On Writing:
What is your favorite genre to read? Is it your favorite genre to write in? If not, what is your favorite genre to write in? How does reading help to shape your writing?
This might seem slightly controversial, but I actually don’t read that much. I’ve always had a hard time finding books that interested me. I would start a book, then lose interest in it about a quarter of the way through. I actually read more comics and manga than I do actual books. That being said though, I’ve always been drawn to the more bizarre stories with kinda out there premises. Haruki Murakami’s Hard Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World being one of them. Two stories that are almost nothing alike being told at the same time in alternating chapters. They don’t seem connected at first, until you start realizing they go more hand and hand than you might think. Or Ursula K Le Guin’s The Lathe of Heaven, a story of a man whose dreams can change the fabric of reality and how a doctor is using dream therapy on him to shape reality to his whim.
Long story short, Weird Fiction is the genre that I’m most attracted to and enjoy reading the most, especially if it has elements of Horror.
When it comes to writing, I prefer a more Horror focused approach to Weird Fiction, while also including elements of Science Fiction and Fantasy. No genre is off the table for me; if the story I’m writing has two characters that naturally begin to bond together, I won’t shy away from putting them in more romantic situations. Or if a character goes through something traumatic to the point causing damage to the psyche, I’ll start to add some psychological horror elements to it that could lead into Unreliable Narrator territory, or possibly even Horror of Personality. If the story calls for a certain genre, then I will explore it.
When it comes to how reading shapes my writing, I would argue that Comics and Manga have helped more. Maybe not in a grammatical or story structure kind of way, but in the way that I depict my characters and “monsters”. Tsutomu Nihei, author and artist of series such as Blame! and Knights of Sidonia, is a huge influence on my character design. In Blame! specifically, there is very little dialogue in the whole series, instead focusing more on the physical journey of the main character. One of the biggest things Nihei does is put a lot of attention to detail in not only the character designs, but the buildings and the landscapes, and every little nook and cranny you can think of. You can spend five minutes on one page with no dialogue, and know what the characters are feeling, what the overall emotion of the situation is like, what temperature the room is, how old the area is, if there’s danger; even if it’s close by and not on the page itself. It makes me feel like I am there and makes me take all of these things into account. When I’m writing, I think back to those pages and try my best to write down and recreate that level of detail, especially more recently.
Would you prefer a piece of writing with a strong story but poor grammar and punctuation -or- a piece of writing with a weak story but with strong grammar and punctuation? Why? What are some ways a strong storyline might make weak punctuation and grammar easier to overlook? Conversely, what are some instances where strong grammar, unique word choice, for example, might make a weaker storyline more exciting?
In my opinion, a story with strong ideas and poor grammar and punctuation is better than a weak story with good grammar and punctuation. It doesn’t matter how well it’s written; if it’s not holding my attention, then I’m not going to read it. I will also be the first one to say that when I first started posting stories on Reddit, my writing capabilities weren’t what they are now, and it didn’t help that I was writing a two to four thousand word story a week and posting it the following weekend. There were grammar and punctuation mistakes all over that I missed in my editing phase of the stories. However, they still managed to draw in an audience and people still enjoyed them. As long as the story is strong and the ideas are good, certain things can be forgiven.
On Horror:
Q: Have you ever had a real-life encounter with the paranormal? If so, what can you tell us about your experience? Has it shaped any of your stories? Before you had the encounter did you believe in the paranormal?
A: I have personally had a few different encounters, my family has a history of being surrounded by stuff like this. In most instances of my encounters, it is “something” just trying to be acknowledged. Like when I was younger and I was home alone, something compelled me to look over to the kitchen garbage can while I was sitting in the living room, and I saw the lid move on its own as something pushed it down and it swung on its axis for a couple seconds.
