The Horror (Books) [Archive] - Quarter To Three Forums

Ben Sones

08-26-2002, 01:06 PM

Honestly, there isn't a lot of good horror out there. I wish there were more. The Shirley Jackson book that you are thinking of is actually called The Haunting of Hill House, by the way, though I do agree that it's a great book. Here are my suggestions:

Just finished reading Coraline, by Neil Gaiman. It's a children's book, and you may need to venture into the children's section of your local bookstore to find it. It's well worth the trip. Scary stuff. Neverwhere is also very good. I don't know that I'd call it horror, though. it's more like dark fantasy.

Weaveworld, by Clive Barker. I don't like all of his stuff, but this book was fantastic. If you like it, the Great and Secret Show is also worth a look.

Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury. He doesn't do much overt horror, really, but some of his books and stories are pretty damn scary. Also check out the Halloween Tree.

Just a few to get you started... =)

nife2o4

08-26-2002, 01:23 PM

I know you skipped shorter stories and only like some King, but I think King's collections of short stories tend to be his best work. The short story format forces King to focus and it really helps his writing.

Skeleton Crew and Night Shift are his older short story collections, and I'd argue that The Mist in Skeleton Crew his one of his best stories ever.

I really can't think of any good horror that I've read lately. Probably the most horrific thing I've read lately is The Perfect Storm, just because the images of being caught in a sinking ship really get to me.

William Harms

08-26-2002, 01:39 PM

The Books of Blood
The Shining
Pet Semetary
Night Shift
Skeleton Crew
The Keep (F. Paul Wilson)
Soft and Others (F. Paul Wilson)
Ghost Story (Peter Straub)
Shadowland (Peter Straub)
The Amityville Horror
Hell House

That's off the top of my head; I can offer more suggestions once I get home. Also, avoid anything by Bentley Little--he's a horrible writer.

Also, if you want decent Lovecraftian-style horror, check out Brian Lumley's early works. (Which have been recently reissued.)

Bub, Andrew

08-26-2002, 01:41 PM

I know you skipped shorter stories and only like some King, but I think King's collections of short stories tend to be his best work. The short story format forces King to focus and it really helps his writing.

I'll go you one further and say that the short story format is ideal for horror. Its a genre that often doesn't work at all when stretched out, often needlessly. The Mist is good stuff, agreed. I only omitted short stories because otherwise, my list would be all crazy.

Oh God Ben, if Sparky sees that you recommended Gaiman's Neverwhere she'll stomp on your house and use that atomic breath of hers. There's a whole thread buried here where she, Brett Todd (I think) and I just eviscerate that book. Suffice it ta say, we din't like it.

Also, I've read a lot of Barker and I only really liked The Books of Blood (again, short stories). Weaveworld, Imagica (or whatever) and the one with the Necropolis were ok, but not favorites of mine. I don't go for the contemporary fantasy stuff he's into. But seeing you recommended Gaiman, I'm not surprised to see Barker follow close behind. They are similar.

Thanks for the Shirley Jackson correction btw, I'm embarrassed... the damn book is sitting right in front of me. Ugh. Really I think what I want is stuff like this. I got "I Am Legend" by Mathieson and I can't believe nobody recommended it to me before now. It's great.

I recall a thread about great opening lines, here's the one from Hill House:
"No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within..."

Those two words "not sane" really got me the first time I read this one.

Ben Sones

08-26-2002, 01:49 PM

Well, she can stomp away. I loved Neverwhere. Best thing Gaiman has written (and I like pretty much all of his stuff), though Stardust and the Season of the Mists (Sandman) story arc come pretty close.

You should check out Coraline, though. I think you'd like it.

Sparky

08-26-2002, 02:39 PM

Hey, Ben and I agree on The Halloween Tree (one of my favorites) :) As for spooky stuff, I don't like anything modern (King, et al). Gimme some Lovecraft, Poe, J.S. Le Fanu and M.R. James. But I'm oldfangled like that. Now excuse me whilst I crawl back under this here moldering, web-encrusted catafalque. Mind the bats!

Don Quixote

08-26-2002, 04:25 PM

Bah. Neverwhere was absolute crap. The plot read just as predictably as the the TV miniseries adaptation it was, and the setting was like an obscene cross between Clive Barker (with his 'other' realities and races living just beneath human notice), and Piers Anthony's Xanth series (with all the absolutely atrocious barrage of puns).

I just finished Coraline as well, and I was kind of iffy on it. It was better than most of his prose work, but still not as good as his comics (and even they owe a huge debt to Alan Moore). I've come to the conslusion that his style is just so much better for comics because his writing style just has no flow ro it. He. Writes. Line. By. Line. This. Makes. It. Very. Hard. For. The. Story. To. Have. Any. Proper. Sense. Of. Pacing.

Bleh. For good, dark childrens books, I'd reccomend Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy- The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Spyglass. Intended for a slightly older audience than, say, the Harry Potter books, these are flat-out amazing. I hear they're fairly popular among the kids, which surprises me. I wonder how these have slipped under the radar of the Chistian Right- this is a series of books that declares war on GOD HIMSELF at one point.

Recomendations, though. I can't reccomend a lot of horror, but I can mention a few books with some thought-provoking horrific material in them. Kathe Koja's Skin is pretty neat, but it's written in a kind of semi-stream of conciousness style (much more coherent than Faulkner or Joyce, but still odd if you're not prepared). Jack O'Connell's latest book, Word Made Flesh is probably one of my favorite books ever. One part gritty crime novel, one part horror story (not supernatural at all though), and one part meditaion on language and communication, I really can't reccomend it highly enough.

junior allen

08-26-2002, 04:46 PM

J.G. Ballard -- CRASH, HIGH RISE, THE ATROCITY EXHIBITION

Robert Aickman -- PAINTED DEVILS, COLD HAND IN MINE

T.E.D. Klein -- THE CEREMONIES, DARK GODS

Ramsey Campbell -- THE DOLL WHO ATE HIS MOTHER, THE PARASITE

Peter Straub -- SHADOWLANDS

Joe R. Lansdale -- his short stories are very fine, especially "The Night They Missed The Horror Show"

Fritz Leiber -- OUR LADY OF DARKNESS

Tried to pick some offbeat ones,

junior allen

Ben Sones

08-26-2002, 06:22 PM

For good, dark childrens books, I'd reccomend Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy- The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Spyglass.

