Category Archives: Genres

What makes romance interesting? If you don’t read romance novels (like me), then you might answer, “Nothing.” But such a pat answer would be a little disingenuous. Personal preference aside, romance is the best-selling fiction genre by far. By far. If you don’t believe me, then just take a quick jaunt over here. Seventy-five million people read at least one romance novel in 2008 and the genre generated nearly three billion dollars in sales in the last two years. Yikes. Anyway, who am I to argue with seventy-five million fellow readers? That’s a fight I can’t win.

You could argue that it’s almost impossible to write a compelling narrative with no trace of romance in it. Even if it were possible, though, you’d be missing out on a massive storehouse of dramatic potential. Interpersonal relationships drive stories, and that’s a fact; romantic interpersonal relationships, by virtue of being the most complicated and emotional type of relationship, drive the most complicated and emotional stories. I know those are some broad statements, but they’re generally true.

So again I’ll ask, what makes romance interesting? What makes it compelling? “The love,” you might say, reductively. That would be true. Kind of. The conflict—the fireworks—doesn’t come from love, per se, as feelings of love are symptomatic of the true root cause of all this interest: intimacy. People really get off on intimacy.

Now, bear in mind that love and intimacy aren’t quite the same thing, though they are certainly close cousins. Love comes from intimacy, as I just alluded to, and the two aren’t mutually exclusive. Which is why, to cite a popular example, you can have sex (highly intimate) without love. This is largely the difference, I suppose, between romance and a lot of erotica.

Intimacy is about closeness. When I fall in love with another person, I let them into my life, sharing aspects of myself with them; they, in turn, share aspects of themselves with me. Our lives merge, at first slowly, and then in more significant ways as the relationship develops. Two—or more, if you swing that way—become one. By absolutely zero coincidence, sex is a wonderful metaphor for this process, which is why it’s intimate.

If closeness generates intimacy, then outright control does the same. Instead of merging your life with another person, you allow another person to take over your life. To control you, to take over your decision-making process. That’s as intimate as it gets. Well-meaning fetishists engage in bondage play all the time, and hopefully they do it temporarily and with some imposed structures. Beyond that, intimacy can go to some really dark places. A lot of crimes revolve around the perverted need for intimate control—rape and kidnapping, to name two—and then finally, the most extreme intimacy of all: murder.

My curiosity was piqued last year, in the darkest and most horrible way, when I stumbled upon some disturbing research while working on a book. As a matter of course, I don’t know that much about various fetishes (and fear not, I’m not going to commit much ink to this), but did you know there is a fetish in which a person can deeply desire another person to murder them, for sexual fulfillment? I even heard of a case from Europe where a person contracted another person to murder them and then cannibalize them; if sex, as a means of physically merging oneself with another, is a metaphor for romantic intimacy, then surely cannibalism is the most extreme metaphor for the intimacy of control.

And thus horror and romance are inextricably linked. Perhaps I’m just naïve, but I’d never heard of any of this before, and frankly I wish I never had.

So yes, people crave intimacy. It’s no longer looking so strange that the romance genre sells so many books. I mean, people are looking for the fulfillment of deep drives and desires which are sometimes hard to fulfill in the real world. Romance in stories—whether in a full-blown romance novel or in the majority of stories which merely contain a romantic element—helps frustrated readers of all stripes come to terms with the state of their own mundane lives.

Horror works the same way, by giving cathartic rise to the dark places inside us all and letting us (or perhaps forcing us to) confront them. Murder specifically—and death in general—is powerful precisely because it touches us in horrifyingly intimate ways. It’s no shock that the best works of fiction combine all these emotions and feelings to get a rise out of us—and understanding these connections can make us all better writers and observers of the human condition.

Having the Self Awareness to Horrify Others

February 20, 2014

Nathan Barra

Craft & Skills Horror Nathan Barra Self-Awareness 1 Comment

I write short stories to experiment with new genres and techniques. Last August, I caught wind of an anthology that was opening for submissions. However, the genre, horror, was largely beyond my experience. I had read a few books, watched a number of movies, and even written a piece or two, but I was still stepping outside my comfort zone. Perfect! I brainstormed, scanning my consciousness for an idea that was shiny enough to start with that I could polish it into a true gem.

My inner eye first turned to the bestiary, drudging up images inspired by the abominations of Lovecraft, the near satirical creatures of B-rated movies and creeping things that I had imagined living in the shadows as a child. I paired monsters with characters, with milieus and with plots, searching for tension and conflict. I worked my way through what felt like dozens of combinations, fleshing out a few, but discarding most. Everything still felt flat, unexciting and unoriginal.

Frustrated, I stood up from my computer and wandered, trying to figure out where I was going wrong. The monsters I was creating were as good as any I had ever read, seen or made up myself. There was nothing inherently wrong with any of the elements I had assembled, and yet, I was not having a strong emotional reaction. How could I expect anyone else to feel when I did not?

