Things That Go Bump In The Night - And The Day

I don't like horror books, horror movies, horror anything. I'm one of those people who don't need horror fiction because we know there are actual things to fear, and some of those are all too human.

Some years ago, January, February, I'm not sure which, I just remember the blizzard. I was slogging home and, while it was daytime, it might as well have been night because I could see practically nothing.  Barely made out my hand in front of my face.  The snow that had been a bare trickle when I left home had accumulated and was now up to my knees and still falling. The temperature was so cold no coat, hat or gloves could have kept it out.  The occasional car inched its way down the road beside me. Fortunately, I knew the route well, and I was only a few blocks from home, but I was in pain.

Then, one of those cars slowed from a crawl to a complete stop beside me. The window rolled down, and the white driver behind the wheel offered me a ride. Now, I know what happens to women who let themselves be picked up by strange men. I've seen and read true crime stories, and I can't tell you how many times I have warned my daughter against hitchhiking.   But I wasn't hitchhiking, I was miserable and I climbed inside that car.  I didn't care about stranger danger, or serial killers, if this man ends up slicing and dicing me and they don't find my body until summer, it beats freezing.

Obviously, he did not leave my body in a ditch. He was just a nice guy who took me safely to my door. But there was no real way to tell.  Fast forward to summer, and I am walking down that same street, happy, under the sun, with that old life is good feeling. Another car comes by and slows, and another white driver leans out the window. This one yells,  calling me a black - expletive before laughing and driving off. I know, this is mild, but it shows my dilemma. I live among monsters disguised as human beings, and I have no way to tell the difference between them and real human beings.

The 2016 K-horror zombie film, Train to Busan, is a classic for a reason. (Why is it no surprise that my favorite horror film was not made in Hollywood?) The Korean film industry was willing to show us a few truths about human nature and the reality of evil. With all the horrific looking zombies swarming the last survivors, the real villain turns out to be  an ordinary looking businessman who is psychopathic enough to believe his survival is more important than anything or anyone else. It show us how one human monster with a loud voice can feed on fear turn otherwise rational people into villains too. 

Over the years, the news has shown ordinary looking people, some looking like businessmen or even wearing badges, acting like brutal monsters.  That is something many black men and women know, both from first-hand experience, and from the experience of others on our family trees. We don't need to be fascinated by things that go bump in the night.  Some of us meet monsters inside human skin every day. That makes the world today its own special kind of horror reality. It's one reason why I take my dose of horror in the form of true crime stories. At least the monsters on those pages have been caught, and punished.

My work in progress begins with the true story of a seven year old hiding in the darkness under his bed, praying that his baby sister will not wake up and cry out, alerting the men outside that the place is not empty.  They have come to kill his father for the sin of defending himself against the unprovoked attack of a white co-worker. The kid lived into his sixties, but never forgot that night.

Unlawful Orders (available October 18 in hardcover, ebook and audio book from Scholastic) begins with a black doctor also hiding in the dark so  the mob outside torturing and killing another black man will not decide to enter his office and grab him too.  

"Huddled behind the locked doors of his nearby medical office, Dr. Aaron Nixon could only listen in horror as Johnson cried while being tortured. Meanwhile, white spectators pulled out chairs and sat on the balconies of surrounding buildings to watch their victim being led across the courtyard to a large oak tree and lynched. The newspapers deemed the crowd 'orderly.'"  

Seymour Tribune Article on Unlawful Orders

Unlawful Orders, the true story of black physician and activist James Buchanan Williams and the life he endured from his childhood in a small town in New Mexico, to earning the title of chief of surgery at a major Chicago hospital, is filled with stories like that, including the Freeman Field mutiny in Seymour Indiana. These horrific events are 100% truth even though they rarely appear in history books. 

I Don't Scare Easily, But When I Do...

First, let me admit  I only read paranormal romances because whether the hero is a shapeshifter, vampire or fallen angel, we always know he is perfect for the heroine, whatever she might turn out to be. Most scary stories never interests me. You can keep that Steven King stuff far away from me (Although I might watch the Stand in December.)

Deep inside, I'm still a romance writer.  My idea of horror is in-laws trying to keep the happy couple apart. I look for happily ever after, not horror. I don 't write it, and I don't read it. 

But for some reason I did find myself watching Lovecraft Country.

Not the book. I have not read that, so I don't know the exact words the author used to describe the various creatures and magical transformation used to deal with the characters. People such as a woman who works to prove herself to the dead father who never felt girls were good enough for the family legacy of magic. Or her distant male cousin who inherited both the family skills and its curses. 

