Joyride by Jack Ketchum - response

The latest work for my Readings in the Genre course at Seton Hill is Joyride.  Yep, nothing with joy there.  Just a psychotic, murderous, rampage for 200 pages.  I did not enjoy this at all.  I will try to focus on what I have learned as a writer and how to craft a villain.

First, an interesting quote towards the end of the novel:

"A victim will do some crazy things to stop being a victim, and maybe you did, too.  But that doesn't make you crazy, and it doesn't make you evil." (page 190 Nook version)

I'm not surprised to see this at the end of the novel given what we were discussing over this last week in class.  What is the definition of crazy or evil?  The real truth we found is that all things are in the eye of the beholder.  As a Christian, my beliefs of what is evil is defined by the doctrine of Christ as revealed through the ancient prophets, himself in the New Testament, and as revealed through his living prophets today.  But I had to step out of that for a minute to examine the villains in these stories.  There is a simple matter of perspective and upbringing.  My Christian upbringing teaches me one thing but a Muslim upbringing would teach me something different.

I did not like how nearly everyone in the novel is damaged.  I was going to say "messed up" or "evil" but stopped myself because that is my perspective.  But it did feel like every character was deeply flawed.  And not just flawed in common ways like low confidence or something like that.  It felt like everyone had a history of abuse or abuser.  Usually sexual and physical but also neglect.  Now, my undergrad was Sociology so I know that studies are showing a rise in physical and sexual abuse and I'm not downplaying the severity of those crimes and what it can do to the victim.  So, I don't really blame what Carol decides to do in the novel.  Especially to find that she had a history of this victimization since childhood.  But it got to the point in this novel where I didn't want to continue because it felt forced.  I bet that was a method for the writer to really drive home Wayne's purpose.  But he's pretty messed up as it is.  (Think of the closet).

So I didn't need to have what felt like all the other characters involved in abuse of some kind.  I think it could have been fine to give the other characters some attribute that bothered Wayne to the point of retaliation.  I have wonderful neighbors.  I trust them to babysit my girls.  But I hate their dogs.  And I'm a dog lover.  Just not theirs.  That's similar to Wayne and Roberts.  What I'm trying to say is that from my perspective, it felt like every person in the novel had a blaring streak of evil.  Even Lt. Rule.  I just don't think I needed such deep wounds in all the main characters.  I know that drew a commonality between them to tie them all together for Wayne.  But they started blending together instead of being individuals.  As the hero of the story, I'm fine with him having a flaw to make him more human.  Maybe I just read this novel at the wrong time in my life because it was really depressing.  I know we all have our past baggage.  And current baggage for that matter.  I certainly do.  But it was too depressing reading about all the abuse.  I know it's out there but I have absolutely no patience with abusers.  So I found it hard to read the novel for that alone.

Here's the other thing I've noticed over the course of these readings.  I'm fine having an uber-villain in the story.  And I thought I wanted to know more about what was going through their head and their motivations.  But I've found that for myself.  I'd rather keep them more as an enigma that the hero must conquer.  In my writing I'm all about deep loss and struggles to force out of my character the best they can be.   Because I know that life can be hard!  And I think there is more value in find the character who overcomes all odds to stand up in the end, victorious, over their trials.  I think that is what many people need.  Someone, whether real or fictional, that encourages them to greatness.  It is for that that I don't understand the people who read about killers for the sake of diving into their lives and worshiping psychos.

So, ultimately, I have found the importance of finding a balance when writing about villains and heroes.  The balance, for me, is finding just how much do you NEED to write about the villain to get across the idea that they need to be taken out by the hero? How much is too much?  I generally right dark fantasy as the darkest I go.  Not straight up horror.  So, I may be pulling back on the details of my killers so that I'm telling just enough without crossing the line into what I consider horror.

Thanks for listening to my ramblings. Now, off to my day job.

"In a world like this"-response to the film Seven

"It's dismissive to call him a lunatic."  This line along with the title of this post really struck a cord with me in this film.  Our prompt in our class forum asks: What makes a person's actions "evil" or "psychotic?"  What's the real difference between insane and sane?  So, I'd like to open that up more here.  

John Doe feels justified in what he's doing.  He is on a mission to remind and expose the evils in the world one heinous sin at a time.  Morgan Freeman's character confesses his fear of being a father and "bringing up a child in a world like this" early in the film.  I think that definitely sets the tone for the whole story.  Doe sees the evil in the world and clearly feels that it needs to be exposed and punished.  Needless to say that is an extremely dangerous motive.  Throughout history he have stories of people acting under the instructions of their God or for a higher purpose.  Why is it we are more willing to accept their stories if they happened in ancient writing and not now?  Is it just hindsight that allows us to accept their stories.  If John Doe really existed in our world, how would he be viewed in 5, 10, 50, or 100 years.  History books are written by the victors.  With the information written now about Bundy and others, I don't see how they could ever be seen as anything other than evil.  But when you have a person like Doe who views himself as a preacher, would people in the future ever see him as anything other than a killer?  I can't even begin to answer this because it all depends on what values society will hold.  George Washington is a hero to the USA but was viewed as a rebel and criminal to the English in the 1700s.  But how do they view him now if at all?

Responding to "The Sculptor" by Gregory Funaro

"And so it was" that I am disappointed in this one.  For those that read this one, did you notice how often he used that phrase?  It started to grate on my nerves.  Queue a pause in reading and a review of my manuscript for over used phrases.

