The Shining Changed My Life

It might sound like an obvious, shameless plug designed to grab your attention, but, as sick and twisted as it may seem, it is true.  I was around 11 or 12 years old, and my dad said I should get a book before we went on vacation; probably an effort to keep me quiet in the car, but little did my dad know it would have an impact on my life.  So, he brought me to Walden Books in the mall and told me to pick something out.  I wandered around for awhile, looking around at books that I had no interest in reading, then I came across the Stephen King section.  My dad was a fan of horror; there were books by the aforementioned Mr. King and Anne Rice to accompany his collection of Kurt Vonnegut and Sci-Fi novels, having an obvious influence on my choice.  I asked him what was a good Stephen King book and he suggested The Shining, but warned me it was a scary story and he didn't want to hear me crying about not being able to sleep while reading it.  The cover didn't do much for me, it was a grey to black gradient with a faceless man shown, which I thought was too simple to be scary, so I thought I'd give it a shot.  I never read the description so I started reading without any idea what the story was about but was intrigued from the beginning. From the introduction of the characters on to the first snowfall, discoveries in room 217, twins, insanity and faulty boilers, I was terrified but completely in love.  This began a lifelong obsession of horror and the macabre, which stands true today.

My desire to be scared has been a bit of a love/hate relationship; as much as I love the genre, it becomes frustrating with some of the, for lack of a better term, cheesy horror stories and movies that have been released over the years.  My faith was somewhat restored after seeing the Paranormal Activity films and, more recently, The Conjuring, but I still feel as though the majority of what's out there is awful.  So, I started to think about what I would do differently if I were writing them and thought I would give writing my own manuscript a shot.  I had an idea for a story, partially based on my experiences in my early 20's, put a lot of thought into the structure, characters, plot, etc, and started writing it about a month ago.  Great, right?  Well, it has been moving along but not without it's struggles.  Which brings me to why I've started this blog; I thought it would be cool to document the process an aspiring writer goes through writing their first novel.  I may be a glutton for punishment and might regret this down the road, but I'm putting this out there for all to see.  God help me.

Feel free to comment, share or just ridicule me, I'm game for anything.  Along the way, I'll post some snippets of the book, sharing the story as I go.  No spoilers, but I'll make it entertaining.  As for the copy of The Shining my dad bought me all those years ago, I still have it.  It's been through countless moves, had beer spilled on it in college and it's been read at least 5 or 6 times, but it's survived.  Just like this genre has and will, as long as there are people who want to be scared, and freaks like me who want to tell stories.