Robert Dunbar's Blog - Posts Tagged "gothic"
THE SWAMP STOMP / Part One
or “How I Found a Topic (but Lost my Mind) in the Pines”
Here, rancid air hangs heavily in a void, its texture thick, liquid, clinging. In a night full of the hot smells of decay, this humid oppression amplifies the dripping, clicking noises: the moldy rasp of dead leaves stirred by tiny animals, the constant murmur of a brook threading the loamy ground, the oozing splash of something that moves heavily through water.
There is no moon, and clouds screen the light from the stars.
Sunk in the still and viscous murk, the trees become vague shapes. Silent. Waiting. The ragged leaves of swamp elms hang as motionless as insects in a web. Slowly, the trees begin to glow.
http://www.amazon.com/Pines-Robert-Du...
According to Amazon, The Pines is now in its eleventh edition. Actually, I’m aware of two other editions, which I only found out about by accident. (Oh, what a joy it was to work with Leisure Books!) My point is that this brings the total to thirteen. My lucky number!
Set in one of the old, vanished shanty towns of the New Jersey pine barrens, the novel employs the legend of the Jersey Devil as a metaphor for human evil and debasement. (For committed horror geeks – like myself – I chronicle my adventures researching the lore in Vortex.) But when THE PINES first appeared in print, I soon found myself in the thick of a different sort of nightmare. My novel had been hacked to pieces by editors who appear to have been motivated by equal parts malice and incompetence, something I didn’t discover until I held a copy in my hands.
I’ll never forget that moment. My first book – it should have been a thrill.
Instead, I got sick. Literally.
Let's not even talk about the bloody stump on the cover.
Okay, so I should have been tougher. Yes, I was a little on the naïve and vulnerable side, but the book had not been edited so much as censored. Who wouldn’t be upset? Even my African-American heroine had suddenly become white. (Seriously? They edited her melanin?) But enough of the text survived, apparently – though I couldn’t see it at the time – to make an impression. To my utter shock, reviews from non-genre sources were immediately sensational.
“Not only a superb thriller but a masterpiece of fiction.” ~ Delaware Valley Magazine
“Dark, foreboding, menacing, eerie … seductive.” ~ The Philadelphia Inquirer
“At last, the Jersey Devil has come out of hiding.” ~ Atlantic City Magazine
Almost from the first, the book became something of a cause célèbre. (Or perhaps I mean bête noire: I get my French terms mixed up.) For every critic who raved about its qualities, another would shriek that the book had no right to exist. I didn’t know what to think, and truthfully much of it barely registered. With huge sections of text missing, I thought the plot incomprehensible.
All right, I tried to get over it. (What were my options?) And the press attention was not altogether unpleasant. Suddenly, I was doing television appearances and radio interviews and being profiled by newspapers. My photograph even showed up on the cover of a writers magazine. (Leisure Books seemed oddly resentful about all this, as though it represented a source of unwanted notoriety, and they always insisted that none of it translated into book sales. Have I mentioned how much fun it was to work with them?) For me, this was all new terrain. There I was at conferences, sitting on panels with famous authors whose work I’d been enjoying for years, answering questions and talking about the importance of constant reading across the literary spectrum, the need for writers to immerse themselves in literature, to hone their craft, and the overwhelming importance of having artistic rather than merely commercial goals. Then I nodded and smiled like a holy fool, waiting for thunderous approval.
The reaction was immediate all right: it was as though I’d spit on motherhood and the flag.
Literature? The very idea!
They were outraged, and if the book took on a life of its own, so did this backlash. I was mystified. At the first conference where I appeared as the guest of honor, an angry little man actually circulated a petition that denounced my being allowed to “pervert the genre.” One line I’ll never forget: “Obviously, Leisure Books doesn’t think normal people read horror.”
Ah.
A light went on. Finally.
(I’m a little slow sometimes.)
To their credit, a host of genre sources came to the book’s defense.
“Full of chilling surprises.” ~ Cemetery Dance
“Vivid and unnerving.” ~ The Scream Factory
“Brilliantly written and superbly plotted.” ~ The Nightmare Express
My relationship with fans has been a bit uneasy ever since. (Of course, I’ve always maintained that I’d much rather have readers than fans, another area in which I seem to be out of step with the times.) Many years would pass before I’d work in the genre again. The trauma of having my book destroyed by the publisher exhausted me, and the death of a loved one that summer left me in a state of nearly paralytic depression. The Mystery of the Disappearing Royalties, combined with the overt hostility of so many in the horror community, didn’t help.
