Setting as a Springboard to Other Elements of Fiction

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

When it comes down to it, a story is about persons, places, things, qualities, and idea, which is to say characters, settings, objects, traits, values, and principles. A writer, whether of horror or other fiction genres, can do much to help him- or herself in plotting a novel or a short story (or, for that matter, a narrative poem, a play, or a screenplay) by researching various places on the Internet or at the library. I like to surf the ‘net with this in mind, even (or especially) when I don’t have a definite plot, or even a story, in mind, hoping a particular place will suggest a character, an object, a trait, a value, or a principle that can be brought alive for others in a fictional format through the telling of a story.

In a previous article, I wrote of Stephen King’s use of small-towns and of Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child’s use of New York City as the settings of many of their novels and of how, in the latter duo’s case, the features of Inwood Hill Park seem to have suggested ideas for the story’s plot; certainly the park itself appears in Cemetery Dance as a strongly atmospheric setting for much of the action involving NYPD homicide detective Vincent D’Agosta, the FBI’s Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast, and other characters.

Referencing places on the Internet or in library books and other sources also allows a write to visit such locations, from the safety, comfort, and convenience of his or her study, which is especially helpful if the story is set in the fall and it happens, in real-time, to be spring. Even when one grows up in a particular time and place, it is unlikely that he or she knows the location as well as it is described and depicted in reference works, because such works are typically written by experts who are not only intimately familiar with such places, but also with what needs to be identified, described, explained, analyzed, compared, contrasted, classified, divided, exemplified, and illustrated. For example, I grew up near Rock Creek Park, but I could never give as detailed and accurate an account of its flora and its fauna as the National Park Service does, complete with photographs of its history and scenery and multimedia presentations, on its website concerning this natural treasure:

Rock Creek Park provides an oasis within the District of Columbia for a variety of animal and plants, including coyotes, raccoons, owls, deer and many species of trees. In addition it is an important stop of and resting spot for neo-tropical migrant birds on their way south to their wintering grounds or on their way north to their breeding grounds.

Rock Creek Park preserves a Piedmont stream valley in a heavily urbanized area and provides a sanctuary for many rare and unique species. The park is approximately 15 km (9.3 miles) long and up to 1.6 km (1 mile) wide. It extends southward from the Maryland –Washington, D.C., border to the Potomac River along Rock Creek valley.

Photographs on the website treat visitors to an aerial view of the park; Beach Drive, shown at a distance, with automobiles traveling through an immense stone arch; a man bird watching along a trail through the forest alongside of which a profusion of white wildflowers is in bloom; a picture of Boulder Bridge in winter, the trees devoid of foliage, a snowy blanket covering the land, and ice upon the water of a creek; a foot bridge leading into a deep woods, green with springtime foliage; dogwood trees in bloom; the mass of stones forming the arch of Dumbarton Oaks Bridge, an ivy-tangled bank on one side of the leaf-choked stream that flows below and the bank on the opposite side festooned with shrubs, grass, and errant stones; a stretch of Dumbarton Oaks Trail, curving through a majestic stand of tall oaks as it makes its way past woodland plants; a waterfall in Dumbarton Oaks, pouring its rushing, white water over granite stones beside a thick carpet of fallen autumn leaves in a turbulence as wild as nature itself; a meadow of green and gold stretching before a stand of trees wearing leafy autumn coats of the same hues; or the snowy Rapids Bridge, seen in winter, laden with snow, as are the branches of trees, heavy with sleeves of ice and snow.

Some photographs vie with artists’ paintings, challenging the most skillful writers to create, in words, what others have captured on film. Some of these pictures appear to have been painted by impressionistic artists of superb talent, such as this photograph of Boulder Bridge. Its description awaits a D. H. Lawrence, a James Fennimore Cooper, or a Mark Twain on one of his better days as a writer--or you or me.

From the website, one learns not only about the park’s animals and geology, but also about its history and culture:

Rock Creek Park was founded in 1890 as one of the first federal parks. Its establishing legislation, cites the area’s natural beauty and high public value. When the park was established, it was on the edge of the growing city and was already a favorite area for rural re-treat. In the establishing legislation, Rock Creek Park was ‘dedicated and set apart as a public park or pleasure ground for the benefit and enjoyment of the people of the United States.” The park would "provide for the preservation from injury or spoliation of all timber, animals, or curiosities within said park, and their retention in their natural condition, as nearly as possible."

On forested hills surrounding the nation’s capital are the remnants of a complex system of Civil War fortifications. Built by Union forces, these strategic buttresses
transformed the young capital into one of the world's most fortified cities. These forts remain as windows into the past in the midst of D.C.’s urban green space, offering recreational, cultural, and natural experiences.

It seems to me after out experience during this rebellion that a wise foresight will not permit us to allow the seat of government to become again entirely defenseless” (Lieutenant Colonel Barton S. Alexander, Chief Engineer of Defenses 1865).

Lieutenant Colonel Alexander's suggestions went unheeded and this circle of forts, known as the Civil War Defenses of Washington fell into disuse as the city developed and grew. Although many of the fortifications have crumbled away, their intriguing and compelling stories are very much a part of our national history as well as the local history of Washington, D.C.

Sometimes, the history of such places can suggest storylines. For example, what if the use of the “complex system of Civil War fortifications. . . . built by Union forces” was never discontinued after the war ended, but was, instead, taken over by an inbred, mutated family of cannibals or the ghosts of the Rebel soldiers who died at the hands of the forts’ Union defenders? What if the forts are being used to store things unspeakably dangerous? According to the National Park Service, Rock Creek Park was created, in part, to “provide for the preservation from injury or spoliation of all timber, animals, or curiosities within said park, and their retention in their natural condition, as nearly as possible.” To what lengths--or extremes--are the keepers and caretakers of the park willing to go to carry out this mission?

