The Written Works of Angela Darling: December 2014

Sunday, December 21, 2014

A Mad Genius...

Something about the way the shadows drape across the room at night, sable plunged against pitch black, flickering candlelight the only reprieve from the darkness.

This is why I love writing at night.

The house is quiet, the trivialities of the day are done. For a few hours, just a few hours before the evening fades, I am a god. A creator. A mad genius. And then the next morning when the stressors of the day return and I look at what I wrote the night before, I inevitably shake my head and edit, edit, re-edit, disgusted with this overzealous stranger who had the gall to type upon my work.

But for that brief moment in time, alone in the dark with my dancing imagination and the promise of only a few uninterrupted hours, anything is possible...

~ Angela Darling

Friday, December 19, 2014

The Storm...

She was caught up in a storm, battling moments rife with Herculean strength and integrity to a feeling of loss so great she wandered aimlessly. Searching for the touch of her mother's hand, the warmth that would flow through her when she knew she was safe. The quest for her place in the world.

She ached for home.

She was calm and coated with electric fire. She was sensual and innocent. She didn't know who she was.

She knew exactly who she was...

~ Angela Darling

Thursday, December 18, 2014

Fragility...

This random memory has haunted me all day. I don't even know why I remembered it when I did; there was no trigger, no spark. And yet there it was, in the forefront of my mind, impossible to shake. So I had to remember it, relish it for the emotions it forced me to relive.

I'm about six years old. We are piling into the car after saying goodbye to my great grandparents after driving hundreds of miles for a visit. We had one of those station wagons with a "way back" seat that faced behind the car. Oh, the faces and gestures we made to innocent travelers over the years! ;)

I remember we were pulling away and my great grandpa was standing behind the car. He had such a look on his face, one I didn't understand at the time. He was sad to see us leave...but there was something else to it. Some finality that was irrevocable. He pulled out a handkerchief and patted the tears from his eyes.

I wanted to jump out of the car and give him one more hug, one more kiss, stay just another hour, another day, another week... I felt such a raging outpouring of love for the man in that one moment, a depth that surprised the confused six year old girl such as I was.

The trivialities of the moment faded away and I felt an urgency to keep my eyes trained on him as hard as I could as we pulled away, watch him for as long as I could until he vanished from view. And I never knew or understood why... Until years later.

He knew that would be the last time he would ever hold us. He died months later. The woman in me now understands but the child in me had no idea. All I knew was that something unspoken and monumental was happening in that one moment, and it was necessary to quiet myself and experience it. It was the sight of a man facing his own mortality, an old man edged away with the rigors of a full life lived, sharing a brief moment in time with a bright-eyed girl with absolutely nothing but time.

I try to live my life unsparingly in my emotions, giving of myself to those I love as freely as I possibly can, asking for nothing in return. It's the very least I can do for the man who, without knowing it, taught me of the beauty and fragility of life...

~ Angela Darling

Photograph: Zdzisław Beksiński

Tuesday, December 16, 2014

The Becoming...

November 21, 2014

Lay me down, amidst the rocks and clover.

A soldier in a weary world, a stranger to the ages before.

I am becoming.

A maelstrom of light I once used to dance to,

Has now been vanquished by a familiar foe.

I am becoming.

Soft sighs fell as I embraced the pain,

Former lovers, happiness no longer was.

I am becoming.

My wings are spreading silently,

In the dark, unnoticed. Useless and monumental.

I am becoming.

~ Angela Darling

Depression & Creativity...

November 13, 2014

“I never made one of my discoveries through the process of rational thinking." ~ Albert Einstein

I'm about to get very personal.

Let me just preface this blog entry with the statement that I do not believe myself to be a creative "genius" by any stretch of the imagination. I'm an imperfect little writer who's continuously trying to better her craft. I will likely never be a New York Times bestselling writer; I will likely never win a Pulitzer. And I'm okay with that. But there were many mentions in this article that I read regarding correlations between depression and creative "genius" that I felt it pertinent that I get that statement out of the way. I believe this article was meant to be more focused around creative types in general; i.e. those that create either the written word, pieces of art, or music.