I think the most out there encounters I’ve had were when I lived in a house in my teenage years. I once saw a pair of disembodied legs run behind a corner. A black mass used to appear at the end of the hallway where my door and my parents door was. I actually made a passing joke about how I was tired of it, and my mother agreed; we had never talked about it before that moment. I once saw a giant black spider and stepped on it out of fear, only for there to be no remnants of it when I lifted my foot. But the most active thing that happened, came when I was getting ready to leave for college. While I was packing, if I dropped something, I could watch where it landed, look away for only a second, then look back and it was just gone. I’d find eventually in a place that it had no right to be in. My Xbox 360 would turn on by itself. I would hear my name called, but no one called for me. But the weirdest thing that would happen, is that when I was laying on my bed, going on my chromebook or doing something. A clear and tiny spider would come down in front of my face, no matter where I was on my bed, and I would squish it every time, with no residue left over on my fingers whatsoever. When I left, my little sister moved into my room; she never had any problems with spiders. None of it was malicious. And I personally think that whatever was in there was just sad that I was leaving.
I have a few other stories as well, but we’d be here all day.
As for shaping my stories, it does and it doesn’t. I have a couple rules that I’ve come up with from my experiences that I follow when encountering stuff like that. But the only one I’ve really implemented in my writing is the wooden box rule. Anything that might give off a supernatural energy of some sort, can be nullified if you place it in a wooden box with no metal on it whatsoever. Metal amplifies the energy.
I don’t really remember a time where I didn’t believe in the paranormal, it’s always just kinda been around me. Even when I asked my parents if they believe, my dad never outrightly said yes, but he talked about some weird things that happened to him in the past. My mom never denied it, and told me that most of them were harmless, which is true. My step dad is half Native American and grew up on a reservation and saw lots of things growing up.
Q: What is it about horror that readers/audiences love? What makes us keep coming back?
A: I think one of the things that people enjoy about horror is that it has an end. What I mean by that, is life is very stressful for everyone, especially with the current state of the world. A lot of people go through their own horrors daily, and for some it never ends. But when you read a horror story, you’re in the story and you’re experiencing it in whatever level of involvement you want. You are escaping the day to day horrors for a simulated one. And eventually the story will end, now the ending can vary, but it still has an ending and in that ending the reader can take solace in the fact that the horror they engaged with is over, giving them a break and some much needed hope that their own horrors will end one day.
Hot Seat Question:
Q: Often writers scribble down notes in small notebooks, napkins, paper wrappers. Let’s say a story idea comes to you, and mid-sentence your pen runs out of ink. Do you finish your thought in blood, or do you steal a pen from someone nearby? Why?
A: What a peculiar question, I like it. As much as I like the idea of using my own blood to continue writing down the story idea, realistically I would ask for a pen. I’m not the hugest fan of self harm in any way, even if it’s for the pursuit of art. Even if the story idea is amazing, and taking time to find a pen will cause some of the idea to fade away, I know I can come up with an equally good continuation of the idea, even if it’s not one hundred percent the same. I’m confident in my creativity to come up with something just as good.
Story Specific:
Q: Virosa is a multi-dimensional look at love (of one’s self and others), release, and redemption. Each chapter has an intriguing tagline that speaks to these themes of transformation. A particularly interesting one is, “The metamorphosis is key in maintaining the delusion for long enough so it can solidify…” (Virosa, Gryphon Alastare). Please, tell us more about this.
A: Well, firstly, thank you for the compliment, I appreciate it. Each tagline is supposed to technically be read right after each other:
Death is not an end, but the beginning of a dream encased in gold…
The dream is a necessary evil that triggers the next stage of metamorphosis…
The metamorphosis is key in maintaining the delusion for long enough so it can solidify…
Once the delusion solidifies, one’s reality becomes forever changed, trapped in the dream…
If not cared for, the dream can turn sour and rot into a nightmare…
If the nightmare continues to fester, then it will collapse under its own rot, leaving nothing but a hollow gold shell in its wake…
… However, if given the proper conditions, the dream can be revived and cared for. It can begin anew again.
I imagine it as Virosa telling this to the reader directly. When I was originally writing the story, I went in with the idea of what if this is all a dying dream of Kanna’s. What if when she fell down the ladder to the subbasement, she actually died. I decided to scrap that idea, but kept the dream metaphor in the taglines.
