Late last year I did a series of posts on On Writing Horror, another collection of How-To articles by some of horror's best writers circa 2007.  Twenty years separate the publication of these two books, but so far I haven't found anything other than the market survey that really differentiate the two.  I've commented before that information repeated across authors is usually good advice, and I think that's still true.  But, I'm a little disappointed that I haven't found anything new here.  Yet.

The Editor's Forward: Certain of What We Do Not See, J. N. Williamson

Williamson give a brief survey of the markets, then dives into providing definitions for the fantasy, science fiction, and horror genres.  What I found most interesting is that Williamson states very clearly that the book was published:

...to help you write publishable novels or stories for the three genres coexisting beneath that umbrella term, fantasy: horror, or dark fantasy; science fiction; and fantasy itself.

I think it's important to remember that horror, science fiction, and fantasy really fall under this one umbrella of fantasy.

Introduction: How to Write Horribly for Fun and Profit, Robert Bloch

I would sum up Bloch's article as: Let the story dictate genre and length.

According to Bloch, hackwork flooded the market at that time (his words, not mine).  And most of that work consisted of ideas stretched to meet commercial needs.  He says that the difference between current authors and those who endured is that the enduring authors had something to say and knew how to say it.

He says of horror that some of the work succeeds on the "fast-read" level, but that he doubts it will endure.  He also thinks that the films of the day were an influence on the "heavy-handed sex and violence" that permeated horror and had little to do with story.

Then he gets to the most interesting part.  He talks about interior logic, and how it poses a problem for horror fiction.  Nightmares are "...inconsistent and episodic."  But to scare a reader, the writer must present the premise in a logical framework.  I have struggled with this in my writing.  When I have ideas or inspiring dreams (nightmares), they do come in clips, often laden with personal symbolism that reinforces them as frightening.  To turn those ideas into a story, I have to work at wrapping a presentable, logical framework around them.  Although performing that transformation is challenging, it helps to clarify the original idea into something much more meaningful.  I also find that the process brings out opportunities for originality, which Bloch believes is necessary for success.

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

Bradbury discusses an idea also found in Stephen King's On Writing: stories are found things.  He does this by describing his own personal development as a writer.  He wrote fast, he wrote a lot, and he let himself make mistakes.  He wound up with an interesting process: he keeps lists of nouns and periodically reviews them for items that seem to click together into a story.  He also learned that his "...characters would do [his] work for [him]."   The more he worked through his process, the more ideas he built, and the more stories he developed.

Bradbury sums up his creative habit as such:

If I had not made up these prescriptions for Discovery I would never have become the jackdaw archaeologist or anthropologist that I am.

I'm discovering the same thing in my development.  Working on a story is more like discovering than creating.  I think it's a little difficult for my critique partners--or will be soon--as I often submit things out of sequence.  But, it's how the story comes around for me.  I set an idea down, I pull together some characters, and I let them work it out.  As the story takes shape, I discover new facets and characters that I feel must have been present all along, I just hadn't seen them yet.  The more I write, the more I uncover.  That could lead to wandering and voluminous work, but I temper it with economy of language.

I think the metaphor of writer as archaeologist works for me, so I'll hang onto it for now.

Plotting as Your Power Source, J. N. Williamson

I have mixed reactions to Williamson's essay on Plot.  He breaks it down into 4 parts.

1. Defining the Plot

Williamson claims hat all novels must have a sense that things are going somewhere.  One can hardly disagree:

...a plot is not an idea, one fairly well-rounded character, a flurry of conversation climaxed by a quarrel, kiss-and-make-up, and a cheery platitude.  That is a vignette.

So what is plot?  I had a little trouble picking out a clean definition, other than it's the mechanism to keep things moving forward.  He cites Koontz's article (later in the book) by saying plot is the skeleton, reiterates that plot is the sense of things moving forward, calls it "...a means of transportation for the characters in your fiction," and again cites Koontz as saying that plot is the "most demanding task that a novelist must face...".  So plot is what keeps the story moving forward.   I'm not entirely sure that's a workable definition, but there's nothing I can't accept in it.

To me, plot is the connecting threads under all the scenes in a story.  It's why all the pieces of a story are present, what makes them related.  That's not so different from Williamson's definition, nor any clearer.

2. Plotting Unpredictably

Williamson states pretty clearly that, for the genres in question, the best stories have plots that contain unpredictable elements.  Again, I can agree with Williamson.  The best horror stories are those that take the reader by surprise at some point.

3. Plotting with the Outline

Here is where my opinion diverges from Williamson.  This is the old argument for Plotting as opposed to "pantsing" (making it up as you go along).  I'm still working out which is right for me, but I suspect that most writers are actually neither.  Sure, we can plan the work out up from all we want, but at some point while we're writing, things will change.  A plan is not the final product, and there's no way to know what will and won't work until you get to it.  I prefer to get into the work.  When I want to, I can be prolific.  I don't mind wasting words on the page if it helps me work out the story.  In fact, that's plotting, right?  It just so happens that I plot better during my writing process and not before it.

That aside, Williamson provides some more advice:

• Start everything in the middle of action.  Too many works start with exposition.  He blames this on working without an outline, but the self-editing process can excise the extra verbiage.  What harm is it if it helps me think, so long as I take it out later?
• End with all significant questions answered.
• Every crisis must advance the plot, show more about your characters, and show more about the "enigma that resides at the soul of your plot."
• Follow expository scenes with action scenes.
• Use a thesaurus.

4. The Art of Plotting

I wasn't clear on what Williamson was getting at in this last section.  I think he's trying to say that plotting is essential to producing good art.  I agree if he's saying that all good stories need a good plot, but I still disagree with the idea that outlining is the only means of producing a good plot.  Once again, he cites Koontz, and the quote is worth repeating:

The purpose of fiction is communication, and if the work is not read, the purpose is not fulfilled.

