Horror story set in modern Ireland

Miniegg

Hi,

I have a story swirling in my head set in a fictional small town in modern Ireland (which will also portray many of the social problems that exist in modern Ireland). It’s a horror story, and I think it would be interesting to write about how supernatural events could affect the lives of people in the town, given that our culture has generally moved on from the superstition and myth of our previous generations.

I'm attempting a slow burner/ humour at the start, so that the reader will get to know the town and some of the people who live there before unleashing the horror upon them! Please let me know if this isn't the right way to go about it. I would appreciate any advice regarding pacing, writing style, etc.


Bertie lowered the teacup from his lips and he sat it in the shallow puddle of tea in his saucer. He watched Nora unload towels from the open porthole of the tumbledryer and after she took them out she folded them and placed them neatly in the plastic basket on the floor.
‘Are you just going to watch me?’ she said.
Bertie took another sip of his tea and he turned in his chair and looked out the window to the yard.
‘It’s starting again,’ he said. Small spatters of rain dripped down from the grey sky onto the already damp concrete.
‘Yep,’ said Nora and she sighed as she picked up the basket of towels and left the kitchen. Bertie ran his finger over the plastic tablecloth on the kitchen table as if he were drawing a map to some place and when he heard the loud engine of a souped up car rumbling up the driveway he rose from the table with his teacup in his hand and he walked to the sink. He turned the cup over and dumped the tea down the drain and looked out the window. A black Honda Civic drove around to the back of the house and pulled up in the yard and Ellie got out and Bertie could hear awful music booming from it, though it dampened when Ellie closed the door. She turned and waved to the driver and then she put her hand over her head to shield it from the rain and she walked briskly to the backdoor of the house. The car reversed and turned itself around aggressively and Bertie could hear the roar from it as it accelerated down the gravel driveway and he heard the clank of it as it struggled over the cattlegrate at the front wall. The backdoor opened and he saw Ellie walk in and she was shaking out her arms as though she were shaking off a swarm of ants.
‘It’s horrible out there,’ she said. ‘Oh, hi Dad.’
‘Do you want a cup of tea?’
‘No thanks.’
She walked up to the fridge and opened the door and took out a can of diet Coke and it hissed as she pulled open the ringpull.
‘Why does that boy never come in?’
‘Barry?’
‘Yea.’
‘He’s busy, Dad.’
‘Why does he have his windows blacked out? I've never even seen his face.’
‘He calls them hater blockers. Cuz people be hatin’,’ she said in a black American accent, and giggled. Bertie said nothing and he turned on the tap and let the water flow into his cup. When it was filled he turned the nozzle off and swished the water around and around in the cup before dumping it down the drain.
‘He’s not selling drugs or anything Dad. It’s just fashionable. It looks nice. Don’t worry about it.’
‘How is he so busy? Does he have a job?’
‘Do you have a job?’ said Ellie. Bertie set the cup upside-down on the steel drainer beside the sink and watched as the water drained from it and trickled slowly down into the grooves. He heard Ellie sigh behind him and then he heard her leave the kitchen. She closed the door loudly behind her and after a minute or so he heard high pitched voices in the hallway and he knew she was giving out to Nora about him. He flicked the switch on the electric kettle and almost immediately the water began to rumble inside of it and he stood there listening to it. When the water boiled he walked up to the coat stand by the backdoor and he took his coat off the hook and he put it on.

‘I’m going to Clancy’s,’ he said loudly and before he could get a response he opened the frosted glass door to the yard and left the house. The rain was coming down harder now and he jogged up to his 98 Toyota Avensis and got in. He put the key in the ignition and Neil Diamond’s ‘I Am…I Said’ filled the grey interior of the car with colourful music. He reversed back and turned the car and drove down the driveway and out onto the road.