This article brought up a lot of interesting questions for me regarding creativity and depression and how they are often interlinked for some people. I found this fascinating namely because I suffer from both afflictions.

I started writing at a very young age. Once I turned sixteen, I was afflicted with a pretty deep depression. My body was changing; I was becoming a woman. I was trying to figure out who I was in the midst of all of these changes. I was trying to find a niche in the world and in my friends at school. And while, in retrospect, it doesn't seem like traumatic a scenario, at the time it was my entire world.

I withdrew. As I often do when I feel that familiar melancholy drift over me. I flaked out on friends. I spent a lot of time in my room. I read every book I could get my hands on, thirsty for answers within their pages to questions that I hadn't yet quite been able to form.

And, most importantly, I wrote.

That's when something wonderful happened. I discovered poetry. There were no rules, no reason behind the structure and flow. Writing poetry was a place that I could just dance uninhibited, not constrained by anything other than the limits of my own imagination. Chaucer, Swift, Dunne, Poe; too many wonderful pioneers to name. I found freedom and kinship with writers who had been dead for years.

I found myself.

Writing held a release for me; I could be whoever I wanted to be in my words. I could create anything I wanted; I could make the impossible come true. I was hesitant to show anyone what I was writing, but I'm glad I did. Often in life, there are certain things that you should inherently know. But our eyes usually aren't truly opened to our strengths until they're acknowledged by someone else. Sad but true little fact of human psychology. The people I showed my writing to weren't repelled as I thought they would be; they didn't give me a strange, sideways glance. They looked up at me with wide eyes and smiled.

"You wrote this?!" And I would nod slightly, a bemused smile growing on my face.

"Do you have any more?"

That's when I knew that I might actually have a gift. I certainly wasn't the best, and I'm still not; I'm constantly striving towards improvement. But it was that moment; someone who wasn't a friend of mine, who had no stake in my self-confidence at all, telling me that I was a good writer.

My confidence grew. I began writing more. The depression eased back. I had things to look forward to. I had a project to focus on.

Writing saved me.

The article was interesting. It discussed the environmental causes for an artist to be susceptible to depression: isolation, intense self-examination, lack of exercise, poor diet, irregular hours, lack of sunlight exposure. We're all little sad vampires moping around, lost in our own little worlds, trying to create something brilliant.

And the reasons for depression are often different for everyone. Obviously life situations lend heavily to depression; genetic predispositions are also a commonly held belief. But what I was most interested in was this: does our creativity and act of creating make us depressed or are we depressed when we cannot create?

The chicken or the egg: which comes first?

For me, as illustrated in the example above, creating was a release from the static depression that I was going through. Perhaps that's why my process is so isolating. (I may have had a mild epiphany just now writing this entry).

When I write, I need to disappear completely. Kiss my husband, disappear into my office, lock the door, turn on my writing music, and completely absorb myself into the project. During this process, I find that I almost have to revert back to that melancholy (if you've read any of my novels, you'll understand why). ;) Not exactly rainbows and sunshine. But perhaps this is my process, one that I've utilized for over two decades, because that's how I first began.

Melancholy. And then creation. Rinse. Repeat.

Over the years, I've danced with depression a few more times. Even still, I withdraw. Disappear. I'm a generally happy person except for these rare occasions; that's why I prefer to withdraw. I don't want people to see me at my most vulnerable.

Perhaps this is why I write. For a momentary release from the persistent vulture on my back. Or perhaps my writing is the source for the sadness.

Each time, though, I know that I'll find my way back out.

As I always do.

~ Angela Darling

The Formula...

October 30, 2014

"Searchers after horror haunt strange, far places." ~ H.P. Lovecraft

“What is your fascination with horror?”

This is the question I get asked the most by people. Indeed, if you meet me in person, you’ll find that I’m a very positive, happy, easygoing person. Which seems completely opposite of what you’d expect horror writers to be.

So, why would a normally happy person be so fascinated with horror?

I think a piece of that answer has to do with “the formula.”

If you’re a lover of a specific genre, you’ll know what I mean. The formulaic equation and expectation that you have when you pick up a book. Danielle Steele fans expect a fiery heroine who eventually wins over the reluctant hero. Happy ending.

