Showing posts with label back story. Show all posts
Showing posts with label back story. Show all posts

Thursday, July 28, 2011

A Sidebar Approach to Writing

Copyright 2011 by Gary L. Pullman

According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, a "sidebar" is "a short news story or graphic accompanying and presenting sidelights of a major story" or "something incidental," such as a "sidelight (a sidebar to the essay's central theme)."

Many book-length commentaries and analyses of popular entertainment products offer, more or less as fillers, occasional sidebars that provide behind-the-scenes information, summaries, or little-known facts about the various topics that the commentaries routinely cover in their murder to dissect. Dusted: The Unauthorized Guide to Buffy the Vampire Slayer is no exception, offering, as it does, 22 such sidebars, among them speculations concerning “Spike’s Nature,” an account of “The Unaired Pilot,” and “Vampire History.”

From a writer’s perspective, perhaps some of the more interesting (and potentially valuable) sidebars are those that deal with characters’ back stories, histories regarding settings, and proposed plotlines. These items present a handy, dandy way of enriching one’s own narratives: pretend that you are a fan of your own work and that, as such, you buy a book (or a magazine) about the narrative of which you are an aficionado. Imagine, also, that you are the writer (or one of the writers) of the commentary and develop sidebars of the sort that you think fans of the narrative you’re writing your book about might enjoy, particularly ones associated with characters’ back stories, histories regarding settings, and proposed plotlines. Write them about your story, and, presto, you’ve developed some ideas for future chapters of your novel in progress or (should you be so lucky) your ongoing series of novels.


For example, let’s assume that your story takes place in ancient Rome and that you want to create a sense of horror mingled with terror. Perhaps you decide to have a present-day visitor to the catacombs get stranded in the underground burial chambers overnight. This situation (and setting) cries out for a sidebar treatment in which you summarize the history of the local catacombs and given a succinct, but ghastly, description of the place.

If your character is (or knows) a famous person of the period, a sidebar concerning the famous man or woman--perhaps he is an emperor of a visiting queen--will help keep your fictitious portrait of him or her both accurate and intriguing, provided that the sidebar contains not only pertinent facts but also a spicy anecdote or two concerning the historical figure.

An artifact could also deserve sidebar treatment. Again, the facts and anecdotes you include in your sidebar will help you to keep on track and be interesting as you describe and explain the significance of the relic or objet d’art.

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Image and Imagination

Copyright 2011 by Gary L. Pullman

Like many who are interested in horror fiction, I occasionally indulge myself by perusing online images linked to such search terms as “horror,” “eerie,” “scary,” and so forth. For those of us who are twisted enough to enjoy such sights, viewing such images can be not only fun (I know, I know; I’ve already admitted I’m twisted!), but also informative, even educational.

One image is that of a young woman. She wears black (or, perhaps, she is naked--it’s hard to tell, because only her face, neck, and upper chest show; she is otherwise lost in, or swallowed up by, darkness--and her skin is not only pale, but also reflective: indeed, she seems to radiate the light that shines upon her, illuminating those portions of her body that I’ve mentioned, but leaving most of her figure invisible in the darkness.


Moreover, the flesh of her upper chest seems to be alive with internal light, as if she glows from within. Her eyes are dark, and she wears a slight, mysterious smile rather like that of Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa. A scar is etched down her forehead, from just above her eyebrow to midway down her cheek, but the scar is not red: it is black, like her hair, her eyes, and her dress (if, indeed, she is dressed), as if she bleeds black, rather than crimson, blood, a suggestion of her innate depravity, perhaps. She seems evil, despite her youth and beauty, as if she is inwardly corrupt. The image is suggestive, posing many questions that could lead to a plot, to other characters, to a conflict, to a setting, and to a theme--in short, to a story that is both horrible to read and to contemplate. The journalist’s questions should get the imaginative writer started: Who? What? When? Where? How? Why?


The next image is full of eyes.  There are eleven of them, all feminine, with long, lustrous lashes and a glittering gaze, floating, as it seems, against a fiery background of yellow and orange, black and white. They stare, intensely, at the viewer, returning gaze for gaze. At the center of the picture, a pair of eyes, complete with the suggestion, at least, of knitted eyebrows, stares forth from the digital canvass, commanding the viewer’s attention; the presence of a strategically positioned diamond shape and of a ridge of material that resembles steel more than it does bone suggest the skeletal remnant of a nose. There is malevolence in her gaze. Filaments of light float and twist in the air, unifying the floating eyes, but there is no context for the vision, so that, collectively, the eyes seem to suggest madness. 

The subject, about whom nothing is knowable but that she is female and apparently beautiful, strikes one as mad; perhaps the multiplicity of eyes implies a fragmented consciousness, shattered perceptions of reality, and a distorted view of the world. If so, the true source of her horror is internal, not external (except insofar as she may confuse the objective with her own subjectivity). Again, this image raises more questions than it supplies answers, producing a wealth--or, at least, a welter--of possibilities for exploration and explication, and, as before, the journalist’s questions may lead the imaginative writer to a story based upon the ideas and feelings that this image may inspire.

Not all images are created equal, of course, and one must exercise discrimination in his or her perusal of the many pictures of horror that are available online. One, for example, although interesting in itself, perhaps, is too puerile to be suggestive of a situation greater than itself--and, therefore, great enough, it may be, for a story.  It shows a skull flanked by jack-o-lanterns; the eye sockets of the death’s-head glow red, as do the mesh strands that serve as the image’s backdrop. There is the suggestion that the skull and the pumpkins are caught in a web of some kind and that along may come a spider, but such intimations are not enough for a horror story and do not raise possibilities for anyone to pursue in fiction or otherwise; they are, at best, merely decorative.

The problem of the skull and pumpkins raises an important question: what must an image accomplish in order to be useful to a writer of horror fiction? What quality or qualities must it possess? What must it evoke in the writer’s imagination?

The journalist’s questions are clues. Who? refers to an agent (if an individual) or to an agency (if an institution), and, of course, to the agent’s or agency’s motive and, probably, to his, her, or its values, feelings, thoughts, and even world view. What? alludes to the situation and the series of incidents or events that have brought the agent or the agency to this point of the action and to the series of events or incidents that are likely to result from both this initial situation and the agent’s or the agency’s actions in response to it. When? and Where? point to time and place, or setting--the story’s physical location and its cultural milieu. How? addresses the behavior of the characters, especially insofar as they are the causes and effects of various situations, actions, and reactions. Why? relates to both the characters’ motives and to the story’s theme. These are the elements common to all fiction, horror stories included, and it is these, therefore, that a truly inspirational image of horror will pose to the thoughtful and imaginative viewer, especially if he or she is--or hopes to be--a writer of imaginative fiction, of the horror genre or otherwise. An image that is capable of suggesting such elements is an evocative--and useful--one, indeed.

Monday, March 28, 2011

Redemption, Vengeance, Love, Hatred--Call It What You Will, It's Still Free Will

Copyright 2011 by Gary L. Pullman


Unlike animal behavior, human conduct is motivated (at times, at least). There is a reason for what people do or refrain from doing. The motives may be good or not so good, selfless or selfish, beneficial or harmful to ourselves or others.

To motivate a character, a writer (and, indeed, a director and an actor) needs to know not only what makes people tick in general but also something about the character he or she is depicting or portraying. For writers, such understanding is enhanced by knowing the character’s past, or back story. What happened in the past influences who we are and what we do in the present.


Like any other qualitative television series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer delves into its characters’ pasts, depicting their back stories so that viewers can get to know and understand these characters as well as their creators do. In the process, fans learn what makes Buffy Summers tick; why Rupert Giles is (at first, anyway) a stodgy, all-work, no-play kind of guy; what happens in Xander Harris’ home life to make him the clowning, but loyal, friend; the reason for Willow Rosenberg’s geeky, shy vulnerability; and why Cordelia Chase is snobby and sarcastic but, at the same time, has “layers” to her personality.

Some of the series’ characters seek redemption: Giles, for an irresponsible youth that included practicing dark magic that led to a friend’s death at the hands of a demon that he helped to summon; Angel, for the misery, suffering, and pain he caused his many victims when he was a soulless, bloodsucking creature of the night; Jenny Calendar for her betrayal of Giles, Buffy, and Angel.

Others are motivated by their desire to live normal lives, including their attempts to fit into the larger world and to be popular with their peers (Buffy, Xander, Willow, and, each in her own way, Cordelia Chase and Anya Jenkins).

Still others--and, sometimes, the same characters, at different times--are motivated by a desire for revenge: Buffy, Angel, Jenny, and Willow.

Spike is often motivated by either hatred or love, or, sometimes by both, for the same character, at different times (Drusilla and Buffy, for example), but he is also energized, at times, by vengeance, boredom, loneliness, or sheer mischievousness. More than any other character, except perhaps Giles’ childhood chum, Ethan Rayne, Spike is the show’s trickster.

Buffy is a show that, although its writers recognize genetic inheritance as a factor in human behavior, also insists, rather passionately, that human conduct stems, more often than not, primarily from characters’ exercise of free will. They are what they do; they do what they are, but they both are and do, more often than not, because of the choices they make. They elect to take this action or that or to refrain from doing one thing or another. In the process, from the raw material, so to speak, of their genetic inheritance, they create themselves. Their choices are what make them realistic, believable, likable, or hateful characters, despite the fantastic nature of the series itself.

Buffy is by no means perfect; especially after season five, it is easy to detect flaws, both minor and significant, but the series remains, although uneven, worthwhile television, and its creator and its talented stable of writers have much to teach other writers about how to create complex, dynamic, and intriguing characters whose actions stem from moral conflicts, existential problems, the conduct of others, the social demands upon them, their own natural abilities and weaknesses, and, most of all, their own free will.

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Quick Tip: Connect the Nouns

Copyright 2010 by Gary L. Pullman

In school, we’re taught that a noun is a word that names a person, place, thing, quality, or idea. In a scene, a writer should connect each of these types of nouns to one another so that, together, they create a unified effect: Person = Character Place = Setting Thing = Property (“Prop”) or Figure of Speech Quality = Atmosphere or Emotion Idea = Theme. Here’s an example, courtesy of Bentley Little’s novel The Vanishing:
It was a muggy day in Manhattan [place], and Kirk [person] spent most of it in his apartment [place], sitting in his desk chair listening to the stack of CDs [thing] he’d bought the day before. But, by late afternoon, even he was tired of sitting on his ass. His mom had just returned from a two-week trip to France, and he’d promised to stop by and see her, so he took a shower, put on some clothes his parents wouldn’t find too offensive and made his way uptown to their building. He was happy [quality] to see his mother again. It was embarrassing [quality] to admit, but he’d missed her. Mama’s boy, he chided himself [idea].
This approach makes even a short paragraph seem as if it is telling a story. Little uses this technique frequently in the course of his novels, the scenes reading like anecdotes, or miniature stories, which serve other such purposes as characterizing his characters, developing atmosphere, expressing mood, developing conflict, locating action, and expressing themes, while, at the same time, both individually and collectively, they move the greater narrative forward. It’s a sound approach, built upon connecting words that refer to persons, places, things, qualities, and ideas.

