Author Topic: Pseudopod 314: What Happens When You Wake Up In The Night  (Read 15271 times)

Bdoomed

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Pseudopod 314: What Happens When You Wake Up In The Night

by Michael Marshall Smith

First published as a chapbook from Nightjar Press, September 2009, this story won the British Fantasy Award for Best Short Story in 2011 and appeared in THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF BEST NEW HORROR for that year. The fee for this story has been generously donated to Cats Protection League - please click the link and consider making some cat’s life a little easier.

MICHAEL MARSHALL SMITH is a novelist and screenwriter. Under this name he has published over seventy short stories, and three novels — ONLY FORWARD, SPARES and ONE OF US — winning the Philip K. Dick, International Horror Guild, and August Derleth awards, along with the Prix Bob Morane in France. He has been awarded the British Fantasy Award for Best Short Fiction four times, more than any other author. Writing as MICHAEL MARSHALL, he has published six internationally-bestselling thrillers including THE STRAW MEN, THE INTRUDERS and KILLER MOVE. His next novel, THE FORGOTTEN, will be published in 2013. He is currently involved in screenwriting projects including a television pilot and an animated movie for children. He lives in Santa Cruz with his wife and son. Check out his website at the link under his byline above.

Your reader this week is Donna Scott - Donna Scott is a short fiction writer, editor, performance poet, storyteller and comedian as well as Awards Administrator for the British Science Fiction Association. She has recently worked with Northampton Museum and Art Gallery to produce an exhibition on the 1612 Northampton Witch Trials and a number of spin-off projects in the region. To find out about her latest projects and appearances check out her website here



“The first thing I was unhappy about was the dark. I do not like the dark very very much. It is not the worst thing in the world but it is also not the best thing in the world, either. When I was very smaller I used to wake up sometimes in the middle of the night and be scared when I woke up, because it was so dark. I would go to bed with my light on, the one light that turns round and round, on the drawers by the side of my bed. It has animals on it and it turns around and it makes shapes and patterns on the ceiling and it is pretty and my mummy’s friend Jeanette gave it to me. It is not very too bright but it is bright enough and you can see what is what. But then it started that when I woke up in the middle of the night, the light would not be on any more and it would be completely dark instead and it would make me sad. I didn’t understand this but one night when I’d woken up and cried a lot my mummy told me that she came in every night and turned off the light every night after I was asleep, so it didn’t wake me up. But I said that wasn’t any good, because if I did wake up in the night and the light wasn’t on, then I might be scared, and cry. She said it seemed that I was waking every night, and the she and daddy had worked out that it might be the light that kept me awake, and after a while I was awake I’d get up and go into their room and see what was up with them, which meant she got no sleep any night ever and it was driving her completely nuts.

So we made a deal, where and the deal said I could have the light on all night but I promised that I would not go into their room in the night unless it was really important, and it is a good deal and so I’m allowed to have my light on again now, which is why the first thing I noticed when I woke up was that is it was dark.

Mummy had broken the deal.

I was cross about this but I was also very sleepy and so wasn’t sure if I was going to shout about it or not.

Then I noticed it was cold.

Before I go to bed, mummy puts a heater on while I am having my bath, and also I have two blankets on top of my duvet, and so I am a warm little bunny and it is fine. Sometimes if I wake in the middle of the night it feels a bit cold but if I snuggle down again it’s okay.

But this felt really cold.

My light was not on and I was cold.”



Listen to this week's Pseudopod.

I'd like to hear my options, so I could weigh them, what do you say?
Five pounds?  Six pounds? Seven pounds?


ElectricPaladin

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Reply #1 on: December 28, 2012, 09:49:33 PM
I am the king under the mountain and this is the first post on this thread.

This is probably the most horrifying story I have ever heard. I'm going to go take a long, warm shower, then drink ALL THE FREAKING COFFEE IN THE WORLD AND NEVER SLEEP AGAIN.

Thanks, Pseudopod. :-\

But seriously, this was just... brilliantly awful. The childlike narration was a good touch - and also brilliantly achieved by both the author and the reader - and really drove home the horror of the situation.

Personally, I will hear no speculation about the facts. The facts do not matter. I don't want to know if they were abducted by aliens, kidnapped by madmen, or restless in their graves. THE FACTS DO NOT MATTER. What matters is that they are STUCK in the DARK and they will be there FOREVER and I am NEVER GOING TO SLEEP AGAIN PERIOD EVER.

