Scary Things

 By Thomas Kies

Halloween is tomorrow so you know I’ve got to talk about scary things.  Things that go bump in the night.  Sounds in the attic, doors that open and close by themselves, children laughing in the darkness…where there are no children.

Things that make the hair on the back of your neck bristle and wake you up in the middle of the night. 

I cut our cable service years ago.  We still get our internet through that same company because they have a monopoly in our market and that’s REALLY scary.  Those bloodsucking ghouls raise the price every six months or so.  Why?  Because they can. 

So, we have a Roku stick and we stream everything.  Since the beginning of October, all the streaming services have been serving up a panoply of horror movies.  Some are classics, like Exorcist, Night of the Living Dead, Alien, Rosemary’s Baby, the Shining, Carrie, Halloween, and Nosferatu. 

I’ve been watching some newer horror that includes a limited series on Netflix called the Fall of the House of Usher. It’s an interesting blend of Succession and King Lear with a mashup of many of the works of Edgar Allan Poe.  

Why do we love scary movies, television shows, and books so much?  When faced with danger, we experience the “fight or flight” response, an autonomic physiological reaction to being exposed to something that is perceived as being stressful or frightening.  It’s a dose of adrenaline. It’s a rush.  It’s exciting if you know the danger isn’t real.  

There’s a safety net. If it becomes too much for you, you know that you can leave the theater, turn off the television or change the channel, or you can close the book.  

Part of the allure of scary films and literature is human curiosity.  We want to know what lurks in that cave, the basement, the attic, or the abandoned insane asylum. We want to follow a character as he or she goes somewhere that you’re secretly shouting in your head, “Don’t go down there, you fool!.  Damn, you’re too stupid to live.”

But we can go down there, because we know it’s not real.  Or is it?

Since this is a writing blog, let me give you some of my favorite scary books:

Of course, there’s nobody who writes horror the way Stephen King does.  And it’s difficult to just name a couple of his novels but my favorites are It, the Stand, and Salem’s Lot.  That last book?  After reading it, I couldn’t go into our basement for months.  Shudder.

Interview with a Vampire by Anne Rice, a modern classic.  It was a brilliant slant on the overwritten vampire trope. 

Speaking of which, the original and still the best—Dracula by Bram Stoker.  Sheer Gothic terror that’s been written, rewritten, and retold innumerable times.  But the best is still the original. 

The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty.  Sure, you’ve seen the movie, and yes, it’s one of the most frightening films of all time.  But scarier still?  Read the novel. 

Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury.  Two young boys meet the malevolent Mr. Dark at a carnival.  This was more significant for me because one of my jobs when I was in college was working as a carnie.  Scary, weird, and ironically comical.  Someday I may incorporate all of that into my own book. 

By the way, another excellent book set in a carnival is Stephen King’s Joyland.  The blurb on the cover reads, “Who dares enter the Funhouse of Fear?”

Who indeed? Happy Halloween everyone!  www.thomaskiesauthor.com

October: Time for Scary Stuff

We’ve just flipped the page on the calendar to October.  Definitely one of my favorite months, it’s the time when the air turns cool and crisp, leaves on the trees magically transform into brilliant bursts of color, and football is in full swing.

Pumpkin spice lattes?  I might do one.  Only one.

October is also the month of Halloween, the time when nearly all the streaming services are showing horror flicks.  What is it about horror that we love so much? 

My theory is it’s like being on a really scary rollercoaster ride.  When you get to the top of the first rise and you’re just about to hit that precarious drop, your heart is pumping, your palms are sweaty, and there’s a scream in your throat you know you’ll be helpless to stop. In short, it’s terrifying and exhilarating, but in the end, you know you’ll be safe. 

We like sitting in a darkened theater to watch a scary movie or cracking open a horror novel if in the end we know it’s all going to be okay.

As close to a horror novel that I’ve written was Graveyard Bay. It’s the darkest of the Geneva Chase Mystery Series.  It’s the book that when I asked my neighbor if he enjoyed reading it, he looked away and muttered, “The ending gave me nightmares.”

What book or movie has stayed with you for a long time or scared you silly?

For me, there have been quite a few.  As I was growing up, I binged on weekend horror flicks like the nineteen-thirties version of Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein, Dracula, and Wolfman. Back in the sixties, Aurora manufactured plastic model kits based on the old movie monsters.  After I’d put those bad boys together and painted them for my bedroom, I decided to read the old classics.  

Dracula by Bram Stoker had some similarities to the movie, but it was much scarier to read.  Frankenstein or The Modern Prometheus by Mary Shelly is a much different story than the movie starring Boris Karloff and I really enjoyed it.