But then the times were right for depression. Living through the AIDS fatalities in the nineties was like surviving a war. (In 1995 alone, more than 50,000 people died of the disease.) New York especially was devastated, but all big cities were hard hit. People still lament the way the arts suffered, but this impact wasn’t only caused by the loss of so many painters and musicians and writers and actors. Legions of people who appreciated their efforts also vanished, people who understood the ballet, who attended plays, who read and discussed books. Good books. Intelligent books. Challenging books. Culturally, the impact was … well, think ‘giant meteor crater.’ And voids tend to get filled. In my particular genre, a reactionary faction came to dominate. Never forget that with greater intellectual sophistication comes greater appreciation for diversity, but the reverse is also true.
It was a full decade later before a restored edition of THE PINES gave the next generation of magazines a chance to log in.
“A work of art.” ~ Shroud Magazine
“Smart … poetic ... intense.” ~ The Fright Site
“Among the classics of modern horror.” ~ Weird New Jersey
Can you blame me for feeling vindicated? A new novel (The Shore) was the first real indication that I was recovering emotionally. (More about that in Part II.)
By now, the new conservatism had begun to be reflected in an endless array of horror novels about American families menaced by some alien thing. Never mind the kind of monster – vampire or witch or werewolf – all plots hinged on destroying the different. This grew monotonous almost at once, and the exaggerated veneration of normality disturbed me profoundly. (I never really considered the market for this type of fiction to be readers so much as consumers.) Seldom does real art celebrate conformity. Isn’t it strange how much easier it is to gain acceptance for outsider characters in other genres? Detective fiction has long championed the loner of questionable social status, and science fiction has a fine tradition of unconventional heroes and heroines. But horror? I can’t be the only one less than fully invested in the spectacle of the status quo being maintained.
For me, the monster is always the lonely one, unloved and unwanted. The outcast. Even as a child I knew where my sympathies lay. Dracula wasn’t a monster so much as a villain out of Victorian melodrama – foreign and mustachioed – a stale template even then. Of course, the hero would rescue the damsel in the nick of time. Was there ever any doubt? Ah, but with the Frankenstein creature … nothing could be certain. Adam was soulful. He was morbid and abject. To this day, he remains a classic outsider, the suffering archetype at the heart of so many truly great novels. What could be more terrifying than all that pain? The monster is among the most supremely tragic – and most intensely human – of literary characters. All he wants is to belong. And he never can. No one will ever acknowledge his humanity. He suffers because he’s different.
Here, rancid air hangs heavily in a void, its texture thick, liquid, clinging. In a night full of the hot smells of decay, this humid oppression amplifies the dripping, clicking noises: the moldy rasp of dead leaves stirred by tiny animals, the constant murmur of a brook threading the loamy ground, the oozing splash of something that moves heavily through water.
There is no moon, and clouds screen the light from the stars.
Sunk in the still and viscous murk, the trees become vague shapes. Silent. Waiting. The ragged leaves of swamp elms hang as motionless as insects in a web. Slowly, the trees begin to glow.
http://www.amazon.com/Pines-Robert-Du...
According to Amazon, The Pines is now in its eleventh edition. Actually, I’m aware of two other editions, which I only found out about by accident. (Oh, what a joy it was to work with Leisure Books!) My point is that this brings the total to thirteen. My lucky number!
Set in one of the old, vanished shanty towns of the New Jersey pine barrens, the novel employs the legend of the Jersey Devil as a metaphor for human evil and debasement. (For committed horror geeks – like myself – I chronicle my adventures researching the lore in Vortex.) But when THE PINES first appeared in print, I soon found myself in the thick of a different sort of nightmare. My novel had been hacked to pieces by editors who appear to have been motivated by equal parts malice and incompetence, something I didn’t discover until I held a copy in my hands.
I’ll never forget that moment. My first book – it should have been a thrill.
Instead, I got sick. Literally.
Let's not even talk about the bloody stump on the cover.
Okay, so I should have been tougher. Yes, I was a little on the naïve and vulnerable side, but the book had not been edited so much as censored. Who wouldn’t be upset? Even my African-American heroine had suddenly become white. (Seriously? They edited her melanin?) But enough of the text survived, apparently – though I couldn’t see it at the time – to make an impression. To my utter shock, reviews from non-genre sources were immediately sensational.
