John has won the Bram Stoker Award and also runs the popular Gothic Book Club at The Last Book Store in LA.
If you don't have any of Palisano's books in your collections, my advice would be to start with Night of 1,000 Beasts.
Horror and Me: a personal relationship
By John Palisano
A few years back, I visited my son’s elementary school classroom. At one point, the kids were pulled from their iPads and desks. Filing to the library, the sense of excitement was overwhelming. What new electronic gizmo were they going to see? What new tech wonder would be unveiled for them?
When we arrived, imagine my surprise to find them scurry into the isles, their fingers scrolling the spines, their voices trying their best not to break whispers.
Every kid had a book. They waited in line and checked them out.
Back in the classroom, the kids shared their finds with one another. Mostly? They had creepy books. Scary books. Monsters. When I asked one why she was so interested, she said, “Because books are real things. Stuff on the computer isn’t as real.”
It delighted me that people at such a young age had the same feelings for books and libraries I’d had at their age. It seemed eBooks and digital were taking over. For this generation? It hadn’t.
The world is a scary place for kids. There comes a certain age where they start to see the cracks. Heck, some kids see the trenches way early in life. I know I did.
When I first picked up horror books––namely Stephen King like most kids my age––I found a voice speaking to me that got that darkness on such a profound level. Even the most comfortable of families could have the worst secrets. And a lot of the time? It was the people who were good who were shoved into the sights of the grinning maniac. It didn’t matter if they were good. In fact? It made those maniacs revel in it even more. The bad guys did an awful lot of winning. Sure, maybe there would be a comeuppance at the end, but the maniacs (or clowns, or devils, or reanimated pets) did an awful lot of damage along the way.
And maybe the good guys, down a team member or three, found a way to banish the maniacs, but there was always the threat that they could and likely would be back. Maybe not tomorrow. Maybe not next week. Maybe a few decades down the line.
That right there was the perfect kind of truth. It made me feel better to know that I wasn’t alone in recognizing that. Sure, I was a weirdo, but there were a lot of others like me who had a yearly pass to the Theme Park from Hell. Some visited in dreams. Some visited in real life. But we all met inside the pages of these stories, and it gave us a shared purpose. It put it all into context. And it was a whole lot more fun to imagine that bully was actually a conduit of Satan. Or that the angry gym teacher had a cellar full of the undead keeping him up all night crying for brains. Or that those most beloved to us that we’d lost could be seen again, even if their skin and souls may have turned to rot after the last time we’d seen them.
What horror gave to me gives to those just discovering the comforts of the dark … a place where they find those like-minded souls, where they befriend monsters, where they find a place at the table, a place that may not be safe, a place that’s never boring, but a place that understands them profoundly.
Once upon a time, horror stories scared people. That was their main job. But something happened along the way to the asylum. Horror became a reflection of the messed up world around its readers, viewers and listeners. Horror became a comfort. Horror became a lifestyle where sense can be made of the madness, where the crazy ones weren’t as awful as the real people out there, where those feelings and anxieties could be read about, expressed, and understood. It’s something I came to realize, and it’s something I imagine those kids in my son’s elementary school picked up on inherently. Horror is a great place for those that may feel a little misunderstood. Horror is a safe place to explore and express the things happening in a very scary new world. Horror is a safe place. A comfortable place. Despite what some of its detractors may think? Horror is here to stay. At least for the next generation. May they find their light in the darkness and join the tribe of us already there.
Recently, I’ve taken up the mantle of President for the Horror Writers Association.
Working with libraries and librarians has been a dream come true, and brings me full circle. For so many of us, as well. Again and again, our members have similar stories to my own, and becoming involved with libraries, librarians, and their patrons has been very rewarding on so many levels. Thanks for reading, and thanks for spreading the word about reading!
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