Pentwist » PenTwist - Page 2

Author Archive

Themes in Horror

Frankenstein vs. Romeo and Juliet
Comments by David Pyle

One of my favorite muses is to read through the lens of an author; specifically Classic Horror.  Most author’s lens’ tend to look either through smoky glass, a microscopic view or even telescopic.  My personal favorites are the imperfect skewed ones, the ones with macular degeneration.
The better interpretive writing classes do something similar; always nudging students to look past the obvious themes in a story; an almost meditative process. 
From personal experiences, I’ve noticed that it usually isn’t until after my completed manuscript is stapled and proudly placed on the appropriate stack that I glimpse what was lurking beneath my own skin; hidden within my own recesses.
I wonder how many other authors have experienced the dissecting experience, the humbling experience of learning something about themselves that escapes through the hubris of writing?  Little tidbits that their soul had been screaming at them to notice, that took the scrutiny of others to expose.  

I recently took a glance into the classic Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, rediscovered by many, sometimes superficially destroyed and neutered.  But the original…, forces me to take note.

In the beloved story of Frankenstein lurks another monster, more devastating than the electrically and chemically regenerated patchwork of dead flesh.

—-Here are a few things I believe the story is trying to speak:

My passion has driven me to look for this unknown that I’ve sought after all my life.  This unknown deep dark pit that I’ve never seen or known is calling to me, so if it doesn’t exist, then I have to create it.  Somehow, I have to put the pieces together and give life to it.

I see those pieces in different people, but there never seems to be that one perfect person with all the pieces I’m craving.  Now my life is at a point where my need is driving me mad.  There isn’t any more time.  I have to create this unknown with my own hands.

I looked everywhere I was instructed to look, among my peers, for years and never saw the one with all the right pieces in place. 
So finally, my passion drives me to do the unthinkable.  I go out, to the places that I know I shouldn’t.  I look in the alleys, in the bars, brothels, the highways and hedges, among the dead of society.  Finally, I see a way to get what I want.

I find one person that is nearest to what I crave.  I take this one home in secret, all the while knowing that if anyone sees this…; this thing that I’m doing at face value, I’ll be ostracized from all my friends, family, peers, and colleagues.

Now.  I have my precious.  My secret that I’m coveting.  Others would never see the potential finished product that I see.  I can barely control my excitement, my passion, as I delve deeper into molding this one into what I crave. 
I begin to hack and cut, knit and force upon this creature all the other attributes that I need.  Hands which are soft to my touch, or strong when needed.  Eyes that are for me instead of all the others which pass by.  Arms that can grip me and never let go.  A perfect creature.  A soul that is of my own making.

Finally, I’ve done it.  I’ve created this monster, sought after this monster; brought it to life, shocked into existence. 

Now that my beloved creature, my distorted vision of love, suddenly comes alive, it sees what I’ve been up to.  This beloved sees itself after all that I’ve done.  It becomes cognizant of it’s original self and no longer recognizes that self any longer; not after all my…, modifications.

The only thing left for my creature to do is try to escape.  But where can something so repulsive run to that is away from the thing it loathes most, -itself?
Then my secret is out; in the open for everyone to see.  It’s hideous to behold, only I can see it’s potential, and everyone else wants to see it dead.  My relationship with this love I’ve created is something no other can visualize.

Above all, now that it has found it’s freedom, now that it’s alive, I can’t control it.  My beloved creature, identified with me by normal society, exposed to all the hateful eyes of society, is now on a rampage and it’s lashing out at everyone it sees, daylight or dark.

During the course of its exodus, my monster meets a child and shows it the tenderness of a mother’s touch without harm.  This creature, this monster is willing to be met halfway if it could only be met with the innocence of a child, even a blind man could see that the horrific creature was only something that had been wounded beyond repair.

Society comes with their pitchforks and torches and all the hatred and loathing to destroy.  Now it’s only a matter of time before what I thought I wanted comes back to destroy me, its creator, for what I’ve done.

———-

So if you’re willing to look through the distorted lens of the author’s eye and see what they see, feel what they feel, you might see a different story.  But be careful that you don’t look too deeply.  You might actually see something more devastating and horrific than you expected…, you might see yourself.

Will you be the Creator, the Creation, or will you be the one carrying a pitchfork and flames?

 ……………

Category: Fan Blog  Comments off

Createspace

Finally!  A reputable self-publishing company.

It’s free to sign up!