Just in case.

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evo.shandor

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Reply #2 on: December 30, 2012, 09:09:16 PM
Michael Marshall Smith's "This is Now" is one of my all time fave stories, but gosh-darn the narration on this one killed it for me. I had to turn up the volume to hear the narrator whispering, then she's shriek in my ear making me pull the buds out to avoid hearing loss. Think I'll skip anymore of Donna Scott's narrations.

But bring back more Michael Marshall Smith! Along with Joel Arnold, I'm grateful to have been exposed to this great writer.



lowky

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Reply #3 on: December 31, 2012, 03:38:12 AM
i agree with Electric Palladin.  I also have my lights on and curtains open.


Unblinking

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Reply #4 on: January 02, 2013, 03:12:29 PM
I didn't find this story scary at all, really.

For most of the body, I found it puzzling, trying to figure out the details of what had happened.  Taken literally, I interpret it as being an afterlife, a particularly boring one.  I wasn't particularly scared by it though.  It sounds dull, but dullness is not all that scary.

But the line at the end "And that's why you don't get up in the night" or whatever, turned it into something comedic for me.  At that point it all seemed to have become a tall tale as told by a restless child who's been told by the parents one too many times to go back to bed--and either the parents tried to scared the bejeezus out of the kid  and the kid applies his own imagination to come up with this bizarre explanation for why you should never get up in the night.  Among other things, if the kid is really sitting in the dark with only his parents for company, the breaking of the 4th wall with speaking to the audience to give a warning does not make a lot of sense if the story is taken literally--his parents already know the story and don't need to be told.  It makes much more sense to me if I see it as a child explaining to someone else in the real world why you don't get up in the night and trying to scare them in turn.

I've always been a morning person, and as a kid I would always wake up very early without cause, much as I do now.  My dad told me I had to wait until 7 to get up.  So as the night went on I would get out of bed and walk downstairs, peek into my dad's bedroom to look at his alarm clock to check the time.  Finally he got me a clock for my own room so that I wouldn't have to wake him up a dozen times in the night.  So I totally related to the kid.



Scumpup

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Reply #5 on: January 05, 2013, 06:15:00 PM
This story actively irritated me and it was a struggle to listen all the way through to the end.  I didn't care for the reader and will, quite likely, look with suspicious eyes on any future stories that may use her.  The story itself went on about 50% too long with characters blundering around in the dark, arguing about whose room they were in, and I absolutely don't want to hear about the bloody nightlight ever again in any context.  I did persevere, though, and listen all the way through.  There had to be a pay off, I was certain.  Jeepers, was I ever wrong!  I came away from the experience with exactly that species of chagrin one feels at having been played by a humorist with a penchant for shaggy dog stories.



Listener

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Reply #6 on: January 05, 2013, 07:27:14 PM
I enjoyed the story. Smith's story "More Tomorrow" is one of the most chilling pieces of "realistic horror" (horror that is non-supernatural and could actually happen) that I've ever read, and I always look forward to more stuff from him. I enjoyed the parts of the story that were supposed to be humorous when read by adults (the MC talking about her parents using naughty words, etc), but overall it was pretty good stuff. I liked the narrator fine, although I think she might want to invest in better equipment.

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zoanon

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Reply #7 on: January 08, 2013, 12:55:14 PM
7:54 AM ... suns finally coming up... I think I can sleep now



Cutter McKay

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Reply #8 on: January 11, 2013, 09:52:06 PM
The story itself went on about 50% too long with characters blundering around in the dark, arguing about whose room they were in... There had to be a pay off, I was certain.  Jeepers, was I ever wrong! 

Exactly how I felt. There was no payoff to this story whatsoever. Being lost in the dark can be scary, sure, but without any context there is no meaning in it and therefore no fear. I found the reading semi-authentic, but annoying at best, especially the frequent pauses, start-overs, and complete lack of contractions. I realize the latter is how the story was written, but omitting contractions doesn't make a narrator sound more childish. Kids use contractions all the time, my 5-year-old does. It's unnatural for a child to not use them.

Overall I found this story disappointing and pointless.

