Welcome back to another week of writing and reading the dark and dreadful. Horror fiction is a beast with many faces—psychological, supernatural, cosmic—and as writers, we’re not just telling scary stories. We’re excavating fear. We’re shaping unease into narrative. This week, let’s talk about restraint.
One of the most effective tools in horror isn’t the monster. It lies in what we don’t show. The cracked door. A sound in the dark. The dread that creeps in when readers start imagining things for themselves. Horror lives in the negative space.
In cinema this can be even more effective, when we can see the effect a monster has on screen, but never know what it is. Think The Blair Witch Project or The Others. Shirley Jackson’s famous book The Haunting of Hill House (really gothic horror in general) famously uses atmosphere to build unrelenting dread. We never see what the monster is, and in the end we wonder if any of it was real, or if the characters were insane all along.
This week’s prompt:
A character moves into a new apartment and notices that something about the space is off. Not haunted in the traditional sense—no footsteps, no voices. Just an uncanny feeling that something about the place is wrong. A patch of wall that seems too wide. A corner that feels too sharp. A silence when they stand in certain places.
As time goes on, they begin to suspect that there's something there. Not visible, not tangible, but present. They can't describe it, only what it isn't. The fear builds not from discovery, but from absence.
Challenge: Write a monster scene, but never explicitly describe the entity or its origin. Use spatial cues, sensory dissonance, and character reaction to imply its presence. Let the reader feel its shape through what’s missing.
The Weekly Digest
A selection of last week’s memorable Macabre Monday offerings:
- gave us the horrifying perspective of watching someone walk a mile in your…skin
- shared chapter 3 of her soon to be published book on Scandinavian werewolves.
- posted an atmospheric, poetic horror tale, “The Queen.”
- shared his contribution to the Small & Scary/Big & Beastly event!
If you haven’t had the chance yet, please don’t forget to check out the Small & Scary / Big & Beastly community event! More than 20 rising horror and dark fantasy writers shared their stories! Dig in!
Great prompt!
Appreciate the Small & Scary shoutout! The Macabre Monday team does so much for the horror community on Substack. Thank you!!