Very true.  But there's still nothing to refute the idea that there are many ways of producing a good plot.  The idea that a writer must use an outline to plot is very narrow-sighted, in my opinion.  The writer must learn what works for them.

Reality and the Waking Nightmare: Setting and Character in Horror Fiction, Mort Castle

Castle centers his essay around the idea of story time.  In order to effectively draw the reader into story time, the writer must create credible fiction.  And, the key to credibility, in Castle's opinion, is setting and character.

These items are more important in horror (actually, any fantasy) because, by the very nature of the genre the reader is already asked to accept some wild "What-if".  In order to keep the reader immersed in sustainable suspension of believe, everything around the story's wild premise must be as believable as possible.  So Castle suggests that we keep the everything else (setting and character) as grounded in reality as possible.

He provides two reasons for such.

• Readers are familiar with the ordinary, and relate to it without the writer having to put significant work into building that relationship.
• Horror happens with the extraordinary infringes upon the ordinary.

I to agree with both of these ideas.  The most terrifying stories are those with characters and settings to which we can relate.  It takes the story from an idea to a demonstration of possibility in our lives.

One View: Creating Character in Fantasy and Horror Fiction, Steve Rasnic Tem

Why is creating character in SF/F/H any different that other genres?  Tem tells us that the idea that characters in our genre are simply ordinary folks tossed into extraordinary conditions is false.  The concept ignores that stories are made things--artifacts that the writer uncovers and develops.  Characters cannot be separated from their context, so the writer must develop a context that helps the reader understand how the fantastic characterizes the protagonist (or presumably any character).  He references the Twilight Zone, and how it made consistent use of "something wrong...dropped into the midst of [a] highly realistic context."  The best writers use this situation of a strange situation to "peer more deeply into the souls of the characters".

Tem goes on to discuss dream characterization, based on a theory of "gestalt dream interpretation" that "suggests that every object in a dream is a piece of the dreamer."  Tem suggests this idea can be used in horror if the writer consider that everything in a story that's not the protagonist is still representation of the protagonist in some way.  I find this an interesting approach, but I think it breaks in very complex stories, or stories where the protagonist and the POV character are different.

Detail is also more important in SF/F/H than in other genres, according to Tem.  He states that in science fiction, "people and communities characterized by the devices...they choose to surround themselves with."  And that in horror, the reader needs to focus on detail to better understand the character, and possibly recognize things about the characters they either ignore or deny.

Finally, Tem links character and plot, stating that using plot to characterize just extends the idea of characterization through action.  He suggests that if working in the context of dream characterization, that those actions that happen to a character must also be considered reflections of the character.  Sounds like karma to me.

Where do we find ideas for characters?  Tem says:

Once you have developed a process of characterization that is intimately connected to all the elements of a story, you will be able to find complete and compelling characters just about anywhere.

But he doesn't leave it there.  He actually provides a list of things that might inspire character, including: anxiety, autobiographies, fear, obsession, dark folk tales, and the anxieties of an era.

I think Tem provides an interesting framework--dream characterization--for developing characters, but I'm not convinced it would apply broadly.  As I said before, I think if the POV character is different from the protagonist, then it would be difficult for the POV character to get an exact lens on how the work around him is a reflection of some other character.  But, maybe I'm wrong.  This is something I'll have to play with later to figure out.

"Oh, Just Call Me Cuthbert": The Naming Game, Thomas Millstead

What's in a name?  Millstead says there's a lot, and that as writers we must pay attention to the "vast importance of names in tales intended to chill, thrill, or enthrall."  Providing good names is important in all fiction, but Millstead tells us it is even more important in the fantasy genres because they strive to get at something deeper and become more than just representational of reality.

What makes the fanciful real, what fives it substance, is a name so apt that, in retrospect, it could be nothing else.

That seems pretty daunting at first.  I think he's right--names are critical because they usually are a reader's first brush with the things they represent.  We introduce characters and places and things by name, or we withhold the name (on rare occasion) to create impact later in the story.  They have to be the right names.

How do we get the names right?  Millstead tells us there are no criteria for picking the right ones, just an underlying precept.  The names must be compatible with the tone and texture of the story.  Don't make the names an afterthought.  Avoid making hasty decisions, and pinning on names that are drab, suggest the wrong ethnic or social backgrounds, or overlap in sound.

Involving Your Reader from the Start, William F. Nolan

Nolan tells us that, "...the acid test of a story is its opening.  A good story should leap off the page, grab you by the throat, and demand, 'Read me!'".

That pretty much sums up the article.  The rest is a listing of about 20 opening lines from his own work.  They are interesting to review, and are good demonstrations of opening lines that grab.

He closes by saying that we live in a fast society, submerged in a variety of media, and that in order for writers to compete they must produce works that seize the reader's attention.  If you don't get them quickly, they have plenty of other options to explore.  This article is copyright 1987.  It was true then, and even more true now.  As technology has blossomed, our readers have plenty of other options for entertainment.  We might like to pretend that the written art is somehow "better" than television or movies, but I would reiterate the Koontz quote from earlier:

The purpose of fiction is communication, and if the work is not read, the purpose is not fulfilled.

To be read, the writer must learn to compete effectively against the other media outlets.  Grab the reader as quickly as possible, and never let go until the end.

Freedom of Originality in Fantastic Fiction--and How to Use It, James Kisner

Kisner claims that the genres in question give the writer more opportunity for originality than the others.  The writer must train his imagination to recognize for two reasons.  First, "the mind is easily fooled into grasping the obvious and claiming it for its own."  Second, he says that beginning writers are told incorrectly that there's nothing new--it's all been done before.

How do we urge originality?  Kishner reiterates what all writers should be doing:  read and study.  The more work a writer is exposed to the more likely they are to avoid the mundane.  He suggests that the writer who keeps notes on original works and analyzes those works considered original is better able to find originality in his own work.  Kishner also reiterates the now familiar advice of reading across genres.

