I have been reading through a novella called, Gwendy’s Button Box, written by Stephen King and Richard Chizmar, and while I was reading, I started to realize why so many people enjoy the horror genre of novels. I’ve never been a fan of horror movies (I get scared too easy) and it led me to fear approaching the horror genre of novels as well. I didn’t want to read a story that would give me insomnia and have me constantly checking every lock in the house. However, that changed, at white elephant Christmas party last year. As part of the gift exchange, I received the novella as a gift. I had never heard of the book, let alone knew that legendary Stephen King put out novellas.
After I got home, I didn’t pick up the book. Instead, I placed it on my bookshelf, thinking I would probably never get around to reading it, considering my already atrociously high queue of books waiting patiently for me to read, and moved on.
Then, just this month in fact, my lunchtime was filled with boredom and out of curiosity, I thought I’d give the novella a look. Almost instantly, I was captivated. The story moved with expert pace; not too fast to cause confusion, but not too slow to feel like a drag. Short chapters, comfortable pace, compelling opening, everything you need for success.
As of writing this, I have not finished it. Why? It’s not just because I’m a slow reader, but I’ve only had like 10 minutes each day. I get about chapter done each day, but I might take this weekend and finish.
Yet, it’s what I learned why reading it that made me re-evaluate my own approach to writing and how to better improve my story’s tense moments and build a bit of a thrill. I can boil it down to two points: Fear & Pace.
FEAR: NOT AN BAD FOUR-LETTER WORD
Honestly, those two points seem to be the bread and butter of horror and thriller stories. Without fear, you can’t create tension, build suspense, or have your character make the ill-informed decisions that they do. Fear disorients both the character and reader, warps reality, and can bring an almost suffocating experience to the everyone in and around the pages. Fear is a powerful emotion and when you used right, it gives the first part of a successful horror story equation. Well, maybe not the first part.
PACE: KNOW WHEN TO RACE AND WHEN TO SLOW WITH GRACE
The first part of our horror story equation is more reserved for pace. Pacing a story, any story, is important from the get-go. We don’t want a large fantasy epic to be moving at breakneck speed with short sentences and intense drama if we know nothing about the characters. We also don’t want a long winded, two pages on the description of the killer as they plunge a knife in an innocent character’s back. Proper pacing is appropriate spacing. To do that, for horror stories, it’s important to build characters, give us some time with them in the beginning. We need to get comfortable, at least in the beginning. Maybe sprinkle in some subtle foreshadowing of the events to come. Striking the right balance is key to delivering a killer story.
Obviously, there is a lot more to crafting a horror story. Put if you keep these two ingredients in mind, making your next horror story might just be scary easy. Well, I doubt easy, no story is, but I’m not you. You might be the second coming of Stephen King for all I know, pumping out 2,000 words a day or something crazy. If so, your awesome! If not, your still awesome!
Anyways, what do you think is important in a horror story? Am I completely off base on what is important in a horror story? Please let me know in the comments. Also, remember that NaNoWriMo is less than 10 days away, so get prepared and ready to write!
Until next time, write, read, edit, repeat.
-J.J.