Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Snow

I was “meh” about this book. There was a lot of it I liked, but there was an equal amount that left me cold, pun intended.

Let’s start with the characters. They were both believable and well developed. I understood their motivations, and I think Malfi did a dynamic job in giving each of them a plausible back story that made us root for them. Who can’t empathize/sympathize with a guy like Todd, whose made mistakes and desperately wants to atone for them, but who gets trapped in the blizzard and all the subsequent madness that ensues. I felt similarly about Kate. Speaking of Todd and Kate, thank you Mr. Malfi for not having these two screw like bunnies in the midst of a life threatening crisis. I can think of a few other horror writers who should’ve take a similar tack in their respective works. Other characters I found equally endearing, even if I didn’t get as invested in their fates.

The story was a good one, well plotted and well paced. The tension built slowly but not too slowly. The conflicts were clear and well defined. The progression of events was logical. As we’ve often discussed in this course, suspension of disbelief is paramount particularly in “monster” horror fiction, and I had no issues with the same as I read this book.

The settings were masterfully detailed. I could easily picture the events that transpired, and I had no difficulty imagining the characters as they were well fleshed out.

At this point, you’re probably wondering what I didn’t like about this book, since thus far all I’ve done is sing its praises. Well, in short, the monsters – in this case the skin suits and what I’d guess you’d call the snow beasts – weren’t scary. In fact, I found the notion of them latching on to human beings and walking them around like puppets to be, well, ludicrous to the point of comic. That’s right, the very idea made me laugh. And while it’s good to laugh when you’re reading horror fiction, it’s probably not ideal if you do so when you’re reading about a monster attack.

I’m not sure exactly what kept the monsters from being at all frightening. There were scary moments in this book, but on the whole they involved humans. The creepiest scenes in the whole book, in my view, were the ones that took place in the church when Todd and Kate encounter Chris and Meg. The image of Chris as a Lord of the Flies-esque dictator dressed in holy vestments was terrifying. The thought of a gigantic snow worm I found far less frightening.

Now, having said that, the idea of a monster emerging from a natural element like snow was both original and intimidating. Really made me think of the snow shoveling I’ll inevitably do this coming winter in a new light.

So, let’s briefly recap: Good plot, well developed and likable characters, a clear conflict, check. Scary monsters that make me want to sleep with the lights on? Not so much.

Friday, October 29, 2010

The Thing

John Carpenter’s The Thing is probably my favorite horror movie of all time. We’ll get into why shortly but first let me tell you another short, personal story.

For the first year after I moved to Pennsylvania, I lived in what could charitably considered a two-story house with a backyard bordered by a cemetery. Creepy, no? A thousand plus dead people right in my backyard. Anyway, setting aside, circumstances dictated that we had no cable and thus no television. We also had no VCR but instead could only watch movies on the computer’s DVD player (this was 1999). We owned roughly six or seven movies, and among a lineup that included The Prince of Egypt and Conan the Barbarian was The Thing.

Point of this story? I watched The Thing probably 25 times that year, and that’s a conservative estimate. I never got tired of watching it, and I relished the opportunity to revisit it for this course.

First off, you’ve got a top notch, all star cast that includes the likes of Kurt Russell, possibly the manliest man alive, and Wilford Brimley, who plays a character very unlike any of his other roles. You’ve got an almost subterranean arctic landscape which lends the film an eerie quality in and of itself. You’ve got special effects that are groundbreaking for the film’s era and which stand the test of time. You’ve got the requisite creepy soundtrack very much like the one in the other film we’ve watched for this course, Alien. You’ve got a facility inhabited by a crew that doesn’t much trust each other from the get go, a situation that never improves and only gets worse. All of these factors combine to lend this film the isolationist quality that makes it work so well.

Throw into that mix the monster itself, a monster terrifying because it can assimilate into anyone or anything. When the dog first arrives at the station, it seems so harmless. By the time it’s discovered that the dog was in fact a “thing”, the tension is palpable and real, and we as the viewer immediately – like the crew – become distrustful of every man in the station.

Carpenter (and his cast) amp up the tension in every subsequent scene. When MacReady and Copper visit the deserted Norwegian station and stumble upon the space ship in the snow, we feel the dread that will soon infiltrate the American station, and we realize our heroes are doomed. From then on, the film is roughly akin to a roller coaster ride. Even at the end of the movie, when MacReady and Childs are the only survivors, we know they too are certain to die. There will be no happy ending; they will never make it to safety and in fact they shouldn’t for the sake of the rest of humanity.

In a nutshell, I very much enjoyed having the chance to watch this film again, and it’s no less terrifying on my 30th viewing than it was on my first.

Sunday, October 24, 2010

The Wolfman

I wanted to like Jonathan Mayberry’s novelization of the film Wolfman. I really did. After all, it had so much potential. Creepy Victorian setting? Win. Jaded actor with a heart of gold? Win. Family secrets brought to light? Win. Monster ravaging the English countryside, much like in Rawhead Rex? Win. Detective from my own thesis novel (Aberline, even if his first name is wrong and his last name is spelled wrong; I get it, it's fiction.)? Win.

Having said that, this was the most horribly written book we’ve read so far in this course and considering that’s a group that includes Breeding Ground (which I loathed), that’s saying quite a bit.

Let’s start with the main character: Lawrence Talbot. I understand his motivation in returning to Blackmoor. After that, he loses me completely. First off, the tension between him and his father, Lord John, is ridiculous. Either you hate either other or you’re happy to see each other, guys, period. We go from prodigal feasts to angry accusations back to a Darth Vader/Luke Skywalker-esque confrontation, and at no point do I care about any of it.

Another beef about Lawrence Talbot: his sudden, all consuming infatuation with Gwen. Come on, man, this was your dead brother’s fiancĂ©e. Let a little time pass before you try to jump her bones; have just the tiniest bit of respect for the dead (and your own brother)! Also, the whole “Gwen was an angel compared to all those sluts back in London” bit was a tad much.

Speaking of Gwen and her Mary, Mother of God depiction: I don’t buy it. She was living with a man in his ancestral home prior to marriage (i.e. living in sin) during the Victorian Era, an era synonymous with over the top morality and sexual repression. Nope, Mr. Mayberry, I’m just not convinced.

Let’s talk about the monster(s) itself/himself/themselves: They were fairly intimidating, but again, over the top. The mass attack scene in the Gypsy camp left me reeling. It was the horror movie novelization equivalent of Dirty Harry shooting every man in the room; it was overkill, pure and simple. Also, I didn’t understand Lawerence’s motivations (again) in chasing after the werewolf after it’s basically attacked and killed every man, woman and child in the camp. Seems to me a smarter man would have bided his time and learned from the experience. Guess not.