He cautions against letting a single work define what is original, and also states there is danger in reading too much.  Apparently the key is to read just the right amount.  I jest.  I think the advice here is correct, but it's not new by today's standards.

There is one place to use as a sort of 'originality checker' that I was not familiar with.  He suggests getting writer's guidelines from publishers, as they will often include a list of things to avoid.  So far, I've only encountered one such list, but I also have yet to start marketing any book-length fiction.

I agree originality is important, but I think Kisner missed one item that can spark originality.  As T. S. Eliot said:

When forced to work within a strict framework the imagination is taxed to its utmost - and will produce its richest ideas. Given total freedom the work is likely to sprawl.

I think originality can also be encouraged by placing constraints on yourself.  Back yourself into a corner and see how you get out.

Creating Fantasy Folk, Ardath Mayhar

Mayhar provides two means for developing fantasy folks--by which he means anything not existing, not just elves, etc.

1. Begin with a world and its characteristics, then figure out what kind of creatures could live there.
2. Begin with a creature that has to be a certain way, then develop the context around it.

These seem obvious to me.  Mayhar provides a couple examples, but I didn't find anything very interesting in either of these.

But, he does wrap up with some very important advice.  As writers, we can't let the plot get overwhelmed by explanations of our fantastic creatures.  Whatever information a reader needs to understand our creatures must come out naturally in the narrative and dialog.  They must be treated as any other character:

Its appearance and habits must come through observation of the being in action.

I thought of Lovecraft when I read this, who is at times given to providing long explanations of his creatures.  I think that may be part of why some readers are less than thrilled with his work.  In other words, "Show, don't tell."

Keeping the Reader on the Edge of His Seat, Dean R. Koontz

Koontz introduces two kinds of suspense: light, and dark.  The light kind of suspense it the roller coaster ride, something fun and desirable.  The darker kind "strains your heart, breaks your spirit."  He says that only in fiction do we actually seek both kinds of suspense, because fiction is vicarious.  Readers are drawn toward tales that can show how to face tragedy with dignity.

Koontz cautions us against confusing action for suspense, and says that action can only be suspense if the writer understands:

(1) suspense in fiction results primarily from the reader's identification with and concern about lead characters who are complex, convincing, and appealing; and (2) anticipation of violence is infinitely more suspenseful than the violence itself.

I agree with Koontz, but I think the first is another way of saying that the reader must care for your characters.  That's common advice among my reading.  I think the second point is the key.  Anticipation serves the writer better than well-described acts of violence.  To be fair, I've engaged in the latter, but that doesn't make it right.  You give the reader more when you build up anticipation.

Koontz continues to tell us that good, likable characters are important for horror because the best horrors are those we find lurking inside the hearts and minds of people.  In order to get our reader to come down that path, we must present them with characters whose heads they want to get into.

One piece I've not heard emphasized before is the importance of style.  Koontz claims it is as important as characterization and anticipation because it is the flow of words on the page that carry the reader along.  The downside of this advice, in my opinion, is that style is only developed, not learned.  I've been working on understanding my style the past six months, and it's a challenge.

None of that is particularly interesting, but they're facts that lay the groundwork for what's been on my mind lately. Every professional writer develops their own flavor of discipline, without which they would be unable to sustain professional standing.  It's actually pretty common among most successful people regardless of profession to develop a habit around their chosen work.  What I've been interested in is how writers measure their progress?

Last term I measured my progress in terms of word count.  It seems reasonable since the publishing industry is largely word count driven.  Every submission guideline includes a word-count limit.  The industry has accepted word-counts attached to novels in each genre.  For instance, horror novels range around 300-400 pages, but an epic fantasy comes closer to 700 pages.

What I found, when I measured word count, was that I spent too much time generating words to reach that count.  It became too easy to wander on the pages, adding words here and there to meet a necessary but arbitrary goal of 500 words per day.  I did pretty well--although Stephen King recommends shooting for at least 1000 per day.  But I had to ditch a lot of it due to the bad behavior that specific goal encouraged.

For this term, I've opted to measure my progress in terms of pages, a page being roughly equal to 250 words.  My goal is to write 4 pages per day, or 1000 words per day to align with King's recommendation.  If you're familiar with On Writing, you'll know that King actually counts a page as 200 words, but for my purpose 4 is as good a stepping stone as 5.  I'll ratchet my goal up another notch next term.

Does it really matter?  I put some thought into this over my break, and these past few weeks have shown my hunch correct.  Yes, I write better when my goal is page count over word count.  I focus better on the story and don't worry at all about producing dense copy.  Before, I would work in extra words.  But now, I can write whole pages of dialog, which tends to be pretty sparse in terms of words per page, and still make my goals.  I just don't care, because a page is a page.

In addition, it helps to remember that word count for a publisher is really a means of estimating number of printable pages.  They take the word count, divide by around 250 (I think this varies), and arrive at page count.  Novelists don't get paid by the word, and I wouldn't want paid that way anyhow.  My goal is to write well-told stories with efficient, emotionally charged language, not drudge on for miles, taxing both the reader and myself by counting every step along the way.

My other read was The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror, Volume 20, edited by Stephen Jones.  It's filled with some excellent short horror from 2008, and definitely worth the time.  It's late, I'm tired, so I won't do any sort of review of them, but here's a list of the one's that appealed most to me:

• It Runs Beneath the Surface, by Simon Strantzas
• These Things We Have Always Known, by Lynda E. Rucker (my favorite of the lot)
• Through the Cracks, by Gary McMahon
• The Camping Wainwrights, by Ian R. MacLeod
• The Oram County Whoosit, by Steve Duffy (excellent story in the vein of Lovecraft)
• The New York Times at Special Bargain Rates, by Stephen King
• 2:00 pm: The Real Estate Agent Arrives, by Steve Rasnic Tem

That last one verges on poetic.  It's shorter than this post, a mere 3 sentences, but paints a beautifully horrific picture and punches you in the end.  Loved it!

