The Devil of it is...

"Beauty is mysterious as well as terrible. God and devil are fighting there, and the battlefield is the heart of man."

Fyodor Dostoevsky

In the Manichean struggle the Devil is the ultimate villain. No small wonder then that many supernatural stories feature this deity as a consummate character. Whether you believe in the existence of a god or his opposite, most people are fascinated by the idea of a being who has all the most undesirable characteristics of human frailty. In many cultures that being is the Devil.

The Devil (or Satan), in Christian culture is always supposedly the fallen angel, Lucifer. But according to the bible the devil has many names (including Amadeus and Mephistopheles) and all associated with much evil doing. “What is thy name? My name is Legion, for we are many.” Mark 5:9

‘The Satan’ first appears in the bible as a messenger sent by God. He was used as a catalyst in the story of Job where he acted as a tempter and accuser. In the story of Adam and Eve he is described as a ‘powerful wicked angel’ who led the plot against humankind by tempting Eve. For this act God threw him and his henchmen out of heaven and thus he became known as 'the Devil who rules the kingdom of darkness and subsumes all evil powers'. He tempts people to evil doings and is also known as ‘The Great Deceptor’ for appearing disguised as an angel of light.

 Despite the murky origins of this so-called fallen angel we do also find the devil appearing in other religions too (in Islam he is known as Shaitan). Whatever the truth (or your own beliefs), everyone understands the significance of good versus evil and the Devil (Satan or whatever) has come to be known as the personification of evil in this world.

So, what a fabulous plot device to use in a story? The ultimate antagonist. And because none of the origins or the stories around the entity can be verified you can use him howsoever you wish! Such brilliant fodder for creating conflict and suspense… And a great adversary for the hero/heroine of a supernatural thriller story…

Have you used the Devil in your stories? Do you think it is still acceptable in this day and age of technology to use an ancient deity?

 

By The Pricking Of My Thumbs...

Wickedly Wicked

Wicked!  I just love that word. It conjures up images of witches and wizards for me and I always think of the late Ray Bradbury‘s brilliant novel “Something wicked this way comes”. He took his inspiration from Shakespeare’s Macbeth, of course.

Nowadays it is used by young people as a replacement for the word ‘brilliant’ or something similar. It is also associated with the word ‘cool’ – as in something or someone being ‘hip’ or current. Whoever said language was not a living breathing changeable entity!

Anyway, I digress. What I mean to talk about is the original proper use of the word. When I looked it up in my dictionary it said it meant evil or sinful. But then there was a whole host of harsh words from ‘abominable’ to ‘abased’ to ‘shameful’ and ‘vicious’. In fact over fifty similar words! Many of which I have used time and again in my own supernatural thriller writing.

But nothing says something evil quite as succinctly as ‘wicked’. It goes best with villainous characters and horrific deeds.

“To the wicked, everything serves as pretext.” Voltaire said.  A wonderful quote, indeed... I think one could weave an entire story around some of the quotes about wickedness.

A good word like this can be as helpful in horror/thriller writing as love is in romance writing. But it can equally be much overused and abused.

Do you have favourite words that you feel inclined to use more often than not?

 

Killers

K – Killer

So many types of fiction have murders in them that it feels almost unnecessary to have ‘who dun it’s’ as a genre. My own fiction is mostly supernatural thriller writing but somewhere in the story, there will likely be a dead body/murder of some kind.

I suppose death fascinates and scares all of us but it becomes really shocking when people have died in violent circumstances, or by another’s hand. It threatens all that we hold dear – that of being able to accept death as natural and inevitable at some point when our bodies wear out… None of us want our lives to end this way…

So perhaps that is why we abhor people who take life (kill or murder), so much. I think it is also the fact that the majority of ordinary people cannot imagine how someone can kill as it goes against what we perceive as the nature of being human and protective of fellow human beings. Killers, who murder and mutilate appear to have little regard for human life and appal and fascinate us at the same time. We cannot put ourselves (mostly) in their place and carry out the same deeds.

