QUICK AND DIRTY TIPS FOR WRITING HISTORICAL HORROR BY DEBORAH SHELDON

​Researching your era’s technology will uncover obscure facts to elevate your story. For instance, many Australian farmers believed the Model T Ford was sentient, like a horse, and could drive itself. Wow! Pick a few pieces of technology that matter to your plot and research them well.

Quick and dirty tips for writing historical horror
By
Deborah Sheldon

While most of my fiction is set in contemporary times, I often like to mix things up by writing stories that occur in the past. My latest release, the horror novella Man-Beast (Severed Press) is set in the Australian outback, 1913. I chose this time period for two main reasons. First, to stand out; almost all ‘hairy hominid’ stories and films have modern settings. Second, to feature a travelling troupe of bare-knuckle boxers. During the first half of the twentieth century, such troupes followed agricultural shows across the country, and this fascinating slice of Australiana made for interesting plot points.


Writing historical fiction is fun, but how do you make your chosen era feel convincing to the reader? Here are my tips:

1. You’re writing a story, not a doctoral thesis.
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To write a horror story set in a different historical age, you only have to research enough to suspend the reader’s disbelief. That’s it. There’s no need to research exhaustively. Forget the ‘tip of the iceberg’ theory. The reader doesn’t require the ‘submerged iceberg’ of all the research that never made it to the page to feel that your story holds up under scrutiny. To reiterate, you’re not recreating life as it was in your chosen time period. Instead, you are giving the reader the feeling that your story belongs in your chosen time period. There’s a big difference between veracity and verisimilitude. Aim for the latter.

2. Get the technology right.

In 1913 Australia, the Model T Ford had just been introduced and the single-shot Martini-Henry rifle was the most common firearm. I investigated those two items in depth because they feature heavily in Man-Beast. Researching your era’s technology will uncover obscure facts to elevate your story. For instance, many Australian farmers believed the Model T Ford was sentient, like a horse, and could drive itself. Wow! Pick a few pieces of technology that matter to your plot and research them well. These will be the touchstones of your story’s verisimilitude. Another example: my short story about harpies versus an Amazon warrior, “In the Company of Women”, was set in the twelfth century BC during the Trojan War. Part of my research focused on the weaponry to make sure my Amazon had the correct equipment.
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3. Clothes are crucial.

My short story “Stagecoach from Castlemaine” is set in Melbourne’s 1880s. The lead character, Minnie Sutton, wears accessories including a bonnet and gloves. She owns a dress shop and plans to introduce her customers to the latest fashion: the Princess Line silhouette. In my mermaid story “What the Sea Wants”, set in the treacherous North Sea off the English coast in about the same time period, the fisherman wears a gansey (a woollen jumper) knitted by his wife. In my novelette The Again-Walkers, set in ninth-century Denmark, my protagonist Svana opts for a dress with a belt and arranges her hair in braids while her lover, Agmundr, favours a tunic and bucks the trend with a clean shave. In Man-Beast, my protagonist Pearl Bennett wears cheap cotton dresses, while a wealthy female character owns boned-bodice gowns and her husband a three-button cutaway frock coat. How are your characters dressed?
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4. Be careful of slang.

Unless you’re writing anachronistic historical fiction, you can’t use modern slang (e.g., lit, salty, shook, etc.). At the same time, however, be wary of packing your dialogue with period-specific idioms because you risk confusing – and losing – your reader. I have a fondness for American noir published in the early twentieth century, but some of the slang is so obscure that I need to consult Google. Who knew that to kick someone ‘in the slats’ is to kick them in the ribs? I didn’t. As much as the phrase delights me, it’s also a reminder not to be specialised with slang. Choose swear words and colloquialisms that make sense in context. For example, when a character in Man-Beast discusses another who has cracked under stress, the gist of his idiomatic comment “as mad as a gum tree of galahs” is understandable to the reader.
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5. Character names suggest a time and place.

If I gave you a list of names like Olive, Cecil, Mildred, Theodore, Ethel, Wilbur and Agnes, what eras might come to mind? What about names like Emil, Astrid, Frederik, Vilma, Otto? Or Tracey, Shane, Narelle, Trevor? One of the easiest ways to give your story historical verisimilitude is to choose character names that are appropriate to your time period and country. For my short story “In the Company of Women”, for example, my Amazon warrior is called Philantha, and the harpy sisters Odarg and Elae. Take your time choosing appropriate names.

