It stares at you from the corner of your dark room. Your little hands pull your covers closer to your eyes. You stare. It stares. The thing standing there is clearly a monster, just like the ones under your bed that swipe at your ankles when you hang them too low over the edge. Or even their cousins, the monsters in your closet, whose clawed hands grab for you from between your t-shirts.
It’s normal for children to imagine monsters lurking throughout their room; a strategically placed shirt thrown over a chair or a gust of wind that rattles the branches against their window. Most people grow out of this fear. By the time someone is hitting puberty they have come to the realization that those things are all part of their imagination.
I never learned the difference. My imagination blends with my reality. Or perhaps my reality is shaped by my imagination. In a sense, the so-called monsters from my childhood still appear.
Needless to say, the supernatural and paranormal have always fascinated me. Even though I absolutely enjoy fiction and nonfiction that deal with everyday realities, such as Toni Morrison, Amy Tan and David Sedaris, I cannot for the life of me write any story that does not have an underlying supernatural twist to it. Every time I sit down to write a story I think, how can I make this interesting? Oh, I know, I’ll just stick a zombie or ghost in it.
The dissertation I am working on currently is a land full of every nightmarish monster you can think of. In the beginning of the story the protagonist has to defend herself against a giant octopus. This was inspired by the tales of Kraken creatures from sailing folklore. Later in the novel, a yeti and werewolf fight is to take place, because you know that is completely logical. In fact, I am trying to think of more way to slip monsters in.
I am sure you are asking: why can you not just write a normal story with normal people doing normal life things? The simplest answer I can give you is a big fat yawn. Reading and writing are connected, but still different. I can read a 200-page novel about the way a person peels a banana and love it, but I could never be the one to actually write it. I would actually find it preferable to have my eyes scratched out by cats then write a reality based story.
I once tried to write a story about a woman who worked in a book shop (shocker I know) and was eventually going to fall in love with a nice normal guy. Guess what happened to that? Turns out the guy was actually stalking her because he was an alien and wanted to preform experiments on her, but could not do it because he fell in love with her from afar. See? I cannot for the life of me ever write anything reality based.
Even as a fearful child, I wanted to know the stories behind the monsters. I wanted to see the good along with the bad. This need to show that not everything is black and white, even our fears, is the underlying reason I write the way I do. Other than that wonderfully psychological analysis, I just really love things that are not considered normal. I’m the type of person who sees a doll’s head hot glued onto a plastic crocodile body and think, yup that is pretty awesome. I like oddities. Supernatural things have become something of an oddity in our lives.
Our history is steeped in monsters and spirits being a part of everyday life. Singing babies to sleep with lullabies was actually the act of a parent trying to protect their children. It was believed that Lilith, Adam’s first wife, would slip into a nursery and steal the babies to consume them. A lullaby was a weapon against her. It wrapped an invisible safety net around the child.
In 1751 Antoine Augustin Calmet, a monk, wrote a dissertation about the existence of the supernatural. This led to people creating weapons against them. A wooden box that contained garlic, stakes, mallets and holy water was a defense against the plague of vampires. In the past all these things were normal and accepted in society. Somewhere along the timeline that shifted.
Why not take something that is not considered normal and connect it to the reality of normal? Not all people are bad or good: they are a mix. Why can monsters not also be a mix of good and bad? I’d much rather write a story about a zombie with a heart of gold than about a woman who works in a bookshop and falls in love with the geeky tech guy next door. I am convinced that is because the zombie story would probably have more action sequences and humorous narrative about how best to avoid being shot in the head by maniacs. But we all know it is because I developed a deep love of the supernatural from a young age and need to express it repeatedly.
To me, incorporating the supernatural into my writing is necessary so that I can give my passions the room they need to thrive and grow. My monsters survive because I feed them.
About Gabrielle Fincutter
Gabrielle wants to spend her life chasing winter around the world. When not staring off into space aka researching for stories, she likes experimenting with photography, riding dragons, harassing plants and wrestling with yetis. To contact her please send an owl or try gfincutter@ymail.com. Or follow the Instagram: @coloredfreckles.