“Not only a superb thriller but a masterpiece of fiction.” ~ Delaware Valley Magazine
“Dark, foreboding, menacing, eerie … seductive.” ~ The Philadelphia Inquirer
“At last, the Jersey Devil has come out of hiding.” ~ Atlantic City Magazine
Almost from the first, the book became something of a cause célèbre. (Or perhaps I mean bête noire: I get my French terms mixed up.) For every critic who raved about its qualities, another would shriek that the book had no right to exist. I didn’t know what to think, and truthfully much of it barely registered. With huge sections of text missing, I thought the plot incomprehensible.
All right, I tried to get over it. (What were my options?) And the press attention was not altogether unpleasant. Suddenly, I was doing television appearances and radio interviews and being profiled by newspapers. My photograph even showed up on the cover of a writers magazine. (Leisure Books seemed oddly resentful about all this, as though it represented a source of unwanted notoriety, and they always insisted that none of it translated into book sales. Have I mentioned how much fun it was to work with them?) For me, this was all new terrain. There I was at conferences, sitting on panels with famous authors whose work I’d been enjoying for years, answering questions and talking about the importance of constant reading across the literary spectrum, the need for writers to immerse themselves in literature, to hone their craft, and the overwhelming importance of having artistic rather than merely commercial goals. Then I nodded and smiled like a holy fool, waiting for thunderous approval.
The reaction was immediate all right: it was as though I’d spit on motherhood and the flag.
Literature? The very idea!
They were outraged, and if the book took on a life of its own, so did this backlash. I was mystified. At the first conference where I appeared as the guest of honor, an angry little man actually circulated a petition that denounced my being allowed to “pervert the genre.” One line I’ll never forget: “Obviously, Leisure Books doesn’t think normal people read horror.”
Ah.
A light went on. Finally.
(I’m a little slow sometimes.)
To their credit, a host of genre sources came to the book’s defense.
“Full of chilling surprises.” ~ Cemetery Dance
“Vivid and unnerving.” ~ The Scream Factory
“Brilliantly written and superbly plotted.” ~ The Nightmare Express
My relationship with fans has been a bit uneasy ever since. (Of course, I’ve always maintained that I’d much rather have readers than fans, another area in which I seem to be out of step with the times.) Many years would pass before I’d work in the genre again. The trauma of having my book destroyed by the publisher exhausted me, and the death of a loved one that summer left me in a state of nearly paralytic depression. The Mystery of the Disappearing Royalties, combined with the overt hostility of so many in the horror community, didn’t help.
But then the times were right for depression. Living through the AIDS fatalities in the nineties was like surviving a war. (In 1995 alone, more than 50,000 people died of the disease.) New York especially was devastated, but all big cities were hard hit. People still lament the way the arts suffered, but this impact wasn’t only caused by the loss of so many painters and musicians and writers and actors. Legions of people who appreciated their efforts also vanished, people who understood the ballet, who attended plays, who read and discussed books. Good books. Intelligent books. Challenging books. Culturally, the impact was … well, think ‘giant meteor crater.’ And voids tend to get filled. In my particular genre, a reactionary faction came to dominate. Never forget that with greater intellectual sophistication comes greater appreciation for diversity, but the reverse is also true.
It was a full decade later before a restored edition of THE PINES gave the next generation of magazines a chance to log in.
“A work of art.” ~ Shroud Magazine
“Smart … poetic ... intense.” ~ The Fright Site
“Among the classics of modern horror.” ~ Weird New Jersey
Can you blame me for feeling vindicated? A new novel (The Shore) was the first real indication that I was recovering emotionally. (More about that in Part II.)
By now, the new conservatism had begun to be reflected in an endless array of horror novels about American families menaced by some alien thing. Never mind the kind of monster – vampire or witch or werewolf – all plots hinged on destroying the different. This grew monotonous almost at once, and the exaggerated veneration of normality disturbed me profoundly. (I never really considered the market for this type of fiction to be readers so much as consumers.) Seldom does real art celebrate conformity. Isn’t it strange how much easier it is to gain acceptance for outsider characters in other genres? Detective fiction has long championed the loner of questionable social status, and science fiction has a fine tradition of unconventional heroes and heroines. But horror? I can’t be the only one less than fully invested in the spectacle of the status quo being maintained.