By the time he pulled in on the curb on Main Street the sky was like charcoal and the rain was rattling off the roof of the car and the gutters on the roadside were streaming with water. The rain was careening down diagonally from the peaks of the Knockmealdowns and the wind was made visible as it blew through it, casting sheet-like patterns in the rainfall. About fifty yards ahead of him Bertie saw the warm glow of the lights from Clancy’s shining out through the big glass window and the reflection of it trembled on the rain slicked footpath. He blew on his hands and rubbed them together and his breath was made visible from his mouth as he exhaled. He turned the key and switched off the ignition and he extracted it and he opened the car door and he got out. The rain pattered on his head and he grimaced as he closed the door behind him, his foot landing in an unpleasant puddle. He hopped up onto the footpath over the stream in the gutter and he jogged up Main Street towards the pub. The rain tit-tatted on the parked cars and rattled on the windows of the grey townhouses and shops as he passed them and he kept his head down until his feet were bathed in the light from Clancy’s window. He pushed open the red door and a bell rang above his head and Emmet looked up at him from behind the bar and raised his hand.
‘Howeya Bertie.’
When he walked inside he received a grunt of recognition from Dick, who was sitting in his usual perch at the table by the window, reading his paper. The thick wine carpet sponged beneath his shoes and the warmness from the log fire crackling in the stone hearth surrounded him. He took off his coat and the wet dripped from it as he hung it up on the coat-stand. Roddy was sitting at the end of the bar and he had a half pint of Guinness in front of him, and another one sitting beside it ready to take its place. Bertie ambled up to the high stool beside him and took a seat.
‘Pint of stout please, Emmet.’
Emmet already had the glass waiting beneath the tap and he pulled down the handle and the black liquid rolled into the pintglass.
‘Howeya,’ said Roddy.
‘Grand,’ said Bertie. ‘Lovely day isn’t it?’
Roddy nodded and drank the rest of his pint and lifted it off the cardboard placemat and set the fresh pint down upon it. ‘Lovely day if you’re an umbrella.’
‘You’re in early,’ said Emmet as he left Bertie’s near full pint rest on the stainless steel drainer beside the beer taps.
‘Sure isn’t he better early than late?’ said Roddy patronisingly.
‘Though I’d be better late than pregnant,’ said Bertie.

Emmet rolled his eyes and didn’t dignify their eejitry with the faintest indication of a smile. When a good head began to form on Bertie’s pint and when the definition between white and black became apparent, Emmet tilted the glass and placed it again beneath the tap and pulled down the handle and filled it to the top and then he put the pint down on a card placemat in front of Bertie. Bertie eyed it for a few seconds and then picked up the glass and put the frothy head to his lips and drank deep as the fire snapped and flickered within the hearth.

The rain fell all evening and into the night, battering Main Street and the townhouses lining it. The wind speared the rain into windows and skylights, the sounds of it like the drum-roll of a million muffled snare drums. The curtains were drawn in all of the houses along the street so as to keep the storm far from sight and from mind. The gullies and the gutters were overflowing with runoff and the low footpaths were almost swallowed in it, the water oily and black against the dark grey concrete. A couple of houses in the low lying dips on the street had sandbags outside their doors and the Blackwater stream, which dissected Main Street near the top of the town, was flowing maniacally on its course. Through all this climactic turmoil, the lights from Clancy’s beamed out onto the footpath. If there ever was a straggler unlucky enough to be caught in the rain, it would have looked like the epitome of cosiness with the warm low ceiling, the sparking fire, the thick wine drapes hanging heavily on either side of the window keeping in the heat, and the red faced punters sitting up at the bar laughing hysterically.

Mark had come in and had taken a seat beside Bertie and was mid-way through his second pint of Bud. He, Bertie and Roddy always sat in the same seats at the toe of the “J” shaped bar. A brass plaque screwed into the wall above their heads entitled this area as “Bull**** Corner”, and they took pride that they sat there and they always tried to motivate the corner to live up to its embossed reputation.

