In Celebration of the Ghost Ship

Being an insane over-analysis of one of my favourite sub-genres!

You know this story, you’ve seen it a million times. It’s two parts sci-fi and one part horror, and it owes its ancestry almost entirely to movies and later, videogames; its only direct literary ancestor would by the haunted house story. Usually taking place in the future, the story will feature a group of humans (often military) who either stumble upon or are sent to investigate a mysterious space ship, space station or remote colony or outpost of some sort. At first it seems as if the place is deserted. There will be no signal and no response to any attempts at communications. There may be some evidence that the previous occupants came to a sticky end. The characters will wander around in the dark with flashlights. Sooner or later, they will encounter whatever it was that killed the original crew, and things will get nasty. It’s often aliens, zombies, ghosts, demons, or some combination of the above. Depending on the ratio of horror to sci-fi, members of the team may be killed off one-by-one, or they may fight the threat outright.

Fictionpress

So, maybe you’ve heard about this fanfiction thing, eh? I remember when I first did, because it was in an article in the Sunday Times, and it was opposite a review for Jurassic Park 3. Nothing dates a moment like a reference to a tired film franchise.

The idea always intrigued me- the presence of a large base of readers and writers of amateur fiction out there seemed like a positive thing. But, by and large, playing in other people’s universes did not really appeal to me. These writers were stuck on using characters and situations that were not their own. Fanfiction.net is the biggest collection of this stuff out there, but it’s got its own sister site for ‘original’ fiction too at Fictionpress.net.

An Airport Novel Takes Off: The Eye of Ra by Michael Asher

*Spoilers all over the shop*

I found The Eye of Ra in the library at work. At first glance, I pegged it as the kind of history-themed thriller that has been clogging bookshelves since the success of The Da Vince Code. In fact, it was published in the late 90’s (most of the action takes place in 1995), before the Dan Brown effect made centuries-long conspiracies, Templars, and famous stuff from history necessary for thriller plots. In fact, this book takes its cues more from Indiana Jones as well as a bunch of much stranger sources, such as the work of Erich von Daniken. So, yeah, there’s going to be some ‘ancient astronaut’ theories bandied round before the sun sets behind the pyramids in this one.