Tag: #horrorallday

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Horror FAQ’s: 5 Things You Should Know as a Horror Fan!

What do you think of when you hear the word “Horror”? Is it some phantasmic image, a ghost from a frozen graveyard? A monster living in your son’s bedroom closet? Maybe the horror is a murderous wife, implicated in four unsolved homicides involving her late husbands. Horror could be a person. It could be a monster. When I think about horror, honestly my first thought is horror movies, because I love them so much.

Horror movies can actually be quite cathartic. We sit at home, usually, in front of our TVs or laptops, streaming away. You are safe. You cannot be harmed. You turn on The Blair Witch Project, or maybe The Exorcist, and you prepare to be scared out of your wits. By being scared, we activate that fight or flight response. If you see a big spider near your arm, the same thing happens. Will you fight, or run away? In my case, I would run, because spiders are terrifying. Anyway, when we watch horror movies, we engage that scared feeling every time the music stops or builds to a crescendo. Every jump scare, we jump too. Or, if you’re a hardened, seasoned horror buff, maybe you don’t jump. But by being scared, or creeped out, we have a lingering feeling of terror from watching the movie, especially psychological horror. You aren’t really being hunted by Ghostface, but you feel like you could be. The horror is palpable. Really good horror films make you feel like you’re in them, like you’re right there alongside the characters. Also, good horror is plausible. It could actually happen. And given the devious and destructive nature of man, you could be next. Or not.

So, here are some Frequently Asked Questions that you might have wondered about. I know I have! Leave any questions in the comment box under this post (be sure to click on the post title), and I will try to answer them.

1) Why should I watch horror movies?   

I feel that anyone should watch a scary movie, especially if you like roller coasters. Horror movies are like that; the feeling you get at the top of the big hill, just before you drop 50, 60, 70 feet or more down it, your stomach suddenly in your throat. Horror is a unique way to see into the mind of all sorts of people: the directors, the actors, the cinematographers etc. With each shot, each scene, they evoke a visceral response from viewers. Other kinds of movies just don’t do that in quite the same way. They make great date nights, too. It’s raining outside, the pizza is delivered fresh and hot, and your significant other suggests a movie. Make it a horror movie, and you won’t be disappointed. Trust me, I’m a professional horror-watcher.

2) What’s the appeal of horror movies?

Horror movies are a unique cinematic experience, with a vast history of some truly epic filmmakers and writers. Steven Spielberg’s Jaws terrified audiences in 1975. (Spoiler) The scary part was that you couldn’t see the shark until nearly the end of the movie. The terror was there, underneath you in the water. Child’s Play (1988) played with the idea of a young boy’s Good Guy Doll coming to life, and a serial killer’s soul inhabits it. The Blair Witch Project (1999) was the first entry into the now-famous horror genre of Found Footage movies (though some might say there are earlier precedents). Found footage is any film shot with a handheld video camera, or in the case of Blair Witch, a supposed “found footage” – literally the footage was recovered after the people seen in the movie disappeared. Blair Witch had an absolutely amazing marketing scheme, and people were terrified to see the film. The movie might have actually happened. This idea is very scary, indeed. It’s easy to get lost in the film history of horror, something I will certainly delve deeper into in forthcoming posts.

3) What are some classic horror movies I need to watch?

Some of the classic movies include:

Nosferatu (1922) – Nosferatu was quite the undertaking back in the day, with filming delays, budget concerns, and the like. Supposedly, the actor playing Nosferatu (the Vampire), Max Shreck, was notoriously difficult to work with. One of the canonical movies for any horror buff. One of the first of its kind.

Dracula (1931) – Based on the 1897 novel of the same name, Dracula starred Bela Lugosi as the dark and mysterious Count Dracula. It’s apparent that he can turn into a bat, and (in the book) scale a castle wall, similar to a lizard, says Johnathan Harker, Dracula’s captive. The Count also has appetites for the blood of beautiful women.

Frankenstein (1931) – This film addresses the motives of a potentially-mad mad scientist by the name of Victor Frankenstein, who wishes to create a human being from the sewn-together body parts of cadavers. Much to his shock and awe, his creation comes to life, and he has a mind all his own. The “creature” has no name to speak of.