Different genres are concerned with different effects and interests. Many, if not all, of these concerns can be found in most settings, if one has developed the eye to see, the ear to hear, the mind to understand, and the heart to fee, for example, astonishment, amusement, intrigue, wonder, fear, disgust, satisfaction of solving problems or conundrums, romantic love, dominance of one’s surroundings, and justice. Studying settings as they are defined and described online or in books and magazines helps writers to fix, to see, and to experience, if vicariously and imaginatively, what is not otherwise present. Such research enhances description, but it can also suggest plots, characters, and most of the other elements of fiction and drama.

Quick Tip: Offer Readers More Than a Story

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

One of the pleasures of reading is experiencing (or, at least, being introduced to) new sights. Reading is travel by armchair. This is so even when one’s reading doesn’t happen to involve travel books. Stephen King takes his readers inside not only the geography of small towns, but also into their psychology and sociology. He helps his fans see not only what it is like to live in a small town but also what is means to live in such a community.

Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child show their readers what it is like and what it means to work for a big city museum, for a big city police department, for a big city newspaper; they also, quite frequently, show their readers what it is like and what it means just to live in and get around in a big city, whether by foot, in a taxicab, on the subway, or by bus. In their novels that are set in New York City, they always refer to landmarks, streets, and other physical locations. Some are known to many; others only to locals or the well traveled. For instance, in Cemetery Dance, the authors allude to Inwood Hill Park. Native New Yorkers are no doubt familiar with this park, but I had to look it up, first to see if such a place really exists (it does, as do many of the places to which Preston and Child allude) and, second, to see where it is. As it turns out, Inwood Hill Park is in northern Manhattan, along the Hudson River, west of Broadway and south of Knightsbridge Road. The New York City Department of Parks & Recreation describes the park as “a living piece of old New York”:

Evidence of its prehistoric roots exists as dramatic caves, valleys, and ridges left as the result of shifting glaciers. Evidence of its uninhabited state afterward remains as its forest and salt marsh (the last natural one in Manhattan), and evidence of its use by Native Americans in the 17th century continues to be discovered. Much has occurred on the land that now composes Inwood Hill Park since the arrival of European colonists in the 17th and 18th centuries, but luckily, most of the park was largely untouched by the wars and development that took place.

The park continues to honor and cultivate its environment. In 2002, the Urban Park Rangers launched a five-year bald eagle release project in the park, in hopes of re-introducing the bird species to New York City. In the summer of 2007, the park's Dyckman Marina was added to New York State's Hudson River Greenway Water Trail, a project aimed at reacquainting city dwellers with natural bodies of water and encouraging citizen stewardship.

Similarly, a hiking trail and the Hudson River Bike Trail offer visitors chances to appreciate large stretches of the park's natural beauty in an environmentally friendly manner.

Also importantly, the park manages to present modern conveniences like athletic fields, playgrounds, dog runs, and a barbecue area, in harmony with its natural assets. The Park stands as a functional, beautiful space, waiting to be appreciated and used.

Inwood Hill Park contains the last natural forest and salt marsh in Manhattan. It is unclear how the park received its present name. Before becoming parkland in 1916, it was known during the Colonial and post-Revolutionary War period as Cock or Cox Hill. The name could be a variant of the Native American name for the area, Shorakapok, meaning either “the wading place,” “the edge of the river,” or “the place between the ridges.”

Human activity has been present in Inwood Hill Park from prehistoric times. Through the 17th century, Native Americans known as the Lenape (Delawares) inhabited the area. There is evidence of a main encampment along the eastern edge of the park. The Lenape relied on both the Hudson and Harlem Rivers as sources for food. Artifacts and the remains of old campfires were found in Inwood’s rock shelters, suggesting their use for shelter and temporary living quarters.

In 1954 the Peter Minuit Post of the American Legion dedicated a plaque at the southwest corner of the ballfield (at 214th Street) to mark the location of a historic tree and a legendary real estate transaction. A living link with the local Indians who resided in the area, a magnificent tulip tree stood and grew on that site for 280 years until its death in 1938. The marker also honors Peter Minuit’s reputed purchase of Manhattan from the Lenape in 1626. The celebrated sale has also been linked to sites in Lower Manhattan.

In the 17th and 18th centuries, colonists from Europe settled and farmed here. During the Revolutionary War, American forces built a five-sided earthwork fort (known as Fort Cock or Fort Cox) in the northwestern corner of the park. It fell to British and Hessian troops in November 1776 and was held until the war ended in 1783. After the Revolutionary War, families returned to the area to resume farming.

In the 1800s much of present-day Inwood Hill Park contained country homes and philanthropic institutions. There was a charity house for women, and a free public library (later the Dyckman Institute) was formed. The Straus family (who owned Macy’s) enjoyed a country estate in Inwood; its foundation is still present. Isidor and Ida Straus lost their lives on the S.S. Titanic’s maiden voyage. When the Department of Parks bought land for the park in 1916, the salt marsh was saved and landscaped; a portion of the marsh was later landfilled. The buildings on the property were demolished. During the Depression the City employed WPA workers to build many of the roads and trails of Inwood Hill Park.

In 1992 Council Member Stanley E. Michels introduced legislation, which was enacted, to name the natural areas of Inwood Hill Park “Shorakapok” in honor of the Lenape who once resided here. In 1995 the Inwood Hill Park Urban Ecology Center was opened. It provides information to the public about the natural and cultural history of this beautiful park. Today the Urban Park Rangers work with school children on restoration projects to improve the health and appearance of the park. Complementing the work of the Rangers is that of dozens of Inwood “Vols” (Volunteers), who assist with park restoration and beautification (“Inwood Hill Park”).

Many of these features of the park are described in Cemetery Dance, both to develop eerie descriptions of atmosphere and to serve the demands of the novel’s plot. In Cemetery Dance, it is very believable as the possible refuge for voodoo priests, devotees of obeah, and zombies that Detective Vincent D’Agosta and Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast investigate.

