FILL: Aged Halloween Treats? (6)

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Sun, 4 Oct 1998 22:07:09 -0400

TECH: Ray Bradbury Quoth...

in honor of the Halloween contest

Run Fast, Stand Still, or, The Thing at the Top of the Stairs, or, New Ghosts from Old Minds by Ray Bradbury

Run fast, stand still.  This, the lesson from lizards.  For all writers. Observe almost any survival creature, you see the same.  Jump, run, freeze. In the ability to flick like an eyelash, crack like a whip, vanish like steam, here this instant, gone the next -- life teems the earth.  And when that life is not rushing to escape, it is playing statues to do the same. See the hummingbird, there, not there.  As thought arises and blinks off, so this thing of summer vapor; the clearing of a cosmic throat, the fall of a leaf.  And where it was -- a whisper.

[Skipping a great deal of good...]

One of the nouns on my list in high school was The Thing, or, better yet, The Thing at the Top of the Stairs.

When I was growing up in Waukegan, Illinois, there was only one bathroom; upstairs.  You had to climb an unlit hall halfway before you could find and turn on a light.  I tried to get my dad to keep the light on all night.  But that was expensive stuff.  The light stayed off.

Around two or three in the morning, I would have to go to the bathroom.  I would lie in bed for half an hour or so, torn between the agonized need for relief, and what I knew was waiting for me in the dark hall leading up to the attic.  At last, driven by pain, I would edge out of our dining room into that hall, thinking: run fast, leap up, turn on the light, but whatever you do, don't look up.  If you look up before you get the light on, It will be there.  The Thing.  The terrible Thing waiting at the top of the stairs. So run, blind; don't look.

[slip and clip...]

I leave you now at the bottom of your own stair, at half after midnight, with a pad, a pen, and a list to be made.  Conjure the nouns, over the secret self, taste the darkness.  Your own Thing stands waiting way up there in the attic shadows.  If you speak softly, and write any old word that wants to jump out of your nerves onto the page...

Your Thing at the top of your stairs in your own private night... may well come down.

From How to Write Tales of Horror, Fantasy & Science Fiction edited by J. N. Williamson, ISBN 0-89879-270-3, pp. 11-19

FILL: Aged Halloween Treats? (7)

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Sat, 7 Sep 1996 18:50:36 EDT

EXERCISE:  Is That A Monster in Your Pocket?

[or are you just happy to meet me?]

drawing on How To Write Horror Fiction by William F. Nolan, ISBN 0-89879-442-0

Do you need a monster for your loathsome tale of supernal menace?

[Say, did you know we will be doing a contest?  Halloweeny stories, grilled over an open fire, waiting for the flickering light to reflect from the slitted eyes behind you...now open those veins and bleed...:]

Pick a number from one to six, then try:

1.  Old Ghoul, New Approach!  Ghost, vampire, werewolf, demon, zombie - take a conventional monster, and think about fresh insights, fresh ways of presenting the old blood and guts.  Make us feel for them, make us think about the humanity and depth, the inner fears and uncertainties of the real monster.

2. Multiple Monsters.  Often, the "human" partner of the macabre is in some ways even more monstrous than the physically bizarre ones.  Mix and match, let us cheer for the witch who is protecting her home town from the zombies or make us shiver when we realize that werefido is just a lapdog for the real monster.  Be careful to avoid losing the sense of reality, though!

3.  Keep those powers in check!  If your monster has the strength of ten, it should also have severe hayfever.  Or maybe the undying heroine also has a broken heart, crushed by rejection, looking for the one lover who can see past the wrinkles...

4.  Human monsters.  Take that criminal, and remove human compassion, human guilt, other ordinary feelings.  Normal emotions and feelings either aren't there, or are twisted and perverted to the point where they are no longer human.

5.  The mechanical, the robotic, the electrical.  Cars, computers, massive machinery - there is a subtle fear of these which you can use. Imagine that machines sometimes grow tired of their slavery to humanity, and stalk the night, looking for revenge...

6.  The unseen and hidden.  What lurks in the shadows?  Outside the edges of sight, below the street in the sewers, chittering in the walls of your apartment building, waiting for you to close your eyes?

There are a few possibilities that might help you get started. Remember, think about your monster, think about what drives them, what thirst and hunger draws them, what evil calls them to act.

And don't forget the stakes!

"...summing up, the monsters you create for your stories and novels must be credible; whether human or supernatural or robotic. ... They must pose a significant threat to your main characters.  They must be removed from the norm.  And they must _not_ be all-powerful."

Short start?  How about...

    "Every night in the year, four of us sat in the small parlour of the George at Debenham--the undertaker, and the landlord, and Fettes, and myself."

Have at it, fiends and other writers of the dark underside, have at it!

And never, ever feed them after midnight...

FILL: Aged Halloween Treats? (8)

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Mon, 23 Sep 1996 00:03:22 EDT

EXERCISE: Fearfully...

[for those who may not know it, we are getting ready to have a little contest concerning All Hallowed's Eve (sometimes known as Halloween).]