Death is not an end, but the beginning of a dream encased in gold is her being turned into a vampire by Virosa. The dream is a necessary evil that triggers the next stage of metamorphosis is Virosa trying to get Kanna to feed on the buck and get her first experience with blood. The metamorphosis is key in maintaining the delusion for long enough so it can solidify, is Virosa using that experience to further push her to consume human blood, against Kanna’s wishes. Once the delusion solidifies, one’s reality becomes forever changed, trapped in the dream, is Virosa hoping that Kanna will get over her aversion to killing people for food and fully embrace her vampiric nature. She wants her to be like her to make it easy to relate to each other without Virosa changing much of herself. If not cared for, the dream can turn sour and rot into a nightmare, is Virosa realizing that she screwed up, and is causing a huge distress in the person she truly cares about. If the nightmare continues to fester, then it will collapse under its own rot, leaving nothing but a hollow gold shell in its wake, is Virosa realizing that it’s already too late, and the only way to fix it, without experimenting, is to sacrifice her own heart to save the person she loves. However, if given the proper conditions, the dream can be revived and cared for. It can begin anew again, is Kanna rebuilding her life after Virosa sacrifices herself to save her. Then getting a second chance at love with the revival of Virosa.
It’s kinda sappy, but I like it.
Q: In your bio, you talk about getting your start in writing on Reddit with a series called Cursed Tapes and How to Avoid Them on R/Nosleep. Can you tell us more about the series? Where did you first come up with the idea? Would you recommend Reddit as a diving off point for beginning writers? Why or why not?
A: Cursed Tapes and How to Avoid Them, was my first big success on Reddit, and I think my third attempt at publishing a series on NoSleep. It takes place in a preexisting universe that I’ve been writing in since I was 14. It starts out as a group of friends who figure out that cursed VHS tapes (The Ring for example) are real, and are concerned about copies being out in the wild, so they decide to watch them and write a summary of what happened, that way if curious minds find a copy, they can instead read the summary and spare themselves of any danger. However it quickly turns into almost a burden, when the main character gets an entity from one of the tapes trapped in their head and has to keep watching tapes, so that the entity can absorb other ghosts and whatnot to eventually maintain a physical form outside of the main character’s head.
It was a series that blew up on NoSleep, which led to countless sequel series that took this ever growing cast of characters called “The Watch Party” to places like a race track for afflicted vehicles, a never ending mineshaft, and even inside a computer from the early 90’s. So far it spans 200,000 words worth of stories. Currently I’m on a hiatus from it, but I want to get back to it soon.
As for whether or not I think Reddit is a good start for new writers, it is kinda up in the air. NoSleep is admittedly not a great place to start. It’s very strict and you have to write a story that follows their parameters, and if a moderator thinks that it might deviate a little bit, they have the right to take it off without any consideration from the writer. And if a moderator ends up not liking you for any particular reason, they can just take your story off because they can. I’ve had a couple fellow writers do nothing wrong rule wise, and still have their stories taken down. Basically you have to write a story along the lines of “I experienced this thing and survived” and if it deviates even slightly, it will be taken down without warning.
There are some other Subreddits that are out there that are for horror stories, like TheCrypticCompendium, OddDirections, and even TwoSentenceHorror. There are plenty of places to start on Reddit, you just have to find the right one for you.
More About Gryphon Alastare:
If I had to give any sort of advice, especially if you’re looking for ways to publish a short story, novella, or even a novel; use a website called Horror Tree. What I do is scour different ads for story collections for various genres and find one that looks interesting to me. I basically take it as a challenge. If I can get this story written and edited before the deadline, then I can submit it and hopefully get accepted. If it doesn’t, then I have a fully written story that I can shop around to other publishers, or expand upon the story itself and maybe turn it into a stand alone novel. Either way, you have a finished story on your hands, and I know that for a lot of people, that’s all they want. And even if you can’t find a publisher for it, then post it online somewhere and just put it out to the people. You never know, it might hit the audience you’re looking for.