Here we are in September, already. It’s difficult to believe, ain’t it? This year is quickly winding down. Another four months and 2021 will be sloughed off. Where does the time go? I guess it really does fly by when you’re having fun, or maybe just when you’re old or busy. Whatever it is, we need to get ready for the holiday shenanigans. I’m eager for them, if for no other reason than I’m a kid at heart.
And with the encroaching holidays, and being a such a big kid, I’d like to paraphrase Jerry Herman– we need a little Halloween right this very minute.
Yes, I need it. I need a good shot of All Hallows Eve. I’ve been watching horror movies, reading horror stories, perusing Halloween decorations…but there’s nothing like that night, is there. If you stay home– and maybe out of trouble– there’s still something in the air that makes it feel different than any other night of the year. Christmas and New Year’s Eve have their certain feelings, but Halloween feels more uncertain, more dangerous. Not just spookier, not just that it feels like unseen, spectral, eyes may be on you. It feels like anything could happen, at any moment, and the invisible world next door won’t only open and bleed through to ours, it may take you with it forever.
The movie Halloween remains one of the best horror movies ever made. If its actions happened on July 4th or Thanksgiving, it’d be a totally different movie, and probably not a franchise. The Halloween season itself is a major star of the movie. It has that feel, you know.
Like me, you’ve probably seen John Carpenter’s Halloween a hundred times or more. Up until a few weeks ago, I knew there was a novelization of the movie, but I had never read it or even seen a physical copy of it. Thanks to the internet and the digital age, the book, written by Curtis Richards, is available in a digital edition (physical copies get a little expensive) through Kindle Unlimited.
I won’t go into the details of the book; if you’ve seen the movie, you know 99.9% of the book. Now, I suggest the book for that shot of good ol’ Samhain you may be needing. It’s not the best written book, not by a long shot, but it has that Halloween feel. Sometimes, that’s all we need: a little something to tide us over.
Curio Macabre 