Writing Yourself Into a Corner

Once you've discovered the direction that you want to go in - often many of my writing students will start writing the story. Many times the story sort of "writes itself" from that point, appearing on the page as they type or put pencil to paper.

I love that process. It's a true merger with the Muse. It's no wonder that the ancient Greeks thought that a strange spirit injected people with creativity when they were writing or creating.

What's interesting about interacting with the Muse is that when you're in that zone, you really have no idea what's going to happen next. When all cylinders are firing, and the story is flowing out of you, often events will pop out of nowhere.

I remember one conference I had with an author and she made this great point. She was writing, and had a character who had just worked through a seriously trying time. Just at that moment, the author was surprised to find that the phone rang in the story. Indeed, she didn't even know who was on the other end of the line until she had her main character pick up the phone.

To explain how this can often work with characters I often explain it this way...

You may have a story in mind but if you have really spent time developing your characters, you may run into a situation where you say to yourself, "Wait. My character wouldn't do that. My character would really do this." And suddenly, that grand plot that you had in your head is changed. That's the reality of writing with real and living characters.

That said, this little bit of magic would often get me into trouble when writing novels. My characters would go off in random directions (like people do in real life) and end up in some place that simply made for a poor story. Imagine if we hooked a camera to the shoulder of someone really interesting and famous. Say, Arnold Schwarzenegger. Well, about 10 to 20 percent of his life would be interesting, but then the other 80 to 90 percent would be snooze-ville as we watching Arnold take a dump, eat breakfast, or run on a treadmill.

There's also the problem that I had in that often I would get my characters into serious predicaments in which there was no escape. Obviously, in my stories, I wanted my characters to face serious odds or something that was threatening. Because my stories flowed realistically...I suddenly found that by all rights, my characters should completely lose the conflict that I set up. Which doesn't make for a very satisfying story. A character who loses in the end can be a great story, but not in the ways that I had set up.

So, when writing novels, I often found that I ended up writing myself into a corner.

Bleah.

That's why I've learned my lesson. I outline my stories now. Yep, I really do that. Keep in mind that my outlines are usually fairly loose and open. But I do it. The reason it's important for me to do that is because when I outline, I am able to see the end of the road. I'm able to keep track of where I'm going, and I can nudge my character in that direction. If the end that I hand in mind doesn't work, that's okay. I just retool the outline so that I can see where the new story is going. The main thing I try to keep in mind is maintaining my eyes on the prize and understanding where my story is going.

All for now.

Writing that Novel You've Always Wanted

So I'm prepping for DragonCon and every year, I run a panel on Horror in Gaming and DragonCon. It’s a real blast, because I rarely get to talk to people about horror, what makes us scared, and the disciple of horror.

Recently, I’ve been neglecting the blog because I’ve been pretty busy with writing material for Paradigm Concepts, and because I couldn’t come up with any more topics for blogging. However, Daniel Perez recently asked about some of my work with the Grand Tome of Adversaries, and it got me inspired to write some more.

So, what I’m going to be doing is starting a series of blog posts about writing and publishing.

Writing that Novel You’ve Always Wanted to Write



So, I’m going to start with the basics. The real basics. Like, how do you write a story anyways?

I’ve never really sat down and talked about how I come up with ideas for stories or games. I guess because the process is so close to me now that I never really think about it. So, let’s focus for a second on the whole process. Just how does one write a story or game? When it comes to writing a story, I’ve learned that everyone goes about it a different way.

Scenes



Some people get this really cool scene in their head and they want to write about it. That’s where they start. It’s sort of the situation that you have with books like Souls Raised from the Dead by Doris Betts. (By the way, this is not a horror novel, but rather a spiritual journey novel.)

She came up with her book after passing by a massive truck wreck. It just so happened that the truck that wrecked was carrying a load of live chickens. She said that the expression of the officer at the scene was both profound and hilarious at the same time. Everything was covered in feathers, blood, and chickens running around. The police officer's face was simply one of complete turmoil as he tried to make sense of a situation both awful and amusing. He was almost an symbol of how life works in general.

Just the image of that scene was the springboard for her novel.