As I prefer my horror in the form of movies, I turned to my collection, flipping through the pages of disks, looking for the echo of emotion that the remembrance of a truly good horror inspires. Das Experiment. Mr. Brooks. Untracable. Pathology. Of all my movies, these four psychological thrillers inspired the strongest reactions of anticipation and fear, the same emotions I sought to evoke in my readers.

For me, it was the difference of conscious intent. The creatures I had imagined were beasts, acting on instinct or hunger. The villains I had admired and feared were rational and extremely intelligent, acting for a variety of motives but all with horrifying cruelty and viciousness. It was the actions of humans and the human mind that I feared more than the brutality of beasts.

I spent hours over the following weeks considering what horrified me, coming up with a number of story ideas that I feel are gems in need of polishing. The difference for me was self-awareness. I found that I could not write something truly horrifying to others until I could first horrify myself.

MYST: The Game that Had it All

August 21, 2013

Colette Black

Action & Adventure Colette Black Fantasy Science Fiction The Writing Life No Comments

Long before Portal or Portal 2, there was MYST, played exclusively on the pc. I know Portal can be played in other formats. In fact, it’s probably preferable, but we never got around to graduating our Nintendo any higher than a Wii, so when my kids and I played Portal it was like the old days, on our pc. Watching my son’s fingers pounce around on the little plastic keys brought back memories. As much as I love Portal, especially the cake song at the end, I think MYST was better. It had EVERYTHING, and I think that’s a bit of a writing lesson:

Mystery: No info-dumping in MYST. You start out relatively clueless, with just enough information to draw you in, so you want to know more, and you want to solve the mystery. Most of the game was spent figuring out puzzles, but the goal pulled you on, because you had to find out what had happened in the world and you wanted each clue in order to put the pieces together and reach the end goal.

Point: Our novels need to hook our readers, give a sense of mystery, and excite the passion for discovery in order to pull our readers from one chapter to the next.

Intelligence: MYST wasn’t some Sudoku or Word Find. The puzzles were hard and varied. It stretched my brain. For some people, that made it too much. They couldn’t figure out the solutions and so they gave up. My husband and I used to play the game together in our early married years–it constituted many of our date nights–and, I admit, we cheated a couple of times. But often, the puzzles would use our different skills. I remember one where we had to match the pitches to sounds on some other part of the island we were exploring. My husband figured out the pattern related to the problem, but I identified the sounds to find the right pitch. Good fun.

Point: Challenging our readers intellectually can actually make them more invested in the story, but push it too far and we might lose readers. We need to find the balance that gives us the widest audience.

Setting: Speaking of the puzzles, the music, and the island; the setting for MYST was incredible. Up until that time, at least to my knowledge, there had been nothing that compared. You’d step into a world and every color, line, and shape told you about the new environment. Eerie creaks and groans added to the sense of mystery. Sometimes, I could almost imagine that I smelled certain things, the details were so complete. When I stepped into the game, I stepped into another world.

Point: We need to immerse our readers into the world we create, whether it be contemporary, fantastical, or far-future. The details need to paint such a complete picture that our readers taste, see, and fully experience that sensation of having stepped into another place.

Story: There’s more I could say but I don’t want to make a ten-page long post, so we’ll end with story. In the past, most games I played, I played to win. With MYST, it wasn’t about winning, it was about completing the story, finding the conclusion, and finally understanding how it all came together.

Point: It’s important that we set up our readers expectations right to begin with, so they have some idea of the type of journey they’re undertaking and where it will take them, and then we need to fulfill those expectations with a satisfying conclusion.

The best part: After playing a couple of versions of MYST, I discovered they’d taken the game and turned the whole thing into a series of books. I don’t know if they were widely read, but I loved them. When my oldest son discovered the series, somewhere around 3rd grade (when the school wouldn’t let him read Harry Potter) he jumped to an adult reading level within weeks, all because he fell in love with those books. From that point on he couldn’t be held back. He voraciously read every fantasy book he could get his hands on. MYST not only made an awesome game, it translated well into an interesting book series. That game, had game.

Just as a side note, anybody else think it’s time for some Portal books…and maybe a movie?

Fangs and Facelifts

July 25, 2013

fictorians

Guest Posts Horror Kim May The Writing Life No Comments

A guest post by Kim May.

To some the idea of changing a classic story may be sacrilege. However, there’s nothing wrong with giving a classic a good literary facelift. Take Dracula for instance. This ancient tale has had so many facelifts that it’s become the Joan Rivers of fiction. Really it is. Look at its journey: Eastern European myth and superstition -> Le Fanu’s Carmilla -> Polidori’s The Vampyre -> Bram Stoker’s Dracula -> hundreds of film and stage adaptations (including two musicals) -> NBC’s upcoming TV adaptation.

