To liven up your disturbing writing, try to avoid or warp the following over-used tropes when it comes to horror and Nefarious Darkness:
• A main character who is a teenage human girl and just happens to get into a relationship with a vampire (sparkly or not) and / or a werewolf. It’s easy to make vampires and werewolves sexy and attractive, because it’s practically part of the public Id or Unconscious by this point. Try something more challenging, like a zombie. Or a haggis.
• Haunted houses with bats, spiderwebs, and ghosts that shake chains and moan. (Moaning, moaning, moaning, they’re never satisfied!)
• Slasher-esque dollops of blood and gore just for the shock factor.
• The creepy tale takes place on either Friday the 13th or around Halloween. Why not some other time, like Pancake Day? Or Star Wars Day (which is tomorrow, at the time of writing this).
• The protagonists decide to split up when it’s NOT a good idea to. It’s a wonder they can’t hear the readers screaming “NO, NO, NO, YOU IDIOTS! SAFETY IN NUMBERS!” (Or is there?)
• Some daft beggar gets hold of a Ouija board or a book of evil chants or something and summons a demon / poltergeist / evil entity which then possesses them and / or other people and generally has a grand old time playing spiritual practical jokes. (Why did they pick the Ouija game as the source of this evil? Why not something the whole family can play, like Snakes & Ladders? Or Ludo…)
• “Found footage” stories where the story is told from the POV of a character who witnesses something strange and scary, or finds documented evidence of such.
• The antagonist won’t die or is supernaturally difficult to kill. Like that teacher you hated back in school who wouldn’t stop giving you homework and impromptu quizzes. They’re always the ones who are never off sick, even if they have the Plague.
• Losing a mobile phone signal just when you need help or rescuing from someone or something. It’s the cut-off-ness and isolation that causes the fear, just try to introduce that into the story in a different way.
• The protagonists are a group of naïve teenagers / young people who get murdered at a summer camp or during a sleepover at a haunted house. Horror isn’t just for the young or the criminally insane. Satan has an equal opportunities policy.
• The antagonist or protagonist is a witch / ghost / zombie / werewolf / vampire.
• Scary clowns, or murderous clowns, or scary murderous clowns.
• The sound of children’s laughter (or a little girl’s laughter / singing) used in a sinister / menacing situation to make it “creepier.” The eidolons possessing haunted houses don’t run crèches.
• The protagonist / victim is a vapid woman, usually blonde and big-breasted, who wanders around in a dark house doing unwise things like calling out “Who’s there?” or descending the stairs into the basement without turning any of the lights on.
• An experiment gone wrong / an unethical or downright evil experiment goes wrong (or even right). E.g. Frankenstein or Jekyll & Hyde.
• Angry mobs.
• Some kind of priest or church person either gets slaughtered or has to face off against a terrible, hellish creature.
• People run around in a spooky forest in the dark, waving flashlights and shouting. (After-school detention cross-country practice inflicted by a sadistic sports teacher, anyone?)
• The monster dies or is saved by the “love of a good woman.” This is the kind of attitude that attracts weirdos to online dating. Please, don’t do it.
Nightwalks 