Why Writing Horror is Scary
I was lucky enough to be a guest poster on Musa Publishing's blog for the Young Adult novelists, called Euterpe. I told the story of how my latest release, middle grade horror story, The Detention Demon, came to be. You may not have read it, so I'd like to share it here.
WhyWriting Horror is Scary by SamanthaCombs
When I was a young girl, I was a fanatic reader. I had books piled up in my bedroom, jammed inmy backpack and even crammed in my purse (small paperbacks can be stuffed in;you don't really need a wallet at fourteen.) I think now it's a good thing my parents didn't pay a lot of attentionto what I was reading…..I think they might have been fairly freaked out. The Oh-My-God-Maybe-She-Needs-A-Psychiatristkind of freaked out. Because I wasn'treading what you might think a young girl was reading. No siree.
I had no time for anyone from anywhere called Sweet ValleyHigh. I loved those True DetectiveMagazines with the gory story about how the woman was attacked. I read Go Ask Alice, a wrenching story abouta teenage runaway. I devoured anythingby Robert A. Heinlen and even though I pretended to be as bored as my peerswith the reading selections from my English classes, secretly, I was in heaven. I pounced on Animal Farm and SlaughterhouseFive and I, Robot. I cruised sections ofthe school library that l am now certain was never frequented by the studentbody. Maybe, you're getting it now…..Ihad, um, different tastes.
When I wrote stories, everyone always died. Horribly. Without limbs. And I gotolder. I developed an all-consumingfascination for true crime as well, worshipping at the literary feet of veteranstory spinners like Ann Rule. I readabout Bundy and the Green River killer and Son of Sam. Then I found and tore through Wes Craven and MichaelCrichton. And then one amazing,wonderful, life-changing day, I stumbled across a book at a yard sale calledNight Shift.
A collection of short horror stories, I couldn't put the book downfor hours, and I couldn't sleep with the night off for days. I scrambled to get everything on this writer,this Stephen King. I became one of thefollowers, the faithful. No one couldwrite like him, ever, I thought. But,Man, I sure wanted to.
I tried my hand at horror. I sucked. I look at my efforts from then now and I'm embarrassed. I knew NOTHING about writing suspense anddrama and tension. But I found I could write a story that someone besides my Mum would read. And I got older.
A lot older. Like marriage,husband, homes and children older. So Ishelved the horror and wrote little stories for the kids. Then one day two years ago, a little storybecame a little novella, which became a novel, which became a Young Adultparanormal series. I was proud of it,and prouder still when it published. Andeven more when it won an award! But Iwanted to do more. I wanted to writehorror. And I wanted it to be in my ownwriting style, not anyone else's. Nomatter how much I worshipped them.
So I wrote one or two stories and let them marinate, to see howthey might taste after a while. Theytasted good. I wrote a couple more andthen I my Muse made her appearance. Icall her Musina.
My son had been given detention at school for an infraction andcarried on so much about it, I wondered what could be wrong with the teacher. Musina planted a seed. I wondered what would happen if there was something wrong with him. I asked my son what he thought about it andhe, wise sage that he is, said, Hey Mommy, maybe boys would like it enough tokeep reading. Wouldn't that be cool, Mommy? Musina and I got busy and just like that, The Detention Demon was born.
But I was worried. Howwould a horror story aimed at young boys go over? There are so few "boycentric" books outthere, if I wrote a bad one, it would really stand out. And anyway, wasn't R.L.Stine already doingit? But once again, Musina set mestraight. No, he didn't have a monopolyon the genre, she said. You writewhatever you want. It'll be great. And if only one boy gets the reading bug, wouldn'tthat be worth it? So I did. And shock of all shocks, a publisher likedit. I was scheduled for a release date!
Then the nagging feeling came back. What if I couldn't write horror? What if I wasn't scary enough? I had to test run something. So I packaged my short horror storiestogether in an anthology, self-published it and held my breath.
Ready for the shocker? Theyliked it! They actually liked it alot! So, now I am back to holding mybreath. The Detention Demon releasedtoday and I'm waiting to exhale. I hopeyou enjoy it and even more, I hope you give it to your son and I hope he justthinks…..it's cool.
A raggedy group of delinquents, thrown together by circumstance,get the opportunity to prove if rumors about the detention teacher being lessthan human are true and discover it doesn't take years of friendship to bondtogether and overcome evil.
Wayne is a Junior High school boy who just got detention forfighting in school to protect his longtime best friend, Gumby. But recently,there have been stories about detention. Kids have mysteriouslydisappeared, creating creepy rumors about detention class. Now, Wayne findshimself trapped in there with school bully Bubba Dugan. Keeping hisdistance from Bubba won't be Wayne's only problem. In fact, those rumorsabout the detention teacher don't seem like stories at all.With his best friend Gumby, a crew of delinquents and asurprising late addition, a pretty cheerleader harboring a secret crush, Wayneand his group of misfits will have to band together to outwit the detentionteacher. He's protected his best friend from harm his whole life…..but,can he protect him and everyone else against something that might not even behuman?About the Author: SamanthaCombs is the Global Ebook Award-winning author of Spellbound, and book two inthe series, Everspell. An additional YA ghost story, Ghostly is her thirdpublication, as well as a short horror story collection, Teeth and Talons, AHorror Anthology, her fourth. She writes for Astraea Press and MusaPublishing and for the sheer love of it. Following the release of TheDetention Demon, her fifth published book, look for Waterdancer, a new YAparanormal from Musa Publishing coming in September of 2012.
CONNECT WITH ME!Fan Page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Samantha-Combs-Fan-Page/205186202866933Email: samanthacombswrites@gmail.comBlog: http://www.samanthacombswrites.blogspot.comTwitter: http://www.twitter.com/samanthacombs1WRITE, PUBLISH, AND BE INFORMED!