A couple of other references in their novel, to Victor Turner’s The Forest of Symbols and Emile Durkheim’s Elementary Forms of Religious Life, were also obscure, although I have heard of Durkheim. An Internet check, sure enough, turned up links to both volumes. One site even features online excerpts of Elementary Forms. In The Forest of Symbols, Turner investigates the function of ritual; in Elementary Forms, Durkheim takes on such topics as “the origin of the sacred,” “totemism,” “effervescence,” “the theory of religious forces,” and “the ambiguity of the sacred,” among others, some of which seems to inform the theories that Pendergast explores, if not embraces, in the novel as he investigates revenants, voodoo, obeah, and the mystical in general.

King’s depiction of small towns and of small town life, like Preston’s and Child’s depictions of their fictitious museum, real places in new York City and elsewhere, and their references to actual scholarly works of interest to their own narrative topics, enhances readers’ experience, offering something more than the stories themselves, which keeps readers satisfied and coming back for more.

Quick Tip: Futurological Predictions as Grist for the Mill

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

It is impossible to predict what shape horror fiction will take in the future. As Soren Kierkegaard points out, “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” The same is true of fiction.

Nevertheless, there are some indications that the horror fiction of the future may address some of the concerns of the futurologist. As the science, or study, of the future, futurology attempts to discern future trends by studying present patterns and causes. Global warming, it might be argued, is an example of futurological thinking. At the heart of futurology are statistics and probability theory, but history, economics, mathematics, and most of the sciences also play key roles in efforts to discern possible and probable future events and to devise possible and probable future scenarios. As one article summarizes the science, “Future Studies is often summarized as being concerned with ‘three P’s and a W,’ or possible, probable, and preferable futures, plus wildcards, which are low probability but high impact events (positive or negative), should they occur” (“Futurology,” Wikipedia).

Of course, such a characterization is simplistic, as futurology also depends upon a nexus of other subordinate, often interrelated, disciplines and approaches, including anticipatory thinking protocols, systems thinking, causal layered analysis, environmental screening, the scenario method, the Delphi method, future history, monitoring, backcasting, back-view mirror analysis, cross-impact analysis, futures workshops, failure mode and effects analysis, futures biographies, futures wheels, relevance trees, simulation and modeling, social network analysis, systems engineering, trend analysis, morphological analysis, and technology forecasting.

The literary equivalents to futuristic societies are, perhaps, the dystopias and utopias of science fiction. In horror fiction, extrapolating from current, known scientific knowledge and theoretical understandings to possible or probable future states of affairs is also a way to anticipate the monsters to come. Some suppose that H. R. Giger’s biomechanical art and the short stories of Ray Bradbury which marry technology and art, such as “The Veldt,” point the direction to at least one likely future topic for horror fiction: mankind’s ambiguous and troubled relationship with the works of his own hands (and mind).

Needless to say, the very concept of futurology is itself very controversial.

Besides, fiction benefits from being fiction; it doesn’t have to be about actual, or real, situations; by nature, it is made up, invented, pretended, even when it is based upon actual events. However, an awareness of the predictions made by futurologists can certainly provide grist for the always-ravenous mill of the creative writer’s imagination.

Quick Tip: Writing Means Reading

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

It seems self-evident that writers must be (not should be, but must, be) readers. Every writer worth his or her salt will tell anyone who wants to write (or, more likely, thinks he or she wants to write), that, to be successful as a writer, he or she must also read.

Stephen King, for example, reads a couple of hundred books or more every year. In fact, his reading has caused him to discover, among others, Bentley Little, a horror writer of no small talent himself. As the many blurbs he has written to help sell other writers’ works indicate, King is as much a fan of other writer’s work as readers are of his oeuvre. His love of reading is shared by his wife and fellow writer Tabitha and their children, one of whom, Joe Hill, has followed in his father’s footsteps, writing horror novels himself.

Writers should read every novel or short story (or see every movie) at least twice (although several times more is actually recommended), the first time for pleasure and to get a sense of the story’s structure, of how it is put together, and of how it attains unity. The second time, readers who would also be writers should read for technique.

How does the writer describe persons, places, and things? How does he or she create and maintain suspense? How are transitions used to tie action and scenes together? Are flashbacks used? If so, why, and, again, how are transitions used to tie past and present together? What figures of speech (metaphors, allusions, irony, symbols, and so forth), either explicit or implicit, are used in the story, and how and why are they used? Why is the action narrated in this, rather than some other, sequence? What can be gleaned from the writer’s choices of words and images? How does he or she fully involve readers in the action of the story? Why is the setting important, if not essential, to the characters, plot, conflict, setting, and theme? What is spicy or memorable about the dialogue? If the novel is a murder mystery or a detective story, what clues does the writer drop, when, where, how, and why? Which are red herrings? If the novel is a horror story, what mythos, legend, historical fact, or scientific discovery or theory grounds the paranormal or supernatural incidents or characters in the everyday world of commonsense realism, and how does the protagonist learn the truth of the monster’s origin or nature so that he or she can banish or destroy it?

Almost every writer has weaknesses as well as strengths, and both aspiring and established writers can learn from both. One of King’s weaknesses is his inclusion of extraneous scenes and exposition in his overly long plots; one of his strengths is his characterization, especially of the young. One of Little’s weaknesses is his novels’ unsatisfying, tacked-on or inconclusive endings; one of his strengths is his ability to create, maintain, and heighten suspense, often through the powers of his descriptions of menacing places. As a reader, learn to avoid the mistakes of writers and to adopt their strengths.

Then, read the novel or the short story or watch the movie again to discover all the wonderful tricks of the trade that you missed the first couple of times you read or watched the story unfold.

Quick Tip: Writing the Short-Short Story

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

A short-short story is a narrative that is under 1,000 words in length, It is often made up of only a single scene, wherein a conflict, usually between two characters, is posed and resolved. There is frequently a twist, or surprise, ending to the story, which is generally effected through dramatic irony, situational irony, verbal irony, or a combination thereof. However, these are not hard-and-fast rules, but sweeping statements. Many times, short short stories derive from situations. In any case, they must be tightly written. Every word counts, adding to the narrative’s development and effect.