Bertie couldn’t stop himself laughing. He watched as Emmet, who was kneeling on the floor at the other end of the bar with his hand dug into his glass washer trying to shift a blockage, stopped and began to sniff at the air. Despite the barrage of steam expending from the unit, he turned his head and looked over toward them. ‘Lads,’ he said. ‘Ah lads, no. Is that a… is that a cigarette?’

Bertie erupted laughing and his shoulders bobbed up and down and he couldn’t stop them. Kneeling down beside him beneath the bar counter, out of the view of Emmet, was Roddy and he was half way through a Superking. Bertie nudged him with his knee and Roddy looked up at him giddily and put his finger to his lips. ‘Shhhh shhhh.’
‘You’re caught,’ laughed Bertie as he wiped a tear from his eye.
‘Shhhh.’
Mark spilled his pint he was laughing so much and he wiped his eyes with the sleeve of his shirt. If there was one thing they found funny, it was winding up Emmet.
‘Stand up Roddy,’ said Emmet. ‘Roddy, what are you doing; are you smoking a cigarette?’
‘No,’ said Roddy and he took a big pull of his Superking and it set the three of them off laughing hysterically again.
Emmet removed the bartowel that was resting on his shoulder and he flung it to the ground in anger. ‘Get out of here with that. Go on, get out. There’s a Guard sitting over there, are you trying to have me closed?’
That’s right; thought Bertie, there is a Guard sitting over there. He wiped his eyes and he looked over at Dick, who was still reading his paper at the table in front of the window. Through all the laughter going on at the bar Dick didn’t even look up, though Bertie detected a faint wisp of a smile at the corners of his lips. ‘Roddy,’ said Emmet. ‘Roddy.’
‘What?’ Roddy peeked over the bar but ducked his head down again after he saw the look of anger in Emmet’s eyes. ‘Ok, I’ll go. I’ll go outside with it.’
‘Ah,’ said Mark. ‘Would you not leave him have the one?’
Roddy peeked his eyes over the counter again.
‘Go on Emmet, I’ll get pneumonia out there.’
Emmet shook his head and took a breath. 'Well, Roddy, since you've no problem giving me lung cancer, I've no problem giving you pneumonia, now f*ck off with that cigarette.'

alfa beta

Miniegg wrote: »

I'm attempting a slow burner/ humour at the start, so that the reader will get to know the town and some of the people who live there before unleashing the horror upon them!

I'm not sure this is a good idea. I'd be worried the reader might lose interest before you get to the 'good' bit of the story.

'Humour' and 'getting to know the people' are both fine aims, but maybe they should be done in conjunction with some sort of growing menace that hints of the darker turn to come.

Otherwise your book might end up like two disconnected halves, written in two different (and perhaps incongruous) styles.

(I haven't read your extract yet, but I will and I'll pop back and comment later - thanks for posting though.)

EileenG

I started to read it, but I got bored when I read endless details about the washing of the cup. Seriously, it doesn't make me interested in these people, it makes me what to push them off a cliff. Who has the mental energy to devote so much time to a teacup? Come to that, what man drinks tea from a cup? Everyone I know uses a mug.

Miniegg

Alfa, you are right. It would be better for the reader to know something was lurking in the darkness than to read on aimlessly, thanks.

Thanks Eileen. I wanted to portray that he would rather devote his time to a meaningless cup than to spend time with his family, and then to show him in the pub having craic with his friends. But it made you stop reading and that was definitely not what I was going for!

This writing thing is tricky...

alfa beta

hi again miniegg

just came back and read that piece there

First reaction - you need to look very closely at your sentence structure. One glaring problem is the amount of 'and's you use. I noticed some sentences with two and three 'and's stringing the phrases together - problem with this is your sentences start reading like lists.

Take this line for example:
"Bertie took another sip of his tea and he turned in his chair and looked out the window to the yard."