6. Cultural attitudes should suit.
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At least in the main. If you’ve got society-busting characters, that’s great, but make sure you illustrate the norm in your selected time period. For example, my short story “Will o’ the Wisp” is set in late 1500s England where villagers firmly believe in faeries and magic. The tension lies in the reader knowing that the villagers have got the medical diagnosis wrong. In my ninth-century novelette set in Denmark, The Again-Walkers, my protagonist Svana is a ‘peace-pledge wife’, which is a daughter given by her father to another family in order to appease a grudge and stop a feud. Unless you’re writing an alternate-history narrative, don’t jolt the reader out of your story with too many anachronistic beliefs or behaviours.

7. Include major social events or pressures.

Your characters don’t exist in a social vacuum. Philantha of “In the Company of Women” is a fighter from the Trojan War. My Man-Beast characters, Big Stanley and Mavis the Mauler, are broke bare-knuckle fighters who make a living in rural Australia before the first world war. My neurologist Dr Ian Webb in my story “November 9th 1989” is haunted by events that occurred around the fall of the Berlin Wall, back when he was a young man and living in London. A major social event can serve as a thematic backdrop to your story’s plot and/or characters. It’s a simple yet dynamic way to create historical verisimilitude.
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​​8. Ransack your memory, if applicable.

My noir-horror novel Contrition has two timelines: the present day, and Australia in the early 1980s. The latter is borne from my experience as a teenager. A story in my upcoming collection Liminal Spaces, “A Small Village in Crete”, is inspired by the European travels I undertook in my twenties. Personal experience can spark a story idea, or give an existing story a more genuine feel. Digging deeper, being an Australian may feel mundane to me, but anyone who lives in another country might find some of the everyday details of Australian cultural life interesting and exotic. Your personal history has the potential to fascinate a reader who doesn’t share the same background.

9. Be inspired by a time period.

My husband has Danish ancestry. As a youngster, our son was obsessed with Vikings. His interest sparked mine, which is how I ended up writing my novelette The Again-Walkers, as well as the flash piece “Entombed”. I first learned of Australia’s boxing troupes as a young woman at university, but it took over thirty years for me to explore the details of that period and put them into Man-Beast. Let your curiosity about historical events or eras lead you, inspire you. Get you wandering down Internet rabbit holes. Plot points present themselves if you open up to the material. Just remember my first tip: you’re not penning a doctoral thesis, which demands strict accuracy and facts. Don’t risk bogging down for months – or even years – in research while never getting any writing done.

​​10. Use back story to help create your plot.

In my crime novella, The Long Shot, the actions of my protagonist Simone are shaped by her traumatic childhood. In Man-Beast, my boxer Big Stanley is a washed-up heavyweight champion who ekes out his living as a bare-knuckle fighter in a travelling troupe. Historical horror isn’t just about the era; it’s also about each character’s earlier life. Research little personal details to give punch to your story.


Horror stories set in historical times are manageable and powerful. In short: don’t drown in research, allow yourself to be inspired by oddball facts, and give readers just enough verisimilitude to suspend their disbelief. Then you can write a story that resonates.

Deborah Sheldon 

Deborah Sheldon is an award-winning author from Melbourne, Australia. She writes short stories, novellas and novels across the darker spectrum of horror, crime and noir.
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Her award-nominated titles include the novels Body Farm Z, Contrition and Devil Dragon; the novella Thylacines; and the collection Figments and Fragments: Dark Stories. Her collection Perfect Little Stitches and Other Stories won the Australian Shadows ‘Best Collected Work’ Award, was shortlisted for an Aurealis Award and longlisted for a Bram Stoker.


Deb’s short fiction has appeared in many well-respected magazines such as Aurealis, Midnight Echo, Quadrant, Island, Andromeda Spaceways, and Dimension6. Her fiction has also been shortlisted for numerous Australian Shadows Awards and Aurealis Awards, and included in various ‘best of’ anthologies such as Year’s Best Hardcore Horror.


As editor of the 2019 edition of Midnight Echo, Deb won the Australian Shadows ‘Best Edited Work’ Award. Other credits include TV scripts such as Neighbours, feature articles for national magazines, non-fiction books published by Reed Books and Random House, stage plays and award-winning medical writing. Visit Deb at http://deborahsheldon.wordpress.com

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man-Beast 
​by Deborah Sheldon  

Taylor’s Travelling Troupe of boxers has set up its tent at an isolated sheep station: bored farmers always bet to excess. Headlining the bare-knuckle fighters is Bluey, marketed as ‘The Man-Beast’, a Sasquatch-like monster, chained and kept drunk enough to fight punters without killing them. But the troupe has returned to where Bluey was first captured. Recognising the mountains, he calls again and again. And when his call is answered, all hell breaks loose.


Man-Beast Amazon page: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09FP3F95R/


Amazon author page: https://www.amazon.com/~/e/B0035MWQ98

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