by James Johnson

Created on: February 20, 2009

It's my experience that most horror writers cannot articulate how they write horror, but horror conforms to a few simple rules that are easy to master.

The point of horror is to make readers scream. How you do this is by deceiving and surprising the reader. The deception and surprise takes the form of assuring the reader that what they sense is common, ordinary fare on the path most traveled. Things are what they seem to be. Except they aren't. The skilled writer makes the reader doubt, and the doubt creates tension and suspense, and the tension builds until you holler. All the landmarks and reference points are bye bye. The reader is adrift on an empty sea, on a dark night, beneath a stormy sky.

The end of the tale is the beginning of the tale, with a significant change added. In SALEM'S LOT, for example, Ben Mears comes to town in the beginning, and everyone is alive; at the end of the book he leaves town, but everyone is dead and he prevailed over Barlow. Ditto for THE SHINING; Wendy and Danny come to town, and then they leave town. This is a very simple concept.

The protagonist always unleashes the evil. He opens Pandora's box and unlocks the monster cage.

The monster has an Achille's heel and a fatal flaw that is absolutely lethal to him.

The time-scape of the tale is brief. Horror tales are time-limited and of short duration. A few days or a week is about as far as you can stretch the story out. Monster's have lives and commitments just like everyone else.

The players are isolated in some form or fashion. Remote Islands, deserts, haunted houses out in the woods, isolated motels, jungles, etc. Monsters aren't very social.

The players are conflicted. The protagonist is forced to re-think what she believes. She needs a better paradigm. The players are like a room full of politicians, and most of them are about as dum and self absorbed as the Real McCoy. The protagonist is not on the same page as the monster, and has to play catch-up. At the climax the protagonist slaps her forehead and says, "I coulda had a V8!"

The monster is confident and has an effective philosophy, but operates in a world that is alien and strange to the protagonist. Like any predator, the monster has an instinctive sense of how to catch game, but his world-view is limited. The protagonist makes the leap from milk & water sissy to lethal.

This is about all you need to know to write horror.

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