For me, the monster is always the lonely one, unloved and unwanted. The outcast. Even as a child I knew where my sympathies lay. Dracula wasn’t a monster so much as a villain out of Victorian melodrama – foreign and mustachioed – a stale template even then. Of course, the hero would rescue the damsel in the nick of time. Was there ever any doubt? Ah, but with the Frankenstein creature … nothing could be certain. Adam was soulful. He was morbid and abject. To this day, he remains a classic outsider, the suffering archetype at the heart of so many truly great novels. What could be more terrifying than all that pain? The monster is among the most supremely tragic – and most intensely human – of literary characters. All he wants is to belong. And he never can. No one will ever acknowledge his humanity. He suffers because he’s different.
THE SWAMP STOMP / Part Two
or “Up to My Neck at the Shore”
Something pale shimmered in the swells. He squinted. Even on such an overcast day, the bay glittered. The object bobbed between two of the boats. Stooping, he strained to make it out. Some sort of fish, belly up among the pilings? Squid-like, the thing wavered down, now visible, now gone. He crouched at the edge of the rotting dock.
The surface stirred as a swell approached, sloughing sideways like an aquatic serpent. He bent to prod the object with his cane, to bring it closer, but with the perversity of things in water, it twisted the other way, and he shivered, leaning further.
Something watched him from the water.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Shore-Rober...
“This book is so stupid I can’t even understand it.”
Zen-like in its purity, that’s still my all-time favorite “reader” comment for one of my books on Amazon. And what’s to be made of this statement (also from Amazon)?
“I hate all that prose and literary stuff. I just wants me some horror.”
So disheartening. I’ve often wondered what a novel should be if not literary. Musical? Athletic? Also I get sick of reading that “Dunbar obviously doesn’t even know what horror is supposed to be.”
Let me guess. Is it "supposed" to be stupid?
“Who does this Dunbar think he is?”
(Sorry. Can't help you there.)
So many years had passed between books: I had to wonder whether I could pick up the thread. And the initial responses to this sequel to The Pines were not encouraging. If anything my anti-fans had grown more incensed with the passage of time, because by now my work had also been stigmatized as “difficult.” One woman on Amazon railed at length about my books being too complicated to read in front of the television. Clearly, she felt betrayed by this, as though Horror itself had let her down. I began to wonder if a readership for adult horror like The Shore even existed.
Good reviews seemed only to fan the flames of outrage.
“A classic. Dunbar is a master.” ~ Nights & Weekends
Message boards and horror sites now sported warnings that no one should buy my books (because I was ‘perverting’ the genre), while others publicly insisted that all my good reviews were evidence of a conspiracy. For weeks, one gentleman on Shocklines, a popular genre community board, kept calling me “deformed and retarded,” really working himself up into quite a state. I never understood what the poor soul was on about, but the level of discourse spoke volumes.
Again, the genre presses rather heroically stepped in.
“This is the way great horror should be written.” ~ HellNotes
“Fresh and fascinating.” ~ Famous Monsters of Filmland
“This intense and wholly original novel is one of the best to come out of the horror genre in years.” ~ Dark Scribe
Art should provoke, and I choose to believe that such angry responses mean I’m doing something right. What’s the Churchill quote? Words to the effect that having enemies proves you stand for something...
Never mind. I hate being so combative all the time. It's really not my nature. Maybe it’s just that I got off on the wrong foot with people. (I excel at this.) For every critic who raved that my books were "much better than the average horror" novel – not the most tactful of compliments – scores of aficionados of the genre vented their resentment at the very notion. Who does Dunbar think he is?
But is it really so objectionable a concept that Horror should also be literature?
Extraordinary talents have flourished in the darkness, artists of the caliber and diversity of Shirley Jackson and Ray Bradbury and Algernon Blackwood and Robert Aickman. Consider the works of Franz Kafka or Gustav Meyrink. What are they if not literary horror? Yet the L word is still routinely applied in a pejorative sense. One flouts this mandated mediocrity at one’s own peril.
Still… there’s a reason I stay.
Years ago, I began to hear from readers who told me that they had “just about given up” finding dark fiction intended for intelligent adults. These folks kept me going, because their responses to my work could be passionately appreciative. What else does a writer live for?
Perhaps I am combative after all, and – yes – it’s worth the battle. Over the years, I’ve so often been moved by the praise of readers, my feelings only enhanced by the fact that the individuals making such comments tend to be articulate and insightful – exactly the readership I’ve always sought.
Sought? Summoned.
Conjured.
Believed in as an article of faith.
