 Horror/Scary: September 14, 2016 Issue [#7860] |
  Horror/Scary
This week: Who Says it's Scary Edited by: Kate - Writing & Reading  
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Welcome to this week's edition of the WDC Horror/Scary Newsletter!
All that I see or seem is but a dream within a dream
...quoth the Raven, nevermore
Edgar Alan Poe
Foremost in a work of horror, story and verse, I believe, is our ability as writer to provoke fear or terror in our readers - a sense of dread or anxiety from the opening image, a foreshadowing of impending doom. Let's explore some of the ways we can make our readers feel this horror while absorbed for a time in the world we create prosaic or poetic.
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Greetings, let me ask a question ~
What scares you? What makes you cringe and shiver with a sudden need to get someplace safe, right away? Think about it for a minute, there has to be something – could be of this world, of another world, of your own mind (or loss thereof). Now believe it’s real, know it’s real for you. Then, write it out in all its visceral detail – show my eyes what you see, make me hear, smell, taste, feel everything you do at the moment of your greatest fear.
Make me know it as you do, that I too must be as scared or as horrified as you. Take those vivid details and give me the why – or the why not – and we’ve got the makings of a horror story or poem that will weave a link between your reality and mine for a time, a footprint in my personal space.
It was a dark, starless night, yet the wind made no sound
as branches wept leaves and twigs, bending limbs in unison
to encircle the lone passerby. An arboreal wave hiding
in autumn’s moldering musk, or perhaps the scent
of fermenting rot was the signal,
the welcome mat, for Axe.
Now - Axe can be a chainsaw wielding eviscerator of flesh-bearing mammals (humans included), an android, a vampire, a dragon, a ghost, a stalker, a serial killer, a feral cat, … Whatever you imagine now, get past my learned skepticism to make me see it; make me know it as though I were there. Ask your character why the situation terrifies him/her. Then empathize with that character’s fear while you write the scene that shows your readers. You don’t need a litany of items, dates and places. Sometimes allusion is even more effecting, allowing your readers to form the image from their own experience or perception as you continue weaving the tale.
Suspending disbelief. I think, is the key element in writing horror. For a brief time, we give our readers an ‘otherworld’ whether today, in the past, future, alternate reality. Make your readers need to know what will happen, Make them know the story, but without relating a litany of 'facts,' but rather weaving them into the story or poem.
 Make it believable, with enough detail to convince your readers it can be real. Give your readers direct reference with relevant physical details in the premise. For example, you wouldn’t have oak trees bending sideways in a desert of 100-degree sand (but how about cacti shedding their outer spikes as the inner growth thrummed, its tempo increasing in sync with the trekker’s own heartbeat). Or does your character touch it, call for help, and why – related to a childhood memory or driven by present-day philosophy.
If you don't want to spell it out, you can allude to the aberrant action or image ~ allow the character and reader to form the picture from his own past experience, fears, retained images of known scary things  I think horror is learned; what scares me now may have been a laugh some years ago. Consider the kid playing with a garden snake while that kid as adult goes running into the house when confronted by the same snake (it's descendant, actually - I think).
I hope the above exploration makes sense ~ writing horror is creating an ‘otherworld’ our readers can step (or stumble) into, led there with either direct or indirect imagery that provokes them – making them want to read on to discover how they can avoid, or else, somehow survive the horror (along with your character(s).
Once you've created the essential horror, ignited terror in your character (and perhaps even enough to make sure your windows are closed  consider sharing the experience of your 'otherworld' here ~
http://thedarkmagazine.com/submission-guidelines/
Write On !
Kate 
Kate - Writing & Reading
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Some offerings by members of our Community ~ do let them know if they've succeeded in suspending your disbelief, either direclty or indirectly, perhaps causing you to double-checked the locks on your door after reading
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Have an opinion on what you've read here today? Then send the Editor feedback! Find an item that you think would be perfect for showcasing here? Submit it for consideration in the newsletter!
https://www.Writing.Com/go/nl_form
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Thank you for this brief respite in the perceived safety of your virtual home. Those scurrying sounds atop the roof are just squirrels scampering around for seeds, yeah, right Until we next meet,
Write On !
Kate - Writing & Reading
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