Saturday, March 20, 2010

"Alien Androids": Another Plot-generating Method

Copyright 2010 by Gary L. Pullman

Writers often say that plotting their stories is one of the most daunting challenges they face. In previous posts, I’ve shared a few ideas for generating storylines. In this installment, I share another, which works particularly well for novel-length fantasy, horror, and science fiction stories. For want of a better title, I’m calling it “Alien Androids.” I offer an outline of the method, followed by an example:

METHOD
  1. Present a startling claim.
  2. Provide several possible justifications for the claim.
  3. Combine as many of these justifications as possible to make the claim seem even more supportable and to widen the story‘s scope.
  4. Using the claim as the story’s premise, break the plot into the three parts common to horror fiction:
    a. Bizarre incidents occur.
    b. The protagonist discovers the cause of the incidents.
    c. The protagonist uses his or her newfound knowledge to restore order.
  5. Repeat 2-4 with a different set of justifications, and then select whichever of the results seems to represent the better basis for the story.

EXAMPLE

  1. Startling claim: Aliens are actually androids created by the U. S. government.
  2. Justifications. The aliens are created to unite the world’s nations against a common foe, to create a secular religion to replace other faiths, to unite humanity indoctrinate people according to predetermined “alien” objectives, to occupy bored citizens by enlisting them to in the global fight against the invaders, to reenergize citizens’ interest in space exploration, and to redirect people’s focus from social and political problems
  3. Combined justifications: all of these justifications can be used. Some of the alien androids can be described as hostile and others as peaceful. The nations unite against the former, whereas the latter are used create a new, worldwide faith as a means of indoctrinating humanity according to the “alien’s” creators’ objectives. Whether people combat or follow the hostile or peaceful aliens, respectively, humans will be engaged, rather than bored, and their attention will be redirected from social and political problems. At the same time, the peaceful aliens can promote humanity’s interest in renewing space exploration, possibly as a means of combating the hostile invaders.
  4. Break of the story into the three parts common to horror fiction:
    a. Bizarre incidents occur: In various places around the globe, people see UFO’s. Some witness alien visitations. Others report having been abducted by aliens who have conducted experiments upon them, including the collection of their semen or ova. News media report increasing cases of dead, mutilated cattle. Important men and women in various fields of endeavor are reported missing. The number of faces on milk cartons increases dramatically. In an age of unprecedented leisure among humans, during which machines do virtually all the work, a clash of titans breaks out between two groups of visiting--or invading--extraterrestrials.
    b. The protagonist, former Navy SEAL and present Service Agent Adam Drake, discovers the cause of the incidents. The president of the United States, flanked by British and Japanese heads of state, is broadcast in an address to the United Nations. The many reports of extraterrestrial visitors that have occurred since Roswell are true! Two groups of aliens, Hostiles and Friendlies, are at war with one another, and, now, that war has broadened beyond both groups of Celestials to include the nations of the earth, and every nation must decide with which party, it will align. The U. S., Europe, and Japan, as well as other, lesser states, have aligned with the Frendlies, while China, North Korea, and the Arab states have aligned with the Hostiles. Other countries, for the moment, hoping to remain neutral, have sided with neither of the Celestials. However, the president suggests, neutrality will not remain an option for long.
    c. The protagonist uses his or her newfound knowledge to restore order: Recognizing that both alien parties represent a threat to humanity’s welfare, Adam organizes a resistance force to fight the Hostiles while, at the same time, sabotaging the Church of the Friendly Celestials in a two-pronged attack upon the Earth’s invaders. Meanwhile, his army continuously recruits new soldiers, preparing for a long and sustained resistance effort against both the nations’ armies and the Celestials themselves.
  5. Repeat steps 1-4 and then select whichever of the results seems to represent the better basis for the story: Not included in this example.

Sunday, March 7, 2010

How To Haunt A House, Part VII

Copyright 2010 by Gary L. Pullman

In the first installment of this series, I listed some of the films which feature haunted houses. In this chapter of the series, I take a closer look, as it were, at four of these houses and their spectral residents to see what I can see, so to speak, regarding these movie’s storylines.

In “Horror Story Formulae,” I lay out the bare bones of the basic horror fiction plot, or formula:
  1. A series of bizarre, seemingly unrelated incidents occurs.
  2. The protagonist (and, sometimes, his or her friends or associates) discover the cause of the incidents (often, it is a monster).
  3. Using their newfound knowledge, they end the bizarre incidents (perhaps by killing the monster).

Although it is often adapted and varied, this formula continues to be the foundation for most horror stories, whether in print or on film, as a consideration of the movies summarized and analyzed in this installment of “How To Haunt A House” suggests:


The Uninvited: “From the most popular mystery romance since Rebecca!

Based upon Dorothy Macardle’s novel Uneasy Freehold, The Uninvited (1944) The plot is not so much traditional as it is stereotypical (that is, formulaic):

  1. A couple buys a lovely mansion that is offered for sale at a price too good to be true.
  2. Shortly after they move in, strange and inexplicable incidents occur.
  3. A back story explains (or seems to explain) the wherefore of the haunting.
  4. The protagonist puts his or her newfound knowledge to use to exorcise the ghosts or abandon the house to the spirits. (The protagonist may be a group, but, if so, they will operate as a cooperative unit.)
  5. A fuller account explains the true cause of the haunting.
  6. The haunting resumes or ends.

Here are the details that fill in this storyline, courtesy of Wikipedia:

1. A couple buys a lovely mansion that is offered for sale at a price too good to be true.

Roderick “Rick” Fitzgerald and his sister Pamela discover a handsome, abandoned seaside house during a holiday on one of England’s rocky coasts. Even though their terrier, Bobby, refuses to climb the house’s graceful, curving stairway, Pamela and Rick fall “head-over-heels in love” with the grand old house. The brother and sister purchase the property, called Windward House, for an unusually low price from its owner, Commander Beech, who long ago inherited the eighteenth-century mansion from his grandmother before giving it to his late daughter, Mary Beech Meredith. During the property sale transaction, Rick and Pamela meet Beech’s 20-year-old granddaughter, Stella Meredith, who lives with her grandfather in the nearby town of Biddlecombe. Stella is deeply upset by the sale of Windward because of her attachment to it and to the memory of her mother, despite Windward's being the location of her mother’s death when Stella was but three. Her nostalgia over the house is discouraged by the Commander, who has forbidden Stella to enter. However, against Beech’s wishes, she gains access to Windward House through Rick, who has become infatuated with Stella's charm and “Sleeping Beauty magic.”

2. Shortly after they move in, strange and inexplicable incidents occur.

The Fitzgeralds’ initial enchantment with the house diminishes, once they have become its owners and unlock a forbidding and uncomfortable artist's studio, in which they experience an unexplainable chill; even a small bouquet of roses Pamela has picked withers in the cheerless room. A few weeks later, once Rick arrives in Biddlecombe to stay, he learns that Bobby has deserted Windward in a decidedly uncharacteristic manner for a terrier. Then, just before dawn, after his own first night in his new home, Rick hears the eerie and heartbreaking sobs of an unseen woman--a phenomenon that Pamela has investigated thoroughly during the time she has spent decorating Winward whilst awaiting her brother's return with the Fitzgeralds’ Irish housekeeper, Lizzie Flynn. Lizzie's cat, like the terrier Bobby, will not climb the stairway. And although the superstitious Lizzie notices a peculiar draft on the stairs, she is ignorant of the sounds of weeping. Now Rick and Pamela must face the obvious--a secret they must keep from Lizzie: Windward House is haunted. On a pleasant Sunday evening, Stella comes to Windward for dinner, and she soon becomes aware of Windward's spirit. Rather than fearing it, she senses a calming presence that she associates with her mother, as well as a strong scent of mimosa--her mother's favorite perfume. Suddenly Stella becomes unreasonably distressed for enjoying herself in her mother's house. Crying, “But she was so young, and she died so cruelly,” Stella dashes down the stairs and out across the lawn towards the very cliff from which Mary Meredith fell to her death seventeen years earlier. “It’s that blasted room!” Rick calls to Pamela as he chases Stella and catches her just before she falls from the cliff to the rocky seas below. Something in Windward has possessed Stella and tried to kill her. As Rick, Pamela, and Stella return to the house, they hear a scream from Lizzie Flynn. Lizzie has seen a ghostly apparition, and, in short order, decides to sleep at a neighbor's farmhouse (although remaining in the Fitzgeralds’ employ).

3. A back story explains (or seems to explain) the wherefore of the haunting.

Windward's now undeniable haunting and the ways in which it relates to Stella prove to be a complex mystery. The strange occurrences are investigated by the Fitzgeralds along with the town physician, Dr. Scott), whom they've befriended, and who has adopted the Fitzgeralds’ wandering terrier, Bobby. In exploring the history of the family, they are told that Stella’s father, a painter, had had an affair with his model--a Spanish gypsy girl named Carmel. Stella’s mother, Mary Meredith, from all accounts a beautiful and virtuous woman, found out about the infidelity and took Carmel to Paris, leaving her there. Carmel eventually came back, stole the infant Stella and, during a confrontation, flung Mary Meredith off the nearby cliff to her death. Shortly afterward, Carmel herself became ill and died.