Back to the writing: it was terrible. As a writer myself, there’s no phrase I detest more hearing or seeing in a critique than “show don’t tell.” I literally cringe when I see it; it’s the most overused, lazy comment you can make in a critique, in my view. Having said that, Mr. Mayberry? Show, don’t tell. And certainly don’t tell, tell, tell, and then tell some more. It was like he’d tell us a detail, then re-tell it three times after that. I get that Gwen has smoky blue eyes. Also, the fashion and food porn in this book was almost fetishistic; overdone to the point of nauseating.

Maybe it’s the fact that I generally detest movie novelizations that made me hate this book so much. Maybe it was just the fact that I kept wanting, on every page, to red ink it until the pages looked like they were themselves victims of the Wolfman because the prose was just so terrible. I’m not sure. I just know I had to force myself to finish this book, and now I’m not even sure I want to see the movie. And, that’s a shame because I think it had the potential to be a good story and just grossly missed the mark.

Monday, October 18, 2010

Alien

The year is 1979. In the thriving metropolis that was Memphis, Tennessee, a 20 year old woman leaves her two year old daughter in the care of a babysitter and accompanies her husband to the movies for a date night. She will leave the theater in near hysterics, having been so unnerved by the film that she can’t finish watching it.

The woman was then Karen Anderton, my mother, and the film was Ridley Scott’s Alien.

Fast forward roughly twenty years into the future, and I had the opportunity to see the film for the first time myself. All my life, my mother had told me this was the most frightening movie she’d ever seen. Now, admittedly, my mother is a bit of a wuss, but she’s a tough cookie and she isn’t easily intimidated.

I was prepared to be terrified the first time I saw this film, both as a result of my mother’s conditioning and the fact that I’d found at least two of the sequels to be fairly scary flicks. What I came away with was more of a feeling of “That was it?” That was the film I’d hesitated at watching because of my mother’s violent reaction to it, and I found it barely scary, more a work of science fiction than pure horror.

Still, aside from the fact that I managed to finish this film – unlike my mother – and didn’t have nightmares afterward (I rarely do, at least about fictional monsters), I have to say this movie was well done and I enjoyed it.

Part of that stems from my love of 1970s era cinema. Alien is a film like so many others of that same era. Visually, it very much resembles John Carpenter’s The Thing or Stanley Kubrick’s 2001, A Clockwork Orange and – later on – The Shining. It’s darkness to the point of surrealism.

Another reason I like this movie is because I love H. R. Geiger’s artwork. His hand is clearly visible in this film and not just in the set design and the alien itself. Just as Wikipedia says of Geiger’s work – “His most distinctive stylistic innovation is that of a representation of human bodies and machines in a cold, interconnected relationship, described as "biomechanical" – there appear to be “cold, interconnected” relationships between most of the characters in the film. These are individuals who are just doing their job, and there aren’t a lot of strong loyalties among the ship’s crew members. That sense of isolation even in the midst of the group is another reason I believe this film works well. Even in near claustrophobic conditions, each man is essentially an island.

There’s little question who the true villains in this film are. I agree with some of my classmate’s assertions that the alien is an innocent if murderous bystander, and that the “real” monster is The Company, who have created the android Ash and put him on board the Nostromo to serve their horrifying, potentially catastrophic purposes.

In a nutshell, I’m glad I had a chance to revisit this film and to examine it more closely. While I think it stands the test of time, I think I at least may be too desensitized by having seen films that were so much more gruesome and over the top, including the subsequent films in the Alien franchise.

Friday, October 8, 2010

World War Z

I have a confession to make. I never considered myself much of a zombie fan. I thought zombies were quite literally the stupidest monster in the whole of the monster horror genre. I loathed them for their utter mindlessness. After all, I’m a self proclaimed elitist; I need my monsters to be smarter than me in order to truly touch me.

Or do I?

Maybe not, because I absolutely loved World War Z. Loved it from the get go, and fell more in love with it with every passing page. In fact, I’d go so far as to compare it to one of my favorite novels of all time, Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. I don’t have to go out on too much of a limb; the back cover blurb from USA Today said this book was “Apocalypse Now, pandemic-style, and everybody knows the movie Apocalypse Now was based on Heart of Darkness, right? Right?

Just as Conrad’s novel depicts a journey that culminates in significant truths about the darker side of human nature being revealed, World War Z is also a gripping, moving and very detailed illustration of what man is capable of when pitted against utter horror. Much as Captain Kurtz says near the conclusion of Heart of Darkness, oh, “the horror, the horror” of world infested with flesh eating zombies, but even more so “the horror” of what man resorts to when confronted with his own certain demise.

The section of this rollicking, riveting documentary style novel that worked best for me was Jesika Hendricks’s account, beginning on page 121. At first, the Hendricks seem to only be on an extended camping trip, but by the end of the story, we see they – along with other desperate survivors clinging to what remains of life – resort to cannibalism. By doing this, they essentially become no better than the zombies in that they too are flesh-eaters consuming their neighbors for sustenance. Wow, Mr. Brooks. Now that is deep.

There were a few sections that didn’t work for me; mainly, these were the ones that depicted actual warfare. The submarine scene didn’t particularly impress me, and most of the “battle” scenes fell flat for me, which is surprising considering I normally love epic battle scenes.

Don’t get me wrong. This novel was epic, battle scenes and all, and to an extent that was part of its charm. It went outside the box; it was global, even universal, in its scope. Were there some believability issues? Sure, but then again, I don’t believe in zombies in the first place, so once I suspended my disbelief enough initially to begin reading and getting engrossed in this book, I was fairly accepting of the unbelievable.

To address the question of “were the zombies scary monsters”, well, no, by and large I didn’t find them all that frightening. The tension in this work wasn’t achieved by hearing how the zombies consumed their victims but rather from hearing the accounts of how the survivors managed to stay alive. For me, the survivor’s tales of their flights from the cities and towns – zombies in hot pursuit – were what interested me most.

In conclusion, I thoroughly enjoyed this book and am looking forward to the point in my life when I have the opportunity to revisit it. Perhaps the highest praise of all is this: Tomorrow, I’ll be passing this on to my son.

Friday, October 1, 2010

The Yattering and Jack

I hope I’m not going to get in too much trouble for this, but I won’t be devoting much of this post to talking about the “monster” in Clive Barker’s “The Yattering and Jack”. I can’t. I don’t think there was one. Yeah, I know the “antagonist” was a demon, but I didn’t find him particularly antagonistic or frightening. I don’t think Barker intended for him to be either, which was part of what made this piece so engaging.

You can’t help but sympathize (and empathize) with both Jack and the demon who tries so hard to torment him. After all, the Yattering is just doing his job; he is more frustrated by his inability to faze Jack or ruffle his victim’s calm, patient demeanor than Jack is bothered by the Yattering’s horrifying and yet hilarious antics.

Oh, I loved this story for a veritable cornucopia of reasons. It’s funny and it’s deep, and the end of it warms my atheist’s heart.