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Sgarre1

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Reply #9 on: January 12, 2013, 02:02:46 AM
Quote
Exactly how I felt. There was no payoff to this story whatsoever. Being lost in the dark can be scary, sure, but without any context there is no meaning in it and therefore no fear

Just so we're clear - you realized they were dead, right?  Just as the little girl realized they were dead, except she doesn't know what "dead" means at all (and there's your context - you're an adult, listening to a child's misunderstanding of a situation, and thus should be figuring out ahead of her that the situation *not* matching her expectations as they developed implies far more than she realizes).

I'm not saying that has to work for you - I'm past assuming everyone is going to like *everything* we put up and the variety roundabout can cause whiplash occasionally - but from the way you put it, I just wanted to be sure you actually heard the ending of the story.



Metalsludge

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Reply #10 on: January 13, 2013, 07:24:03 PM
I'm kind of glad that others had such a mixed, at best, reaction to this story so that it's not just me, as this seems like the kind of cleverly written piece that most people would love despite its limitations. Quick mood pieces that don't really go anywhere can be masterfully done and worthwhile. But I'm not sure this is a particularly good example of such a story. Waking up in the dark? OK, a basic fear situation everyone has experienced in childhood. Now, how to expand on it? The person turns out to be dead! Mind blown. Or not...

It's a well written piece that was a fun short read when I first came across it in one of the Best New Horror anthologies, but it does seem pretty limited, even for what it is. By contrast, Lovecraft's The Outsider raises issues of alienation and longing that seem more thought provoking in a similar very short space, only in that story, the protagonist climbs out of a cemetery as opposed to being perhaps suddenly trapped in one, depending on your interpretation of this story. The author's This is Now story is, again, a very simple piece, but it raises issues about changes and regrets in a small space that resonated with some readers. I suppose this story forces one to contemplate eternity in particularly grim terms, but that's almost as basic to horror as, well, being afraid of the dark, like the kid in the story. For some people, the technique and quick,hard hit of the theme will be enough. For others, it all runs a bit thin.



Listener

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Reply #11 on: January 14, 2013, 02:19:09 PM
Quote
Exactly how I felt. There was no payoff to this story whatsoever. Being lost in the dark can be scary, sure, but without any context there is no meaning in it and therefore no fear

Just so we're clear - you realized they were dead, right?  Just as the little girl realized they were dead, except she doesn't know what "dead" means at all (and there's your context - you're an adult, listening to a child's misunderstanding of a situation, and thus should be figuring out ahead of her that the situation *not* matching her expectations as they developed implies far more than she realizes).

I didn't. I thought they were abducted or something. It didn't impact my enjoyment of the story at all to not have figured out that they were dead.

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Sgarre1

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Reply #12 on: January 14, 2013, 11:41:46 PM
Huh.  I'm actually surprised.  I didn't even think this was a possibility and all the people complaining about a non-ending  just meant they didn't like the ending (because they didn't find it surprising, although that was never the point - to actually be surprising -  nor was it a study in mood or atmosphere, as Metaldsludge seems to have as the binary possibilities).  But "Mom says we're asleep but Dad says we're in a big stone box on a hill near the church" didn't bring it across?  Huh.  puzzling.



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Reply #13 on: January 15, 2013, 02:36:56 AM
I caught it but chose to disregard it, honestly.  I'd rather they were kidnapped by faeries or something.  "The main character(s) is(are) dead!" is one of my least favorite tropes.  There is very little in it that I find tremendously interesting, either as question or answer.

I loved the voice.  I found the plot, such as it was, a little on the bland/predictable side, but a well-told old tale is well worth the effort, in my estimation.  Two thumbs up, one maybe a little wobbly.



Sgarre1

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Reply #14 on: January 15, 2013, 05:27:08 AM
When I read this story originally. I *felt* it - felt it more honestly than any other "best" story in the book (and there were some very good stories in the book)- that's why I described it in the Facebook teaser as "the most basic horror story there is".  I'm very big on the *emotional note* in horror, whether from character or from basic story thrust as, honestly, it seems to be something few modern writers can pull off (or even attempt to pull off) with aplomb.  I sought it out for purchase, though, because after looking online, I was quite astonished at the number of negative reactions it got in reviews - it really seemed to rub a certain amount of people the wrong way.  "Ahhh, I thought, here is a nicely contentious work to take the temperature of the listeners, another tough nut to be chewed over by some" - the fact that it turned out to be by an author we'd previously published only made the getting that much easier.