I think my fascination with horror is based on the fact that there’s often not an equation. Not to the type of horror that I’m drawn to anyway. I love indie horror movies that are done well, because they’re far removed from any Hollywood formula feeding to the audience. Often when people really, really hate something or really, really love something, it’s BECAUSE of its uniqueness.

People either hate it because it’s not what they were expecting. Or people either love it because it’s not what they were expecting.

I like a genre that can turn everything on its head: where the bad guy sometimes wins, where things are left messy and unresolved, where things don’t tie up nice and clean for the hero or heroine of the novel. I like mystery. I like intrigue. And I LOVE impossibilities sprouting up in the most unexpected of places.

It’s not because I’m an inherently dark person. But I love writing in a genre that gives me creative license to torture my characters the way I see fit.

I love a world where anything can happen.

~ Angela Darling

A Taste of the Macabre...

October 27, 2014

“There are moments when even to the sober eye of reason, the world of our sad humanity may assume the semblance of Hell. ” ~ Edgar Allan Poe

I want to open up this Halloween installment with one of my favorite urban legends.

A woman working late at an office building walks to her car in the dark. It is pouring down rain. As she opens her door she is approached by an old woman. The old woman is cold and wet and states that her car has broken down and she was in desperate need of a ride home. The woman of course obliges as she feels pity for the old woman and allows her into her car. She notices the old woman's extremely hairy arms.

Suspicious, the woman makes an excuse to head back into the office; that she had forgotten something in her hurry to leave work. She comes back a few minutes later with the security guard.

They soon discover the old woman is really a man in a dress, sitting on an axe.

What makes these stories terrifying? What is it about the situation above that touches a part of our psyche and instills fear?

Is it because we’re familiar with these vulnerable pockets of time where these situations can present themselves? That it too can happen to us?

Now…. Let me tell you a TRUE story.

My mother and my aunt were cruising along the streets one night in my Mom’s car. They were teenagers. My mom pulled up to a stoplight and noticed in her rearview mirror two shadows pass in front of the headlights of the car behind her. One on either side.

Suddenly a man is at the passenger window, which is partially rolled down.

The man asked if he could have a ride around the corner. He states that his car has broken down and he motions to a car on the side of the road. He says that his friend lives just around the corner and will be able to help.

My mother, being the smart girl who became a smart woman, said, “Where does he live? If you give us his name, we’ll go down there and let him know where you are.”

The man is insistent. “It’s just around the corner,” he said. “It’ll take just a few minutes.”

My mother was growing concerned about the missing shadow that was still unaccounted for… and the fact that the window was still rolled down a few inches. The doors were locked but the situation did not feel right to my mother.

She stood her ground. “Give us his name and his address and we’ll go and get him.”

Frustrated, the man did as he was bid and gave her a name and an address. She took off and went to the house he instructed. Knocked on the door. Gave the name.

The man at the house had never heard that name in his life.

A few minutes later, they drove back down the road and the “stranded” car was gone.

Are urban legends solely based off of myth? Or is there an element of truth to them? Added to and glittered up over the years to further illustrate the narrator’s point?

The Hairy-Armed Hitchhiker, as my favorite UL is called, did not teach me not to pick up old stranded ladies in a downpour.

But it DID show me that often nothing is what it seems and you must always be cautious.

That’s not such a bad lesson at the end of the day, no?

~ Angela Darling

A Good Death...

October 11, 2014

“Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,

And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,

And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well

And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?

One short sleep past, we wake eternally

And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.”

~ John Donne

I used to believe the strength of a man’s character resided in his life. That every decision, every action or inaction, was indicative of who a person truly was. And this credo seems a solid and reassuring one; all of our questions are answered. We have these wonderful scepters to wave judging one man from another, deciphering the good and the bad.

And yet this belief is folly. The world is full of charming charlatans, conniving marauders. They are men who sin in the dark and yet know every proverb by heart. They whisper and scheme in the shadows and revel in lies in the light. We are quite often fooled.