4. The protagonists put their newfound knowledge to use to exorcise the ghosts or abandon the house to the spirits.

Rick, Pamela and Dr. Scott conspire to dissuade Stella from her dangerous obsession with Windward by staging a séance. Using an upturned wineglass and an alphabet on a tabletop, they attempt to convey to Stella the “message” that Stella’s mother wants her daughter to stay away from the house. Suddenly the real ghost takes over the proceedings, communicating that it is guarding Stella, presumably from the ghost of Carmel. A sort of ghostly confrontation ensues, causing the wineglass to fly from the table and shatter. Stella is unexpectedly possessed by the spirit of a woman who mutters in Spanish, “My love,” and “Do not believe!” The séance is interrupted by Commander Beech, who removes Stella and secretly arranges for her to be sent to The Mary Meredith Retreat, a sanitorium run by a Miss Holloway), Mary Meredith’'s childhood friend and confidante. Holloway worships Mary with an obsession that borders on insanity. The Fitzgeralds travel by car to the sanitorium to interview Holloway, not knowing that Stella is confined there. Holloway explains to them that after Mary's death, she took care of Carmel, who had contracted pneumonia and eventually died of the illness. The Fitzgeralds return home with little new information. Rifling through old records left by the previous village physician, Dr. Scott discovers that Carmel died of neglect at the hands of Miss Holloway. The doctor is then called away to care for an ailing Commander Beech, who tells him that Stella is at the sanitorium. Knowing Holloway's true nature, Rick, Pam, and Scott decide to rescue Stella. They telephone Holloway and tell her that they are on their way. At the Meredith Retreat, knowing the trio is en route, Holloway deceives Stella, saying that the Fitzgeralds have invited her to live with them to be closer to the spirit of her mother. Stella happily takes the train home, not knowing Holloway's motive is to send her alone to house filled with a malevolent spirit, who will quickly overwhelm Stella, leading her to the cliff and a deadly fall. The trio arrives at the sanitorium only to find a deranged Holloway, who tells them that Stella is on her way to Windward House. They rush back towards Biddlecombe, but are twenty minutes behind Stella's train. Stella arrives at the house to find her grandfather in the haunted artist's studio. Weakened nearly to the point of death, he begs Stella with his last strength to get out of the house, but she loyally remains at his side. As a ghostly presence appears, the Commander succumbs to a heart attack. Stella welcomes the ghost, convinced it is the protective spirit of her mother. But the cold, vindictive apparition makes her scream with fright, and she flees in panic again towards the cliff. Rick, Pam, and Scott arrive just in time to pull Stella from the crumbling cliff to safety.

5. A fuller account explains the true cause of the haunting.

Back inside the still-troubled house, the group is drawn again to the physician’s journal found by Dr. Scott. They discover that before her death at the hands of Miss Holloway, Carmel gave birth to a child--apparently in Paris, where Stella herself was born. Then the truth becomes clear: Stella's mother is actually Carmel, who returned to Windward from Paris not for love of Mary's husband, but to be near her own little girl. Stella recalls that mimosa was said to be her mother's favorite perfume, not that of Mary Meredith at all. Indeed, the warm scent of mimosa and the heartfelt, ghostly sobs have been emanating from Carmel--not from supposedly saintly Mary--all along. Understanably, Stella is relieved to learn that she is not the child of the cold, perfect Mary Meredith. Being Carmel’s daughter makes sense to her, and she realizes that the spirit of her true mother is free and has left Windward, never to cry again.

6. The haunting resumes or ends.

Something evil, though, has remained. The living flee the house--all but Rick, who overcomes his own terror to confront the cruel and furious spirit of Mary Meredith, admonishing her that they are no longer afraid of her, and that she has no power over them anymore. Defeated, Mary's spirit then departs, and the house is calm. Lizzie's cat eases up the stairway, licking a paw. The night of struggling spirits and wicked vindication has ended, and a bright future dawns for Rick, Stella, Pamela, Scott, and, perhaps, even for Windward House on its lonely cliff along a haunted shore.

Ghost Ship: “Sea evil.”

Based upon the fate of the ocean liner S. S. Andrea Doria, which sank in 1956, after colliding with the M. S. Stockholm, near Nantucket, Massachusetts, Ghost Ship (2002) is a remake of the 1952 film by the same name.

This movie embraces a plot ploy that has become typical, if not yet stereotypical, of contemporary horror stories: it begins with a teaser, a horrific scene which begins in media res (literally, in the middle of things, and, therefore, without any narrative context) and, as such, represents a hook, or teaser, that is intended to capture the audience’s attention and motivate them to watch the rest of the film--a sort of cliffhanger that appears at the beginning of the story rather than at the end of a chapter. Following the teaser, the story’s actual inciting moment occurs, and, from this point onward, the storyline pretty much follows the formula that is common for horror stories. With these advisories, the plot for this type of story can be represented by the following outline:

  1. As a teaser, a festive scene ends in horror as a catastrophe occurs.
  2. In the story’s true inciting moment, an opportunity for profit occurs.
  3. Shortly after the protagonist seeks to profit from the opportunity, strange and inexplicable incidents occur.
  4. A back story explains (or seems to explain) the wherefore of the haunting, and the protagonist puts his or her newfound knowledge to use to exorcise the ghosts or abandon the house to the spirits. (The partial back story and its basis as for an attempted resolution of the problem or conflict are a combination of two of the plot sequences typical of the traditional horror story formula, and each part is provided in a piecemeal and cumulative fashion, alternating with the other throughout the remaining portion of the story.) (The protagonist may be a group, but, if so, they will operate as a cooperative unit.)
  5. A fuller account explains the true cause of the haunting.
  6. The protagonist puts his or her newfound knowledge to use to exorcise the ghosts or abandon the house to the spirits.
  7. The haunting resumes or ends.

Here are the details that fill in this storyline, courtesy, again, of Wikipedia:

1. As a teaser, a festive scene ends in horror as a catastrophe occurs.

The film opens aboard an Italian ocean liner, Antonia Graza, in May 1962. Dozens of wealthy passengers enjoy dancing in the ship's luxurious ballroom while a beautiful Italian woman) sings “Senza Fine.” Galley crew wheel carts of soup around as stewards carry trays of champagne and wine. On the bow deck, more passengers dance on a platform surrounded by a cable attached to a mast. Away from the party in an outer room, a gloved hand pulls a switch that causes a spool to reel in a thin wire cable at high speed. Suddenly, the cable runs out and is detached from the mast. The cable slices across the deck (dance floor) like a blade, cutting through the crowd of dancing passengers. They stand still for several seconds before grasping that they have been cut in half, and then begin to fall apart. Only little Katie), who had been dancing with the ship's Captain, is spared, thanks to her small stature and to the captain leaning down to protect her when he saw the wire snap. Seeing the fate of the other dancers, she looks up at the officer's face. He looks back at her sorrowfully, as his face splits open at mouth level and the top of his head falls off. Katie then screams, the view from the outside of the ship zooms down underwater, and the
film cuts to the present day. A salvage crew made up of Captain Sean Murphy,
Maureen Epps, Greer, Dodge, Munder, and Santos have retrieved a sinking ship in
the open ocean. They bring the ship into port and receive its salvage value from
the authorities.

2. In the story’s true inciting moment, an opportunity for profit occurs.

While celebrating their success at a bar, Jack Ferriman, a Canadian Air Force pilot, approaches them and says he has spotted a mysterious vessel running adrift in the Bering Sea. Because the ship is in international waters, it can be claimed by whoever is able to bring it to a port. The crew soon set out on the Arctic Warrior, a small tugboat. While exploring the abandoned ship, they discover that it is the Antonia Graza, an Italian luxury liner that disappeared in May 1962 and was believed to be lost at sea. The ocean liner's disappearance was well known at the time.

3. Shortly after the protagonist seeks to profit from the opportunity, strange and inexplicable incidents occur.

When they board the ship and prepare to tow it to shore, strange things begin to
happen. Epps claims to have seen a little girl on the stairwell while trying to save Munder from falling through the floor, Greer claims to have heard singing in various places on the ship, and Epps and Ferriman discover the corpses of another team of salvagers in the ship’s laundry room. The crew decides to leave the ship but also to take a large quantity of gold in the ship’s hold. Before they can escape, however, their tugboat explodes when a propane tank mysteriously explodes as the engine is started, which also kills Santos, who was on board trying to fix the boat. The rest are stuck on a ghost ship in the middle of the Bering Sea with no form of communication.
When they decide to attempt to fix the Antonia Graza and sail it back to shore, they all experience hauntings. Epps finds a child's skeleton hanging by a noose in a wardrobe, and Dodge and Munder find (and accidentally eat) maggots in ration cans they initially mistook for rice and beans. Meanwhile, Greer meets the beautiful Italian singer who seduces him; however, when he tries to touch her, she disappears, and Greer falls down a shaft and is impaled on tools and equipment.

4. A back story explains (or seems to explain) the wherefore of the haunting, and the protagonist puts his or her newfound knowledge to use to exorcise the ghosts or abandon the house to the spirits. (The partial back story and its basis as for an attempted resolution of the problem or conflict are a combination of two of the plot sequences typical of the traditional horror story formula, and each part is provided in a piecemeal and cumulative fashion, alternating with the other throughout the remaining portion of the story.) (The protagonist may be a group, but, if so, they will operate as a cooperative unit.)

Epps meets the ghost of Katie who was on her way to New York to be with her parents, who tries to tell Epps the secret of the ship but is attacked by an unseen force and vanishes Epps runs and finds Murphy who has been drinking with the ghost Captain. Murphy sees a disfigured Santos instead of Epps and attacks her thinking she is a ghost. Before he can harm Epps, he is knocked out by Ferriman. Munder, Dodge and Ferriman dump Murphy into a aquarium while they try to find Greer. Despite the loss of Murphy and Greer, however, the team does manage to get the boat running again enough for it to start sailing. Epps with Katie's help finds Greer's body and Katie then takes her momentarily back to the past where Epps finally sees what had happened. While the numerous dancers were sliced by the wire, the chefs in the kitchen were murdered by the crew who began pouring rodent poison into the evening's food. The food was served, and the diners began to succumb to the poison, plagued by severe nausea and dizziness. The crew then began taking the lives of the rest of the passengers by lining them by the pool and shooting them (young Katie was hung in the closet). As the crew takes the gold for themselves, one crew member (an officer) walks out of the small compartment where the valuables are stored. He takes a look at Francesca, the ship's sultry ballroom singer, who is also standing there dressed in a shimmering red satin strapless ball gown, turns around, and viciously murders his fellow crewmates out of greed with a submachine gun. Francesca then shoots him in the head with a pistol. At last, a man walks up to Francesca and they embrace. As he walks away, the singer looks up and sees a large hook swing into her face, killing her. The man burns a mark into her hand, and it is
revealed that he, the mastermind of the attack, was Jack Ferriman. Ferriman, as it turns out, is an evil spirit. Realizing the danger they are all in, Epps tries to get Murphy out of the aquarium only to find that it is already filled to the brim and Murphy has drowned. Epps finds Dodge and tells him what she found out just as Ferriman comes back. Epps tells them to not let each other out of the others sight. She goes to find Munder, who unfortunately had already been killed when the gears in the ship started up and he was trying to fix them and he was ground into them. Back on the deck Ferriman says he wants to go check on Epps. When Dodge refuses to let him, Ferriman mocks how he worships Epps, and warns Dodge that killing a man would send him to hell. Ferriman attacks Dodge who shoots him anyway. Knowing everything now, Epps decides to blow up the ship, but is confronted by Dodge. When Dodge begins to try to talk Epps out of blowing up the ship, she realizes that it is really Ferriman who has killed Dodge and disguised himself as him.

