Two Wrongs Don't Make a Good Story

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Two Wrongs Don't Make a Good Story

I’vejust gotten back from watching Weapons in the theater as I write this. Ireally enjoyed the movie, especially the actors’ performances, the direction,and the cinematography. The script, however, had some problems for me. I onlywant to focus on two of those problems for this blog entry, though, becausethey’re among the most common ones I see as a writing teacher, often instudent-written stories, but sometimes in professionally published (or filmed)ones, too. (Don’t worry; I’m not going to give any spoilers for Weapons.)

ProblemNumber 1: ForgettingThat Media is Everywhere

Ifirst became aware of this problem when I read a horror novel in the early1990s (and no, I’m not going to say which one to avoid spoilers). It was agreat book, an award-winner, and I enjoyed the hell out of it. But the eventsthat occurred within it were realistic, the public was aware of them, and theywere so bizarre that both print and TV reporters would’ve been all over thestory throughout the novel. But there was no media presence in the book whatsoever.

A morerecent example (which I will name) is Bentley Little’s The Bank (2020).I love Bentley’s fiction, and I enjoyed the book quite a lot. But in the novel,nearly twenty people, all who work at the same bank, are found dead in a fieldoutside town. (This happens early in the novel, so my telling you isn’t much ofa spoiler.) One of the dead people has an obvious cause of death, but theothers don’t. Weird, right? But no news media – not even a single localreporter – shows up to cover the story.

I seethis failure to address the presence of media happen a lot in horror –including in Weapons. Given the mysterious circumstances – seventeenchildren all disappear at 2:17 a.m. on the same night – and the fact the eventsof the story go on for weeks, local, state, national and international mediawould quickly show up to cover the story, and they’d stay on it. The mediawould be omnipresent in town, and they’d bug the elementary school teacher, theone child who didn’t disappear, the kids’ parents, law enforcement (both localand federal), and regular citizens alike to get interviews and sound bites –and they would not stop.

Add tothis all the people who’d be texting each other, posting on social media,making YouTube and TikTok videos about the case, discussing it on podcasts –especially in this age of true-crime entertainment – and people would flock tothe town: influencers, true-crime writers, paranormal investigators, conspiracytheorists, dark tourists… The entire world would become obsessed with thedisappearances. And the parents of the missing children would use this to theiradvantage, granting interviews to the media to put more pressure on lawenforcement to find their kids. But there’s nothing but crickets in the film asfar as the media is concerned.

Now,in a more intimate, character-focused story like Weapons, the writersmight decide not to make the media a major aspect of the story, and the mediamight fade out of the story for the most part as the plot moves on, but they’dstill be in the background somewhere. But not having any media atall present is extremely unrealistic – and it always strains my suspension ofdisbelief.

Here’show I handle the issue of the media in my fiction:

Many of my novels take place over the course of a few hours, and there often isn’t time for news media to become alerted to the weird stuff going on.

My characters are usually so caught up in dealing with weird stuff that they don’t have time to text anyone or post about it on social media.

The weird stuff is usually supernatural, and characters may perceive it, but the rest of the world doesn’t, so no media becomes involved.

The situation might only impact a few characters, so the incidents aren’t known – and maybe never will be known – outside their circle.

I might have law enforcement try to conceal the more bizarre/extreme aspects of an incident to keep news media from becoming involved (as long as they can, anyway).

I have news media show up for a scene or two to establish their presence, but they don’t play a big role in the story.

I’ll show someone post a message on social media or read one, send a text or receive a text, talk to someone on the phone, etc. about what’s happening. I’ll do this once or twice to show that people are upset about what’s going on and talking about it, but I don’t make it a major part of the story.

Sometimes I’ll make the news media and social media a significant aspect of the story. I may do this by having one reporter be a supporting character or even a main character. This reporter stands in for all the other media that’s present in the background. I might have characters stay in regular phone/text/social media contact with friends or family during a story (although I’ll make sure not to overdo this).

Problem2: Not Checking Your Plot Forward AND Backward

Writers seem so focused onmoving their plot forward that they sometimes don’t fully consider theramifications of the events they’re writing about. They write a cool scene revealingthe central mystery of the story, but they don’t go back to the beginning ofthe draft and check to make sure everything else in the story fits theexplanation. This happens in Weapons, but I can’t talk about where andhow without spoiling aspects of the film. But I’ll give you an example fromTobe Hooper’s Salem’s Lot (1979) All the vampires in the miniseries arerepelled by the cross – except master vampire Barlow. When Father Callahanshoves a metal cross toward Barlow, he reaches out, crumples it in his hand,and tosses it away. No explanation. The audience can guess that Barlow is sopowerful that the cross doesn’t affect him, but in the novel, King makes itclear that the bearer of the cross must have faith for it to work, and FatherCallahan’s faith is more than a little shaky at that point in his life. I’msure Hooper loved the imagery of Barlow crushing the cross without anyexplanation, but King’s version is infinitely better – and it’s logical withinthe confines of the story. It often doesn’t take much to fix a problem likethis. Fright Night (1985) dealt with this same issue in one line. WhenPeter Vincent thrusts a cross toward master vampire Jerry Dandridge, Dandridge laughs,then says, “You have to have faith for that to work on me.” If you’regoing to establish rules in a story – whether explicitly through dialogue orshowing them through action – they need to be consistent, and when there’s anexception to the rules, the audience needs to know why.