And I guess these posts prove that desire was fulfilled.  I'm going to resist the urge to be didactic (too late!) and further extrapolate or defend and leave this very simple story (that is doing something only horror can do) to speak for itself and for those who can feel it as I did, some of whom *must* be out there because this story has brought in more donations than anything since episode 300.  I've said my peace already about the form it's working in (which seems to wrongfoot quite a lot of people), and we all already know that I'm looking to get as many types of/approaches to stories as there are out there onto here in some representative form - the better to give the listeners... well, something to chew over as they lay in bed at night (with the lights off), wondering how anyone could have thought *that* was a good story. We'll just keep flipping all the cards up and laying them down in a different order and hoping for the best...

And yet, no one's mentioned Matheson's "Little Girl Lost", which is the science fiction version of this basic set-up, and nicely illustrates a completely different direction to go.



eytanz

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Reply #15 on: January 15, 2013, 08:34:40 AM
I caught the part where they think they were dead, but I thought it's just speculation by the parents as to what happened - they don't actually have any source of information. Sort of like Scattercat, I believe that if you accept that as actual truth, it cheapens and weakens the story considerably.

As a story about something unknown happening to these people, it's very effective. But the afterlife is the horror story equivalent of technobabble science in SF - a way of allowing authors to "explain" anything they want by making reference to a premise that sounds familiar but is actually entirely unchallengeable by the readers.



Scumpup

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Reply #16 on: January 15, 2013, 04:03:43 PM
I got it that they were (possibly) dead.  It simply wasn't scary, surprising, or interesting.



Cutter McKay

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Reply #17 on: January 15, 2013, 07:30:39 PM
Just so we're clear - you realized they were dead, right?  

Honestly, no. Like others, I missed the implication that they were dead. However, having that piece of information does not improve my opinion of the story any. If they're dead, then they're obviously in some sort of afterlife, which implies either a very sadistic god or a devil of some sort and Hell. The latter is the most likely. However, what kind of hell is that? Being trapped in the dark with your entire family? I know some people that would suffer in that situation, but I have four brothers and we get along famously. Being trapped in the dark with them would be nothing. We would have all sorts of fun. Or, if I was trapped with my wife and kids, great; eternity with the ones I love. In other words, there are many worse and more terrifying fates than just being trapped in the darkness, in my opinion.

I get that this was more of a mood piece, a "What if you woke up in the dark and were trapped like that forever, how would you feel?" But the setup and even the revelation of the situation were so long and drawn out that I felt no fear or terror or even sadness for the characters. I just didn't care. And then when it ended with little-to-no explanation or resolution, it just killed the whole thing for me.

Like Scumpup just said:
It simply wasn't scary, surprising, or interesting.

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Sgarre1

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Reply #18 on: January 16, 2013, 03:03:19 AM
Quote
If they're dead, then they're obviously in some sort of afterlife, which implies either a very sadistic god or a devil of some sort and Hell.

I guess this is where we differ dramatically - old school, binary thinking.  Surprising, really.

Quote
But the afterlife is the horror story equivalent of technobabble science in SF - a way of allowing authors to "explain" anything they want by making reference to a premise that sounds familiar but is actually entirely unchallengeable by the readers.

And the same.  More "trope" avoidance.  With, of course, astonishment that sci-fi readers expect the same level of explanation from a horror story - as "unscientific" as it gets (despite all the fan level "the unknowable must have rules" malarkey/D&D rule book expectations we get as received wisdom).  I'll have to seriously reconsider ever podcasting some Robert Aickman, even if I could get the rights (which is unlikely).  It doesn't follow those "rules"...

I do not consider myself to be in a position of lesser power, as a reader, by having to accept an "unchallengeable" premise, especially one as unformed and non-traditional as this. No God, no Devil, just continuation of the immediate... forever.  Yeah, doesn't make sense... by any system humans have conceived of, probably.  But humans lie to themselves all the time about their truth and their logic and their rationality and their systems of ordering random bits of nervous system sensations, to make themselves feel better.  Does *anything* about this ending imply higher powers, seriously, as opposed to the slow decay, say, of magnetic fields in the brain, repeating decaying loops of electric sparks of consciousness?

Wow, 86 episodes until episode 400 and I *still* have so much work to do!  Hope I can find (well, really, buy) the stories to do it with!

