The Darkening Help Needed

    • 15 posts
    November 5, 2014 11:21 AM EST
    Maybe most of you have read http://literarysocial.com/article/6/sip-the-darkening-mists-of-curakan/ my novel in progress. The book is not intended to be a young adult book though it did start with the kids. Adults are coming into it now and one of the kids was eaten by Curakan already. That is my issue.

    Will people read a book in which children die? It is a part of this story as monsters do not look at kids and say, "well, that's off limits as people won't like me" . However, do people come back to read more if any kids die? Is that a taboo area? I struggled with it but really, if it doesn't play out as real as it could be, it just doesn't feel like the monster is real and the story I think will die.

    Opinions are welcome.

    #Curakan
    #SIP
    • 15 posts
    November 7, 2014 8:08 PM EST
    Oops. I posted this in the wrong section. Will move it tomorrow when I'm wearing the Admin hat.
    • 15 posts
    December 28, 2014 8:51 PM EST
    Any thoughts?
    • 1 posts
    December 29, 2014 4:05 PM EST
    Here's my thoughts. Death is a part of life. It happens. And sometimes certain emotions cannot be evoked without a visceral, tangible feeling of identifying with the people in the novels you are reading.

    If you have looked at it from all angles and the best way to evoke those feelings is for the story to play out exactly the way you have it written, then you need to do what is best for the story itself. The death of a child is always hard to grasp in any medium. But I think in a horror story, those readers are already primed to expect the worst, and frankly, if you did ease the story into another path, I think your chosen market would be disappointed that the story didn't push the envelope as well as it could have.
    • 15 posts
    December 31, 2014 3:33 PM EST
    Thank you for the input. I thought of taking out the death of the child (note that in the chapter, it's not overplayed) but then it seemed too "unreal". Like you say, in life things happen. Bad things. It sucks when it does.

    If the book is to create a living, breathing monster for folks, that monster, in reality, wouldn't say "hey this is a human child so it's off limits". Though, if a publisher says to remove it in order to publish the book, I guess I would have to find a way but it feels like it would then diminish the realism and the reader would not be taking a trip in this world but instead just viewing it. Those sort of stories are ok but are not what I'm after. I'm after the real world effect, the impact a reader gets when reading - of traveling to this other world that we create for them and immersing themselves there for the time we share it with them.

    Honestly, when the reader puts down the book, I want them feeling Curakan looking over their shoulder. Otherwise, I've not created, I've just told a good story. Do you get what I mean?