Three Writers, One Genre - Horror! (Part 2)

Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.

During our scary night in, I probed my three talented guests (Jenny Twist, Su Halfwerk and Tara Fox Hall) about the writers who had inspired their own imaginations. As you can guess, Stephen King's name (actually, I'm beginning to wonder if, as far as the horror genre is concerned, that shouldn't be King Stephen) cropped up more than twice. Jenny considers his book On Writing to be the Bible of any aspiring horror writer, though she also acknowledges one of my favourite writers, Ray Bradbury for her inspiration along with James Herbert, Stephen Laws and John Wyndham (you know, The Triffids guy).

Tara

Tara generously credits King with her childhood nightmares as well as her inspiration (well she did start reading him at the tender age of eight when she first read Pet Sematary. I doubt her parents were aware of that though, so let's keep it quiet). What she particularly likes about the master of horror is not the gore but the psychological insights and suspense he creates in stories like The Body and Stand by Me. This fascination with the human psyche is clearly evident in her own writing.

Su

Su admires King's smooth writing style and facility with words but for her darker thrills, she turns to Brian Lumley "because of his Necroscope series and his creative take on vampires. He made them do delicious things." Oh Su, what would your Mum say?!

Of course being an avid reader of these three luminaries here present, I know which stories of theirs I like best, but I was particularly interested to hear which of their stories they rated as their own favourites, and after a couple of glasses of wine (well it was a very hard task requiring a lot of internal - and also a fair bit of external - debate), I persuaded them to tell me.

Su chose The Substitute one of the three stories in the really excellent anthology: Hellbound. She didn't need to elaborate on her reasons - You'll see yourself from the excerpt below. A word of warning: don't read it just before bedtime!

Tara told us: "I favor my Latham’s Landing stories above my other works, probably because the story All That Remains was my very first short horror work years ago." Aww! Pull on the heartstrings, why don't you, Tara? We'll judge for ourselves when we read the excerpt I wrenched from her at great personal cost very soon (hint: she's right of course - when isn't she?).

Jenny

Jenny (I'm told her family and best friends do agree she changes her mind often) says "My favourite changes, of course, depending on what I've most recently been working on. But I am rather proud of the first story in Bedtime Shadows, The Man with no Face. I think it complies with all my criteria – short, starting off as a little intriguing but not too alarming, then slowly gathering pace to reach a crescendo with the ending which (I hope) comes as a shocking surprise. I tried to do the literary equivalent of the end of the film, Carrie, when the hand comes shooting up out of the grave." Well I, for one, wouldn't disagree with that at all. When I first read it, I honestly thought a ghostly hand had come out of my past to plunder my own infant memories! Shiver! Jenny Twist's stories often have that effect on me, which must be why I can relate to them so well (unless she's some sort of...hmm...well, let's not go there).

I'm going to post all three wonderful excerpts during the next week, but am starting with Su's today, so, once again, are you sitting quite comfortably? Then we'll let Su begin:


Stan’s mind churned, working rapidly to come up with a proper response, but the bloody thing froze, unable to produce a single plausible excuse. This wasn't helping his business; it would ruin him. Half of his clientèle came to him through word of mouth.
Then it happened. That damned switch turned inside of him and his lips moved against his will. A raspy ancient voice croaked out of his throat, “Ha! Jas, the macho man. Jas, the bad boy in leather. Jas, the wife beater! Wife killer!”
Jason’s face paled; his lips trembled. Stan couldn't blame him.
“I didn't mean to push you down the stairs,” Jason babbled. “You just fell.”
The thing on the floor snapped her head to the right and then left, making popping sounds in the process. “I always fall. Tsk, tsk, tsk. Clumsy meeee.”
Jason hiccuped a cry and went on his knees in front of the desk. “Please say that you forgive me. I want to hear it one more time. I've cheated on you, beaten you up, and you took it all. Now I see that my ways were wrong, that my unjust actions have damned me for eternity.”
Stan’s mouth moved in an age-old cackle. “You think I minded that you stuck your ding-a-ling in any hole you found? It was a blessing, it meant I was spared the degradation of screwing you. Even the beating was fine. But the killing? No!”
Jason flinched.
“Remember when I tried to walk out and you cut off my pinky? What a klutz I've been, chopping off my own finger while cutting onion. That’s what I had to say to that chauvinist arrogant doctor.”
“A-a-all I want is your forgiveness.” Sniff. “If I could take it all back, I would.”
“You can. First, dig out my body from our basement and clear my name in front of our kids. I didn't run off with the gardener. Second, take out your .22 and shoot yourself in the groin. Finally, lay down on the ground and enjoy the pain until you die.” She snapped her head around again. “I might forgive you then, but I’ll also be waiting for you.” She flashed those teeth again, her smile no different from her grimace.
Jason fell on the ground, face down, weeping and slapping his hand on the wooden floor.
Stan watched his client and his dead wife in horror. A maggot travelled through one of Patricia’s cheeks to an eye, and she chose that perfect moment to wink at Stan. He almost threw up.