5. A fuller account explains the true cause of the haunting.

He states the obvious--by using the gold as bait, he has taken multitudes of souls to his masters (presumably Satan); he has been doing this for a long time, and considers himself a “salvager” of souls. A ferryman of souls, hence the name Ferriman. He guided the salvagers there merely to effect repairs.

6. The protagonists put their newfound knowledge to use to exorcise the ghosts or abandon the house to the spirits.

They fight for a short amount of time before Epps manages to blow up the ship, “killing” Ferriman. She is left in the debris as the souls trapped on the ship ascend to heaven. Katie stops to thank her and leads her out of the sinking ship.

7. The haunting resumes or ends.

Epps is discovered by a large cruise ship and taken back to land. The last scene hows Epps in the back of an ambulance at the docks. She looks out the back of the vehicle from her stretcher and sees the battered crates of gold being loaded onto the cruise ship by her deceased crew, followed moments later by Ferriman. Realizing what is about to happen she screams, only to be silenced by the closing ambulance doors.

The House on Haunted Hill: “See it with someone with warm hands!”

The House on Haunted Hill (1959) brings together a party who are challenged to survive a night in an allegedly haunted house; those who do will be rewarded with $10,000 each.

This plot is an variation of the typical horror story storyline:

  1. The story’s inciting moment occurs, as a host challenges his overnight guests.
  2. Cause is given to doubt the host’s sanity.
  3. An act of violence, usually resulting in someone’s death, occurs among strange, possibly supernatural, circumstances or incidents.
  4. One or more characters unsuccessfully try to cover up the effects of the violence.
  5. An explanation clarifies or seems to clarify the strange circumstances or incidents, revealing them to have resulted from an entirely natural cause.
  6. The occasion of the explanation is turned to the antagonist’s advantage, allowing him or her to commit a murder.
  7. The true explanation for the circumstances or incidents is provided, revealing them to have resulted from a different, but still entirely natural, cause.
  8. A truly supernatural incident occurs.

Here are the details that fill in this storyline, courtesy, again, of Wikipedia:

1. The story’s inciting moment occurs, as a host challenges his overnight guests.

The five guests all arrive in separate funeral cars with a hearse leading, which their host, Fredrick Loren, explains may be empty now, but they may be in need of it later. He explains the rules of the party and gives each of the guests a .45 caliber pistol for protection.

2. Cause is given to doubt the host’s sanity.

Loren’s wife tries to warn the guests that her husband is psychotic, causing them to be very suspicious of him, especially Nora Manning, who becomes convinced that he’s trying to kill her when she keeps seeing mysterious ghouls, including the ghost of Annabelle, who had hanged herself after being forced to attend the party.

3. An act of violence, usually resulting in someone’s death, occurs among strange, possibly supernatural, circumstances or incidents.

After being driven into a fit of hysteria by the ghosts who haunt her, Nora shoots Mr. Loren, assuming he is going to kill her.

4. One or more characters unsuccessfully try to cover up the effects of the violence.

Dr. Trent, another guest, tries to get rid of the body by pushing it into acid, but the lights go out, and when they come back on, both of the men are gone.

5. An explanation clarifies or seems to clarify the strange circumstances or incidents, revealing them to have resulted from an entirely natural cause.

Annabelle emerges, having faked her death with the help of Dr. Trent, and having
apparently tricked Nora into killing Loren.

6. The occasion of the explanation is turned to the antagonist’s advantage, allowing him or her to commit a murder.

Suddenly, a skeleton emerges from the acid accompanied by the voice of Loren. The specter approaches Annabelle as she recoils in terror. In this panic, the screaming Annabelle accidentally backs into the acid herself. The real Mr. Loren walks out of the shadow, holding the contraption that he was using to control the skeleton of Dr. Trent. In his triumph, he watches Annabelle disintegrate.

7. The true explanation for the circumstances or incidents is provided, revealing them to have resulted from a different, but still entirely natural, cause.

Nora tells the other guests that she's shot Loren in the cellar, and they all rush down there. When they arrive, they see that he's actually alive, and he explains to them that his wife and Dr. Trent were having an affair, and that the “haunting” was just a joke planned by him with the help of the caretakers. He also tells them that they’d planned to trick Nora into murdering him so that they could get away with his money. He had not loaded Nora’s guns with bullets, but blanks.

8. A truly supernatural incident occurs.

Just when everyone thinks the trauma is finally over, Mr. Pritchard, the house owner, looks up, a terrified expression on his face, and announces that the ghosts are finally coming for them.

What Lies Beneath: “He was the perfect husband until his one mistake followed them home.”

What Lies Beneath (2000) is Robert Zemeckis’ homage to Alfred Hitchcock.

The storyline resolves itself into a familiar pattern:

  1. A protagonist’s suspicions are aroused by a strange incident.
  2. Strange incidents continue to occur.
  3. A back story explains (or seems to explain) the wherefore of the haunting.A back story explains (or seems to explain) the wherefore of the haunting, and the protagonist puts his or her newfound knowledge to use to exorcise the ghosts or abandon the house to the spirits. (The partial back story and its basis as for an attempted resolution of the problem or conflict are a combination of two of the plot sequences typical of the traditional horror story formula, and each part is provided in a piecemeal and cumulative fashion, alternating with the other throughout the remaining portion of the story.) (The protagonist may be a group, but, if so, they will operate as a cooperative unit.)
  4. A fuller account explains the true cause of the haunting.The protagonists put their newfound knowledge to use to exorcise the ghosts or abandon the house to the spirits.
  5. The haunting resumes or ends.

Here are the details that fill in this storyline, courtesy of Wikipedia:

1. A protagonist’s suspicions are aroused by a strange incident.

Claire Spencer moves to Vermont with her husband, renowned scientist Dr. Norman
Spencer, after a serious car accident which leaves gaps in her memory. Combined with her daughter Caitlin’s departure for college, Claire is profoundly affected. Overhearing her new neighbor Mary Feur sobbing one day, Claire is concerned, despite Norman’s reassurance, and her worry increases when she sees Mary’s husband Warren dragging what looks like a body bag out of the house in the middle of the night. Claire decides to investigate by taking a basket of flowers and wine to the house as a gift. After nobody answers the door she walks around the side of the house and discovers a woman's sandal with a dark stain on it, which she steals. Back on the doorstep, she is surprised by Warren whose surly behavior further arouses her suspicion.
2. Strange incidents continue to occur.

Mysterious events begin to occur when Claire is alone in the house--pictures fall, doors open and close and Claire witnesses a shadowy reflection in bathwater. Claire is convinced that Mary is dead and haunting her. Desperate for closure, and facing little sympathy from Norman, Claire invites her best friend Jody to join her for a séance in her bathroom. Claire produces the sandal she had earlier taken from Mary's house and places it on the table. The Ouija board does not move, but a candle starts to flicker, then goes out. The dial on the Ouija board then starts to move slowly from M to F. Claire informs Norman of the séance, prompting him to accuse her of going crazy. Meeting Warren, Claire hysterically accuses him of killing his wife, to which Warren responds with confusion before introducing Mary to the pair.
3. A back story explains (or seems to explain) the wherefore of the haunting, and the protagonist puts his or her newfound knowledge to use to exorcise the ghosts or abandon the house to the spirits. (The partial back story and its basis as for an attempted resolution of the problem or conflict are a combination of two of the plot sequences typical of the traditional horror story formula, and each part is provided in a piecemeal and cumulative fashion, alternating with the other throughout the remaining portion of the story.) (The protagonist may be a group, but, if so, they will operate as a cooperative unit.)

Back at the house, a picture falls off the windowsill again, and as Claire removes the newspaper cutting from the broken frame, she notices a partial missing person report on the back of the cutting, for Madison Elizabeth. Claire finds a missing person report for Madison Elizabeth Frank, a student at the university where Norman had been a lecturer. Claire decides to visit Madison’s mother. Claire performs a ritual with the lock of hair she found at Madison’s mother’s house, which allows Madison to possess her and seduce Norman when he returns home from work. Norman, frightened by comments Claire has made, pushes her away from him, causing her to drop the lock of hair and break the connection. Claire’s memory begins to return and she recalls that she had once caught Norman with Madison.
4. A fuller account explains the true cause of the haunting.
Norman makes a confession: he had a brief relationship with Madison, but realized quickly that he loved Claire too much to leave her, causing unstable Madison to threaten to kill Claire. He then visited Madison to find her dead of an overdose with a letter to Claire. Burning the letter, he pushed Madison's car (with Madison inside) into the lake. Norman and Claire agree to telephone the police. Norman makes the call before going to take a shower. As Claire realizes that the number her husband called is not that of the police, Norman suddenly sedates her and places her into the filling bathtub, expecting her to drown. He leans over her to give her one final kiss, and see's that she is wearing a pendant around her neck. Realizing the pendant is on backwards, he picks up Claire’s head to adjust it as her face morphs into the corpse-like face of Madison. He is startled and jumps up against a mirror, collapses and hits his head on the sink, then falls to the floor. Claire, recovering from the sedative, crawls out of the bath and downstairs. The telephone has been disconnected, so she starts to drive somewhere that will have better cellular telephone reception, passing Norman's body as she leaves the house. Norman, only stunned, chases her and jumps into the truck when she pauses on a bridge. The truck veers off the bridge and plunges into the lake, the same lake into which Norman pushed Madison’s car. Norman grabs Claire’s leg so that she cannot escape, but Madison’s ghost grabs Norman dragging him to the bottom of the lake, and forcing him to release Claire’s leg so she can float to the
surface.
5. The haunting resumes or ends.

The following winter, Claire is seen placing a single red rose at the grave of Madison Elizabeth Frank, but not the grave of Norman. The camera pans out and an image of Madison’s face is seen in the snow.

Thursday, December 24, 2009

Blind Panic, The First 10 Chapters and the Final One: A Study of Technique

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

The withholding of the cause of a whole series of unusual or bizarre events until well into the narrative is a familial, yet effective, technique for creating and maintaining suspense, especially when the events involve dangerous, injurious, destructive, and/or fatal consequences to many over a sustained period of time, as they do in Graham Masterton’s Blind Panic. Meanwhile, on a more immediate basis, incidents can sustain readers’ interest by implicitly posing questions that are more quickly--in some cases, almost immediately--answered, only to have other questions arise that are also relatively quickly resolved, as also happens in Blind Panic.

Dangerous, potentially fatal, situations which involve ordinary men, women, and children are frightening and suspenseful, but such emotions are heightened when the characters are of greater than ordinary importance or stature. In Blind Panic, both VIP’s (the president of the United States, for example) and ordinary men and women (a flight crew and airline passengers, motorists, campers, and hikers, among others) are represented as victims.

