Five Links Friday Halloween Edition (2016)

It’s the final weekend of October (big sad face) and with Halloween taking place on a Monday (double big sad face) it’s technically Halloween weekend. So while we can’t change the fact that we won’t have a weekend night Halloween until the year 2020, we can still take advantage of the season and practice our craft. No, not our witchcraft–our writing craft. So here is another Halloween Edition of Five Links Friday, with a focus on writing horror. Enjoy!

1. Let’s start with an oldie, but goodie from Chuck Wendig’s Terrible Minds blog: 25 Things You Should Know About Writing Horror gives us 25 great hips on horror that you should definitely check out if you’re planning to do some serious, scary, writing this weekend.

2. Similarly, the always awesome Now Novel blog has 6 Terrific tips on How to write a horror story that are worth a look. The most important piece of info there, in my opinion is # 5: Write scary novels by tapping into common human fears. Good stuff!

3. I don’t post a lot of writing prompts here, so let’s take advantage of this rare opportunity to share some Horror Story Ideas from LetterPile.com.

4. In the horror genre, screenplays are often more important than novels, as the visual component is so vital. And supernatural horror makes the scariest films. Here is an article on Writing Horror Screenplays: How to Write Supernatural Horror from Industrial Scripts.

5. Finally Nightmare Magazine has a great article On Writing Horror by Tananarive Due with a good, personal look at horror and the civil rights movement. Warning, it’s a little depressing, but also a little inspiring. Give it a read.

That does it for the week. Have a great and safe weekend. Celebrate the dark and spooky, but don’t forget to get some writing done as well 🙂

And also don’t forget to check out Theme of Absence first thing Halloween morning to read the winning story of my second annual Halloween Horror Flash Fiction Contest!