These are the readers I envision when I sit down to write. Whenever one of them declares some novel of mine to be among the finest books they’ve read, it constitutes validation on a profound level… if only because there’s not a vanilla character to be found anywhere in my work.
This gives me hope. Perhaps the genre isn’t as reactionary as it seems. Perhaps culturally we are at last emerging from a dark time, like some noble monster groping toward the light.
Something pale shimmered in the swells. He squinted. Even on such an overcast day, the bay glittered. The object bobbed between two of the boats. Stooping, he strained to make it out. Some sort of fish, belly up among the pilings? Squid-like, the thing wavered down, now visible, now gone. He crouched at the edge of the rotting dock.
The surface stirred as a swell approached, sloughing sideways like an aquatic serpent. He bent to prod the object with his cane, to bring it closer, but with the perversity of things in water, it twisted the other way, and he shivered, leaning further.
Something watched him from the water.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Shore-Rober...
“This book is so stupid I can’t even understand it.”
Zen-like in its purity, that’s still my all-time favorite “reader” comment for one of my books on Amazon. And what’s to be made of this statement (also from Amazon)?
“I hate all that prose and literary stuff. I just wants me some horror.”
So disheartening. I’ve often wondered what a novel should be if not literary. Musical? Athletic? Also I get sick of reading that “Dunbar obviously doesn’t even know what horror is supposed to be.”
Let me guess. Is it "supposed" to be stupid?
“Who does this Dunbar think he is?”
(Sorry. Can't help you there.)
So many years had passed between books: I had to wonder whether I could pick up the thread. And the initial responses to this sequel to The Pines were not encouraging. If anything my anti-fans had grown more incensed with the passage of time, because by now my work had also been stigmatized as “difficult.” One woman on Amazon railed at length about my books being too complicated to read in front of the television. Clearly, she felt betrayed by this, as though Horror itself had let her down. I began to wonder if a readership for adult horror like The Shore even existed.
Good reviews seemed only to fan the flames of outrage.
“A classic. Dunbar is a master.” ~ Nights & Weekends
Message boards and horror sites now sported warnings that no one should buy my books (because I was ‘perverting’ the genre), while others publicly insisted that all my good reviews were evidence of a conspiracy. For weeks, one gentleman on Shocklines, a popular genre community board, kept calling me “deformed and retarded,” really working himself up into quite a state. I never understood what the poor soul was on about, but the level of discourse spoke volumes.
Again, the genre presses rather heroically stepped in.
“This is the way great horror should be written.” ~ HellNotes
“Fresh and fascinating.” ~ Famous Monsters of Filmland
“This intense and wholly original novel is one of the best to come out of the horror genre in years.” ~ Dark Scribe
Art should provoke, and I choose to believe that such angry responses mean I’m doing something right. What’s the Churchill quote? Words to the effect that having enemies proves you stand for something...
Never mind. I hate being so combative all the time. It's really not my nature. Maybe it’s just that I got off on the wrong foot with people. (I excel at this.) For every critic who raved that my books were "much better than the average horror" novel – not the most tactful of compliments – scores of aficionados of the genre vented their resentment at the very notion. Who does Dunbar think he is?
But is it really so objectionable a concept that Horror should also be literature?
Extraordinary talents have flourished in the darkness, artists of the caliber and diversity of Shirley Jackson and Ray Bradbury and Algernon Blackwood and Robert Aickman. Consider the works of Franz Kafka or Gustav Meyrink. What are they if not literary horror? Yet the L word is still routinely applied in a pejorative sense. One flouts this mandated mediocrity at one’s own peril.
Still… there’s a reason I stay.
Years ago, I began to hear from readers who told me that they had “just about given up” finding dark fiction intended for intelligent adults. These folks kept me going, because their responses to my work could be passionately appreciative. What else does a writer live for?
Perhaps I am combative after all, and – yes – it’s worth the battle. Over the years, I’ve so often been moved by the praise of readers, my feelings only enhanced by the fact that the individuals making such comments tend to be articulate and insightful – exactly the readership I’ve always sought.
Sought? Summoned.
Conjured.
Believed in as an article of faith.
These are the readers I envision when I sit down to write. Whenever one of them declares some novel of mine to be among the finest books they’ve read, it constitutes validation on a profound level… if only because there’s not a vanilla character to be found anywhere in my work.
This gives me hope. Perhaps the genre isn’t as reactionary as it seems. Perhaps culturally we are at last emerging from a dark time, like some noble monster groping toward the light.
