Writing Bite-Size Horror

We have once again reached that time of year where pumpkins bear their toothy grins and scarecrows threaten to step down from their perches. We can hear the torturous buzzing of chainsaws in the distance, but we know there are no trees being cut down. We also notice the local radio station has subtly placed Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ “I Put a Spell on You” into its daily rotation. Some of us might even be watching more horror movies or television shows on the plethora of cable channels and streaming services out there.

For readers, many of us are looking at those horror books on our shelves, the ones that we have been promising ourselves that we would eventually read, and thinking that this would be the perfect month to finally indulge in those works. And finally, writers—yes, writers—might begin to entertain darker thoughts in their works, especially if they are already inclined to write some form of speculative fiction.

As much as I would love to write a lengthy short story or even begin a novel during this time, I realize that I no longer have as much free time to write as I once did. This might have concerned me a while back, but I now understand that there are ways to write horror (or darker fiction) using a much shorter creative form: microfiction. Honestly, I did not think it was possible for anyone to create a work of so few words that could successfully scare me (or at the minimum, make me feel deeply uncomfortable) until I picked up the book Tiny Nightmares: Very Short Stories of Horror, edited by Lincoln Michel and Nadxieli Nieto (Catapult, 2020). Reading that book helped to plant the seed in my mind of how the right tiny group of words could have the effect of deeply unsettling a reader. While I had been writing microfiction long before I read that book, I was now suddenly aware of how a writer could incorporate horror elements into a work of microfiction and create something scary without being time-consuming.

If you have ever considered adding a bit of horror into your writing, especially if you are inclined to write shorter works, here are some tips I have found to be enormously helpful.

Oftentimes, a story might come to you almost like a mental movie. You visualize the beginning, middle, and end—and sometimes even the soundtrack playing in the background. With microfiction, though, full-length story ideas don’t usually fit into small word counts. There are more than a few stories out there where the writer attempted to distill a large story into a tiny space. What tends to happen is that the story winds up reading like a film treatment or the description on the back of a DVD case (assuming you’re old enough to have seen one of those). An outline like that can be interesting to read, but it will lack the emotional resonance of a story that is better sized for that particular writing form. So, choose an idea where you can genuinely scare a person, as opposed to an idea where it merely tells how you would scare a reader if you had more time.

You should consider a pivotal scene in your story idea and try to build around that scene or that moment where the plot actually “shifts.” Sometimes that could be reflected in a realization by the protagonist. Other times it can be represented in some type of ironic twist at the end. By looking at that singular element of your story idea, you cut away the fat so that the reader is left only with the most resonant part of the story.

Imagine that you have a story idea about an axe murderer chasing the archetypal hormone-crazy jock around a lake. You originally envision the jock talking with friends and not even seeing the axe murderer until he is within striking distance. You might be tempted to write all of the details in an effort to build up the “scare” for the readers. A microfictionist would likely choose to focus on a single moment like, say, the axe murderer attempting to yank his axe out of a tree after nearly hitting the jock. By putting the reader square in the middle of the action (in medias res), you will allow the reader to piece together all of the relevant information on their own. You could even conclude a story like this with an open-ended denouement, such as, “Grizzly usually didn’t miss on the second swing.” Focus on that moment that leaves the reader feeling uncomfortable.

[It's not too late to join the Writer's Digest February Flash Fiction Challenge!]

With microfiction, you don’t have much space to scare someone, so you have to be deliberate with the details of your setting to achieve an effective story. The setting is now a character, and that character is going to provide mood to everything else that takes place in the story. For example, if the story is going to take place in the bedroom of a child preparing to go to bed, you’d want to pull in the strongest elements of that setting into your story. The trick, though, is to do it so that it corresponds with the other elements of the story. It should not overshadow the plot or the characters. It should also be as original as possible. Thanks to Snoopy, all writers are forbidden from using “It was a dark and stormy night …” Find inventive ways to bring your setting alive.

