Laughing at the Abyss

Photo Courtesy of Kevin Kovelant / JackKetchum.Net

Jack Ketchum’s books have sold over three million copies.  He’s won four Bram Stoker Awards.  Stephen King has referred to him as the “scariest guy in America”.  If that’s not enough to pique your interest, how about this:  he was a protege of Robert Bloch and served as literary agent for Henry Miller.

His most recent release, The Woman (co-authored with director Lucky McKee) is a novelization of  the controversial film of the same title.

This month, Laughing at the Abyss is taking a detailed look at Ketchum’s Stoker-winning Halloween story “Gone” in a three-part series.  Part one, posted last week, provided a synopsis and analysis of the story.   Today in part two, we hear from Jack, himself.  He tells us about the inspiration for “Gone”  and explores the connection between horror fiction and trauma.

Nicole Cushing:   I always enjoy it when an author shares his or her thoughts about a story (as Harlan Ellison has done in his famous story notes in his collections). I know that it’s been over ten years since “Gone” first appeared, but can you share with your readers any memories about how it came together?

Jack Ketchum:  When I was growing up we lived on a dead-end street, and almost every house on that street — about fourteen of them as I remember — was built on the post-World War II GI Bill.  That meant that, with only two exceptions, all the kids on the street were Baby Boomers, only a few years apart in age.  The same was true of most of the streets nearby.  Halloween was always our favorite holiday (unless you count the night before — Mischief Night.) It was one of my mother’s favorite holidays, too.  She made most of my costumes on her Singer Sewing Machine.  Superman, Peter Pan, etc.  We had a tub filled with water where the kids could bob for apples and apple cider for all of us thirsty trick-or-treaters and slabs of homemade pumpkin pie for the moms and dads of the younger ones.  Then we…grew up.  Went to college, moved away.  Got too old for kids’ stuff.  And I remember my mom’s very real sadness when on Halloween night hardly anybody came around anymore.  When Rich Chizmar asked me for a story for October Dreams I knew that was what I wanted to write about, that sadness.  Only I gave it a darker underpinning than just us kids fleeing the nests.

N.C.:  I first read “Gone” in October Dreams. Since then, I’ve started reading your collection, Peaceable Kingdom, and have discovered that several other stories touch on themes related to trauma and loss (in particular, the loss – either literal or metaphorical – of children). I’ve been kicking around a theory that horror fiction is, quite often, the literature of trauma – that horror readers and writers tend to be folks who’ve had more than their fair share of life’s dark side. This might not be an entirely new idea. Gary Braunbeck explores the notion in To Each Their Darkness. Do you think there’s anything to this? Is horror the literature of trauma?

J.K.:  Sure it is.  And loss.  I remember after 9/11 having a conversation with Peter Straub in which we both admitted we had no idea what the hell to write about.  The real-life trauma was too huge, especially for us New Yorkers.  With me this lasted for months.  Finally I got the idea to write about terror, only on a small, personal scale, and what emerged was the novella Closing Time, about a guy who robs bars at night, not so much for the money as for the thrill of terrorizing the bartenders, set in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 (to make the connection).  I’d just broken up with a woman I loved very much and based the bartender on her, with myself as the model for her ex-lover, who just happens to go looking for her that night — with terrible consequences.  I thought I’d broken my dry spell about writing about terror.  Clever me.  But when I re-read it I realized I hadn’t written about terror nearly so much as I’d written about loss — my own loss.  And then, a reader of mine told me subsequently that he thought that pretty much everything I’d ever written was about loss.  I’d sure never thought of it that way.  But when I checked back into my stuff, damned if he wasn’t right.

N.C.:  In “Gone”, the story starts with the protagonist already in a dark place, and progresses to an even darker place. I think it’s fair to say that many of your short stories progress in a similar fashion. In a Locus interview Caitlin Kiernan once talked about her propensity to inflict misery on her characters. She’s quoted as saying: “…I’m wondering, ‘Why do I do this to people?’ I keep dragging these poor characters through these horrible things – it’s just what happens when I write. Am I a literary sadomasochist, or am I only trying to accurately describe the way things are?”

I’m curious if you’ve ever asked yourself that question. What’s your answer?

J.K.:  It’s a cliche to say that I proceed from the dark side into the light, but sometimes a cliche is simply truth put simply.  Yeah, I put my characters through hell, but I’m also interested in human resourcefulness under pressure and the power of love, friendship, and courage.  I don’t think I’ve ever harmed one of my characters gratuitously — even those who richly deserved a world of hurt thrust upon them.  You have to have compassion, even for your bad guys.  I always want to look inside.

N.C.:  Last question.  Currently the book and film versions of The Woman are enjoying quite a bit of publicity, but I’m wondering if you’re working on any new short stories?

J.K.:  The answer to that one’s easy.  I haven’t for a while.  But yup, time for a short one or two.

Next week this series of articles on “Gone” concludes with part three — a look at the story’s continuing influence.  If you have comments about this interview, please feel free to post them in the area below  (note that comments will be moderated).  — N.C.