The Essentials of Writing Great Horror

Guest post
by Caroline Gebbie

“The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.” H P Lovecraft

Since we first gathered around campfires we have told stories to elicit emotion and one of the most basic emotions is fear. Writing great horror is about invoking that fear in the reader, it can be done in much the same way as you would elicit other emotions in any story. The elements you need to create that feeling of horror include characters, plot, setting, point of view conflict and theme. Continue reading “The Essentials of Writing Great Horror”

Vampires and Werewolves and Zombies, Oh My!

I loved monster movies when I was a kid.

When one harkens back to the classic monsters, there are really only three types that have literary legs. At least, I am unaware of any boom in Godzilla-based novels.

I don’t count ghosts as monsters because, well, they’re ghosts.

Frankenstein was for all intents and purposes, a zombie, as was the Mummy; though neither was of the more popular brain-consuming variety.

Aliens of any variety don’t count as monsters because wherever they come from, they’re just regular. On their home-worlds, they’d just be Joe the Blob, Fred the Predator, Alice the Alien, Marsha the Body-Snatcher, etc. Continue reading “Vampires and Werewolves and Zombies, Oh My!”