And now, I'm off to see if I can wrap up some stuff before getting into the groove tomorrow.

I just started reading Old Man's War, by John Scalzi, the reading selection for my January writer's residency.  I've not decided if I'll do any journal posts or not on it, since it's not Horror.  First impressions [2 chapters]: Scalzi makes good use of the CDF contract as a framing device for providing background information to the reader; he does an equally good job of slipping in a space elevator explanation during casual conversation.  Those are just the first two things that came to mind; I am enjoying it as well.

Finally, I've started work on new short story based on the name of a character that I've carried around for a few years.  I didn't mean for it to be a zombie story -- already tried my hand at zombies once -- but... it's a zombie story.

BTW - Beware the Krampus!

Click here to view the embedded video.

His opinion is that there are 4 classes of writer: Bad, Competent, Good, and Genius.  He states that there are 2 theses to his book:

The first is that good writing consists of mastering the fundamentals (vocabulary, grammar, the elements of style) and then filling the third level of the toolbox with the right instruments.  The second is that while it is impossible to make a competent writer out of a bad writer, and while it is equally impossible to make a great writer out of a good one, it is possible, with lots of hard work, dedication, and timely help, to make a good writer out of a merely competent one.

The fundamentals of writing are covered in the prior section.  So, what does it take to make a competent writer into a good one?

King cuts us down to the reality of writing.  It doesn't come from dreaming, theorizing, or speculating. It comes from sitting down in the chair and whittling away at the story one word at a time.

I won't pretend that I found a lot of new advice in here.  Much of what King recommends is pretty common; but, as I've said before, if so many writers repeat the same advice, there must be truth in it.

Most writers will find the following advice familiar. However, King continues throughout to provide excellent examples, so while the advice is common, the book is worth reading for the additional clarity he provides.

Read a lot. Both good writing and bad writing can teach us a lot.

Write a lot.  "A lot" is a subjective measure, and varies from writer to writer. Each writer must discover this on their own.

Develop a Work Ethic.  Have a schedule, have a place.  These two things help to build the habit by providing a comfort zone in which to work and a target to work towards. King shoots for 2,000 words per day. I shoot for 500, but expect to increase to 1,000 after the first of the year. Do I make my mark? Not always. But I am improving.

Regarding the place, King suggests one with a door the writer is willing to close. I agree. Shutting the door is a way for the writer to show commitment and dedication, both to themselves and the people around. It should be simple and free of distraction.

What to Write?  Whatever the writer wants, but he/she must be truthful. King says to interpret "write what you know" as broadly as possible. King also warns against writing for the wrong reasons: to impress people, to make money, etc.

According to King, novels consist of 3 parts: narration, description, and dialog.

• King works from a situational root, letting plot develop organically as he works through the narration of a first draft.  In his mind, stories are things we uncover, and we have to take care in unearthing them, making sure they are extracted as complete and intact as possible.

• Description should be done in moderation.  Trust the reader to fill in the gaps and provide their own meaningful context and details where appropriate.  "...good description usually consists of a few well-chosen details that will stand for everything else."  Keep the ball rolling, tell the story.  Good description is clarity, fresh images and simple vocabulary.

• Dialog is essential to defining character.  We get to know them through how the talk.  Good dialog is partially how it sounds.  It must be honest. It must go beyond the page and ring true to the ear.

The writer builds character by paying attention to real people and telling the truth about what he / she sees.  King believes the best stories are character-driven, ties back to his belief in plot coming from the process, not an outline created ahead of time.

Description, dialogue, and character are foundational.  The rest is available, it's up to the writer to discover what improves the writing and doesn't inhibit the story. I can appreciate this. It's clear that King has his own preferences and biases when it comes to writing, but here gives other writers the same license. Once a writer masters the fundamentals, they are free to use the remaining tools at their own discretion, to leverage them as they see appropriate for the work.

King elaborates further on symbolism and theme as demonstration of what's available for use. In themselves, neither is essential to the writing process, but he shows how he has used them successfully in his own revision process. He demonstrates problems each one helped him resolve, and how they can provide a useful framework for revision.

King recommends that all beginning writers go through at least 2 drafts; one with the door closed, one with the door open.

The first draft and revision, the one with the door closed, is an outpouring onto the page.  Tell the story, get it all down in black and white.  Let the story sit, King recommends, for 6 weeks.  Let is sit long enough to forget about it, to get immersed in a new project.  Then revise, concentrating on the mechanics. The writer should ask if the story is coherent, figure out what they meant, and take notes on these. The writer will use them in the second draft. This is internal feedback.

The second draft is done with the door open. This is the point where the writer shares the story with a select few people to get external feedback. King doesn't use the term, but these are the beta readers. King stresses the importance of listening to these people, but to balance out the feedback each gives against the others. If every Beta Reader says the story has a certain problem, then pay attention and do something about it. However, if the response is mixed, any ties are up to the writer.

The beta readers are also the best way to gauge the story's pacing. King brings out a formula he received early on in his career: 2^nd Draft = 1^st Draft - 10%. He learned from this to collapse a story during revision, to cut out the 'boring' parts. He focuses on back story as one keep place to collapse a novel. Essentially, don't bore the reader.

Research is something far in the background, as far as King is concerned. It's something that can happen after the first draft and should never get in the way of telling the story. It's another place to trust the Beta Readers, too. Do it to keep small details from distracting the reader, but it can come towards the end of the revision process.

King goes on to express his doubts about the usefulness of writing classes. He finds a couple redeeming qualities for them: they are one place where writing is taken seriously, and they provide another source of income for the working writers who lead them. But, by and large, he feels they contradict with the idea of writing with the door closed, that all-important act of getting the story out unhindered.

King addresses other topics such as agents, whether he does it for the money (no), and provides a more personal account of how writing helped him through recovery after being struck by an automobile. All worth the read, but not essential to what I found most useful from this section.