Authors, Share Your Book with Millions of Readers

Category: Fan Blog  Comments off

Knock-Offs and Placebos

Knock-Offs and Placebos
by David Pyle

Oftentimes it is discouraging to go into a store and see every other item on the shelf is either a cheaper or useless version of its original creation.  An inventor came up with the idea, went through all the trouble to put pride and effort into the creation, applied for patents, spent good money to sell the idea to a manufacturer, and finally…, one day it hits the shelf.

One month after the product of the inventor’s creation becomes available, there on the shelf is a cheaper ‘great value’ sitting next to it, flying off the shelf. 
One of the big conglomerates has sent off the said product to ‘the Borg’, a third world country with cheap slave labor and stolen the idea, only to replicate it with a ‘toy’ version marketed under a pseudonym or parody name.
Of course, the person is livid that the intellectual property has been stolen.  The beloved Widget is now marketed as Wijet and there is no way to recoup any losses to the much bigger competitor. 

The same thing happens every day to authors, writers, novelists, poets, bloggers, songwriters, and journalists; any variant of wordsmith with a pension for pouring out something unique. 
Regardless of the hours spent in research, the unique spin, the personal touch, that product is almost immediately plagiarized with a change of title, rephrasing a few sentences, or restructuring of content.

These knock-offs show up as HBO specials, B-movies utilizing dissected scenes from books and stories, with little concern for their origin.
Copyright laws are so useless and unenforceable today that unless you hide your written work until the last possible moment, it can be subject to reenactment in some ‘made for television’ movie of the week before the year is out.  I’ve seen it happen, had it happen to myself.

Unique narratives, unique characters, and unique scenes, even by bestselling authors, regularly show up as a Television special.
Most recently, I noticed how some of the unique characters, furtive imaginations, and written works of Laurell K. Hamilton, Kim Harrison, Bentley Little, Anne Rice, and many, many more end up in series like ‘True Blood‘, ‘Buffy the VK‘, or sad movies such as ‘Drag me to Hell’ or ‘Scary Movie’.  In a matter of weeks, love trysts between werewolves, vampires, and impressionable young humans are commonplace.  Oh…, and witches…, let’s not forget the witches.
The ‘crack of the whip’ has been effectively stolen by the plagiarist.

No matter if they ‘shape-shift, howl at the moon, raise the dead for a living, stake the dead, or cavort with the dead’, the original creator, the author that dreamed up the original character, the original scene, should get some credit. 
A line should be drawn somewhere even in the name of rewrites.

The best we can hope for is to guard our product with the fervor of a paranoid schizophrenic until the day we give it the first slap on the ass and let it take its first breath; then all bets are off.

Comments are welcome, even if I don’t agree.

© 2012 Pentwist.com

 …..

Category: Fan Blog  Comments off

Thank You!

Pentwist.com just passed the 4000 (regular) reader mark.
Many of my regular readers are the international crowd, to which I wave a hearty hello and thanks!

I suppose my regular weekly subscribers have noticed that I haven’t posted much lately – I’m working on three projects at the same time.  All three are different genre’s.
Much like taking classes in German, Spanish, and Italian at the same time (which I’ve done).  The syntax is close, but the vocabulary is hell!  That’s a horror story in itself…,  LOL

Thank you all for visiting and being patient,

David

Category: Fan Blog  Comments off

Twisted Lines?

Got Second Place for one of the Short Stories I gave away back during the holidays.

Forty Minutes of my time – I was actually surprised.
(How Cool is that?)

Link to the story and download – No Longer Available
AuthorStand no longer exists.

 

Category: Fan Blog  Comments off

Horror – The Divine Comedy

Horror – The Divine Comedy
By David Pyle

A few nights ago, I had a conversation with a very clear-minded, newly adopted child of mine about horror fiction.  Not about plots and scenarios or themes, but about the validity of creative horror fiction.
Our collaborative conclusions focused on the absolute comedic absurdity of horror in the context of horror fiction.
My interpretation of horror in fiction stems from the belief that the basest element of horror is merely a scalpel that exposes the internal workings on today’s society and morality.  Horror in itself is nothing less than a satirical allegory that has the ability to scrape the rust from the bottom of the kettle of our souls, displaying a glimpse of the tragedies lurking inside.

     Ignoring the contents inside would be the true tragedy.
I often hear comments from Writers and Readers’ and yes even the Religiosity alike, blasting horror fiction as heinous and destructive, as if in itself Fiction contains some supernatural power to incite…, no…, conjure fear to arise.
(Admittedly it is a powerful catalyst!)