I'd recommend them, too, but I don't know that I'd consider them dark, and they certainly aren't horror. They are good, though.

Another good book that isn't quite horror but is vaguely unsettling is Jame's Blaylock's "The Rainy Season." Also in that category is Peter S. Beagle's "Tamsin" (which leans a bit more towards horror, since it is a ghost story).

William Harms

08-26-2002, 07:15 PM

Dan Simmons' horror books are also quite good, especially Carrion Comfort and LoveDeath. (Although the latter might not be technically "horror".) Also, Robert McCammon's Blue World is a great read.

It still amazes me that no one (in the horror genre) has ever come close to duplicating King's success, especially since his formula is so obvious (and correct)--take a seemingly All-American family/person, establish their lives, and then have really, really bad stuff happen to them.

Instead, fools like Bentley Little regale us with tales of witches receiving their own city from the US Govenment after a letter-writing campaign...

Dean

08-26-2002, 07:16 PM

I kind of like Peter Strab's Blue Rose loose trilogy of books-- Koko, Mystery, and [Damn! I forget the name of the last one], but they're not really horror. Unless just having really bad things happen to good people counts. Mystery I especially liked because of its rewriting of The Shadow legend. They're more crime.

I just like King because I know I'm in for a good time whenever I pick up one of his books, even the bad ones are better than anything by Koontz or Anne Rice. His Bag of Bones is a pretty fair ghost story that has more levels than your modern horror novel. I honestly think King is underrated in terms of talent (as opposed to sales).

Ever read any John Fowles? The Maggot is a creepy as hell book where you never know quite what's going on, and The Magus is a real rollercoaster ride. Again, I'm not sure if you'd call them horror.

Also, I've read a couple issues of http://www.thespook.com which is an interesting twist on the online magazine genre. The magazine is free to download in PDF form, but it comes with ads, just like a regular magazine. For awhile they were putting in a fake ad, and giving away a prize for finding it, in order to make readers actually look at the ads. I'm not sure how their business model is treating them, but they've had some good horror fiction in there.

William Harms

08-26-2002, 07:46 PM

The other book is The Throat.

Tyjenks

08-27-2002, 09:55 AM

Alright, who brought up Koontz. Blech!! My wife was reading him and tried to get me to read one about an agoraphobic who wrote video games. Around 250 pages into it I realized any pay off coming would not offset what I had been forced to read until that point. "The water fell in torrents like Niagra falls", "Outside pressed upon her flesh like a momentous granite boulder". These are not his exact words, but similair comparisons were spread in large quantities throughout. I do not think Koontz can write a sentence without drawing some mundane parallel.

I pointed these irritants out to my wife, as it had really not bothered her. I do not think she has read one of his books since. Hooray!

I too like King and have read most of his stuff. It's fun. A couple of Barker's books are good (Weaveworld for one). I have not found any other decent and consistent horror authors writing today either.

Chris Floyd

08-27-2002, 11:08 AM

If anyone's interested in the horror short story, there's a great compilation edited by Joyce Carol Oates called American Gothic Tales. Worth checking out to see literary masters dip into the horrific genre and to see the quintessential choices (in Oates' estimation) of the horror masters like Poe and Lovecraft.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0452274893/qid=1030472405/sr=2-2/102-0335475-2316955

Toddy

08-27-2002, 10:32 PM

Robert Aickman -- PAINTED DEVILS, COLD HAND IN MINE

T.E.D. Klein -- THE CEREMONIES, DARK GODS

Ramsey Campbell -- THE DOLL WHO ATE HIS MOTHER, THE PARASITE

Speaking of horror, this thread must be cursed. XP went down in a rather spectacular crash when I was responding to this post a moment ago. Anyhow...

Great picks. Anything by Aickman is great. Campbell's really got a way of blending supernatural dread with real-world fears about sex and death. His Cold Print collection should be read by anyone interested in Ia! Ia! Cthulhu fhtagn! stuff. And TED Klein? What the hell ever happened to him? He was getting big in the mid-80s as editor of Twilight Zone magazine and those two books (one's a novel, one's a collection of novellas), then he just seemed to vanish into Innsmouth or something. Have to plug his name into Amazon and see what comes up, though I don't think he's written a novel in 14-15 years. He reminded me a bit of Clive Barker at the time. Klein also played with Cthulhu. One of the novellas--Man With A Black Horn?--is about Lovecraft being "right." Good and creepy.

Toddy

08-27-2002, 10:49 PM

Here are some other offbeat considerations--though I don't have a lot to recommend anymore, since I got rid of most of horror a few years ago...

James Herbert -- Haunted (better than the movie from a couple of years ago, though the movie was a pretty faithful adaptation of what's really a classic ghost story; and obviously the template for The Others)

Richard Matheson -- Hell House (fun, though perhaps not as fun as the movie with Roddy McDowell)

Nicholas Conde -- The Believers (a lot better than the Martin Sheen movie, with a much more appropriate ending)

Dennis Wheatley -- The Devil Rides Out (a lot of fun--basically a battle between the forces of good led by anti-black magic guy Duke de Richleau and evil nasty Satanists; part of a series but the only one I've got; made into a Hammer movie)

William W. Johnstone -- The Devil's Kiss (fall down laughing awful; MST3K movie in book form; check out the following, taken from the page I flipped the book open to just now...)

