{"id":162657670,"date":"2025-10-08T07:30:00","date_gmt":"2025-10-08T12:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/?p=162657670"},"modified":"2025-10-08T09:17:05","modified_gmt":"2025-10-08T14:17:05","slug":"sub-genre-slam-two-ways-of-looking-at-hauntings-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/?p=162657670","title":{"rendered":"Sub-Genre Slam! Two Ways Of Looking At Hauntings Edition"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h6 class=\"wp-block-heading\">&#8220;&#8216;This house is haunted,&#8217; Claire says. &#8216;I know if is,&#8217; the babysitter says. &#8216;I used to live here.'&#8221; &#8211; Kelly Link, &#8220;The Specialist&#8217;s Hat&#8221;<\/h6>\n\n\n\n<p>First of all, Brendan and I hope you&#8217;re enjoying <em>Behind With Knife<\/em>! I want to keep this space relatively spoiler-free, but there was some excitement on Monday, with Chapter 6. If you haven&#8217;t been reading? It&#8217;s never too late to catch up!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/?p=162657621\">Chapter 1<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/?p=162657628\">Chapter 2<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/?p=162657647\">Chapter 3<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/?p=162657652\">Chapter 4<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/?p=162657660\">Chapter 5<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/?p=162657666\">Chapter 6<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/?p=162657668\">Chapter 7<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/?p=162657671\">Chapter 8<\/a> |<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Don&#8217;t forget that TONIGHT, yes TONIGHT, October 8th, is our fall reading at Rivers &amp; Roads Caf\u00e9. We&#8217;ve got readings from Brendan and me, then Lauren Bolger and Theodore C. Van Alst, Jr. It&#8217;s going to be a great time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Oct8square-1-1024x1024.jpg\" alt=\"a flyer reading Lazy &amp; Entitled Presents Scary Stories To Tell In Rogers Park October 8th 7 PM celebrating new books from Theodore C. Van Alst, Jr. Lauren Bolger additional readings by Chris Corlew and Brendan Johnson Rivers &amp; Roads Cafe espresso bar and snacks available 1259 W Devon Ave\" class=\"wp-image-162657674\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Oct8square-1-1024x1024.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Oct8square-1-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Oct8square-1-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Oct8square-1-768x768.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Oct8square-1.jpg 1080w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>In poetry news, Bob and I have a new episode of <em>The Line Break<\/em> up that&#8217;s real fun (<a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/whats-been-making-you-feel\/id1524056726?i=1000730536735\">Apple<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/episode\/6VPnEz9v6fXGFICeJD5tyT?si=iaHIjijZQriLqp01MLxVBQ\">Spotify<\/a>) <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Also, the reading we threw back in June? That&#8217;s now <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=gPMoTDq7UB0&amp;\">on YouTube<\/a>! Thanks to the brilliant and talented Adam Hinkle, who filmed and edited everything. We got readings from Micah Mabey, Sandra Marchetti, Adrian Sobol, Bob Sykora, and me. I&#8217;ll drop it here, too, just in case. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"The First Lazy &amp; Entitled Poetry Reading\" width=\"790\" height=\"444\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/gPMoTDq7UB0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>And now: HAUNTINGS<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"700\" src=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/image.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-162657675\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/image.png 500w, https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/image-214x300.png 214w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">credit: Wikimedia Commons, <a href=\"https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:Ghost_(dark).svg\">Editor B<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Like last week, I\u2019m going to give myself a narrow focus for this topic. I love hauntings. I could go on for days about hauntings. The second short story (and first non-flash, for whatever that\u2019s worth) I ever published was <a href=\"https:\/\/whiskeytit.com\/article\/remodeling\/\">a haunted house story<\/a>. The spark for that story came from a <a href=\"https:\/\/radiolab.org\/podcast\/haunted\">2014 episode of <em>Radiolab<\/em><\/a> that super stuck with me, and I\u2019m not even that big of a <em>Radiolab<\/em> listener. So I\u2019m gonna focus on hauntings through the lens of two Mike Flanagan shows I love, but have only watched once each: <em>The Haunting Of Hill House<\/em> and <em>The Fall Of The House Of Usher<\/em>. Nothing too detailed here, since I\u2019ve only seen both shows once, but mild spoiler warnings. And yes, there will be book recs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"The Haunting of Hill House Season 1 Trailer | Rotten Tomatoes TV\" width=\"790\" height=\"444\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Ce0RQq-rjPk?