Then I went through my H.P. Lovecraft phase.  It doesn’t get much darker than his Cthulhu Mythos.

My thirst for horror had taken root.  As I grew older, I read the likes of The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty.  That was pretty scary book, but the movie frightened the living hell out of me.  It was one time when the film was scarier than the book.

The book that gave me nightmares, however, was Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot. It scared me so much I hated going down into the basement for any reason for years.  His book The Stand comes in a close second.  

And of course, since then I’ve read many of Mr. King’s novels as well as such horror writers as Peter Straub, Clive Barker, Dean Koontz, and Anne Rice.  

Just a quick aside, did you know that in addition to horror novels, Anne Rice wrote erotica under the names of Ann Rampling and A.N. Roquelaure? BDSM erotica...written years ahead of Fifty Shades of Gray.

So, I’m going to pour a glass of wine, pop some popcorn, and get ready to binge on some horror before Halloween gets here.  What are your favorites?

Resolving to Write Every Single Day!

Since the beginning of December, I haven’t been on a deadline and have fallen into a very bad habit.  I’m not sitting down and writing every day.

Whenever I offer a workshop or give a talk to a group of readers and aspiring writers, I’m asked for my advice.  I always tell them, no matter what- write something every day.  Even if it’s a single sentence.

Write something every single day.

But how much should you write?

There’s no good answer to that, but let’s break it down in a quasi-scientific manner.  Most novels are between 70,000 and 100,000 words.  If we average that out to 85,000 words and we write 1000 words a day, you could write a novel in 85 days.  That’s under three months.


But that’s not counting revisions, false starts, or tossing your first, second, and third draft into the fireplace.

Michael Crichton, who passed away in 2008, wrote 28 novels, some under his own name and some under a pen name.  Author of books like Jurassic Park, The Andromeda Strain, and The Great Train Robbery, Crichton was extremely prolific, writing up to 10,000 words a day.  He said, “Books aren’t written, they’re rewritten.  It is one of the hardest things to accept, especially after the seventh rewrite hasn’t quite done it.”

Anne Rice is the author of an eclectic mix of gothic horror, Christian literature, and erotica. Best known for her book Interview with a Vampire, she knocks out about 3,000 words a day.  In her words, “I have to get all the distractions out of the way. I plunge into the work and write an episode; I can’t just clock in at 3,000 words.  I have to have time free to resolve things.  I write in episodic ways.  But when I’m ready to plunge in, I write from late morning through all afternoon, all evening.”

Arthur Conan Doyle, the grand master of mysteries and the author of the iconic Sherlock Holmes stories, wrote 3,000 words a day.  He said, “Anything is better than stagnation.”

Lee Child who pens the Jack Reacher novels writes about 1,800 words a day.  “I write in the afternoon, from about 12 until about 6 or 7,” he said.  “I use an upstairs room as my office.  Once I get going, I keep at it, and it usually takes about six months from the first blank screen until the end.”

Here are a few of my suggestions for reaching a word goal.

1) Work in a location in which you are comfortable.  Much like Lee Child, I have an office in a small room over the garage.  I’m near enough to a window that I can see if it’s raining but it’s not a distraction.  I have access to the internet in case I need to do some research, but I try not to overdo it. When I’m writing, I usually have some low ambient music in the background.

2) Limit internet usage.  It is a killer of time.  Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, news websites, and kitty videos are addicting and rob you of your productivity.

3) Find the time of day that you are the most productive.  Most writers find that they can get into a writing rhythm during a certain time of day.  Whenever it is, make sure it’s devoid of distractions.  For me it’s about 1 in the afternoon until about 5.

4) Don’t write boring stuff. If you can’t stay excited about your work, readers won’t either.

5) Don’t be afraid.  A bad first draft is better than no draft at all.  Keep in mind, that unlike in real life, you can go back and change a scene, or make dialogue sharper and wittier.

Shifting gears for just a moment, let’s talk about New Year’s resolutions.  Mine are the same as last year, with one important addition!

1) A healthier diet…more salads, less carbs, less sugar…which means less wine. Well, we all know how that resolution is going to end up.

2) Exercise more often. Carve out time for a long walk or the stationary bike.

3) Don’t be afraid of my first draft. I have to remember that a bad first draft is better than no draft at all.  Wait a minute, didn’t I already say that?

4) Read more. I’m a voracious news junkie, but I find when I’m writing, I can’t seem to find time to read books.  That should be every bit as important as time for writing.

5) Cut back…way back…on the internet. That is a time KILLER.

6) Learn to relax, take a deep breath, look around and appreciate life.

The addition?  Write. Every. Single.  Day.

Happy New Year!