THE SWAMP STOMP / Part Three
or “Taking it to the Streets”
Legends linger in the dark places of this earth...
http://www.amazon.com/The-Pines-Rober...
After more than twenty years, The Pines continues to attract new devotees… and new detractors, many of whom still sputter in outrage.
It also still garners sensational reviews. Go figure.
Weird, isn’t it? There’s been a gold-embossed leather-bound volume, a limited-edition hardbound collectors’ edition, mass-market paperback editions, and now “rebranded” paperbacks and ebooks from 47North. (This publisher is also talking about audio books and translations and, since they’re a subsidiary of Amazon, presumably have the resources to make such things happen.) Early on, I created a trailer. If you're curious, you can check it out at http://youtu.be/qjchi9VScG4.
Happily, the bad old days are over. For so many years, I had to advise readers NOT to purchase these books, since no royalties were being paid to authors. (Have I mentioned how much fun it was to work with Leisure Books?) Finally, I can recommend both The Pines and its sequel, The Shore.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Shore-Rober...
There’s also a trailer for The Shore here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TeIJsF...
THE PINES centers on Athena Lee Monroe, a displaced person eking out a marginal existence in the New Jersey pine barrens. It also introduces her son Matthew, a boy with a strange affinity for the forest. There’s a presence in those woods, an influence. This remains a key theme, and those elements (and some of the characters) resurface in The Shore, with the setting moved to a desolate beach town on the edge of the woods.
If I feel connected to a specific tradition, it’s that of all those writers who told tales of the ancient, sentient forest. Something lurks in those shadows, something that destroys … or seduces.
I wanted THE SHORE to continue the storyline while staying as far from the tone of the first book as possible. I mean, THE PINES seethes. It’s all steamy summer nights. The emotions are scalding and miserable, and the (frequent) sexual encounters are tawdry. Everyone drips with sweat, and the air roils with insects. Despite the meanness of their situations, some of the characters possess a sort of innate nobility, which has nothing to do with conventional morality. (It’s not the heat, it’s the lucidity.) They redeem themselves. They make sacrifices for love. They grow. And die (some of them). If THE PINES seems to be occurring in an equatorial jungle, THE SHORE may as well take place on a polar icecap. A winter storm menaces a beach town. The people barely speak. They huddle and harbor secrets. And die (some of them).
No vanilla “heroes” here. My people are always more likely to be minorities or outlaws of one type or another. These are the people closest to my heart, my soul, and I believe this continues to cause a substantial amount of the provocation experienced by so many “fans” of the genre. Some people will resist the very notion of diversity with their last breaths.
And so the battle rages on. The novel I’m working on now, the final section of the trilogy – THE STREETS – finds characters from both earlier books struggling in a very urban environment. They won’t give up without a fight either.
Legends linger in the dark places of this earth...
http://www.amazon.com/The-Pines-Rober...
After more than twenty years, The Pines continues to attract new devotees… and new detractors, many of whom still sputter in outrage.
It also still garners sensational reviews. Go figure.
Weird, isn’t it? There’s been a gold-embossed leather-bound volume, a limited-edition hardbound collectors’ edition, mass-market paperback editions, and now “rebranded” paperbacks and ebooks from 47North. (This publisher is also talking about audio books and translations and, since they’re a subsidiary of Amazon, presumably have the resources to make such things happen.) Early on, I created a trailer. If you're curious, you can check it out at http://youtu.be/qjchi9VScG4.
Happily, the bad old days are over. For so many years, I had to advise readers NOT to purchase these books, since no royalties were being paid to authors. (Have I mentioned how much fun it was to work with Leisure Books?) Finally, I can recommend both The Pines and its sequel, The Shore.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Shore-Rober...
There’s also a trailer for The Shore here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TeIJsF...
THE PINES centers on Athena Lee Monroe, a displaced person eking out a marginal existence in the New Jersey pine barrens. It also introduces her son Matthew, a boy with a strange affinity for the forest. There’s a presence in those woods, an influence. This remains a key theme, and those elements (and some of the characters) resurface in The Shore, with the setting moved to a desolate beach town on the edge of the woods.
If I feel connected to a specific tradition, it’s that of all those writers who told tales of the ancient, sentient forest. Something lurks in those shadows, something that destroys … or seduces.