The Invisible Man (1933) – A scientist in a sleepy English town has discovered the secret to making himself invisible. He checks himself into a hotel and makes a huge mess of his room and misses his rent. The hotel owner’s wife insists the man be evicted at once. Eventually, the man reveals he is invisible. In the canon of Universal movie monsters, this is not one to miss.

The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) – The direct sequel to Frankenstein, the Creature and Frankenstein’s old mentor, Dr. Pretorius, ask that Frankenstein make a companion for the Creature, a “woman creature” so that he won’t be lonely anymore.

Rosemary’s Baby (1968) – Based on the Ira Levin novel of the same name, Rosemary’s Baby follows the story of, you guessed it, Rosemary, and her…well, baby. She spends a good portion of the movie pregnant, and eagerly awaiting the birth. But something just seems…off. Rosemary worries at every little thing (as I suppose many pregnant women are wont to do), and what’s the deal with her creepy neighbors?

Night of the Living Dead (1968) – A seminal classic directed by the late George A Romero, Night of the Living Dead is a story about what exactly might happen if the zombie apocalypse came to our door…today. What will the still living people do against hordes of the undead—who were once people, just like you and I?

The Exorcist (1973) – Again based on the novel of the same name, The Exorcist follows a mother, Chris MacNeil, and her 12-year-old daughter, Regan. One afternoon, Regan is playing in the basement, and she happens to have a Ouija board. When asked by Chris who she is taking to, she says a person named “Captain Howdy.” The movie progresses when we learn Regan may not be a well girl at all. Might she even have fallen under demonic possession? Creepily, the film is actually based on a true story that occurred in 1949, in which a young boy became possessed. Spooky!

Suspiria (1977) – This film, directed by Dario Argento, tells the story of a dance academy in Germany and follows a young girl named Suzy Bannion, wishing to devote herself to ballet. After a series of brutal murders, Suzy realizes that all is not what it appears at her dancing school. Something sinister lurks there…just beneath the surface. The question, of course, is what?

4) Are horror fans crazy?

Well, maybe some of us. But of course, every one of us is unique. Only horror fans go home and sit up late at night watching scary movies before bed, and don’t bat an eye. It so happens these same fans are often the ones that love true crime documentaries. I am one of those, as well. Man’s inhumanity to man (and woman) can be infinitely more terrifying than any horror movie. However, this is not to downplay the importance of horror movies and other horror media. So, what about horror fans? There are legions of fans all over the world. Readers, writers, artists, and more love horror. For some, it’s a way of life; people eat, sleep, and breathe horror. I am fast becoming one of those! With my books and this blog, I can only expand my love of horror books, movies and other media.

5) Which horror novels should I read?

Here’s a short list of some good horror books to keep you up at night!

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (1818) – Follows Victor Frankenstein, an ambitious young doctor trying to, quite literally, bring dead flesh back to life once more. The scary part is, he succeeds.

Dracula by Bram Stoker (1897) – Follows Johnathan Harker and the mysterious Count Dracula, who journeys to London to live inside the old, creepy Carfax Abbey.

The Most Dangerous Game (a short story) by Richard Connell (1924) – Who, truly, is the most dangerous animal of all? Why, man, of course! When a big game hunter becomes bored hunting animals, he decides to indulge his…darker appetites.

A Stir of Echoes by Richard Matheson (1958) – A man who undergoes hypnosis at a dinner party becomes overtaken by the ghost of a young woman.

Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin (1967) – A young woman is drawn into a swirling state of unease surrounding the soon-to-be birth of her child. It appears her neighbors have other plans.

The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty (1971) – We follow a young girl who inadvertently becomes possessed, perhaps by the Devil himself.

Jaws by Peter Benchley (1974) – There’s a series of inexplicable deaths caused by a giant shark in the seaside town of Amity Island.

Ghost Story by Peter Straub (1979) – A group of old men gather to tell ghost stories. When one of them dies, the remaining men begin experiencing nightmares in which they, too, die. It’s as if the past is coming back to haunt them.

