‘Necessary Death’ Authors Share The True Power of Horror
Mary Beth McAndrews
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Mental health and horror go hand in hand. Whether a film is tackling issues of grief, depression, anxiety, or other mental health struggles or someone sees horror as a comfort in times of darkness, horror is a critical genre for understanding how our minds work. Authors Chris Grosso and Preston Fassel agree, which is why they wrote Unnecessary Death.
Per Simon & Schuster,
“Based on very real and practical commentary, life experience, and occasionally, tongue-in-cheek-misfortunes of horror legends, Necessary Death explores how the horror genre, its motifs and characters, offer individuals a unique opportunity for insight and understanding of their own lives.”
Dread Central spoke with Grosso and Fassel about watching horror classics from a new lens, finding support in the community, and more.
Dread Central: Chris, I would love to hear where this book came from. I believe you had the original idea, and you brought it to Preston?
Chris Grotto: Yeah, correct. It’s been a passion project for a few years, and essentially I’ve written books and worked in the mental health field for over 10 years now. So that’s where my passion is, helping other people. My other passion is horror movies, I’ve loved them since as far back as I can remember. It hit me one time when I was covering a Rock and Shock conference up in Worcester for my website. It was a cool day. I got to interview Ken Foree from Dawn of the Dead and Danny Treijo. It was just a rad day.
I was talking to some of the attendees like I do with these events, I realized we shared a lot of similar things in common regarding mental health in the past. Driving home, I was just like, “Why haven’t I thought about writing a book melding these two worlds?”
So, I talked to my literary agent. She’s like, “All right, it’s probably going to be a tough sell, but I believe in you. Let’s see what we can accomplish.” I was putting together the proposal, and around that time I was writing for Fangoria, as was Preston. That’s where I learned about him and his work and his incredible book, Our Lady of the Inferno. I had him on my podcast, and afterward we chatted and I’m like, “Dude, I got this kind of crazy idea, and I know I can’t go it alone. I think you’re the man for the job. What do you think?” And I’ll throw it over to you, Preston.
Preston Fassel: It was a really intriguing idea to me. I was riding high on Our Lady of the Inferno at the time, and thinking, “Oh, I’m on top of the world. I can do anything.” And I actually have a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Sam Houston State University. I was part of this generation that grew up on Silence of the Lambs and CSI. We all thought we were going to grow up to be Clarice Starling and catch serial killers. Then I got into the reality of that and realized it’s a lot more fulfilling to read about this stuff than actually engage with it in real life. I thankfully had enough background in biology as a result of my degree plan that I was able to become an optometric assistant and optician. But I still have all of this psychological background.
So it’s like, “OK, so this is something I’ve never thought of before. It’s something completely new.” It’s something not unlike anything I’ve ever done before, and it pulls from this psychological background that I’m not using. And I was like, “Damn, man, let’s do this thing.” This would’ve been like 2018, 2019, and we’ve been on the journey to getting this book into publication ever since.
DC: Well, and it’s so funny you say that because no one has done this, which is so wild to me. It’s such a natural connection between horror and mental health and horror and grounding practices and bodywork. I’ve talked extensively about how horror has helped with my own mental health issues. So we finally have a book on it.
How did you decide on what movies to cover, and then how did you go about co-writing together? Each chapter, for those who haven’t read it, is a different movie and then a practice that goes with the films. So then how did you all pick the films?
PF: A lot of that was Chris. And a lot of it was also kind of dictated by just the practicalities of people wanting to read this. I know if Chris and I had had our way, there would be a lot more esoteric stuff in here. But we tried to walk the line between what are horror movies that true dedicated horror fans are really going to respect, but then also horror movies that just plain movie lovers are going to be familiar with and recognize.
We didn’t want to pander, but we also didn’t want to exclude somebody who might come to this who’s not necessarily a horror geek, but who still likes A Nightmare On Elm Street, who still likes Jaws, who still likes Friday the 13th. And so it was what is the perfect intersection on the Venn diagram between horror classics and movies that aren’t going to put off a broad film fan who might be able to get something of material substance out of the book.
If we’d had our way, there’d be Dario Argento’s Suspiria would be in there, Videodrome would be in there, and some weird 1960s underground British exploitation movie would be in there. And it would be a book very specifically for a very niche corner of the world. From there, we kind of did an assembly line process of writing. The sections are divided between, “Oh, the Horror”, which is my section, which is an exploration of the plots and themes and different psychological elements of different horror movies. Then, “Oh, the Humanity”, which is Chris taking that material and putting it into application in actual practices that a person could do for real material benefit.
What it really breaks down to is theory and practice. And I’ve got that theoretical background of having this academic history with psychology. Chris has the practical background of actually having counseling experience. And so that’s how we divvied it up. I would write the first part of the chapter looking at all of these different themes and how different concepts of mental health or different psychological ideas manifest in different horror movies. Turn that over to Chris, and then he would turn that into how can somebody apply this information in their day-to-day life.
CG: What I love about it is, for me, equanimity is super important in life, the meaning of the heart and the mind and coming together. I feel like even though his section, there’s a lot of heart stuff in there. But it comes from more of an analytical mind perspective where for me, the “Oh, The Humanity”, sure, there’s some analytical stuff as well. But I come a little more from that heart-like space, and Necessary Death is just such a beautiful meeting of those two worlds.
