Blog Set # 13

For my readers choice I am doing Demons. I know covered ghosts but I think the most popular supernatural spirits these days are definitely demons. I think they are scarier than normal ghosts because they are not human and can often times cause harm and take over the bodies of its victims. Most movies todays don't have a haunted house of just a dead person they almost always involve the work 0of some sort of no0n human presence praying on the people living in the home. The novel I picked was the Exorcist by Willi8am Peter Beatty. This book is terrifying and the movie was one of the first horror films I ever saw which is probably why I have such a love for the genre. It is very well written and the book inspired the movie which started an epidemic and widespread fear of possession and demons. It is an iconic piece of work and a great scare.

Blog Set # 12

                                                        Premature Burial
I think the medical condition in the story Premature burial cold have been very real. There are many documented cases of premature burials ad diseases which often time mimicked signs of death. I could never imagine waking up in a coffin already in the ground and not being able to do anything about stopping my death. That has to be one of the scariest things to ever go through because all you can do is lay there and wait and suffer while your body gives out.  In the story much like people centuries ago the character was obsessed with death and making sure that he took precautions to never be buried alive. Ultimately he wakes up one day thinking he is buried alive when he is actually on a boat. It must have been a horrible time period when people actually had a legitimate fear of waking up in a coffin. In current times that seems so bizarre and so far fetched its hard to think of that ever happening. Even though it is unlikely now the fear is still there do to the fact that it could happen on purpose instead of on accident like most cases.

                                                          The Monkeys Paw

 The story of the monkeys paw has a always been a good read for me. There are many mystery in the story and the reader is never sure if there are actual supernatural elements happening or just weird coincidences. In the story a man obtains a magic monkey paw meant to grant three wishes. He makes a wish for two hundred pounds and the next day he is informed that he son was killed in a factory accident and for their troubles the factory will give them two hundred pounds. The man is horrified and refuses to believe that he caused his sons death by wishing for the money but his wife is so distraught she blames her husband for the death of their son. She makes her husband wish that her son was alive again that night when they are in bed and in the middle of the night they hear a banging sound on the door The wife is convinced it is he dead son so she runs to the door to try and let him in, knowing how disfigured his son was thru husband is terrified to see him and does not want his son back. The knocking grows mo9re violent and the man makes a final wish on the paw and the noises stop as soon as he does. When the wife finally gets to the door there is no one there it is just darkness. I think this story did have supernatural elements to it rather than just coincidence because of how the background history of the paw and the fact that there would be too much coincidence for all of the mans wishes to come true every time he made a wish. Although it could have been just the wind knocking on the door what are the chances that on the night that he made a wish the win would have been that violent sounding to wake them up? The sons death and the two hundred pound grant the factory gave the family could just be a tragic mishap that happened but the specific amount the man wished for matching thru factories payment it a little to eerie to be called coincidence.

Annabel Lee

The tone of this poem is romantic and loving but also very dark and tragic. Its about the death of a woman that the narrator loved dry much. He blames her death on the angels getting envious over their powerful love for each other. The rhyming and way this poem is written however gives the poem a joyful tone. Its beastie and romantic and is instead of being somber and sad is remembering this beautiful woman in a loving way. Even after the death of this woman the narrator still describes their love as powerful and something to be envious of. I love this poem because of how romantic it is. The repetition creates a constant flow and the repeating of her name signifies the importance that she had to the narrator. I knew this poem sounded familiar and I did some researching and found it in the movie holes.I love that this poem was used in this movie romance because in the movie a couple has a great love and then is torn apart by death because of an envious man just like in the poem.