The only truth to a man’s character arises when he’s faced with his own mortality. Man can only hope for a good death, a chance to die well. To reflect upon his life in that moment and collide into fate with dignity.

To hear the resounding trumpets, to look to the sky and know that he has been mastered.

That he has lived in love and he has died in love.

~ Angela Darling

We Have Always Lived in the Castle...

August 26, 2014

"On the moon we spoke a soft, liquid tongue, and sang in the starlight, looking down on the dead dried world.” ~ Shirley Jackson

One day I went to the store. Nothing at all interesting, just a mid-day stop for some essentials: coffee for the husband and jerky treats for the pup.

On my way out I quite surprisingly ran into a gentleman who I had not seen in years. Our paths crossed by happenstance, both stenograhy students at the same college, both ardent lovers of words. And, of course, both of us writers.

He has published a few Indie novels as well, mostly fantasy fiction, along the same vein as a J.R.R. Tolkien read. He'd received great reviews on Amazon and was in the process of starting another. (In case you're curious, his name is S. Arthur Martin; check out his stuff if fantasy fiction is your thing).

We briefly caught up on our recent goings on and of course talked about our current writing projects. He had mentioned that sometimes he often re-read some of his older works and cringed, always imagining how he would re-write it to make it sound better, or clean something up. I agreed with him, that I often do that too, and then told him that, "Being a writer is not a destination, it's a journey."

For some reason, the last week or so that's really stuck with me. And I think that confusion is the cause for aspiring writers to not take the "plunge" and publish. Not because they can't or no longer have the means to (the face of the publishing industry is changing every day; there are more options and resources available to Indie writers than there used to be) but it's because they believe that, in order to be a "writer," that first published book needs to be something that will be taught in college lecture halls decades from now; that it needs to be a book that will change the world.

Those are lofty ambitions, no?

Creative types tend to be perfectionists and, while that's a wonderful thing, it's not conducive to actually being a contributing member of the writing community. While attention must be paid to a certain degree to the absolute quality of your work, there has to be a point in time where you let it go, come hell or high water, out into the world.

Sink or swim. And move onto the next.

Honing your writing craft is (or rather should be) continuously changing. Never static. I'm at this point in my writing career where I have my "formula" down pat. I have a system that works for me, a method to my madness, and I'm getting comfortable in my writing, punching down the words and creating yet another product. I've become a producer; my readers have come to expect a certain product from me, a certain formula. And they love it; that's why they buy my books. But, while I give my passion to everything I pen, I feel a certain freedom unbound by expectations. The element of the unexpected, the beauty of a surprise.

And then I read my favorite Shirley Jackson story, We Have Always Lived in the Castle, yet again. And a fire lit inside my belly, as it always does when I feel I've stumbled across something exciting and monumental.

The idea of an unreliable first-person narrator has never been something that I have done. Everything I've ever written has been third person, omniscient. The reader knows almost everything that the protagonist does. Is Merricat just an imaginative young woman or is she mad?

So that is my next long-ranged project goal. To write a piece of fiction that is completely unlike anything I've ever written before. I may finish it and discover that I just spent a lot of time creating something that should never see the light of day. Or it may surprise me and turn out to be a great read.

Either way, the point of this tale is to push yourself out beyond your boundaries: constantly. Don't get too comfortable in your mode of writing that you're afraid to take any risks. Keep your readers guessing. And most importantly, write what you are passionate about. You will eventually find a readership, no matter how strange your subject is. Stay true to what makes you feel, what makes you cry, what excites you, even if you feel that no one else will ever take an interest in it.

Even the most obscure minds have lovers somewhere...

~ Angela Darling

The Lantern...

August 15, 2014

I mourn the fair maiden, her eyes wild with fire.

Retreating into the encroaching fog

Golden tendrils trailing down her back

Beckoning for me to follow.

A fool am I, I told myself,

When to the maw of the wood I hesitated

That exquisite beauty disappearing swiftly

Into the moonlit night.

The years have been merciless

A coward, a traitor I am

When I breathed in her ear how I could not live

A single moment without her.

Her fingers still grip my heart

Before the rooster crows in the morning chill

And I awaken to the familiar despair

That has haunted me in the shadows.

