#Horror is my favorite genre!!!

[creepyscritches]

Do you have any recommendations for horror books? I've been meaning to try reading horror but I don't really know where to start

Oh yeah! My mom would read Stephen King books as they released when she was in college, so my first experience was reading some of the older stuff like The Shining (the book is much more unnerving than the movie 💀), Cujo, and Thinner. However...the older King novels in particular have a lot of author bias that surfaces as racism/sexism/homophobia, so it's important to think critically while going through them.

I'm not familiar with much of the recent King stuff, but I re-read Cujo pretty frequently.

As far as non-King recommendations go, I have a small variety you could pick from!

Funny/tongue-in-cheek:

David Wong has a really comedic sense of nihilism in his work. "This Book is Full of Spiders" and "John Dies at the End" were super fun and had a great horror atmosphere that wasn't afraid to be as ridiculous as it needed to be. Easy first step into the genre if you're a little unsure on your terror/gore tolerance. Kinda Zombieland attitude almost and reminds you to enjoy your time with the story.

Childhood Boogieman:

Joe Hill's "NOS4A2" is a FUN ride that marinates you in the childhood helpless/determined dichotomy. Centered around the mystery of an eerie old man that drives an imposing black vintage car bearing a "NOS4A2" plate and the countless and seemingly traceless disappearances of young children he comes into contact with, you solve the mystery through the eyes of a child who very much fits the profile of all the other missing children.

Just. Zombies.:

Kieth C. Blackmore has a whoooooole load of short stories based in a zombie apocalypse loosely collected under the "Mountain Man" titles. The setting is similar to early seasons Walking Dead, but Blackmore brings more sympathetic characters and taps into a baser universal terror that comes with surviving in a decaying world. "The Hospital" is the first in the series and. Zombie babies. Zombie babies. ZOMBIE. BABIES. Splatting on the ground and wriggling towards you with toothless gaping mouths. Zombie babies. A lot of his short stories are also free in audiobook form (I've had to switch to audio only so most of my recs are also good audiobooks). The performances are really impressive!

YUCKY:

The highly acclaimed Chuck Palahniuk is YOUR guy if you like it nasty, dirty, and down right yucky. He will get under your skin and describe how wet it is in there. Yucky 💕. He has a large horror collection, but his standout to me is "Haunted". This is like my yuckiest favorite. "Haunted" tells about an eccentric-hosted writing retreat far removed from any cities. The group of writers are invited to stay only if they promise to focus entirely on writing their masterpieces. No phones, computers, letters, or outside interaction for the multi-month retreat. While all of their living needs have been more than provided for, somehow these writers manage to reach dire straits when it comes to simply surviving each other. Interspersed between chapters are short stories that each of the authors are work shopping during the retreat. Each story gives more and more insight into the quiet, unique insanity each is harboring and makes you worry about what's on the pages to come! Again though. YUCKY (affectionate).

[valentimmy]

I like horror when it’s camp I like it when it’s silly and goofy I also like horror when it symbolizes themes that keep u up at night and make u cry I like horror when it’s funny I

[goryhorroor]

horror sub-genres: slasher

[hellboys]

rb if you have a different answer than the above options and also to expand the test sample (!!!)

[nerdside]

The Carpenter sisters + killing ghostfaces

[silverskye13]

I need to ask, though:

*How* long has he been in the water?

The earliest "he is surely in the water now" mention I can see is Etho stepping backwards after the splash - he's stepping through the water that's why it's hard. The Bdubs hug feels like "not yet" cause Etho shouldn't be up to his shoulders then - but it might be the starting to lead in point, 'm unsure? And the singing moment might indicate the start of charming?

Honestly, I love everything about this. I love everything about every your text, the way you manipulate details and atmosphere. When I'm trying to remember my first read, it's. A lot of suspence. I know something will come, it might be Bdubs - it surely is Bdubs, and I expect him to catch Etho unaware. The murder talk, the danger that I anticipate - it's not there yet, but I'm waiting for it, and the tune, the hug, the splash, the buckle - all of them feel like fakeouts to keep the pressure. And the bells are ringing, the hints are all there, but they're so carefully weaved into everything else they might be just words.

And then the question sounds, and the horror hits.

With frantic scrolling up, re-reading, getting even more terrified, and begging for Etho to do something.

It's high mastery, imo.

Oh man, thank you so much for the kind words :D I'm glad you liked the fic, and that the suspense/horror came together so well! I don't write straight horror too terribly often? And I was trying to really stretch some muscles with this one, to see what I could do.

For when exactly Etho gets in the water: I didn't really define that for myself. I wanted him in the water to happen in the space between cues in the story. But I can talk about the things that happen around that.

When Etho sees the stone on the still water, he is getting his first glimpse of the creature. Something is watching him from across the unnatural stillness of the river. When he thinks to himself, "I'm on the dock and I'm safe," the siren song has started and he's been charmed. Up until this point, he's shown some amount of caution [walking quietly on the dock, making sure he isn't wearing anything heavy besides his sword, prioritizing what activities he does first] but when he suddenly and overtly drops caution for "I'm safe on the dock", he's being lied to by something else. And, after emphasizing that nothing can drag him into the water against his will, he reaches over the side of the dock and touches the water willingly.

The rest of the story after that is, to me, the siren justifying sounds and sensations that would break the spell. Etho hears himself shuffling on the dock -- that's just BDubs walking up behind him, nothing to worry about. Etho feels a sense of danger and unease -- well, BDubs is talking about killing Grian. Etho hears the creature moving towards him in the water -- BDubs has his legs over the side of the dock and is kicking around. BDub's eyes are the wrong color -- well, the sunset is reflecting off them, making them red.

Somewhere in these cues, Etho starts shivering, because the water is cold, and he's standing in it.

