After all the ghost, gremlins and goblins have come to my door trick-or-treating, I like to snuggle down with the leftover candy and a spooktacular book on Halloween night. There’s no shortage of wickedly good books to choose from. When my children were young, they enjoyed hearing me read Linda Williams’ The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything. It wasn’t long before we graduated to Washington Irving’s classic, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. On my own time, I gravitate to such haunting books as The Exorcist, Rosemary’s Baby, The Haunting of Hill House, the early novels of Stephen King and anything by Edgar Allan Poe.

What is it that attracts us to horror stories designed to capture our imagination in the creepiest, most terrifying ways? Danish researcher Mathias Clasen claims it’s in our DNA to want our fill of thrill. “When our ancestors lived as hunter-gatherers in the East African savannah, it was important that they were prepared for possible attacks by predators and vermin,” says Clasen, who presented his PhD thesis on horror at the Department of Aesthetics and Communication – English, Aarhus University (Denmark).

Dracula may have been inspired by the real Vlad The Impaler, a cruel Romanian Prince who lived in the 1400s. But, according to Clasen, our fear of creatures with fangs began when some of our ancestors were possible blue plate specials for lions and other sharp-toothed creatures of prey. In order to survive, our early predecessors “had to train their reactions to stressful situations, and the desire to do so became stored in their DNA – which we still carry today.”

Likewise, the ancient real fear of the danger of eating rotten meat may be at the core of our horrified disgust with zombies. When watching a horror movie or reading a horror book, says Clasen, “We’re training our danger preparedness.”

In horror stories, characters and plots may also address topical concerns. Bram Stoker’s Dracula, published in 1897, reflects Victorian views of women, sex and colonialism. William Peter Blatty’s 1973 shocker, The Exorcist, plays on contemporary themes of questioning established religion and the generation gap felt between parents and their children. “We use fiction as an ‘emotional simulator’ to broaden our horizons,” says Clasen. “Horror fiction exercises our reactions to what’s terrible and frightening.”

Perhaps the biggest attraction to horror fiction is the reader’s awareness that the nightmare can be ended with the simple closing of a book. Of course, that does not guarantee that the fear will leave you. As you shake and shiver your way through a nightmarish book this Halloween, know that the tingling in your spine is more than your imagination. It’s the DNA message from beyond the grave!

Who among us has never been spooked by one of Stephen King’s novels? In a previous blog post, I wrote that Salem’s Lot disturbed me so much that I locked the book outside my apartment every night; then devoured the story in tasty bites during daylight hours. King’s latest novel, Dr. Sleep, is a sequel to one of his most revered books, The Shining, which was published in 1980 and adapted to an iconic horror movie . Featuring an adult Danny Torrance, the telepathic child from the original book, Dr. Sleep is an instant bestseller. Most reviews are favorable but the naysayers – many of them King fans – are very vocal in their disappointment. Perhaps King anticipated the criticism when, in an author’s note, he wrote, “Nothing can live up to the memory of a good scare, especially if administered to one who is young and impressionable.” Instead, he said, his intention was to tell “a kick-ass story.”

Writing a sequel can be easy work. Writing a good sequel is very hard. On the one hand, the author has already successfully created memorable characters in believable settings; a built-in fan base has invested in the story. On the other hand, the success of the first book creates expectations that must be met or exceeded in the follow-up. If the author didn’t already have a continuing story in mind when writing the original, it’s a bit like trying to conceive a second child that is as accomplished as the first: at once similar and different, both seeking our love and praise. Each child needs to stand on its own while connected to each other.

Sequel, prequel or something else entirely? When a follow-up to an original story sets characters or plots back in time, it is called a prequel. When the follow-up gets a follow-up, it is called a trilogy (example: Lord of the Rings). More than three connected books are considered a serial; either with established characters but few references to past events (example: Hardy Boys or references to earlier plots that rely on the reader to follow the series chronologically (example: Harry Potter).

Unlike movies and TV shows where commercial successes spawn hopeful successors, bestselling books don’t guarantee a sequel; at least not from the original author. Other writers may take up the pen, carrying the original story forward or using established characters or plot to suggest a new vision. Sequels to Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind include Scarlett, written by Alexandra Ripley and authorized by Mitchell’s estate. The book was excoriated by literary reviewers and had mixed responses among general readers. At the other end of the spectrum is Jean Rhys’ highly acclaimed Wide Sargasso Sea, written more than 100 years after Charlotte Bronte’s classic, Jane Eyre. Rhys’s award-winning novel takes a character referred to but never seen in Bronte’s story – the insane first wife of Jane Eyre’s love, Mr. Rochester – and reimagines the wife’s viewpoint of the cause of her insanity, casting Mr. Rochester in a very different light. Brilliant!

It’s hard to make a second kiss as exciting and rewarding as a first kiss. Most sequels fall short. Those that succeed enhance our appreciation of the original while savoring the second.