In horror of the situation, let us consider some things that might make you fearful.  Scared?  A deep-down, bone shaking, quivering puddle of pusillanimous timidity?  Just as examples:

fear in a dentist's office...the sound of whirring, punctuated with clashes of whining, framed in aching silence touched with liquid gushes. the medicinal odors, tainted with the stink of burning bone and decay. the faint twinge of abdominal muscles tightening in anticipation.  the screaming--expected, awaited as a release from the tension, and yet never allowed, never heard, swallowed in sputtering silence.

or perhaps your metier is a wall of blooms--lovely golden explosions of petals, a joyful collar of lavender pink surrounding a black velvet button, long green stems and tattered leaflets--and the small black spider lurking deep inside, red hourglass marking the last grains of the sands of time.  Or does the flitting bobbing drone of the happy bee conceal the sting of finality?

So, pick a number from one to six.

1.  Insects (pick one, pick one...)
2.  Snakes/Reptiles/fish (you get to select one that you shiver with)
3.  Illness (yes, you decide whether it will be a simple burst appendix or the more exotic strain of something from afar...Andromeda?)
4.  Disability (smashed, cut, gouged, a small nick in a nerve...)
5.  Rodents and other chitters in the night...
6.  Plants (from the little greenhouse of horrors?  or your own backyard?  you plant the seed, water it, and reap the thorny cold embrace...)

Play with it.  What about that would be frightening to you?  Now, can you take a character or two and put them in a situation where they are going to put their hand into the dark crevice where it lurks?

Let me give away a plot.

1.  The protagonist is introduced, with a little bit of foreshadowing that this is a person who has some problems.  Perhaps they duck away from the sound of a car backfiring?  Or maybe they have some trouble pulling the drapes in their room to hide the hideous green outside?

2.  There is...a kitten?  a puppy?  a child?  someone weak and in need of help...that forces our protagonist up against the thing they fear.

3.  amid flashbacks, carefully sketching in the breaking of the protagonist, the horror of that time that can never be forgotten -- and never remembered in full! -- the protagonist struggles and twists, trying to help, but...

4.  take your time.  make us feel the agony of the protagonist, looking at the little girl about to drown and fearing to tread where memory tells them evil lurks...tighten the tension, drive home the drip of sweat trickling cold down the back, make us hang our head in shame as the hot tears and fear paralyze us...

5.  And the triumphant end!  The cathartic release of doing it, of snapping the bonds of the past and saving the day!

Quick Start?

    "Leave the bloodsuckers behind us," she said, and kicked his kneecap, hard, leaving him lying on the ground.

or maybe...

    Any day that starts with dead men kicking in your front door isn't going to be a good one.

Write two three four...
tink

FILL: Aged Halloween Treats? (9)

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Sun, 29 Sep 1996 19:19:13 EDT

EXERCISE: Don't Open The Door!

[based on Chapter 5 in How To Write Horror Fiction by William F. Nolan]

(Behind that locked door, so rumor goes, lie the remains of...)

Suspense!

"_Anticipation_ is the key to suspense.  You are leading your reader towards what he or she _knows_ is going to result in a dangerous confrontation with evil.  You do it in careful stages, encouraging the reader to anticipate the horror, but holding it back, layering in other sequences that move your story forward but delay the actual climax the reader _knows_ is coming."

(no, no, it was years ago, and the key was lost.  It was almost a work of art, that key, and...yes, that's it!  Where did you get...you can't be the long lost son of the family, sent away in hopes that the curse...oh, nothing, nothing...)

"If you have done the proper job of characterization, of making your reader _care_ about the protagonist, then they will emotionally identify with the upcoming danger."

"The descriptive words and phrases you use to build suspense are
extremely important.  They set the proper mood for the upcoming encounter."

"The reader never knows when or under what circumstances this horrible transformation will occur--a guarantee of reader anticipation."

(I remember the night when it first happened...the dark clouds rolled over the waning moon, and the ocean seemed to moan against the rocks, grinding, battering, roaring defiance of the fates...)

1.  Set up your threat early.  Right in the beginning, have someone else die, let a rumor ramble past, refer to the mystery...

2.  build and deepen suspense by bringing the menace closer.   a near encounter, destruction of the means of escape/rescue, loss of protection...

(We thought the priest could save us...and then we discovered him crouched outside the church, frothing at the mouth, with his own hands holding the stake in his chest...)

3.  separation/isolation are excellent aids in building the suspense. Start with a busload of happy travellers, then whittle them down, down, down to the final desperate survivors, standing off the hordes of genetically exercised cockroaches with a bowie knife and a can of beans...

"Your readers will stick with you as long as the outcome is uncertain. They will be trying to guess what's going to happen, so your job is to give the narrative a sudden twist that misleads.  This creates surprise and continues the process of building suspense."

"The threat cannot be false.  It must pay off, and this means you must show your monster _in action_.  Chewing up minor characters, for instance..."

1.  The Principle -- Don't Open That Door!  And the hero(ine) walks down the long, dark hallway, takes a deep breath, and slowly, slowly turns the handle...

