FEATURE ARTICLE ON WRITING GRIEF BY RYAN LA SALA

ON WRITING GRIEF BY RYAN LA SALA

22/8/2022

For me, grief was an inescapable brightness lighting up my world in a new, awful way. Normal things became horrific in its strange illumination. Setting the table, singing happy birthday, taking photos -- everyday life becomes its own monster, yet no one but you can see it.

I didn’t want to write THE HONEYS. I had to.

I’ve had the idea for THE HONEYS since before I was even an author. It was always horror, but it felt wrong from the start. It wasn’t dark and spooky, like the movies and stories I loved. Instead, I could feel it as this lovely, unsettling brightness far off in my future. The book always centered on a character trying to make sense of a recent death in their life, but the strangeness of it all made it hard to start.

And then my sister died. Very suddenly. Grief recolored everything in my life. Time and space felt warped by this new heaviness I embodied. And suddenly the idea for this book--this far-off brightness--was immediate and burning me up from within.

Those who have dealt with death will know this: you must get it out. I wrote mine out into the horror that is The Honeys. The book opens with Mars awakening to his sister attacking him, and in the ensuing fight they fall from the second story of their house. Together, embraced. Mars survives because he lands on his sister, crushing her, and she dies instead (this is not a spoiler, this is page six). It’s an accident, a horrible fluke, but Mars can’t shake the sense that everything about what just happened was planned. And so, in his grief, he develops obsession: relive his sister’s final days and figure out what it all means.

Grief in horror isn’t new or anything, in fact it’s an ancient and common fuel for many horrors, but like light through a prism, it splits into all sorts of dimensions when it passes through a storyteller. For me, grief wasn’t a ghost, or inky shadows. A ghost would have been a comfort, and shadows would have been nice to hide within.

For me, grief was an inescapable brightness lighting up my world in a new, awful way. Normal things became horrific in its strange illumination. Setting the table, singing happy birthday, taking photos -- everyday life becomes its own monster, yet no one but you can see it. That’s why I decided to write a story in which the monsters don’t lurk in shadows; they simply stand before you in the bright of day, convincing you that you’re the crazy one for wondering why no one else is running away.

Mars links his sister’s gruesome death with her clique of campmates known as the Honeys--beautiful, cunning, inexplicably terrifying, and named for the mysterious beehives they tend to behind their cabin. Mars witnesses one such honey coax a living bee from his sister’s ear at the open-casket wake. He follows them back to camp, where his late sister lived her final few weeks, immersing himself in a setting that should be lit with an almost juvenile nostalgia. But it’s wrong. It all feels very off to Mars. This is where the bright, inescapable nature of my grief makes its nest. The journey leads Mars right up to the Honeys and their hives, and then into their perfumed world, where he may finally find answers about his sister’s death. But that’s only if he can remember what he’s searching for.

The Honeys are not what they seem. And grief isn’t an obvious monster. It doesn’t lurk under beds or spring out of shadows. It doesn’t pass through populations like an infection. It doesn’t zombify. You can’t stake it in the heart. So how is it defeated?

Connection. Sensitivity. That was my discovery, at least. It isn’t Mars’s. I won’t spoil much, but in a book about girls who keep bees, it’s not hard to imagine there is something to be learned from the tiny animal, the mind that lives in millions of bodies all at once; something further to be learned about the divine power in letting down one’s guard and giving all your pain over to a larger system. A hive, perhaps. I myself have had to redevelop my own connection with the world these last few years, and I now understand the power that such sensitivity bestows. Unlike Mars, however, there’s nothing supernatural waiting for me to open up and let it in. At least not that I know of. But if there was, and if it was already within me, would I know?

The blaze of summer bleaches all color from convictions, I find, and it can be tempting to give oneself over to the sweet embrace that the Honeys--the girls and their cottagcore camouflage--use to entreat their prey. Acceptance, I think is the term, from all those self-help books people kept quoting to me. I appreciate the sentiment--really, I do--but this is a horror story. That’s why The Honeys has a sixth stage. Because some of us need a bigger finale to our suffering than simple acceptance. Some of us, like Mars, will find they require a bit of sweet, sweet revenge.

The Honeys: The Hottest New Queer YA Horror
by Ryan La Sala

A twisted and tantalizing horror novel set amidst the splendour of a secluded summer retreat.

When Mars Matthias loses his sister Caroline under horrific circumstances, it propels him to learn all he can about the once-inseparable sibling who'd grown tragically distant.

Mars's gender-fluidity means he's often excluded from the traditions - and expectations - of his politically-connected family, including attendance at the prestigious Aspen Conservancy Summer Academy where his sister devoted so much of her time. But with his grief still fresh, he insists on attending in her place.
The setting may be pristine and sun-drenched, but there's an undercurrent of tension buzzing ominously. Mars seeks out his sister's old friends: a group of girls dubbed the Honeys, named for the beehives they maintain behind their cabin. They are beautiful and terrifying - and Mars is certain they're connected to Caroline's death. But the longer he stays at Aspen, the more the sweet mountain breezes give way to hints of decay. Mars's memories begin to falter, bleached beneath the relentless summer sun. Something is hunting him in broad daylight, toying with his mind. If Mars can't find it soon, it will eat him alive...

Heathers meets Midsommar, exploring the corruption that lies just under the surface of the perfect lives of the uber-rich
Perfect for fans of Kathryn Foxfield and Ace of Spades
Highly original, brilliantly written, queer YA horror

Ryan La Sala

Ryan La Sala writes about surreal things happening to queer people.Ryan resides in New York City, but only physically. Escapist to the core, he spends most of his time in the astral planes and only takes up corporeal form for special occasions, like brunch and to watch anime (which is banned on the astral planes).

Ryan is the author behind the riotously imaginative Reverie, and the brilliantly constructed Be Dazzled, and the highly anticipated The Honeys. He has been featured in Entertainment Weekly, NPR, Tor.com, and one time Shangela from RuPaul’s Drag Race called him cute. Right in the middle of the road downtown! So. Pretty big deal all around, yes?

His latest book, The Honeys, was published with Scholastic on August 16, 2022.

Find out more about Ryan and follow his social media accounts

Website
https://www.ryanlasala.com

Twitter

Ryan La Sala
@theryanlasala

Youtube

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdSEi9_QgtUHnouxMhXdfXw