The original 1978 Halloweenhas a different problem. When Michael Myers escapes from the mental hospitalwhere he’s been confined since he was a child, he steals a hospital vehicle anddrives away. When did he learn to drive? It’s established that he’s beencatatonic the entire time he was in the hospital, so even if someone wanted toteach him, he wouldn’t have responded to them. In the novelization of Halloween,one of the hospital staff gives Michael driving lessons, which isn’t believablegiven what the script says about his mental condition, but at least it’s somekind of explanation.

Probably the horror movie mostguilty of plot inconsistency (at least for me) is M. Night Shyamalan’s Signs.At the end of the movie, humans discover that water is like acid to the alieninvaders. They use it as a weapon against the aliens, and the survivinginvaders, evidently realizing the egregious error they’ve made, get the helloff the planet. My guess is that Shyamalan loved the symbolism of pure waterdefeating the evil aliens so much, that he didn’t bother to ask why wouldaliens with super-advanced tech come to a planet and not know its water wasacid to them? Don’t they have sensors? Probes? Water-testing kits? Couldn’tthey have seen a buddy step into a puddle and lose a foot and realize somethingwas wrong? Or couldn’t they have done what we humans do when we go into ahostile environment and wear fucking protective gear? I mean, those dudes walkedaround Acid World naked! (And what if it rained on the aliens or they went to aplace with a shit-ton of humidity, or…) It also irritates the hell out of methat Shyamalan seems to imply the entire alien invasion – and all the humancasualties that resulted – was created by God to restore one man’s faith.

Assuming Shyamalan had theending of his story in mind first, he should’ve figured out why the alienswanted to come to Earth and take it over, and why they were unaware that wateris acid to them. He wouldn’t have to address either issue in the film, but hisknowing those things would’ve allowed him to avoid what turned out to be anextremely bad ending. So imagine him rereading his script and realizing it’sdumb as hell for aliens to come naked to a world that’s mostly acid to them. Hethen asks himself why they wouldn’t know ahead of time what water could do tothem. Answer: Because it’s not just water that harms them. It’s water combinedwith another liquid, a combination the aliens could not foresee. So JoaquinPhoenix swings his bat, smashes the water pitcher and a cup of coffee. Themixture hits the alien, and it melts like the Wicked Witch of the West. Joaquinsays, “Holy shit! Water and caffeine together! Who knew?” Again, it doesn’ttake a huge adjustment to fix problems like this. (I’d probably have Joaquin orsomeone else hurl a different liquid at the alien first, then he could add thewater by smashing the pitcher, just to make the combining of liquids seem morerealistic.)

Now, I don’t need to haveeverything spelled out for me in stories. To me, Michael Myers is a liminalbeing that exists somewhere between the real and the unreal. His driving isjust another part of the mystery that is this unknowable creature. And Ifucking love David Lynch’s films and TV shows, and they don’t make alick of sense, nor are they supposed to. My favorite stories are ones wherebizarre shit happens for reasons we will never understand or for no reason atall. Most of the horror fiction I’ve written in my career is in this vein,especially my short stories. But if you are going to write morerealistic horror fiction (or really, any kind of realistic fiction), you needto mentally sweep through your story forward and backward – as well as considerthe story before the story – to make sure everything fits, or at leastfits as well as it needs to.

I don’t mean to trash Weaponshere. If you haven’t seen it already, you should check it out. Like I saidearlier, it’s a really good film, and afterward, I heard members of theaudience talking about how scary it was, and that’s always a good endorsementfor a horror movie!

DEPARTMENTOF SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION

THE WORLD TURNS RED

My newhorror novella, The World Turns Red, came out in June, and reactionsfrom reviewers and readers alike have been overwhelmingly positive! Here’s asample:

“A dark,disturbing masterpiece worth binge-reading in one sitting.” – S.E. Howard

“This isa very dark, intense read with a surreal quality that pulled me in from pageone and held me spellbound to the bitter end.” – Well Worth a Read

TheWorld Turns Red isanother in a long line of brilliant horror work by Tim Waggoner. There wasnever anyone who could blend the real with the surreal so seamlessly that, aswild as the story gets, it makes perfect sense somehow. Now THAT takes one hellof a writer. The book is a flawless masterpiece…6 out of 5 stars. – Carson Buckingham

Synopsis:

Welcometo the meat room.

At first,it’s a whisper on the edge of your consciousness.

As itgets louder, you begin to make out words—dark, sharp, dangerous words… You clapyour hands over your ears to shut them out, but you can’t escape what comesfrom inside you.

The voicetells you to do things to yourself. Bad things. Awful things…

Thelonger you listen, the more they seem reasonable. Desirable.