My own short-short story, “Finis” illustrates the form. After writing it in full, I changed the second paragraph to provide a stronger motivation for the protagonist’s extreme action. Before this revision, the paragraph supplied enough information to suggest why the actress might do as she does, but not sufficient motivation for her to do what she does; the revision makes her actions more believable.

Finis

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

The director asked, “Ready, Amanda?”

The actress thought of her husband and three-year-old daughter trapped inside their SUV, burned alive before they could be rescued; of the doctor’s pained expression when he’d detected something suspicious in her left breast and had, sober-faced, his voice flat, an attempt at a smile faltering at the corners of his lips, telling her that, “just to be on the safe side,” he wanted to order a biopsy; and of the five million dollars she’d been paid for this role and of how the money would finance her institutionalized daughter’s needs, and she nodded. “Ready.”

“I’d like to get it right the first time,” he said, and she nodded.

The production assistant held the clapboard between her and the camera: Snuff, Scene 1, Take 1. He snapped the top lever, the clapstick, down, upon the board, clack!

“Action!” the director called.

The camera dollied in, close.

Blood spurted from Amanda’s left forearm, bright and explosive.

She grimaced, drawing the straight-razor down the vein in her other forearm.

Blood was everywhere. Amanda felt faint. She listed to her left, her head spinning. Dizzy, she capsized, landing in the pool of her own splattering blood. The vital fluid was warm and thick. She moaned.

“Cut!” the director cried. “Perfect. Print it.”

For Amanda, everything went dark, and silence claimed her.

Quick Tip: Narrative Reversals

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

 

Most readers and writers know about plot twists, which usually result from situational irony--setting up an expectation that is later resolved in a manner different from that which one is led to believe is likely. However, writers can, and sometimes do, also upset expectations regarding other elements of fiction, such as character, conflict, setting, and theme. A character who is established as self-centered and self-serving can turn out to be capable of being altruistic and humane, as Han Solo, of Star Wars, turns out to be. A conflict that seems likely to end in only one way can end in an unexpected manner, as the conflict between Gone With the Wind's Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler does; all the way to the end of the novel, Rhett is interested in winning the heartless Scarlett’s heart, and, when he finally seems to get his own heart’s desire, well, “frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn,” he tells her. A setting that appears to be dangerous can turn out to be a refuge, as Spike’s crypt is for Dawn when she is being hunted by the goddess Glory (Buffy the Vampire Slayer). The opposite can be true, too: a character who seeks sanctuary in a church can find that the holy place is a place of danger, as Nightcrawler does in the X2: X-Men United movie, only to be tracked down and captured by Jean Grey and Storm. A theme can also be inverted through irony. The apparent theme of a story can be provided, perhaps through the dialogue or the habitual behavior of a character, only to be reversed at the end of the narrative or drama. At the outset of Gran Torino, Walt Kowalski, a racist war hero, avoids young people, members of ethnic and racial groups, religious people, and anyone else who does not measure up to his narrow standards of propriety until he rescues a young Hmong woman from black gang members who seem intent upon raping her. The movie’s theme, which seems to be that it is best to mind one’s own business, adopting an everyone-for-himself philosophy, turns out to be one that affirms the importance of brotherly love and self-sacrifice.

Blind Panic, The First 10 Chapters and the Final One: A Study of Technique

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

The withholding of the cause of a whole series of unusual or bizarre events until well into the narrative is a familial, yet effective, technique for creating and maintaining suspense, especially when the events involve dangerous, injurious, destructive, and/or fatal consequences to many over a sustained period of time, as they do in Graham Masterton’s Blind Panic. Meanwhile, on a more immediate basis, incidents can sustain readers’ interest by implicitly posing questions that are more quickly--in some cases, almost immediately--answered, only to have other questions arise that are also relatively quickly resolved, as also happens in Blind Panic.

Dangerous, potentially fatal, situations which involve ordinary men, women, and children are frightening and suspenseful, but such emotions are heightened when the characters are of greater than ordinary importance or stature. In Blind Panic, both VIP’s (the president of the United States, for example) and ordinary men and women (a flight crew and airline passengers, motorists, campers, and hikers, among others) are represented as victims.

By heading each chapter of a novel with a tagline that specifies a different location (and, sometimes, time), the narrative implies the great sweep of the story’s action. In Blind Panic, such headings indicate that the story’s catastrophes and other situations occur in such diverse locations as “Washington, DC,” “AMA Flight 2849. Atlanta-Los Angeles,” “Los Angeles,” “Miami, Florida,” “Portland, Oregon,” and many other places. The story’s action takes place on the national stage, involving big cities and points in between, just as it also includes both national leaders and ordinary citizens. These taglines also help readers keep track of the subplots’ characters, because each set of characters is associated with a different setting or settings. Moreover, allusions to actual places can make uncanny incidents seem more believable; such references are also interesting to readers because they locate the action in places that are familiar to them, anchoring the incredible or the unknown in the recognizable and known.

A mysterious character, especially if his or her origin is supernatural, will intrigue readers, keeping them reading, as will a change in the narrative’s point of view or the addition of a subplot. An extraordinary cause of the bizarre series of events will be captivating, especially if the cause is explained a bit at a time, in a piecemeal fashion, throughout the novel. Mysterious characters are even more compelling when they are associated with centuries-old mystical rituals and historical events or with vanished cultures that continue to have present-day consequences.

Alternating among different sets of characters with each new chapter or after several chapters maintains suspense because such alternations parcel out the incidents of the action that involves these characters, offering a piecemeal revelation of the storylines that keeps readers coming back to learn more, first about one set, and then about another set, of the story’s characters.
The alternation between apparently supernatural and natural explanations for the same events or incidents maintains an ambiguity that is fantastic, rather than uncanny (explained by having natural, if unlikely, causes) or supernatural (inexplicable in natural terms), as Tzvetan Todorov explains in The Fantastic. Such an alternation also suggests that even seemingly far-fetched conditions or circumstances (an “epidemic” of blindness, for example) may be rooted in real possibilities and are not, therefore, necessarily as far-fetched as they might first appear to be, which lends verisimilitude to the narrative.