Drop one of the ands and change the structure slightly and it reads better:

New version: "Bertie took another sip of his tea before turning in his chair to look out the window and into the yard."

Also don't be worried about shortening your sentences. Keep em short and simple - it'll help you develop the narrative and it'll stop the reader stumbling over long sentences.

Here's an example:

Original sentence: "A black Honda Civic drove around to the back of the house and pulled up in the yard and Ellie got out and Bertie could hear awful music booming from it, though it dampened when Ellie closed the door."

Change to something like:

"A black Honda Civic drove around to the back of the house. It pulled up in the yard and the passenger door sprang open. Ellie stepped out. Bertie could hear the awful music booming from the car - a monotonous, repetitive, thumping bass. The sound dampened ever so slightly when Ellie closed the door again."

I'm not saying that new version is any good (to be totally honest, it's not) but you can probably see what I mean about breaking up the long stringy sentence and how doing so tends to help the flow.

Now, here's another sentence that needs looking at:

"The car reversed and turned itself around aggressively and Bertie could hear the roar from it as it accelerated down the gravel driveway and he heard the clank of it as it struggled over the cattlegrate at the front wall."

Have a go at revising this one yourself.
Things to think about.
1. cars don't reverse or turn themselves around - (unless they're that volkswagen beetle from those awful films in the eighties - herbie was it???)
2. Again drop the 'ands' and split the sentence into a number of shorter ones.
3. Also look at the phrases you use. To me the phrase 'the roar from it' sounds odd - I'd rather something like 'the roar of its engine'. Similarly 'the clank of it' sounds funny - I'd drop 'of it' and maybe use an adjective to describe the 'clank', for example, 'Bertie heard an unhealthy clank as the car struggled over the cattle grid'

Anyway, I'll leave you have a play around with it. Remember, it's all about rewriting and rereading and rewriting and rereading, one sentence and then one paragraph at a time. It's slow, often tedious but sometimes it really is worth the effort.

Miniegg

Thanks Alfa, very in-depth. It's funny how you don't see things until someone points them out to you. Since reading yours and Eileen's post, all I see are the words 'and' and 'cup' when I read over what I wrote

EileenG

A useful trick is to read the story out loud. Or even better, get someone else to read it out loud while you listen. It's amazing how you can hear clunky sentences and repetition when you hear them, even though you can't see them.

jonbravo

EileenG wrote: »

A useful trick is to read the story out loud. Or even better, get someone else to read it out loud while you listen. It's amazing how you can hear clunky sentences and repetition when you hear them, even though you can't see them.

Limit action and movement to a sentence or two!? Would that work?

EileenG

jonbravo wrote: »

Limit action and movement to a sentence or two!? Would that work?

Depends on the action and how significant it is. Rinsing a teacup gets three words. A first kiss might get three paragraphs.

EileenG

jonbravo wrote: »

Limit action and movement to a sentence or two!? Would that work?

Depends on the action and how significant it is. Rinsing a teacup gets three words. A first kiss might get three paragraphs.

HeeBeeGeeBee

Miniegg wrote: »

Alfa, you are right. It would be better for the reader to know something was lurking in the darkness than to read on aimlessly, thanks.

Thanks Eileen. I wanted to portray that he would rather devote his time to a meaningless cup than to spend time with his family, and then to show him in the pub having craic with his friends. But it made you stop reading and that was definitely not what I was going for!

This writing thing is tricky...

Sure is tricky but you are doing it and thats the hardest part. I agree the lines may be a little too long in parts and would benefit a shorter cut in places. I get what you are trying to do in setting the scene but its easy to over compensate in this regard at the expense of the actual flow of the story (which is quite interesting). However, kudos for having the bottle and confidence to put your work out. It can and will only get better the more you try. Big respect and keep writing.

CathyMcGee1

I wouldn't be as brave as you to put your work up here but i have to say I enjoyed the read and I agree with the comments thus far. Wish you the best of luck with the book.