THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY WITH KONN LAVERY Konn Lavery is a Canadian author whose work has been recognized by Edmonton's top five bestseller charts and by reviewers such as Readers' Favorite, Literary Titan, and The Wishing Shelf Awards. His work has also been curated into the Edmonton Public Library's Capital Press collection. He started writing stories at a young age while being homeschooled. After graduating from graphic design college, he began professionally pursuing his writing with his first release, Reality. He continues to write in the thriller, horror, and fantasy genres. His literary work is balanced alongside his graphic design and website development business. Konn's visual communication skills have been transcribed into the formatting and artwork found within his publications, supporting his transmedia storytelling fascination. The previous works have also included musical scores primarily composed by Konn with occasional collaborators, also found within his audiobooks. The Good Horror has so many wonderful aspects to the genre, it's hard to narrow down what to say about it. The interesting thing about horror is how it evolved over centuries. The genre is quite fluid and can be injected into any other genre. Modern thrillers, sci-fi, and crime stories have prominent horror elements. For example, psychologically disturbed people committing tragic acts or technology leading us into a cold, lifeless future are elements we see in today's writing. The type of horror written while Edgar Allan Poe was alive was entirely different than HP Lovecraft or Stephen King's initial rise. Now, with the world's fast evolution of technology and the pandemic, we've seen horror change again. Horror is a genre that mutates with its times, keeping culturally relevant on what frightens humans. It can be injected into period pieces and let the audience experience a different type of horror they may be unfamiliar with. For example, basing a book in the 90s (if you can even call that a period piece. . .), you remove the advantage of smartphones which in today's times could be quite frightening to some people. The ever-evolving state of horror is what makes the genre so exciting to write about. We get to explore new depths of our minds and see what elements trigger fear. The Bad From a writing standpoint, you have to ask yourself difficult questions: how far do you go with fear? What type of fear are you wanting to inflict upon the audience? The answers vary depending on the themes and plot of the story. Too often, one can answer these questions (consciously or subconsciously) without much effort just so they can get that stamp of fitting within the horror genre. If you're not careful, you can easily fall into a cheap shock trick. Or you're not making something scary enough, and the work isn't considered "horror." This leads into "The Ugly" part too. The Ugly Horror gets shoved into a corner as "slash and gore" or, for a while, "apocalyptic – zombies!". The genre is far more fluid than that. I recently read The Children of Red Peak by Craig DiLouie, which involved cults. On a deeper level, it dove into the psychological repercussions that survivors experience and the meaning of life, which is a hard pill for many people to swallow. Another example would be Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn, a thriller, but the story itself has many horrific elements. Too often do audiences presume horror to be a one-trick-pony with checkboxes to meet. This may be due to the rise in popularity during the 80s with slashers. Who knows? Whatever the source may be, most people are consuming horror without even knowing it from its integration into other genres.  From the award-winning author Konn Lavery comes a gritty new tale of angst and survival.Seth is ready for the greatest rave of 1999, which lands on the ten-year anniversary of his cousin Floyd’s brutal crime. Prince George is a small town. Cursed by proxy, love, and desire, Seth needs this night as an escape.But his hopes of sweet release wither as he and his friends witness an unexplainable murder, carelessly getting their DNA on the scene. The RCMP are going to love them! They’ll completely believe that these drugged-out kids saw a horned man-beast decapitating people—right?The head-chopper closes in as the authorities connect the dots. Oh, and Floyd shows up, sharing the truth about his dark, unsettling past. In just over twenty-four hours of drugs, bloodshed, and lust, the four kids are in for a rave of a lifetime. Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08Y92C384/ All Distributors: https://books2read.com/rave-novel TODAY ON THE GINGER NUTS OF HORROR WEBSITETHE YOUNG BLOOD LIBRARY'S MAY/JUNE YA AND MIDDLE GRADE HORROR AND DARK FICTION ROUNDUP THE HEART AND SOUL OF horror featuresComments are closed.
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