Blogger Trick-or-Treat: A Discussion and Halloween Event Hop

Today I’m happy to be taking part in the Trick-or-Treat Blogger Halloween event with Lyn and Kara from Great Imaginations. When Lyn asked for me to join in, of course I couldn’t pass it up because Halloween is my fave holiday and I love all things related to this time of year. The main reason I love it so much is because it was the only time as a kid I felt like I could be myself. That probably doesn’t make much sense, but I was a bit of an outcast at times, and I loved dressing up in the costumes and being my little eccentric self. I started watching horror movies when I was around six years old. Though I’m personally not a huge fan of the genre nowadays (well, with a majority of horror movies I mean), I do still enjoy the tradition of watching a lot during the month of October at least. Trick-or-Treating also got me out of the house for awhile. Ha. And the candy. As an adult, I don’t eat a lot of sweets anymore with the exception of my moments and only particular kinds, but it’s admittedly hard for me not to steal the Twizzlers from my kids when they get in from their own trick-or-treating at least. Haha.



For my part in this event, and in the spirit of Halloween, I have an interesting question and discussion for you:

　

What if THAT book had been a horror novel?

　

Imagine if one of your favorite romantic reads was in the Horror genre instead. Or say you’re not much of a fan of contemporary romance… How about a comedy? Or a fantasy? Well, that’s today’s fun activity. Please feel free to join in at the end of the post in the comments. ^_^

　


Let’s start with Anna and the French Kiss for example. This is one of my favorites, btw, for the simple romance and characters and beautiful setting. But traveling overseas to a new boarding school and leaving your fam can be a scary thought, also. Then there’s Mr. French-Guy Mysterious with his sexy smile and Oh la la’s. This situation could’ve been easily reversed though to turn it away from the sweet romance it was into something out of a traveling nightmare. In the horror version, maybe Anna only thought her parents were sending her off to boarding school, only to discover when she gets there that she’d been shipped off to a cult.

That's a cult I'd probably join, just sayin'.

The leader is a young man, and though charming at first, quickly hates Anna for not wanting to convert to their way of life there. Or perhaps he starts stalking her? Or takes her into a lab to try and implant some chip into her brain that would try to make her be a “good member/student.” A good horror story doesn’t have to always have blood and gore, and if this book had been written in the genre, I think it would be more psychological. A slow-build up of tension and gasps.

And what of Dystopias? I feel they’re not far off from horror already as they are most of the time because of the usual bleak future and realism they present to a reader. The idea that any one of these worlds--The Hunger Games, Wither, Ashfall, Blood Red Road, etc.--could become a reality is a frightening thought, but a slight change could make something even more terrifying perhaps.

For example, Wither (Which is probably more strange potential reality than scary). In a horror version of this, maybe the women are required to get artificially inseminated and have one child before the required marriage. That child is taken away by doctors as soon as its born. The scientists only started doing this in the last decade or so--but after Rhine is married to Linden and trying to get used to that whole polygamy thing, the rebellions begin. It’s the forgotten lab kids and there’s something strange about them. I think that’d make for an interesting horror twist, or something like that anyway. Ideas? Thoughts?


Of course these are only examples. I’d never tell an author how to write and that isn’t my intention here. This is a just-for-fun idea for Halloween, and would also love to know what kind of ideas you all would have if one of these would have been a horror novel. Zombies? An innocent kiss that spreads a new plagues across the continent? Rhine finds out Linden isn’t human… In fact, none of the males are because all the human ones actually died several years before from that strange virus…


　

What book do you think could be rewritten as a horror novel and how would you do it?



Have a fantabulous, freaky Halloween!