Short, tightly written chapters, comprised of only one or two scenes, in which composed, if not serene, action alternates with fast-paced, sometimes violent, action (and usually a change of setting and characters), also keeps readers reading. The 27 chapters of Blind Panic average 10 and a half pages each, for a grand total of 284 pages.

Writers and readers alike complain about the difficulty of bringing a narrative to an appropriate and satisfying end--one which doesn’t make readers feel as though the writer has cheated them with a convenient, tacked-on, but emotionally unsatisfying and philosophically unrealistic, conclusion. Blind Panic’s final chapter shows an effective way of concluding a story of combined genres, which might be called the horror-mystery-science fiction-thriller.

Note: Bold black font indicates incidents which create or maintain suspense or otherwise keep readers' interest in the narrative; bold red font explains how these incidents accomplish this purpose.

Chapter 1 (pages 1-2)

Who: President David Perry, First Lady Marian Perry, Dr. Cronin, Doug LatterbyWhat: The president discovers that he has gone blind
When: As he boards Marine One
Where: White House lawn
How: N/A
Why: Unknown at this time
Twist: None

As the president of the United States, David Perry, approaches Marine One, which has set down upon the White House lawn, he discovers that he has gone blind [how? why?]. He asks his wife, Marian, to help him board the aircraft so as to keep his blindness a secret from the everyone else [can his ruse succeed?]. She objects, saying he should go to the hospital, but he says he can have Dr. Cronin, the physician aboard the helicopter look at him first. She helps him board the aircraft, and he tells Doug Latterby to fetch the doctor [what diagnosis will Dr. Cronin make?], get them airborne, and take them to George Washington Hospital [what will be learned at the hospital, and how will President Perry’s blindness be treated?].

Chapter 2 (pages 3-6)

Who: Tyler Jones, Captain Sherman, copilot, navigator, flight attendants
What: Tyler is asked to land an airplane after the flight crew goes blind
When: During AMA Flight 2849, from Atlanta to Los Angeles
Where: Above the Sangre de Cristo Mountains
How: N/A
Why: Unknown at this time
Twist: None

A flight attendant awakens Tyler Jones, asking him to accompany her to the cockpit of the commercial aircraft aboard which he is a passenger. He is surprised to find not only the pilot, the copilot, and the navigator, but also three other flight attendants crammed into the cockpit. Captain Sherman informs him that, except for the flight attendants, the whole flight crew has gone blind [again, how? why?], perhaps as the result of “an airborne virus in the flight-deck ventilation system” [is this the true cause of their blindness? If so, what caused the president’s blindness? Are the situations related? If so, how? If not, why not?] They are seeking someone to land the airplane [why would Tyler be able to do this?], and Tyler’s name came up in an LAX search of the passenger list as someone with “flying experience.” However, Tyler objects, saying that he has flown nothing larger than a Cessna 172, but the pilot assures him that he will “guide” him [will he be able to land the aircraft with such limited experience, even with the pilot to help him?].

Chapter 3 (pages 7-13)

Who: Jasmine (“Jazz”), a tractor-trailer driver
What: An accident on an interstate highway leaves Jasmine’s truck hanging over a precipice
When: Morning rush hour
Where: Interstate 101, a mike and a half east of Encino, California
How: A Hummer swerves into a concrete divider in front of Jasmine
Why: The Hummer’s driver has gone blind
Twist: None

As Jasmine presses the speed limit during rush-hour traffic, a mile and a half east of Encino, California, on Interstate 101, a Hummer suddenly swerves “sideways” and strikes “the concrete divider,” [why did the Hummer suddenly swerve into the divider?] causing Jasmine to slam into the vehicle and lunge halfway off the freeway’s elevated off-ramp, where it dangles above a “dry concrete river bed” forty feet below [will Jasmine fall to her death?]. As vehicles crash into her trailer, she climbs out of the tractor’s cab, where she sees a Ford Explorer “pouring out thick black smoke. . . only three or four vehicles away from” an “Amoco truck” [will the Amoco truck explode?] As Jasmine clambers over the hoods, roofs, and trunks of some of the “more than two hundred” wrecked vehicles behind her big rig, some of the cars explode, finally setting off the fuel inside the Amoco truck. Jasmine is blown off, to the right, but she survives. At the center of the wreckage, she hears a woman in a car that is engulfed in fire, holding her baby son out the passenger door and pleading for someone to save him [will the baby be saved? If so, by whom, and how?]. As other vehicles continue to explode and burn, Jasmine rescues the woman’s baby, just before the mother herself burns to death. She walks with the rescued infant down the shoulder of the highway as vehicles continue to explode and burn and fire trucks, impeded by the wreckage, attempt to arrive at the scene of the multiple accidents [what will become of Jasmine and the baby? Will she adopt it? Turn it over to the authorities?] No reason for the Hummer’s swerving is given, but it is implied (because of the sudden blindness of the characters in the two previous chapters) that the driver suddenly lost his or her sight.

