Just Writer's Block

[caddyman.livejournal.com]

I am toying with writing something and entering the Times ghost story competition that sushidog mentioned below. Especially as my attempt to write an episode from Dimpler Towers has stalled because I can’t get the voice right.

I can't let Baggy be our only contributor after all!

The competition is to write a 2,000 word ghost story for Halloween. The problem is, I can’t think of a ghost story at the moment. I was thinking about rehashing and expanding one of the pieces I’ve already posted, but with the exception of the story of “Old Harry” that I posted a couple of years back, the others are Christmas ghost stories and strictly limited to 500 words. I don’t think I could revisit Marley’s Ghost without ruining it.

Any thoughts, suggestions etc, oh good and faithful readers?

X-posted in caddyman

Comments

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

Oh, I've been struggling with this myself; I have a sort of a vague idea for a ghost story, but I'm not sure it would work, and now I have several of M R James's masterpieces going round my head, and I feel like if I can't match those, what's the point? :-)

[caddyman.livejournal.com]

It is a bit dis-spiriting when you put it like that!

I still think it's worth having a shot, though!

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

Well, i've been trying to think about what made his stuff so good,a nd what I've come up with so far is that he uses lots of suggestion rather than showing you exactly what's going on, and he also uses tactile descriptions quite a lot; there's a wonderful story about some carved wooden figures ina church, and in one part, the protagonist (who may or may not have pushed his predecessor down the stairs and is thus a Bad Sort) has his hand on the figure of a cat, and it grows warm and silky under his hand; it's enough to have you wiping your own hand against your jeans in creeped-out disgust.
There's another with long hair wrapping round people's feet, which is similarly shudder-inducing.

So I'm thinking if I write anything, those are a couple of elements to think about.