It don't get scared about the various monsters, or the sight of flesh peeling away as one human body shifts into another. Not even the all-powerful space woman with a strong resemblance to Grace Jones phased me.

I thought I was good, until the scariest thing I could imagine happened in the most recent episode. I'll try to be vague and not give away any spoilers if you intend to see it but the writers were awesome. 

I watched a character travel through time to their own childhood in 1921. Of course they received the obligatory warning about not changing anything for fear of altering the present before going. That's standard time-travel information. They arrive in Tulsa, Oklahoma on May 31, 1921. I instantly recognized that as the first night of the infamous Tulsa Race Massacre. The character is paralyzed by memories. Their mother and beloved grandmother were burned alive inside their home that night. Yet, as awful as that is, they have no trouble fighting the urge to warn them, save them.

Someone else died that night, a bullet blew away a young man. The character is almost paralyzed by memories while standing in the shadows, watching, knowing there are only minutes before the first members of the invading white mob enters the black neighborhood and fires his gun.  

The writing was so compelling, I felt like I was right there, inside the character's head, burning with the knowledge that all I had to do was step out of the shadows and warn my lover. I could save him and put an end to the lonely future I had to endure without him. Added bonus, he and I could then run home and save Mom and Grandma from the mob that will set their house on fire with them still inside.. and get back home to save his mother and grandmother who are about to be burned alive inside their home.

Only, my child came into the past with me and is right at my side. The son who will never have existed if if I save my lover. If he lives, my child will vanish before my eyes and I will never have a offspring. I have to chose between my child and reliving an event that hurt me so deeply never even let myself remember my love's name until now.  I have to chose, the past, or the future; a dead lover and a lifetime of pain or a never-born child and I love with all my heart.

To me, watching that, feeling the agony as the minutes ticked by while the character struggled to chose evoked real horror. Don't change the past was no longer something theoretical, and it had real consequences. No matter what they did, someone they loved with all their heart was about to die right before their eyes. 

That's why I fear I will end up having to read the book after all. Not for the monsters, like the Korean Kumiho, a soul-sucking succubus who takes the form of a beautiful woman to fulfill her quest to  kill enough  men to make herself human. No, I need the kind of horror that haunts someone's mind forever.

If you write that kind of horror, the stuff that takes a reader right to the source, I want to read it. Let me know.

And if you want to write more inclusively, you can join me on a webinar on October 24. We'll discuss imagination, and why you need more than that to succeed.  Head for https://alaska.scbwi.org/events/imagination-is-not-enough-with-author-b-a-binns/ to learn more.

Heavy on the Scary, Light on the Gore

By Linda Lovely

I walked out on this "classic" due
to its graphic violence.

I love mysteries and thrillers—books and movies.  However, I try to avoid any entertainment medium that dishes up excessive violence and gore. While many people consider Clockwork Orange a movie classic, I walked out on that film when it premiered. I don’t need horrific, violent images polluting my mind and invading my nightmares. I’m not a fan of horror movies—even on Halloween.

I’m delighted when mystery/suspense/thrillers give me chills and goosebumps. I read/watch because, at least in my favorite books/films, the hero/heroine ultimately wins out over evil. For those of us who love these genres, the promise that right/justice can prevail (at least occasionally) is both comforting and inspiring.

I love books that make me eager to turn the page to find out what will happen next, to discover how the protagonists will escape what seems like inevitable doom. Dire situations are just dandy. But severed body parts, gallons of blood, and extended torture scenes are unnecessary and unwelcome for this reader/viewer. Spare me the chainsaw and slasher flicks. My imagination is quite adequate to feel the intense cruelty of a serial killer or psychopath without pages of gory description. 

Marathon Man is one of my favorite films
even though the torture scene made me squirm.

However, I have to admit one of my favorite movies, Marathon Man, includes an extended torture scene—though the instruments of torture can be found in most dentists’ offices. That seems to suggest my tolerance for violence extends well beyond PG.

The the people who die in my mystery/suspense/thrillers don’t exactly pass away in their sleep either. Since my killers tend to be smart, I figure they’re entitled to come up with ingenious methods to engineer their victims’ deaths. Their weapons have included everything from fire ants and dog collars to eye drops. If you haven’t read my novels, I don’t want to give details that could be spoilers.

So how do you feel about scary books/movies? Do you choose to pass on the gore? Where do you draw the line on violence?