First off, the humor: This piece is resplendent with it. Beginning on page 44, when Jack backs out of the bathroom so his adulterous wife can finish cuckolding him, I laughed heartily, and I found myself in stitches on every subsequent page. Jack’s response to his daughter’s announcement that she’s a lesbian was priceless. Other examples include Barker describing how the Yattering’s existence is so uneventful that he looks forward to the mailman coming, or the fact that the creature spends its day watching game shows and hoping to catch a glimpse of the neighbor woman walking around her house naked. Even the imagery of Jack pissing on the drowned cat was amusing, in its way.

Second, I loved this story because I really related to it. Some of my classmates in the genre readings course posted that they empathized with the Yattering’s plight in that they too have been up against seemingly insurmountable obstacles and subject to the demands of “Evil Overlords”, but I related more to Jack. I say this because I live with a Yattering; an honest-to-god crazy person who is prone to flip out on me at any given minute. Jack’s reaction to finding his cat floating in the toilet (or spontaneously combusted in the living room) is roughly akin, I suspect, to the frustration I often feel when I encounter the latest evidence that my roommate is batshit insane. I only wish I had Jack’s unflappable demeanor.

Speaking of his calm demeanor, I want to draw what I thought was an obvious comparison between Jack and Job of the Bible. “The Yattering and Jack” is near parallel the story of Job, when Satan torments Job with the loss/death of his wife and children, the ruination of his crops, and the wreck of his personal health, all in an attempt to make Job renounce God.

Speaking of God, I adore the fact that at the end of this piece, Jack acknowledges that although he now has control over the Yattering, his contact with and apparent condoning of the creature has, in fact, barred him from entering the so-called gates of “Heaven”. So, to an extent, the Yattering has (post-disgrace) served his purpose; he has kept Jack Polo from spending the afterlife in “paradise”.

Nicely done, Mr. Barker!

Saturday, September 25, 2010

Cycle of the Werewolf

I’ve never been much a comic book enthusiast. I’m not a huge fan of werewolves. (I know, you’re probably wondering at this point what monsters I actually like, and the answer to that would be: the ones that live next door.) So honestly, the only reason I’d ever read Cycle of the Werewolf was because it was a Stephen King novel. I wouldn’t count it among my top 20 favorite King works, and though he has quite a body of work, that says something.

Re-reading it for this assignment, however, altered my perception of it, and now I’m of two minds.

First, here is what I loved about this book. I really enjoyed the setting. When I first read this book 20 years ago, I had no idea places like Tarker Mills existed. Now I live in an equally small, clannish, backwater town, and I think King did a masterful job of capturing the essence of small town life. He does this in a lot of his work, of course, but the brevity of this work necessitated that he capture small town life in a nutshell, and I think he did a bang up job. I would even say this work is Hemingway-esque.

Getting back to what I said about liking monsters who live next door, I loved the fact that the Beast turned out to be a Baptist minister (I’m a recovering Southern Baptist, y’all). I thought the notion of the Beast being destroyed by a puny kid in a wheelchair and his bad boy uncle was delightful and ironic. However, I would have enjoyed more background on all three: Reverend Lowe, Marty Coslaw and Uncle Al. I thought the relationship between Marty and the rest of his family could have been fleshed out a lot more, and I was disappointed by the ambiguity.

Now, on to the Beast itself. He just didn’t do it for me. He didn’t scare me, and I wasn’t invested enough in any of his victims to care what he did to them. Some of this was due to the omniscient point of view. The same brevity that lent itself perfectly to capturing small town life in a nutshell worked against the attack scenes; they were too short and I think King could have gone a lot farther in both developing his victim characters and in describing their deaths. It was more like reading newspaper articles than reading a horror novel: just the facts, hold the gore. And let’s face it, people don’t read the newspaper for pleasure.

The illustrations that accompanied each attack scene I found cartoonish and not at all frightening. In fact, I would go so far as to say they made the work comic, pun intended. If the material itself had been more humorous, the illustrations would have been appropriate, but it really wasn’t.

In short, I found this to be a quick, engaging read, but I probably won’t read it again. Cycle of the Werewolf falls squarely in the “meh” category in my view.

Friday, September 17, 2010

Rawhead Rex

Okay, so we’ve got a vicious, bloodthirsty maniac roaming the English countryside, dismembering and disemboweling everyone he encounters? Win! Rawhead Rex reminded me of my own favorite bad boy, Jack the Ripper, down to Rawhead’s assertion on page 371 that “he’d slaughter their children and wear their infants’ bowels as necklaces.” Mr. Barker? You had me at page 362.

First things first. Let’s banish the notion that Rawhead Rex isn’t a sympathetic character. If you buried me alive, then left me to rot for thousands of years, I can assure you I’d come out of my crypt fighting mad. I’d want to eat you, your young, your livestock, whatever I could find to sink my teeth into. I’d want vengeance, plainly stated, and I don’t think we can cast aspersions at Rawhead for wanting his comeuppance. Having said that, I have to admit it doesn’t sound if he was a particularly sterling being prior to his untimely demise.

As to Rawhead’s monstrous qualities: I thought Barker did a terrific job of fleshing out, so to speak, Rawhead, and I had a very vivid image of him in my head as I read. However, he failed my litmus test for determining how scary a monster/concept is. When I went to bed shortly after I finished reading this, I didn’t find it necessary to leave a light on. It was well written enough, but it was overkill, pun intended. After the first few victims, the carnage started to lose impact and to some degree to become comedic. There wasn’t one specific killing that stood out in my imagination.

In fact, I found the scenes where Rawhead didn’t kill the characters immediately upon seeing them much more terrifying than the descriptions of him instantly slaughtering his victims. For example, on page 385, when Rawhead is urinating on Declan and Declan is happily bathing in the stream, that sent a chill down my spine. For that matter, Declan and his devotion to Rawhead was the creepiest aspect of this story, in my view.

Also in the same vein, the fact that Rawhead refuses to go near Gwen Nicholson because she’s menstruating I found disturbing, much as I found the concept that Rawhead and his brothers impregnated the village women all those years ago with babies that ripped them apart during birth ghastly and alarming.

Now that I’ve addressed the monster itself, I do want to speak to what I felt this story was really about. I believe Rawhead Rex was about the consequences of colonization. Barker alludes to this almost from the get go when he describes how Zeal has been basically invaded by the Sunday trippers. Replace “Zeal” with “Britannia” and Rawhead Rex is essentially the monstrous embodiment of the Celts and the Saxons, with the Sunday trippers being the Romans. Fast forward roughly a thousand years, and Rawhead Rex is Australia. I could go on making these comparisons in relation to England for hours; you get my point already, I’m sure.

In short, I found this to be a terrifically engaging work which I thoroughly enjoyed. I am eager to read more of Barker’s work.

Saturday, September 11, 2010

Breeding Ground

I was afraid I was going to hate this book, and I was right. Still, I have to say I hated it for unexpected reasons.

