“All great things must first wear terrifying and monstrous masks in order to inscribe themselves on the hearts of humanity.” ~Friedrich Nietzsche

I always found masks alluring, macabre and, in a way, sensual.There's an almost-foreplay in the fact of talking to someone in a mask.

Carl Jung said that we all wear different masks, going through life switching our persona to match some type of social normalcy. But what if we could literally wear a different mask each day to show our true feelings or to hide from the IRS or an ex or to try something new, step out of our bubble without ever having to tell anyone? What would the world be like? Would we all get along? Would shit hit the fan? At least we'd know to steer clear from the guy with the Deviant Smile mask on...Write about it. Perhaps it goes swell. A little too swell. Stepford Wives swell. Or R.L. Stine's The Haunted Mask awry.

To challenge yourself even more, wear a Different Writer mask. Don't write the way you always write. Write in Olde English or if you're from the south, write like a yank. Have fun. Go schizo. Just get writing!   

"My job: to terrify kids." ~R.L. Stine

According to R.L. Stine's via Twitter, it is National Scare A Kid Month.

I've always like to be scared as a kid. When I was younger, I would go to my cousins' house in Jersey and we would rent scary movies, write scripts for potential movies that were never made and I would write scary stories (which were usually based on our scripts that we based on urban legends). My favorite was "The Hook." Here is one of the many versions of the story taken from About.com:

"A teenage boy drove his date to a dark and deserted Lovers' Lane for a make-out session. After turning on the radio for mood music, he leaned over and began kissing the girl. 

A short while later, the music suddenly stopped and an announcer's voice came on, warning in an urgent tone that a convicted murderer had just escaped from the state insane asylum — which happened to be located not far from Lovers' Lane — and that anyone who noticed a strange man lurking about with a hook in place of his right hand should immediately report his whereabouts to the police. 

The girl became frightened and asked to be taken home. The boy, feeling bold, locked all the doors instead and, assuring his date they would be safe, attempted to kiss her again. She became frantic and pushed him away, insisting that they leave. Relenting, the boy peevishly jerked the car into gear and spun its wheels as he pulled out of the parking space. 

When they arrived at the girl's house she got out of the car, and, reaching to close the door, began to scream uncontrollably. The boy ran to her side to see what was wrong and there, dangling from the door handle, was a bloody hook."

For more great horror stories that are probably aimed for younger kids (but I own and read repeatedly), check out:

• Beware! Ed. R.L. Stine (with a few stories by the legend who brought us Goosebumps)
• Nightmare Hour by R.L. Stine
• Scary Stories Retold by Alvin Schwartz
• Coraline by Neil Gaiman
• The Stinky Cheese Man and other Fairly Stupid Tales by Jon Scieszka
• Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi
• The Grimms Fairy Tales
• The Witches by Roald Dahl
• The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
• The Gashlycrumb Tinies by Edward Gorey

Now, even though March is National A Scare Kid Month doesn't mean that you can't always incorporate terror in to kids' hearts all year round. After all, they're little terrors themselves.

Buy R.L. Stines Little Shop of Hamsters.

The She-Beast of Skull Lagoon

Writer R.L. Stine and artist B.K. Taylor team up to bring fans a little tale of terror in EC Comics fashion.

"Where do you get your ideas?"

That question makes me freeze.

I don't know where they come from, they're just these little green goblins that plunge into my cerebrum, bouncing up and down like a pool of Jell-O. Sometimes my ideas come from a piece of art that triggers something in my brain, or a story I have just read that urges me to produce something as compelling as the author's piece. Once, a few years ago, I fused and elaborated on two, hard news stories I read in the paper.

J. K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series, said that "Harry just sort of strolled into my head, on a train journey. He arrived very fully formed. It was as though I was meeting him for the first time."

But, simply, author R. L. Stine has said that he generates his ideas by asking himself "What if?"

What if?

It's that simple. And effective. I use it all the time in all of my writing be it horror or (attempted) romance. Roald Dahl, author of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, must have used in it his short, horror story "Genesis and Catastrophe: A True Story."

Think of the "What if?" as a water fountain. You start with a basin (the idea), add water (paragraphs), plug it in (editing) and the outcome is exquisite: a water show extravaganza that people can't seem to take their eyes off of.

Now it's your turn. Write a story that constantly makes you answer the "What if?" factor. Refer to "The Nightmare Room Writing Program" for examples and exercise.

"Horror, for me, is the compelling
'don't want to look/must look' sense of awe
we feel under the breastbone."
~Mort Castle