Tips for Editors New to Horror

In honour of the final day of spooky season, here are some great tips for editors who want to explore the haunting world of horror literature. 

Focus on atmosphere

The setting is important in every story, but more so for horror. It’s quite hard to scare readers, so authors must rely heavily on the ambience, just like haunted houses in amusement parks do. A character walking down a long dark hallway can be interesting, but if they’re also hearing the creaking floorboards above them and can smell the rotten stench of decay, it transforms the scene. 

Conversely, the setting can also create cognitive dissonance (something I find particularly compelling in horror). Characters can be in “safe” environments like their homes, amusement parks, playgrounds or other fun and uplifting places when terror strikes. It’s all the worse for happening somewhere they (and the reader) would never expect. 

Pacing

The crux of any good horror story is the delicate balance of suspense and action. This isn’t the same as a traditional story structure’s rising action and climax; you need to keep the audience invested and actively dreading the next page. 

Authors often rely on sentence structure here: long, drawn-out sentences for building tension and short sentences for the release. 

Understand subgenre expectations

As all seasoned editors know, subgenres play a crucial role. If you’re editing a cosmic horror story (think H.P. Lovecraft’s Call of Cthulhu where the creature is so inhuman that trying to fathom it fractures your sanity), you’ll be dealing with a completely different beast than a monster-of-the-week anthology. In the former, expect a lot of monologues, descents into madness and minimal description of the entity, often in the first person present tense. The latter, not so much. It’s essential to research the subgenre if you’re not familiar with it!

Research cultural context

One of my favourite things about the horror genre is how much it encompasses. People around the world find different concepts scary. I love dissecting what I (an American) find scary versus what people in other countries see as horrifying. 

If you’re working on a story from someone and thinking it doesn’t seem that scary, ask the writer who their intended audience is. They could be from a culture where this monster or concept is terrifying. 

Prepare for gore

Gore isn’t a foregone conclusion in horror stories. In fact, some of the scariest stories sidestep it entirely by merely implying what’s going to happen. That can be effective, but most writers enjoy a bit of blood and guts. As editors, we sometimes have to set aside our sense of good taste and focus on what the authors (and readers) want to see. 

Additionally, some horror stories touch on things that go beyond gore and may be outside your comfort zone. Authors typically list content warnings when recruiting an editor, but you might encounter topics like sexual assault, stalking, kidnapping, psychological or physical torture, and other unsavory elements. If an author doesn’t provide a list, you can always ask for one. Depending on how heavily these topics feature, you may wish to recommend a sensitivity reader to the author or publisher. 

It’s important to check in with yourself before and during work. Remember, it’s okay to turn down a project that features something you find distressing. Your well-being is just as important as the work you do! 

The chilling conclusion

Editing horror literature isn’t terribly different from other types of stories. Like all genres, the best way to start is by reading. I’d recommend short stories. Found an author you like? Go through, line by line, and interrogate the text. How did they make it scary? How did they build tension? Did they focus on description or leave things up to the reader’s imagination? Take notes on what aspects you think work well and keep them around to recommend to authors as you work with them. 

Just because the stories are scary doesn’t mean editing them has to be! 

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