"Tony, tell me about the goings-on at the funeral home."

"It's just whispered rumors among the elderly, Sam. That bodies are not being embalmed. Being buried whole."

"Interesting." Sam said. "But is there more?"

"Yes. Necrophilia and necromancy."

Toddy

08-27-2002, 10:54 PM

One more I forgot--Richard Laymon. Again, pure crap like most contemporary horror, but he's got a good ear for dialogue. B movie-like stuff you can rip through in a couple of hours.

gnmarsh

08-28-2002, 03:58 AM

It's understandable for koonts to be slammed on now. He puts out a book every six months and the they are pretty much crap. However, if you go back and read lightning and watchers, both are outstanding. Also the King straub collaboration black house was pretty good.

Bub, Andrew

08-28-2002, 06:33 AM

I'll cop to liking The Watchers by Koontz back in the day. But I attritubute that mostly to my innate love for talking golden retrievers and hatred for mutant baboons. Corey Haim starred in the movie btw.

Tyjenks

08-28-2002, 06:59 AM

I kinda liked the 4-hour mini-series for Koontz's Intensity simply because thst "Scrub's" guy with the funky teeth plays a pretty convincing nutcase. He has always been a good "bad-guy" character actor, but he is superb in Scrubs IMO.

Nick Hyle

08-28-2002, 10:26 AM

OK, things that haven't already been listed:

Talisman, by Straub & King

Beastnights, by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

(Let me note before anyone jumps in that I am certainly not recommending Yarbro wholesale - she's written a lot of crap. But this one is a horror gem.)

If we're willing to expand this to twisted dark fantasy, etc, then I'd recommend Laurell K. Hamilton and Anne Bishop.

And if his pulp style works for you, R.E. Howard's old horror short stories are definitely worth a read - they've held up better than his fantasy.

Nick

Anonymous

08-28-2002, 05:54 PM

I like that actor, but I can't watch Scrubs given that I have pleged feminist allegiance to the sentiments of a certain TLC song.

Brad Grenz

08-28-2002, 09:52 PM

I've liked some of Koontz' stuff, but I'll agree that his prose is completely out of control these days.

Don Quixote

08-31-2002, 04:30 PM

Hey. For all of you that just finished 'Coraline' by Neil Gaiman, and enjoyed it even a little bit, do yourself a favor and go read 'The Thief of Always' by Clive Barker. I just finished it, and it was really pretty good. It shares the same 'kid's book that wasn't really intended for kids' vibe that 'Coraline' had, but IMO, it was much, much better.

Anonymous

09-02-2002, 09:07 AM

I've liked some of Koontz' stuff, but I'll agree that his prose is completely out of control these days.

In my small experience, he's virtually unreadable. I'm reminded of a scene from the FOX's canceled "The Family Guy" in which Brian, the family dog, hits a man with his car.

He gets out and says something like, "Oh my god, are you Stephen King?"

"No," says the injured man, "I'm Dean Koontz."

Brian proceeds to get back in his car and back over his victim. I thought it was a stitch.

Tyjenks

09-02-2002, 12:28 PM

Kevin Grey

09-02-2002, 02:41 PM

Dan Simmons' "Summer of Night" is excellent. Very similar to a lot of King's work. The sequel "A Winter Haunting" is also good.

mtkafka

09-03-2002, 01:00 AM

I thought Henry James 'Turn of the Screw' was pretty freaky, almost like The Others movie but in 'literary' mode. And William Blatty's Exorcist was pretty scary. And Matheson's I Am Legend I thought was VERY cool, a really great fast read!

etc

Anonymous

09-03-2002, 10:59 AM

Alright, who brought up Koontz. Blech!! My wife was reading him and tried to get me to read one about an agoraphobic who wrote video games. Around 250 pages into it I realized any pay off coming would not offset what I had been forced to read until that point. "The water fell in torrents like Niagra falls", "Outside pressed upon her flesh like a momentous granite boulder". These are not his exact words, but similair comparisons were spread in large quantities throughout. I do not think Koontz can write a sentence without drawing some mundane parallel.

Makes me think of the writing class from "Throw Momma from the Train."

"His guts oozed nice, like a melted malted."

Peter

William Harms

09-03-2002, 09:33 PM

And William Blatty's Exorcist was pretty scary.

Blatty's prose is too clunky. The Exorcist is a freaky book, but his writing got in the way for me.

DrCrypt

09-04-2002, 01:37 AM

My age spans many generations. The loud incredulity of my beholders can not shout down that calm truth. Of my birth I shall say nothing. Does a man reminisce fondly of the dung-smeared apes that were his forebears?
Introductory paragraph of Dr. Samuel Johnson's recently discovered memoirs? Derek Smart's most recent riposte to his Usenet detractors? The story of Tarzan as told by Alistaire Crowley? Nope, just an absolutely mind-boggling passage from Ramsey Campbell's "The Doll Who Ate His Mother".

I used to love horror novels... I lived and breathed them through basically my entire teens and probably read hundreds of them during that time. Then I got on a literature kick and basically haven't read any fiction except that since. Still, I got sort of nostalgic from this thread. I remembered Ramsey Campbell as actually a really good horror writer, so I picked up a couple of his books (THE DOLL WHO ATE HIS MOTHER! THE FACE THAT MUST DIE! THE BUTT THAT WON'T QUIT! &c.), a nice bottle of Glenrothes scotch and some old jazz records and whiled away the weekend with them.

I just can't even get past the writing. I know from personal experience that Ramsey Campbell is actually one of the better writers among the horror flock, yet I found the entire book painful to read - there are a few competent passages, but for the most part, it is cliched slop. I'm going to move on to the Face That Must Die, which I think is a later novel and might be better written, but I'm not hoping for much beyond a mediocrely-written creepshow.