2.  Isolation, vulnerability -- put your characters at the mercy of the incoming menace with nowhere to run, no one to help...and feel the suspense rise!

3.  Darkness.  The primal fear of the night, of what may be lurking in the shadows, of that sound from behind the black shield...

4.  Is the Monster Real?  Often, characters start out not believing, then slowly give ground, until they finally believe completely in the monster, just as they finally reach the limits of their attempts to deal with it...often while the people at the 911 desk are still chuckling about the nut with their crazy story...

Okay?  So, pick a number from one to six...

1.  napkin
2.  telephone
3.  empty vase
4.  broken light
5.  wastebasket
6.  painting

and again?

1.  A door
2.  A cave
3.  A car trunk (or the bonnet, for those of you who speak the queen's own)
4.  A locked suitcase
5.  A closet
6.  A long-unused boat house

and one more time?

1.  the family curse
2.  the monster from...
3.  the marching dead
4.  a zombie snake
5.  a doctor who doesn't know when to say "no more cutting and stitching!"
6.  your own pet fear, magnified and manifested out there, waiting for us...

Take the object, put it in the place, and think about how finding a napkin in a locked suitcase could be the clue that makes (in time, once we've fought our way past the disbelief, past the fear that clutches our stomach, past all that...until, at last) your protagonist rock and roll with the marching dead, streaming past on their way to...

Short starter?

"I don't want to go in there," she said.

But you and I know that she will, almost certainly, because she has to face her terrors...and those terrors will grow, will encircle her, and will make her shake in agony...

shiver!
tink

(and if you're still wondering what's behind the door...open it, go ahead, turn the latch, pull on the handle and...now tell us what you found there!)

FILL: Aged Halloween Treats? (10)

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Fri, 11 Oct 1996 23:30:20 EDT

EXERCISE: To Dream, Aye, There's The Rub...

"To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause...who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveler returns..."

Hamlet, III, i, 56, Shakespeare
From Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 16th Edition.

fardels?  oh, well, we could look it up, but such burdens and loads are not worthy of our harried times, eh?

[For those who may be wondering--this is a simple exercise in the art of tall tale construction, sometimes known as writing.  For our purposes today, we'll be picking a few bits and pieces by selecting a number from one to six (you may use dice if you like).  You may use or abuse the exercise as you like, the instructor in the course isn't terribly formal about it...]

Let's see.  Try taking one from the following:

1.  There and back again.  ...in which someone from our world ventures, falls, or is abducted into another more magical world.

2.  Beyond the fields we know.  ...those works which take place entirely in magic worlds, with no concrete links to our own time and place.

3.  Unicorns in the garden. ...those tales in which magical and fantastic events occur in our mundane world.

4.  That Old Black Magic.  stories in which the everyday is menaced by the supernatural to inspire fright and horror are a class by themselves; alas, the unknown is still terrifying to most of humanity.

5.  Bambi's Children.  ...stories in which animals think, speak, and act with human intelligence...

6.  Once and Future Kings, Queens, and Heroes.  stories that have been handed down from time immemorial, the great legends of many cultures, which have been used by contemporary authors to provide new insights into the ancient myths or into our own time.

[categories from A Reader's Guide to Fantasy, by Baird Searles, Beth Meacham, and Michael Franklin, ISBN 0-380-80333-x]

Mix well with...

1.  Health - fitness, ailments, liver, bile, or physical infirmity?
2.  Fate - work, career, plans and goals?
3.  Success - prestige, distinction, a name?
4.  Life - ambition, illness, emigration, where does this life wander?
5.  Head - concentration, self-control, independent, reckless, mindful?
6.  Heart - the emotions, the feelings, sympathy, jealousy, happiness?

[palmistry lines borrowed from The Book of Fortune Telling by Agnes M. Miall, ISBN 0-517-64730-3]

Season with a dash of fairy dust, blinking in the eyelids:

1.  Ghosts
2.  A talking non-human entity (animal, mineral, veggie at your discretion)
3.  A moving part of a dead body (which one?  you decide!)
4.  Energy (flashes, mere shocks, or whatever your little spirit moves...)
5.  Parasites, small insects, or even your local viral infection...okay, a mold or two will do if you really prefer fungi
6.  those amazing marching machines, ticking their way into your embrace...with a scalpel?

So - one very sketchy category of story, one line of interest, and a dash of ugliness.  Stir well, and think about where your protagonist would like to go (the back seat of a chevy?  why?) and what your evil genius (the monster, mashed?) wants (a quiet coffin of its very own? with a view of the swamp?  simply heart rending, eh, wot?).

Then write that tale of the darkness, enchant the evil spirits, and send it in to the contest!  Only a few hours remain before sharp edge of time cuts across the deadline, so hurry, hurry, hurry, scrape your very own beast out of the dusty soul of the cemetary and let it go...

Submit to the halloweenie contest!

Fast Start?

    From the shadows, bent, fetid, tumultuous and lonely, squealing and whistling now and then with exhilaration, it watched.

[You may use this sentence to start your work if you like.]

What dreams may come...
tink

[was that a shiver running down your spine...or a ghastly finger from beyond?]