Posts Tagged ‘authors’

New Ideas At Work

Posted: March 12, 2014 in ideas, Reflections, Writing
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Today at work, I had a mostly usual day. Went through a ton of files, ate lunch, went through another ton of files, and had conversations with some of my coworkers about life, the weather, and the job. Pretty average. Oh, except for the fact that I came up with several different ideas for short stories and articles today. About 16 new ideas total, if I remember correctly.

And this is not unusual for me: just yesterday I had an idea for a psychological horror novel. The day before that, I came up with a science-fiction/horror novel, all while sitting calmly at my desk and going through file after file after file. So while coming up with so many ideas in a single day is somewhat unusual for me, coming up with ideas while working or going to classes is a pretty regular occurrence for me.

Why am I making a blog post out of this? Because there are some writers–not many, but some–who are under the mistaken impression that holding any sort of job will stifle creative juices and ruin them as an artist. For example, I used to be on friendly terms with a writer and blogger over in Europe. He wrote a lot of poetry, took plenty of photos, and was working on a novel. For reasons that I never found out, he and his wife separated and he ended up living on the streets. Because he didn’t want to get a job that would most likely force him to be a slave to a corporation or a government (at least based on his political views I assume that’s why he didn’t get a job), along with his views that a job would ruin his artistic power, he asked his readers to donate money to him through PayPal so that he could buy airline tickets to America where his parents were. Nobody donated, which he felt was a personal insult and he got really nasty afterwards. When I tried to be nice and encouraging to him, he swore at me, leading me to stop following him. Last I checked he’s still in Europe and living on the streets billing himself as a starving artist.

Now, I’m not saying that all artists who refuse to get jobs are like this. Many are the kindest, sweetest people you’ll ever meet. They’re sincere about wanting to do well in their chosen fields. But I do want to let artists of all kinds know that a job won’t necessarily ruin your career and your skills, whether you’re selling only a few books or several thousand books. In fact, sometimes a job can help you. Several of the people in my office read my work when it comes out; I wouldn’t have made some of the money I’ve made without their help. Not only that, but I’ve made a few connections through my job, including with a screenwriter I met today who’s working on a screenplay while helping students out with financial aid and other questions during the day. Tomorrow I’d like to give him the name of a professor at school who also has connections to Hollywood. I figure that’d help him.

So don’t worry about losing your creative streak if you get a 9 to 5 or even just a part-time job. It may actually make you more creative, or give you the drive to produce better work just so you can get out of that job. I’ve certainly benefitted from working. I’ve come up with so many ideas over the years while working in the financial aid office. I don’t think I would’ve come up with those ideas if I was in a different setting.

Not to mention the fact that I would’ve had to move back in with my parents or become homeless long ago if I hadn’t gotten a job. Trust me, I’m very grateful for that. Especially since I’m sheltered from the cold. Do you know how bad the weather can be in Ohio in winter?

If you’re still not sure, just go ahead and try it. Give it a month or two. If a job does kill you creatively, then I’m sorry that you can’t write while holding a job. And if you don’t find any change or instead find yourself becoming more creative, then I’m glad things are working out for you and I wish you luck in whatever occupation you’re currently working in.

How has holding a job affected your creativity? What advice do you have for authors who are concerned about how a job might affect their writing?

Self-Pub Authors: Taglines

Posted: March 10, 2014 in Journalism, Writing
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Does anyone here ever use taglines for their novels? I do occasionally (I created one not too long ago for Snake: “How far will you go for love and revenge?”), and they really are fascinating marketing tools. Sometimes they even become more than what their creators intended, and become part of our collective pop culture.

For my twelfth article on Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors, I decided to write on taglines and how to create your own. It’s a quick read, but I think the tips are very informative, and I spice it up with my own weird brand of humor in and around the article. If you’d like, please check it out by following this link.

And if you’re a self-published author, you should definitely take time to peruse Self-Pub Authors and see the articles we have there. The blog is written by other self-published authors and has articles on many, many different subjects involved in DIY writing, editing, publishing, and marketing. You never know what article might give you the gem you need to create, publish, or market a wonderful story.

That’s all for now. I’m heading for bed. You have a good night, my Followers of Fear.