I have a horror of spiders, in fact I would say that I’m a certified arachnophobiac, so it was with no small amount of dread that I began reading this book. Still, I didn’t really fear the “widows” as initially depicted. It was only when our band of survivors reached the military compound and mention was made of the legions of spiders in the trees that I started to find the spiders at all menacing.

I found the description of the humans mutating into spiders way more horrifying than the spiders themselves. I think this was because the author devoted significantly more time to fleshing out the description of Dave, Katie and even Neil’s respective mutations than she did to depicting the spiders. I believe this was a good decision on the author’s part; it was far creepier to think of humans transforming into spiders from within. It literally made my skin crawl.

Now that I’ve addressed what I felt made this book scary and therefore effective, I have to repeat: I hated this book. I thought the way every female in the book was depicted was misogynistic and revealed the author’s apparent distaste for her own gender.

Let’s start with Chloe. I realize she gets fat and give birth to a widow but while I find her transformation repugnant, I found Matt’s reaction to it to be more so. He closes off from her emotionally almost from the get go. While I can’t stress enough how much I sympathize with what he experiences, I found his lack of grief at the death of his wife to be appalling.

Further, like many of my fellow students in this course have posted, I found Matt’s willingness to hop into bed with every female of age he encountered reprehensible. You’d think after seeing what happened to Chloe, he’d have been more gun shy in regard to the so-called fairer sex, but he starts eyeballing and flirting with Katie almost upon meeting her and Jane. Then, even after Katie’s transformation and subsequent suicide, this on the heels of his own wife’s demise, he sees fit to fall in love/lust with Rebecca and impregnates her. What’s even more bizarre is when he finds out Rebecca is pregnant, he is happy about it! This blew my mind. You’d have thought he’d have been more concerned she’d give birth to a spider, too.

Women aside, I didn’t find any of the male characters in this novel to be particularly sympathetic or engaging. Nigel was obviously a prick and got exactly what he deserved; of course, the author reminded us of this at every turn. Other than Nigel, none of the male characters were very memorable.

In conclusion, this novel made my skin crawl which I suppose is a bit of a testament to the author’s prowess as a horror novelist, but for the most part I had to force myself to finish it. The story didn’t initially draw me in and nothing in the text as I kept reading redeemed this book for me. I can say with no small amount of conviction that I would never reread this book or suggest it to a friend.

Friday, September 3, 2010

The Funeral

Much as I opined last week about “Buried Talents”, I think Richard Matheson's “The Funeral” makes a fine companion piece to I am Legend. Ludwig Asper could very well have been Ben Cortman and vice versa. You’ve also got a motley gang of the undead wanting vindication and recognition in both pieces. One has to think Matheson knew what he was doing when he paired these works together; they complement each other very well.

I greatly enjoyed this story, and like many of my classmates I found the fact that it was so humorous the most engaging aspect of it. The other two areas in which I felt Matheson excelled were in his characterization and setting depiction.

In the first paragraph alone, I get a sense of who Morton Silkline is; he’s a fussy type he muses “over floral arrangements” and yet he is, almost ironically, the proprietor of an establishment called Clooney’s Cut-Rate Catafalque. These two facts are obviously incongruent and yet they seem perfectly matched as they set us up for the later revelations about Silkline’s dual nature.

Silkline’s dual nature is in fact that funniest part of this piece. Here’s a guy whose life is imperiled by catering to the rather unusual demands of monsters. His establishment is nearly burned down by the same. Still, he’s willing to take the risk of that happening again if the price is right. It’s the quintessential “sell your soul to the Devil” story, except in “The Funeral” the Devil is replaced by monsters. Silkline’s character never truly aroused my sympathy but I don’t think he was intended to be a sympathetic character. Rather, I think he was supposed to be representative of the guy we’ve all met in real life, the kind of man that can be bought. (There’s no shortage of them running around.)

The monsters themselves were all so comical that they weren’t really frightening, but this certainly didn’t detract from my enjoyment of this piece. As other students have posted, I felt Matheson intentionally depicted the monsters as stereotypical Beasts that Go Bump in the Night to add to the humor of the work, and his approach definitely worked for me.

I also posted last week that in I am Legend I could see the influence that would later guide Stephen King, and that’s no less true in “The Funeral”. Additionally, Matheson’s attention to detail in his description of setting is reminiscent of Lovecraft. This is high praise as I’m not a huge Lovecraft fan but I do feel he’s a master of setting. I can’t imagine Matheson not being influenced by his predecessor so I doubt this is coincidental. I’ve often heard it said that “good writers borrow and great writers steal” and in this piece I can see Matheson stealing from Lovecraft much in the manner King will later steal from him.

In summary, there wasn’t anything about this story that I didn’t like, and my esteem for Matheson continues to grow.

Friday, August 27, 2010

I am Legend

Aside from Bram Stoker’s Dracula, I’ve never been particularly interested in vampire stories, and even Dracula I think intrigued me mostly because of the historical context and the period detail. I cringed through the first Twilight movie and failed to understand my then tween son’s fascination with what’s been often denounced as the sparkly vampire series. Though I can’t say I’ve ever read a Stephen King book I hated, I wouldn’t count Salem’s Lot among my top ten favorite books of his. Aside from the subject matter, I’ve only recently been introduced to Matheson’s work, and I wasn’t a huge fan of the first book of his I read, Hell House.

I am Legend redeemed Matheson for me. In addition to being beautifully written, it is brilliantly plotted. For me, I very much enjoyed how Matheson conveyed the isolated nature of the Robert Neville’s existence. In spite of the fact that the guy’s confronted on a nightly basis by hordes of the undead, his reaction to the solitude of the daylight hours was more striking, and really helped me get into his head and become fully invested in his character. I was so moved by his loneliness that I cheered when he found a canine companion. When we find out the dog has died in that single, stirring sentence, “In a week the dog was dead,” (Matheson, 110), I had to choke back tears. (This is remarkable only in that I don’t especially like dogs.) I was equally intrigued by the introduction of Ruth near the close of the book, and by his reaction to her. At that point, Neville had been alone so long it seemed most of his animalistic impulses (sex drive, etc.) had practically dissipated, which I thought was a fairly realistic detail.

In addition to Matheson’s depiction of Neville’s hermit like lifestyle, I was also very impressed by how well he interjected scientific detail into the story. Oftentimes, books with scientific terminology and concepts I feel run the risk of being bogged down by the detail. However, Matheson (through Neville’s character) explains the germ theory in laymen’s terms and then seamlessly makes the connection to the “plague” that turned the rest of the world into vampires. I felt this was a very effective demonstration of how to blend genres in the interest of the story.

I definitely saw, in this work, the style that later influenced Stephen King. As I was reading I am Legend, I thought several times that this book was indisputably the forerunner of books like King’s The Shining, from the isolated quality of the work down to the protagonists’ struggles with alcohol.

