Dear Reader,
You might ask what brought me here, the writing that is. It happened by accident, with a seminar series I gave as part of the First Year Odyssey at the University of Georgia. This is a required course for all entering first year students, and it was one course with many sections, capped at 15-20 students. The intent was to get students into a smaller size course, rather than the 100-plus student courses like General Chemistry, focus on writing, and get students comfortable with interacting with faculty. Other than these minimal requirements, faculty could teach whatever they wanted. Whatever we wanted.
My wife encouraged me to put in an application to teach in the First Year Odyssey, a section on horror films, so that in her words, “I could find my people.” And I’d stop dragging her along to see the latest horror film. I was stumped at first because I’m a microbiologist, what do I know about film, film critique, or film history, except, I like horror films.
While I was struggling to come up with a course proposal, The Walking Dead was gathering an audience. My wife and I loved the show; she liked the drama and I liked the zombies. As a microbiologist, I appreciated how the “zombie” disease was depicted in the show: slow development of symptoms; clinical signs that mimicked several infectious diseases; and the means of transmission was through bites or scratches. It may have been while I watched an episode of The Walking Dead that I had a eureka moment. I could use zombies to teach students about infectious diseases and public health. A year earlier, the CDC had published a zombie comic book to teach people how to prepare for a disaster.
I sent in my application, anticipating it would be rejected. I was stunned that it was accepted.
I started every class showing 10-15 minutes of some horror film matched with the lecture topic. In a discussion of sexually transmitted diseases, for example, I used the David Cronenberg classic Shivers. As for writing assignments, I had the students write 100 to 250 word essays on aspects of a scene that did not mesh with certain epidemiology principles, for example, incubation period, the time it takes following exposure before someone exhibits symptoms. The other things the students had to do was interview a faculty member and do a presentation of said interview. The final assignment was a ten page short story, focused on zombies and they had to use the principles taught in class as rules or guidelines to follow in “the turning”.
As I graded the assignments, I was disappointed with the student’s reports. Their writing was not great, and that’s being kind. I was pleased with the students’ presentations. I was blown away by their short stories. They were fantastic! Such imagination and creativity.
The next semester, I dropped the report-style assignments and had them write instead 100-250 word stories. I kept the longer short story assignment. Normally, I dreaded grading student papers, but I looked forward to reading their assignments. Our kids could write. Their stories were brilliant. I had never before bonded with the students, as I did with the students in my section. We had movie night once a semester. I’d take them out for pizza to celebrate the end of the semester. I’ve kept in touch with one student, a Walking Dead fan on Facebook.
My section, “The Zombie Plague” became popular. I often overturned the course cap so more students could take it. The local news outlet, Online Athens, did an article my zombie class. I even won a teaching award for my class.
Semester after semester, I loved reading my students’ stories, but I was rather envious of their ability. I saw so much talent. They inspired me to try my hand at writing fiction. A nudge from my wife, also helped. I couldn’t retire until I found my passion. This is how I ended up here, Dear Reader. I’ve found my passion.
We are at step 2 of the publication process for my debut novel, Enter Infernum. I will have a link up to Pegasus Publishing once the book is available. Is it a zombie novel? No. Horror novel? Yes. Plans for a zombie novel. Yes. I do have an outline for one.
Until my next blog. In the words of horror host Sammy Terry, “Goodnight and have a pleasant nightmare.”