Characters



Some people start with characters. They get a character idea in their head and they really like the idea of this person. For example, in The Great Gilly Hopkins, the author Katherine Paterson had this idea of a character who was named Galadriel...after the elven queen from Lord of the Rings – then she started to work backwards from there. For example, what kind of parents would name their kid that? Suppose further that this girl was raised by those parents. What kind of life would she have?

Concepts



Some people start with a concept or tension. For example, someone may write a historical novel where the South won Gettysburg. Or like in the novel World War Z, where Max Brooks sits down and supposes that the world really did get invaded by zombies. These sorts of projects start with a basic idea. Then, the writer takes that concept and thinks of the next logical steps in the chain of events that he or she has set up. What was genius about World War Z was that Max Brooks writes about how such a thing could be possible. For example, how could zombies take over the world if people have things like guns, and artillery, and explosives? How could it spread so widely and so fast? He writes about those things realistically in his novel.

By the way, you have to check out The World War Z website. Click on the link above! Be sure to check out the map with the dramatic readings.

Understand that there's not right or wrong way to start a novel. Also, you don't have to "pick" one of the methods I described above. Finally, many people use a combination of the techniques I just mentioned. Myself, for example....

What I Like to Do
For one, understand that writing fiction and writing games are two different disciplines for me. I'll talk about writing fiction for now.

When writing a story, I usually come up with the characters first. I think of some interesting characters and think about their lives. I think about what these characters look like, act like, etc. Then, I usually sit down and start writing a scene putting these interesting characters into that scene. I try to make sure that the scene I write about it fairly interesting. This interesting scene is usually the catalyst for my story.

For example, I might develop a character who is an adult male with a son. To make things interesting, I'll say that he has a son who is autistic. I think about his life, what that character does for a living, etc. Then, I put that character in a catalyst – like maybe he’s going to be depositing a check at the bank when it suddenly gets robbed. To make it even more interesting, let’s say his autistic son is there. While everyone is getting down on the floor, the main character’s son doesn’t want to get down on the floor. The floor feels cool and strange to the son. And he’s just refusing to get on the floor as these bank robbers are waving around their guns and screaming at him.

That is what I do to come up with a story.

Now, that was just me shooting around in the dark. If I want to really get serious and write a piece of fiction, I also do one more thing. I think about some themes.

Yep, that stupid, ridiculous concept that you learn about in 9th grade Literature Class. I literally think about themes I want to explore in the story. Now, I don’t force my story to have those themes. Instead, I think about the kinds of themes and concepts I’d like to explore with my invented characters and point them in that direction. If they don’t get there…then they don’t get there.

For example, I might think about my main character and his autistic son. I might think it would be interesting to explore the concept of fatherhood in the context of an average guy and a high-functioning, but autistic son. Or I might want to explore the idea of childhood discipline with an average father and an autistic son. To do that, I might dream up scenes wherein the father has a “moment” with his son. And these moments might be one of love, or ones where the father unfortunately has to level some kind of discipline on his son. Again, I don’t force this situations on the characters, but I start with the concept and start writing out a scene. Whatever happens next is a surprise. And I’m always surprised.

In this example, what I might do is have the father talking to the son and trying to discipline his autistic son. Maybe the scene is about how the father is trying to explain to the son that he can’t yell in public places – like the bank. Then, in the middle of the father dealing with his son, trying to teach his son a lesson about the world…bank robbers drop in. So now we have a really interesting situation.

And the best part is, I myself am not sure how the scene will unfold.

That, to me, is the most fun part of writing a story - I never know for certain what I'm going to write about next. Maybe I'll touch on that later.

Why Are Zombies Scary?

Zombies are pretty damn cool.

One of the coolest things about zombies is the fact that they answer the "open the door" problem in horror immediately. The "open the door" problem is a really hard issue to surmount in horror. And that issue is this:

Usually, in a horror movie, we might hear the monster lurking around outside. We might catch a glimpse of it through a darkened window. However, when the heroine of the movie finally opens the door, and reveals the monster...usually it's not near as bad as we thought it was.

That's because up until the moment the door is opened, our imaginations are running wild. And no matter what the movie comes up with 9 times out of 10, whatever our imaginations have cooked up is far worse.