I don't mean for all this to be insult after insult against horror novels. I guess I'm just wondering if any of you could recommend some horror novels that might be of a higher literary caliber than the norm.

Ben Sones

09-04-2002, 05:45 AM

William Harms

09-04-2002, 11:09 PM

I don't know that I can. I'm in essentially the same boat--I used to love horror novels in high school, but after a prolonged break from them I've come back to discover that most of them simply aren't very good. I still enjoy the staples (Lovecraft, Poe, Jackson, et al), but I've not been able to find a consistently readable modern writer. Ah, well...

And unfortunately, the bad books sell. Take Bentley Little's novel The Walking. The premise is brilliant: The dead rise up and start walking around. They don't eat people or do anything, just walk around. Damn creepy.

And then the whole thing devolves into a convoluted tale about witches (who get granted a town in the 1800's by the US Government) and a bunch of other crap. By the end of it I wanted to shoot myself in the teeth.

That said, there is some good stuff out there. You just have to dig for it.

Mark Asher

09-05-2002, 01:21 AM

Is Lovecraft good, or just a seminal figure? I find his prose difficult to wade through.

Anders Hallin

09-05-2002, 01:53 AM

Is Lovecraft good, or just a seminal figure? I find his prose difficult to wade through.

I don't really know how to define "good" in this case. On the one hand, it is very difficult to take his adjective-laden stories, but on the other hand, every time I actually read something of his at night a feeling of dread creeps up on me. His style is a bit silly at times but it does convey the feel of world that is our own, yet so much more than that.

Bub, Andrew

09-05-2002, 05:53 AM

Is Lovecraft good, or just a seminal figure? I find his prose difficult to wade through.

Yes on all counts.
He's overly verbose, a bit racist, stodgey, but he's probably the most effective horror writer I've ever read. Start with something short or more accessible. Like The Outsider. Or start with one of his more conventional, like The Shadow of Innsmouth.

Ben Sones

09-05-2002, 07:53 AM

Is Lovecraft good, or just a seminal figure? I find his prose difficult to wade through.

His prose is something that you'll either love or hate. I love it, but I understand when other people don't share my opinion. It has a tangible style, however--you can't read a sentence by Lovecraft without knowing that he wrote it. I find it to be somewhat lyrical, which plays into his subject matter nicely. It never feels entirely natural, and I think that's intentional.

William Harms

09-05-2002, 01:33 PM

Is Lovecraft good, or just a seminal figure? I find his prose difficult to wade through.

I read all of his stuff when I was in high school and thought it was wonderful; I tried re-reading it last week and it put me asleep. (Worse yet is when someone else tries to ape his style.) I just don't have the patience to read through it anymore.

[quote="Bub, Andrew"]He's overly verbose, a bit racist, stodgey, but he's probably the most effective horror writer I've ever read.[quote]

As popular as it is to kick him around, in my mind no one can match King. 'Salem's Lot, The Shining, and Pet Semetary, in particular, are three of the most terrifying stories ever put to paper.

Bub, Andrew

09-05-2002, 02:01 PM

As popular as it is to kick him around, in my mind no one can match King. 'Salem's Lot, The Shining, and Pet Semetary, in particular, are three of the most terrifying stories ever put to paper.

Not coincidentally, I think, all three of those are among his earliest and most heavily edited books. Today editors can't touch him and that isn't ideal for a word-spewer like King. Today he completely lacks restraint and, I'd say, creative energy. Those three you mention are his best books though, I wish he could rekindle that because for all his faults King is excellent at characterization. I admire how he has terrified characters react in odd or weird ways. Like when you fall and instead of your life flashing before your eyes, you think about whether you left the iron on. That rings true to me somehow and I think I stole that from him...

...but there's something about Lovecraft's worldview, that being killed isn't the worst fate - going mad is, that really scares the crap out of me. I like how Lovecraft never over describes* and how his stuff is just plain weird. Restraint is probably what I think makes Lovecraft a classic and King (mostly) a hack. King just never knows when to stop and let me complete the picture for myself.

* EDIT
I mean in describing concrete details. He very much over describes using weird evocative words. Cyclopean, for example.

Anonymous

09-05-2002, 04:45 PM

I think Lovecraft's best stuff is his straight horror stories. In the Vault. The Outsider. With the Pharoahs. (Not sure if that's the right title, but it's close.) The Diary of Alonzo Typer. (This last a rewrite of someone else's story.) A few others.

For the most part, these stayed out of, or stayed on the fringe of, the Cthulu Mythos. (As fine a concept as this might be, it saddled Lovecraft's writing with an awful lot of ornate verbiage and the reader with additional burdens.) The horror pieces were subtler, slyer, less heavy with language.

Peter

Bub, Andrew

09-05-2002, 04:49 PM

You forgot "The Rats in the Walls" Peter, that one is just brilliant. I see your point even though I strongly disagree with you. But I see your point. That sentiment is exactly what I meant when I recommended Mark start with his "more accessible" stories. They're good, but it's the Cthulhu stuff that will keep Lovecraft a (pardon the pun) cult figure for a long time to come.

Tyjenks

09-05-2002, 08:15 PM

As popular as it is to kick him around, in my mind no one can match King. 'Salem's Lot, The Shining, and Pet Semetary, in particular, are three of the most terrifying stories ever put to paper.

I really liked the characters and story lines in Needful Things.

And William I agree. I did not know how bad King was until I read it here. :wink: (One of) My problem(s) is I went for several years without reading much else while catching up on his older stories so I had nothing to compare him to. Now that I have some perspective I can finally say.......

Dreamcatcher was really good and I will be buying his next book as soon as it hits the shelves. So there.

William Harms

09-05-2002, 08:28 PM

Not coincidentally, I think, all three of those are among his earliest and most heavily edited books. Today editors can't touch him and that isn't ideal for a word-spewer like King. Today he completely lacks restraint and, I'd say, creative energy. Restraint is probably what I think makes Lovecraft a classic and King (mostly) a hack. King just never knows when to stop and let me complete the picture for myself.