Blog Post #11

                                                                       BerniceOnce again I feel super biased about this story because I literally love everything Poe writes but I can't help but like this story a little too much for how violent and a little twisted it is. This story really got my attention because of how violent it is without necessarily being really violent. It skips the details of the actual acts but you're still able to get the full feeling of uncomfortableness just by his use of language afterwards. The line  "Why... did the hairs of my head erect themselves on end, and the blood of my body become congealed within my veins?" is a great one in the story because Poe does not include a scene of teeth pulling and violence but instead an eerie unknown after thought of the narrator. Another spine tingling element of this story was that the Poor cousin Bernice was actually a live when found mutilated. This story is very dark and really draws the line between love and unhealthy obsession,

                                                  The Furnished Room             
I really liked this story and the way it was written giving small clues one by one. The plot twist at the end about his lost sweetheart killing herself in the same room her did gave the story a romantically tragic twist. I think this story definitely reflects the authors negative way of thinking about city living by saying in this story that city living can somewhat be cruel just like the people living in the city and that there is no room for romance or love when living in such a transient setting. This story almost reminds me of Romeo and Juliet because of the tragic end to a young love. A young boy is dying to find his lost love in the city and end up killing himself in the same room that she tragically took her life in a week earlier. The Lady in charge of renting out rooms failed to tell him that she had rented a room to his love when he asked because she did not want to lose his money by saying that someone died in his room which is a reflection of the greed and dishonesty many people display in this world.

                                                        The Boarded Window
In this story there was anything supernatural going on.  The wife was never fully dead and the panther came in through the window to get her and in order to save herself she fought for her life and attacked back at the panther taking off some of its ear and making it bleed. The wife not being dead is further confirmed because of the fresh blood that is found and dead bodies do not bleed. The man in fear of the panther returning then boards up the window. In this story the reader is lead to believe that there are supernatural occurrences happening in the beginning of the story because of the husband failing in his burial rituals and that it is night time when the wife is presumably coming back from the dead so the reader is left wondering what possibly could have been strong enough to move a table without being seen. I liked this story a lot because of the twist at the end and again not knowing all the details until the end of the story. It was a fun read and just further condemned by believing that living in isolation in the woods is a good idea.

Blog Post #10

                                      Fall of the House of Usher
Edgar Allen Poe is one of my favorite writers of all time. He makes reading scary stories enjoyable and its no wonder that The Fall of the House of Usher was one o9f the first stories to really set a typical setting for the "Haunted House". Horror fans owe much to Poe because of his writing and the way it has shaped the settings and stories of their favorite movies and stories after his work. In this story it plays with the readers mind not giving them full disclosure if the house is really haunted or if Roderick is a vampire. Realistically he is not but the reader is given all kinds of clues that he could possibly be one. I like this element of the story because cheap scares and gore are not the only way to freak someone out. The unknown is most times the most terrifying as well as psychological games. This also allows the reader to make the story what they would like to believe as it goes a long. This story really set the framework for the look an feel of the scary house that we think of today and for that reason alone I really liked this story. How could I not its by my main man Poe.

                                                                      Afterward
The story afterwards I think definitely falls under the definition of "American Gothic" Because it has so many of the definitions features. The whole story is mentioned with darkness, hidden passageways, ghosts, the past coming back in a horrible way. The setting of the story also shared many characteristics with American Gothic stereotypes because of how it is described to be in disrepair and in a beat up state. The characters somewhat fall in love with the dilapidated house which goes back to the dark romances of the American Gothics definition. This story almost finds beauty in the supernatural and the broken down. I really liked this story because of the unknown factor. Making the reader think I think is always on of the best things a writer could do in one of their books. The hints of foreshadowing in the story also made it very enjoyable to read because it gives the reader clues and the ability to try and solve the mystery for themselves.

Blog Post #8

Well, I don't even know where to begin with this story and how much I disliked it. For me this story lacked any enjoyment or elements that makes a story fun to read. In the story Dora  was not really a woman despite haying all characteristics of one and Don was not really a man. I was just very confused the whole time as to what was happening and why there were no actual woman or men in the world. The whole thing seemed jumbled and jumpy and for me was not a pleasurable story to read. I will thank the author for warning readers in the beginning but even then I did not expect to dislike it as much as I did. This definitely was not a conventional love story because after try got married after speaking one time they never saw each other again. This made the story end very abruptly and not have any details about their life together. Usually if you marry someone its because you would like to spend time with them but for this couple they got married and then just decided to download each other whenever they needed love. I just found the whole story a little bizarre. This story dos howler make the reader think about what humans really think makes a woman a woman and a man a man. Even though Dora had all the characteristics of a woman she had a double x which means she was truly a male. SO what does this mean she really is? And Don even though he was male he almost wasn't even human anymore so was he robotic or an actual human. Again although this story raised god questions I didn't like the execution at all.