For me, this section read like a set of instructions on where to account for each fear a writer encounters. I find it easy to get overwhelmed by all the different concerns a writer must address as part of the creation process, and I firmly believe that fear lies at the core of "writer's block". I realize now that each concern has its place and time. The first draft should be carefree, an outpouring of the story itself in an act of discovery. Stop worrying about the details. The mechanics are addressed in the first revision, along with note taking on all the stuff that little voice inside wanted to say during the first draft. Other concerns can be addressed on subsequent drafts, and at least one draft should be dedicated to what other people have to say. Good writing comes from good rewriting. That's not an unfamiliar concept either, but I have to reiterate that the unique thing King provided is excellent demonstration of all these concepts.

So what goes in this metaphorical toolbox?

The first layer consists of common tools.  The most common tool, per King, is vocabulary.  It's something we all have to varying degrees.  I really appreciate King's take on vocabulary, which is essentially, learn to use what you have and don't worry about developing more.  Your vocabulary develops as a by-product of reading.  All writers are readers first, right?

The other common tool is grammar, and it goes on the top along with vocabulary.  He covers two fundamental issues in grammar: passive voice, and use of adverbs.  These are pretty common topics in discussions of grammar.  His reason for the mistakes really got me thinking.  He attributes both mistakes to a form of fear.  For passive voice, King thinks that timid writers use passive voice because it's safe and because it lends some sort of authority to their writing.  Adverbs, on the other hand, come from the writer's fear of being unclear.  King believes that "fear is at the root of most bad writing."  Good writing is about letting go of fear.

The second layer in the toolbox contains style.  Aside from the usual reference book recommendation, King concentrates on the paragraph as a good measure of style.  How the writer uses it to break up the page and follow the beats of the story can show the difficulty of reading the work.  Easy reading has short paragraphs and white space, hard reading looks dense.  In fiction, the paragraph requires less structure than in other writing.  He compares it to talking, and its use can be an act of seducing the reader.  It's the music the writer hears in his/her head.  He says that the paragraph is the basic unit of writing, and that to learn it well is to learn the beat.

King also talks about commitment throughout this section, and how a writer's first goal should be to help the reader out.  Words have weight, they take a lot of work to put together, and can demand a lot from a reader to digest.  In writing, we must be considerate and mindful of the reader, always working towards clarity and  brevity, to keep the reader from drowning in a sea of words.

King wraps up by talking about the third layer, which is to write real fiction.  Stop the fear, build your works as a carpenter builds a house, one brick or board at a time.  Build your writing with the basics, and you can build whatever you like.

That's it for the toolbox.  I think King does an excellent job of reminding us as writers just how far basic skills will take you.

Learn the basics, lose the fear.

I can't say if it was intentional on his part, but in telling what he considers his "C.V.", King demonstrates a series of important lessons that were critical in shaping him.  Notice I said demonstrate.  I think this is, perhaps, one of the first aspects he teaches us.  His book is about writing, but instead of listing out a series of lessons, he shows us what he learned and how he learned it.  It is a vehement adherence to the old adage of "show, don't tell".  I've read too many books and articles on writing that do little more than list out rules or guidelines or maxims or adages or aphorisms or whatever word you want to use.  But, in the end, they're nothing more than a handful of words on a page that leave the reader with little more than a sense that there's something to memorize.  There's no feeling in the lessons they impart, no connection to the reader.  Just rules.

I also think that each person who reads his book will come away with different insights based on how they relate King's stories to themselves.  I'll recount what I learned from this, but by no means is this an exhaustive list of lessons to be found.  It's one of those things that you simply must read for yourself in order to get at the real value.

Humor and Horror are very close cousins.  As writers, we don't necessarily need to avoid one in favor of the other.  King emphasizes that having a sense of humor is important.  Rather, we need to be aware of both and conscious of when we cross the line between the two.  He learned this (sort of) early on from his experience with a baby sitter who would fart on his face.  Boy could I relate - for me, it was my brother.  He also tells the story of how he was cut off the list for being in Honor Society due to his sense of humor, and how he's happy to have humor over prestige any day.

Good ideas don't come from some common place that we must learn to tap.  For him, they come from taking two unrelated things and putting them together.  He demonstrates this by discussing how the ideas for several of his stories appeared.  This is pretty common advice anymore, but I think he does a really good job of demonstrating it.

Even Stephen King felt shame about his writing.  I just can't imagine this guy ever being ashamed of his writing, but he lays it out.  Early on, there were people in his life, authority figures, who thought that writing horror was a waste of his talent.  That shame stuck with him for a while.  There's always going to be someone who will try to make you feel bad about your ability to create and how you choose to use it.  Don't let it keep you down.  That's a tough one to deal with.  I know I've experienced shame, I even tried to set my desire to write aside, chalk it up to some sort of childish endeavor.  But it caught up with me.  There's misery in letting other people manipulate you through shame.

The first draft of a story is you telling it to yourself.  The second draft and beyond are you telling it to someone else.  This is one I personally struggle with.  The perfectionist in me wants to do it right the first time and be done with it.  I have no idea why that's part of my personality.  I suppose, if I look at my parents, there's something of a perfectionist in each of them.  But it's also not fair for me to attribute that to them at my age.  I think part of it is also living in the 9 to 5 culture.  When someone is paying you by the hour, they're not inclined to just let you try until you get it right.  I've also read that perfectionism is a form of fear, a way of delaying the end of something.  Sounds weird, but okay, I guess it's possible.  Whatever the reason, the important thing is that I'm aware of it now, and I can work on giving myself permission to use the first draft to tell myself the story.  Then I can go back and rewrite it for everyone else.

King gets into this idea of work ethic, which is not something I've every really heard directly associated with writing (or any creative endeavor).  It's more than just perseverance.  He talks about a poem his wife wrote when they were still in school.  Part of what made the poem so appealing to him was that, in a time when people were just writing crap out of thin air (my words, not his), she constructed a poem with intent and full understanding of what she was trying to accomplish.  I can really relate to this.  My undergraduate work involved several poetry writing classes.  I saw my fair share of words thrown together with disregard to craft.  I did my fair share, as well.  In the long run, it's unsatisfying for everyone involved.