Chapter 4 (page 14-19)

Who: Harry (introduces in this chapter merely as “I”), Mrs. Zlotorynski; Mrs. “Zee’s” servants, Emigdilio and Rosita, Marco Hernandez (for whom Harry is house sitting)
What: Harry ingratiates himself with a wealthy, elderly widow, Mrs. Zlotorynski, whom he advises
When: Daytime
Where: The beach outside Delano Hotel, Miami, Florida
How: Flattery
Why: Harry earns his living by flattering rich old ladies
Twist: None

Harry, who earns his living by flattering, advising, and acting as a fortune teller for wealthy, elderly widows, takes time out from house sitting to play on Mrs. Zlotorynski’s vanity be interpreting a recent dream she had as signifying her generosity. He enjoys tweaking the actually stingy social matron by advising her to demonstrate this trait by giving her chauffeur a long weekend off with a bonus and her maid the choice of garments from her own wardrobe. After she treats him to lunch at the “five-star” beach front Delano Hotel” and pays him for the dubious services he’s rendered, he leaves. [This chapter holds readers’ interest by introducing a new character, as yet known only as an “I.” As a charlatan who manipulates wealthy old women who tend to be pompous and full of themselves, he is intriguing, if not entirely sympathetic, and it is fun for readers to witness the display of his charm. In addition, the change of perspective from omniscient third-person to limited first-person is interesting, because unusual.]

Chapter 5 (pages 20-26)

Who: Harry, Amelia Carlsson, Marco Morales (aka Hernandez), Lizzie, Kevin, Lizzie’s children, Misquamacus
What: Amelia telephones Harry with the news that her sister Lizzie and Lizzie’s family have gone blind and asks him to accompany her to the Casey Eye Institute in Portland, Oregon, telling him of a vision she’s seen of a medicine man who seeks vengeance against white men
When: Immediately after Harry leaves Mrs. Zlotorynski
Where: Delano Hotel lobby, Miami, Florida
How: Telephone conversation
Why: Unknown at this time
Twist: None

As he takes leave of Mrs. Zlotorynski, walking through the lobby of the Delano Hotel, Harry receives a telephone call [who’s calling and why?] from Amelia, an old friend, who advises him that her sister Lizzie and Lizzie’s family have gone blind while biking near the edge of a canyon [this incident links the main plot and the subplot, but how are these two plots causally related?]. They were rescued by a ranger and have seen a doctor, but the physician is unable to say why they all suddenly lost their sight. Amelia asks Harry to accompany her to the Casey Eye Institute in Portland, Oregon [why does she want to go to this particular clinic, and why does she want Harry to go with her?]. Lizzie told Amelia that she and her family have “spread the disease,” but not what disease she means [what disease, and why does Lizzie believe it is a disease?]. She insists that everyone is going to go blind because everyone deserves to lose his or her sight [why is blindness “deserved,” and why it is deserved by everyone?]. Despite her being a “genuine clairvoyant,” Amelia is unable to discern what is disturbing her sister or why. Like Harry, Amelia initially attributes Lizzie’s odd talk to shock, but Amelia performs a “bead reading,” using “Navajo misfortune beads” and receives the message that “a great darkness” is coming that would blind “the masters of the world” [what is this “great darkness,” why is it going to blind “the masters of the world,” and who are these “masters”?] and that “a great wonder-worker, The One Who Went And Came Back, is “walking the land of his ancestors” [who is this, where did he go, and why is he back?] Amelia’s assurance that no bead reading has ever been wrong prompts Harry to accept her offer to buy him an airline ticket to Denver, Colorado, where he will join her on another flight to Portland, Oregon. Harry remembers The One Who Went And Came Back as a 400-year-old , extremely powerful medicine man, Misquamacus, who swore vengeance upon European immigrants after they’d stolen Native Americans’ land. He has since struggled to be reborn and has finally accomplished his mission, being reborn in the body of a woman named Karen Tandy [who is Karen, why was she chosen as the medicine man’s mother?], whose mother had appealed to Harry for help. He, in turn, appealed to Amelia, and, with the help of a Sioux medicine man, they’d banished Misquamacus to the spirit world [how did Misquamacus escape and return to this world?].

Chapter 6 (pages 27-42)

Who: Charlie, Mickey, Remo, Cayley, Infernal John (aka Misquamacus), totem-like figures
What: Charlie, Mickey, Remo, and Cayley drink beer and fish in the Modoc County National Forest
When: Afternoon
Where: Modoc County National Forest, North Carolina
How:
Why: Fishing trip
Twist: None

Young adults Charlie, Mickey, Remo, and Cayley are drinking beer, sunning themselves, and fishing in the Modoc County National Forest, North Carolina, when they hear a sound that Remo attributes to a mountain lion [is it really a mountain lion? Is it something harmless or something worse?]. When Cayley becomes frightened, Remo returns to their Winnebago and fetches his rifle [will the rifle protect them?]. They sit around their campfire, have dinner, smoke marijuana, and listen to Charlie tell a horror story. They are interrupted by Infernal John, a strange man with silver eyes who speaks both a foreign tongue and English, telling them that they must pay for having polluted the land [who is this mysterious man, why does he have silver eyes, why does he speak in a foreign tongue, and why does he say the foursome “polluted” the public land of a national forest?] . As he speaks, two “impossibly tall,” masked “totem-like figures” rise out of the ground, wearing “antlers” and “decorated with beads and small bones and birds’ skulls” [who, or what, are these figures, and why are they dressed in such a bizarre fashion?] The foursome retreats to their Winnebago, followed by Infernal John and the two figures, and, after Remo fires a warning shot, Infernal John begins singing, and the figures with him emit a dazzling light that blinds the four friends [are these figures responsible for the blindness of the other characters as well? Why do they blind them?]. He then ties them up and force marches them to the top of a promontory, where he tells them he will order them to walk off the edge of the 600-foot-tall cliff, as their ancestors made his do after they’d massacred and captured them in a centuries-old attack upon his people, Native Americans [do the four young adults actually die in such a horrible manner?].