My sleep-filled eyes see her still

At her window staring beyond

Her cheek harbors a secret tear

But the fire in her eyes has died.

The infernal ticking of the clock

Cloaked deep in the darkened corner

Reminds me that she waits in the fog

Waits patiently for me.

I take one last drink of my grappa

And cautiously open up the lantern hinge

Sparking a fire within its belly

One final time.

The path has grown over

And festered with decay

But still I wander slowly into the depths

Knowing what beauty lies within.

Deep in the fog I hear the stirring of violins

Emanating all around me

I envision the two of us swirling around in dance

Her laughter echoing in the darkness.

Her arms wrap tightly around me

As her maelstrom golden hair flies

Her breath sighs into my ear

But she is not there.

I stand alone in the foggy wood

Just my trusty lantern and I

Crying for a love lost long ago

Begging to die.

Down to the edge of the water I arrive

And she is standing in the waves

Smiling at me, calling my name

Her eyes wild with fire.

Oh, what ravaging fire!

I cry out to her, a name that has not crossed my lips in years

As the lantern is dropped to the dirt

And move towards her, wading into the waves,

And into her arms.

I hold her, no longer a vision but flesh

Breathing and warm and real against me

With a smile her face lowers to mine

And she closes my eyes with a kiss.

The water moves around us swiftly

Moving higher and higher

Until we are under the waves

Dancing forever to the echoes of violins.

On shore, the lantern light slowly flickers

And then diminishes completely

Its secret will forever remain

Its story never told.

By Angela Darling

The Gothic Heart...

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Who Are You?

June 22, 2014

No other question can seize the confidence from the heart of man so quickly as this one.

It seems so simplistic in nature, but it's not. People are neither black nor white; we're a grey bunch, an amalgamation of ever-changing parts.

We're byproducts of our environment, our opportunities, our challenges and our experiences. We are not good or evil. We are both and we are neither.

We're complicated little messes that bounce around, trying to find some unspeakable peace, some final destination of contentment that we neither know nor can place into words. We just know that we need to get there, instincitvely, the same way a baby knows to nurse on its mother's breast.

We just know.

So we move throughout the battlefield, brushing against others, inflicting harm, collecting blisters, scars...

We finally reach this nirvana alone, bloodied and smiling. We are battered, but we always travel alone. We enter alone. We wander alone. And we arrive alone.

All we can hope to do in the meantime is to spread a little love, a little hope, into the lives and hearts of those who mean something to us.

Who are you?

The answer makes us tremble because it's so complexly profound: where do we begin to answer? Our answer will not be the same from one day to the next. This makes time, its echo ticking softly in the distance, that you can just barely hear if you stop for a moment and stand quietly, even more precious.

We are heroes. We are failures. We are liars. We are saviors. We are loving and we are cruel. We are passionate. We are uncaring.

We are smiling, sinning, fallen angels...

We are human.

~ Angela Darling

We Walk On...

June 16, 2014

We often thirst for reason in chaos. We are hungry for rationalization in a maelstrom. But it's not there. It's never there. The world, in one instant, is upended and astray.

Reason is an evasive mistress; cruel and merciless and absent. Yet our hope for an answer, the quest for absolution, is far too great.

So we walk on...

We wear down… our feet blister, our energy drains, our soul tires... We want to stop, lie down, rest our eyes for just a moment.

Though the road is long, each step is a celebration. We have time to reflect upon memories that warm the heart, a fire that no passage of time will ever dim. We have a moment to breathe and smile and know that if we just take another step, if we just wait for the bend of the road to stray a little further back, for the crest of the hill to fall away just a bit more… then stubborn Reason will release all her mysteries… and the journey would be worth the pain..

So we continue…

In the end, what else can we do?

We walk on…

Mutiny...

June 11, 2014

"In her delirium, she thought of her father. She thought of war. She thought of secrets. She thought of Vietnam.

It was the dark secret that families didn’t talk about; hidden deep in the back of closets that were never to be opened. It was something that was hidden behind the veneer of dinner parties, dressed to the nines, putting on airs for the neighbors; it was hidden behind the professional family portraits on the walls, those white, broad smiles never faltering, never giving out their secrets.