Now the story When it Changed I did like. I think it definitely reflects the patriarchal society we live in in this world and the idea that women in some men's eyes are helpless and need a man to have a full life. In this story all the men were wiped out by a plague and women built a new society where they are hunters and mothers and adventurers. All of a sudden men from earth come to this planet and look at this all female society and are kind of condescending towards them and just see them women to have babies with. In the story the men say that there is now equality on earth and I like that the characters did not totally believe them because they could tell the men were still only seeing them as women to have children with. I'm not saying that men are useless and we will never need them in the future but I like that this story has female characters that are independent and strong and breaking stereotypes that are often found in stories about women being in distress and only men being able to save the day.

Blog Post # 7

The story " We can Remember it for you Wholesale" was a great story. It had a lot of twists and turns and you could never really determine what was  true or not. The concept of having artificial memories plated in our minds is a crazy thing to think about. It could be possible one day but I think it a horrible idea. We would never know what was real or fake ever again. I go crazy trying to figure out if an experience I think I had actually happened was a dream or real so I could no imagine having a fake memory put in my head of something that never happened. I also don't like the fact that this technique is being used to deceive others as well. Even though the person with the fake memory is not aware that they are lying the people around them are being given actual planted proof of what the other thinks they did. I wouldn't want to live in a place where everyone is saying they did things they didn't actually do. As horrible of an idea that this is it is also very cool. Being able to have memories of something that I know I would never be able to do is a new way to experience joy in life. It is true that as we get older we lose memories of things we experienced and its almost like it never happened. Having fake memories implanted would be basically the same thing. We wouldn't remember actually participating in this particular even just the memories that we take from it. Being able to actually believe I went to mars would be cool but at the end of the day nothing beats true life experiences and the feeling of actually being somewhere.

Blog Post #6

In the story "Computer Friendly" we are getting the story from the perspective of Elizabeth, a seven year old girl. By telling the story from her point of view I think it makes the story a bit more relatable And gives this very dark story line a lighter more naïve tone. The Asia center is a perfect example of the making a morbid place very light hearted because its a very common thing for children to misheard a word and then make up a new word based on what they thing was said. They know that they will be sent there to "sleep" and all the children are naïve enough to believe that is what's going to happen. If this story was from a older perspective it definitely would had been more morbid because any adult would know what really happens at the Asia sentence. I think telling form a Childs view hits the reader even harder in a more emotional sense.  Children are often seen as a symbol of hope and when you have a society that is killing off their children that's how you know things have gone terribly wrong somewhere in history. In this story and also so the story "Burning Chrome" technology has taken over the lives of the people of the world and interfered with their lives often times not for the better. Just like in "Computer Friendly" Elizabeths mom was constantly connected to a computer in order to feed it data and in "Burning Chrome" the main character had computer connectors in his arm when he took off his fake arm. These societies are completely engulfed in technology instead of real life experiences. In both stories none of these societies haven gotten better from the advances in technology and it almost as if these writers knew that one day technology would run the world and make things worse for the world. I take these as warning and even though they may seem almost in possible a bit exaggerated weirder things do happen.

Blog Set #5

In both the stories "Reason" and "Super-Toys Last All Summer Long" the idea of robots and non human forms of life are brought into the world that we live in. They are not average robots set out to perform a job but life like human simulators who are capable of thought and understanding. These were both written in times when robots did not exist yet today we are seeing real life examples of these stories coming to life. In Modern technology there are robots everywhere. In factories on the assembly line, in war, and in space Although these may not be human robots they have lead to the creation of many life like robots that talk and act like humans. I think it is amazing that 50+ years ago even though this kind of technology didn't exists these writers were still able to think about one day living In a world where robots are present. This kind of technology definitely shapes the way our societies function because most things these days are able to be done by computers instead of people. Humans are not having to do the work once required to do certain tasks like they were 30 year's ago. Although this saves time and is often more efficient its changing the way our brains work and out ability to solve things on out own. When technology makes everything available to us first hand we no longer have to put thought or effort into things which could possibly end up hurting humans in the end. If technology out smarts us then who knows maybe something like iRobot could happen in the future. This is an example of one of the many realistic robots being produced.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXaaprU9DhY. From far away you can barely tell it is not a real human. With technology advancing there might be a day where it is almost impossible to tell the difference.