By heading each chapter of a novel with a tagline that specifies a different location (and, sometimes, time), the narrative implies the great sweep of the story’s action. In Blind Panic, such headings indicate that the story’s catastrophes and other situations occur in such diverse locations as “Washington, DC,” “AMA Flight 2849. Atlanta-Los Angeles,” “Los Angeles,” “Miami, Florida,” “Portland, Oregon,” and many other places. The story’s action takes place on the national stage, involving big cities and points in between, just as it also includes both national leaders and ordinary citizens. These taglines also help readers keep track of the subplots’ characters, because each set of characters is associated with a different setting or settings. Moreover, allusions to actual places can make uncanny incidents seem more believable; such references are also interesting to readers because they locate the action in places that are familiar to them, anchoring the incredible or the unknown in the recognizable and known.

A mysterious character, especially if his or her origin is supernatural, will intrigue readers, keeping them reading, as will a change in the narrative’s point of view or the addition of a subplot. An extraordinary cause of the bizarre series of events will be captivating, especially if the cause is explained a bit at a time, in a piecemeal fashion, throughout the novel. Mysterious characters are even more compelling when they are associated with centuries-old mystical rituals and historical events or with vanished cultures that continue to have present-day consequences.

Alternating among different sets of characters with each new chapter or after several chapters maintains suspense because such alternations parcel out the incidents of the action that involves these characters, offering a piecemeal revelation of the storylines that keeps readers coming back to learn more, first about one set, and then about another set, of the story’s characters.
The alternation between apparently supernatural and natural explanations for the same events or incidents maintains an ambiguity that is fantastic, rather than uncanny (explained by having natural, if unlikely, causes) or supernatural (inexplicable in natural terms), as Tzvetan Todorov explains in The Fantastic. Such an alternation also suggests that even seemingly far-fetched conditions or circumstances (an “epidemic” of blindness, for example) may be rooted in real possibilities and are not, therefore, necessarily as far-fetched as they might first appear to be, which lends verisimilitude to the narrative.

Short, tightly written chapters, comprised of only one or two scenes, in which composed, if not serene, action alternates with fast-paced, sometimes violent, action (and usually a change of setting and characters), also keeps readers reading. The 27 chapters of Blind Panic average 10 and a half pages each, for a grand total of 284 pages.

Writers and readers alike complain about the difficulty of bringing a narrative to an appropriate and satisfying end--one which doesn’t make readers feel as though the writer has cheated them with a convenient, tacked-on, but emotionally unsatisfying and philosophically unrealistic, conclusion. Blind Panic’s final chapter shows an effective way of concluding a story of combined genres, which might be called the horror-mystery-science fiction-thriller.

Note: Bold black font indicates incidents which create or maintain suspense or otherwise keep readers' interest in the narrative; bold red font explains how these incidents accomplish this purpose.

Chapter 1 (pages 1-2)

Who: President David Perry, First Lady Marian Perry, Dr. Cronin, Doug LatterbyWhat: The president discovers that he has gone blind
When: As he boards Marine One
Where: White House lawn
How: N/A
Why: Unknown at this time
Twist: None

As the president of the United States, David Perry, approaches Marine One, which has set down upon the White House lawn, he discovers that he has gone blind [how? why?]. He asks his wife, Marian, to help him board the aircraft so as to keep his blindness a secret from the everyone else [can his ruse succeed?]. She objects, saying he should go to the hospital, but he says he can have Dr. Cronin, the physician aboard the helicopter look at him first. She helps him board the aircraft, and he tells Doug Latterby to fetch the doctor [what diagnosis will Dr. Cronin make?], get them airborne, and take them to George Washington Hospital [what will be learned at the hospital, and how will President Perry’s blindness be treated?].

Chapter 2 (pages 3-6)

Who: Tyler Jones, Captain Sherman, copilot, navigator, flight attendants
What: Tyler is asked to land an airplane after the flight crew goes blind
When: During AMA Flight 2849, from Atlanta to Los Angeles
Where: Above the Sangre de Cristo Mountains
How: N/A
Why: Unknown at this time
Twist: None

A flight attendant awakens Tyler Jones, asking him to accompany her to the cockpit of the commercial aircraft aboard which he is a passenger. He is surprised to find not only the pilot, the copilot, and the navigator, but also three other flight attendants crammed into the cockpit. Captain Sherman informs him that, except for the flight attendants, the whole flight crew has gone blind [again, how? why?], perhaps as the result of “an airborne virus in the flight-deck ventilation system” [is this the true cause of their blindness? If so, what caused the president’s blindness? Are the situations related? If so, how? If not, why not?] They are seeking someone to land the airplane [why would Tyler be able to do this?], and Tyler’s name came up in an LAX search of the passenger list as someone with “flying experience.” However, Tyler objects, saying that he has flown nothing larger than a Cessna 172, but the pilot assures him that he will “guide” him [will he be able to land the aircraft with such limited experience, even with the pilot to help him?].

Chapter 3 (pages 7-13)

Who: Jasmine (“Jazz”), a tractor-trailer driver
What: An accident on an interstate highway leaves Jasmine’s truck hanging over a precipice
When: Morning rush hour
Where: Interstate 101, a mike and a half east of Encino, California
How: A Hummer swerves into a concrete divider in front of Jasmine
Why: The Hummer’s driver has gone blind
Twist: None

As Jasmine presses the speed limit during rush-hour traffic, a mile and a half east of Encino, California, on Interstate 101, a Hummer suddenly swerves “sideways” and strikes “the concrete divider,” [why did the Hummer suddenly swerve into the divider?] causing Jasmine to slam into the vehicle and lunge halfway off the freeway’s elevated off-ramp, where it dangles above a “dry concrete river bed” forty feet below [will Jasmine fall to her death?]. As vehicles crash into her trailer, she climbs out of the tractor’s cab, where she sees a Ford Explorer “pouring out thick black smoke. . . only three or four vehicles away from” an “Amoco truck” [will the Amoco truck explode?] As Jasmine clambers over the hoods, roofs, and trunks of some of the “more than two hundred” wrecked vehicles behind her big rig, some of the cars explode, finally setting off the fuel inside the Amoco truck. Jasmine is blown off, to the right, but she survives. At the center of the wreckage, she hears a woman in a car that is engulfed in fire, holding her baby son out the passenger door and pleading for someone to save him [will the baby be saved? If so, by whom, and how?]. As other vehicles continue to explode and burn, Jasmine rescues the woman’s baby, just before the mother herself burns to death. She walks with the rescued infant down the shoulder of the highway as vehicles continue to explode and burn and fire trucks, impeded by the wreckage, attempt to arrive at the scene of the multiple accidents [what will become of Jasmine and the baby? Will she adopt it? Turn it over to the authorities?] No reason for the Hummer’s swerving is given, but it is implied (because of the sudden blindness of the characters in the two previous chapters) that the driver suddenly lost his or her sight.

Chapter 4 (page 14-19)

Who: Harry (introduces in this chapter merely as “I”), Mrs. Zlotorynski; Mrs. “Zee’s” servants, Emigdilio and Rosita, Marco Hernandez (for whom Harry is house sitting)
What: Harry ingratiates himself with a wealthy, elderly widow, Mrs. Zlotorynski, whom he advises
When: Daytime
Where: The beach outside Delano Hotel, Miami, Florida
How: Flattery
Why: Harry earns his living by flattering rich old ladies
Twist: None

Harry, who earns his living by flattering, advising, and acting as a fortune teller for wealthy, elderly widows, takes time out from house sitting to play on Mrs. Zlotorynski’s vanity be interpreting a recent dream she had as signifying her generosity. He enjoys tweaking the actually stingy social matron by advising her to demonstrate this trait by giving her chauffeur a long weekend off with a bonus and her maid the choice of garments from her own wardrobe. After she treats him to lunch at the “five-star” beach front Delano Hotel” and pays him for the dubious services he’s rendered, he leaves. [This chapter holds readers’ interest by introducing a new character, as yet known only as an “I.” As a charlatan who manipulates wealthy old women who tend to be pompous and full of themselves, he is intriguing, if not entirely sympathetic, and it is fun for readers to witness the display of his charm. In addition, the change of perspective from omniscient third-person to limited first-person is interesting, because unusual.]

Chapter 5 (pages 20-26)

Who: Harry, Amelia Carlsson, Marco Morales (aka Hernandez), Lizzie, Kevin, Lizzie’s children, Misquamacus
What: Amelia telephones Harry with the news that her sister Lizzie and Lizzie’s family have gone blind and asks him to accompany her to the Casey Eye Institute in Portland, Oregon, telling him of a vision she’s seen of a medicine man who seeks vengeance against white men
When: Immediately after Harry leaves Mrs. Zlotorynski
Where: Delano Hotel lobby, Miami, Florida
How: Telephone conversation
Why: Unknown at this time
Twist: None

As he takes leave of Mrs. Zlotorynski, walking through the lobby of the Delano Hotel, Harry receives a telephone call [who’s calling and why?] from Amelia, an old friend, who advises him that her sister Lizzie and Lizzie’s family have gone blind while biking near the edge of a canyon [this incident links the main plot and the subplot, but how are these two plots causally related?]. They were rescued by a ranger and have seen a doctor, but the physician is unable to say why they all suddenly lost their sight. Amelia asks Harry to accompany her to the Casey Eye Institute in Portland, Oregon [why does she want to go to this particular clinic, and why does she want Harry to go with her?]. Lizzie told Amelia that she and her family have “spread the disease,” but not what disease she means [what disease, and why does Lizzie believe it is a disease?]. She insists that everyone is going to go blind because everyone deserves to lose his or her sight [why is blindness “deserved,” and why it is deserved by everyone?]. Despite her being a “genuine clairvoyant,” Amelia is unable to discern what is disturbing her sister or why. Like Harry, Amelia initially attributes Lizzie’s odd talk to shock, but Amelia performs a “bead reading,” using “Navajo misfortune beads” and receives the message that “a great darkness” is coming that would blind “the masters of the world” [what is this “great darkness,” why is it going to blind “the masters of the world,” and who are these “masters”?] and that “a great wonder-worker, The One Who Went And Came Back, is “walking the land of his ancestors” [who is this, where did he go, and why is he back?] Amelia’s assurance that no bead reading has ever been wrong prompts Harry to accept her offer to buy him an airline ticket to Denver, Colorado, where he will join her on another flight to Portland, Oregon. Harry remembers The One Who Went And Came Back as a 400-year-old , extremely powerful medicine man, Misquamacus, who swore vengeance upon European immigrants after they’d stolen Native Americans’ land. He has since struggled to be reborn and has finally accomplished his mission, being reborn in the body of a woman named Karen Tandy [who is Karen, why was she chosen as the medicine man’s mother?], whose mother had appealed to Harry for help. He, in turn, appealed to Amelia, and, with the help of a Sioux medicine man, they’d banished Misquamacus to the spirit world [how did Misquamacus escape and return to this world?].