IT by Stephen King (1986) – Follows the happenings of a group of young friends living in the town of Derry, Maine. A sinister clown named Pennywise killed Bill’s younger brother Georgie, and now he’s after Bill and his friends, too. Fast-forward about twenty years, and it appears Pennywise is back to finish what he started all those years ago.

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Stay Out of the Basement by R.L. Stine (1992): (Goosebumps #2) Book Review

Ah, middle grade fiction, and horror fiction at that. It always makes me smile when someone mentions Goosebumps or Fear Street. These were the series—Goosebumps especially—that ultimately sparked my interest in reading, first and foremost. Thank you, R.L. Stine. I am forever in your debt.

Not only was collecting the books fun (it may be surprising that I never did actually collect all of them back in the 90’s), but reading them was by far my favorite thing. Through R.L. Stine, I was brought into the wonderful world of reading. And it stuck. Now, I love all things horror. Movies. Books. Memorabilia. Clothing. Toys. You name it, I’ll probably want to eventually own it. And of course, I love reading. When you combine reading and horror, two of my favorite things, you can never be steered wrongly.

I remember being home sick from school one day. It was overcast, rainy and cold out. I felt crappy, but then I pulled out my copy of The Headless Ghost and began to read. The environment outside was perfectly suited to reading a horror novella (all the Goosebumps books fall under the novella category, though some of you may disagree with this). Under the covers, my head nestled on a pillow, my reading light on as I began turning pages. If I seem to be gushing nostalgia, it’s because I am. I just can’t help it. I love these books so, so much. As a kid, I used to say to my Mom, on overcast or rainy mornings, “Hey…it’s a Goosebumpy day out there!” I love rainy days! I am one of THOSE people. *Grins*

And those COVERS. Let’s all take a moment to remember that Goosebumps would not have been the same were it not for the beautifully done illustrations by Tim Jacobus. Each cover, he took some scene from the book and then vividly rendered them in all their spooky glory. The covers of today (done by different artists) may be a cool way to introduce more kids to the Goosebumps series, but they don’t hold a candle to Jacobus’s covers. I am in the (slow) process of recollecting all the original Goosebumps books (#1-62). I’m certainly getting there! Some of the original editions included bookmarks inside, or trading cards. Whenever I come across one of those, I usually try to buy it, because they are rare. Even editions that say “trading cards inside” rarely have them intact. Hard to find, surely.

I must have momentarily had an episode of sheer mindlessness when I sold my entire Goosebumps collection to a mother for only $12 at a garage sale. *Gives myself the side eye, rolls eyes* What on earth was I thinking?! I spent years of my childhood collecting those books, and then poof! Gone, just like that. Well, now is the time to right that particular wrong. I possess most of the Goosebumps. It’s just a matter of time, and I will have them all over again. At any rate, on to the review.

Plot: Stay Out of the Basement is the second book in the Goosebumps series. Margaret and Casey have a botanist father experimenting with his plants in a fashion not done before. He wants to successfully make a plant that is also part animal. He was recently fired from his job, but hopes to get it back soon. In the meantime, he has turned the entire basement into his own private plant greenhouse. The kids’ mom is away caring for a sick relative for most of the book; so, it’s just Casey, Margaret, and their weird father.

Naturally, the kids are curious to know what Dad is doing down there. He won’t take them aside and tell them, so they decide to go exploring. He keeps the door locked tight, but it just so happens Casey knows how to pick a lock—and he’s only 11! When they get down there, it’s hot and humid, and there are grow lights and plants all over the place. Of course, these aren’t just ordinary plants. They’re—bizarre. Like, some of them seem to be breathing. And moving around. Some are tree-like. Some have tendrils or vines. Some bear fruit. Stine makes a great effort to make the plants scary and foreboding. Imagine if your dad was doing all that stuff in your basement! Pretty creepy.