My only real gripe with this work was that I felt it was too short. I made the stupid mistake of thinking it was a 317 page book as opposed to a 170 page one, and I kept thinking even as I neared the end of the work that we still had plenty of time for Neville to save the world from the threat of vampires/vampire germs and restore order to society. While I recognize that in many cases books in the horror genre don’t have “happy endings” I found the ending of I am Legend to be abrupt. In fact, I kept on reading and finished all of “Buried Talents” before I realized it wasn’t a continuation of the novel. (It would have made for an odd juxtaposition of plots, true, but at that point I was convinced of Matheson’s ability to pull it off.)

On the whole, I felt this to be a thoroughly enjoyable story and I’m glad I had the opportunity to read it.

Friday, April 2, 2010

The Shining

Oh, what to say about The Shining beyond this: I love this book. In my opinion it’s one of King’s top three best novels, the others being IT and Dolores Claiborne. When I saw this book listed on the readings list for this course, I was thrilled to have an opportunity to read this novel I like so much for so many reasons again for what has to have been at least the tenth or eleventh time.

Having said that, when I reached the end of The Shining, for the first time I felt somewhat disappointed in the work; it didn’t live up to my expectations. This puzzled me. What was it I found lacking about the book on this reading, I mused. Had I simply finally read it too many times? Or is that I’ve seen both versions of the film adaptations of the movie each almost as many times as I’ve read the text, and that any story about the Overlook that doesn’t include all the fantastic elements of each version is bound to fail to satisfy me? It’s hard to say, but I definitely came away from this reading with a feeling of “meh” about it.

Don’t get me wrong. I still love Jack Torrance. In fact, I think he may be both the greatest character King’s ever created and the most realistic. Everyone knows Jack Torrance, if they think about it. He’s the guy with the seedy, shameful past that usually includes some sort of substance abuse issues, the guy who just so happens to be down on his luck and needs a lucky break. Then he gets one, or so he believes. He goes from disgraced instructor to master of a vast domain and, naturally, it goes to his head and he goes out of his mind. He’s also an Everyman I think we can all identify with to some degree.

Danny I’m less enamored of, and Wendy I flat out dislike. There’s nothing very interesting about her apart from her less than harmonious relationship with her mother. I found her to be passive and meek and I do think she could’ve and should’ve done more to protect her son, even early on. (As an aside, I detested her character in the Kubrick movie; I wanted to axe her myself. What a clinging, whiny bitch she was depicted as being!)

Getting back to Danny, he does seem perhaps too mature for his age, but I don’t find this particularly troubling. The kid’s clearly got an astronomical I.Q., he’s got the second sight, and he’s lived through a lot in a short period of time. He’s seen both of his parents at their lowest and has good reason to be apprehensive of his father, even as he loves him unconditionally.

The true stars of The Shining, in my estimation, are the supporting characters – Dick Halloran, Stuart Ullman, Al Shockley – and of course the Overlook Hotel itself. This novel is a perfect illustration of how setting can become a character. In addition to being obviously haunted, he building has an opulent appearance and a rich, violent history. What more could you ask for in a compelling character?

In short, while I still love this book and think it’s one of King’s best, I’m starting to see places where the paint is peeling on the old hotel.

Friday, March 26, 2010

The Dreams in the Witch House

I understand why Walter Gilman spent so much time in bed in H.P. Lovecraft’s “The Dreams in the Witch House”. The poor lad was bored to the point of distraction! Personally, I almost fell asleep halfway through my reading of this piece, and after I was done I needed a nap before I felt prepared to pen this entry about the work. (This after about a pot of coffee, no less.)

Fresh from my siesta, I perused this story a second time and found it no more appealing. Having said that, here’s what I think is going on in this story: You’ve got Gilman, a youth who likely was never tightly wrapped in the first place, living with a couple of similar nut jobs in some sort of macabre fraternity house with a horrific history. He’s attending college in Arkham, studying mathematics and otherwise trying to tinker with the “space time continuum”, and he’s getting a tad burned out. He feels ill and starts having hallucinations and dreams about shapes. (Geometry, anyone?) So he does what quite a lot of overtired, stressed out people do when they’re confronted with more than they’re physically or mentally capable of handling: he snaps. Yes, he snaps, but not before spending an extended period descending into madness, sleepwalking and having sensory delusions. What does he do both during and after this decline into lunacy? He kills people, most notably small children, in a state of seeming unconsciousness, and ultimately he kills himself.

Or, at least, I hope that’s what happening in this story, otherwise I’m going back to sleep. If there’s no deeper meaning to this than the flimsy story Lovecraft gives us? I find it without redeem. The characters were one dimensional. The setting was bland, which was a first for Mr. Lovecraft, at least in the stories of his we’ve read so far in this course. The action was nearly nonexistent.

I liked that the hauntings, so to speak, Gilman experienced involved a woman accused of being a witch. Had Lovecraft followed this angle more closely and given me more about the history of the witch house (and, subsequently, the witch), I think I would have liked this story more. As it was, it seemed like a topic introduced then skimmed over too quickly to be consequential.

I did notice in this work - more than in others of his - Lovecraft’s seeming racism and misogyny. It’s pretty telling that the only female in this work is the wizened Keziah and the only person of color is the uber threatening evil black man. Of course, it’s likely indicative of the time in which he was writing and not terribly misplaced for that era.

I said at the beginning of this course when we read “Pickman’s Model” that I’d reserve judgment on whether or not I liked H.P. Lovecraft’s work until we’d read more of it. After this the fifth story we’ve read, I have to say I don’t see myself actively seeking out other works of his after this course.

Friday, March 19, 2010

Rosemary's Baby

Of all the books we’ve read so far this term for this course, Rosemary’s Baby was the quickest read. I believe I read it – all told – in about two hours, thus making it what I’d like to call a great book for an afternoon at the beach. This was also the first book we’ve read that I’d seen the movie before I read it. I think to some degree this affected my reading of this work. I knew what was going to happen – or at the very least some version of what was going to happen – before I ever cracked the spine of this novel, and I believe that helped keep me engaged in the work.

I felt this was a very compelling premise for a novel, and doubly so because of the era in which it was written. When Rosemary’s Baby was initially published in 1967, the subjects tackled in this work – Satanism, group sex, human sacrifice – would have been revolutionary, and I was impressed by the Levin’s treatment of them. The best way I can describe his approach is as being much the same as what people often say of old movies: the camera fades or the scene changes before you see the murder/sex/body/etc. This is effective because we as the readers are given enough credit to follow along with the story without Levin necessarily having to pile on the gore or the risquĂ©.