Chapter 6 (pages 27-42)

Who: Charlie, Mickey, Remo, Cayley, Infernal John (aka Misquamacus), totem-like figures
What: Charlie, Mickey, Remo, and Cayley drink beer and fish in the Modoc County National Forest
When: Afternoon
Where: Modoc County National Forest, North Carolina
How:
Why: Fishing trip
Twist: None

Young adults Charlie, Mickey, Remo, and Cayley are drinking beer, sunning themselves, and fishing in the Modoc County National Forest, North Carolina, when they hear a sound that Remo attributes to a mountain lion [is it really a mountain lion? Is it something harmless or something worse?]. When Cayley becomes frightened, Remo returns to their Winnebago and fetches his rifle [will the rifle protect them?]. They sit around their campfire, have dinner, smoke marijuana, and listen to Charlie tell a horror story. They are interrupted by Infernal John, a strange man with silver eyes who speaks both a foreign tongue and English, telling them that they must pay for having polluted the land [who is this mysterious man, why does he have silver eyes, why does he speak in a foreign tongue, and why does he say the foursome “polluted” the public land of a national forest?] . As he speaks, two “impossibly tall,” masked “totem-like figures” rise out of the ground, wearing “antlers” and “decorated with beads and small bones and birds’ skulls” [who, or what, are these figures, and why are they dressed in such a bizarre fashion?] The foursome retreats to their Winnebago, followed by Infernal John and the two figures, and, after Remo fires a warning shot, Infernal John begins singing, and the figures with him emit a dazzling light that blinds the four friends [are these figures responsible for the blindness of the other characters as well? Why do they blind them?]. He then ties them up and force marches them to the top of a promontory, where he tells them he will order them to walk off the edge of the 600-foot-tall cliff, as their ancestors made his do after they’d massacred and captured them in a centuries-old attack upon his people, Native Americans [do the four young adults actually die in such a horrible manner?].

Chapter 7 (pages 43-50)

Who: President Perry; Drs. Cronin, Schaumberg, and Henry, First Lady Marian Perry, Vice-President Kenneth Moran, Russian Federation President Gyorgy Petrovsky, Doug Latterby, Secretary of State George Smirnotakis, Director of the FBI Warren Truby, a White House butler, Sergeant (the Perrys’ dog), Russian criminals Lev Khlebnikov and Viktyor Zamyatin
What: A meeting between U. S. President Perry and Russian President Petrovsky When: Uncertain
Where: The White House, Washington DC
How: Face-to-face dialogue in the Oval Office
Why: Securing of Russia’s assistance in curbing Russian criminal activity in the United States
Twist: The Russian president is insulted by the American president

The president learns that he has 100 percent “corneal opacification; in other words, the transparent lens covering” his “iris is no longer transparent.” None of the doctors know whether the condition is permanent [the reader wonders whether it is], and they want to run more tests at another facility, the Washington National Eye Center, but, against doctors’ orders and their warning that the condition could become incurable unless treated as soon as possible [will their prediction come true?], he insists upon meeting with Gyorgy Petrovsky, the president of the Russian Federation concerning “Russian criminal activities in the United States.” Doug will coach him through the meeting so that it seems that President Perry is sighted rather than blind [can they get away with such an unlikely deception?]. During the meeting in the Oval Office, President Perry asks President Petrovsky to prevent two Russian criminals who have immigrated to the United States from laundering money they’ve collected as a result of their criminal activities through Russian banks and to seize all the men’s assets in Russia. If President Petrovsky refuses, President Perry says, then he will order the suspension of ten billion dollars in American foreign aid to Russia for every billion dollars the Russian criminals launder through Russian banks. [Diplomacy between two heads of state concerning a significant matter is, buy nature, intriguing, and these men are the heads of two of the world’s most powerful countries.] President Petrovsky promises to consider President Perry’s request and shows him a picture of his two children. Unable to see the photograph and thinking it shows the two Russian criminals, President Perry unintentionally insults his guest by saying, “I already know what these two bastards look like” [will the last-minute insult, at the close of the meeting, destroy the chance of cooperation between the two countries?]

Chapter 8 (pages 51-59)

Who: Tyler Jones, Captain Sherman, Copilot George O’Donnell, Learjet pilot Norman Rossabi, Tina Freely, LA Times reporter
What: Tyler lands the 747
When: 3:25 AM (according to news report in Chapter 9)
Where: Runway 7L, LAX, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California
How: Guided by blind pilot’s instructions
Why: Aircrew is blind
Twist: A second aircraft, also piloted by a blind pilot, crashes into 747 after 747’s successful landing

Tyler lands the 747 jumbo jet successfully, but, as the passengers and crew try to evacuate the aircraft, another airplane, a private jet piloted by a blind pilot, [was the pilot blinded by the same “totem-like figures” who blinded President Perry, the motorists on Interstate 101, the foursome camping and fishing in North Carolina?] lands on the same runway, crashing into the first airliner, and several people are killed, including Captain Sherman [does Tyler die? How many others die, besides the captain?].

Chapter 9 (pages 60-71)

Who: Jasmine, Amadi (Jasmine’s “Auntie Ammy”), rescued baby, Misquamacus
What: Four airliners crash near LAX; the baby shows the women a vision of Misquamacus
When: The morning of the 747’s crash at LAX
Where: Ladera Park, Los Angeles
How: Clairvoyance and magic
Why: Revelation
Twist: The women decide to keep the baby

Jasmine takes the rescued baby to her “Auntie Ammy” to baby sit until Children’s Services personnel can arrive to claim the infant. They hear on the news that a 747 airliner was involved in a runway crash with another aircraft at 3:25 AM at LAX. Auntie Ammy, a devotee of Santeira belief, suspects that both the freeway and the runway “accidents” are deliberate. The baby starts crying and points at the ceiling. A rumbling sound occurs, and Jasmine thinks an earthquake is happening, although “she had never heard an earthquake like this before.” An Airbus 380 flashes overhead, stripping tiles from the roof of Auntie Ammy’s apartment, and crashes into the intersection of West Centinela and La Tijera Boulevard, near Ladera Park. Cars then crash into the wrecked aircraft, and many explosions occur. Auntie Ammy suspects that the baby might be clairvoyant, since he seemed to sense the impending crash before it happened. Auntie Ammy also senses a thickening of the air and believes that they are under attack by a powerful enemy. Auntie Ammy prays to Oya, the Santeria goddess of storms, lightning, and cemeteries. The baby points to a protective magic mirror on Auntie Ammy’s wall, one that can show what is wrong. The room in the mirror grows darker and darker, and Jasmine, Auntie Ammy, and the baby are visible in it only as silhouettes; as they watch, another figure joins them in the looking-glass--Misquamacus. Auntie Ammy realizes that the baby is showing them a vision of the person who is responsible for the death and destruction that has befallen American citizens. The image in the mirror is not a reflection of anyone who is actually in the room, and it is transparent; Auntie Ammy believes it to be a projection of what the baby sees in his head. As the women and the baby watch, the ghostly figure chants an incantation, and beetles scurry from the horns and headdress that he wears. Auntie Ammy’s apartment is full of cockroaches. Jasmine tries to turn the mirror to the wall, but it is too heavy to more than budge, and the figure in the mirror, scowling, steps toward her in the glass. She lets go of the mirror, and it falls from the nail that holds it, shattering upon the floor, and all the cockroaches vanish. Auntie Ammy believes that the mirror shattered to protect her, preventing the figure from entering her apartment. Auntie Ammy wants to keep the baby instead of turning him over to Children’s Services. As she discusses this possibility with Jasmine, the baby murmurs, and three more aircraft crash into South Central Los Angeles, within a mile of Auntie Ammy’s apartment, on their approach to LAX. [The appeal of this chapter is rooted in its references to unusual religious traditions such as those of the Santeira and Algonquin faiths, which suggest a conflict between two different understandings of the spiritual world and the cultures that originated them, African-American and Native American, respectively, and broadens Misquamacus’ concern for vengeance beyond just European [i. e., Caucasian] immigrants. The mirror’s ability to protect the women and baby from the medicine man also suggests that he can be blocked, if not stopped [as does the Sioux medicine man’s earlier banishment of Misquamacus to the spiritual realm]).

Chapter 10 (pages 72-83)

Who: Harry, Amelia, Lizzie Amelia’s sister) and family, airline passengers, a taxicab driver, doctors, a nurse
What: Amelia and Harry visit Amelia's sister
When: After Lizzie and her family are blinded
Where: Portland, Oregon
How: Flight and taxi
Why: To determine how Lizzie and her family were blinded
Twist: None

As Harry and Amelia, aboard a flight from Denver, Colorado, to Portland, Oregon, approach Portland International Airport, they see wrecked airplanes on the tarmac below, and a nearby passenger receives word on his cellular telephone of the several airplane crashes that have occurred all over the country [the widespread nature of the threat is indicated, which increases suspense]. The passengers believe that the nation’s airlines are victims of terrorist threats by “Ay-rabs” [a possible explanation for the bizarre events adds a note of verisimilitude to the story]. Their airplane lands safely, just as Amelia, a “genuine clairvoyant” predicts it will do. As they take a taxi to the University of Oregon’s Portland campus, to visit the Casey Eye Institute, the cab driver repeats the airline passenger’s suspicion that the country is under an attack by the Arabs. Updates about the crashes continue to come in via television; the latest number is 39 commercial airline crashes and two crashes of Air Force fighters. The Secretary of Homeland Security, John Rostoff, appearing on a news show, informs the public that the crashes were caused by the airliners’ pilots’ sudden and complete blindness. The agency is investigating the cause of the blindness, to determine whether it is natural or “the result of terrorist activity.” Doctors watching the newscast offer various possibilities for medical causes of the “epidemic” of blindness, which include “a virulent form of CMV. . . spread by human contact” and a “contaminated food product.” As Harry and Amelia meet with Lizzie, she tells them that the doctors have still not diagnosed the cause of her and her family’s blindness, although, at one time, they thought that it might have resulted from “a rare. . . infection” they “caught in the woods” [these possible causes of the “epidemic” of blindness add to the plausibility of a natural origin of the condition, making such an “epidemic” believable]. Lizzie mentions the strange man that she and her family saw at the site at which they lost their sight, saying, in an “oddly flat and expressionless” tone, “as if another woman were reading her words from a cue-card,” that they “deserved” to go blind. When Amelia asks her to clarify herself, Lizzie seems to come to herself and denies having said that she and her family deserved such a fate [is some other entity in possession of Lizzie?]. She mentions the two totem-like figures that stood on either side of the stranger and, reverting to her unnatural voice, again says that she and her family deserved to lose their sight because they “spread the disease.” Lizzie tells Harry and Amelia that the stranger identified himself both as The One Who Went And Came Back and Thunder Rolling In The Mountains [it seems eerie that the same figure would be known by a plurality of odd names, as such a device often indicates a divine origin or nature]. She also tells Amelia, “He knows who you are. He knows that you have come to see me. He knows that--this time--you will be ground into dust,” to be remembered no more [suspense increases as a sympathetic character is threatened by a powerful, supernatural entity]. When Amelia asks Lizzie if the stranger’s name is Misquamacus, Lizzie screams--and keeps screaming, even after a nurse injects her with a “dose” of tranquilizer that “would have dropped a horse” [the supernatural being’s power is demonstrated before Amelia and Harry--and the readers]. As she is about to be injected again, Lizzie relaxes, and says the name of the medicine man: “Misquamacus.” The nurse reassures Amelia and Harry that Lizzie’s “fits” might have resulted from nothing more than “delayed shock,” although the patient’s failure “to react to ethchlorovynol” has never happened with any other patient and should have rendered Lizzie unconscious “on the count of three” [from a scientific point of view, a medical expert confirms the unusual nature of what has just happened]. As Amelia confides to Harry, she has another theory by which to account for her sister’s strange behavior: In delivering her message, Lizzie was responding to a “post-hypnotic suggestion,” addressed specifically to Amelia and Harry, which is why Misquamacus chose to strike Lizzie blind: “She’s my sister. She was bait [this obvious note of foreshadowing maintains the increased level of suspense as readers take note of the narrator’s prediction of a crises in conflict to come].

