TECH: How to Write Horror Fiction 05
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writercisesOriginal Posting Oct. 16, 2017
Wait a minute? What happened to 04? Well, we're slipping closer and closer to the deadline (October 20? That's this FRIDAY! Get those stories and poems going!) so I decided to skip ahead...
William F. Nolan's How to Write Horror Fiction, Chapter 5. has the memorable title Don't Open That Door!
Suspense! But how do you create and maintain suspense? Well, anticipation. Something is behind that door, down those stairs, out there… And the reader wants that confrontation, but they also know the protagonists really shouldn't go there. Don't open that door!
Words and phrases, a mood… Gets built.
"One primary method of creating suspense is to set up your threat early in the book." Earlier deaths, horrors, bad things happen… And now, here comes your favorite naïve protagonist, about to walk into it.
Make the outcome uncertain. Twists, surprises, what is going to happen next? "The threat cannot be false. It must pay off, and this means you must show your monster in action." Chew up a minor character, drops of blood here and there.
"Setting your beleaguered protagonist to battle a series of dangerous obstacles is another method that can be used to create suspense."
And of course, the horrible thing behind the door.
Don't forget isolation. Dark and stormy nights, alone in the graveyard, what's a person going to do? Isolation makes most of us vulnerable.
Darkness, of course, is when ghoulies and goblins and things come out to bite.
Make the monster real. Your protagonist, your characters, everyone finally needs to believe in the monster. They should start out skeptical, but then… Wait a minute. It really is a werewolf chewing on my shoe.
"Finally, then, suspense is the pulse of life beneath the flesh of your story. The tell-tale heart of horror."
There you go. Something relaxing for the Halloween... what, you don't think opening the door is a good idea? Well, we'll just peek around it....
AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGHHH!
slurp.
And it all begins again.
Write?
tink
Wait a minute? What happened to 04? Well, we're slipping closer and closer to the deadline (October 20? That's this FRIDAY! Get those stories and poems going!) so I decided to skip ahead...
William F. Nolan's How to Write Horror Fiction, Chapter 5. has the memorable title Don't Open That Door!
Suspense! But how do you create and maintain suspense? Well, anticipation. Something is behind that door, down those stairs, out there… And the reader wants that confrontation, but they also know the protagonists really shouldn't go there. Don't open that door!
Words and phrases, a mood… Gets built.
"One primary method of creating suspense is to set up your threat early in the book." Earlier deaths, horrors, bad things happen… And now, here comes your favorite naïve protagonist, about to walk into it.
Make the outcome uncertain. Twists, surprises, what is going to happen next? "The threat cannot be false. It must pay off, and this means you must show your monster in action." Chew up a minor character, drops of blood here and there.
"Setting your beleaguered protagonist to battle a series of dangerous obstacles is another method that can be used to create suspense."
And of course, the horrible thing behind the door.
Don't forget isolation. Dark and stormy nights, alone in the graveyard, what's a person going to do? Isolation makes most of us vulnerable.
Darkness, of course, is when ghoulies and goblins and things come out to bite.
Make the monster real. Your protagonist, your characters, everyone finally needs to believe in the monster. They should start out skeptical, but then… Wait a minute. It really is a werewolf chewing on my shoe.
"Finally, then, suspense is the pulse of life beneath the flesh of your story. The tell-tale heart of horror."
There you go. Something relaxing for the Halloween... what, you don't think opening the door is a good idea? Well, we'll just peek around it....
AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGHHH!
slurp.
And it all begins again.
Write?
tink