Dave's Anatomy: My History as a Writer, #20: More Horror: Saint Cointha's Bridge: Geography and Evil

As a writer I continued doing horror. I've been reading more of it lately. A story I just read contained the typical elements. A young woman is trapped in a restroom on a train after the lights go out and the train fills with screams, thumps, and blood covers the floor and seeps into the john. She doesn't know what's going on, finally opens the door to see a young girl who may be a vampire, manages to get away from her and lock herself in the loo once more, and hears voices talking about killing her and burning her body and how it would be better for the little girl than what will befall her if they don't. As a reader, you get the idea that some kind of purge—maybe of vampires—is going on and that the vampirism (or zombie state) may be contagious and the narrator has been infected. But you're not certain. The uncertainty, along with the darkness, squishing, screaming, and blood make for horror.

This is horror's mainstay. But there are others ways to do it. In my story, "Saint Cointha's Bridge," geography and history inform the horror.

In her marvelous book Dakota:  A Spiritual Geography, author Kathleen Norris speculates on how geography—where we live, the landscape around us, the physical make-up of our place on earth—affects us spiritually. Norris argues that how we understand God, the supernatural, the spirit world, whatever you want to call it, is shaped and formed by the physicality of the land around us. If you live in Dakota, your spirituality will be different from what it will be if you live in Florida—or Vermont, or Devonshire or the Mekong Delta.

Proximity has always figured into stories of magic and evil. There are haunted houses, castles, and forests; being within their physical limits makes you susceptible to the evil lurking there. I had just finished Norris' book. The idea of geography lay fresh in my mind. All the old horror stories that involve evil places also informed the string of ideas that led to the story "Saint Cointha's Bridge."

 In this story, a peaceful village in England is menaced by the spirit of an evil woman burned at the stake long ago. Thirsty for revenge, her ghost appears, but the village is inhabited by a lot of good people and in every generation some people there are "gifted":  they can see her and their mere presence—because they are virtuous—stops the woman from harming the town.

 But a short distance away is a college also known as evil. From the Middle Ages, rumors of dark rites have clouded the school's reputation. Today it produces unscrupulous business types and does weapons research. It has also, over the last few centuries, systematically bought up the land around the village and now controls enough of it to build a road from the college to Saint Cointha's bridge, where the spirit of the evil woman, Jacquetta Montfort, is most often seen. The main character in the story, Sebastian, knows that if the two sites of evil—the bridge and the college—are physically united by a line of paving stones, the evil of the two sites will be united, and the village engulfed by an evil energy that will permit Jacquetta to carry out her long-contemplated revenge.

Sebastian is one of the people who can see her. He is contemplating her when a local skinhead, who complains about the bullying local political administration, tells him that there will be a little "surprise" for the Mayor and the 

City Council—one they won't soon forget. Sebastian

has other things to think about. He senses his life will be the payment for stopping Jacquetta Montfort. He doesn't quite know why or how, but he is sure of it.

Just before the last stones to unite the college and the bridge are laid, Sebastian encounters Jacquetta. The road to the college is not connected yet, but it is close enough to empower Jacquetta. She assaults him, knocking him to the ground and saying she means to kill him—and that now there will be no stopping her. 

But even as she speaks, something happens. The bridge, built with her blood in the mortar, begins to burn. Jacquetta, whose soul is "in" the bridge, is destroyed. Sebastian, hurt, can't get up and thinks he will die too, though he is satisfied that his life was well spent and instrumental, somehow, in stopping evil from engulfing the town. Someone rescues him.

It is the skinhead. He and his buddies have burned the bridge in retaliation for the city administration's heavy-handed rule. Sebastian thanks him and promises he won't tell anyone what has happened. He knows that the local roughnecks (who never do any real harm to anyone) have inadvertently done the city a good turn.

The bridge is completely destroyed. The city decides not to rebuild it. The road to the college ends in a plaza, since there is no bridge now to connect with. The geographical coupling that would have exponentially increased the velocity of evil is effectively stopped.

"Saint Cointha's Bridge" appeared in a print anthology Horror Through the Ages, available from Amazon. I had another story in that anthology and wrote the introduction as well. Get a copy! It contains lots of good stories--a good introduction too!

I am promoting my fantasy novel, ShadowCity. In a dark world, the light inside you is all have.

For more titles, check my Writer's Page.

Comments are always welcome.

Dave's Anatomy: My History as a Writer #19: Horror Through the Ages, Horror.