The Day The Tigers Came To School: Finished

Posted: March 9, 2014 in ideas, Progress Report, Scary Stuff, short story, Writing
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This particular short story could also be called “My tribute to Stephen King’s Carrie without any psychic or telekinetic elements”. I basically took the idea of a girl getting revenge on the bullies in her life through supernatural means and wrote a dark and powerful story around it. And it involved tigers, too (my favorite animal), so I definitely had fun writing it.

The Day The Tigers Came To School is a story with a very interesting evolution. It merely started out as a story about a school being invaded by tigers and wolves with some sort of strange twist about how they got there. Then I dropped the wolves because that’s just too much for one short story and I like tigers more. Then I added the bullying/revenge theme. Then I played around with different ways the plot could go, even while I was writing the story. 4,159 words later I have a new short story that pushed boundaries even for me.

By boundaries, there were a couple of moments where things got incredibly graphic in detail. It was enough to make me wonder if I shouldn’t hold back a little in writing something so terrifying. But then I reasoned, if it makes me a little hesitant, it will probably scare the pants off of anyone who reads it. And that’s basically my goal in writing. So I relaxed the restraints and just went with it. I’m glad I did, because the story’s much better that way.

Well, I’m going to let a friend give me some feedback on it, and then I’ll…save it for my next short story collection. Yes, I’m doing another short story collection, which I’ve tentatively entitled Dead and Dying (it was going to be Dead and Dying Teens but I thought that since some of the stories might not involve teens, I dropped that part). I can’t confirm content or release date, but I can tell you that this time around I want at least eight short stories, this one and a couple of others among them. When it gets closer to me actually releasing the book, I’ll make sure everyone knows.

In the meantime, tomorrow evening (work and homework permitting, of course), I plan to start up again work on Laura Horn. It’s been put on hold long enough and I want to get it at least halfway done before I leave for my study abroad trip. Then this summer I can edit it along with Video Rage. Wish me luck on the project. I still have more than half the novel left to write! It’s not going to be easy.

Well, I’ve got work tomorrow, so I’m heading to bed. You all have a lovely evening and have pleasant nightmares. Goodnight, my Followers of Fear.

Conversations With Becket

Posted: March 7, 2014 in Author Interciew, Journalism, Living and Life, Novel, Reflections, Writing
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Today’s interview is with indie author Becket, whose books include The Blood Vivicanti series and the Key The Steampunk Vampire Girl books, including the recently released The Tower Tomb of Time. When not writing, Becket works for author Anne Rice and is supplementing his education with a degree in psychology.

I had the chance to email Becket and learn a little bit about him, his books, and what it’s like to work for Anne Rice. It was definitely an enjoyable correspondence.

RU: So Becket, you’ve had quite the interesting life, working as an author, working for an author, and at one point you were a Benedictine monk. Makes me curious about what else you’ve done, so could you give us a brief history of yourself?

Becket: I entered the seminary when I was 21 because I wanted to deepen my relationship with God as well as be a minister of hope, faith, and love. I spent three years in the seminary, during which time I also finished my BA in music composition. Then in the summer of 2000, I entered a Benedictine monastery, St. Joseph Abbey in Covington, LA. The spiritual charisma of the monastic life appealed to my personality type. The monks lived a very silent life, guided by two principals of work and prayer. During my first year in the monastery, Anne Rice requested a harpsichord for a book signing in New Orleans. We monks had a very nice one; and the abbot asked me to deliver it because of my musical background – I had studied the instrument in college, along with several others. That was when Anne and I first met. We developed an email rapport over the next few years while I was earning my MA in theology. When I completed my degree in 2005, I decided that it was time for me to re-enter lay life and, needing a job, I emailed Anne, asking her fi she had a job on her staff for a former monk with a few degrees. She replied with a job offer. I’ve been with Anne ever since, studying the craft of writing under her guidance while also earning an MS in psychology.

RU: What is it like, working for Anne Rice? Besides the amount of jealousy you must receive from fans including myself, I mean.

Becket: What is it like, working for Anne Rice?