Laughingly, those same people ineptly scan the ingredients of every box and container on the grocery shelf in an attempt to filter or understand the emulsifiers and sulfides they are about to ingest.
Horror fiction is merely the content label that exposes what already exists in the heart and mind, hidden in the darkness, even from ourselves.  In muting that fear, we end up unable to communicate with our own hearts.
I suppose that could be the reason that the majority of all fiction today in both the cinema and literature is concentrically attached to horror in more or less degrees.  At the local movie outlet, the shelves are profuse with horror-related genre – From Abattoirs to Zombies!

Why?

The fact that our audience waits on the edge of their seats for the next event or its sequel is the best conclusion to be drawn.
Happily, some of those same aforementioned critics return week after week and year after year to the theater to peer around the corner into the darkness, then run screaming back to the safety of their own theatre of life and flip on the evening news!

Ha!  What fun….

As in Dante’s Inferno, Horror Fiction truly is the Divine Comedy.

“There is nothing to fear, but fear of  fear.”
D. Pyle

Category: Fan Blog  2 Comments

Critical Critiques

Critical Critiques
by David Pyle

With the advent of online bookstores, e-books, and e-readers (Kindle, Nook, etc…) the proverbial literary barn door has swung wide to a vast new audience.
Personally, I love the Kindle Fire I received as a Christmas present.  It was a stroke of marketing genius to give avid readers and students the ability to carry around an entire library in a pocket or purse sized device.
(I still purchase hard covers of my favorite authors)

As a result of these new toys, people who most likely haven’t turned a page in a good novel since high school or college have suddenly found themselves being force fed a glut of Novelry they otherwise wouldn’t have given a second glance.
To exacerbate the dilemma, more novels are being published now than in all of recorded history.

My point you ask?
Because of this, suddenly everyone has become self-ordained hyper-literate critics over the last year or so.  Suddenly, even miraculously, these same people feel the ardent need to critique every single paragraph of every book they’ve pasted before their bleary eyes.

If you’ve purchased a book from any of the aforementioned outlets, then you have seen the “reader reviews”.  Many of these negative page long expert reviews are simply a heated and biased opinion based on the reader’s personal preferences.

My request to my audience is that you favor the positive reviews lurking just below your proposed purchases.
I discovered just recently that had I allowed myself to be swayed by some of these gutting reviews I would have missed out on some fantastic tales, by some fantastic storytellers; even with (God forbid) grammatical errors.

As a published author, I know from personal experience that copy editors are only human and can mess up spelling and grammar, software can puke all over your meticulous formatting, and that there are unscrupulous publishers that will publish your raw work unedited.

As a matter of etiquette, any reviews found here on pentwist.com are chosen because I LIKED the book and believe my audience would enjoy reading a particular medium from a particular author.
Regrettably, I have been forced to give reviews of books in online book clubs simply because it was a requirement for receiving a pre-published review copy.  Not all books, even well edited books are to my liking and for conscience sake, I have discontinued accepting review copies that require a written review.
However, this does not mean that an author I didn’t care for does not have an audience that will like the style or voice or the content of their published work.  It simply means that I didn’t like it and therefore refuse to pass judgment.

Please Click Here to view a few personal favorite reads.

Or Click Here to download the list— (.doc format)

 

…………..

Category: Fan Blog  Comments off

Relentless

Another quick gem I found in one of the many books by Dean Koontz.  Like some of my previously mentioned authors, I found several gems in Relentless that are blatant and wonderful peeks into the mind of the author / writer:

Relentless
By Dean Koontz

Page 67 – Paragraph 5

“This happens often when writing fiction.  Outlines are a waste of time.  If you give your characters free will, they will grow in ways you never anticipated, and they will take the story places you could not have predicted, raising themes you might or might not have intended to explore.  Characters shape events; events illuminate the characters.  The people in a story begin as seeds, become buds, and blossom in surprise him with their intentions and capacities.”

My only comment is that I  believe Outlines are NOT a waste of time for fiction, however they are not God. 
I use outlines for anchoring the ideas of a story for future reference when my Muse flies by, then when I do my research, and begin the rough draft, I allow the outline to grow as my Muse intended.

…………

 

Category: Fan Blog  One Comment

Made in the U.S.A.

Please remember during the upcoming Holiday Season to buy some American products along with all your shopping. 
Don’t forget to give the gift of a good book for the cold winter evenings! 

Thanks to everyone and Happy Holidays to all.

David

 

 

……

Category: Fan Blog  Comments off

Between Life and Death (VERSION 1) no longer on sale.

Between Life and Death (Second Edition is Here)

Debut Novel by David Pyle
Between Life and Death is a
Supernatural Thriller
centered in

historical Natchez, Mississippi.

Released in 2009
_________________________________________________

……………..

 

Category: Fan Blog  One Comment