The characters I found for the most part to be engaging if not always particularly memorable or well developed. I loved Hutch, period, and was genuinely sad when he died. I hated Guy outright. He seemed, simply put, too easily seduced by the “dark side”, too readily inducted into the cult. Rosemary I, as a mother, could sympathize with and on the whole I liked her as a person, but I did find her to be somewhat naĂŻve. To an extent, I suppose it could be argued she needed to be for the story to work. Levin’s depiction of the Castevets I felt was competent but not stirring. I never really felt one way or the other about either of them. Other characters I wanted to know about. For example, I wish Levin had taken the time to develop the character of Terry Gionoffrio. I would have liked to have known about her past. The other cult members also seemed vague and not as well defined as I’d have liked.

The plot was very active and, as I stated above, I found this novel to be very fast paced hence my ability to digest it so quickly. (The fact that it’s only 218 pages probably didn’t hurt, either.)

There are of course obvious parallels between this novel and the Christ story, beginning with the female lead herself, Rosemary. She’s clearly portrayed as a Madonna figure. The conception itself, taking place during a dream state, is reminiscent of the “virgin birth” of Jesus Christ to Mary. Guy very much resembles Mary’s husband Joseph. The idea that Adrian’s birth will lead to a new age is very much one that’s addressed in both the Old and New Testaments. I found all the various ways Levin’s story mirrored the Biblical one to be a very effective frame for the novel.

In short, it’s a good book, a quick read, and I had fun reading it which is, as we all know, what matters.

Friday, March 12, 2010

The Shadow Over Innsmouth

I liked this story. I really did. It was active, the characters were engaging, and the plot stimulated and held my interest. I’m a history buff so I found the back story – of how Innsmouth came to be what the narrators learns from Zadok Allen it is – very compelling. The setting was richly detailed as well.

However, if I had to sum it up this piece in one word, it would be this: Overkill.

Yes, I said overkill, an overabundance of unnecessary description of setting and characters. I get that the seeming frog people are “repellent”; Mr. Lovecraft tells me so on practically every page. Naturally, I expect a city of amphibians to smell a little fishy; there’s no need to reacquaint my nostrils with the stench in every other paragraph. When our narrator’s in jeopardy in his room at the Gilman house, Lovecraft goes into such excruciating detail about the potential escape routes that I lost track of how he finally did manage to escape. I could make similar remarks about all the descriptions of the town we get as Lovecraft moves the narrator about it. Though I knew the narrator had a map, I felt lost through much of his travels.

The amount of “telling” in this piece is another aspect I found somewhat off-putting. Though I realize Lovecraft’s style is/was illustrative of the time in which he lived and wrote, it was difficult to overcome my contemporary biases as well as everything I’ve been told about showing as opposed to telling. I wonder how much of this story might have been edited out of this work had it been published more recently. Having said all that, there was to some degree a nice balance of showing versus telling. There was just so much of both that I found the telling at least to be overwhelming

In conclusion, after having spent so much time pointing out what I didn’t care for, here’s more of what I liked about this work. I enjoyed the premise very much. I loved the historical feel. By that I don’t mean the actual period during which the action took place, rather I mean the amount of history the narrator learns about Innsmouth first from the station ticket agent, later from Miss Anna Tilton and the young grocery store clerk, and finally from old Zadok Allen. I thought the ending of the story was brilliant, when the narrator realizes why it was said he had “Marsh eyes” and decides to accept and even embrace his fate. It was a great plot twist mostly in that I didn’t see it coming.

Of all the Lovecraft we’ve read so far in the course, I’d say this was my second favorite. I liked “The Thing on the Doorstep” slightly more.

Friday, February 26, 2010

The Thing on the Doorstep

In my view, “The Thing on the Doorstep” should have been subtitled “The Lovecraft piece that restored my faith in the good taste(s) of many of my friends and colleagues.” Admittedly, I’m a relative newcomer to the works of H.P. Lovecraft, but likeminded friends – writers and non-writers alike – had always raved about his work to me. After reading the first two stories assigned, however, I failed to understand the attraction.

“The Thing on the Doorstep”, however, redeemed Lovecraft for me. It had all the characteristics of a good short story: fast paced plot, effective use of dialogue, engaging characters, as well as twists and turns to help maintain reader interest. Furthermore, it did the job of a good horror story: it sped up my heartbeat.

Despite the fact that the early pages of this story are composed entirely of exposition, I had no difficulty maintaining interest in the tale. The first real chunk of dialogue we get is after Edward is found incoherent and hysterical in the woods. This first statement he gives has a serious impact because we have waited this long to hear him speak. His near unintelligible rambling about, among other things, the “abomination of abominations” definitely ramped up the tension in the piece and made me as the reader want to stay aboard for the rest of this voyage.

Plot-wise, another aspect of this story that I really liked was how active it was. Once we got beyond the initial expository passages, things happened fast and with increasing frequency.

Beginning with the narrator, Dan, Lovecraft gives us a character with whom we can sympathize. In spite of the fact that Dan fully admits to having shot his best friend, we find him – even in the early pages – likable and want to gain a greater understanding of what’s prompted him to take this drastic action. Clearly, he had a great affinity for his friend, Edward Derby, as he demonstrates time and time again when he seeks to come to his aid in various ways.

Edward Pickman Derby is depicted as being an empty vessel almost from the start. This is appropriate given his fate. At first, he is entirely the puppet of his parents and goes directly from dutiful son to obedient husband. His wife, Asenath, is able to easily sway and control him. The fact that Asenath is eventually proven to have been only an empty vessel for her father makes her rule over Edward no less impressive. Additionally, the fact that she is ultimately vanquished makes her no less a strong female character.

Unlike some of my fellow students in the course, I didn’t find Lovecraft’s depiction of Asenath to be particularly misogynistic. I didn’t even consider this until I was skimming the blog list prior to penning this, and upon further reflection don’t personally believe there’s significant basis for this point of view in this work.

In conclusion, I very much enjoyed this story and am now a little closer to becoming a Lovecraft fan.

Friday, February 19, 2010

Hell House: "Saved by the Sex and the Gore"

Last week, I opined that “The Music of Erich Zann” was setting porn. Obviously, “Hell House” comes a lot closer to being actual porn. Lest you think my delicate sensibilities were offended by this, let me assure you that wasn’t the case at all. No, I think it’s safe to say “Hell House” was saved by the sex and the gore.

In all other aspects, however, I found this work lacking. Simply put, it lacked a clear plot peopled by likeable, realistic characters.

Okay, so we’ve got this wealthy, old guy – Rolf Deutsch – who wants proof that paranormal phenomenon either do or do not exist, so he buys a huge, creepy house with a sordid history and sends our heroes to investigate whether it’s haunted. Of course, he’s got no connection to the Belasco family, and we never learn what prompts his interest in the supernatural, but I guess we needed somebody to fund this venture? Other than that, there’s no real justification for his character to exist.