Inevitable.

And asyou reach for the nearest knife, gun, or rope, the voice speaks the last fourwords you’ll ever hear:

Allhail the Unhigh.

CemeteryDance: https://www.cemeterydance.com/TheWorldTurnsRed

Amazon: https://tinyurl.com/5cabrjn2

Barnesand Noble: https://tinyurl.com/kzphuep7

CONAN: SPAWN OF THE SERPENT GOD

The timeis drawing nigh! My Conan the Barbarian novel, Spawn of the Serpent God,will be released October 28th! The novel ties into the comic book event Scourgeof the Serpent Men (Conan being said scourge, of course, although it lookslike King Kull may be involved, too). You won’t have to read the comics tounderstand my book, and vice versa, but if you’re a Conan fan, you might enjoyreading both. Here’s a link to the first issue of Scourge of the Serpent Men:https://titan-comics.com/c/2316-conan-the-barbarian-scourge-of-the-serpent/

You canfind various preorder links for the novel at the Titan Books site: https://titanbooks.com/72365-conan-spawn-of-the-serpent-god/

And whileI’ve had no official word (because nobody ever tells writers anything), itlooks like Spawn of the Serpent God will be getting an audio edition!I’m super excited because the narrator is Bradford Hastings, who’s not only anexcellent reader and performer, but his Conan is my absolute favorite portrayalof the character. The audiobook is due out in late December, and you canpreorder it at B&N and Amazon. I’m sure it’ll be available directly fromBlackstone Audio (who’s the publisher of the audio version) as well.

Amazon: https://tinyurl.com/bn6hh2m

B&N: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/conan-tim-waggoner/1148011208?ean=9798228671591

Synopsis:

InZamora, the city of thieves, Conan meets Valja, a thrill-seeking thief. Sheentices him to join

her on aheist, where they steal a golden statuette of Ishtar, said to contain thegoddess herself.

Afterkilling a dozen guards and failing to escape, the pair are saved by priestessesof Mitra. But

Conanknows that nothing is free.

Thepriestesses have need of their skills. They have waged war against Set, god ofchaos and

serpents,who demands constant sacrifice from his subjects and massacred thousands of his

followers.Yet they are no match for Uzzeran, a powerful sorcerer, who has been performing

unspeakableexperiments on humans in the name of Set. To defeat Uzzeran, they will need a

legendarywarrior on their side. They need Conan the Barbarian.

ISCREAM, YOU SCREAM

WeirdHouse Press is going to bring out my middle-grade horror novel I Scream, YouScream. Joe Morey, publisher at Weird House, says “We are going to do a deluxe signed andlettered hardcover with slipcase, and double lettered deluxe hardcover (noslipcase), a signed hardcover edition, and a signed and numbered tradepaperback edition sometime next year. Also an Amazon trade paperback editionand ebook.”

Check out thatcover! The art from Derek Rook is perfect for the novel! It reminds me of theartwork that appeared on the covers of the DC horror comics I read as a kid – TheHouse of Mystery and The House of Secrets. Young Timmy would befreaking out even more than old(er) Tim is!

If you’re a fan ofmy adult horror fiction, this story is just as weird and bizarre as anythingelse I’ve written, but geared toward younger readers. I think older readerswill enjoy it, too, if for no other reason than to see how I translate my darkand surreal style for a middle-grade audience.

Synopsis:

Eighth-grader JoelTaylor just moved to Shadow Springs with his mom. He likes his new home wellenough – until a sinister being called Mr. Freezee begins driving his creepyice-cream truck up and down the streets at night, playing “Pop Goes theWeasel.”

Joel heard themusic.

He looked out thewindow.

He saw Mr. Freezee,and what’s worse…

Mr. Freezee saw him.

Now Mr. Freezeewants to take Joel to a very special place where the world is made of everyflavor of ice cream you can imagine – all of them deadly. Mr. Freezee bringsall his new friends here, and they love it so much that they never leave.

Mr. Freezee makessure of it.

Welcome to SweetLand, Joel.

Welcome to anightmare that never ends.

Here’s a link to the book’s page on the Weird House. Preorder info isscheduled to appear on August 26th: https://weirdhousepress.com/products/i-scream-you-scream-by-tim-waggoner

SCHEDULEDAPPEARANCES

Moon Lit Tales and Haunted Trails.Oct. 11-12. St. Albans, West Virginia.

2026

SuperstarsWriting Seminar. Feb. 4-5. Colorado Springs, Colorado.

AkronBook Fest. March 7. Akron, Ohio.

StokerCon.June 4-7. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Into theSprings Writers Workshop. August 7-9. Yellow Springs, Ohio.

WHERETO FIND ME ONLINE

Want tofollow me on social media? Here’s where you can find me:

Website: www.timwaggoner.com

NewsletterSign-Up: https://timwaggoner.com/contact.htm

AmazonPage: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Tim-Waggoner/author/B001JP0XFM?ref=ap_rdr&store_ref=ap_rdr&isDramIntegrated=true&shoppingPortalEnabled=true