WhyWriting Horror is Scary by SamanthaCombs
When I was a young girl, I was a fanatic reader. I had books piled up in my bedroom, jammed inmy backpack and even crammed in my purse (small paperbacks can be stuffed in;you don't really need a wallet at fourteen.) I think now it's a good thing my parents didn't pay a lot of attentionto what I was reading…..I think they might have been fairly freaked out. The Oh-My-God-Maybe-She-Needs-A-Psychiatristkind of freaked out. Because I wasn'treading what you might think a young girl was reading. No siree.
I had no time for anyone from anywhere called Sweet ValleyHigh. I loved those True DetectiveMagazines with the gory story about how the woman was attacked. I read Go Ask Alice, a wrenching story abouta teenage runaway. I devoured anythingby Robert A. Heinlen and even though I pretended to be as bored as my peerswith the reading selections from my English classes, secretly, I was in heaven. I pounced on Animal Farm and SlaughterhouseFive and I, Robot. I cruised sections ofthe school library that l am now certain was never frequented by the studentbody. Maybe, you're getting it now…..Ihad, um, different tastes.
When I wrote stories, everyone always died. Horribly. Without limbs. And I gotolder. I developed an all-consumingfascination for true crime as well, worshipping at the literary feet of veteranstory spinners like Ann Rule. I readabout Bundy and the Green River killer and Son of Sam. Then I found and tore through Wes Craven and MichaelCrichton. And then one amazing,wonderful, life-changing day, I stumbled across a book at a yard sale calledNight Shift.
A collection of short horror stories, I couldn't put the book downfor hours, and I couldn't sleep with the night off for days. I scrambled to get everything on this writer,this Stephen King. I became one of thefollowers, the faithful. No one couldwrite like him, ever, I thought. But,Man, I sure wanted to.
I tried my hand at horror. I sucked. I look at my efforts from then now and I'm embarrassed. I knew NOTHING about writing suspense anddrama and tension. But I found I could write a story that someone besides my Mum would read. And I got older.
A lot older. Like marriage,husband, homes and children older. So Ishelved the horror and wrote little stories for the kids. Then one day two years ago, a little storybecame a little novella, which became a novel, which became a Young Adultparanormal series. I was proud of it,and prouder still when it published. Andeven more when it won an award! But Iwanted to do more. I wanted to writehorror. And I wanted it to be in my ownwriting style, not anyone else's. Nomatter how much I worshipped them.
So I wrote one or two stories and let them marinate, to see howthey might taste after a while. Theytasted good. I wrote a couple more andthen I my Muse made her appearance. Icall her Musina.
My son had been given detention at school for an infraction andcarried on so much about it, I wondered what could be wrong with the teacher. Musina planted a seed. I wondered what would happen if there was something wrong with him. I asked my son what he thought about it andhe, wise sage that he is, said, Hey Mommy, maybe boys would like it enough tokeep reading. Wouldn't that be cool, Mommy? Musina and I got busy and just like that, The Detention Demon was born.
But I was worried. Howwould a horror story aimed at young boys go over? There are so few "boycentric" books outthere, if I wrote a bad one, it would really stand out. And anyway, wasn't R.L.Stine already doingit? But once again, Musina set mestraight. No, he didn't have a monopolyon the genre, she said. You writewhatever you want. It'll be great. And if only one boy gets the reading bug, wouldn'tthat be worth it? So I did. And shock of all shocks, a publisher likedit. I was scheduled for a release date!
Then the nagging feeling came back. What if I couldn't write horror? What if I wasn't scary enough? I had to test run something. So I packaged my short horror storiestogether in an anthology, self-published it and held my breath.
Ready for the shocker? Theyliked it! They actually liked it alot! So, now I am back to holding mybreath. The Detention Demon releasedtoday and I'm waiting to exhale. I hopeyou enjoy it and even more, I hope you give it to your son and I hope he justthinks…..it's cool.
A raggedy group of delinquents, thrown together by circumstance,get the opportunity to prove if rumors about the detention teacher being lessthan human are true and discover it doesn't take years of friendship to bondtogether and overcome evil.
Wayne is a Junior High school boy who just got detention forfighting in school to protect his longtime best friend, Gumby. But recently,there have been stories about detention. Kids have mysteriouslydisappeared, creating creepy rumors about detention class. Now, Wayne findshimself trapped in there with school bully Bubba Dugan. Keeping hisdistance from Bubba won't be Wayne's only problem. In fact, those rumorsabout the detention teacher don't seem like stories at all.With his best friend Gumby, a crew of delinquents and asurprising late addition, a pretty cheerleader harboring a secret crush, Wayneand his group of misfits will have to band together to outwit the detentionteacher. He's protected his best friend from harm his whole life…..but,can he protect him and everyone else against something that might not even behuman?About the Author: SamanthaCombs is the Global Ebook Award-winning author of Spellbound, and book two inthe series, Everspell. An additional YA ghost story, Ghostly is her thirdpublication, as well as a short horror story collection, Teeth and Talons, AHorror Anthology, her fourth. She writes for Astraea Press and MusaPublishing and for the sheer love of it. Following the release of TheDetention Demon, her fifth published book, look for Waterdancer, a new YAparanormal from Musa Publishing coming in September of 2012.
CONNECT WITH ME!Fan Page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Samantha-Combs-Fan-Page/205186202866933Email: samanthacombswrites@gmail.comBlog: http://www.samanthacombswrites.blogspot.comTwitter: http://www.twitter.com/samanthacombs1WRITE, PUBLISH, AND BE INFORMED!
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