This week, I offered the folks over at Apex Book Company a blog post entitled, “Why Do Some Horror Authors Write about Rape, Incest and Abuse?“ This was a sensitive topic to write about, and I found out after the article was published that I made a slight oversight in the post.

My goal for this article, was not to provide a definitive “answer” on this subject, but to facilitate discussion and to get people really thinking about writing for “shock” value or how they might address serious issues like rape, incest and abuse.

Let’s take a look at a quote:

Good horror stories can cause a reader to react in a number of different ways. They can jump out of their chair, groan in disgust or feel their skin crawl. Fear, however, isn’t the only emotion a reader can feel. They can also feel empathy for a character, anger because the villain got away, or sadness because a victim died. These reactions occur as a result of the story’s pacing or description; an author’s goal is to help guide the reader through a broad range of reactions so that the reader won’t put their book down.–SOURCE: “Why Do Some Horror Authors Write about Rape, Incest and Abuse?“

If this topic interests you, there’s a lot of comments and interesting discussion on the post that you might want to check out. As I mentioned earlier, I firmly believe that there aren’t definitive answers to my question. I just feel it’s a question worth exploring.