I could write a book discussing each version but for the sake of time I’ll limit myself to my two favorite film adaptations – The classic 1931 Dracula, starring Bela Lugosi, and the 1979 Dracula, starring the very sexy Frank Langella. Both adaptations were based on Stoker’s novel and while they don’t follow the novel faithfully, they do have all the elements that we associate with the story of Dracula.

Most of the characters from the novel are present. After arriving in England, Dracula wastes no time moving into Carfax Abbey (AKA the Adams family summer home) and turns the damsel’s best friend into his first late night snack (vampires love fourth meal). Van Helsing outs the Count as a vampire, using traditional methods. With the help of the young hero, Van Helsing destroys Dracula’s first British vampire bride, formerly known as the damsel’s best friend (I believe this makes her second life shorter than Bree Tanner’s). Dracula then turns his attention to the damsel, later absconding with her. The hero and Van Helsing pursue and kill Dracula, saving the damsel and the world.

The heroes in both films also employ the traditional countermeasures for vampires – the crucifix, holy water, sacred ground, a wood stake, mirrors, garlic, and wolfsbane – and the trademark line “Children of the night. What (sad) music they make”.

One would think that with so many similarities the films would be almost identical. They’re not. The scriptwriter(s) put their own spin on the story, characters, and the vampire mythos.

For the most part the 1931 film doesn’t stray very far from Stoker’s story. It also portrays gender roles in a very traditional way. The women are demure and meek while the men are the ones who are truly in control. In today’s eyes that sounds terribly chauvinistic but you have to remember that the bra burning feminist movement was a few decades away and the writers primary goal for this film wasn’t to promote equality. It was to frighten the audience. While such stereotypes are a bit disturbing, only the most ardent of feminists would find it terrifying.

The base story is a bit terrifying to begin with because it preys on mankind’s instinctual fear of dangerous creatures that creep in the dark. However, since the previous film adaptation, Nosforatu, relied on that (with successful results) the writers upped the ante. They did this by giving the story a modern (1930s) setting. The actors wore the fashions of the day and many scenes have telephones, electric lamps, and battery operated flashlights in them. While this seems like a small change, it does make the story more relatable.

“What if?” is a powerful question. It increases the tension and gives the audience room to wonder if this was real. Could a vampire actually terrorize the city or turn Sally’s pet bunny into a sanguinarian? Was that rustling sound a leaf on the wind or a vampire sneaking up on them? The audience’s minds work against them and makes every scary moment more powerful.

In contrast, the 1979 film is not designed to scare the audience, though they still made it relatable in another way. In the late 70s there were a higher percentage of college graduates than there were in the 30s so the modern setting trick wasn’t going to be as effective. The various popular re-tellings of Dracula, of which the 1931 film is one, made the public very familiar with the story. So with this in mind, the writers set out to make the vampire mythos logical. When it’s discovered that the crates Dracula shipped from home were filled with soil, his explanation that he has an interesting botany gives the characters reason to believe him to be a normal human rather than one of the undead. The audience still knows the truth of course, but none of the characters look like idiots for believing the lie.

Since the writers didn’t need a modern setting, they placed it at the beginning of the twentieth century – the same time period as Downton Abbey – so it would resonate with fans of the gothic romances that were popular in the 70s. What they updated instead, because the successful women’s rights movement, was the gender roles. The men are still very much in control of the world, but Lucy, our damsel, is an intelligent, assertive, and passionate woman. Despite the best efforts of the men around her, Lucy has no compunction telling them that she is not a victim and is the only one in control of her future.

Speaking of Lucy, her role in the tale is one of the biggest deviations from Stoker’s novel. He wrote Lucy as our fair damsel’s best friend and the first victim of Dracula. However, in this film the roles were flipped with Mina, the damsel, being the friend and victim and the new, improved Lucy being the Count’s love interest.

In keeping with the romantic theme, Dracula was portrayed as the lonely, tragic survivor instead of a monster. This transforms him into a sympathetic character. So instead of cheering Van Helsing and company, we cheer on Dracula and Lucy as they try to escape so they can live together in peace. It’s quite brilliant.

Both of these films successfully updated a classic without losing the charm or the appeal of the original. I’ll even go so far as to say they made the mythos richer as well. So you see, literary nip/tucks can be a good thing.

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Kim May writes sci-fi and fantasy but has been known to pen a gothic poem or two. She works at an independent bookstore and dog/house sits on the side. A native Oregonian, she lives with her geriatric cat, Spud, and spends as much of her free time as she can with family and friends. She recently won The Named Lands Poetry Contest. If you would like to find out what she’s working on, please visit her blog.