Working for Anne Rice is like working for a childhood hero. I first read Anne’s books when I was a teen. Being a lonely adolescent, an outsider, Anne’s words spoke to me powerfully – because her words have a wonderful way of showing empathy for the outsider/reader. Many days she and I talk about literature and the book publishing business. It is a continual learning experience. Every day I learn something helpful and significant about my writing, about the publishing of my own books, about my own capacity for problem-solving, about many things. But every day is a new experience because every day I’m presented with a new challenge. Before I started working for Anne, I had never used Photoshop. So to assist her as best as I could, I learned many new skills, such as photography, shooting video, proper lighting, sound engineering, etc. I also learned several programs in the Adobe Creative Suite, namely Photoshop, Illustrator, and even Premier Pro and After Effects. Most of those programs I use every day, whether it is creating an app for Anne, or posting an image, or editing a video for Youtube. And today all those programs have helped me greatly in my own work; they are invaluable book publishing tools. A successful indie author cannot live on Word alone.

RU: Tell me about it. iMovie and Photoshop have been great tools in the past for me. Now, you’re new book is the latest adventure for your character Key the Steampunk Vampire Girl. Tell us about her and the new book.

Becket: Key’s new adventure picks up where the last book left off: Key has just escaped from the Dungeon of Despair. Yet unlike the last book, which takes place over the course of 250 years, the course of this book happens in a single night. Key gets to do what she has not done in over two centuries: She gets to explore the City of the Dead. She rides a Hobbeetle, she meets the Worm King, she visits the Grave of the Grim Goblin, whose not as grim or dead as some people might think, and she does so much more! Ultimately she finds herself at the Tower Tomb of Time, which allows her to visit the moment when she was first made a vampire. She discovers the mystery behind her mom and dad’s disappearance, as well as the reason she was taken to the City of the Dead in the first place. In other words, The Tower Tomb of Time explores questions that were raised in The Dungeon of Despair.

RU: Some people would hesitate to write a vampire novel these days when most people associate vampires with Twilight. What made you decide to write about vampires?

Becket: Before there was Twilight, there was Anne Rice. She was ground breaking (and indeed she still is) in the sense that she made the vampire a Byronic hero – someone whom we could easily identify with. Moreover, being a vampire isn’t the story of Key the Steampunk Vampire Girl – which is fundamentally the case with Bella, the heroine of Twilight. Bella actively seeks to become a blood drinker. Key, on the other fang, like Anne’s Louis or Lestat, never wanted to be a vampire at all. Becoming what she is happened to her, and then lots more terrible things happened to her, and so she has to make the best of her situation. That kind of narrative ambience is what I strove to create when I wrote Key. I hope readers will associate with her story and say to himself or herself, “I know how she feels being in the Dungeon of Despair, or confronting the Worm King, or revisiting a past that was hitherto forsaken.” Additionally, I hope readers would also feel inspired by Key’s successes and victories over personal demons. Key’s story is a coming of age story.

RU: What is your writing process like for you?

Becket: Generally my process begins with an idea, which usually comes to me while I’m writing another book. I write down that idea, and if it stays with me for some time, I will jot down notes about potential plot development, prose style, themes, and so on. When I finish one novel, I immediately begin another; there is no waiting for me. I write every day. It is a routine. And the routine for starting new novels is grounded in two goals: (1) the long-term goal of my book, and (2) the short-term goal of my daily writing. My long-term goal is the size of the book that I want to write, and I generally determine that by comparing it with other books. For instance, I know that Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is about 25,000 words. So if I am seeking to create a children’s story, such as Key the Steampunk Vampire Girl, I will make the long-term goal of my first draft comparable to 25,000 words. My short-term goal is the amount of words that I will write in a day. On average my goal is at least 1000 words a day; usually I write more, often twice as much; and some times I write fewer words. The point isn’t perfection: It’s progress. As long as I am writing, I am coming closer to the completion of a book.

RU: I admire your tenacity. Now what are some tips you might have for other self-published authors, such as myself, on writing and getting your work out there?

Becket: The beauty of indie-publishing is in the word “indie” – independent. This is a quintessential word to keep in mind because, if a writer gets embroiled in the industry of professional book publishing, that writer would lose some degree of control. The writer would usually not be able to control, for instance, interior or exterior formatting. In other words, you would probably have little to say in the creation of your book jacket. I can’t tell you how many times I have heard professionally published authors complain about their book jacket, how it does not look like the story they told. Other authors have complained about the struggle they have with their editor or copy editor, how important words will be edited out, or how sometimes sentences or pages completely rewritten. There are some authors who want to be controlled like that. And that is good! Great books have been written with the help of excellent editors. But finding such an editor is like finding love in your life: It usually happens when you least expect it. Being an indie-author means controlling every element of your work. I like this, not micro-managing, but being purposeful and meaningful with every element that I produce.

