Dylan Charles's Blog, page 17

31 Days of Spoooktacular: A Repeat

I’m copping out tonight. Not for any real reason, except that maybe I don’t want to put you through some half-assed attempt at something. Instead I’ll just pull something out of the long ago for you to read. There are two reasons why this entry might seem familiar:

A) You’ve been reading my blog for over a year. Good for you.

B) You bought my book of horror short stories for less than a dollar and recognize the Introduction. Even better for you!

I hope you enjoy reading it, if you haven’t alread...

31 Days of Spoooktacular: The Halfway Point

It is now the 16th of October and the halfway point, or a little over the halfway point. 31 doesn’t really split equally very well.

I’m torn with how this is turning out. It’s really hard to write non-stop about one subject for 31 days and keep it interesting for both myself and the people reading. I kind of gave up on that a long time ago. It’s kind of like how NANWRIMO isn’t about writing a good novel, it’s just about writing a novel.

I’m trying to build some good habits here by writing every...

31 Days of Spoooktacular: Reflection

I’m still reeling a bit from the convention yesterday. I’m not a person that really likes big crowds of people and I don’t like big crowds of exuberant people. So yesterday was a bit overwhelming.

But, as I mentioned briefly in my last blog entry yesterday, there is somethinginvigoratingabout being surrounded by a bunch of people who are doing what you want to be doing, who are enjoying what you enjoy. I write, on occasion, horror, but I surround myself with the things I like and the things I’...

31 Days of Spoooktacular: Rock and Shock (The Event)

I keep trying to condense all of this into one picture or thought that encompasses the entire event, but it’s just not possible.

There are the celebrities. The few we actually talked to were absurdly nice and patient with our mumbling and limp handshakes.

All around me, I see adulation for a genre that gets very little love outside of a small subset of fans. From modern horror to the old classics: everyone is here to share in their love of being scared.

It’s the feeling of being with a bunch o...

31 Days of Spoooktacular: Rock and Shock

I made it. -D-

31 Days of Spoooktacular: Rock and Shock (The Trip)

We’re taking the train to the convention and so far, there have been enough oddities too warrant a mini entry.

The moment we boarded the train, an older woman stood up and shouted, “Oh God, is this Worcester?” The confused young man standing next to her assured her we had not reached the last stop on the train, but only a mile out from Boston.

We were also surrounded by old men wearing pins that said “train enthusiast”. Some had walkie-talkies queued to the train’s radio and it was from them we...

31 Days of Spoooktacular: Rock and Shock (Prelude)

So here’s the plan; I’m going to try and post small entries throughout the day from Rock and Shock. Hopefully there’ll be pictures and commentary and at least one story of me running from a crowd while Yacketty Sax plays.

I’m terrible at live blogging, but we’ll see how this goes. At the very least, keep an eye on my twitter, because I do update that.

I’m pretty excited.

-D-

31 Days of Spoooktacular: Harvest Season

Sometimes, it’s important to take a break from Halloween in the middle of the season and remember that Fall is great for other reasons as well.

When I was a kid, we used to head up to my grandparent’s house in Virginia in the Fall to pick the apples in their small orchard. My dad would climb into the trees and shake them as hard as he could and the apples would rain down. We’d gather them up and sort them out, the bruised and abused apples being set aside for cider.

The cider making was really...

31 Days of Spoooktacular: Even a Man Who Is Pure in Heart

For 31 Days of Spoooktacular, I wanted to do the occasional spotlight on the monsters that have formed the deep and gristly backbone of pop culture. Through a society’s monsters, you can tell a lot about that society. What scares us, helps to define us. It is no coincidence that, in the wake of World War II and the Emergence of the Atom Bomb, atomic horrors plagued our silver screen.

More telling, is the changes we made to old legends.

The werewolf, in the olde days, in the olde country, was a...

31 Days of Spoooktacular: Rock and Shock (The Prequel)

I know I’ve already talked about this once already, but I cannot stress enough how excited I am about Rock and Shock. Pinhead and Michael Myers and Jason and Candyman are all going to be in the same room together at the same time. And I will do my best not to call them that to their faces.

It’ll also be interesting to be in a place where I’m not the biggest horror freak. There be hundreds of other people there, all of them either on my level or more so. I will blend in and fit in with the crow...