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One of my biggest struggles as an emerging writer was understanding the concept of a scene and how it differed from the overall events of the book. After all, if I plotted the beats* in my novel, wouldn’t each scene naturally fall into place?
Short answer: No.
If you rely only on your outline to establish the overall arc of your story, you’ll end up with a lot of transition… read more
The year 2022 was a banner year for retellings of classic stories, fairy tales, and myths, and it doesn’t show any signs of stopping. Recent and upcoming examples include Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s The Daughter of Doctor Moreau (a riff on The Island of Doctor Moreau), Nghi Vo’s The Chosen and the Beautiful (a fantasy remix of the The Great Gatsby), and Mary McMyne’s The… read more
When working in the subgenre of cosmic fiction, it is critical to remember that the atmosphere of creeping dread is key.
Real-world issues such as climate change, racial violence, and political upheaval work well in the realm of Lovecraftian horror.
It is the sensation of fear centered on the unknowable that creates this existential panic and madness experienced by characters who… read more
In 1921, American author Howard Phillips Lovecraft began publishing the first of his stories in what would later be collectively coined the Cthulhu mythos. Heavily influenced by the tradition of Gothic horror, H. P. Lovecraft found inspiration in the work of such esteemed authors as Edgar Allan Poe, Algernon Blackwood, Bram Stoker, Robert W. Chambers, and Arthur Machen. However, Lovecraft’s… read more
Once safely past the harvest season, winter begins, bringing with it a storytelling season that begins in November and runs through the end of the year. The Victorians especially delighted in the tradition of telling spooky tales during the darkest nights of the year, a custom that reaches back hundreds of years. After all, Shakespeare reminds us, “A sad tale’s best for winter” (The… read more
Storytellers today are indebted to early scholars who wrote down local stories and preserved them for future audiences. Without these records, many of our most loved stories would have been lost and forgotten.
Through the years, these traditional tales have inspired countless authors, and their structure and themes offer a wealth of ideas for a myriad of story genres and formats.… read more
As a genre, horror is deeply rooted in the traditions of Gothic literature. These tales express haunting reminders that there is no escape from the past. They contain a creeping sense of dread that is magnified through setting, one of the hallmarks of the subgenre.
Named after the European, medieval architectural style (characterized by cavernous spaces dominated by vaulted ceilings,… read more
The presence of pumpkin spice, fall color, and lengthening shadows heralds the holiday season. Spectacle soon follows with creepy costumes, jack-o’-lanterns, and haunted attractions. It is the beginning and the end, that dreaded time when the dead walk among the living. After all, there’s a reason one of the most successful slasher film franchises in history is named after a day that… read more
Horror belongs under a speculative fiction umbrella that also includes fantasy and science fiction, and while horror is identified by its ability to create intense feelings of terror, shock, or disgust in the audience, the genre’s aesthetic often infiltrates its sister genres.
These crossovers—such as dark fantasy and sci-fi horror—have joined the speculative fiction ranks of subgenres… read more