RU: I love that independence too. It’s gone well for me. So what’s next for you, Becket?

Becket: The Blood Vivicanti Parts 5 and 6 will come in March and April. And after that, I will be publishing a book titled, The Door to Heaven, which is about a boy whose life is changed forever when he encounters an old man’s face on the doorknob to the Door to Heaven.

RU: That “Door To Heaven” sounds very Stephen King-ish. Last question: If you were stranded on a desert island and could only take three books with you, which books would you take?

Becket: Well, I am a man of faith and prayer, so I would probably take the ESV Bible (because I like that translation), The Imitation of Christ, and a book of blank pages, so that my mind could fill it up with my own stories.

RU: I love it when authors say they want to bring a blank notebook with them. Shows their true writing spirit, in some ways. Well, thanks for joining us, Becket, and best of luck to you.

If you’d like to find out more about Becket or check out some of his books, you can check out his website, his Facebook page, Twitter feed, and get personally autographed copies from the Changing Hands Bookstore.

Our next scheduled interview is March 31st with author and dear friend Angela Misri, who will be talking about her debut novel Jewel of the Thames. So get excited for that!

Creating That Dread Feeling

Posted: March 4, 2014 in Reflections, Scary Stuff, Writing
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Recently a fellow horror author and blogger I admire brought up a good point about horror, one that I’ve made in countless other posts. The point that he made was that a lot of horror out there is actually pretty terrible because of an over-reliance of gore and gross-out elements (blood, knives, etc.). Real horror is made not by grossing people out continuously over the course of a horror story, but by creating a feeling of dread, that feeling that something bad is going to happen and that it is going to get worse. That feeling builds and builds, until (hopefully) the reader is scared stiff by ensuing events.

Creating that dread feeling is difficult, to say the least. Like I’ve said in previous posts about terror (and I’m not yet convinced that they can’t be the same thing, depending on the circumstances), it’s one of the hardest parts of creating a good horror story. Creating that feeling takes time, precision, keen insight, and skill, cultivated over years and years of practice. It’s why plenty of would-be horror writers and filmmakers just opt out of trying to use terror in favor of just plain old blood and guts and gore as a so-so substitute. And when that doesn’t work so well, they add in sex as well (don’t believe me? Watch the Friday the 13th remake in all its crummy filmmaking and see how much dread there isn’t and how much sex and blood and gore there is. And no, I’ll never stop harping on how bad that film was).

Here’s an exercise that can help authors of all kinds visualize creating that dread feeling for your story: close your eyes and imagine yourself in a dark, dank, eerie hallway. This hallway goes on for some length, so far that you may not be able to see the very end. And it also takes many twists and turns, so that doesn’t help. As you walk down this hallway, you get the strange feeling that something horrible is going to happen just around the next corner or right behind that table or from that ceiling lamp with the crackling bulb. And as you get farther along, this feeling that something bad will happen grows and grows. Sometimes the places you think something will happen prove to be harmless, but other times you are correct and you’re only just able to get away with your head still on. Even so, you continue on, even though the feeling of ill-boding keeps growing, and you wish you could turn back or even just stop and stay where you are but you can’t, those aren’t options. The only option left is to continue on, reach the end with hopefully all your body parts still attached, and find a safe room located at the end of the hallway.

That hallway is your horror story. And it can be as long as it needs to be, have as much furniture under which monsters can hide as needs be, and have as many twists and turns as needs be. You just got to find a way to create that feeling of ill-boding, which is the feeling of dread that all the best horror stories are able to create. The exercise above is meant to help give people an idea of how creating that terror and dread can happen and to give them something to work with if they need help or practice creating that dread.

I hope that helps in some ways. Also, if you want to check out some books, TV shows, or movies that do a great job creating that feeling of dread, I highly recommend Stephen King’s IT, The Amityville Horror, and the first two seasons of American Horror Story. They do a very great job with creating dread in the reader/viewer. Trust me, I was afraid to go to sleep after I encountered one or two of these titles. They’re that scary.