There are a few rare occasions where this isn't true, of course. A key example would be John Carptener's The Thing. That movie continues to horrify us to tears, because we just don't know what is going to happen next. The Thing manifests itself in different forms every time and in new and more terrifying ways. We can never be truly prepared for what The Thing throws our way.

But accomplishing that perfect and pure moment of terror is pretty damn hard. It's extremely difficult to completely surprise the audience or show them something that not even their wildest imaginings would come up with. So, unfortunately, many authors and movie-makers go for a stalemate with the audience.

Take for example, The Blair Witch Project. By now, it shouldn't be a spoiler that the Blair Witch is never seen in the film. While I love the movie, and many horror fans do, it only offers a stalemate. Because we never see the Blair Witch, about 50% of the population pans the movie and hates it because it "doesn't show anything". I think that M. Night Shylaman often runs into this problem.

So...here's what's cool about zombies. They solve the open the door problem right away. In a zombie movie, we usually see the object of horror fairly soon. What's more is that usually the film's feature monsters are front and center. The Night of the Walking Dead surely doesn't waste any time showing us zombies in the film.

Even though zombie movies show the object of horror early on, even though zombie movies reveal the monster in the open light of day...we are still scared. And here's why. In a zombie movie, we aren't so much afraid of the zombies as we are of what they represent. I think this is very clear in the introduction of the remake of Dawn of the Dead. Besides that great Johnny Cash song, you've also got all of the terrible fear that zombies represent to us in that opening. You have the complete and total breakdown of society. You have a mysterious plague that cannot be stopped. You are given a faceless enemy that has already been predestined to beat you.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdPWrAMXGGo

In a zombie movie, we're far more afraid of being eaten alive, or being turned into a zombie, or one-hundred other horrible things that might happen to us.

Anyhow, that's why I think zombie movies are so cool.

Zombie Horror

I didn't talk about zombies in my post about the archetypes of monsters because I thought that zombies would need their own post to discuss. The Cultural Phenomenon Obviously, zombie horror is huge right now. I thought it was going to be a fad, but it's turned into a fashion. From zombie movies, to zombie comics, to zombie video games, to zombie boardgames, and zombie roleplaying games...there seems to be no limit as to where this trend will end. I guess the resurgence really started with 28 Days Later, which came out in 2002. It's one of my personal favorite horror movies. But hot on the tails of 28 Days was the remake of Dawn of the Dead in 2004 which got great critical acclaim as well as serious dollars at the box office. Also, in 2004 was Shaun of the Dead which not only drew great critical acclaim but also launched Simon Pegg's career as an old-ball character actor. I'm going to also mention The Walking Dead comic book, which came out in 2003, because it is so critically acclaimed and so influential. The Walking Dead is a comic that is read by people who write comics. And - it's pretty damn good. The fact that these really well-done zombie movies were released in such a short period of time really tells us something - the whole zombie genre was simply simmering in the water. The kids who watched the George Romero zombie movies growing up were now finally in positions of power. They were writers, directors, and producers, and so they brought back something from their youth that they enjoyed. And the response was overwhelming on two levels - they got a tremendous response from the people who remembered the old zombie flicks of yore and from a whole new generation who experienced zombie horror for the first time. All I have to say is: Go Gen X. In any case, there can be no denying that zombie horror has become something of a phenomenon. There's a ZombieCon in Manhattan. Watch that here. There's an incredible fansite for zombie fans, and an extensive site based on All Things Zombie which discusses everything you wanted to know about zombies - from movies, to books, to games. There's even something called Revenant Magazine, which is a whole damn magazine on zombies and horror. So, I say again - it's in the water. The Secret Behind the Horror What makes a really good zombie movie interesting is that a truly good zombie movie, in and of itself is not a straight-up horror movie. Most zombie movies are disaster movies disguised as a horror movie. Like all disaster movies, zombie movies usually feature a cast of disparate characters who are thrown together under extraordinary circumstances. The characters are then forced into a situation where they must combat an elemental force (in this case a horde of the walking dead) in order to survive. Just like in a disaster movie, you know going into a zombie movie that everyone's not going to make it, and often the story becomes one of attrition, where characters are lost throughout the story. What makes a zombie or disaster story interesting is that you have a perfect excuse to throw interesting characters together and have them interact with each other. Often times, the characters will turn on each other, because the desperate situation has in turn made the characters in the story desperate. The idea of desperate characters facing a desperate situation is one of the things that makes the zombie movie so interesting to me - it becomes an convenient vehicle to do interesting character studies during the narrative. After all, when faced with a dire situation, often our civilized facades fall away, and our true natures emerge. Going along with the idea of losing our civility...one strong theme zombie movies is the idea of the breakdown of humanity. That when faced with truly desperate situations, humanity turns upon itself. The reason this theme is so compelling is that behind it lies the inexorable message: "The zombies aren't the true monsters. We are." The reason, of course, that this theme is so compelling is that it's very difficult for us to look in the mirror and see that the true horror is us. All for now - I'll be back later with the intricacies of why zombies are scary.

