A Free E-Comic and Friends From Back In The Day

Some years ago, five or six friends (several absent from this picture), used to spend their summer weekends messing around on Otsego Lake in Cooperstown, New York.   They water-skied, they cooked way too much meat, drank some beer, lay on the dock, and pretty much wasted the days away.  Read more in detail about their experiences here.

One of the friends dreamed of becoming a writer.  Now, back then he felt bound and determined to be the next Issac Asimov.  Raised during the Star Wars years, exposed to Tron (a pre-Matrix Matrix for all you youngsters), gifted box sets of original Star Trek five year mission novels by his parents, this college student's head was in the stars, and he believed he'd be the next big thing in science fiction and fantasy.   That's all he wrote, read, or watched in the theater.

However, in the summer of 1996 this guy encountered something up in Cooperstown that shifted his perspective.  Suddenly, his creative juices churned over things that hid deep in the dark woods, old abandoned houses and gothic relics, a few of which he saw every weekend as he and his friends boated all over Lake Otsego.  

At first he tried to make this new creative desire fit the old science fiction mold - maybe some aliens crash-landed in the forest - but he couldn't do it.  He realized he was far more interested in the dark corners that lurked here on earth than he was the deep reaches of space.  This was all due, in part, to an old abandoned  Victorian farmhouse in the middle of a field.

Several trips were made to this house, over the course of two or three years, and while nothing too awful happened, some things a bit out of the ordinary did.  Or at least, these guys found evidence of that.  Anyway, safe to say after finding this place, the science fiction writer guy had changed genres forever. 

Now, that writer guy still hasn't hit it big like he dreamed of doing all those years ago, lying on the dock with his best friends.  He promised them, though, that he'd write about that house.  Make up a real good story about it.  And he did write several bad ones that never saw the light of day.  One or two pretty good ones are still doing the rounds, not having found a home yet.

However, one pathetically small peek of this house did find a home in Northern Haunts, a flash fiction anthology of fireside ghost stories.  He had to set it in the Maine area to fit the anthology,  but it's still about that house.  Eventually, with the help of artist and writer Corey Clubb and artist Mike Brunt, he put together a simple little e-comic as a wedding gift for one those friends.  Below is that e-comic.  It's an early work, maybe a little contrived and hokey, but it's fun and free.  Just click in the cover and open it up.  Enjoy!

Open publication - Free publishing - More horror

Why Horror? - And Some Personal Revelations

So I'm going to try another question.  Some people actually answered last time, and that was cool.  We'll see how it goes this time.  I was going to do a Friday question, but we've had some sleep issues with Zack this week, so Friday morning was simply a no go.  He slept better last night, so we'll give it a whirl today.

But no, I'm not asking "what is horror" or trying to define "horror".  That topic has been done to death.  I want to know what brought people to horror in the first place - fans and writers alike.  Folks are often surprised to discover that horror wasn't my first love.  

There were certainly indications that I'd go that way someday: I loved those collections of "spooky" tales in the school libraries and I was obsessed with "movie monster" books in sixth grade.   Plus (don't laugh, people) as a youngster I found a few of the Hardy Boys to be a "touch" spooky, and I liked that.

However in high school I was pretty much an "equal opportunity" kinda reader.  I read everything I could get my hands on. Even a few (again - some of you, I KNOW where you live) teen romances when I'd exhausted our library's stores.  BUT, toward the end of my high school career I discovered Isaac Asimov's Foundation series and it pretty much hooked me.  

That same year Timothy Zahn wrote the first ever post-Return of the Jedi STAR WARS novel, Heir to the Empire.  During this time, my parents also got me my first box set of Star Trek novels, and this coincided with the premier of Star Trek: TNG on television.  So, for most my college career I considered myself a Sci Fi guy and devoured every science fiction novel I could find.  Of course, I also planned on being the next Isaac Asimov and my greatest dream was to write a Star Wars novel ( that latter sorta still is, BTW).

My first completed novel manuscript - written senior year in high school, in a Mead spiral notebook - was a goofy teen basketball drama/romance.  My second completed novel manuscript -part one of an epic science fiction trilogy that would stun the world with its bloated 178,000 words - I finished my senior year in college.  I also sold my first science fiction story - for a grand  total of $10 - to a long defunct magazine called Millennium Science Fiction & Fantasy, of which only this encyclopedic entry remains (sadly, I misplaced my contributor copy during several apartment moves).

This all extended to January 2000.  Then, my life came to a screeching halt.  

I ran into serious money and credit problems.  Lived every day one step from eviction, and pretty much felt like a reprobate.

My personal life descended into a shambles.  I can honestly admit I did a lot of things and went  a lot of places I'd regret later.

I broke off my engagement to my then-fiance four months before the wedding.  Even though it was the right thing to do - that's never fun.  This, of course spurned me into several ill-advised relationships directly following.

I enlisted in the NAVY Reserves, went to Boot Camp, survived - and discovered what a BAD decision that was.

I had my driving privileges almost taken away, and was limited to a "work-restricted license".

After graduating from Binghamton University, being a teacher, Youth Director, administrator, and college basketball coach...I found myself working as an aide in a middle school for just barely over minimum wage.  And I pretty much lived in a slum apartment.

AND, for a brief time, I believed I'd never write anything, ever again.

Enter horror.  Enter Stephen King, Dean Koontz, Peter Straub and for a few novels, John Saul.  On the faith side of things, enter Ted Dekker.  Science fiction just didn't do it, anymore.   Those stories didn't have that sense of "loss" that consumed my life for almost 5-6 years.  Plus, I no longer cared about monsters from space.  I'd seen - most powerfully in my mirror - what a monster a human being could be, and how people survived those things - even the monsters themselves - called to me in a way science fiction never has.

Soon after that, I met Abby and got married. Then, several years later, Madison was born... and then my sense of horror became even further defined.  Now, loss of life and sanity or soul didn't seem so bad.

How about the loss of a wife?  A child?  Your entire family?  Or loss of respect and pride before them?  Ironically enough, during this period I also discovered what I still believe are seminal works in my development as a writer, Peter Straub's lost boy, lost girl and in the night room - and to me, Rio Youers is the modern contemporary to Peter. And of course recently I've been delighted to discover T.M. Wright, Norman Prentiss and Charles Grant, writers who epitomize "quiet horror".

So  there.  I love battles against monsters and demons and ghosts, but I'm only interested in them insofar as they reflect the monsters and demons within, and our battles against them.  I'm into atmospheric, tension-filled, "quiet horror" - where any bloodshed is calculated and moderated.

So.  How about you? Why horror?  What type of horror is for you?