Greetings everypony! I am currently working on an idea for a story that chronicles my OCs camping in the woods and getting attacked by a fierce and ominous creature and I want to make sure I do this story/genre justice considering I've never really written anything of this type before. Would any of you out there happen to have any tips or advice to offer me with regards to writing horror/thriller/mystery fics? I will accept any and all tips I can get, but some of my main concerns are as follows:

• Setting up the OCs: I understand that incorporating an OC's entire backstory/scope of personality generally should not be a main focus behind these types of stories, but considering the average reader would not be too familiar with them, exactly how much of a background into my OCs would be appropriate?
• Choice of perspective: At this moment, I am thinking that third-person perspective would be better since I would like to focus on each character equally rather than viewing it entirely from one person; then again, I've listened to several Creepypastas that use the first-person perspective rather effectively, but what do you guys think? Also, how would one use either perspective to effectively tell the story?
• Cliches to avoid: As a relatively beginner fanfic writer, I feel like I am naturally drawn to including certain cliches in my stories, regardless of the subject matter, because I believe such tropes are recognizable and therefore popular. I was curious to know if there were any cliches related to this subject matter that I should avoid when writing my story? (I cannot think of any off the top of my head since I typically don't read/watch many scary and horror stories/movies)

I apologize if this thread seems a bit lengthy, but I am genuinely curious to hear what you have to say on the subject so that I can better develop my writing skills on this site. Thanks!

J.D. (John Darkblaze)

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Hey, sorry it took me so long to comment on this thread. I meant to respond earlier but I was busy with other things at the time. But anyway, here's my two cents on the things you were asking for advice on:

•Setting up the OCs: I understand that incorporating an OC's entire backstory/scope of personality generally should not be a main focus behind these types of stories, but considering the average reader would not be too familiar with them, exactly how much of a background into my OCs would be appropriate?

Based on my own experience of given some OCs--a couple of pro-wrestlers named Highflyer (a flightless pegasus) and Screwjob (an earth pony)--a fairly major part in The Ponies who Played with Fire, I would suggest you start things off by giving the readers enough information to physically picture the OCs, then sprinkle in little bits of their backstory etc. here at there as your main story progresses. That way it can make the readers feel like they're getting little pieces of a puzzle that they're putting together to as they get to know the characters rather than starting off with a big info dump telling them everything about the characters.

•Choice of perspective: At this moment, I am thinking that third-person perspective would be better since I would like to focus on each character equally rather than viewing it entirely from one person; then again, I've listened to several Creepypastas that use the first-person perspective rather effectively, but what do you guys think? Also, how would one use either perspective to effectively tell the story?

It depends on what you're trying to accomplish with your choice of narration. Could you give a bit more information, such as how many characters you were thinking of focusing on?

•Cliches to avoid: As a relatively beginner fanfic writer, I feel like I am naturally drawn to including certain cliches in my stories, regardless of the subject matter, because I believe such tropes are recognizable and therefore popular. I was curious to know if there were any cliches related to this subject matter that I should avoid when writing my story? (I cannot think of any off the top of my head since I typically don't read/watch many scary and horror stories/movies)

I don't consider myself a horror fan, but I do enjoy a well-done scary story every once in a while, and in my opinion the trick to doing a good scary story is giving the readers characters they want to root for, rather then worrying about clichés. The Conjuring, a horror movie I actually really like and would recommend is a fairly by-the-book haunted house-type story, but the reason it works as well as it does is because I cared about the people in the story. I wanted them to survive the terrifying situation. However, one cliché I'd suggest you try to avoid is "gore=scary." (Another reason the Conjuring is so good is because it relies on creepy atmosphere far far far more than it does on gore to get scares.) I've seen my share of writers who seem to grab the "gore=scary" idea and run with it, stuffing so much gore into their stories that it just feels gratuitous rather than effective. Yes, that is definitely one area where less is more.

Please let me know if this was any help, or if you have anything else you were wondering about. Thank you.

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Thank you, this was a great help! The way I originally outlined this concept was exactly how you mentioned with the "big info dump" at the beginning, so I'll be sure to change that now. I agree with your point about "gore=scary" as I don't particularly care for those stories nor was I going to include any in this story (or the potential sequel).

To answer your question about narration, I plan to feature my main 4 OCs in the story. One of the things I wanted to have was shifts in focus between each character at different parts of the story without necessarily making the reader feel like they are seeing things directly from their perspective. With that in mind, I think third-person would work best, so I was wondering what your thoughts would be about making such perspective effective in context of the story?

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Sorry, I forgot to hit reply button on this thread. Here's my original response:

Thank you, this was a great help! The way I originally outlined this concept was exactly how you mentioned with the "big info dump" at the beginning, so I'll be sure to change that now.

No problem. Oh, and as a slight side note regarding how and when to sprinkle in background info:
I took a course on novel-writing a while back and one of the things they mentioned is that whenever you're writing a scene, ask yourself if it does any of the following:
1. Advance the plot
2. Enhance the setting (help us picture what's going on around the characters)
3. Deepen characterization (show us some new detail about a character's personality, etc.)

Try to make sure every scene meets at least two of those requirements, though it's even better if the scene can meet all three.

To answer your question about narration, I plan to feature my main 4 OCs in the story. One of the things I wanted to have was shifts in focus between each character at different parts of the story without necessarily making the reader feel like they are seeing things directly from their perspective.

Ah, I believe that's called limited third-person view, where you focus on what a certain character is thinking or feeling even if the character isn't specifically narrating the story to the readers.

With that in mind, I think third-person would work best, so I was wondering what your thoughts would be about making such perspective effective in context of the story?

Hmm, well, that shifting between characters is definitely useful if you happen to have the characters split up and you need to let the readers know what's happening to the individual characters. On the other hand, if they're all together in one group, you probably want to focus on one character's limited third-person view unless the other character's views are also important to see. (For example: In my story The Draconequus with the Dragon Tattoo, I did a fair a bit of hoping back and forth between Fluttershy's and Discord's view points even when it was just the two of them together in the same scene, because I felt it was important the readers know how that scene was affecting each of the characters; whereas later on in The Pegasus who Kicked the Changleings' Hive, I've had several scenes that are told only from Fluttershy's limited third-person view, even though she's with several friends, because it wasn't essential that we get all their view points regarding the scene.) Does that make sense?

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Thank you for getting back to me, you bring up some valid points and more things for me to consider, both for this story as well as any future stories I write. Thanks again for all your help!

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No problem. Happy to help and hope your writing goes well.