All for now. I’m going to try to get some of my own fiction written and full of that dread feeling. Goodnight, Followers of Fear.

WordPress Tag!

Posted: March 3, 2014 in Living and Life, Writing
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I’m tagged! And yes, that’s a good thing. author Lorna Dounaeva just tagged me in a game of WordPress tag, which means I answer some questions and then I tag at least three other writers to answer the same set of questions. So excited! So let’s get started:

What are you currently working on?

At the moment, I’m just working on a bunch of short stories, though I plan by at least the fifteenth to get back to my WIP Laura Horn. I’m also working on getting my novel Snake published on June 10th (assuming the copyright office doesn’t screw with me in any way, shape or form. As a government office, they’re likely to do so, I’m afraid). I’m also trying to publish some short stories, so we’ll see what magazines accept them. Fingers crossed and hoping for the best.

How does your work differ from other authors in the genre?

Well, that’s really kind of a loaded question. Every author is different in terms of style and content, no matter what genre. However if I have to say, it’s that I try to make crazy concepts seem believable. At least, in theory I do. Ask my critics on how I’m doing in that department.

Why do you write what you do?

I’ve always loved scaring people, ever since a somewhat traumatic event in my past. And I love writing, so it’s fun to combine the two together.

How does your writing process work?

I work best in my room on the bed, so I try to write there mostly. When I work on novels, I usually write an outline of what happens in the story, and then set about writing the story out. It’s a torturous process, especially in the beginning. Tackling a whole novel gets easier as the story moves forward, but at the beginning it’s almost like rolling a boulder up a very big hill. Eventually I finish the story, and after several edits and feedback from a beta reader or two, I try to publish it. For short stories, the process is similar, except without the outline phase.

And now I tag three writers:

Matthew Williams, author of the recently released Papa Zulu.

Raymond Esposito, author of You and Me Against the World.

Pat Bertram, author of Grief: The Great Yearning.

Self-Pub Authors: Stuck For An Idea?

Posted: March 2, 2014 in ideas, Journalism, Reflections, Writing
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I just published my latest post on the blog Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors. Today’s article is called Stuck For An Idea?, which explores osme of the methods and techniques I use when I can’t think of anything to write about. It’s based on a lot of personal experience, but I think a lot of authors might get something out of it. If you’re interested, please go check it out.

And if you’re an author who’s already self-published or considering self-publishing, please check out the rest of Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors. It’s written by a variety of authors, myself included, who are dedicated to writing articles to help other authors out in writing and publishing in the indie market. I certainly find it helpful, and I recommend it every time I get the chance. And if you find the blog helpful, please subscribe to posts. You’ll learn tons, and what you learn may help catapult your writing and your career to new levels.

Good luck and enjoy!

Darkness at Noon: Finished

Posted: February 23, 2014 in Living and Life, short story, Writing
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Great book if you’re interested in the Dust Bowl of the 1930s.

You know you’re a writer and a college student when you manage to find ways to make your writing count for a grade. And that was kind of the point of this latest short story, which I wrote for one of my classes. Called Darkness at Noon, it’s not a horror story despite the title. Instead, it’s more literary/historical fiction. Why the heck am I writing that sort of story? I’ll explain.

The class I wrote this story for is my Deaf Literature and Culture class. Our teacher gave us an assignment to bring in some artifact (a book, a painting, a TV show or movie), something that represented deaf culture and do a presentation on it. I chose to write a short story, partially because I didn’t want to repeat myself by bringing up the episode of House where he treats a deaf teenager (I’d used this for a previous assignment), but mostly because I seriously wanted to write a short story and get something from it, such as a good grade. After getting the okay from my teacher, I started on the short story immediately.

As with most writing, getting started and keeping it going can be difficult. The style of story was also difficult for me, as I prefer horror and with no serial killer, ghost, or even angry wild animal, it was sometimes slow going writing this one. However this evening, after getting home from watching a movie with some members of my study abroad group and taking a shower, I set down to finish the story. I’m happy to report that I finished it at 4,652 words, at about a quarter to two in the morning.

The story itself follows a young woman living in the Dust Bowl during the 1930s who is deaf. She’s unhappy with the direction her life has taken, and it takes a terrible dust storm to make her realize that things aren’t as bad as she thinks.