(*memo to self* - maybe focus on the European fantastique current - a 20th century locale that watched precious, precocious rationality chewed up and spit out by two world wars, watched logic be turned towards slaughter, binary thinking imploded under the weight of actual experienced history, without the benefit of television and film as salve?  TTT has been doing a good job with that from time to time, but maybe more from us?  Might that bring it across?  Wouldn't start until sometime in the summer, regardless, but - better turn to the Russians again....)

« Last Edit: January 16, 2013, 03:14:34 AM by Sgarre1 »



Sgarre1

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Reply #19 on: January 16, 2013, 03:15:46 AM
BTW - Scumpup, REALLY dig the Golgo 13 icon.

"..." right back atcha!



Scattercat

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Reply #20 on: January 16, 2013, 07:59:24 AM
Well, that's just it, really.  "They're dead!" isn't ambiguous or intriguing; it's limiting and rather dull.  If they're not dead, then they might be where they are for a reason, and that creates ambiguity.  If they're dead and this is all that happens, well, then that's all that's going to happen, isn't it?  Death is the end, rather by definition; no more change.  If there's no one there to punish or reward them, then it appears the universe is meaningless and arbitrary.  Well, gosh, let me put on my shocked face.

I prefer to leave the option of them being dead there (especially as it resonates nicely with the title, providing an amusing alternate meaning), but to leave open also the idea that someone or something has put them where they are.  The wondering is really what would make it worse, would extend the period of agitation and worry before the inevitable slide into sensory-deprivation madness.



eytanz

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Reply #21 on: January 16, 2013, 08:14:11 AM
Quote
But the afterlife is the horror story equivalent of technobabble science in SF - a way of allowing authors to "explain" anything they want by making reference to a premise that sounds familiar but is actually entirely unchallengeable by the readers.

And the same.  More "trope" avoidance.  With, of course, astonishment that sci-fi readers expect the same level of explanation from a horror story - as "unscientific" as it gets (despite all the fan level "the unknowable must have rules" malarkey/D&D rule book expectations we get as received wisdom).  I'll have to seriously reconsider ever podcasting some Robert Aickman, even if I could get the rights (which is unlikely).  It doesn't follow those "rules"...

I think you miss my point, which is quite the opposite. I don't require the same level of explanation from horror. I want to avoid unnecessary explanation.  The reason tropes are dangerous is because they carry a weight of familiarity, and of a social context. This story was an extremely effective portrayal of the confusion and dawning understanding that something is seriously wrong, as viewed from the eyes of a child. That spoke to me, and I could relate to it on a rather primal level. But then at the end I was given a very mundane explanation to it - "oh, they were all dead". Which was the equivalent of the little dog pulling at the curtain and showing the old man behind the great and terrible wizard. It was the moment of realization that this wasn't an *actual* emotional experience, that this was just something someone thought up.

Of course all stories are just something someone thought up, but for a story like this to work, we must be able to forget that. For most of the length of the story, I did.

Now, the idea of an arbitrarily horrific afterlife, without a deity or a cause, is a terrifying one indeed, if one truly stops to think about it. But, as is often the case, the line between pathos and bathos, between the sublime and the ridiculous, is a thin one indeed, and adding one too many serious concepts into one's story is a way to cross it, which is the nature of my complaint.



lowky

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Reply #22 on: January 16, 2013, 04:17:30 PM

Wow, 86 episodes until episode 400 and I *still* have so much work to do!  Hope I can find (well, really, buy) the stories to do it with!

(*memo to self* - maybe focus on the European fantastique current - a 20th century locale that watched precious, precocious rationality chewed up and spit out by two world wars, watched logic be turned towards slaughter, binary thinking imploded under the weight of actual experienced history, without the benefit of television and film as salve?  TTT has been doing a good job with that from time to time, but maybe more from us?  Might that bring it across?  Wouldn't start until sometime in the summer, regardless, but - better turn to the Russians again....)
another suggestion, look through some years best anthologies, and see if anyone is worth soliciting for unpublished (audio rights) material. 


danooli

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Reply #23 on: January 17, 2013, 01:41:59 PM
I thought this was deliciously creepy and found the narration helped that feeling. Loved it.



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Reply #24 on: January 18, 2013, 02:54:25 PM
I love afterlife stories, because I love contemplating what comes after death.  But if I view this story in that straightforward fashion, I find it pretty dull.  "The afterlife is you in a dark room with your family.  At first it's confusing, then it's boring."

I still like the idea that this is a tall tale as told by the child who is exaggerating his parents warning to not get up in the middle of the night.  That's what I'm sticking with.