Next, there’s our seeming protagonist, Lionel Barrett. He doesn’t believe in ghosts and ghouls but – just in case – he’s spent much of his adult life building what amounts to a ghost-busting machine. His wife, Edith, doesn’t seem to really comprehend what her husband does but must admire him for it. Otherwise, there doesn’t seem to be much rationale behind her having married him: he’s much older than her and he’s impotent, therefore he must be either rich or a genius. I have to guess this, however, because Matheson certainly doesn’t tell us.

Then we’ve got Florence Tanner, the “super-emotive Spiritualist medium." If you ask me, this woman’s got an obvious hard on for Jesus, which in my view contradicts everything else about her character. Still, she’s not too busy with Jesus to somehow seem to will herself to become possessed by demons. Did I mention she was hot and has lesbian tendencies? Thank goodness, otherwise I’d have found her entirely unlikable. Her close encounter with Edith when she’s being frisked prior to her “sitting” was about the most titillating part of that scene.

Finally, there’s Benjamin Franklin Fischer who, much like his namesake, used to conduct electricity in his capacity as a medium. Clever pun at least, Mr. Matheson. He’s along for the ride because he’s the lone survivor of an earlier incident at the Belasco house AKA Hell House, and – if you ask me – because we needed a virile man for Edith to attempt to seduce when the house turned her into a rabid slut. Oh, and he appears to be interested in Florence. Too bad she gets possessed by demons and dies; he might have asked her out if she’d survived. Anyway, his character later saves the day in a confusing showdown with Belasco.

Meanwhile, Belasco, our villain, wrecks all this havoc all because he was short and a bastard? I’m sorry, but it just didn’t add up for me. I wanted something horrifying to have happened to him to justify his turning into a sex crazed cannibal.

In conclusion, had this novel NOT contained scenes of extreme violence and hyper-sexuality, and had I not been required to read it for this course? I’d have thrown it down midway in disgust.

Friday, February 12, 2010

The Music of Erich Zann

Our instructor posted prompt this week asked us to describe what we feared, a topic I had no difficulty addressing. Similarly, I can state with utter certainty what I do not, so far, fear: the work of H.P. Lovecraft, and in this specific instance his short story “The Music of Erich Zann”.

Simply put, this story failed to terrify me or even to move me much at all. For a “horror” tale, there just wasn’t anything horrifying about this piece. I came away from reading it with one overwhelming emotion: disappointment that this story didn’t scare me at all.

Much like he did in “Pickman’s Model”, Lovecraft gives us an artist – in this case, a musician – and his devotee, neither of which I found particularly intriguing. Their respective fates, consequently, I was never fully invested in. I did feel he did a more than competent job of describing at least the character of Erich Zann, and as I didn’t need to know what the narrator necessarily looked like, that was sufficient. In fact, I thought Lovecraft went a little overboard with his modification when describing Erich Zann. As a reader it was a challenge to assemble so many concrete details in my head.

Again as in “Pickman’s Model”, it seems the dread Lovecraft is trying to evoke in his reader is their fear of the unknown. We are asked to be fearful of what lies outside of Erich Zann’s window and to find the unknown origin of his “weird notes” unsettling. I am not one of those readers that finds the unseen to be frightening. It’s almost, in my view, as if I needed to invent my own back story in order to be remotely interested in the story Lovecraft actually told. In a nutshell, that’s where this story fell flat for me: I simply didn’t know enough about these characters to care what happened to them or even what had already happened to them.

I have to give Lovecraft credit where it’s due, however, and comment on what I did find appealing about this work. The real star of this show was the setting. Beginning in the third paragraph, passages like “shut out the sun perpetually” and “odorous with evil stenches which I have never smelled elsewhere” I found evocative and arresting. I certainly got a clear mental picture of the characters’ surroundings throughout the piece. Erich Zann’s “lofty and isolated garret room” was very masterfully depicted.

Unfortunately the setting porn just wasn’t enough to actively engage and maintain my interest in this work, and my overall impressions of it are that it was a mediocre effort. I don’t even think Hollywood could salvage this one. All the CGI animation, creepy music and special make up effects wouldn’t be enough to make this frightening.

As I stated in my earlier entry about “Pickman’s Model”, I can only hope that before this course is over, I read something by Lovecraft that moves or frightens me. Thus far, however, I am not a huge fan.

Friday, February 5, 2010

Phantom of the Opera

In spite of the fact that we are presented with a hanging corpse on page 18, my initial impression of this work was that it was more of a comedy than a horror novel. The Opera Ghost, who was often hilariously nicknamed “O.G.”, seemed like more of a prankster than a credible threat. The cast of characters that surrounded him – for example, the hapless new managers, the lovestruck Raoul, the ultimately disgraced songstress La Carlotta – all appeared to my eye to be humorously portrayed and in many ways satirically depicted.

As I progressed through the novel, however, I felt that of all the genres it most closely resembled a romance. After all, Leroux gives us a pair of star-crossed lovers presented with a seemingly immovable obstacle to their happiness. Around Chapter 19 or so, the story seemed to become more of an action-adventure, and it wasn’t until around page 266 that I felt the work truly was a horror novel. At the line “The Persian stooped and picked up something, a sort of cord, which he examined for a second and flung away with horror” a chill literally went up my spine, as for the first time, I was genuinely terrified of and anxious about what was going to happen next.

Am I complaining? Am I disappointed that I had to read clear to the conclusion of the 21st chapter before I felt Erik AKA the Opera Ghost was a truly scary antagonist/villain? Not at all, in fact I felt that was the real genius of this work. Leroux’s ability to intermarry multiple genres and still tell a good story is impressive and also something I feel we as writers should seek to emulate. The hallmark of a well written “genre” novel is, in my view, that – much like Phantom of the Opera – it doesn’t conform to one specific genre but instead blends several of them.

Another aspect of this story I found intriguing was the Pygmalion-esque relationship between Christine Daae and Erik AKA the Angel of Music. Since I’m essentially employing this theme in my thesis novel, I paid close attention to how Leroux handled it and – for the most part – I felt he did so masterfully. Erik’s anguish at his inability to coerce her to love him, and her fear of arousing his wrath, incited powerful emotions in me as the reader. To some degree, on a personal note, it was a case of art imitating life and vice versa and really made me feel a kinship with these characters. Additionally, I think the introduction of and subsequent elaboration on the relationship between the pair added new dimension to the character of Erik; it demonstrated to the reader that Erik is a multifaceted individual capable of both passionate love and intense hate.

I have a few quibbles about this work. I wanted Leroux to have given us more information about Erik’s background. I finished the work without really understanding the cause of his disfigurement. I would have preferred a more elaborate description of the torture chamber itself, but that may just be because I’m a fairly sick puppy. I thought Raoul was a simpering fool and I didn’t see why Christine was so enamored with him. I thought Phillippe was a fairly ineffectual character and didn’t feel his character enriched the work at all.

Aside from those minor trivialities, however, I enjoyed reading this novel.

Friday, January 29, 2010

The Madness of Art

I found reading Joyce Carol Oates’ essay “The Madness of Art” to be a very humbling experience. In a nutshell, here’s why.