I don't think the "heavily edited" comment is true at all. Based on an interview with King from a few years back, the only major edit made to 'Salem's Lot was the stair scene--originally rats scurried out and did the killing and King's editor (Bill Thompson, I believe) requested it be changed to a board with knives.

As near as I can tell, most of the changes made to King's work have been in regards to scenes of violence, not the actual language he used or his style. And even some of his more recent work, such as Misery (which is a great read) is tight and to the point. Even the Bachman books, which were written before he was ever published (except for Thinner) are fantastic reads--the prose is tight and the pace is brisk.

The other reason that argument doesn't hold up for me is because of his short stories. He's published a lot of them and for the most part they've all been flat-out brilliant, especially the ones in Night Shift and Skeleton Crew. Those stories were published in a variety of publications; I seriously doubt that the fiction editor working at Cavalier was as good as the fiction editor working at Playboy. If it all hinged on the editor, there would be wild swings in the quality and that simply isn't the case.

Like I said, it's popular to kick him around now and I think some of that is warranted: Dreamcatcher's ending was predictible, Bag of Bones was a snore-fest, and Rose Red was damn near an affront to humanity. But just because he's wordy and loosey-goosy with his use of language now doesn't invalidate his entire library of work.

Chris Floyd

09-05-2002, 08:32 PM

In some ways, Lovecraft's non-Mythos work is stronger because it latches on to a more familiar form of horror story. Particularly the suspenseful Poe-esque tale. But, for mine and anyone's money, that's what Poe is for. Lovecraft can't compare.

Lovecraft's mythos work is less about suspense and the ending that catches you like a noose with a twist or shock, and more about atmosphere -- built and sustained until it is often left, fairly unresolved, to slowly dissipate around you as the story ends. Mountains of Madness is a classic example of this.

Tyjenks

09-05-2002, 08:58 PM

Like I said, it's popular to kick him around now and I think some of that is warranted: Dreamcatcher's ending was predictible, Bag of Bones was a snore-fest, and Rose Red was damn near an affront to humanity.

Dreamcatcher: predictible ending, yes, but a fun ride until then.

I have to agree on the other two. Ugh! Especially RR whose name I have promised myself I shall neither speak nor type in full again.

Toddy

09-05-2002, 11:44 PM

The other reason that argument doesn't hold up for me is because of his short stories. He's published a lot of them and for the most part they've all been flat-out brilliant, especially the ones in Night Shift and Skeleton Crew.

I dunno about "brilliant," but those collections do feature some really good stories (...and also some crap like The Mangler and Children of the Corn). But they're awfully old, now. King's short stories and novellas after that universally blow. Try reading Everything's Eventual sometime, if you're feeling particularly masochistic. If I didn't know that King went to bed every night on a bed padded with gazillion dollar bills, I'd have felt embarrassed for him, peddling that schlock. But what's even more astounding is that King is getting the best reviews of his career for this garbage, in complete contrast to his earlier, better work, which was critically savaged.

Toddy

09-05-2002, 11:52 PM

Introductory paragraph of Dr. Samuel Johnson's recently discovered memoirs? Derek Smart's most recent riposte to his Usenet detractors? The story of Tarzan as told by Alistaire Crowley? Nope, just an absolutely mind-boggling passage from Ramsey Campbell's "The Doll Who Ate His Mother".

Like most horror writers, Campbell often can't sustain what he's doing for the length of a novel. So he's better appreciated in short story form. His novels are spotty at best, particularly the early ones. I couldn't finish The Doll Who Ate His Mother, either, and had a tough time with Parasite and Incarnate as well. I liked some of the later books, like Ancient Images and Count of Eleven. But, again, Campbell's short story collections show him at his best. Cold Print is a great anthology of Cthulhu tales. Anyone who likes Lovecraft should hunt down a copy of it. I also really liked Scared Stiff, a collection of sexual horror stories that features some really disturbing artwork by JK Potter, who used to do illustrations for Night Cry magazine (horror digest anthology, sister mag to Twilight Zone) back in the 80s. And Demons by Daylight rounds up some of Campbell's older stories.

Toddy

09-06-2002, 12:11 AM

...but there's something about Lovecraft's worldview, that being killed isn't the worst fate - going mad is, that really scares the crap out of me. I like how Lovecraft never over describes* and how his stuff is just plain weird. Restraint is probably what I think makes Lovecraft a classic and King (mostly) a hack. King just never knows when to stop and let me complete the picture for myself.

And Lovecraft did? Every second story was jammed with "incredible, mind-blasting horrors that I cannot describe," described in detail on page after page. What worked best were the sparser pieces, like "The Rats in the Walls." Parts of that story still stay with me, like the noise of the "rats" and descriptions of the old Roman temples beneath the castle. That is one incredibly creepy story.

Overall, though, I've never bought into Lovecraft's "worldview." The insanity stuff seemed too stylized to me, even back in grade and high school when I was first reading the Cthulhu mythos stories. It's hard to suspend your disbelief when there is little evidence of real life, too. When the characters are all grotesque stereotypes--every story has a protagonist who delves into things man was not meant to know, and gets his synapses kicked around because of it--and they rarely speak with one another, how can you be afraid? It's so far removed from actual living human beings that you can't help but see the stories as fiction. You can never lose sight of Lovecraft himself pulling the strings. Most of all, I can't get past the absence of dialogue. Lovecraft's ideas were often brilliant, but he wasn't a very good story-teller.

DrCrypt

09-06-2002, 01:13 AM

Stephen King's problem (re: later works) is not so much that he isn't being editted anymore. In my opinion, it seems pretty clear he isn't writing with an outline. The books are tedious, meandering and tangential. He can go hundreds of pages in his later works without making a single point and entire chapters without illustrating a character better than he did in his introductory paragraph.