I got most of my research from what I’ve been learning in my Deaf Lit class, as well as from the book The Worst Hard Time by Tim Egan, which I finished last weekend for another class. Both helped me visualize not only the world my character lived in, but also taught me what might go through the mind of a young woman who has to live in a town where she’s the only one who can’t hear. I like to think my character has a lot of baggage to her. She feels alone and isolated because of her deafness, and has some understandable anger towards those who’ve looked down on her because of the fact that she’s deaf.

Anyway, I like how this story turned out for the most part. I think the ending will need a little tweaking to make for a smooth finish, but I feel confident that when I turn it in on March 21st, I’ll get a very good grade for it (and possibly a recommendation for some Deaf Lit magazines or somewhere else I could publish the story).

Well, that’s all for now. I’m probably going to go to bed soon, so I’d like to wish you all good night and hope you have pleasant dreams. See you tomorrow, my Followers of Fear.

The Story Must Come Before The Theme

Posted: February 18, 2014 in Living and Life, Reflections, Writing
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This evening I went to a very interesting meeting of Ohio State’s Science Fiction Club (a whole other blog post to discuss what we talked about), and I got inspired for a few stories and articles. As I walked home from the meeting, I had another idea for an article, which you’re reading now.

As I walking home from Campbell Hall, enjoying the slightly warmer-than-usual weather and listening to heavy metal on my iPod (the mood music I usually listen to when I’m thinking or brainstorming), I was musing on the sorts of stories I tend to write, which ones were good and which ones were terrible, and what differentiated them. I realized something then: one thing that separated some of my good stories from my bad stories is which comes first, the plot or the theme.

Let me explain what I mean: when I first came up with the concept for Reborn City, it started as a simple gangster story with a science fiction twist. I had no idea of what the story would be like beyond that. I wanted it to be more adventure than explanation of scientific theory, I wanted excitement and sci-fi wackiness and life-or-death fights and maybe some sex (which got cut out after the first draft because it just didn’t fit the plot of the story). All the themes that ended up being woven into the story–the struggles and problems of gang life, Islamaphobia and racism, drug abuse, etc.–were woven in at a much later stage, though they became part of the story well before I started actually writing it.

On the other hand, there have been some short stories–which I don’t want to name–where I write them with the specific intention that they represent a theme or an idea. One early sci-fi story from high school about two technicians on a spaceship was meant to reflect on the loneliness of space travel and of isolation. Another was meant to be a ridicule of patriarchal values in society. And there are a few more I could mention, but let me just summarize by saying they were all conceived with a theme first that subjugated the story to the theme.

Apparently for me that latter approach doesn’t really work. The words feel all wrong and forced when I write like that and I find it difficult to make the story move forward.  And I realized as I walking home, past the library and towards the north end of campus, that my best stories are written when I focus more on the plot rather than any significant meaning behind the story. If the story itself is compelling, then the rest will follow, including any very deep themes.

I’m going to have to keep this in mind when I write stories in the future. And if I do end up writing a story where plot is subjugated to theme, at least it’ll be a good learning experience for me on what stories I shouldn’t write and how to avoid writing those sort of stories. I’m sure that there are plenty of authors who can write those stories and do it well (for some reason I’m thinking Kate Chopin’s The Awakening and plenty of other authors I’ve been assigned to read in my high school and college careers), but apparently I’m not one of them.

But in the end is that not surprising? People who love genre fiction, especially the sort of fiction I write, don’t necessarily read a story because they’re looking for a story that exposes the mindset of a battered woman or because they want an allegorical tale of small towns haunted by ghosts representing the ills of ignorance and a narrow-minded worldview. No, they want a story that scares them, and if the themes in the story make you think as well facilitate the whole scaring part of the story, then great. And since this is what I do when I read a story–to look for a good time, not for a deep meaning–it makes sense that my best fiction comes from focusing on the story rather than on what the story means.

Do you ever have problems with this? What are your thoughts on the subject?