Ebay - O the Zany Horror!

A while back, someone posted a comment to me asking me what I thought about this: a haunted Ebay painting.

The painting sold for an incredible amount on Ebay, probably just for the unique story. So why would people want to dish out money for a haunted object? It just points to our unending fascination with the mysterious and unknown.

I mean, if you think about it, buying a haunted painting has got to be a lose/lose proposition. If you get the thing and it's really haunted...well guess what. Now you live in a haunted house. And you paid money for this to happen. Or if you buy it and it's a hoax (much more likey) - then you've just spent a lot of good money on a painting and perhaps a story that people will make fun of you about for a very long time.

The painting is called "Hands Resist Him" . The interesting thing about the panting is that it's supposedly haunted.

According to the Ebay auctioneer, their 4 year old daughter claimed that the children in the picture were fighting. Then, they stated that after setting up video cameras, they could see the boy in the picture trying to exit the painting.

Right. I didn't really buy it, either. But it makes for a good story. If you want to read what the auctioneer wrote in their entirety, click on the first link in this post.

Now, truth be told, there are some interesting phenomena that accompany this painting - the art critic who first saw this painting and the art gallery owner who featured it both died within a year of each other. The artist himself confirms this. Yep, as a matter of fact, the artist of the painting is still alive. His comments are here.

The fact that the artist is still alive and didn't put any curse on the painting or what not sort of kills the "what if" factor for me.

But this haunted painting is not the only such gimmick to appear on Ebay - least we forget the "Ghost in the Jar" that appeared on Ebay as well.



The "Ghost in the Jar" auction featured a jar that was supposed to be full of some kind of black ash or dirt. In any event, supposedly the auctioneer had found two of these jars and broken one. The broken jar released a black, shadowy entity which had attempted to strangle the auctioneer on a number of occasions. So now, the auctioneer was here trying to sell us the other, unopened jar that he had found. Did it have a ghost trapped inside of it? Or something else?

Yet again, this jar started going for a lot of money. However, people started treating this item as it was meant to be (a joke or hoax) and the bidding got out of hand. Eventually, the item was made invalid. The bidding page is here.

What drew so much attention to this "Ghost in a Jar" though was the idea that someone would try to auction an actual "ghost" on Ebay...and our fascination for the bizarre and unusual.

It also shows us that one basic thing about us as human beings - some people will do anything for a buck.

Today, if you go on Ebay today, you can find all manner of supposedly haunted or supernatural items. How fast can you find one? It took me about 4:50 min. I timed myself.

The Three Archetypes of Monsters

First of all, a shout out to a commenter on my blog for pointing me in the direction of Rado Javor. This guy's art totally rocks.

Many of his works are very much Colonial Horror and feed right into that Witch Hunter ideal. You can see Sir Olivier's comments on the sidebar if you haven't already.

And now, an issue I've been wrestling with - designing and working with monsters. In honor of the upcoming Grand Tome of Adversaries, I’ll talk about the three archetypes for monsters that Stephen King talked about in Danse Macabre. According to King, monsters generally fall into one of three categories: The Vampire. The Werewolf. The Thing.