Though I am in fact enrolled in a genre fiction MFA program, I’ve always been hesitant to label myself a writer of popular fiction. Call it elitism, call it what you will, but all my writing life I’ve striven to be what is generally termed a literary writer. This aspiration, I believe, has been revealed in most of the pieces I’ve written, be they works of fiction, poetry or non-fiction. For example, nowhere in my view have I employed more metaphors than in the monthly columns I wrote when I edited a newsmagazine. For the most part, it’s been my goal when writing to craft highly stylized pieces. On an occasion when an agent disdainfully referred to my work as “literary fiction”, I didn’t understand why that was an insult; in fact, I thought it high praise even if he didn’t.

Oates’ essay, however, made me reconsider the necessity of labeling myself as a writer of either literary or popular fiction. It is enough that I write and seek to write well, she postulates in statements like the following: “Yet talent, not excluding genius, may flourish any genre, provided it is not stigmatized by that deadly label ‘genre’.”

In the same essay, Oates points out that in this day and age, writers we consider great, such as Edgar Allen Poe, would be referred to as “mainsteam” writers. Personally speaking, to put it succinctly? If it’s good enough for Poe, it’s certainly good enough for me.

(As an aside, perhaps it is true as Oates maintains, that “to transcend categories others have invented for us, we have to be both dead – long dead – and classics.” Yes, I do think there’s validity to that statement.)

The same – that she is a “mainstream” writer – can be said of Oates herself, as she tells her audience when she interjects herself into the piece. She admits, unashamedly, she is “a writer predisposed to reading and frequently to writing what I call ‘Gothic’ work.” And she shouldn’t be ashamed, as she later posits: “Gothic fiction… is entertaining; it is unashamed to be entertaining.”

What a revolutionary idea, the notion that we as writers should seek to craft work that is entertaining as well as thoughtful! (Note the sarcasm.) This idea is at the very heart of Oates’ essay, as evidenced by passages like the following: “The standards for horror fiction should be no less than those for ‘serious, literary’ fiction in which originality of concept, depth of characters, and attentiveness to language are vitally important.”

After reading this piece, I realized what I feel is an important truth. Our ultimate goal as writers is to find readers, and then to engage the imaginations of our audience. If we accomplish this end, what does it matter what label is applied to us? Does it makes us any less writers if we are “mainstream” or “popular” than if we attain the heights I admittedly aspire to, to become “literary” writers?

According to Oates, with whom I largely agree, the answer to that is not at all. What matters in the end is that we are writers, and that we seek to do quality work regardless of genre considerations.

Pickman's Model

I’m a Lovecraft newbie, shameful as it may be to admit, and I really wanted to like my introduction to his work, Pickman’s Model. After all, this story had as its antagonist an artist who paints morbid pictures and who exudes a creepy if not murderous vibe. Anyone familiar with my thesis novel in progress will know that’s a premise I should enjoy, but I have to say that, on the whole, I was not particularly impressed with this piece.

In the early pages, this story had tremendous potential to terrify, but in my view it failed to live up to it. Lovecraft promises much but fails to deliver. First, he introduces a protagonist/narrator with, by his own admission, various eccentricities. This is a character I want to like and to whom I’m immediately sympathetic, but he seems to get lost entirely as the story progresses. Aside from his self declared hero worship of Pickman and his willingness – if not outright eagerness – to accompany him to his near secret studio, we learn very little else about the narrator. Thus, I never felt invested in his fate. I couldn’t care less if he had in fact been hacked to pieces in Pickman’s cellar. (Which, obviously, he was not.)

I felt the same way about Pickman. He never reached monster status, in my estimation, and that’s what Lovecraft set me as the reader up for in the first few pages. He seemed too much like your typical professor of art painting controversial pictures, in the end. I learn much about him and his leanings if not outright deviations, but I never get to see him actually commit any violent acts. Sure, he paints creepy pictures, and maybe he’s made some sort of deal with the Devil, but he doesn’t scare me.

I should insert here that I thought Lovecraft’s descriptions of the Pickman’s various paintings were beautifully rendered. His settings in this piece were also very well realized. Even though I wasn’t emotionally involved in what happened to the characters in each scene, I must admit that Lovecraft did a marvelous job of constructing a backdrop upon which much mayhem could have successfully occurred. But, it never did.

For me, that was the fatal flaw in this piece: the fact that I wasn’t at all interested in the outcome. I never felt genuine fear or revulsion. As the story closes, we as readers don’t receive what I believed Lovecraft dangled in front of us at the onset. I finished reading it and I’m left unclear as to what exactly the narrator still fears. Yes, he saw some seriously disturbed art. He’s spent a spell in a secluded location with a madman, but he’s come to no real harm because of it. He didn’t even have to escape some horrible fate; there was none in store for him. So, in short, I’m not sure what he’s so discombobulated about. Technically, he was never in any danger.

If this piece were submitted by a fellow student in a critique session, I’d have to label it competent but not stirring. Lovecraft’s prose is well crafted, no pun intended, but in my view the story doesn’t live up to its considerable potential. I was left wanting way more. Hopefully, as we continue to read Lovecraft’s works in the Readings in the Genre – Horror course, I’ll have the opportunity to read one I do find to be genuinely frightening.

Thursday, January 14, 2010

The [Actual] Return of the Bird Blog

Yep, I'm back. Yours Truly, everyone's favorite disgraced newspaper editor and recovering trophy wife, has decided to reclaim her space in the blogosphere.

Yesterday marked my return from my third residency at Seton Hill University in Greensburg, PA. For those who've been living under a rock for the past year in regards to YT? I'm enrolled in the Master of Fine Arts in Writing Popular Fiction program at SHU. Suffice it to say the experience [my third residency] was vastly superior to my second residency, during which I was more or less on the verge of a nervous breakdown. (The actual breakdown came later, post flight from the Bird Cage, but that's all irrelevant now, no?)

Back here in Hooterville, I've thus far managed to avoid seeing that paper I used to run back in my days of indentured servitude. I'll admit it smarts quite a bit knowing that I spent four plus years shaping that paper into what it became only to be denied any ownership of the same. But I think I'll stay the ostrich course, and keep my head in the sand in regard to the California Focus. (Go ahead, click the link, I designed the site and I still own the domain.)

After all, I've got a novel to write and a shitload of horror books to read, not to mention someone has to maintain order in this Dollhouse. Then, of course, there's the Amazing Dancing Guitar Strumming Emo Boy, who will be auditioning for the School of American Ballet early next month. Finally, there's Mulder, and the 100,000 words I'll need to listen to before I can get my toilet fixed again.

So, in a nutshell, I really don't have any time to feel sorry for myself, nor do I intend to. Back in June 2009, when I was literally living for six words on this very Bird Blog, I swore I would no longer waste time wallowing in self pity, and I do intend to keep my word.