The Tell-Tale Heart 5 gr. B

The Mist, Stephen King, 1985

Characterization in King's story is helped by the fact that the story begins with mundane, everyday life events. Unlike Poe or Lovecraft, this first person narrative doesn't begin with horror directly (in media res), but takes its time, and builds up over many pages, exploring family life and contemporary problems. It certainly helps readerse to identify with the likeable protagonists (here, the narrator is married to Stef and has a kid named Billy).

This story exemplifies the power of identification and of suspending action. As Hitchcock would have it (would say), take your time before the big kill.

Illustrates 2 ways of starting a horror plot, in media res or family, ordinary life. other tricks of King : spoiling the reader and delving into the head of his characters, free indirect speech

Strangers, Dean Koontz, 1986

In this introduction, Koontz first mentions a character with his name as the first words of the novel. This character is presented lying in a fetal position after a sleepwalking episode, and he doesn't remember his dream. The key to the plot will be in this dream, it represents the "dark, repressed side" of the character, who needs to uncover its secret to move on.

This is a third person narrative, and the narrator seems to be all-knowing. Characterization relies mainly on quick details about the character's life (his name, his job, his attitude to problems - he researches history when he sleepwalks), and how the setting influences the emotions of the protagonist (a dark closet vs a bedroom filled with light).

Formulaic author, renounced some of his books as too weak

The Hellbound Heart, Clive Barker, 1986

The story starts with Frank trying to open a puzzle-box. Just like in countless Gothic novels, we as readers enter the plot as the character himself enters a mystery. In the end of the passage, Frank manages to solve the puzzle and open the box, only to find out that it contains a mirrored surface inside.

Characterization differs from Koontz's : here, we only know the character's name, Frank. We also discover that he's a traveller (he went to Hong Kong), and that he's curious (so intent).

Gothic literature is hinted at (évoquée) multiple times : the music from the box is "sublime" and it follows a "perverse logic" (an oxymoron if we understand perversity the way Poe did). There's also the reflection of Frank in the mirror inside the box, which is distorted and fragmented.

Finally, the box itself feels like a maze, a labyrinthine embodiment (incarnation) of the story. Can the reader solve the puzzle too? 

adapted into a movie / new wave of Britsh Horror Writers (N. Gaiman, etc)

The Town Manager, Thomas Ligotti, 2003

The story opens with a doubt : has the town manager disappeared ? We don't know anything about him (or her), or about any other character (but for someone named Carnes), yet it's a first person narrative, in the plural (us, we).