Chapter 27 (pages 283-284)

Who: President Perry, Harry, Amelia, Belinda Froggatt
What: Amelia and Harry debrief the president about Misquamacus’ attack upon America
When: The last day
Where: Belinda Froggatt’s house
How: Dialogue
Why: Brings completion to the story
Twist: None

After Amelia explains to the president how and why the Algonquin medicine man attacked the United States (to effect vengeance against the European, African, and other immigrants who destroyed his people’s culture and faith), the president assures them that he will do what is necessary to put the pieces of the nation back together and to repair the rift in foreign policy that his unintended insulting of President Petrovsky caused [the president’s reassurances restore the order and security that Misquamacus’ assault on the nation jeopardized]. After breakfast with Brenda, Harry asks Amelia to divorce her husband and marry him, but she refuses [her refusal is honorable and maintains readers‘ respect for her; Harry is already a cad, but a loveable rogue, in spite of his amoral ways, and her refusal suggests the novel’s theme], that civilization is built upon individuals’ remaining true to the choices they make, in being committed to their promises: “Sometimes, Harry, when you’ve made a choice in life, you have to stick with it. Where would we be, if we didn’t?” she says, before adding, “Let’s get back to civilization.”

According to the novel’s flyleaf, “It appears that the Algonquin medicine man Misquamacus has come back to life to seek a final devastating revenge against the white man who massacred his people, and tried to eradicate their religions and culture forever.” By withholding the cause of the mysterious and bizarre events that comprise the beginning chapters of the novel, Masterton maintains suspense and readers’ interest in why the plot’s incidents are happening and what ties them together. (Unfortunately, the revelation of the cause on the novel’s flyleaf undermines this source of suspense, of course, but at least readers will want to learn how the medicine man seeks to accomplish this purpose.)

If, in reading how Masterton advances the plot of Blind Panic and creates and maintains his readers’ interest in continuing to read their novel, you would like to know the outcome of the action, this writer has done a good job in generating and continuing your suspense.

Friday, December 18, 2009

Horror as Image and Word

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

What’s scary? Deprivation. No, I don’t mean missing a meal or not being able to buy an outfit. I mean not being able to see. Or hear. Or missing an eye, an arm, or a leg. Of course, physical injury or mutilation can deprive a person--or a fictitious character--of such body parts and the physical abilities associated with them, but the deprivation can be subtler. A thick fog, maybe rolling across a cemetery, darkness, or an impenetrable forest or jungle can deprive one of sight, in effect rendering him or her blind. A waterfall that’s so loud that it blocks out all other sounds in effect deafens anyone nearby.

What else is scary? Being isolated, which means being cut off--from society, from civilization, from help. There are no police or fire and rescue personnel or stores or hospitals or friends in the Amazon rain forest, on a deserted island, or atop the Himalayan mountains. However, there could be an undiscovered predatory beast, a tribe of cannibalistic headhunters dedicated to human sacrifice, or a Yeti. With nowhere to run and no one to help, the isolated character is on his or her own.

Being at the mercy of another person or group of persons, especially strangers, who not only intend to do one harm, but may well enjoy doing so, is scary. A relentless torturer or killer who just keeps coming, no matter what, is terrifying. Sleeping with a serial killer might be, too, especially if he or she is given to nightmares or sleepwalking.

Typing “scary,” “eerie,” or “uncanny” into an Internet images browser will turn up hundreds of pictures that other people consider frightening, giving a writer the opportunity to analyze what, in general, is scary about such images. Completely white eyes--no irises or pupils--are scary, because they suggest that the otherwise-normal--well, normal, except for the green skin and fangs--is inhuman. Bulging eyes can be scary because they suggest choking, which suggests the possibility of imminent death. Deformity is sometimes frightening, because it suggests that what has befallen someone else could befall you or me. Incongruous juxtapositions--a crying infant seated upon the lap of a skeleton clad in a dress, for instance--can be frightening because incongruity doesn’t fit the categories of normalcy. Blurry or indistinct images can be scary because they deprive us of clear vision and, therefore, represent a form of blindness or near-blindness. Corridors, alleyways, and channels can be frightening, because they lead and direct one, compelling him or her to travel in this direction only--and maybe trap the traveler by leading him or her into a dead-end terminus or into the jaws of death. Many other images, for various reasons, are scary, too; I will leave the “why” to your own analyses.

We think we know the meanings of terms, but when we’re considering words that are supposed to mean more or less the same thing, it’s easy to overlook distinctions that could make a big difference in writing horror--and in understanding just how and why things are scary. It makes sense for a horror writer to keep handy a glossary of terms related to horror, possibly with an account not only of the terms’ definitions but also of their origins and histories, or etymologies.

These, lifted from Online Etymology Dictionary, will get you started:

FEAR

O.E. fær "danger, peril," from P.Gmc. *færa (cf. O.S. far "ambush," O.N. far "harm, distress, deception," Ger. Gefahr "danger"), from PIE base *per- "to try, risk, come over, go through" (perhaps connected with Gk. peira "trial, attempt, experience," L. periculum "trial, risk, danger"). Sense of "uneasiness caused by possible danger" developed c.1175. The v. is from O.E. færan "terrify, frighten," originally transitive (sense preserved in archaic I fear me). Sense of "feel fear" is 1393. O.E. words for "fear" as we now use it were ege, fyrhto; as a verb, ondrædan. Fearsome is attested from 1768.
“Ambush,” deceive, trial--these meanings of the word suggest movies like Saw.

PHOBIA

1786, "fear, horror, aversion," Mod.L., abstracted from compounds in -phobia, from Gk. -phobia, from phobos "fear," originally "flight" (still the only sense in Homer), but it became the common word for "fear" via the notion of "panic, fright" (cf. phobein "put to flight, frighten"), from PIE base *bhegw- "to run" (cf. Lith. begu "to flee," O.C.S. begu "flight," bezati "to flee, run," O.N. bekkr "a stream"). Psychological sense attested by 1895; phobic (adj.) is from 1897.
“Panic” suggests the movie Panic Room, which, although a thriller rather than a horror movie per se, certainly presents elements of the horrific.

TERROR

great fear," from O.Fr. terreur (14c.), from L. terrorem (nom. terror) "great fear, dread," from terrere "fill with fear, frighten," from PIE base *tre- "shake" (see terrible). Meaning "quality of causing dread" is attested from 1520s; terror bombing first recorded 1941, with reference to German air attack on Rotterdam. Sense of "a person fancied as a source of terror" (often with deliberate exaggeration, as of a naughty child) is recorded from 1883. The Reign of Terror in Fr. history (March 1793-July 1794) so called in Eng. from 1801.

O.E. words for "terror" included broga and egesa.
Critics usually distinguish terror, as a formless fear that results from the perception of an unseen menace, from horror, which is comprised of both fear and revulsion and derives from the perception of a clear and present danger, a distinction that many horror writers find invaluable.

EERIE

c.1300, north England and Scot. variant of O.E. earg "cowardly, fearful," from P.Gmc. *argaz (cf. O.N. argr "unmanly, voluptuous," Swed. arg "malicious," Ger. arg "bad, wicked"). Sense of "causing fear because of strangeness" is first attested 1792.
Here is a reminder that the weird in itself may occasion fear, as it does in countless horror stories.

Some of the words that one encounters in tracking through the lexicon of horror may themselves suggest stories (or themes). Consider the term “Luddite,” for example:

LUDDITE

1811, from name taken by an organized band of weavers who destroyed machinery in Midlands and northern England 1811-16 for fear it would deprive them of work.
Supposedly from Ned Ludd, a Leicestershire worker who in 1779 had done the same
before through insanity (but the story was first told in 1847). Applied to modern rejecters of automation and technology from at least 1961.
Couldn’t this word have inspired The Terminator series or, for that matter, the mad computer in 2001: A Space Odyssey or the antagonist of Dean Koontz’s Demon Seed or the “I Robot, You Jane” or “Ted” episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer?

UNCANNY

1596, "mischievous;" 1773 in the sense of "associated with the supernatural,"
originally Scottish and northern English, from un- (1) "not" + canny.
Okay, this is Poltergeist sand its sequels, right?

ABSURDITY

absurdity 1520s, from M.Fr. absurdité, from L. absurditatem (nom. absurditas)
"dissonance, incongruity," from absurdus "out of tune, senseless," from ab- intens. prefix + surdus "dull, deaf, mute" (see susurration). The main modern sense (also present in L.) is a fig. one, "out of harmony with reason or propriety."
The attack of the birds in The Birds is scary because it is “out of harmony with reason.”

There are many, many other words related to horror that could be listed, but, again, you get the idea. Language itself, as a repository of ideas and understandings, can suggest stories to the imaginative reader, and a good dictionary can be as fruitful as an Internet image browser in suggesting ideas for novels and short stories, or even screenplays, in the horror mold.

Paranormal vs. Supernatural: What’s the Diff?