Impotent and plastic; emotionless. Fake. It was what the world had become. And these men, riding off so valiantly and brave to wage war on an unseen enemy, came back crumpled over shells.

The faces looked the same; the bodies, the lips, the mouths, the noses.

But the eyes were the betrayers. They absorbed the world around them like a sponge, soaking in every image, every detail; sprawled bodies of comrades lying in a field, blood and macabre dripping stains everywhere, being told to believe in a goodness, in a reason, for all of this. But never being privy to what that is. Fighting for men who went to bed safely ensconced in their big houses, wrapped up with their seductive wives, warm in their beds.

It was the greatest secret of all. Perhaps the greatest of all time. The shells came back from a land where they may face the cold death stone at any moment, with an enemy that held the upper hand, fighting in their homeland, with their own traps, their own trails, their own caverns; arriving back to their homeland with a tirade of people calling them babykillers.

The reverent hero; returning proudly on his white steed.

Returning to a world of senseless monotony in factory jobs, lunch breaks, useless paperwork, wives that incessantly ask for opinions on the best drapery, dinner parties, free hippie love, The Brady Bunch, helping with homework, smog and traffic, the alarm clock, the 9 to 5, draft dodgers, bosses who didn’t care or understand, rising gas prices.

They were expected to return to these insignificancies of life and to forget all that had occurred, things that reached deep into the core of man; things that tested the substance of a person. No debrief. No triumphant returning victory cry.

Not for these men. The truths were too dirty, too frightening to face head on. So they were pushed aside, hidden behind all of these other things. But they all began to ferment. Slowly decaying and decomposing.

As all things do."

Excerpt from Mutiny on the Morning Glory, Tenebrous Volume 2

Angela Darling

Rogue River...

June 11, 2014

"There was a man standing near the river.

I crept forward slowly, careful to avoid the dry twigs sprinkled at my feet, but unable to take my eyes off of him. For some reason I felt if I took my eyes off of him he might disappear. A bird above ruffled the branches of the trees and took off, squawking loudly, as if trying to give me away.

The man did not move or give any indication that he had heard.

He wore an ill-fitting black suit. His hands were incredibly pale and protruded long and gnarled from beneath the too-short sleeves of his jacket. He was tall. Too tall. Abnormally tall.

Rogue River flowed on lazily in front of him, the water building in a crescendo to the anticipation of the rocks further down the bed. The man’s back was to me and I could not see his face.

Suddenly the smell wafted to my nose. It was light at first, merely drifting to my nostrils on the mild gust of wind in the gulley. One final, forceful breeze brought the smell to me fully, and I froze in my tracks.

The smell of rotten things. Spoiled eggs.
Sulfur.

A smell that brought back a childhood memory, one that I had tucked far back in the annals of my mind, pushed behind happier memories, even fantasies that I had created in order to avoid thinking of the truth. Remembering.

Those lost 18 hours.

And the man who held my hand and led me away...

My hand slowly strayed low to the piece at my side, my fingers tracing the familiar metal as I pulled it from the holster.

That smell. I had smelled it once before. An unfamiliar car, littered with trash and beer cans as I crouched low in the backseat as I had been instructed to do.

Those lost 18 hours.

The man began to turn, as if sensing that I was there. I heard him make an odd sound; one that seemed out of place.

Sniffing.

He was sniffing me out.

Finally his face turned to mine. There didn’t seem to be anything out of place with his features. I tried to search his face for a glimmer of recognition of any kind but found nothing. He did not look familiar.

Yet his eyes.

Those eyes were beady and not right. And then his lips curled, the corners of his mouth snarled upward obscenely.
A moment later, he was gone.
Vanished.

And there I was, weapon in hand, shivering with fright over childhood demons.
Not sure who he was.
What he was.

Or if he had anything to do with the body of the dead little girl we had found lying two hundred yards away…"

Excerpt from Rogue River

Tenebrous, Volume 3
Rogue River & The Treatment of Dr. de Rais

Angela Darling