From time immemorial murderers have been the antagonists and adversaries in all types of fiction. The policeman/woman, in crime writing, trying to solve a case finds the murderer a tough opponent in a battle of wits and the secret agent in spy thrillers may well be trying to stop the murder of many. The war hero/cowboy fighting an enemy he perceives has murdered his fellow countrymen… Even some romance stories take murder and mayhem as their settings. But the ultimate fictional murderer has to be the Devil himself who not only kills but takes souls!

Whilst, in real life, unlawful killings are relatively few, in fiction they happen left right and centre!  They add an extra dimension for so many stories because there are no higher personal stakes than the risk of losing one’s life!

For myself, I relish dreaming up a murderer for my stories – it is wicked!

Do you use killers in your stories - even if you don't write in the crime genre?

Wicked is as Wicked Does!

By the Pricking of my Thumbs...

Wicked!

I just love that word. It conjures up images of witches and wizards for me and I always think of Ray Bradbury‘s brilliant novel “Something wicked this way comes”. He took his inspiration from Shakespeare’s Macbeth, of course.

Nowadays it is used by young people as a replacement for the word ‘brilliant’ or something similar. It is also associated with the word ‘cool’ – as in something or someone being ‘hip’ or current. Language is definitely a living, breathing, changeable entity!

Anyway, I digress. What I mean to talk about is the original proper use of the word. When I looked it up in my dictionary it said it meant evil or sinful. But then there was a whole host of harsh words from ‘abominable’ to ‘abased’ to ‘shameful’ and ‘vicious’. In fact over fifty similar words! Many of which I have used time and again in my own supernatural thriller writing.

But nothing says evildoer quite as succinctly as ‘wicked’. It goes best with villainous characters and horrific deeds. A good word like this can be as helpful in horror/thriller writing as love is in romance writing. But it can equally be much overused and abused.

Do you have favourite words that you feel inclined to use more often than not?

Mothering and Murder Most Foul!

Mothers who kill



Nurturing is Natural?

I have always been fascinated yet repelled by some of the classic narratives of mothers who kill their children. As a mother myself and possibly because of my child protection background I have always been interested in why some mothers murder their own offspring and why writers would want to write about it.

Writers who have used this theme litter the history of narratives and whilst child murder – indeed any murder - is unacceptable to society there is something so shocking about the phenomena that it has always had shock value and therefore been of interest to writers.  In classic literature there is the tale of Medea who murdered her children to exact revenge on their father. In modern literature there is the story of Beloved by Toni Morrison and countless stories which involve some measure of Fabricated Induced Illness (F I I). This can include mothers who smother their babies so making the death seem like natural causes e.g. cot death. These women are generally emotionally unstable or suffering mental illness but their concern for their children is very believable. These women appal people but maternal instinct is sometimes no match for deadened emotions or thwarted personal ambition.

But why are mothers who kill their children, seen as so much more repulsive than fathers who kill? The evolution of mankind has always required a mother or mother substitute and without that connection to a nurturing person during the defenceless time of infancy, the human race would not have survived. Jung says that the mother archetype is an inbuilt ability to recognise and form a certain relationship – that of mothering. The issue of trust and dependency therefore becomes an important one and I believe this is the reason why we are so repelled by women who go against the archetype and kill the very people they are supposed to be protecting.

I believe this theme makes for some of the most compelling drama and story telling I have come across. Modern day writers have used F.I.I. in their plots and there are many books and films depicting this condition although it is still a hotly debated topic.  Crime writer Patricia Cornwell uses it in her book ‘The Body Farm’ The murdered victim is an 11-year-old girl and the suspect is a serial killer but it turns out that she was killed by her own mother. The screenwriter M Night Shyamalan also uses a similar scenario in the 1999 film ‘The Sixth Sense’. Even ‘The X files’, ER and Law and Order have all featured episodes around women who kill their children (FII). These stories reflect today’s society where the awareness of mothers killing their children is both growing and yet controversial.

It makes for challenging drama but also reflects some of the darker corners of our society.

So, could you use controversial issues like this in your writing?