Consider what images might be frightening to a reader (and yourself). How much of a description of a clown do you need in order to make a reader feel uneasy? How large and grotesque does a rat need to be? Leaving some of these images more general than specific will allow a reader to fill in the blanks with what is most horrifying to them. A loose description of a clown might put one reader in the mind of Pennywise from Stephen King’s It, whereas it might put another reader in the mind of Twisty from “American Horror Story.” Select your imagery carefully and leave space for your reader to frighten themselves with it. Need more proof? Consider this: If I use the word beast, what do you see in your imagination? Most words carry connotations and personal connections. Allow your words to work for you to create the maximum scare.

Before you can scare someone, it helps to know what scares you. This is where you have to be honest with yourself. It doesn’t have to be some kind of monster or snake or spider or even person; it could be a situation: losing a kid at the mall, being in the middle of a mass shooting, or anything that makes you deeply uncomfortable. Ask yourself why this situation makes you feel uncomfortable. Answering that question allows you to understand why and what your characters will fear. I remember watching the original Pet Sematary movie and being completely freaked out when (spoiler alert) the zombie cat tossed a large dead rat into the bathtub while the protagonist was bathing. Why is that scary? First, there’s a dead cat that was brought back to life who jumps up on the tub while a man is taking a bath. Next, the cat slings … well you get it. Figure out what will happen to your character(s) that will make the reader freak out.

To be a good writer, most authors will admit that you have to write a lot and read a lot. This applies even more when you are writing in a genre like horror. Look at how authors like Victor LaValle and Tananarive Due have managed dark suspense at the novel length. Look at how writers like Clive Barker and Shirley Jackson have accomplished similar effects with short stories. Even check out writers who write flash fiction and microfiction and observe the techniques they use. When you read the work of other authors, ask yourself what they do so well that you would want to put it into your personal author toolbox. Maybe it’s a turn of phrase. Maybe it’s the way they create mood. Maybe it’s the way that they resolve their plots. Regardless of the length of the horror fiction, there is something to be learned about the genre and how language can be used to create scary moments.

One of the secrets of many microfiction writers is that they read just as much poetry as they read fiction. Why? Because when you’re writing something short, every single word matters. Whether it’s Edgar Allan Poe or Linda Addison, poets have been using their words in original and resonant ways to express dark stories for centuries. A careful turn of phrase here, a particularly explosive image there, and soon you will have a collection of carefully arranged words that will resonate far beyond their form. If you don’t believe me, just remember that the two-time Super Bowl champion Baltimore Ravens were, in fact, named after a horror poem written by Poe.

One of the biggest questions many writers of dark speculative are often asked is where they get their ideas. The short answer is everywhere. That could include the news, a podcast, an old folktale, some myth from a particular culture, or even a writing prompt. It is helpful to train yourself to look at things while asking the question “What if?” Horror is a type of speculative fiction, so posing that question can help you to find any number of ideas to explore. What if a child had an encounter with an alien, but no one will believe her? What if everyone in a grocery store starts dropping dead for no apparent reason? Ideas are around us constantly. For a writer, this is our milieu. As a horror writer, we need only ask what would happen should this bad thing befall a group of people (or maybe just one character). Consider my 100-word story “Black Water,” based on an idea some true-crime aficionados might recognize:

As with any other genre, horror has its own tropes and archetypes. “A clown terrorizing a community” could be the trope, while the demented clown itself could be the archetype. There are certain expectations we have when we read or watch these types of stories. For example, the “final girl” is a familiar archetype in movies. This is the “last woman standing” once a slasher has worked their way through the rest of the cast of characters. During the story, this character normally has to retreat into an enclosed space out of fear (a closet, an attic, etc.), but when she emerges, she is ready to take on the killer and bring an end to the killer’s reign of terror. That’s how it normally works, yet films like The Strangers easily subvert those expectations. Use your stories to play with the expectations of your readers.

As I pondered a list of how you can use microfiction to tell bite-size tales of horror, I considered giving you a list of 10 things. As you have probably noticed, there are only nine tips here—nine being an unlucky number in some cultures, but isn’t that the point with horror? To leave the reader off-kilter? But seriously, these nine tips are more than enough to help you as you look to explore horror through the lens of microfiction. As we settle into the season, why not try your hand at writing a tiny horror story?