During a rough period in his life, when he was working hard and felt like he was just repeating his mother's life, King finds himself thinking that that isn't what his life was supposed to be.  I suppose at one time or another we may all think this, and he admits as much.  The difference, and this isn't anything unique to writing, is that King did something about it.  Even when the writing was hard, when it came infrequently, and the day-to-day drained his life away, he never gave up.  This is a quality most successful people share, and I think it also relates to work ethic.  Never give up.

Even from the start, King had emotional support.  His mother encouraged him, and later on, his wife encouraged him.  This isn't advice for the writer, but for those around him or her.  King sums it up: "Just believing is usually enough."

King gives background on the story of Carrie.  He drafted three single-spaced pages of the novel, and then threw them away.  His wife recovered them later, and encouraged  him to work on it (there's the support), but what I found really interesting is why he threw those pages away in the first place.  He gives four reasons, and provides them in order from least important to most important:

1. It didn't move him emotionally.
2. He didn't like the lead character.
3. He wasn't comfortable with the setting or the all-female cast of characters.
4. The story wouldn't pay off unless it was pretty long - longer than what the men's magazine market supported at the time.  He didn't think he could sell it.

Look at that list again - it speaks volumes about King's work ethic and his sense of writing as a business.  The least important thing on his list was that it didn't move him emotionally.  The most important was whether or not he could sell it.  It turns out that he was wrong about #4, but the point is, it was at the forefront of his mind when writing.  He treated it as a career, it was a source of income for him and his family, not some esoteric activity he did on the side.  I suppose some might think these priorities aren't in the right order, but I think they are.  In order to be an author, one must recognize and engage in writing as a business as well as a creative endeavor.  Writing a book is easy.  Sit down and bang away at a keyboard until you've produced somewhere between 50,000 and 200,000 words.  That doesn't make you an author, although it's good practice and a necessary part.  Sit down and do the same thing with all the awareness and intent of one doing business, producing something that has market value, and now you're an author.  It doesn't have to be a big market, but in the end, authorship comes through sales.  Okay, so I guess the first time through is for yourself, as discussed above.  But, it must be refined into marketable material.

King wraps up his C.V. with the story of his battle with drugs and alcohol.  Through it all, he kept writing.  In retrospect, it's clear that many of the works he produced were related to this battle.  Some are more direct than others.  Part of writing fiction is developing metaphors for life, revealing truths through lies.  But in discussing his drug abuse and how his works relate to it, King gives a spectacular demonstration of fiction as a metaphor.  More importantly, though, is that King shows us that his fiction contains metaphors for his life.  That, I think, is key.  It's a combination of the idea of metaphor and the idea of writing what you know.  Your work will likely contain metaphors for your own life, and getting in touch with those personal metaphors can help develop both your work and you.

There's a little section after his C.V. called "What Writing Is".  Kings spends just a few pages on the subject, but they provided an immense amount of clarity to me.  One of my problems is getting caught up in details.  I think it must be related to the perfectionist in me, but at times I think it's also a form of procrastination.  Somewhere I read that writing is about the half-described gesture, and King says as much.  King describes writing as a form of telepathy, and that what's important is the message, not the details.  Trust the receiver / reader to know what you're talking about, that a cage need only be described as a cage if it's not the core of the message.  He closes the section with some noteworthy advice:

Come to [the page] any way but lightly.  Let me say it again: you must not come lightly to the blank page.

...If you can take it seriously, we can do business.  If you can't or won't, it's time for you to close the book and do something else.

I'm here to take it seriously.

Here's the advice I'm taking right now, given by Night Shade Books:

Write what you think is your best book.  Put it in a trunk and write another one.  Do this four times.  Then start sending your novels out for submission.

So, while it's never to early to build awareness about the market, right now I'm focusing on building my writing skills.  If there's nothing to sell, there's nothing to market.

Oh, and the afterword by Harlan Ellison - quite cool.

I'm done with this book, moving on to the next.

Archetypes and Fearful Allure: Writing Erotic Horror, Nancy Kilpatrick

I really struggled with this one.  Kilpatrick seems to rely heavily on the concept of Archetypes, and the just of her advice can be summed up in the following quote:

This means that the energy embedded in the image resonates with all readers because it taps into and stirs up the collective unconscious.

I don't see anything practical in that sort of advice.  I mean, conceptually, it's a neat way of thinking about it - Archetypes as a framework for developing characters can be useful.  But, I didn't find any truly functional advice in here.

A few other things bothered me.  She makes a pretty bold statement when she addresses the balance between Erotic and Horror in a single story: "The story needs to perform on both levels equally."  My problem is, this is a black and white statement.  The story works if it achieves and appropriate balance, not by achieving 100% equality on each side.

The rest of the article reiterated a lot of the same things as the other.  Reinforcement of good ideas, but nothing really new or useful to me personally.

Writing for the New Pulps: Horror-Themed Anthologies, John Maclay

This one interested me.  I always thought Anthologies were 'invite only' publications.  Goes to show how little I know about the publishing world.  Anyhow, Maclay and the editors he interviewed make some good cases for working with anthologies.

• They are geared to sell, although not necessarily in a way that authors make significant money.
• They are an opportunity for new authors to get published next to established authors.
• They have taken the place of the old pulp magazines, many of which are dwindling or defunt.

Never considered it as an accessible market, now I will.  I guess that's what I got from this.

Freaks and Fiddles, Banjos and Beasts: Writing Redneck Horror, Weston Ochse

Great introduction to Urban Horror.  Honestly, I've never really given much serious consideration to what exactly it is, but I really think Ochse gets to the heart of the matter.  Urban Horror is about isolation, not locale.  Urban Gothic, Brian Keene's latest novel, is a great example of this concept.  It's a standard Cannibal Clan story, along the lines of Wrong Turn or Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but it takes place in a New Jersey ghetto.  Intoday's world, that ghetto in NJ is just as isolated as the solitary farm in Appalachia.

