Horribly fantastic authors
I have always been happy to be a writer born in Autumn, I consider that, except for the month of April in Spring, the months of Autumn are the most literary months of the year, and that makes Autumn have a much more attractive touch of the one he already has.
On the one hand, the literary rentrée happens in September, and it has some poetry to watch as the trees slowly uncover from their dry and autumnal leaves, and, at the same time, the bookshelves of the bookstores are covered with a thousand more sheets of literary novelties of all.
Writers’ Day is celebrated in October, normally it is the closest Monday to Santa Teresa (October 15) and it is an initiative created to give visibility and celebrate literature written by women; but also, in the same month of October, throughout the month, and as a result of an initiative of tweeters the month of #leoAutorasOct is celebrated, in which throughout the month of October the hashtag is used with publications on literature written by women .
Another reason to please in Autumn is the celebration of the festivities of Todos Santos, Halloween, Día de Muertos, so that the commercial impulse given to these festivities has also favoured the launch of more novelties of the genre horror, fantasy and mystery, a fact that has helped in recent years to relaunch classic authors of the genre.
For all these reasons, I would like to highlight the authors who have written novels of the genre of the fantastic, horror and mystery, and, particularly, although they are classics of the genre, these autumn months it is especially pleasant to delight again with their letters.
Shirley Jackson (1916-1965) is one of the vital authors in the horror and fantasy genre. Around this renowned writer, many urban legends have been created, which members of her family have been forced to deny after her death. One of them refers to the passion that the author felt for the world of occultism and witchcraft, perhaps this is why her work is so interesting to read for lovers of the genre, her most popular novel, for its subsequent adaptation to the cinema and, also recently, a television series, was The Curse of Hill House (1959) and is also one of the most outstanding works in terms of contemporary horror. This novel is especially beautiful because of the treatment given to the mansion where the novel takes place, becoming a character in the story. Simply a delight of horror literature. Although it is also true that in Jackson’s work the atmosphere of haunted houses and mansions is very ubiquitousº it is a habitual resource in the genre, but that Shirley Jackson makes it something simply wonderful and that will produce enjoyment in the reader passionate about gender. Another novel by Shirley Jackson is We have always lived in the castle (Tiny, 2012) in which the author relocates to a haunted mansion to favour that terrifying atmosphere that many addicts to the genre cause, this novel is also well known among bibliophiles addicted to the genre, but without a doubt, The curse of Hill House is constituted as the most commercial work of the author.
Toni Morrison (1931), one of the most renowned American writers of our century, winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1988 with Beloved, a novel that launched her to ultimate success, and also a winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1993. Toni Morrison is also a Notorious civil rights activist and against racial discrimination. His Beloved novel is a story where the opportunity to forget the weight of an extremely difficult and painful past is constant. In the narrative, we also find references, not only to the ancestral traditions of North American slaves of the mid-nineteenth century but above all to the dramatic experiences that these slaves of South African origin had to live in the United States until they achieved freedom. Toni Morrison describes in Beloved the racial injustices experienced by slavery, using the horror that through tools of magical realism determine a novel that has become a classic, also, of the genre. The novel tells the story of a slave woman and how she must kill a daughter of her to free her from slavery and the suffering she has experienced as a slave woman, but years later, once the liberation of slaves in the United States has been achieved, a character interrupts the life of the protagonist and her family, is that character the spirit of the daughter who killed the protagonist? Feelings such as guilt, the anguish of grief, the pain of motherhood, the tragedy of slavery in North America and all mixed with that atmosphere of magical realism offered by the plot, make Beloved the best work of Toni Morrison, and the That threw her to ultimate fame.
Sunsan Hill (1942), the English author recognized for the wonderful descriptions of British Gothic environments that inhabit her work and ghost stories. Of all the novels that this contemporary author has written highlights La Mujer de negro, a story told in an atmosphere of subliminal fear in which we can delight in misty environments and gothic landscapes, while we live closely the dark loneliness of the protagonist, a lawyer with A professional assignment to fulfil. This work by Susan Hill was a bestseller at the time and was brought to the big screen by film director James Watkins and starring Daniel Radcliffe. A work of art that you should not stop reading or seeing.
Anne Rice (1941) is one of the great authors of the horror genre. His bibliography is full of mysterious characters and full of fantasy, but perhaps his most recognized work is the Vampiric Chronicles where he deals with classic themes such as love and death, but through the point of view of his characters: vampires, educated, educated and attractive to the reading eye. Of all the Vampiric Chronicles, every Fall I am surprised to re-read The Prince Lestat of Anne Rice, even if they are only small paragraphs, it is a delight to always reread it with the sound of the rain of Autumn in the background. In particular, I recommend the edition that published, for the first time in March 2015, Editions B. A beautiful edition in black and red that will delight the most sybarites of the genre.
Mariana Enriquez (1973), Argentine writer, author of several works, but in Spain she discovers with her collection of stories The things we lost in the fire (Ed. Anagrama) as one of the most recognized authors of the genre in Spanish. The prose of Mariana Enriquez is direct, cold and very urban, that relies on terror to talk about urban plots full of everyday life and the most urban of our days: suburbs, characters who think they are going crazy, fear of accepting their own sexuality, etc I recommend his stories for moments in which we want to read authors of contemporary literature but that leaves us that taste of the best classic terror.
Finally, I would like to recommend two writers aimed at a young audience, L.J. Smith, author of The Vampires Diaries and who obtained recognition through the Vampiric Chronicles television series based on her books. The Vampires Diaries is a set of books that narrate the romances, adventures and misadventures of teenage protagonists but linked to the world of horror and fantasy through the vampires that make up that little universe that mixes fiction and teenage reality.
The second writer aimed at the young public is Carolina Andújar, a wonderful Colombian writer of the fantasy and horror genre, which was released in Spain with Vampyr (2009), a novel of gothic atmosphere and vampires, although also, from the same author, there are We recommend Pie de Bruja (2014) for telling stories full of pagan traditions and mystery.
Both authors have been very successful in their countries of origin L.J. Smith in the United States, and Carolina Andujar in Colombia, a success that led them to be recognized authors in the youth literature of the horror and fantasy genre internationally.
After mentioning and recommending all these books, don’t you feel like enjoying a gothic storm night and good horror literature written by one of these great authors?