It’s the holidays, so why are we talking about horror? Well, 15 minutes at my family reunions could answer that, but in short, horror authors aren’t all blood, guts and gore. In fact, the horror legends do what ALL authors should do…they probe the human soul, peel back falsehood and reveal the authentic human condition for better or worse.

Whether we pick up a Stephen King, Dean Koontz, Edgar Allen Poe, or Rod Sterling story, what surfaces almost immediately is these authors understood people when creating these tales. Writing great novels requires we become masters of exploring the psyche, of using what makes humans weak, greedy, vengeful, callous, vain or jealous. Human frailty is the lifeblood of story—CONFLICT. Whether one writes thrillers, romance or YA, we must be able to delve deep and go to those uncomfortable places, because THAT is why readers turn pages.

Today, Kevin continues his series about…

Good morning, afternoon, evening or good night!

Salutations, wherever you are in the world. It’s been a more hectic week than usual, as you might have gathered from my weekend post. So it’s high time I caught my breath and updated everyone on The Paperbook Collective.

The Culture Issue.

Firstly, I want to say an enormous

to everyone who shared, liked, reblogged, or read Issue Five of The Paperbook Collective. It had a record number of reblogs, which was absolutely thrilling. It is a lovely feeling to have people spreading the word about this little venture, it makes all the hard work more than worth while.

Just on the off chance that you missed Issue Five, here are the links for you.

PDF ~

The Paperbook Collective Issue Five 2013

ISSUU ~

The Paperbook Collective Issue Five 2013

It was a wonderful issue in which contributors shared a little…

just because i love christmas and cats and it stars my fave cat of all time grumpy cat though the colonel is adorable ^_^ please share everyone because they have (friskies cat food) have said they will donate one can of food for each view the video gets and donate it to cats in rescue so please share as much as you can lets make them honour the promise and feed as many rescues as possible love and hugs to all xx

Kidding aside, it might seem strange that I have our WANA International Instructor, Kevin Lucia here talking about the horror genre. Yet, sometimes it’s good to get out of the comfort zone and cross-pollinate our creativity. I can tell writers who do too much reading in the same genre. What can really add that certain je ne sais quoi is when an author adds in elements from unexpected areas.

This is what makes the writing unique. Writing is similar to music, and the legends we remember in music are transcendent simply because they possess a gift of surprising listeners. They might add elements of opera to heavy metal or jazz to rap. This is where tropes can transform into something magical. Writers can do the same.

Kevin’s here to offer some suggestions to help diversify your creative palette.

Take it away, Kevin!

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Some horror writers, for whatever reason, never end…

Okay, MERRY CHRISTMAS! Yeah, a series on horror? Well, if you spent five minutes with some of MY family members, a chainsaw might sound like a great idea. Truth be told, horror is one of my FAVORITE sub-genres and our WANA International Instructor Kevin Lucia? He’s an AMAZING teacher. Also, horror is one of those genres that goes for the guts (no pun intended). It truly probes the human condition, and whether or not we are fans, we can learn A LOT from what horror authors do best.

All great stories probe what we FEAR. This is the essence of good storytelling. Whether it is the fear of not finding love or losing love or not achieving a goal? FEAR is the heart of conflict. No conflict? No story. This is why I’ve recruited one of the best authors I know to talk about a genre that many might not…

The surprising story behind Dickens’s A Christmas Carol

Charles Dickens’s classic Christmas tale A Christmas Carol was published over 170 years ago, in 1843. Since then, there have been countless stage, screen, and radio adaptations of the classic story. The first film adaptation was a short silent movie version in 1901, titled Scrooge; or, Marley’s Ghost. There have been opera and ballet versions, an all-black musical called Comin’ Uptown (1979), and even a 1973 mime adaptation for the BBC starring Marcel Marceau. The Muppets, Mickey Mouse, and Mr Magoo have all featured in adaptations of the book.

It wasn’t the first Christmas story Dickens wrote. It wasn’t even the first Christmas ghost story Dickens wrote. He’d already written ‘The Story of the Goblins Who Stole a Sexton’, featuring miserly Gabriel Grub, an inset tale in Dickens’s first ever published novel, The Pickwick Papers (1836-7). The tale shares many…

We’ve entered the UK Blog Awards 2014. You can vote for us here. It’s quick and easy to vote for us, and in return, you’ll receive a free blogging ebook from the UK Blog Awards folk, which is rather nice.

However, we wouldn’t ask you to vote for us and offer only a free ebook for your trouble. So, here are some more wonderfully interesting literary facts for you, which we hope will convince you to take the trouble to reach for the vote button…

Where the Wild Things Are was originally titled ‘Where the Wild Horses Are’, but Maurice Sendak changed his mind as he couldn’t draw horses.

Harper Lee’s friend gave her a year’s wages for Christmas, on condition that she give up work and write. She wrote To Kill a Mockingbird.

Dickens’s house at Gad’s Hill reportedly had a secret door in the form of…