I wanted THE SHORE to continue the storyline while staying as far from the tone of the first book as possible. I mean, THE PINES seethes. It’s all steamy summer nights. The emotions are scalding and miserable, and the (frequent) sexual encounters are tawdry. Everyone drips with sweat, and the air roils with insects. Despite the meanness of their situations, some of the characters possess a sort of innate nobility, which has nothing to do with conventional morality. (It’s not the heat, it’s the lucidity.) They redeem themselves. They make sacrifices for love. They grow. And die (some of them). If THE PINES seems to be occurring in an equatorial jungle, THE SHORE may as well take place on a polar icecap. A winter storm menaces a beach town. The people barely speak. They huddle and harbor secrets. And die (some of them).
No vanilla “heroes” here. My people are always more likely to be minorities or outlaws of one type or another. These are the people closest to my heart, my soul, and I believe this continues to cause a substantial amount of the provocation experienced by so many “fans” of the genre. Some people will resist the very notion of diversity with their last breaths.
And so the battle rages on. The novel I’m working on now, the final section of the trilogy – THE STREETS – finds characters from both earlier books struggling in a very urban environment. They won’t give up without a fight either.
THE SWAMP STOMP / Part Four
or “Mud, Blood & Beyond”
Interviewers are forever asking me what makes a work literary – frequently in the most confrontational tones – as though defying me to quote some rule. I usually say zombies and gore, lots of gore. Plus gouged eyeballs just scream artistic style.
(Cue the illiterati to denounce me as pretentious. Pitchforks and torches ready… and three… two… one…)
But maybe we could take another stab at a definition?
Obviously, talent is an essential (and nebulous) criteria, but intellect is also necessary, as well as passion, even courage. All writers will understand what I’m talking about here, but many authors won’t have a clue … and are already seething.) Other components? Technical proficiency, of course. Integrity. Vision and execution. Discipline and a touch of madness. All of it. And so much else. The term “literary” describes a level of prose that aspires to do more than just appeal to the lowest common denominator, and that single aspect remains the key – what I can only call seriousness of intent. A few years ago, I had the disagreeable experience of witnessing a popular author address a horde of his admirers. “What’s scary to you? Is it vampires? Is it werewolves? Then that’s what you should write,” he told them. “But that’s not the important part. No. SELLING yourself is the important part. Look at me. I don’t have much talent, but I’m really good at self-promotion.” He was completely unabashed by this pronouncement. If anything, he seemed proud of it, as though success without talent somehow enhanced the accomplishment. I looked around: the room was full of aspiring authors, all scribbling notes.
Now, that’s scary.
My own journey was never about marketing. (General rule: Any author who talks about his “brand” should have one on his forehead. Maybe a nice dollar sign.) As a kid, I don’t know what I would have done if not for the public library. Killed myself probably. I’ll never be certain why I didn’t wind up a teen statistic, but I suspect it had something to do with being able to lose myself in a book. And find myself. Learning to write was about becoming. Do composers feel that way? Or painters? Does the craft become a chrysalis? Michelangelo said he didn’t create his statues so much as free them from the stone. I suspect he freed himself as well.
So much rock to chip away. One makes slow progress.
Author Page:
http://www.amazon.com/Robert-Dunbar/e...
No, my journey wasn’t about self-promotion, but even an artist needs to eat. In the years between books, I wrote poetry that appeared in several journals, and a number of my plays were produced in a variety of strange venues (few of which resembled actual theaters). So clearly I didn't eat much. But I also worked for a bewildering array of newspapers and magazines and finally – for my sins – wound up writing for television, mostly PBS and Discovery, that sort of thing.
But these days I concentrate on my fiction.
Not the smoothest of paths to follow.
No, it can be rough, and it’s so easy to get frustrated. Over the years, one critic would rave that The Pines was a “masterpiece of the genre” or another proclaim that The Shore was “surprisingly good for a horror novel,” and I’d be pleased for a split second, then plunge into despair. With Martyrs and Monsters – for the first time – reviewers began to avoid the patronizing restrictions when discussing my work and just talked about quality, and that made all the difference. Without this level of support, I’m not sure I would have had the courage to attempt a novel as complex as Willy. I’m very grateful.
With both of those books, I went back to the pine barrens. Readers are familiar with the setting now, but when I wrote THE PINES, the lore of the Leeds Devil was almost unknown outside of New Jersey. It was a rich vein to mine, because the legend boasts so many classic components: the hut in the swamp; the cursed thirteenth child. By exploring the atmosphere around the myth, rather than the myth itself, I tried to fashion the folklore into something meaningful and contemporary, as well as something intensely personal. There’s a Carl Jung quote about “owning your shadow.” Such a delicious phrase and so reassuring … as though by knowing the darkness we gain some measure of control over it. How could a writer – or any artist – resist this sort of intensity?
