gwendolynkiste

In Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897), Mina Harker makes it to the final battle against the vampire, even though she fell victim to his bite along the way. Her best friend Lucy Westenra wasn’t that lucky. A vivid character in her own right, she succumbs to Dracula and becomes a vampire. Even more disturbingly, she preys upon children. The methods the men use to stop her are gruesome: she is staked, and her head is removed. To top it all off, the men seem more disgusted by her forward and unladylike behavior as a monster than by her vampiric exploits. In Gwendolyn Kiste’s story “The 8 People Who Murdered Me (Excerpted from Lucy Westenra’s Diary),” we get Lucy’s story from her perspective. She breaks down how she became a victim and almost “a footnote in a story that’s not my own,” but it turns out that Lucy may use her immortality to take control of a life that wasn’t necessarily hers while she was mortal.  

Links mentioned in ep:

The story:

https://www.nightmare-magazine.com/fiction/the-eight-people-who-murdered-me-excerpt-from-lucy-westenras-diary/

On Lucy Westenra's character:

https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/why-do-so-many-dracula-adaptations-screw-over-lucy-westenra

 Recommended in this episode: W. Scott Poole's Wasteland

On  the next episode: Elsa Lanchester and The Bride of Frankenstein

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Our social media is @MonsterWrote on Twitter and Instagram. Our email is monsterwrote@gmail.com. This episode was produced and researched by Lisa and Mel. Theme music is “Misconception” by Nicolas Gasparini, used with permission. 

Gwendolyn Kiste (author of And Her Smile Will Untether the Universe) and I talk about what makes body horror so appealing, why traditional family structures are so terrifying, and how to update fairy tales for the modern era.

Eric and Dizzy (a writer and advocate for victims of domestic violence) discuss Gwendolyn Kiste's thematically rich story "Skin Like Honey and Lace." They also discuss their experiences with Skinder, a new app pairing people who have too much skin with people who have too little.

Note: apologies for our mispronunciation of Kiste's name!

Special Guest Cullen Bunn joins us to discuss his work on Valiant Comics' forthcoming relaunch of Shadowman, which two classic horror movies have most shaped his approach to the horror genre, and Karl Edward Wagner's classic short story, "Hell Creek," for our spoiler-filled discussion of the week. We also sound off on the Director's Cut of Dr. Sleep, the first three releases in Unnerving's Rewind or Die series of novellas, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, Hill House Comics, and Gwendolyn Kiste's latest charitable chapbook from Nightscape Press, The Invention of Ghosts.

The theme music, "Insidious," was created by Purple Planet Music and is used here under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution License 3.0.

Music: https://www.purple-planet.com

Follow Staring Into The Abyss on Twitter: @intostaring