Horrifying Fiction

I'm a mad Alice Munro fan, but haven't gotten the NYer since I moved. Luckily, I just got a forwarded renewal thing, so this will be remedied. Anyway, didn't see that one.

I don't read horrror books as such, though I do read some fairly tough crime/police procedurals, and recommend Soho Press crime series (relatively international in flavor) for some often taut writing.

Both stories can be found by clicking on the titles in my first post... though I'd get in an explicit warning, as if it couldn't be gathered from context, that one may want to prepare oneself before reading, and not read at all if you're not in the mood to be plunged into the abyss.

Neither are horror stories in any conventional sense. One is about an abusive domestic relationship, one is about Rwanda.

Also a mad Alice Munro fan, she's an absolute master.

Thanks, I'll check them out. (Rwanda, eek.. )

I'm not much for horror anything...just as I was starting to get over seeing "The Exorcist" at the movies, I decided to test myself by reading my mother's copy of the book. All I succeeded in doing was ******* myself up for another six months.

bm - I love horror, if it's well written.

I've just read the second story. It's grim, all right.

BOOkmark.

I just read the Rwanda one.


I am glad I read it, because I think, doubtless irrationally, that engaging with the horror of other's reality is important to our understanding of the world, and enlarges our world and, hopefully, our empathy with others.

I think, somehow, that this is an absolute good (yeah, I know, on what basis? But I just FEEL that this is right...doh!) and may, hopefully, make us less likely to continue to turn blind eyes to this stuff?



Generally, my work means I "sup full with horror" on a daily basis, so I have little appetite for reading about the usual abuse and such which I work with daily.....a lot of pieces of literature which might seem horriffic to more sheltered folk are bread and butter to me.



I kind of feel weird about what reading REALLY fictional horror is all about...you know, the supernatural stuff, Stephen King etc.....what appetire are we feeding, exactly, when we read that? A popular one, clearly....but I feel sort of sullied when I read it, and feel concerned about what exposing oneself to it all the time does.

This is precisely my reaction, down the line, complete with qualifiers.


I assumed, when first reading it, that it was written by someone who had experienced it (or something very close), but then researched and found the author is a Nigerian Jesuit priest (who also wrote the very affecting "Ex-Mas Feast" in last year's debut fiction NYer issue). I find myself wondering whether that matters, if it is someone who is closer to the situation than we are but still not someone who experienced it, himself.


As for horror fiction, I think it's the same impulse as rollercoasters -- the "whee!" of being scared. The adrenaline rush, the pounding heart, and then the reassurance of being on solid ground (or in a nice neighborhood with no actual deranged serial killers... you hope).

I think if you already have the adrenaline rush and pounding heart from everyday life, the appeal may be lessened.

T couldn't stand ER for that reason. Too much trauma from her clients to want to watch it on TV.

There are those who tell me that happy endings are what makes stories successful, but, I disagree. If one is intrinsically good, it will have an audience, no matter the outcome.

I've learned to avoid grim fiction, both pulp fiction and serious literature.
Ever since I was a child I've dreamed about fictional scenes that I've read recently and I see no need to feed my nightmares.

What the hell? In that first story was she going back to that guy? Was saving that boy supposed to offer some kind of redemption? Did she need redeeming? That story left me confused in ten different ways.

The second story - that was tragic and brilliant. Certainly a stick to your ribs tale.

I don't read much crime or horror fiction though it can be fascinating to read about things you would never ever want to experience from such a safe distance.

The horrifying stuff I can't stand are stories about the mafia.

That is very interesting, Boomer...the Mafia bit, I mean.

What makes it so, do you know?

Past life experience?

Just kidding.

I don't really know. I guess it is that I can read or see a lot of horror/crime fiction as a work of imagination but the Mafia is real and real big and they are cold and calculated and greedy enough to kill anyone who gets in their way and I don't think it takes much imagination to think they would really do these things.

The second story that soz posted hit me in the same way.

You can read a book about some lunatic serial killer and even if it is a "true crime" book you know you are reading about some isolated, random, individual who is a lunatic. The first story that soz posted hit me in the same way.

The ONLY mafia movie I have ever been able to sit all of the way through is "Casino" and I still have nightmares about the whole Joe Peschi in the cornfield scene.

So for you it the realler it is the worse?


I understand that fully.....but I sort of want to understand and comprehend that stuff (eg as a kid I read a lot about the holocaust and the jewish experience etc.) but the desire to steep oneself in horror that is purely imagined disturbs me...

I think that it is the more possible it is - the worse it is. The more likely it is - the worse it is.

I spent many years in Oklahoma when I was a kid. I had A LOT of Indian friends (now of course we would call them Native Americans). When I took Oklahoma history all of that was glossed over but I was a curious girl so I read beyond the books.

When I was in high school I wrote a paper on the Tulsa, Oklahoma race riot. Now you can find out a lot about it but 30 years ago it was not really documented; at least it wasn't documented accurately.

I guess it is the more global or systemized or organized and planned hurt that gives me the shivers. The stuff that could be more easily prevented that makes me more sick even when it is not as sensational as the random psychopath.

You mentioned how your job makes you weary. This I perfectly understand and I will say once again that I don't know HOW you do it, only that I appreciate that you do DO it.

Often my life makes me weary.

And it's not just ME and it's not just MO it is knowing that the issue is so so so so much bigger.

It is bigger to the point that you just bend your head.

THAT is the kind of global I mean. If I am making a lick on sense.

The big kind of hurt that an individual is powerless against, not the random hurt that an individual is powerless against, is the kind of hurt that infects my imagination.

The idea of steeping oneself in the horror that we might all be capable of is what most distrubs me.

That's an interesting distinction.

Also, in the first story, there were warning signs -- at many points along the story we, putting ourselves in Doree's shoes, at least imagine "I wouldn't have done that -- I would have gotten out of there."

In the Rwanda story, the whole point is that there was no getting out of it, for anyone. When we put ourselves in either of the parents' shoes, there is no escape, and they got there simply by being born where they were born and living where they lived at the wrong time.

I more made the point, Boomer, that I weary, or have no need of, books/films that illuminate the everyday horror I deal with, than that my work wearies me...I mean it does, of course, but also enlivens (we were talking about that last night, as it happens)


Thing is, though, that I would not be put off WRITING about the horrors that are daily to me (and anyone else in the field) ...partly because it is fascinating and because I do understand it...and I think the people fortunate enough not to would do well to do so, particularly in the midst of this ideological fad for destroying social infrastructure and supports, which means condemning more and more people to these horrors.


I am actually brewing a story right now about a woman who kills her baby.....partly because I get so utterly shocked and distressed by the judgmental and vengeful responses of many people that I read here to such things.....and their utter lack of understanding of the experiences of people who commit crimes generally...like people here were cheering and celebrating (and I am not even convinced of the reality of this story) the action of a woman who allegedly shot a bullet up the anus of a man who sexually abused her daughter......

I guess vengeance and denial of human commonality with people who do terrible things is a natural enough reaction.....but I think it a very unhealthy one for a myriad of reasons (including a failure to grapple seriously with the causes of such behaviour) and I become increasingly impatient with the silly lack of thinking it causes...eg the common fallacy that understanding equals condoning and a lack of appreciation for the victim.


So...I think it possible that the examination, with understanding and an artistry that allows people really to be able "get" the mindframe that leads to everyday horror...of these things in literature/film etc is a possible real good...with all the "yes buts" and hesitation that I included in my first post.