Ochse goes on to discuss what a Redneck is, and gives a comparison of the 'stereotype' with great examples from current works.  He boils it down to a perspective on the world that's derived from the isolation, the lack of "book-learning" and a reliance on intuition.    He adds in this sort of fiction relies more heavily on dynamic characterization, but I think that's a good target regardless of subgenre.

What really spoke to me in this piece is Ochse treatment of style.  He claims that Backwoods Horror is neither genre nor subgenre, but a style.  Maybe, maybe not.  The style he goes on to describe, though, is one I've found myself striving for as of late.  He says that "imagery fails as sentence structures expand", and he cites Ed Lee as an example of strong prose through "active voice and transitive verbs."  The writer still has to describe things to the reader, but:

This is done with short, declarative sentences and strong transitive verbs.  The reader gets the image in a one-two punch instead of a long visual wrestling match.

I've found that the more I focus on achieving this style of writing, the less my work wanders.  I guess in a way it forces me to get to the point, and I think it creates a fast pace for the reader regardless of the level of action.

Youth Gone Wild, Lee Thomas (aka Thomas Pendleton)

I'm not interested in writing YA stuff, but there are some interesting observations in here.  Thomas notes that teens are in a unique point in their lives, and I don't think anyone can argue with that.  Teens are in a constant struggle, one that can serve as a metaphor for the human conditions of life and death, of movement and journey, and of loss.  These are all very powerful emotions that can serve as underpinnings for good horror.

The rest of the article covers usage of slang (sparingly, just like dialect), boundaries, and an overview of what editors look for in teen fiction.  Not interesting to me.

Writing Horror comic books - And Graphic Novels, David Campiti

This was another enlightening article.  As with anthologies, I personally never considered writing comic books.  Much of the actual writing advice in here is a rehash of ideas presented throughout with some focus on comics, but the gem is revealing how lucrative comic books actually be for a writer.

Acts of Madness: Writing Horror for the Stage, Lisa Morton

I have no interest in being a playwright.  Morton's article covers the peculiarities of being a playwright, from working with a company to the mechanics of portraying visceral horror on the stage.  But, I personally found nothing in there that would help me be a better writer.  Not a shortcoming of the article, just a mismatch of interests.

Fear Spins Off: The Tie-In Novel Comes Into Its Own, Yvonne Navarro

Tie-Ins are a long way off for me.  If ever.  Actually, probably never.  I prefer to work in my world, not someone else's.  Navarro makes it pretty clear that Tie-Ins are really only available to writers who have proven themselves, so experience and reliability are key to even getting a chance in this space.

I found it interesting that Tie-Ins are usually written just from the script.  It explains why the visualizations contained in the novel version often stray quite a bit from the movie.

The Play's the Thing on the Doorstep: Writing Video and Role-Playing Games, Richard E. Dansky

Another one I'm not interested in at this point.  I'm just trying to be a better writer!  Anyhow, writing for rpgs and video games is clearly a team sport.  Dansky does a nice job of delineating the writer's role in both processes.

Now Fear This: Writing horror for Audio Theater, Scott Hicky and Robert Madia

Another interesting medium to work with, one I might tackle some day.  What I found really interesting, although not surprising, is that dialog has to spell things out for the listener.  What makes for good dialog in print makes for terribly ambiguous audio scripting.

Hicky and Madia also make the claim that "...the time is ripe for a comeback of the genre in new and emerging media."  Okay, yes, the Internet  certainly provides a readily accessible channel for setting audio theater.  But, having an accessible channel doesn't mean this will make a comeback.  I'm not arguing against it, but I didn't see anything in the article aside from "the internet makes it so" to support this statement.  Is there an audience for it?  In the face of competition from the likes of On-Demand cable and streaming video like YouTube, is there a contingent of folks other than the nostalgic few to make and keep audio theater horror as a viable market?  I don't know, but it seems counterintuitive to me.

Good Characters and Cool Kills: Writing the Horror Screenplay, Brendan Deneen

What I got most from Deneen's article is a sense of proportion.  He covers the issues of premise, protagonist, villian, kills, second act, and conclusion, much of it similar to what's been said before.

In his discussion on Second Act and Conclusion, he gets at something not really covered.  The idea of timing (or pacing), and how it needs to be tracked and manipulated to meet audience expectation.  He talks in terms of screen time, but I think it's an important notion.  In order to keep things moving along, to keep the audience engaged in the middle, the story must have layers.  And, it's during the second act that those layers are explored and peeled back, momentarily leaving the prime horror element to explore the lives of the characters.  It's a good framework, I think, for tackling the middle of any story, not just screenplays.  The conlcusion, then, serves to tie all the layers together.  He adds that in a screenplay, the conclusion should be open-ended enough for a sequel.

One other bit Deneed pulled out that I had not put any thought into is that the protagonist and villain should have a direct connection.  When I read it, I thought, "duh".  But in considering my current work, I realized I had not made a direct connection yet between the two.  So, I got some work ahead of me.

NB: All in all, I didn't get a lot out of this section.  I think that's because it covers so much in such broad terms that there's bound to be parts that aren't of interest to all horror writers.

No More Silver Mirrors: The Monster in Our Times, Karen E. Taylor

Taylor addresses how the old monsters can be made new again.  She's got some good advice, and I'll get to that in a second, but there's something she says early on that is direct opposition to what at least one other author claims in this series of articles.  Taylor states:

...modern readers are more sophisticated than their parents and grandparents.  Today's readers also require credible premises and explanations; they want things to be scientifically possible.

I added the emphases.  Compare this to what Winter states in section 5:

But today, explanation, whether supernatural or rational, is simply not the business of horror fiction.