I've talked about how I'm not a horror writer, but people are not consistent. I went through a phase where I wrote and published horror. I had done this before. One of my first stories, "The Snow Demon," was a horror story, and I had written a few others, but mainly my stories did not go along the lines of horrific supernatural. Then a streak of them came, and most of the tales were more traditional and "dark" horror. As for my aversion to that kind of writing—well, as Walt Whitman once said, "Do I contradict myself? Very well, then, I contradict myself." Some of the stories were quite fascinating and interesting to compose.

A series of horror stories came from my pen (I write in longhand). The first one, "Dream Catcher," was about a serial killer with Satanic connections who goes after a young man's girlfriend (he has already killed her sister). His attempts to get at the girl are blocked because the young man possesses a dream catcher from a friend who is Native American and practices their ancient spirituality. Also, his girlfriend is a sculptor, and art communicates.

That's probably the best part of the story. An artist puts 

something of himself or herself into a

work of art. Any writer knows this. Margie, the girlfriend of Daniel, who narrates the story, has done a sculptured bust of Amy, her sister. So much of Margie is in the bust, and so much of Amy in Margie, that Daniel begins to have a recurrent dream. Amy is communicating through the statue, and which has captured so much of her soul—which has, like all good art, immortalized her. The dream catcher Daniel has facilitates this. He begins to see an old train signal tower, an anchor, and something having to do with Alabama.

All of the substance of the dream came from my home town. There is an old, fading, creepy train tower from the days when railroads hung lanterns out for signals so trains would not overlap on the tracks and crash into each other. Near-by is the Anchor Bar. And the street that runs just past this is Alabama Street. Daniel does not comprehend this, but eventually he recognizes the landscape and begins to investigate.

In the tower he finds a photo of Amy. It is surrounded by cryptic writing in  ancient languages. With the evidence he needs, Daniel climbs the narrow steel ladder to the street below.

Rail Tower near Alabama Street, Grand Rapids, MI

He is attacked by shadowy creature but manages but destroys it with the dream catcher. After that, Daniel confronts the killer himself, who has a gun. He hears voices. He has killed Amy as "tuition" (Daniel terms it this) so he can gain occult power from these higher powers he hears. Daniel is not impressed. He has the dream catcher. The killer scoffs at the dream catcher, calling it an "Injun charm." In reply, Daniel says, "This 'Injun charm' draws on power that was recognized and feared thousands of years before your ancestors or mine ever set foot on this land. Whatever two-bit magic you learned will collapse when it comes up against this."

The serial killer's gun won't work. He eventually flees. Daniel calls the police. At first they suspect him, but he tells them they will find the real culprit somewhere on Alabama Street. They find him hiding in a warehouse. Amy's murder is solved, as are the murders of three other women. The dream catcher has proved its potent magic.

But, as I've said before, horror is not my thing—at least not the type of horror I often encounter,where characters face unopposable evil. To me, such writing is simplistic. It strikes me rather like the classic cartoon Bambi vs. Godzilla, which is only about ten seconds long. You see Bambi grazing. He looks up to see Godzilla approaching. A shadow falls and then Godzilla's foot comes down and squishes Bambi. End of movie. This typifies a lot of horror. Where is the conflict, the complication, the plot twists—other than the protagonist fleeing from the monster and ending up in a box alley where he or she can't escape—or the woman in the fifties 

horror movie, Tarantula, who gets her skirt caught in 

the door of a car as the spider closes in on her?

In "Dream Catcher" evil is not ultimate because, unlike good, it is derivative. It has no existence in itself but is only the twisting of something good. It can exist, but when it runs up against its opposite—no, not it's opposite, the genuine thing of which is the perversion—no contest.

But the horror-writing phase went on for a while. More on this to come.

If you want to read "The Dream Catcher," here is a link to it. The Horror Zine, an award-winning online horror publication, is one of the very best and I highly recommend it.

I am promoting my science fiction story, Mother Huda. Based on a tale by the Brothers Grimm, taking place in a future where the peoples of India are the predominant race and cultural force on Earth, containing elements of sci-fi, fantasy and romance, it's a great read. Get a copy!   

For more titles, check out my Writer's Page.

I would love to hear your comments.

Dave's Anatomy: My History As a Writer #18: "Jergen Kouhat's Blues," Creating Characters

 Last time, I talked about the story "Jergen Kouhaut's Blues," which challenged me with its length. Sustaining a story through almost 30,000 words is test of skill. But the story kept going along—kept "working"—and the complexity of the characters, their inner conflicts, the unfolding of their personalities, demanded something more than the usual 5000-7500-word limit that delineates most short stories published online or in print. It also crossed some boundaries into what is accepted and not so much accepted in the modern writing scene

There are two basic approaches to writing a story. One is plot-driven. The story centers around the plot, is fast-moving and has lots of action and incidents that "move the story along." Writers are told to catch the reader's interest and keep it. All action must "advance the plot" (how many times have I read that in an editor's comments?). The plot is the center of the text.