The Vampire



The vampire archetype of monster is basically the monster that can pass for a human. Part of what makes the vampire of myth and legend so frightening is that it is a creature that can appear as a friend, loved one, or seducer. This is evokes the classic terror of making the familiar unfamiliar. The idea that your very best friend or loved one could be a monster is quite disturbing to us.

Hannibal Lecter is a sort of a vampire. On the one hand, he’s very urbane and intellectual. On the other hand, he’s a killer and cannibal. In fact, with Lecter’s preference for flesh, he’s not very far removed from the vampire at all, which drinks blood instead of eating flesh to survive. In the same way, Lecter eats people for his own survival. Not the physical survival of his body, but for his own psychological survival, because it’s his deep psychosis which drives him to do these deeds.

Moreover, most serial killers in books and movies nowadays are really vampire archetypes, updated for modern tastes. Like the vampires of old, these modern monsters stalk the streets, looking to prey on victims. And what makes them so terrible is that they could be the friendly neighbor next door. There’s also the added fear that serial killers are real, while vampires are part of the realm of myth.

Interestingly enough, in Silence of the Lambs we almost want to like and respect Lecter, despite his sinister nature. This leads me to my next point, which is that vampire-archetype monsters often lead people to twisted power fantasies. It’s fun to read The Vampire Lestat or play the Vampire RPG because it’s fun to the be the bad guy. And it’s even more fun to play a bad guy that is at least somehow familiar to us. Something we can at least understand on some level.

The Werewolf



The werewolf monster is a creature in horror fiction which is tortured in some way. It can’t really help being what it is. But we, as society, can’t allow it to live, either.

There are numerous legends and tales about this sort of horror. The story of the Wampas Mask is a classic story of someone who has to essentially trade in their humanity to save their community. To save her community from a terrible monster, a woman has to don a mask that will frighten the people away, but it makes her an outcast to her society, for the mask turns her into a monster as well. The reason the story resonates with us, is that we recognize that tragic choice of having to choose between our own well-being and that of others.

Werewolf stories are not just horrific, but gut-wrenching. They usually involve the theme of looking too far into the Abyss and becoming what you fear the most. A great example of this would be Edgar Alan Poe’s The Black Cat. In this classic horror tale, the narrator increasingly becomes deranged, eventually harming his beloved pets and then murdering his wife. The slow transition of normal man into a creature of madness is truly terrifying for a profound reason. Basically, the werewolf story teaches us that within all of us there lies a beast, and that this evil can be awakened within each of us.

Side Note: I think that the most poignant moment of the film 28 Days Later is when the main character has to surrender his own humanity in order to defeat the soliders, who sort of fit into the vampire category. After all, the soliders invite the main characters into their home, feed them and offer them shelter, only to turn the tables and prey on their guests in the end.

The Thing



The final creature archetype is the Thing. The thing is a horror archetype that represents the unknowable Other. It represents that part of ourselves and the world that is mysterious and unknown.

Ripley’s Alien is a classic example of the thing archetype. We’re not exactly sure where the Alien comes from, or what it’s purpose is. We’re not sure if the Aliens are intelligent or animalistic. We’re not entirely sure what their motives are.

With the thing archetype, the creature is almost a force of nature. It cannot be reasoned with or bargained with. Unlike the vampire or werewolf, the thing cannot be empathized with. Indeed, the thing is so terrifying precisely because we cannot understand it. It is the manifestation of the fear of the unknown in a walking, crawling, or flying form.

A New Archetype?
That leads me to the zombie. The zombie is a curious monsters archetype to me. At first glance, the zombie really fits the thing archetype. You can’t reason with zombies. You can bargain with them. And even if you explain them with a virus or something like that, there is a definite mystery about them. Their very inhumanity makes them unknowable and horrifying.

However, tied up in this archetype of the thing is the archetype of the werewolf. There is the terrible fear in the zombie story of becoming a zombie – becoming the very thing you fear the most. So I’ll give zombies their own special category.

Maybe I’ll talk about that next.

Final Note
I think many monster can be different archetypes depending upon how they are view. The classic Grendel monster from Beowulf would certainly fit into the "thing" category. However, recent fiction about the creature casts him in the "werewolf" like. It's not about what the monster is or is not. It's about how the story is told.