YA. NA. MM. The market is so obsessed with labels. You want to know what else interviewers are always asking me? Still in such confrontational tones? They always want to know why I don’t just write literary fiction instead of horror.
I’ll let you in on a little secret: I am writing literary fiction.
Just don’t tell anyone.
Interviewers are forever asking me what makes a work literary – frequently in the most confrontational tones – as though defying me to quote some rule. I usually say zombies and gore, lots of gore. Plus gouged eyeballs just scream artistic style.
(Cue the illiterati to denounce me as pretentious. Pitchforks and torches ready… and three… two… one…)
But maybe we could take another stab at a definition?
Obviously, talent is an essential (and nebulous) criteria, but intellect is also necessary, as well as passion, even courage. All writers will understand what I’m talking about here, but many authors won’t have a clue … and are already seething.) Other components? Technical proficiency, of course. Integrity. Vision and execution. Discipline and a touch of madness. All of it. And so much else. The term “literary” describes a level of prose that aspires to do more than just appeal to the lowest common denominator, and that single aspect remains the key – what I can only call seriousness of intent. A few years ago, I had the disagreeable experience of witnessing a popular author address a horde of his admirers. “What’s scary to you? Is it vampires? Is it werewolves? Then that’s what you should write,” he told them. “But that’s not the important part. No. SELLING yourself is the important part. Look at me. I don’t have much talent, but I’m really good at self-promotion.” He was completely unabashed by this pronouncement. If anything, he seemed proud of it, as though success without talent somehow enhanced the accomplishment. I looked around: the room was full of aspiring authors, all scribbling notes.
Now, that’s scary.
My own journey was never about marketing. (General rule: Any author who talks about his “brand” should have one on his forehead. Maybe a nice dollar sign.) As a kid, I don’t know what I would have done if not for the public library. Killed myself probably. I’ll never be certain why I didn’t wind up a teen statistic, but I suspect it had something to do with being able to lose myself in a book. And find myself. Learning to write was about becoming. Do composers feel that way? Or painters? Does the craft become a chrysalis? Michelangelo said he didn’t create his statues so much as free them from the stone. I suspect he freed himself as well.
So much rock to chip away. One makes slow progress.
Author Page:
http://www.amazon.com/Robert-Dunbar/e...
No, my journey wasn’t about self-promotion, but even an artist needs to eat. In the years between books, I wrote poetry that appeared in several journals, and a number of my plays were produced in a variety of strange venues (few of which resembled actual theaters). So clearly I didn't eat much. But I also worked for a bewildering array of newspapers and magazines and finally – for my sins – wound up writing for television, mostly PBS and Discovery, that sort of thing.
But these days I concentrate on my fiction.
Not the smoothest of paths to follow.
No, it can be rough, and it’s so easy to get frustrated. Over the years, one critic would rave that The Pines was a “masterpiece of the genre” or another proclaim that The Shore was “surprisingly good for a horror novel,” and I’d be pleased for a split second, then plunge into despair. With Martyrs and Monsters – for the first time – reviewers began to avoid the patronizing restrictions when discussing my work and just talked about quality, and that made all the difference. Without this level of support, I’m not sure I would have had the courage to attempt a novel as complex as Willy. I’m very grateful.
With both of those books, I went back to the pine barrens. Readers are familiar with the setting now, but when I wrote THE PINES, the lore of the Leeds Devil was almost unknown outside of New Jersey. It was a rich vein to mine, because the legend boasts so many classic components: the hut in the swamp; the cursed thirteenth child. By exploring the atmosphere around the myth, rather than the myth itself, I tried to fashion the folklore into something meaningful and contemporary, as well as something intensely personal. There’s a Carl Jung quote about “owning your shadow.” Such a delicious phrase and so reassuring … as though by knowing the darkness we gain some measure of control over it. How could a writer – or any artist – resist this sort of intensity?
YA. NA. MM. The market is so obsessed with labels. You want to know what else interviewers are always asking me? Still in such confrontational tones? They always want to know why I don’t just write literary fiction instead of horror.
I’ll let you in on a little secret: I am writing literary fiction.
Just don’t tell anyone.