I came into his book with a lot of hope.  To date I had heard about Psycho, Hannibal Lector, and Stephen King.  But, I hadn't read them before this class.  But, so far, the only pieces I hadn't heard about at all were Church of Dead Girls and The Sculptor.  Based on our fearless leader, there's a reason for that.  I felt like this had a lot of potential but there were too many things that just felt..... blah.  Seriously? He's super strong? But a recluse as well.  That didn't feel believable.  Now, I'm not saying that Dan Brown's books are the best, but, in the aftermath of his Angels and Demons and DaVinci Code novels, I really felt like this was trying to ride on the coat tails of that success by bringing in the symbolism and art masterpieces for the villain.  Especially since when a single, beautiful, expert on Michelangelo is there to  help the authorities.  Yeah, it just felt too similar.  And at parts it felt like a personal love letter to Michelangelo.

But, what the villain does to the victims was definitely intriguing.  I don't claim to be well versed in horror and murder stories but I don't think I would have ever thought to turn victims into pieces of art.  That definitely takes a unique look at life and art to have come up with that.  While I didn't like the novel as a whole, it was interesting to see how someone can fixate on something.  Our last book it was Annie Wilkes fixating on Paul/Misery and Paul fixating on finishing his novel.  This it was his work.  I think that is a very telling attribute to psycho killers in life and fiction to see how many of them view what they do as "their work?" That in of itself opens a wide world of psychosis and study.

African cockadoodie oogy dirtie birdie: A response to Misery by Stephen King

Ummmmm.... yeah.  This was an interesting one.  Misery is the first Stephen King book (aside from On Writing) that I've ever read.  I like the style and the story idea.  It's creepy and there were many times when Paul is struggling to write that I wondered if that was autobiographical for Mr. King.  He certainly captures my plight as a fledgling writer.

It took getting about 2/3rds through the novel before I realized why this one bothered me more than Psycho, Church of Dead Girls, Red Dragon, and Silence of the Lambs combined.  And then it dawned on me.  Misery is written from the point of view of the victim!  I internalized it more and it freaked me out more.  I honestly can't say that I would have tried to last as long as Paul did.  That is partly what I feel is unbelievable about Paul.  He's unconnected from everyone yet he finds a reason to stay alive for so long.  I have a wife and two kids and I'm still close to my extended family.  I'd only keep going because I wouldn't want them to have to deal with my death.  I wouldn't be fighting to stay alive for myself or for a "cockadoodie" story.  But, as the novel progresses, I can understand to a point why he's so attached to finishing the novel.

Photo from http://www.stephenking.com/library/novel/misery.html  Creepier cover than the one on my Nook book version in my opinion.

Annie Wilkes was pretty creepy to begin with.  Super fan to the extreme.  Yeah, then she dumps soapy water in Paul's face forcing him to drink it.  Oh, and then shattering his already busted knee!  So I was pretty convinced that she's psychotic.  And that's all before Paul sneaks a peak at her book of memories.  I screamed at him to get back to the room every time he "thought" he heard a car coming.  I can't remember the last time that I actually vocally yelled at a character in a book!  Mr. King, I applaud you and your astounding story-telling abilities.  I didn't fly through this book like the others because it was more painful to read.  Not that anything was wrong with the story, craft, grammar, etc.  As I said earlier, it was simply because I internalized Paul more than I internalized Will Graham or Dolarhyde for example.  Now I understand why our fearless leader, Scott Johnson, warned us at the beginning of his syllabus for this course.  

I'm struggling to find ways to articulate how this affected me.  It will lend to interesting reads from my classmates as they post their reviews (see horror blog roll on the side).  One thing I can say is that I can see now why Mr. King has such a following.  We've read a number of scary stories in the class so far.  Most of those just intrigued me with questions like "How does someone get like that?" Misery didn't do that as much for me.  If I questioned anything it was "Would I last as long? Don't think so." I seriously think if I had been in Paul's place I would have succumbed to the pain and horror long before I found out about Annie's past.  Just goes to show what a tale you can make by putting your character through some truly horrific situations.

Responding to Silence of the Lambs

My latest foray into the criminal/psychotic mind is a follow-up to Red Dragon by Thomas Harris.  I haven't read the novel Silence of the Lambs but I was pleased to see that what I was wanting from the novel Red Dragon was present in Silence of the Lambs.  That being Hannibal Lector.  I am aware of his cultural significance as the modern Dracula.  I was therefore intrigued to literally see him in action.  Wow, I knew Anthony Hopkin is a very talented actor but his portrayal of Hannibal Lector, in my opinion, is stunning. Truly creepy.

There were some questions that I still have about the character.  Much of my focus in this Readings in the Genre course is on motivation in the killer.  I got the impression between Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs that Hannibal is an elitist without any sympathy for others.  But, Anthony Hopkins shows some emotions for Lector that I hadn't expected.  When he's questioning Clarice Starling about her past, he turns away from her and as she tells him about a painful experience his expression appears to be one of compassion.  Not lust and hunger for pain as I expected.  I think it's compassion because when Lector finds out that Starling had made up the deal with the Senator without the Senator knowing he doesn't get angry with Starling.  Instead, by the end of the movie, he "wants to keep her in the world" and goes after Dr. Chilton.  That boggles my mind.  How can someone be so disturbed as Hannibal Lector but then apparently show compassion to Starling? I guess it is similar to Dolarhyde trying to protect his new love instead of satisfying the Dragon.

The effect on the audience is clear.  Give the villains something that we can relate to and our hatred for them declines.  We may even get to the point of sympathy.  You could actually see something like remorse in Buffalo Bill at one point.  If not remorse then at least discomfort.  Did he only feel it with the senator's daughter or did it feel it with any of the others?  It's like what has been discussed by my classmates regarding the Red Dragon.  Who among hasn't, at least once, struggled with our own body and appearance.  Both Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs have individuals who struggle so much with what they were given at birth that it drives them to drastic measures.  I don't  think Thomas Harris was trying to say that everyone struggling with their body has the potential to kill.  But, it is food for thought that there are so many commonalities with killers and their past.