All for now.

Elements of Colonial Horror

I was writing some notes down for the new book I'm working on and I came up with some themes that often appear in Colonial Horror. These things are not absolutes. Nor must they appear each and every time for something to be considered Colonial Horror.

After all, as the Horror Writer's Association says: Horror is really about a feeling or a sensation.

And that's what it boils down to. Colonial Horror has a particular flavor and taste. But I figure we can always look in the stew and try to see what the ingredients are. So here's what I found in my spoonful.

A Superstitious Setting
For me, one of the key elements of Colonial Horror is the fact that the setting is not based in a world of science, but instead based in a world of the supernatural. As I sit here and think about it, some of my favorite horror stories and films have their roots here.

For example, the film The Serpent and the Rainbow is one set against a superstitious backdrop, where the old rules of science and reason don't apply and are replaced by the rules of mysticism. I guess this conceit really intrigues me, because it is something that is very difficult for us in the modern world to conceptualize. Science is deeply rooted into our society.

In a superstitious setting, there are certainly rules, just like there are laws in a setting governed by science. For example, if it's known that pouring salt around your house will protect you from evil spirits, then generally those sorts if things will work.

It's playing with those unique and interesting rules that makes the setting fun. It's like going back to your childhood, when the monsters couldn't get you if you had a blanket over your head. Or the thing under the bed couldn't grab you as long as you didn't put your foot down on the floor. This sort of strange superstitious rule-making and logic is really fun to play with in terms of story and roleplaying games.

An Unfriendly Wilderness
In a Colonial Horror game, the wilderness is a source of mystery and fear. Its depths are unknown. The wilderness may as well be endless as far as any of the characters are concerned. And the wilderness hides untold secrets.

That's not the say that the wilderness in a Colonial Horror game is the enemy. Just like any aspect of nature, the wilderness in a Colonial Horror game doesn't really work actively against the characters, but it doesn't really help out either. Yet, it remains an obstacle to overcome.

Think about how the wilderness is portrayed in the The Village. In that movie, the wilderness is a great barrier that separates the village from the "towns" which are always portrayed in a bad light. While the wilderness certainly hinders the main character, it hinders the antagonist of the movie as well.

Think also about the wilderness in the Solomon Kane stories. The wilderness in those stories hides vast civilizations that have been long lost to history. It keeps unspeakable creatures hidden. But all of this is not intentional - rather these wicked civilizations and creatures merely use the wilderness as their hiding spot.

Strangers in a Strange Land
Now there's one problem with everything I've said so far. A superstitious setting? Unfriendly wilderness? That's something you could find in Ravenloft, a Fantasy Horror setting. You could also find this in a Medieval Horror setting, like Vampire: The Dark Ages.

So there's one thing that Colonial Horror has that these other two paradigms do not - Colonial Horror, by and large, is from the perspective of the colonists. So another one of the tensions in Colonial Horror is the idea that the main characters are unfamiliar with the world in which they are in. They are outsiders.

That doesn't necessarily mean that Colonial Horror can only take place in colonies, either. Solomon Kane often visits distant jungles or barren deserts - lands that he is certainly unfamiliar with, but he is not a colonist to these places.

That brings up an interesting question, can you have a Colonial Horror game or story with all Native American characters? Certainly. Just as long as you have the problem of dealing with a culture or place that you not familiar with. For example, what if the Native American characters have to deal with a vampire that has moved into the area and lives in the nearby Dutch village? Now, the Native Americans have to possibly travel into the Dutch village and deal with these strange people and their strange customs.

Guidelines, Not Rules
I'll say it again: Everything I've outlined above is, of course, not an absolute. You could easily have a Colonial Horror game set in London, far away from the wilderness and any strange lands...just as long as those themes appearing your campaign or story at some point.

However, if your story or campaign takes place entirely in London, and you never deal with the wilderness or the strangeness of another culture, then I might argue that that sort of game is not Colonial Horror.

But maybe it is. Maybe you've managed to make it feel like Colonial Horror without the wilderness or strangers in a strange land. If you do, let me know, and tell me about it. I'd like to hear what you have to say.

All for now.