CT: The Dionaea House
Here we are, readers, on the Friday before Halloween and I am feeling strangely festive. Halloween is not really a holiday I'm usually into, despite my undying love for all things horror. This year, however, I'm actually feeling this holiday. I actually bought decorations, shocking our whole house into silence.
So in celebration of my sudden excitement for Halloween, let's talk about one of my absolute favorite pieces of horror writing. What do you get when you cross a super slow burn horror with the inherent creepiness of houses with the possibilities of writing on and for the internet with one of my personal favorite screenwriters? You get The Dionaea House.
Before you click on that link, let me give you a little background on this super creepy, amazing horror story. The Dionaea House was written by Eric Heisserer in 2004, when personal blogs were really just starting to be a thing. It was the era of LiveJournal and Myspace and we were all just starting to see the creative potential that the internet holds. If Heisserer's name sounds familiar to you, he wrote Arrival, a movie that I don't think I could have gushed about more if my life had depended on it. He's a smart, structural, interesting writer and you can see that in every inch of The Dionaea House (and let's be honest, all of his other work too).
The Dionaea House is an epistolary story, which means that like Dracula, it's told in the form of letters/emails to a fictional version of Heisserer from an old friend named Mark, about another of their friends from high school. Like I said above, the story is a slow burn but when things start to go nuts it's a crazy ride. The name comes from dionaea muscipula, the scientific name for the Venus flytrap, because the story centers around a house that... absorbs people? eats them? after drawing them in and making them feel safe. For someone like me who's a little creeped out by houses anyways, it's the best level of terror.
But here's where this story gets cool. You move through the emails, learning more and more about the story as you go in the careful way that Heisserer gives you information. When you're done, there's a link to a blog, where the story continues. And on that blog are comments- some of which are legit readers commenting, and others are more characters in the story. Clicking on their names takes you to yet another blog, where the story continues again. It's an absolutely brilliant use of the internet as a story telling tool. I've been through the whole thing several times and I'm still not sure that I've seen the whole thing.
There was a little stir about this becoming a film back in the day, which I think has died out. To be honest, as much as part of me wants to see this on the screen the rest of me is alright with it living just on the internet. It's such a gorgeous piece of writing and I'd hate for it to get a crappy adaptation.
At any rate, Heisserer's other work is getting approximately all the attention, so we can all celebrate that. Arrival was life changing (have I mentioned that we liked that movie?), Lights Out was terrifying and awesome, and he's also adapting one of my favorite horror novels, Bird Box, which should be coming out next year some time.
So when you have a couple of hours to dig around on the internet, click the link up top and treat yourself to this awesome, totally unique story.
Happy Halloween!
CT
So in celebration of my sudden excitement for Halloween, let's talk about one of my absolute favorite pieces of horror writing. What do you get when you cross a super slow burn horror with the inherent creepiness of houses with the possibilities of writing on and for the internet with one of my personal favorite screenwriters? You get The Dionaea House.
Before you click on that link, let me give you a little background on this super creepy, amazing horror story. The Dionaea House was written by Eric Heisserer in 2004, when personal blogs were really just starting to be a thing. It was the era of LiveJournal and Myspace and we were all just starting to see the creative potential that the internet holds. If Heisserer's name sounds familiar to you, he wrote Arrival, a movie that I don't think I could have gushed about more if my life had depended on it. He's a smart, structural, interesting writer and you can see that in every inch of The Dionaea House (and let's be honest, all of his other work too).
The Dionaea House is an epistolary story, which means that like Dracula, it's told in the form of letters/emails to a fictional version of Heisserer from an old friend named Mark, about another of their friends from high school. Like I said above, the story is a slow burn but when things start to go nuts it's a crazy ride. The name comes from dionaea muscipula, the scientific name for the Venus flytrap, because the story centers around a house that... absorbs people? eats them? after drawing them in and making them feel safe. For someone like me who's a little creeped out by houses anyways, it's the best level of terror.
But here's where this story gets cool. You move through the emails, learning more and more about the story as you go in the careful way that Heisserer gives you information. When you're done, there's a link to a blog, where the story continues. And on that blog are comments- some of which are legit readers commenting, and others are more characters in the story. Clicking on their names takes you to yet another blog, where the story continues again. It's an absolutely brilliant use of the internet as a story telling tool. I've been through the whole thing several times and I'm still not sure that I've seen the whole thing.
There was a little stir about this becoming a film back in the day, which I think has died out. To be honest, as much as part of me wants to see this on the screen the rest of me is alright with it living just on the internet. It's such a gorgeous piece of writing and I'd hate for it to get a crappy adaptation.
At any rate, Heisserer's other work is getting approximately all the attention, so we can all celebrate that. Arrival was life changing (have I mentioned that we liked that movie?), Lights Out was terrifying and awesome, and he's also adapting one of my favorite horror novels, Bird Box, which should be coming out next year some time.
So when you have a couple of hours to dig around on the internet, click the link up top and treat yourself to this awesome, totally unique story.
Happy Halloween!
CT
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