Chapter 7 (pages 43-50)

Who: President Perry; Drs. Cronin, Schaumberg, and Henry, First Lady Marian Perry, Vice-President Kenneth Moran, Russian Federation President Gyorgy Petrovsky, Doug Latterby, Secretary of State George Smirnotakis, Director of the FBI Warren Truby, a White House butler, Sergeant (the Perrys’ dog), Russian criminals Lev Khlebnikov and Viktyor Zamyatin
What: A meeting between U. S. President Perry and Russian President Petrovsky When: Uncertain
Where: The White House, Washington DC
How: Face-to-face dialogue in the Oval Office
Why: Securing of Russia’s assistance in curbing Russian criminal activity in the United States
Twist: The Russian president is insulted by the American president

The president learns that he has 100 percent “corneal opacification; in other words, the transparent lens covering” his “iris is no longer transparent.” None of the doctors know whether the condition is permanent [the reader wonders whether it is], and they want to run more tests at another facility, the Washington National Eye Center, but, against doctors’ orders and their warning that the condition could become incurable unless treated as soon as possible [will their prediction come true?], he insists upon meeting with Gyorgy Petrovsky, the president of the Russian Federation concerning “Russian criminal activities in the United States.” Doug will coach him through the meeting so that it seems that President Perry is sighted rather than blind [can they get away with such an unlikely deception?]. During the meeting in the Oval Office, President Perry asks President Petrovsky to prevent two Russian criminals who have immigrated to the United States from laundering money they’ve collected as a result of their criminal activities through Russian banks and to seize all the men’s assets in Russia. If President Petrovsky refuses, President Perry says, then he will order the suspension of ten billion dollars in American foreign aid to Russia for every billion dollars the Russian criminals launder through Russian banks. [Diplomacy between two heads of state concerning a significant matter is, buy nature, intriguing, and these men are the heads of two of the world’s most powerful countries.] President Petrovsky promises to consider President Perry’s request and shows him a picture of his two children. Unable to see the photograph and thinking it shows the two Russian criminals, President Perry unintentionally insults his guest by saying, “I already know what these two bastards look like” [will the last-minute insult, at the close of the meeting, destroy the chance of cooperation between the two countries?]

Chapter 8 (pages 51-59)

Who: Tyler Jones, Captain Sherman, Copilot George O’Donnell, Learjet pilot Norman Rossabi, Tina Freely, LA Times reporter
What: Tyler lands the 747
When: 3:25 AM (according to news report in Chapter 9)
Where: Runway 7L, LAX, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California
How: Guided by blind pilot’s instructions
Why: Aircrew is blind
Twist: A second aircraft, also piloted by a blind pilot, crashes into 747 after 747’s successful landing

Tyler lands the 747 jumbo jet successfully, but, as the passengers and crew try to evacuate the aircraft, another airplane, a private jet piloted by a blind pilot, [was the pilot blinded by the same “totem-like figures” who blinded President Perry, the motorists on Interstate 101, the foursome camping and fishing in North Carolina?] lands on the same runway, crashing into the first airliner, and several people are killed, including Captain Sherman [does Tyler die? How many others die, besides the captain?].

Chapter 9 (pages 60-71)

Who: Jasmine, Amadi (Jasmine’s “Auntie Ammy”), rescued baby, Misquamacus
What: Four airliners crash near LAX; the baby shows the women a vision of Misquamacus
When: The morning of the 747’s crash at LAX
Where: Ladera Park, Los Angeles
How: Clairvoyance and magic
Why: Revelation
Twist: The women decide to keep the baby

Jasmine takes the rescued baby to her “Auntie Ammy” to baby sit until Children’s Services personnel can arrive to claim the infant. They hear on the news that a 747 airliner was involved in a runway crash with another aircraft at 3:25 AM at LAX. Auntie Ammy, a devotee of Santeira belief, suspects that both the freeway and the runway “accidents” are deliberate. The baby starts crying and points at the ceiling. A rumbling sound occurs, and Jasmine thinks an earthquake is happening, although “she had never heard an earthquake like this before.” An Airbus 380 flashes overhead, stripping tiles from the roof of Auntie Ammy’s apartment, and crashes into the intersection of West Centinela and La Tijera Boulevard, near Ladera Park. Cars then crash into the wrecked aircraft, and many explosions occur. Auntie Ammy suspects that the baby might be clairvoyant, since he seemed to sense the impending crash before it happened. Auntie Ammy also senses a thickening of the air and believes that they are under attack by a powerful enemy. Auntie Ammy prays to Oya, the Santeria goddess of storms, lightning, and cemeteries. The baby points to a protective magic mirror on Auntie Ammy’s wall, one that can show what is wrong. The room in the mirror grows darker and darker, and Jasmine, Auntie Ammy, and the baby are visible in it only as silhouettes; as they watch, another figure joins them in the looking-glass--Misquamacus. Auntie Ammy realizes that the baby is showing them a vision of the person who is responsible for the death and destruction that has befallen American citizens. The image in the mirror is not a reflection of anyone who is actually in the room, and it is transparent; Auntie Ammy believes it to be a projection of what the baby sees in his head. As the women and the baby watch, the ghostly figure chants an incantation, and beetles scurry from the horns and headdress that he wears. Auntie Ammy’s apartment is full of cockroaches. Jasmine tries to turn the mirror to the wall, but it is too heavy to more than budge, and the figure in the mirror, scowling, steps toward her in the glass. She lets go of the mirror, and it falls from the nail that holds it, shattering upon the floor, and all the cockroaches vanish. Auntie Ammy believes that the mirror shattered to protect her, preventing the figure from entering her apartment. Auntie Ammy wants to keep the baby instead of turning him over to Children’s Services. As she discusses this possibility with Jasmine, the baby murmurs, and three more aircraft crash into South Central Los Angeles, within a mile of Auntie Ammy’s apartment, on their approach to LAX. [The appeal of this chapter is rooted in its references to unusual religious traditions such as those of the Santeira and Algonquin faiths, which suggest a conflict between two different understandings of the spiritual world and the cultures that originated them, African-American and Native American, respectively, and broadens Misquamacus’ concern for vengeance beyond just European [i. e., Caucasian] immigrants. The mirror’s ability to protect the women and baby from the medicine man also suggests that he can be blocked, if not stopped [as does the Sioux medicine man’s earlier banishment of Misquamacus to the spiritual realm]).