I also tried to weave in a little bit, the idea that Etho knows he's being charmed? Mostly to do with the end, when he finally gives us the reason why he came to the water in the first place: he wants to see and hear his friend again, and the monster's illusion is the only way he can. But he knows enough to be cautious. He doesn't want BDubs to touch him -- it could be the monster, keep your distance. He feels fear at the idea of deep water, something that nearly scares him out of the illusion, but when he's given the chance to break it [checking his heartbeat to see if it's unnaturally calm], it's knowing he'll stop seeing BDubs that makes him decide not to check.

Etho's flaw in this is he thinks he has more control than he does. He hasn't "come to the water" until he's stepped in. But the truth of the matter is, as soon as he decided he wanted to see BDubs again, he was already willing to be deceived, and someone can't be dragged in against their will.

"How long have I been in the water, BDubs?" [When did I fall for the charm?]

"Does it matter?" [The minute you missed hearing my voice.]

There are other little things I had fun with: the start and end of the illusion both have to do with armor, something that should protect him, but is useless when it isn't worn. Every time Etho makes the mistake of feeling safe, he can see the creature [in the river at the start, when it's trying actively to drown him at the end]. The fact that, when BDubs jumps in the water, Etho shouts "Keep your distance!" and Tango mentioned they would be listening for his scream, to come rescue him. The fact that BDubs straight up says "You're not scared of me, the monster, you're scared of the deep water. But people drown in shallow water all the time."

I dunno! Fun little things that up the stakes a little. This was a really fun one to work on :D

[naquey]

i find it amusing that i used to write romance all the time and now I'm writing Angst & Horror, it's crazy how that pipeline works.

[lazycranberrydoodles]

freehand doodles from the sodom & gomorrah music video because i’m fucking obsessed with fanfare (dorian electra’s new album‼️)

and it is a coincidence that i drew this today but

[soobiesworld]

Get to know your mutuals!

I was tagged by @bubblegumflavor to share my top 4 movies that are not necessarily my favorite nor do i need to watch them all the way through, but i will ALWAYS get excited and turn them on as background if i see they're on

thank you for the tag hehe<3

I was really tempted to put the karate kid but we all know that’s in my like top 10 EVERYTHING! i have a lot of favorite films but i selected a few that you guys didn’t know i liked! just for fun:)

tagging: @miyagi-hokarate @russolaw @karatehusbandos @skyf0ckz @blak68-rit and whoever wants to join!

[kathairoscloset]

music tag game

AH SHEIT THIS WAS IN MY DRAFTS FOR MONTHS IM SO SORRY @puzzl-d HAHAHA (THANKS FOR TAGGING ME THO I APPRECIATE IT BIG KISS)

Rules: shuffle your on repeat playlist and post the first 10 tracks, then tag 10 people.

I Love by LiLiPi

Key Ingredient (Instrumentals) by Mili

Twit by Hwasa

Waltz from the ballet Glazunov A. "Lady Soubrette"

AYA by MAMAMOO

As if its Your Last by Blackpink

KiLLER LADY by 8-Prince-P (feat. Gumi)

Cry for Me (Eng. Ver) by TWICE

Love Like You by Rebecca Sugar

Shanti (Chogakusei Ver.) by wotaku

hork hork bold of you to assume I have 10 ppl I can tag, but hey if you see this and find this interesting then go do it! I'm not stopping you~

[lylahammar]

lays down on the floor

holy fuck slay the princess is so good

[saikis1truelove]

Teruhashi is practically fearless, right?

While Saiki has his own weaknesses.

Saiki can’t handle jumpscares on television very well. So when Teruhashi and Saiki watch a horror movie together, it scares the living shit out of Saiki. Meanwhile Teruhashi jus sitting peacefully with a smile on her face😭

[turnipoddity]

Omg just found ur 2018 hereditary phase I’m so in love the fact I had a hereditary phase at the exact same time and now I’m obsessed with saw🤭🤭🤭

great minds think alike man, idk what else to say 🤝

[the-everqueen]

for the AMA: what compels you most in a fictional character!

rage as a trauma response.

it compels me when a character spits in the face of god. when the response isn't "why did you let all this happen" but "how dare you let this happen." something about the assertion of agency in the wake of un-meaning. something about "there was never a Purpose, the point is what you make of it." this is undoubtedly because i was raised evangelical and continue to struggle with what i believe vs what i want to be true. pero also i think i was denied anger for so long (and even now my reflex when i'm hurt is to divert/repress/hide/sublimate anger) that it's cathartic for SOMEONE to get to be mad at the powers that be.

misogyny means it's usually (white) male characters who get these narrative arcs. this is evident in my blorbos: astarion from bg3, the corinthian from sandman, will graham from hannibal. (my immediate first thought was actually emilio sandoz from the sparrow, very literal autistic brain serving me well here lmao, what does it mean to be god's whore.) but my favorite female and genderqueer characters have this, too. saga anderson from alan wake 2 (LITERALLY tells both the in-game narrative force and the meta "fuck off, i'm done with other people writing my story"). essun from the broken earth trilogy (everyone who says they can't connect to her...i need you to examine yourself for misogynoir). vic from nos4a2. eurydice from hadestown. erica slaughter from something is killing the children. jade from my heart is a chainsaw.

(horror is obviously a huge medium for this...the final girl is a figure of righteous anger, the avenging angel, the woman who mows down the ultimate horror with a baseball bat or a butcher knife and she's right, she's in the right, she's the monster slayer, fuck you fear me.)

[stalebagels]

Finally; a movie just for me

[abracazabka]

turns out scaring yourself shitless with consecutive horror films at night isn't a good coping mechanism and gives you the Anxious and also the Scared. that's crazy?