Again, I added the emphasis.  Who's right?  What's going on here?  At first blush, they do seem to contradict one another.  But, based on the advice Taylor goes into, I think they are consistent with each other.  I took Winter to mean that the modern story itself need not necessarily address the reason for the events it contains.  To me, he's speaking to whether or not the internals of the story must link to an external reason.  Taylor, on the other hand, is speaking in terms of internal consistency.

She first addresses the question of consistency and the rules of your story.  She suggests that, unless you as the writer know the rules for your 'monster', you cannot meet reader expectation and deliver a believable story.  So, whether you start with a vampire or a werewolf, you must first understand and commit to the rules of the trope.  And then, you can decide which ones to break.  But, when you break the rules, you must remain internally consistent.

The other two bits of advice she offers are to spend time in characterization of your monster and to know your reader.  I don't recall the first being addressed in any other articles, and it's good advice for the modern horror writer.  It seems that a generalization of the horror genre is the stupid, lumbering, unstoppable force of the monster, a thing to be reckoned with rather than a person to interact with.  She suggests taking the time to provide the reader with your monster's point-of-view, and that by doing so, you can help the reader better understand the internal and external processes that make this monster a possibility.  Again, the explanation lies not in locating a foundation in reality, but in creating an internally consist world where that monster can and does exist.

The part about knowing your reader is common advice, but no less important.  In the context of the article, Taylor is emphasizing that in order to create and maintain the consistency while using the venerable monsters of old, you must as a writer address the reader's expectations.  You don't have to meet the expectation, but if you're going to violate an expectation, you must create the internal consistency that will help the reader accept your violation.

Fresh Blood from Old Wounds: The Alchemist Meets the Biochemist, Joseph Curtin

I personally did not get a lot from this article, I think primarily due to its subject matter.  Curtin describes how the modern horror writer can leverage current-day science to enhance or refresh old tropes.  He cites how Dean Koontz refreshed Frankenstein in his series of books, and how Michael Crichton refreshed The Lost World with Jurassic Park.  These story achieved a freshness by enhancing the old story with current scientific thought on how the 'monsters' could be produced.

He also talks about the modern social fear is in Biotechnology, and relates that to the Cold War terror of the prior generation.

To me, this is an advocation of explaining the beast and tying it to an external plausibility.  It's good advice, but for me, it's not necessarily relevant.  My current interest and focus is in leveraging myth as a basis for horror, not leveraging science.  If and when I change focus, I'll be sure to come back and revisit this article to prime myself.

More Simply Human, Tracy Knight

Knight's article gives some great insight into characterization of personality and mental disorders.  He cites some common errors in representing these and a list of reference material that writer's can use to validate or help ensure that they're portraying these things accurately.  He also clearly states that he's not advocating the use of mental disorder, but just wants to help make sure that it is done accurately.

• Aside from the reference material, Knight goes on to clear up a few common misconceptions.
• Current psychotherapy goes well beyond Freud.  Know and make use of contemporary techniques.
• Take care not to stereotype based on the reference material.  Not everyone has every symptom.
• People who are unbalanced are, in fact, less likely to be unpredictable due to the nature of mental illness.  People with personality disorders are more rigid, predictable, and inflexible than the rest of us in terms of their perception and interactions.
• The behavior of people with mental disorders is not without goals.  Every behavior has a goal, and they are coherent and consistent with how each of us views the world.
• Everyone does what they believe to be their best.

Some of Knight's advice, particularly the last two, I think demonstrate that people with mental or personality disorders are still human like the rest of us.

The Possibility of the Impossible, Tom Piccirilli

This is the first time I've ever really considered the close relationship between horror and humor.  Piccirilli does a great job of demonstrating how both derive from the surreal - the juxtaposition of the normal and abnormal  Combining things in new and interesting ways also provides the writer with the ability to create new and interesting metaphors.  And that is foundational to all fiction, in my opinion.  Like Taylor, Piccirilli also stresses the importance of internal logic or consistency in creating the illusion.

Take a Scalpel to Those Tropes, W. D. Gagliani

Gagliani rehashes the previously presented ideas of combining old things in new ways to innovate and altering the rules for freshness.  What I liked about this particular article is that Gagliani uses this short piece as a practical demonstration through one of his own works. Nothing new, but it serves to reinforce some very useful ideas.

That Spectered Isle: Tradition, Sensibility, and Delivery Or Ghosts? What Ghosts?, Steven Savile

While the premise of Savile's article is about the difference between American and British horror, the real value to me is in getting yet another perspective on horror without monsters.  He gives 2 resasons for what he calls the "British Sensility":

Britain has a long history and rich heritage that is filled with ghost stories.

Brain has a heritage of "withstanding atrocities with that stubborn stiff upper lip".

What he lead to is that the most frightening things to the British audience are those that can't be seen.  So, the most frightening things are those based on internals - social ills, ghosts, stuff that can't be seen.  I think what he is driving at is that there's tremendous value for the modern horror author in working with things less tangible than the old vampires and werewolves.   I wasn't really getting a point from him until he brought up Easton Ellis's American Psycho.  It works so well because it drives the reader into the head of a madman.  Aside from the gruesome acts of the main character, being inside his head adds an element of horror beyond.

New Horrors: A Roundtable Discussion of Horror Today and Tomorrow, Joe Nassise (moderator)

I don't have much to say on this.  All four authors (Pat Tremblay, Gary Frank, Melinda Thielbar, Nate Kenyon) provide some good advice.  But it's short, so none of them really have the opportunity to delve into any one subject.  It's definitely a good read for new authors, as you can see that even here, not all authors play by the same rules or focus on the same things.  Here are the questions posed to the group:

• What are the three most important skills a new writer should have?
• What three pieces of advice to new writers do you not agree with?
• What's different about the publishing industry today than when you started?  What'll happen over the next couple of years?
• What's the value of horror to the literary community?

Like I said, interesting questions and a variety of answers (sometime contradicting one another), but nothing that I felt helped me out.