Even his earlier works suffer from this. I'd say the only really great (not literary great, just fun great) books he's written have been The Shining, Pet Semetary and The Gunslinger (first book only), and they are all pretty well-plotted and effectively terse, but look at slop like "The Stand", which was 800 pages too long when he released it the first time in 1978, then added 600 pages more in 1990.

King has gone on record saying he just sits down every day and for 8 hours hammers out fiction. This is a BAD way to write, especially for someone as verbose and seemingly clueless to the advantages of tense, sinewy pacing in a horror story as King is. When I write like this, I tend to get caught up in my own cleverness and go flailing about, writing some (independently) great stuff that I end up having to profusely cut out with a sigh when it is time to revise, because it doesn't fit. King is like this (and so are other really mediocre popular writers like Tom Clancy, every fantasy author under the sun who can't tell their retarded Conan rip-off stories in under twelve, one-thousand-page tomes, etc.) - I haven't read a single one of his books that couldn't have been cut down to less than three hundred pages. He ought to be writing with a strict outline to keep him on track.

If you need twelve hundred pages and an epic scope of forty years to tell the story of a spooky clown and his age old battle with a giant turtle, you're a pretty incompetent writer.

mtkafka

09-06-2002, 03:31 AM

Sometimes reading existential lit stuff makes me feel insane or mad depressed!, but it isnt scary. Reading something grotesque like Amercan Psycho or Blood Meridian is creepy but not scary. I dont know if I can be scared in a book anymore. I definitely get more scares (more like a feeling of being scared/watched) in some pc games than in books!

I think the 'scary' books of today are the serial killer vs cop books ala Red Dragon or Hannibal since they are closer to home I guess.

Plus I think Stephen King should stop writing and just take a break. Hes already damn rich! I stopped reading him after Misery (my fave King book). And Carrie and Christine were awesome!

etc

Bub, Andrew

09-06-2002, 05:43 AM

If you need twelve hundred pages and an epic scope of forty years to tell the story of a spooky clown and his age old battle with a giant turtle, you're a pretty incompetent writer.

Haha!

William, King's short stories work best because of the limitations of the form. Since most of King's foibles, I'd argue are overindulgence (and a mistaken belief that anything he writes is printable), of course he's going to be more effective with a lower word count and limitations. I think you're wrong about the editing. Give me any King book, even early work like The Shining and Salem's Lot and I'll find you pages that could be cut out. (Show me something recent and I'll remove entire chapters.) As King has grown more powerful, his page count has risen and he's lost editors with the courage to suggest changes to sentences. Dr. Crypt nailed it with his The Stand example. Some editor removed 600 pages (600 pages!) from that book. King added them back in in 1990... and I think they were better left out. Right now it looks like King's editor is about as effective an advisor to him as McCallum is as George Lucas' Star Wars producer. Someone who says "yes" instead of saying: "Um, that isn't working boss."

As for Brett and Lovecraft. I think the lack of dialogue and his removing it from a context I can relate to is why it works. Put it into a context I can relate to and it becomes a little silly. "Uh-oh, the island was just a sleeping giant octopus guy!" What proves this is when you see better writers try and imitate him, it falls flat because they can't get the obscure/bizarre cadence right, most notably with Michael Chabon's story at the end of "Werewolves in their Youth" (a decent short story collection overall - he writes as that fictional horror writer from Wonder Boys, I think this story was in the New Yorker too.)

And you missed my asterix edit. Lovecraft was poor in describing things in concrete terms. That works. He admittedly totally overdid it with the "cyclopean vistas of terrifying reality" passages.

mtkafka is right that King absolutely needs to take a long break. The Green Mile was great (again, I'd argue because he had to limit himself to bite sized peices and he had to plan the book out)... and whomever mentioned Needful Things... I love that book too. More for the concept than the execution though.

William Harms

09-06-2002, 07:04 AM

I think you're wrong about the editing. Give me any King book, even early work like The Shining and Salem's Lot and I'll find you pages that could be cut out. (Show me something recent and I'll remove entire chapters.) As King has grown more powerful, his page count has risen and he's lost editors with the courage to suggest changes to sentences. Dr. Crypt nailed it with his The Stand example. Some editor removed 600 pages (600 pages!) from that book. King added them back in in 1990... and I think they were better left out.

Based on what? Your gut feeling?

In regards to The Stand, 400 pages were cut from the original version because of how the additional pages would've affected the book's price point--his publisher thought the increase in price (because of the increase in pages) would result in lower sales. As for the cuts themselves, he made them, not his editor.

Also, just because you can find examples of sections that should be cut doesn't mean anything; I can pick up any book and find passages and/or pages that I find dull or boring. That doesn't mean the author or the author's editor agrees that those sections should be cut or that they are ineffective.

DrCrypt

09-06-2002, 07:52 AM

Bub, Andrew

09-06-2002, 08:24 AM

Bub, Andrew

09-06-2002, 08:30 AM

William Harms

09-06-2002, 09:21 AM

Oh and William ... that anthology "Weird Trails", the collection of Western horror stories from Triad I told you about, is hide your eyes and protect your children from the sight of the cover, unremittingly awful. Maybe the worst writing, in so many different ways, I've ever seen in print form. The Western Horror Story is still a genre for you to dominate and I'm tempted to ask you to send me a draft of yours ... just to wash this taste from my brain.

That's too bad--the western and the horror story were made for each other, in my opinion. As for my little tome, it'll be released next year (assuming the artist finishes on time) in graphic novel form by AiT/PlanetLar, the same folks who are publishing the reissue of Abel. I am bound and determined to become the Harry Turtledove of western horror fiction! :-)

And just because an author feels that those sections should remain, it doesn't mean that they SHOULDN'T actually be razed out of the manuscript immediately. This entire new-fangled idea that "writers know best about their art" is complete nonsense most of the time. Look at Max Perkins and Thomas Wolfe, or Max Perkins and Ernest Hemingway, or Max Perkins and F. Scott Fitzgerald.... Max Perkins made these guys by editting their clunky books into masterpieces.

