It Was a Dark and Stormy Night...

From Angie in Administration:

“It was a dark and stormy night…”                    

So begins many a tale of horror and woe. I always look for a good scary book to read in October, as the approaching Halloween puts me in the mood to explore the locked basements and dark closets of the horror genre. Nothing’s better than curling up in a comfy chair on a cold night with a book full of things that would scare the pants right off you if they showed up in your living room. At the Nashua Public Library, we’ve got plenty of books to keep you up at night. Ghosts and witches? Check. Vampires, werewolves,  and zombies? Check. Maniacal serial killer whose goal is to make an entire outfit from human flesh? Uh…check. How about a rapidly mutating flu virus accidentally released from a government facility that will wipe out 99% of the earth’s population? Uh…wait, those last two couldn’t really happen – could they?

Within the horror genre there are many different types of fear to feast on. For some,  it’s the simple fears from childhood – the shadow man under the bed or the monster in the closet - that bring goosebumps and clammy skin. (Just between you and me – when I was about eight,  I was convinced that my wooden Pinnochio doll came to life in the dark after I went to bed. Creepy!) Some readers enjoy mixing their apocalypse with a dash of humor. Yes, when it’s done right, reading about the end of the world can be quite a gas! For others it’s the popular creatures of legend, and the blood and gore that they leave in their wake. Readers of this type of horror might want to keep the following items handy: garlic, silver, holy water, and maybe an axe. And then for some of us it is the more realistic horrors that bring the most fear, those things that are absolutely real, and more terrifying than any vampire or zombie, because they actually exist in our world and could, possibly, show up in our living room one night. Maybe it will be a dark and stormy night.

So what is it that keeps you up at night? C’mon, you can tell me. It will be our deep, dark secret.