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

Sometimes, in demonstrating how to brainstorm about an essay topic, selecting horror movies, I ask students to name the titles of as many such movies as spring to mind (seldom a difficult feat for them, as the genre remains quite popular among young adults). Then, I ask them to identify the monster, or threat--the antagonist, to use the proper terminology--that appears in each of the films they have named. Again, this is usually a quick and easy task. Finally, I ask them to group the films’ adversaries into one of three possible categories: natural, paranormal, or supernatural. This is where the fun begins.

It’s a simple enough matter, usually, to identify the threats which fall under the “natural” label, especially after I supply my students with the scientific definition of “nature”: everything that exists as either matter or energy (which are, of course, the same thing, in different forms--in other words, the universe itself. The supernatural is anything which falls outside, or is beyond, the universe: God, angels, demons, and the like, if they exist. Mad scientists, mutant cannibals (and just plain cannibals), serial killers, and such are examples of natural threats. So far, so simple.

What about borderline creatures, though? Are vampires, werewolves, and zombies, for example, natural or supernatural? And what about Freddy Krueger? In fact, what does the word “paranormal” mean, anyway? If the universe is nature and anything outside or beyond the universe is supernatural, where does the paranormal fit into the scheme of things?

According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the word “paranormal,” formed of the prefix “para,” meaning alongside, and “normal,” meaning “conforming to common standards, usual,” was coined in 1920. The American Heritage Dictionary defines “paranormal” to mean “beyond the range of normal experience or scientific explanation.” In other words, the paranormal is not supernatural--it is not outside or beyond the universe; it is natural, but, at the present, at least, inexplicable, which is to say that science cannot yet explain its nature. The same dictionary offers, as examples of paranormal phenomena, telepathy and “a medium’s paranormal powers.”

Wikipedia offers a few other examples of such phenomena or of paranormal sciences, including the percentages of the American population which, according to a Gallup poll, believes in each phenomenon, shown here in parentheses: psychic or spiritual healing (54), extrasensory perception (ESP) (50), ghosts (42), demons (41), extraterrestrials (33), clairvoyance and prophecy (32), communication with the dead (28), astrology (28), witchcraft (26), reincarnation (25), and channeling (15); 36 percent believe in telepathy.

As can be seen from this list, which includes demons, ghosts, and witches along with psychics and extraterrestrials, there is a confusion as to which phenomena and which individuals belong to the paranormal and which belong to the supernatural categories. This confusion, I believe, results from the scientism of our age, which makes it fashionable for people who fancy themselves intelligent and educated to dismiss whatever cannot be explained scientifically or, if such phenomena cannot be entirely rejected, to classify them as as-yet inexplicable natural phenomena. That way, the existence of a supernatural realm need not be admitted or even entertained. Scientists tend to be materialists, believing that the real consists only of the twofold unity of matter and energy, not dualists who believe that there is both the material (matter and energy) and the spiritual, or supernatural. If so, everything that was once regarded as having been supernatural will be regarded (if it cannot be dismissed) as paranormal and, maybe, if and when it is explained by science, as natural. Indeed, Sigmund Freud sought to explain even God as but a natural--and in Freud’s opinion, an obsolete--phenomenon.

Meanwhile, among skeptics, there is an ongoing campaign to eliminate the paranormal by explaining them as products of ignorance, misunderstanding, or deceit. Ridicule is also a tactic that skeptics sometimes employ in this campaign. For example, The Skeptics’ Dictionary contends that the perception of some “events” as being of a paranormal nature may be attributed to “ignorance or magical thinking.” The dictionary is equally suspicious of each individual phenomenon or “paranormal science” as well. Concerning psychics’ alleged ability to discern future events, for example, The Skeptic’s Dictionary quotes Jay Leno (“How come you never see a headline like 'Psychic Wins Lottery'?”), following with a number of similar observations:

Psychics don't rely on psychics to warn them of impending disasters. Psychics don't predict their own deaths or diseases. They go to the dentist like the rest of us. They're as surprised and disturbed as the rest of us when they have to call a plumber or an electrician to fix some defect at home. Their planes are delayed without their being able to anticipate the delays. If they want to know something about Abraham Lincoln, they go to the library; they don't try to talk to Abe's spirit. In short, psychics live by the known laws of nature except when they are playing the psychic game with people.
In An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds, and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural, James Randi, a magician who exercises a skeptical attitude toward all things alleged to be paranormal or supernatural, takes issue with the notion of such phenomena as well, often employing the same arguments and rhetorical strategies as The Skeptic’s Dictionary.

In short, the difference between the paranormal and the supernatural lies in whether one is a materialist, believing in only the existence of matter and energy, or a dualist, believing in the existence of both matter and energy and spirit. If one maintains a belief in the reality of the spiritual, he or she will classify such entities as angels, demons, ghosts, gods, vampires, and other threats of a spiritual nature as supernatural, rather than paranormal, phenomena. He or she may also include witches (because, although they are human, they are empowered by the devil, who is himself a supernatural entity) and other natural threats that are energized, so to speak, by a power that transcends nature and is, as such, outside or beyond the universe. Otherwise, one is likely to reject the supernatural as a category altogether, identifying every inexplicable phenomenon as paranormal, whether it is dark matter or a teenage werewolf. Indeed, some scientists dedicate at least part of their time to debunking allegedly paranormal phenomena, explaining what natural conditions or processes may explain them, as the author of The Serpent and the Rainbow explains the creation of zombies by voodoo priests.

Based upon my recent reading of Tzvetan Todorov's The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to the Fantastic, I add the following addendum to this essay.

According to Todorov:

The fantastic. . . lasts only as long as a certain hesitation [in deciding] whether or not what they [the reader and the protagonist] perceive derives from "reality" as it exists in the common opinion. . . . If he [the reader] decides that the laws of reality remain intact and permit an explanation of the phenomena described, we can say that the work belongs to the another genre [than the fantastic]: the uncanny. If, on the contrary, he decides that new laws of nature must be entertained to account for the phenomena, we enter the genre of the marvelous (The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre, 41).
Todorov further differentiates these two categories by characterizing the uncanny as “the supernatural explained” and the marvelous as “the supernatural accepted” (41-42).

Interestingly, the prejudice against even the possibility of the supernatural’s existence which is implicit in the designation of natural versus paranormal phenomena, which excludes any consideration of the supernatural, suggests that there are no marvelous phenomena; instead, there can be only the uncanny. Consequently, for those who subscribe to this view, the fantastic itself no longer exists in this scheme, for the fantastic depends, as Todorov points out, upon the tension of indecision concerning to which category an incident belongs, the natural or the supernatural. The paranormal is understood, by those who posit it, in lieu of the supernatural, as the natural as yet unexplained.

And now, back to a fate worse than death: grading students’ papers.

My Cup of Blood

Anyone who becomes an aficionado of anything tends, eventually, to develop criteria for elements or features of the person, place, or thing of whom or which he or she has become enamored. Horror fiction--admittedly not everyone’s cuppa blood--is no different (okay, maybe it’s a little different): it, too, appeals to different fans, each for reasons of his or her own. Of course, in general, book reviews, the flyleaves of novels, and movie trailers suggest what many, maybe even most, readers of a particular type of fiction enjoy, but, right here, right now, I’m talking more specifically--one might say, even more eccentrically. In other words, I’m talking what I happen to like, without assuming (assuming makes an “ass” of “u” and “me”) that you also like the same. It’s entirely possible that you will; on the other hand, it’s entirely likely that you won’t.

Anyway, this is what I happen to like in horror fiction:

Small-town settings in which I get to know the townspeople, both the good, the bad, and the ugly. For this reason alone, I’m a sucker for most of Stephen King’s novels. Most of them, from 'Salem's Lot to Under the Dome, are set in small towns that are peopled by the good, the bad, and the ugly. Part of the appeal here, granted, is the sense of community that such settings entail.

Isolated settings, such as caves, desert wastelands, islands, mountaintops, space, swamps, where characters are cut off from civilization and culture and must survive and thrive or die on their own, without assistance, by their wits and other personal resources. Many are the examples of such novels and screenplays, but Alien, The Shining, The Descent, Desperation, and The Island of Dr. Moreau, are some of the ones that come readily to mind.

Total institutions as settings. Camps, hospitals, military installations, nursing homes, prisons, resorts, spaceships, and other worlds unto themselves are examples of such settings, and Sleepaway Camp, Coma, The Green Mile, and Aliens are some of the novels or films that take place in such settings.

Anecdotal scenes--in other words, short scenes that showcase a character--usually, an unusual, even eccentric, character. Both Dean Koontz and the dynamic duo, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, excel at this, so I keep reading their series (although Koontz’s canine companions frequently--indeed, almost always--annoy, as does his relentless optimism).

Atmosphere, mood, and tone. Here, King is king, but so is Bentley Little. In the use of description to terrorize and horrify, both are masters of the craft.

A bit of erotica (okay, okay, sex--are you satisfied?), often of the unusual variety. Sex sells, and, yes, sex whets my reader’s appetite. Bentley Little is the go-to guy for this spicy ingredient, although Koontz has done a bit of seasoning with this spice, too, in such novels as Lightning and Demon Seed (and, some say, Hung).

Believable characters. Stephen King, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, and Dan Simmons are great at creating characters that stick to readers’ ribs.

Innovation. Bram Stoker demonstrates it, especially in his short story “Dracula’s Guest,” as does H. P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allan Poe, Shirley Jackson, and a host of other, mostly classical, horror novelists and short story writers. For an example, check out my post on Stoker’s story, which is a real stoker, to be sure. Stephen King shows innovation, too, in ‘Salem’s Lot, The Shining, It, and other novels. One might even argue that Dean Koontz’s something-for-everyone, cross-genre writing is innovative; he seems to have been one of the first, if not the first, to pen such tales.

Technique. Check out Frank Peretti’s use of maps and his allusions to the senses in Monster; my post on this very topic is worth a look, if I do say so myself, which, of course, I do. Opening chapters that accomplish a multitude of narrative purposes (not usually all at once, but successively) are attractive, too, and Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child are as good as anyone, and better than many, at this art.

A connective universe--a mythos, if you will, such as both H. P. Lovecraft and Stephen King, and, to a lesser extent, Dean Koontz, Bentley Little, and even Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child have created through the use of recurring settings, characters, themes, and other elements of fiction.

A lack of pretentiousness. Dean Koontz has it, as do Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, Bentley Little, and (to some extent, although he has become condescending and self-indulgent of late, Stephen King); unfortunately, both Dan Simmons and Robert McCammon have become too self-important in their later works, Simmons almost to the point of becoming unreadable. Come on, people, you’re writing about monsters--you should be humble.

Longevity. Writers who have been around for a while usually get better, Stephen King, Dan Simmons, and Robert McCammon excepted.

Pacing. Neither too fast nor too slow. Dean Koontz is good, maybe the best, here, of contemporary horror writers.


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