Update Post : 🐸

WARNING: Possibly the most foolish story to ever exist.
Character: Spencer Johnson, 27
Dreams of moving to Japan to train Shiba Inus
Flaw: Self Centered
End of World Disaster: Virus turns everyone to frogs🐸

Spencer Johnson was a normal 27 year old man that had dreams of one day moving to Japan and training Shba Inus. In order to obtain that lifestyle he works full time at a shoe shining store in downtown Miami, FL. One day while working at the shoe shine he came across an old woman looking to get her sons shoes shined for a school dance. She was dressed like and old witch and looked like she hasn't bathed or brushed her hair in her entire life. Jowl she has a child while he didn't he could not fathom.  While shining her shoes Spencer was to busy looking at himself in the mirror to notice that he accidentally used brown shiner on her black shoes! He panicked trying to fix his mistake but it was too late the shoes were ruined. Although Spencer should have tried to fix his mistake or at least find new shoes he figured that the stress alone was punishment enough and he decided to go get what he thought was a well deserved massage. After an hour of pure relaxation Spencer returned to his shop where he saw the old woman standing at the register talking to his assistant Monroe. Not wanting to stress himself out again he asked Monroe to please deal with this customer. Poor Monroe had no idea what he was getting himself into when he agreed. As he brought out the shoes the old woman face went from slightly disturbing to look at to almost unhuman. She blamed the entire shop for ruining her sons life and proceeded to place a hex on the entire store and all who worked there. The hex was a virus that turned anyone within 5 feet of anyone infected into a frog. The virus spread all over the world, changing everyone into an amphibian. A webbed toe here a webbed finger there. After about a year and a half the world was ridden with frogs and there were thousands of untrained Shibas running around Japan just looking for a trainer. Amongst all the frogs Spencer was always recognizable because he was constantly staring at his reflection in the pond and ribbiting on about how fantastic his lily pad was.

Blog Set #4

When reading the star I found it slightly boring because it took so long for anything to actually happen and it was already determined that it wasn't going to actually hit the earth. There was also no plans to try and prevent anything bad from happening which I found very interesting. In not having a rescue mission or one single hero I feel like the author was trying to unite humanity and show everyone on the same level as each other. In life there are some things that are inevitable and for the world this was one of them. Instead of separating a select few or just one from the rest of the world and raising them above he chose to unite everyone on the basis that this was something the world was going to have to face together. As much as I did not like this story  I did like the messages of unity and togetherness of the world.


I found the story speech sounds very interesting. It showed the downfall of the world after communication was wiped out completely. The world became animalistic and almost primal as people were not able to communicate their true thoughts or wants because of a virus. It was an every man for himself type of world where a simple wrong movement could have caused a fight. The importance of communication and language is highlighted in the story and shows how important the spoken language is when dealing with all people. I thought at then end of the story when Rye found the children that were able to speak it created a glimmer of hope that one day the world would be able to be a place like it was before this virus hit. One of the lines that really hit me was when it was said that if a woman was raped no one would help her. This real demonstrated how afraid and how reserved people were to help others because of the possibility of being killed or causing another fight. The cop that still worse his uniform really intrigued me because even though no one else knew what it meant he did and he almost felt like it was his duty to protect and serve these people that did not want be served or helped.  This also showed hope that people would still hold true to the old life they knew and would one day be able to bring those old ways into the new world they are building.

