers here as well
Until we next meet,
Write On!
Kate
Kate - Writing & Reading
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Horror/Scary: May 11, 2011 Issue [#4382]
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