Talk:The Monkey/@comment-31077845-20170224121804

I'll give this a thumbs up. Often times the topic of "imaginary friends" winds up being absurd and trite; I think the problem is less experienced individuals who don't quite grasp how effective a device subtlety can be in horror. Many of them believe the more extreme the better, but...well, it's like the "uncanny valley" effect. In case anyone's unfamiliar and hates search engines for some reason that's the thing that makes dolls and ventriloquist dummies so creepy; it's a sort of autonomous aversion people have to things that look human-like, but are off enough your subconscious recognizes they aren't human. I believe a similar principle applies to horror stories; if a story just goes out of its way to be as over the top as possible it simply comes off as being a ridiculous infantile work of fiction that's easily written off. If it maintains a level of restraint, however, it can slip into one's subconscious and bring about the thought that, at different points in time, can be either the greatest strength or the greatest weakness of humankind; the thought "what if?".

I have to to remember that last part in case I ever write a book. It isn't that deep though, someone probably already came up with a similar quote. If they haven't and anyone here steals it though I swear I'll be so mad.