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>The first way to talk about hauntings is maybe the most classic. You\u2019re trying to live your normal life, but there are ghosts around. Often, you\u2019ve recently moved into a new-to-you home that is an already-old-to-the-ghosts home. One of the best examples of this is a TV show based on a Shirley Jackson novel that I haven\u2019t read: Mike Flanagan\u2019s adaptation of <em>The Haunting Of Hill House<\/em>. Have you watched it? It was everywhere when it came out, and it\u2019s on Netflix. The story centers around a family who, years ago, experienced a pretty bad haunting in a house that they had bought and were renovating. There are layers of ghosts here: now-adult children reliving the events of their childhood, and the physical ghosts that attacked them in childhood. We heard you liked ghosts so we put ghosts on your ghosts, etc etc, yes please. More ghosts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Because ghosts are always a metaphor for what you personally can\u2019t bury, or what society can\u2019t bury and you now have to deal with. Hill House is a personally can\u2019t bury story. I saw a movie once\u2014I\u2019ll keep it nameless for spoilers\u2019 sake\u2014 where a secret room in the basement turned out to be a child abuse torture chamber. That\u2019s\u00a0 an example of society\u2019s inability to bury something. The classic \u201cNative American Burial Ground\u201d trope is the settler-colonialists of the United States trying to handle their generational guilt. In these types of hauntings, ghosts are usually tied to a physical place. Ghosts want something, often for people to atone. Is there a lot that brushes up against this next category I\u2019ve artificially created? Sure!\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Book recs: <em>The Haunting of Hill House<\/em> by Shirley Jackson (I guess! lol), <em>Stranger Than Fiction<\/em> by Kelly Link and <em>The Two Sams<\/em> by Glen Hirshberg (those two are short story collections that I haven&#8217;t read in a while but have ghost stories), kinda <em>The Ballad of Black Tom<\/em> by Victor LaValle. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"The Fall of the House of Usher | Official Trailer | Netflix\" width=\"790\" height=\"444\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/yvuAWVzP6wI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>The second way I want to talk about hauntings is as sin catching up with you. The person being haunted has done something in the past, and now the bill is due. In the excellent <em>Fall Of The House Of Usher<\/em>\u2014which is less an adaptation and more of a remix of a bunch of Edgar Allan Poe stories into a contemporary fairy tale\u2014a brother and sister&#8217;s pharmaceutical empire has been built upon sin. Not just the sin of getting millions of people lethally addicted to prescription drugs, either. I want to keep things vague, but suffice to say that there are simply some evils that can&#8217;t be outrun.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Because there are always consequences for your actions, at least in fiction. It sure feels like a lot of people don&#8217;t see real-life consequences lately\u2014in the United States, you&#8217;ve always been able to buy your way out of any jam. In this new fascist United States, you can also ass-kiss your way out of a jam, or at least get enough fillers in your face that the botulism gets in your brain, <em>They Live<\/em>-style. We&#8217;re talking hauntings, though, and I can&#8217;t help but wonder about the erosion of these elite jagoffs&#8217; souls. The Usher family is portrayed as the richest of the rich. While none of them seem to have much of anything resembling a conscience, there&#8217;s nagging struggle. They are deeply, deeply unwell people. And of course, they <em>do<\/em> pay for their sins, one by one, in thrilling ways. In these types of hauntings, ghosts are chasing a person or people. Ghosts are here to collect a debt, or make you pay for your sins. Is there a lot that brushes up against Faustian bargains in this category? Yes, but I would argue these types of hauntings are distinct from the Great Satan Hisself. It\u2019s more like the ghosts are consequences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>How do I find watching Fall Of The House Of Usher in our new age of wealth inequality and impunity for elites at every turn no matter how evil they reveal themselves to be? Satisfying. Cathartic. Revelatory. Inspiring.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Who says hauntings can\u2019t be positive?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Book recs: <em>Extended Stay<\/em> by Juan Martinez, <em>Mexican Gothic<\/em> by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, <em>The Autumn of the Patriarch <\/em>by Gabriel Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez, <em>The Only Good Indians<\/em> by Stephen Graham Jones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Hey, speaking of hauntings, go watch HAUNT SEASON, starring my dear friend Adam Hinkle and featuring\/directed by Cool Guys Who Come To My Cookouts Sometimes, When Adam Invites Them, Tommy Martin and Jake Jarvi. It\u2019s currently available on Amazon, Tubi, and Pluto TV. Here\u2019s a trailer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Haunt Season (2024) Official Trailer\" width=\"790\" height=\"444\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ajAowc1JYZ4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Sorry you got an email, <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Chris<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;&#8216;This house is haunted,&#8217; Claire says. &#8216;I know if is,&#8217; the babysitter says. &#8216;I used to live here.&#8217;&#8221; &#8211; Kelly Link, &#8220;The Specialist&#8217;s Hat&#8221; First of all, Brendan and I [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":162657675,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,169,10],"tags":[181,184,31,178,177,180],"class_list":["post-162657670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-horror","category-shipwrecked-sailor-blog","category-wednesday-column","tag-glen-hirshberg","tag-haunt-season","tag-horror","tag-kelly-link","tag-mike-flanagan","tag-victor-lavalle"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162657670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=162657670"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162657670\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":162657678,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162657670\/revisions\/162657678"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/162657675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=162657670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=162657670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=162657670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}