Quote of the Week
I try to avoid watching the news. Sure it is a great place to see what is happening in your neighborhood or across the world and it is wonderful for the writer who is looking for inspiration but I find it counterproductive and depressing as hell. It seems like every time I click over to a news station there's been another shooting, another child has been bullied into suicide or beaten to death at school while their fellow students and teachers watched on too afraid to interfere. I love monster stories. I write dark fantasy and horror and usually that is where my brain lives steeped in darkness so when I turn my television set on it is a break from work. I want something bright and happy. I'm not too proud to admit that I will binge on Hallmark movies some weekends because I know I will always get a happy ending. Don't get me wrong - I adore stories that don't have happy endings but sometimes it feels necessary to balance the dark with the saccharine happiness of Hallmark.
I think what turns me off to the news is what turns me on to books and it's a trick I try to use in my own writing. Pick up a Stephen King or a Clive Barker novel (I could name so many other authors but I have a soft spot for these two) and you will find that along with an actual breathing, living, honest to God monster are the other monsters that we see daily. Human beings. You don't have to look far for true evil because it could have just passed you on the street dressed as an empty eyed teen or as the worker dropping off your mail. Creatures from the dark places get a pass because we don't expect them to have feelings or regret. Human beings lacking these qualities are scary as hell and unfortunately too real.
In honor of this darkness I present this weeks quote. This should be a reminder that there is evil and ugliness in the world and it can be packaged as a harmless child.
"His mind was crowded with memories; memories of the knowledge that had come to them when they closed in on the struggling pig, knowledge that they had outwitted a living thing, imposed their will upon it, taken away its life like a long satisfying drink."
"His voice rose under the black smoke before the burning wreckage of the island; and infected by that emotion, the other little boys began to shake and sob too. And in the middle of them, with filthy body, matted hair, and unwiped nose, Ralph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of mans heart, and the fall through the air of the true, wise friend called Piggy."
William Golding, Lord of the Flies
I think what turns me off to the news is what turns me on to books and it's a trick I try to use in my own writing. Pick up a Stephen King or a Clive Barker novel (I could name so many other authors but I have a soft spot for these two) and you will find that along with an actual breathing, living, honest to God monster are the other monsters that we see daily. Human beings. You don't have to look far for true evil because it could have just passed you on the street dressed as an empty eyed teen or as the worker dropping off your mail. Creatures from the dark places get a pass because we don't expect them to have feelings or regret. Human beings lacking these qualities are scary as hell and unfortunately too real.
In honor of this darkness I present this weeks quote. This should be a reminder that there is evil and ugliness in the world and it can be packaged as a harmless child.
"His mind was crowded with memories; memories of the knowledge that had come to them when they closed in on the struggling pig, knowledge that they had outwitted a living thing, imposed their will upon it, taken away its life like a long satisfying drink."
"His voice rose under the black smoke before the burning wreckage of the island; and infected by that emotion, the other little boys began to shake and sob too. And in the middle of them, with filthy body, matted hair, and unwiped nose, Ralph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of mans heart, and the fall through the air of the true, wise friend called Piggy."
William Golding, Lord of the Flies
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