A
Aevin
Heh heh. I know it sounds stupid, but these children's horror books have a lot going for them. At one point, RL Stein was the best-selling author in America, and there are reasons. These books are remarkably enjoyable--some of them actually read like mini-novels--and are a must-study for those writing fiction for pre-adolescents.
The books are written so that a "scare" happens in each chapter. Most of them are fake scares that unravel in the first sentences of the next chapter, but it does keep the intensity up, ensuring the books are never boring for kids. And there's usually a "real scare" in the end, something genuinely creepy that avoids the feeling that nothing really happened in the book--some of these real scares are quite clever.
Stein is also a master of dialog--he writes very simple dialog that communicates the emotion and tone of the speaker in the words themselves, without a lot of description necessary in the dialog tags.
The stories move along very quickly because of the shortness of the books--the characters are always either DOING something, or deciding to do something; there is no lag. They're made to hook children and keep them hooked, and the same idea can be applied even to fiction for adults.
I reread "The Phantom of the Auditorium" and "Ghost Beach" the other day. The "Phantom" is actually the book most responsible for me being a writer today, and it still has an inspirational effect. For those of you who enjoyed these books when you were younger, you might check them out again for the sake of nostalgia. And as for the children's fiction writers out there, maybe you should take a look to see why they're so good.
If nothing else, RL Stein deserves credit for getting thousands of children to read. Good stuff.
The books are written so that a "scare" happens in each chapter. Most of them are fake scares that unravel in the first sentences of the next chapter, but it does keep the intensity up, ensuring the books are never boring for kids. And there's usually a "real scare" in the end, something genuinely creepy that avoids the feeling that nothing really happened in the book--some of these real scares are quite clever.
Stein is also a master of dialog--he writes very simple dialog that communicates the emotion and tone of the speaker in the words themselves, without a lot of description necessary in the dialog tags.
The stories move along very quickly because of the shortness of the books--the characters are always either DOING something, or deciding to do something; there is no lag. They're made to hook children and keep them hooked, and the same idea can be applied even to fiction for adults.
I reread "The Phantom of the Auditorium" and "Ghost Beach" the other day. The "Phantom" is actually the book most responsible for me being a writer today, and it still has an inspirational effect. For those of you who enjoyed these books when you were younger, you might check them out again for the sake of nostalgia. And as for the children's fiction writers out there, maybe you should take a look to see why they're so good.
If nothing else, RL Stein deserves credit for getting thousands of children to read. Good stuff.