Two Models Of Using Terror

Posted: February 14, 2014 in Reflections, Scary Stuff, Writing
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See also: The 3 Types of Terror

As a horror writer, one of the biggest challenges I face is building terror in a story. As Stephen King said on Facebook not too long ago, terror is “when you come home and notice everything you own had been taken away and replaced by an exact substitute. It’s when the lights go out and you feel something behind you, you hear it, you feel its breath against your ear, but when you turn around, there’s nothing there…”

Creepy! Anyway, I’ve been thinking of different ways authors utilize terror in their stories, how they manage to insinuate that terror element into their work and look for patterns. Based on those observations, I think I’ve come up with some answers, and I’ve put those answers into two models for using terror, which I will talk about below.

The first model of using terror is called the Uphill Model. In this version, you slow ramp up the strangeness and terrifying aspects of the story, starting with small, subtle cues but gradually introducing more overt signals until the wrongness of the situation is so obvious that at this point you can introduce the horror aspect (aka the vampire or the demon or whatever’s meant to creep us out in the story) to the sound of terrified squeals and screams (especially if you’re in a movie theater). A good example of this model would be Samson Weiss’s Curse, one of the short stories from The Quiet Game. The story starts out with small things that are out of the ordinary (a stalker at a rally, maybe some trouble sleeping, a voice or two), but things escalate and become more obvious as the story goes on until the villain of the piece is revealed, in all his horrifying grandeur. I also used the Uphill Model in The Loneliest Roads, one of my more recent short stories, which is currently going through the editing process and may be submitted to magazines soon. This is a good method to use for short stories, especially since it requires a steady but quick escalation in order to keep the reader interested and scared. However, the method requires precision in measuring out how much terror you should use and in what ways. Too much or too little terror used too soon or too late will work against the story, and actually turn readers away. Writers need to be cognizant of this when using this model.

Bad movie. Great example.

The second model is called (quite appropriately) The Seismograph Model, because there are moments where there is intense moments of terror followed by lulls or smaller spikes of terrifying elements. A wonderful example of this is Stephen King’s IT, where there are moments where the strangeness of the situation is very high followed by moments where the amount of terror is low or non-existent. Usually during the spikes of terror there is also a lot of accompanying horror and Gross-out, the other two types of terror. During the lulls, authors generally use this time to work on character development and to expand on the situation the characters find themselves in, as well as to maybe show the characters in more casual settings or enjoying life without threat of something evil. This model is helpful for novels, especially longer ones where there are plenty of run-ins with the great evil of the story before the actual climax takes place and it requires a bit less precision than the Uphill Model, though it does require some skill to do it right.

Let me just say that these models are not perfect and that they don’t apply to every horror story out there. They are simply frameworks to examine a story and maybe to help shape your stories while you are writing them. There may be other models out there that I’m unaware of and have yet to discover, and if there are, I doubt any story out there fits any of these models perfectly. Like I said, the models are tools of examination and reference more than actual models to be followed.

Anyway, I hope as time goes on and I work on new short stories, I hope to be able to use both models to some degree and to use them effectively in my stories. I think that if I can, I might be able to write better stories and further my career as an author. That’s the hope, anyway.

Do you use any models when writing? If so, what?

Oh, and while I have your attention, I have some announcements to make. First, I’ve included links to the book trailers of my various books on the pages above. So if you want to see the book trailer for a novel or a collection of short stories, all you have to do is visit the appropriate page and click on the link. Makes more sense than having to scour YouTube or this blog for the correct video or post, right?

Second, I’d like to announce that I’m starting work on a new collection of short stories. By that, I mean I merely plan to write a new collection that includes some old, unreleased work and some new work that I’ve been looking forward to writing. I’m not sure when this collection will be ready, when it’ll be released, or what I’ll call it, but when I do get around to all that, everyone here will be the first to know.

And finally, I’ve created a new page on this blog, entitled Interviews. The page contains both interviews with other authors and interviews with characters from my novels. It doesn’t have much on it yet, but I plan to add more interviews for both authors and characters as time goes on. I’m especially looking forward to adding more interviews with other authors: those are a chance to help out friends with new books coming out, meet new authors and get a chance to know them, and to possibly expand the number of people reading my work. We’ll see what happens, but I hope only for good things.

Well, that’s all for now. Tonight’s Buckeyethon, so I’ll be offline until I get home after a 12-hour dance marathon, followed by a 6-12 hour nap to catch up on my sleep. See you guys Saturday evening, when I write a post about how awesome Buckeyethon was and what happened while I was at it. Happy Valentine’s Day, Followers of Fear.

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