Chapter 10 (pages 72-83)

Who: Harry, Amelia, Lizzie Amelia’s sister) and family, airline passengers, a taxicab driver, doctors, a nurse
What: Amelia and Harry visit Amelia's sister
When: After Lizzie and her family are blinded
Where: Portland, Oregon
How: Flight and taxi
Why: To determine how Lizzie and her family were blinded
Twist: None

As Harry and Amelia, aboard a flight from Denver, Colorado, to Portland, Oregon, approach Portland International Airport, they see wrecked airplanes on the tarmac below, and a nearby passenger receives word on his cellular telephone of the several airplane crashes that have occurred all over the country [the widespread nature of the threat is indicated, which increases suspense]. The passengers believe that the nation’s airlines are victims of terrorist threats by “Ay-rabs” [a possible explanation for the bizarre events adds a note of verisimilitude to the story]. Their airplane lands safely, just as Amelia, a “genuine clairvoyant” predicts it will do. As they take a taxi to the University of Oregon’s Portland campus, to visit the Casey Eye Institute, the cab driver repeats the airline passenger’s suspicion that the country is under an attack by the Arabs. Updates about the crashes continue to come in via television; the latest number is 39 commercial airline crashes and two crashes of Air Force fighters. The Secretary of Homeland Security, John Rostoff, appearing on a news show, informs the public that the crashes were caused by the airliners’ pilots’ sudden and complete blindness. The agency is investigating the cause of the blindness, to determine whether it is natural or “the result of terrorist activity.” Doctors watching the newscast offer various possibilities for medical causes of the “epidemic” of blindness, which include “a virulent form of CMV. . . spread by human contact” and a “contaminated food product.” As Harry and Amelia meet with Lizzie, she tells them that the doctors have still not diagnosed the cause of her and her family’s blindness, although, at one time, they thought that it might have resulted from “a rare. . . infection” they “caught in the woods” [these possible causes of the “epidemic” of blindness add to the plausibility of a natural origin of the condition, making such an “epidemic” believable]. Lizzie mentions the strange man that she and her family saw at the site at which they lost their sight, saying, in an “oddly flat and expressionless” tone, “as if another woman were reading her words from a cue-card,” that they “deserved” to go blind. When Amelia asks her to clarify herself, Lizzie seems to come to herself and denies having said that she and her family deserved such a fate [is some other entity in possession of Lizzie?]. She mentions the two totem-like figures that stood on either side of the stranger and, reverting to her unnatural voice, again says that she and her family deserved to lose their sight because they “spread the disease.” Lizzie tells Harry and Amelia that the stranger identified himself both as The One Who Went And Came Back and Thunder Rolling In The Mountains [it seems eerie that the same figure would be known by a plurality of odd names, as such a device often indicates a divine origin or nature]. She also tells Amelia, “He knows who you are. He knows that you have come to see me. He knows that--this time--you will be ground into dust,” to be remembered no more [suspense increases as a sympathetic character is threatened by a powerful, supernatural entity]. When Amelia asks Lizzie if the stranger’s name is Misquamacus, Lizzie screams--and keeps screaming, even after a nurse injects her with a “dose” of tranquilizer that “would have dropped a horse” [the supernatural being’s power is demonstrated before Amelia and Harry--and the readers]. As she is about to be injected again, Lizzie relaxes, and says the name of the medicine man: “Misquamacus.” The nurse reassures Amelia and Harry that Lizzie’s “fits” might have resulted from nothing more than “delayed shock,” although the patient’s failure “to react to ethchlorovynol” has never happened with any other patient and should have rendered Lizzie unconscious “on the count of three” [from a scientific point of view, a medical expert confirms the unusual nature of what has just happened]. As Amelia confides to Harry, she has another theory by which to account for her sister’s strange behavior: In delivering her message, Lizzie was responding to a “post-hypnotic suggestion,” addressed specifically to Amelia and Harry, which is why Misquamacus chose to strike Lizzie blind: “She’s my sister. She was bait” [this obvious note of foreshadowing maintains the increased level of suspense as readers take note of the narrator’s prediction of a crises in conflict to come].

Chapter 27 (pages 283-284)

Who: President Perry, Harry, Amelia, Belinda Froggatt
What: Amelia and Harry debrief the president about Misquamacus’ attack upon America
When: The last day
Where: Belinda Froggatt’s house
How: Dialogue
Why: Brings completion to the story
Twist: None

After Amelia explains to the president how and why the Algonquin medicine man attacked the United States (to effect vengeance against the European, African, and other immigrants who destroyed his people’s culture and faith), the president assures them that he will do what is necessary to put the pieces of the nation back together and to repair the rift in foreign policy that his unintended insulting of President Petrovsky caused [the president’s reassurances restore the order and security that Misquamacus’ assault on the nation jeopardized]. After breakfast with Brenda, Harry asks Amelia to divorce her husband and marry him, but she refuses [her refusal is honorable and maintains readers‘ respect for her; Harry is already a cad, but a loveable rogue, in spite of his amoral ways, and her refusal suggests the novel’s theme], that civilization is built upon individuals’ remaining true to the choices they make, in being committed to their promises: “Sometimes, Harry, when you’ve made a choice in life, you have to stick with it. Where would we be, if we didn’t?” she says, before adding, “Let’s get back to civilization.”

According to the novel’s flyleaf, “It appears that the Algonquin medicine man Misquamacus has come back to life to seek a final devastating revenge against the white man who massacred his people, and tried to eradicate their religions and culture forever.” By withholding the cause of the mysterious and bizarre events that comprise the beginning chapters of the novel, Masterton maintains suspense and readers’ interest in why the plot’s incidents are happening and what ties them together. (Unfortunately, the revelation of the cause on the novel’s flyleaf undermines this source of suspense, of course, but at least readers will want to learn how the medicine man seeks to accomplish this purpose.)

If, in reading how Masterton advances the plot of Blind Panic and creates and maintains his readers’ interest in continuing to read their novel, you would like to know the outcome of the action, this writer has done a good job in generating and continuing your suspense.