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Essay / A contrast between Alden Bell's The Reapers Are Angels and Stephen King's "Salem's Lot" contemporary horror writers, wrote that "the great literature of the supernatural often contains the same syndrome of 'let's slow down and watch the accident.' (King, Nightshift XV). This refers to the guilty fascination readers feel when they are captivated by the gruesome details of horror literature. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Alden Bells' Reapers are the Angels and Stephen King's "Salem's Lot" draw on the phenomenon to create a gripping story. Most people cannot deny that they feel compelled to admire a tragic wreck that is completely out of the ordinary, and this same instinct makes horror literature, such as those mentioned, successful. When in a car accident, survivors worry about their safety and survival and cannot fully understand the details of the situation. Other passersby, however, tend to slow down and look at the wreckage, because they were not in the accident. danger and have the mental capacity to examine the details of the wreck. They can consider and understand the terrifying accident that happened. Likewise, horror novels allow readers to experience the supernatural and the morbid without being overcome by their own fear, but instead can inspect and approach the supernatural and the morbid in a rational manner. Alden Bell's novel The Reapers are the Angels is set in a world of morbidity. . Temple struggles to survive in a world largely overrun by the undead, where "slugs" or "meatskins" hunger for human flesh. She encounters humans, some who help her and others who are enemies, as she moves nomadically across the United States. She distances herself from the characters and refuses to live in a single house, after the death of her younger brother, Malcolm, for which she felt solely responsible. Its world involves constant running and fighting, displaying constant fearlessness, as most readers would not survive a day among the undead. Morbid images, involving human flesh, blood and carcasses, are a reality for Temple. Many parts of the horror novel go into detail about how a human body is torn apart, something an ordinary person would never see or experience. An example of this is when part of Temple's little finger is cut off and she is in the process of repairing it again. “It happened just above the first joint, a sharp cut through the bone that appears as a yellow twig sticking out at the end. She uses her other hand to pull the skin up to the end of the bone and pinch it like a foreskin...now just run a wire through there a few times and tie it off. Everything will be fine. (Bell, The Reapers are the Angels Ch. 4) This situation is truly out of the ordinary for most readers, who would probably not be able to close half of their finger without getting sick. However, Temple's tone makes this seem like a completely normal occurrence. This tone is also expressed when she kills Abraham Todd, thinking, "Why must life and death always be half an inch apart?" She walks over to the desk, takes a ballpoint pen from the drawer, puts the tip of it in her nostril and pushes it sharply and hard with the heel of her hand to keep it from coming back. (Bell, The Reapers are the Angels Ch. 3) Mostpeople are not murderers and would be extremely shocked in such a situation; probably too shocked to recount memories or make snide remarks. Throughout the book, Temple is constantly confronted with dead bodies and other extremely morbid things, which she describes in detail to readers. His reactions and feelings in these situations are rational and calm, or at least calmer than any ordinary person would react. She describes horrific situations in great detail so that readers can understand and experience the situation; neither Temple nor the reader is too overcome by fear to understand the fear situation. Rather, readers are fascinated by the situation, as Stephen King suggests in his foreword to Nightshift's Salem's Lot which illustrates the author's own assertion about horror novels. Ben Mears, the main character of the horror novel, is an author who stays in his childhood town to research his new novel. While there, he makes friends and tries to protect the townspeople as they turn into vampires. Without success, he leaves with one of the other survivors, leaving the city empty of living humans. The detailed explanations that King uses to describe the story's morbid events create a novel that captivates readers. One such event happened when Ben killed his girlfriend Susan's vampire. “Death had not marked her. Her face was flushed with color and her lips, without makeup, were a deep, glowing read. His forehead was pale but flawless, his skin was cream. Her eyes were closed and her dark eyelashes rested on her cheeks… Yet the overall impression was not of angelic beauty but of cold, disconnected beauty. (King, 'Salem's Lot Ch. 14 Pt. 15) The undead are monsters that we expect to appear frightening, but we don't understand why we would be frightened by them, until... an author like King describes the beauty of a vampire like Susan and we understand why we feel uncomfortable. Later in the chapter, as Ben stakes her body, “blood gushes from the stake's entry point in a bright, astonishing stream, splashing his hands, his shirt, his cheeks. In an instant, the cellar fills with its warm, coppery smell. This description fascinates readers, because in such a situation we would not be able to understand what is happening, as we would be overwhelmed by fear. When we read this shocking scene from history, we experience it without fear of distraction from the details. Readers can slow down the situation and inspect the details, the same way one would slow down to contemplate a car accident. The style and structure of the book itself is filled with extraordinary detail, even though the conclusion of the story is an empty city, devoid of humans. The novel moves through the points of view and storylines of several different characters. Looking at the storyline, many additional details and characters would not have been necessary to reach the same conclusion. For example, the story of Dud Rogers, who lived in and maintained the Lot' Town landfill in Jerusalem, has been described in painful detail. It described his introverted personality, his enjoyment of setting fire to the dump, his angry thoughts, and his habit of shooting rats (King, 'Salem's Lot Ch. 3 Pt. 10). References and connections between Dud and other members of the community were very rare. and insignificant, and his fate was death and ascension as a vampire like everyone else in the town, begging the question of whether his role in the book was significant. Although it seems really distracting..
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