See what I mean about it being a must read?

Three Writers, One Genre - Horror! (Part One)



Like everyone else, I've been getting myself in the mood for Halloween this month by reading horror stories from three of my favourite modern writers in the genre: Jenny Twist, Su Halfwerk and Tara Fox-Hall  As always when I read, I want to ask the writers questions and so I thought, why not?  To help celebrate Halloween, therefore, I invited these three extremely talented writers round for a scary night in and I thought I would share some the highlights with you over my next few blog posts.

 

I feel I should almost say, four writers, because all three of them mentioned one specific writer whose work they enjoy or feel inspired by and he seemed to be very much present in spirit.  Of course I'm referring to the great Stephen King.  (I did try phoning him, but he was busy, busy, busy - the time of year, I expect). Unlike their hero, however, my three writers prefer the short story genre, seeing it as an art-form in itself. 

"There is something exquisite about the perfectly constructed horror story," says Jenny.  "They can deliver a timely surprise or twist realistically without dragging it over hundreds of pages," Su explains.  "The longer the story, the easier to figure out its ending and/or the faster a reader is fed up with it."  Showing her practical side, Tara adds: "Short stories are quick to write. I can finish one, if properly inspired, in a day or so. These are also usually relatively easy to place with a publisher, compared with a novel, because so many places publish short horror fiction."




Tara Fox Hall

But what made them choose to write horror in the first place?  Tara explained that she suffers from nightmares (well, maybe that's all those horror stories you read, Tara?) and the process of writing scenes from these is cathartic.  Our irrepressible joker then adds: " I also enjoy scaring people, and since locking peers in the basement is no longer effective—and has only an immediate reach—I had to graduate to more sophisticated ways, like fiction."  Su, who will be my guest on this blog on Halloween Day to talk about her thrilling (and believe me it is!) collection entitled Hellbound, plans to make us all wait until then to divulge her reasons while Jenny simply fell in love with the genre after devouring the stories of M. R. James and the entire Pan Book of Horror series at a young age.

When I asked them about scary moments in their own lives, Jenny recounted a toe-curling experience of living in an isolated Oxfordshire farmhouse that should have auditioned for the 'Amytiville Horror' movie.  "Horrible things happened to us in that house," she told us, "and we used to fantasise about previous tenants committing murders to explain the awful atmosphere of the place.



Jenny Twist

 One night there was a dreadful storm. The wind shrieked around the house like a woman screaming. The doors and windows rattled as if something was trying to get in. And the big picture window in the kitchen bowed in and out, distorting the reflection of the room. We were afraid it would break (and let in the nightmare creatures outside?) so we hoisted the kitchen table in front of it, hoping it would hold it in place. Then we sat in the living room, clutching each other in terror as things stalked the night outside."

Of course it was only a storm. Wasn’t it? Wasn’t it?  The jury's still out on that one, Jenny…

Su Halfwerk

Su on the other hand told us the story of losing her five year old in a busy shopping mall for a full ten minutes.  Now that's a real life horror story every parent in the world knows and tries to avoid.  Just remembering back to losing track of my two year old in IKEA many years ago has made my hair stand on end.  Seeing this, Tara takes pity on me and decides I've had enough scary stories for one evening.

She's probably right.  I do hope you'll join me on Sunday for the next instalment, which will include the scariest excerpts from their own scary stories as chosen by them.  If you like horror, you won't want to miss it.  Take my spooky word for it!