You may have guessed something was bound to go wrong. The kids decide to go into the basement. Casey gets a bit hot under the collar, so he takes off his shirt. They hear Dad returning, and rush back up the stairs as fast as possible. Only then does Casey realize he left his shirt down there. He rushes back to get it before Dad can find it, proving they were down there—after expressly being told to stay out of the basement at all times! He’s taking too long down there, Margaret thinks. She goes down to see what’s keeping him. Casey gets back, just in the nick of time!

Things get even weirder from then on. First, Margaret sees Dad…eating something in the kitchen. Sounds pretty normal, right? But in this scene, he’s really wolfing something down as though he has never eaten before in his life. She checks the trash can, and is shocked by what she finds. This is not the first shocking thing, as luck would have it. She wants to tell Casey all about it, and wishes her Mom would come home.

Margaret and her brother are tossing a Frisbee, when Dad walks outside, only to be struck in the head. He wears a Dodgers cap, which the Frisbee knocks away, and he just so happens to have leaves growing on top of his head where hair should be. Curiouser and curiouser.

Dad’s boss, Mr. Martinez, comes by to see how Dr. Brewer (AKA Dad) is getting along with his experiments. The trouble is, the kids don’t see Martinez leave the house. Even more bizarrely, the kids also hear moaning coming from the storage closet in, you guessed it, the basement.

Casey decides to fly a kite, and asks if Margaret would like to join him. She agrees. They look for the kites; but strangely, they find items that are out of place there. Could it be some type of clue as to what’s making the oddly human-like sounds in the storage closet? Could it have something to do with all these plants? The rest of the book unfolds even further mysteries, and a very wacky explanation is soon forthcoming.

Ending: One thing about Stine’s books: you can always expect a twist ending. R.L. likes to end each chapter on a mini cliffhanger. The purpose behind this, he says, is to keep kids invested and to keep them reading. I am living proof that yes, even 28 years later, this stratagem does, in fact, work.

Final Thoughts: This book was well written and a classic, without any doubt. Why is it a classic? It’s vintage Stine, at his very best. Also, don’t forget the Goosebumps TV show, where Stay Out of the Basement is proudly featured. After the craziness of Welcome to Dead House (Goosebumps #1), Basement is a welcome reprieve from people’s eyeballs coming out of their skulls (a heavy scene, given the fact that seven and eight-year-olds read these books!). Now I know why I was genuinely scared by Goosebumps!

Grade: A – for delicious horror scares and some heavy concepts, such as job loss, a sick relative, and even darker things (you will have to go read it to find out about these!). The scares are great and numerous, and as I said, each chapter ends in a mini cliffhanger. I think it’s easy to see why Stine is so popular with his audience! And I don’t just mean children. He has a veritable legion of 30-something fans that love these books, and got hooked in the 90’s, just like I did! And, he maintains a rigorous working schedule to this day! As a writer, I aspire to be even partially as successful as R.L. Stine has been.

Have a good day!

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The Cabin at the End of the World (2018) by Paul Tremblay: Book Review

The Cabin at the End of the World by Paul Tremblay is a thrilling ride of small proportions. What do I mean by this? Well, Tremblay delivers jabs and punches right to your midsection. The cabin is the main setting, so such jabs can only be thrown in a small, defined space. As you might imagine, this means that when the thrills start coming, you don’t have much room; you hit a wall, and then must turn and face them head-on. There’s nowhere to run or hide.

Plot Summary: Wen, Andrew and Eric’s adopted daughter, is catching grasshoppers in the front yard, alone. Her dads are in the back, unaware of her activities. Wen is approached by Leonard, a true mountain of a man, well over 6-feet tall. At first, Wen is guarded, but then she is won over by Leonard’s smile. They get to talking, and she discovers he is great at catching grasshoppers.  But then the conversation turns off, and Wen feels more and more like she needs to go inside and be with her dads. It’s really due to the kinds of things Leonard’s been saying: “Nothing that’s going to happen is your fault. Your dads aren’t going to want to let us in, but they have to…We need your help to save the world.” (pg 28-29)

Suddenly three more people show up, all similarly dressed, and all carrying strange weapons in their hands. Leonard says that Wen must explain to her dads what is happening, and that she has to convince them to let the four strangers into the cabin so they can all talk.