On the other hand there are stories that are character driven. The most important thing in the story is how the characters develop, their inner lives, the emotions they feel as they walk through the story's conflict, and how they change (or, sometimes, do not change) as characters. The plot in a story like this must be strong, but it is not the primary focus. The characters and how the conflict in the story affects them is the focus.

Plot-driven stories are much more important today. In the writer's group I have gone to for about fifteen years, many people want plot-driven stories with lots of action. They complain my stories are "boring" and, sometimes, are "not providing entertainment value." One member, whom I dearly love, tells me my stories are boring and pedantic. The reason those friends of mine say this is because I spend a lot of time talking about what is going on in the characters' minds and hearts. I write about their feelings and reactions and, as a result, my stories 

might be a little short on high-speed chases.

Traditionally, what marks off "literary fiction" from genre fiction (i.e., mysteries, horror, action-adventure, fantasy) is the focus on character rather than plot. Much of genre fiction centers on what happens and on keeping the plot moving. In literary fiction, psychomachia, the battle of inner feelings, motivations, and ethical choices gets more attention. In a James Bond novel you will get in shoot-outs, chases, and cliff-hanger escapes. In high-fantasy there will be battles, attacks by fantastical creatures, and daring missions into dark woods or haunted castles. This difference divides literature into its major divisions.

"Jergen Kohaut's Blues" is about how self-serving choices get a character the thing he has always dreamed off but also deprives him what he loves most. Jergen abandons Hannah, his live-in girlfriend, whom he plans to marry, in order to engage in an affair with rock star Sossity Chandler. He is finally able to play in Sossity's band, and she keeps him in the band even when their fling ends. But Jergen's treatment of Hannah haunts him. He asks if they might reconcile, but Hannah has been too badly shaken by their split and sinks into depression and drug abuse. Jergen resents that Sossity took him up and threw him off so easily, though he realizes the decision to pursue her was his choice. Outwardly, everything goes his way; inwardly, he suffers from what he has done.

The denouement, the final unraveling of the story, occurs when he runs into Hannah at a restaurant. He hardly recognizes her, not because she is disheveled but because she is neatly dressed, groomed in a business-woman style, and looks very socially proper—not at all like the quirky, cute, playful woman he loved. She agrees to talk with him. This exchange follows:

"I don’t think," she said, "you have any idea how much I loved you and how much that relationship meant to me. We construct our lives around the people we love. I made my world around our relationship—around you, Jergen—and when you threw me over for Sossity Chandler, my world dissolved—and so did I."

She paused. He decided not to speak. She went on.

"For a while I did dope to ease the pain—dope and bad relationships. Then I realized that if I

wanted to survive and stay sane I would have to leave the old world and the old life I had made. Reality had changed for me, Jergen. I knew things would never be the same and could never be the same. I saw three options: suicide, mental illness, or become a new person—not the old Hannah who loved you and had centered her being in a world with you, but a new woman with a whole new world. But it’s all over, Jergen. I’m a new me. I’m happy, I’ve found a man I love, and I have children and a fulfilling career. But I’m a different person. Too bad. I really liked the way I was. But I can never be that Hannah again—not for you and not for me."

After a long silence he said, "I guess not."

"I’d say we could be friends but we can’t. I don’t hate you, Jergen, but you hurt me more than anyone else in my life has hurt me. And, as I said, I had to stop being me to get over you. So I think it would just be better if we didn’t talk. Do you see what I mean?"

Jergen leaves and goes to the home of his best friend, where he weeps. Ironically, he, a blues player, has learned what the blues really means:  losing everything you held dear and having nothing left it all. The group Everlast sang: "But God forbid you'd ever walk a mile in his shoes—'cause then you really might know what it's like to sing the blues." Jergen learns this, at last, and can do nothing but face what he has done and who he has become.

 Who he is, the person he becomes, is the focus of the story. It has a plot, the story moves, but plot is not the main thing; or, to put it another way, the plot involves more inward issues than things that happen in the outward world. It is a character-driven story rather than a story driven by plot.

Some of the people in my writer's group think this is "boring and pedantic." But the story was published, along with 177 others to date and seven novellas and novels. Character-driven story is not such a liability and some may think.

Character-driven sci-fi appears in my novella, Mother Hulda. Lakshm Parvati struggles with her past and her identity. But it has a lot of good plot elements as well.

For more titles check out my Writer's Page. 

Sorcery, witchcraft, and the conflict of good and evil. Read The Sorceress of the Northern Seas.

 

 Comments always welcome!