I didn't say anything that disagrees with your statement...I said that just because Bub feels a certain passage should be cut or rewritten doesn't mean that the author and the author's editor would agree with that opinion.

As for Max Perkins, the days of seeing someone of his genius wandering the halls of a major publishing house are over. It's a sad situation when the marketing department has the final say in what does and doesn't get published.

Bub, Andrew

09-06-2002, 09:25 AM

It's a sad situation when the marketing department has the final say in what does and doesn't get published.

Indeed. Congratulations on your next graphic novel William. That's great news! Man, you sure have rebounded since the last time we talked about that. Things were bleak then. (Any editor that comes to me for "work-finding" tips is in a bleak situation.) But you're back at PCGamer and publishing a new graphic novel. Kudos!

Can I expect another signed copy from you? ;-)

junior allen

09-07-2002, 07:21 AM

Also, just because you can find examples of sections that should be cut doesn't mean anything; I can pick up any book and find passages and/or pages that I find dull or boring. That doesn't mean the author or the author's editor agrees that those sections should be cut or that they are ineffective.
When I get to that first semi-colon, I mentally append an aposiopesis, then "cunt!", then <BITCH SLAP> to the end. But not to interrupt you in getting your panties in a bunch...

And just because an author feels that those sections should remain, it doesn't mean that they SHOULDN'T actually be razed out of the manuscript immediately. This entire new-fangled idea that "writers know best about their art" is complete nonsense most of the time. Look at Max Perkins and Thomas Wolfe, or Max Perkins and Ernest Hemingway, or Max Perkins and F. Scott Fitzgerald.... Max Perkins made these guys by editting their clunky books into masterpieces.

Good writing is knowing when to cut. That's why artistic-minded editors are necessary: they have none of the paternal-love for the prose in front of them that misty-eyed writers do, and have no problems with hacking it apart with a razor and burning the viscera in their waste-paper basket as an offering to Art.

Not that a good editor would make King a literary genius, just saying....

Such unreconstructed, old-school literary snobbishness is an absolute delight. This is like listening to a high school English teacher, circa 1958 or so.

I hardly know what to praise first. The slams at genre fiction, bolstered by sentences taken out of context; the assertion that King ought to write to an outline, which is the noted technique of the hacks you deplore; the notion that Max Perkins "made" Hemingway and Fitzgerald and Wolfe (well, maybe Wolfe); the backhanded compliment of King as a "fun" (ie, not important) writer (one can almost hear the harumph, there).

I think my favorite moment, though, occured earlier in thread, when DC praised, of all things, the first Gunslinger book, as unrepentant a book of juvenalia as I've ever seen, as being "good King".

Bravo, sir!

junior allen

DrCrypt

09-07-2002, 10:14 AM

Such unreconstructed, old-school literary snobbishness is an absolute delight. This is like listening to a high school English teacher, circa 1958 or so.
1958 being the date when my fellow high school English teachers were routed and delivered from the shackles of their pince-nez literary snobbishness by Tom Clancy and his Charging Light Brigade, riding ivory steeds a thousand pages high, right? I alone remain, the last bastion of defense, to fight the good fight. Pip pip!

I think my favorite moment, though, occured earlier in thread, when DC praised, of all things, the first Gunslinger book, as unrepentant a book of juvenalia as I've ever seen, as being "good King".
Jesus, what have we got here, a Stephen King snob? Oh, sorry, gourmet? I might not have the well developed palate necessary to detect the proper delicacies and degrees of fineness in the bouquet of whatever King's latest dysenteric literary expulsion is - but then again, I never wanted to start profusely guzzling from the septic tank. Anyway, I liked The Gunslinger, but if you Stephen-King-gourmet fancy-pants want to rank Rose Madder or the Stand higher on a Stepen-King-centric scale of excellence, be my guest.

On my part, I don't see what your temper tantrum here is about, since I always thought the point of novels was entertainment, not what some stranger on the Internet thinks. Yeah, you're right, though - I don't think Stephen King is an "important writer". I could sort of argue my point more, but I'm pretty secure in my opinion that the majority of King is absolute garbage that only an idiot would possibly find more "literary" than penny-dreadful slop. And anyway, your shrill, hysterical response is the token one I get anytime someone gets huffy that I don't take the dog-eared paperback saturated in urine splashes and sitting by their toilet to be "serious literature". Then again, the fact that you're getting upset shows you put more importance on something being "serious literature" than I do. So I'll let you get back to furiously underlining passages and scribbling notes in the margins of "Buick 8" or whatever King's latest is.

PS: I'm kind of assuming you were being sarcastic or ironic or whatever is being passed off for a witty retort these days in all of your praises, but if you were being dead serious and emphatically agreeing that everything I've said is dead on: obviously, I agree, and in closing, I rule!!!!!!!!!

DrCrypt

09-07-2002, 10:23 AM

PPS: That said, I looked over my post on editors, and the "burning viscera as an offering to Art" was much more pretentiously phrased than I'd have liked, so I'd like to distance myself from the phrasing, though not the intent. Sorry, I think I was possessed by a Tommyknocker or some other embarassing creation you think is the next fucking David Copperfield when I wrote that shit.

junior allen

09-07-2002, 05:13 PM

Dude, no, really, this is very charming. You're a genuine throwback -- like a Japanese soldier still fighting WW 2 on some remote island, or some New Guinea tribe where television is a "magic box".