Blog Set #3

The story " That Only a Mother" is definitely and interesting one. The entire story is told from the mothers point of view and although she is a little frantic and paranoid we can't help but think that it might just be the nerves of an expecting mother. We build sympathy for her because her husband is at war and she seems to have a hard time with rude nurses at the hospital and her own mother is giving her a hard time about the possibility that her baby might have a mutation due to the radiation from the war. When the baby is finally born we get the firs hint that something is off when she starts to develop really rapid. She is able to able to have full conversations when not even a year old. I couldn't tell at first whether or not this was the mothers delusion or if it was really happening. The ending really gave me an unsettling feeling because all signs point to the fact that the father killed the child when he saw that she had no limbs at that his wife was in denial that her daughter had a mutation. I liked this story because it gave an alternate twist on a real life event so it almost makes it like it could have been real life if things had gone differently in history.

I was not a fan of the story " We See Things Differently". It did have a good plot twist at the end but the whole story through out was not pleasurable for me to read. I don't know if it was because I was too tired when I read it but it was kind of hard to follow. One thing I did like about it though was that Americas new hero was a rock star type figure. I think it pinpoints Americans tendency to idolize pop culture icons more than our political figures. This man Tom Boston is the new hero of the American people and is trying to raise the spirits of the country after America fell in power.  Charlie is a journalist from the middle east and is trying to get an interview with Tom Boston for his magazine. At the end of the story we find out that Charlie is a martyr and poisons Tom Boston and himself with cocaine that causes cancer. This is similar to Americas Presidents being assassinated over time because certain groups would like to see America be a strong leader in the world.

My cat thinks its fun to cuddle with my syllabus while I try and do my work.

Blog Post #2👽👾

So I just finished reading "Passengers" and I must say it was a very cool story. I liked the way it doesn't come right out and describe them as typical aliens👽. The fact that the passengers are invisible and can strike at any moment really adds to the suspense of the story. One of the things that I took away from this story was that no matter what bad things may be happening in life and even though things could change in an instant it doesn't mean that you should stop your life and live in fear. The passengers being invisible can also be seen as I events in life because you can never really see them coming. In "Passengers" the people of earth live in constant fear of being what they describe as ridden by these aliens👽 that they no longer bother developing relationships with other humans or living their lives to their full potential. During the period in which these people are taken over by these aliens👽 they no longer have control over their body and have no memory of anything they did while they were taken over. Although this is kind of extreme I see a definite relation between this story and real life. Nothing in life is ever certain or for sure. Anything could happen and change our lives forever but the unknown should not stop us from living to the fullest. Instead of living in fear these people in the story should have taken control of their lives and not let these passengers win completely. Take advantage of each free moment they had in order to create as many happy memories while they were still alive. My favorite part of the story however is the slight plot twist at the end. Here we think that maybe the character might be able to somehow beat these aliens👽 and find a way to live a happy life and then he is taken over right as he is beginning to win his loves trust back. We the readers never find out what happened between the two lovers however and as much as I wish we could find out what happened, the cliffhanger ending was definitely the best way to let the reader finish the story for themselves.

As for the story "Out of All Them Bright Stars" I wasn't as big of a fan. It did have a lot of meaning to it though. It definitely pointed out to humans way of judging and being afraid of new things. Although this other life form was just looking for some food and trying to be as normal as possible the owner did not want to serve him because his skin was a different color than his This made me think of the civil rights movement and how unfairly people with darker skin tones were treated and how just horrible and ridiculous that way of thinking is. I did admire the main character for wanting to stick up to her boss but by the end of the story she starts to take on a negative view of these visitors just like her boss. People need to be more accepting and open to change if we are ever going o be truly happy and live in a world where things are not so hostile and uptight all the time. 👽

Blog Post #1

Hi, my name is Cailin I’m 20 years old and I’ve been a horror fanatic for the majority of my life. It started out with a small fascination with ghosts and the paranormal and then took off into loving all types of scares. Edgar Allan Poe has been one of my favorite authors since I was about 11 and has driven my love for reading horror or mystery type stories. I've always been a ghost nerd and the rush from reading a scary story is or seeing a scary movie is what draws me to the horror genre.  In this class I hope to further my love and knowledge on the horror genre as well as broadening my knowledge on the sci-fi and fantasy genres. Some of the things I hope to view for my watch list are things along the paranormal and horror lines. This gif always gets me really creeper out so naturally its my favorite. :-)