And again, even prior to this book, my own practices of grounding, meditation, all various sorts of things, equanimity, discernment, and using our critical thinking mindset are all super important. But also for me, tuning into my heart and my gut, and meeting those two worlds together is the best way I can skillfully move forward in my own life and the world.
DC: Oh, yeah. You both have a background in psychology, but Chris especially, you have a lot of fieldwork putting these things into practice. But was there anything that both of you learned about mental health practice that surprised you and weren’t expecting to come to the surface while you were writing Necessary Death?
CG: I was thinking about this the other day on a different podcast that Preston and I were on. I don’t know if it’s necessarily mental health, but it’s two things. One, just really going with the flow, which we do. I write about Daoism and just going with the flow of the process of life. And that was awesome. Working with Preston, he would send his part and I might have a vision of what I was going to be writing about, and it’s like, “Oh, no, wait.” My mind went in a whole different way, and I loved that.
The other part was learning to celebrate the little wins. I was writing this when I was going through a really hard time myself, to be transparent. It was rough man, and I was rebuilding certain areas of my own mental health. So something as seemingly simple as just finishing an editorial deadline or a new chapter, those were big little wins. And I would take time and be like, “Dude, nice, you did that.” So nothing groundbreaking, but at the time it was so necessary in my life, and I’ve carried that with me ever since.
DC: Preston, what about you? Especially with less of that counseling background and being more into that very specific part of horror, was there anything that kind of surprised you about the process?
PF: Looking at these movies from different perspectives and different angles. As part of the compilation process of the movies, Chris had come up with these sort of writing prompts for each of the chapters based on what the ultimate exercise was going to be at the end of it. Then I reversed engineered from there looking at these films from the perspectives of the themes of the exercises.
Prior to this, I’d seen The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, I don’t know how many times, and I was and am still very interested in Jungian psychology. But I had never looked at The Texas Chain Saw Massacre through the lens of Jungian psychology with Leatherface using literal masks for metaphorical personalities. I had never looked at Carrie before as an exploration of the positive and negative applications of shame. These were all these prompts that Chris had come up with for how these movies can be used to explore these different psychological themes.
So I had to rewatch all 13 of these movies prior to writing the book. As I’m rewatching them, I’m looking at them through completely new eyes, and it’s almost getting to see these favorites again for the first time because it’s a completely new perspective that I’ve never brought into any of them before.
DC: That’s so cool. Well, that’s awesome, especially as a horror fan, you realize I’ve seen everything. So having that unique new perspective on something, that’s awesome.
CG: Yeah, and I got to give credit to Fangoria for this because I kind of tested the waters writing with them. That Texas idea, to be honest, was an article I’d written for them. I also did an article exploring Misery and another one exploring Joker with Joaquin Phoenix in relation to horror. To me, that was one of the most horrific movies I’ve seen in a long time because of the incredible mental health display that they gave in that movie. And I didn’t know how [the articles were] going to go over, to be honest. And all those articles were met with a lot of really nice reception. People are open to the meaning of these worlds. So I just wanted to say, I got to give credit where it’s due. And credit to horror fans, because a lot of people thumb their nose at horror.
DC: So many of us horror fans feel like outcasts in our own ways and have our own struggles with mental illness. Necessary Death is a necessary book to have for a genre like this, not just because of the content, but because of the people that love the genre. I think all of us probably identify in some way, or maybe this will even help them realize, too.
PF: That’s a big part of the mission statement that Chris presented to me when he came to me with this book. It was the idea that a lot of horror fans feel like outcasts. So the horror world is someplace where they can come together and find a sense of comradery. A lot of people who are on the periphery have issues and problems and maybe are afraid or don’t know how to get help because help is part of this establishment that they feel has cast them aside.
So something that was really imperative for us in writing this book was something that could kind of serve as a stepping stone towards moving towards getting that help. Necessary Death, Chris has brought this up, I brought this up, is not a replacement for therapy, it’s not a replacement for psychological help, but we hope that it is a stepping stone for people towards asking for and receiving that help
CG: And trying not to sound corn or cliche, but you’re not alone for real. I spent so much of my life feeling alone and isolated, and that was a brutal many years, especially when I was younger and a teenager. But it doesn’t have to be like that. So that is one of the huge, huge underlying reasons that this book is in the world. There’s some cool stuff out there that can help lessen your pain and suffering.
DC: I don’t think that’s cheesy at all. It is so easy to feel alone. I always think about younger generations of horror fans growing up, and not to forget about the older generation, but people are getting into it for the first time and realizing there’s a lot more to horror. It’s been a really good resource for all three of us in terms of processing our own lives and everything. And I’m just so glad this book exists now.
CG: Yeah, me too. I’ll tell you, as Preston said, it was 2018, and we started working on it. It came out on Halloween this year which was just amazing. On the day itself, and something we haven’t really talked about much in any of our podcasts or interviews is one of my all-time favorite writers. Jason Parin from the John Dies at the End series wrote the forward for Necessary Death. At first, we were like, “Hey, Stephen King would be amazing.” And yeah, Stephen King would be amazing, but that didn’t work. The second best, if not the best, was getting Jason to write this forward.
We’ve also gotten some really sweet endorsements from people that I know and that Preston and I really admire. From actors to filmmakers or whatever it is, some really beautiful people, showed up and wrote some really encouraging words about this, and that meant a lot to me. So it’s nice to see this Necessary Death resonating with people. How cool is that?
Necessary Death is available now wherever you buy books.
Categorized:Interviews