1958 being the date when my fellow high school English teachers were routed and delivered from the shackles of their pince-nez literary snobbishness by Tom Clancy and his Charging Light Brigade, riding ivory steeds a thousand pages high, right? I alone remain, the last bastion of defense, to fight the good fight. Pip pip!

Strawman. We haven't ascertained whether or not I like Clancy. Actually, I think he's dreadful, and more generally, I agree with you that a lot of bestsellers are overwritten and could stand some judicious cutting.

Unfortunately, with friends like you who needs enemies.....

Jesus, what have we got here, a Stephen King snob? Oh, sorry, gourmet? I might not have the well developed palate necessary to detect the proper delicacies and degrees of fineness in the bouquet of whatever King's latest dysenteric literary expulsion is - but then again, I never wanted to start profusely guzzling from the septic tank. Anyway, I liked The Gunslinger, but if you Stephen-King-gourmet fancy-pants want to rank Rose Madder or the Stand higher on a Stepen-King-centric scale of excellence, be my guest.

No, what we have hear is somebody who doesn't have a tin ear for prose. If you really don't like Ramsey Campbell and yet think that The Gunslinger, of all things, is "good", well, God bless you. But I ain't gonna trust you on these matters.

On my part, I don't see what your temper tantrum here is about,

See, tin ear. I'm not mad. Why would I be mad? I found your spiel very amusing. I eagerly await more such Grand Pronouncements in the near future.

since I always thought the point of novels was entertainment, not what some stranger on the Internet thinks. Yeah, you're right, though - I don't think Stephen King is an "important writer". I could sort of argue my point more, but I'm pretty secure in my opinion that the majority of King is absolute garbage that only an idiot would possibly find more "literary" than penny-dreadful slop.

Somewhere else I see you praising Horatio Hornblower, which is pretty pulpy stuff in it's own right. Certainly not high art. Is Forrester more acceptable to you because it's stalwart Brits fighting the French? Instead of vampires?

Whatever the merits of King -- and I haven't read a book of his in years, actually -- it's pretty silly to be cracking on horror writers because they don't meet your rather undefined standards of literary quality, while in another place praising Robert Howard, of all people, who actually wrote for honest-to-goodness pulps and is kinda the ultimate example of the breed. But really, I shouldn't spoil things like this. Rant on, Brother Crypt! Preach the Word!!

And anyway, your shrill, hysterical response is the token one I get anytime someone gets huffy that I don't take the dog-eared paperback saturated in urine splashes and sitting by their toilet to be "serious literature".

Now who's getting shrill and hysterical?

Then again, the fact that you're getting upset shows you put more importance on something being "serious literature" than I do.

Oh, you're fibbing now, sir. After all, you're the one who dragged the poor body of Max Perkins into things, not me.

So I'll let you get back to furiously underlining passages and scribbling notes in the margins of "Buick 8" or whatever King's latest is. PS: I'm kind of assuming you were being sarcastic or ironic or whatever is being passed off for a witty retort these days in all of your praises, but if you were being dead serious and emphatically agreeing that everything I've said is dead on: obviously, I agree, and in closing, I rule!!!!!!!!!

Indeed, you do rule, sir. I look forward to much more from you. I urge you to sound off at every available opportunity, in fact, on every conceivable subject. Perhaps more about these "jazz records" you mention earlier. Much better than that noisy rock and roll stuff the kids are listening to nowadays, huh?

junior allen

DrCrypt

09-08-2002, 02:16 AM

As soon as I saw your last post, I immediately began to profusely wet my skin-tight Archy and Mehitabel underoos. Because, dude, I admit it - I lose.

Obviously, as you combed over the Q23 archives furiously compiling all of my posts, you were somehow able to pull out of the psychic ether (aided only by the tin-foil-covered lampshade you sometimes wear as a David-Cronenberg's-Scanners-protection device, but which can also be directed ominously OUTWARDS) my PhD thesis, and in doing so, debunk it. You know the one I mean, because you obliquely reference it so many times in your post: the one where I use razor-sharp critical techniques to sort the entire body of twentieth century literature into a descending scale of excellence, going roughly like this "Horatio Hornblower -> Conan (as edited by Maxwell Perkins) -> Fafhrd and Gray Mouser -> Stephen King's Gunslinger -> Ramsey Campbell -> Stephen King". Obviously, that's just a rough scale of it - it would take several hundred pages of meaty literary criticism to fishbone properly. The point is that every single post I've made on this board has been subscribing to this thesis, and you've just debunked it.

Ha ha! No, seriously - you're an idiot. In case you're confused - THERE IS NO SUCH PHD THESIS! And way to stick it to jazz records by the way.

Obviously, you're just a troll, but even so, I'm not sure what your lunatic point even is (although I'm sure you'll spend a few hundred words and numerous quotes of mine to babble on about it), besides the fact that - throwing the entire world into topsy-turvy-Yellow-Submarine-style chaos! - some of my tastes in books seem contradictory. I know idiots are told by their state-appointed social workers to have a cohesive, black-and-white world view in order to stop them from masturbating on public street corners. In that world view, it is impossible to say that you like a pulp writer without saying that you find him to be "great literature", and it is impossible to criticize one pulp writer's bad prose while enjoying another pulp writer.

With such an outlook, no wonder you're doing a Thorazine-shuffle of exasperation over the fact that, gasp!, I dig Horatio Hornblower and Conan while thinking Ramsey Campbell and Stephen King are pretty god-awful writers of prose. Or that I find some of Stephen King's books to be better than others. Or that I like reading books by Conrad just about as much as I like reading Astro Boy funny books, but think the former is great literature and the other is just fun nonsense.

In the real world, this isn't a contradiction at all, but I'm not sure what I can do to convince you of the fact besides pat you soothingly on your furrowed brow (so desperate to understand the mad universe it has cruelly been placed into by some malicious Cthulu god - a universe not composed entirely of polar opposites!).

So pat pat, my son. Rave on, crazy diamond!