The dads don’t let the group inside, because they can see Wen is scared, and they don’t know who these people are. Frustratingly, Tremblay has Eric and Andrew go back and forth for pages and pages, asking if all the doors and windows were locked. It turns out that, no, the windows were not actually locked. Shortly, the quartet of bad guys breaks into the cabin in dramatic fashion. Quickly enough, Andrew and Eric are tied to some chairs.

Tremblay easily switches character viewpoints, telling Andrew and Eric’s side of the story (or their pasts), and then effortlessly switching to Wen, or Leonard’s, or some of the others’, views. There is quite a lot of background detail for each character; we learn that Andrew was attacked in a bar for being gay, which prompts him to take up boxing and the use of firearms to feel safer. We find that Leonard, Adriane, Redmond, and Sabrina don’t really know one another well. They’ve only met recently, through a messaging board, and apparently, they have had similar “visions” regarding the end of the world. Leonard tells Eric and Andrew that they have to make a sacrifice, or many millions of people will die.

Leonard turns on the television, which was previously showing cartoons for Wen. He shows the two men the news, using the program that’s playing as proof that the world is coming apart, maybe even ending. Planes are crashing. There’s a tsunami. A set of earthquakes, one of which causes said tsunami.

Leonard uses these events as proof that the world is ending, telling the heroes they have got to make a choice, a sacrifice, before it’s too late.

And will they sacrifice one of themselves to save millions, even billions? The news is saying these horrible events are happening, but Andrew notices Leonard, and even the other three, keep checking their watches. Who the hell wears watches anymore? he thinks to himself. Maybe, he says to Eric, they keep checking their watches because they wanted to see a specific program at a specific time. Maybe, he says, they even knew what would be broadcast. Maybe these events were already happening, sacrifice or no sacrifice.

I should mention that Andrew’s attack comes back to haunt him. He says that Redmond is actually the same man, named O’Bannon, (older and 50 pounds heavier), that attacked him in that bar all those years ago. Perhaps then, they are all being targeted for some sick and twisted hate crime, a sort of bizarre continuation of what happened all those years ago.

As you may imagine, none of the three heroes is willing to sacrifice one of their own. This creates an obvious problem for Leonard and the others. In his mind, a sacrifice has to be made to save millions. I sort of began wondering what these grand, end of the world visions really were. Are the visions of the end actually real? Did Leonard and the others really have them, collectively, or are they just saying that as a reason for why they decided to break into the cabin?

Some of these questions are answered and some, unfortunately, aren’t. Tremblay uses a lot of words, but the reader gets the sense that, because everything happens inside the cabin (except for the first scene, a scene on the back deck, and some flashbacks), the visions sort of seem “out there,” and as a result they don’t have much of an impact. Which is really a shame, being that the visions seem intricately tied to the novel’s title.

Ending: The ending was really pretty terrible. It’s one of those endings where you expect something final to happen, and nothing ever really does. I feel potential readers would benefit greatly from knowing why the world is ending, as well as how. And, more importantly, IS the world actually ending?

The conclusion, if you can call it that, leaves a lot to be desired, which I guess isn’t really saying much; but of course, I don’t want to give anything away, in case you decide to give this book a go.

Final Thoughts: The Cabin at the End of the World is a showcase for Tremblay’s talents. This man knows how to write and engage the reader. He does, at certain points, tend to drone on and on. One sequence near the end of the book went on for at least 17 pages. I was ready to pull my hair out and took most of the day to finish the 30 or so pages I had left. If you haven’t read Tremblay before, I recommend that you don’t read this one first. Try A Head Full of Ghosts, a Bram Stoker Award winner for 2019, and then maybe come back to this one, once you get to know the author’s style a bit better.

Grade: B- for gore, blood and decent descriptions. Character development is solid. Beware of long soliloquies. Many people will not like the ending (I did not), and this affects the book’s grade. But, all in all, the book was entertaining. If you like horror fiction, give this book a try!

Have a good day!

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