Nicholson debuts new horror novel

By Rose Hooper

And everybody loves the story of small town boy makes good.

Scott Nicholson, who was raised in Sylva, combines these truisms with the debut of his first novel, "The Red Church."

He will sign copies Friday night, Aug. 9, at City Lights Bookstore at 7:30 p.m.

This 1980 graduate of Sylva-Webster High School got the idea for the book after he conducted research on a small Episcopalian church built shortly before the Civil War.

"When I was studying broadcast production in college, I did a video project on the church," said Nicholson, who attended Appalachian State University. "All kinds of legends made the rounds that didn't match the historical record- that the founder had committed adultery and then hanged himself at the church, that his grave was set apart from the others in the cemetery due to the scandal, and that the church had been moved from the edge of the river to get away from his restless spirit," he said.

The story follows a church constructed in the 1862 under the guidance of Rev. Wendell McFall. His sermons declared the existence of God's second son- whose mission it is to undo all of Jesus' work on Earth.

For 20 years the red church had stood empty. Crumbling to ruin, it became a site for Halloween pranks and the setting for ghost stories- including one about the thing ("with wings and claws and liver for eyes") that lives in the bell tower, a creature blamed for a brutal murder that occurred in the church's graveyard.

Then Archer McFall, great-great-grandson of Wendell, comes home after abandoning a television ministry in California. He purchases the church to house his Temple of the Two Sons. Then the deaths begin.

The main character is a boy who lives near the church, and the strange happenings coincide with his own struggle making sense of his Christian faith. "My goal was to do more than simply scare the reader," said Nicholson, son of Bobby and Delores Nicholson of Webster.

"Some people have told me that just seeing the cover sends a chill up their spine, so if you like a good scare in the safety of your own home, then you'll enjoy that aspect of the novel," said this writer who now lives in Boone.

"But to me, 'The Red Church' is really about faith," he said. "Thirteen-year-old Ronnie is at that point where he's beginning to question some of the contradictions in his Baptist upbringing. Ronnie's mother is lured by the charisma of Archer McFall, who may be the devil or may be just another opportunist. Sheriff Frank Littlefield's faith has been shaken because he blames God for the death of his younger brother years before."

Nicholson, who has worked as a newspaper reporter and radio announcer, said, "I am influenced by the people I meet in daily life, and my characters tend to be blue-collar and rural, while most thriller writers stick with tried-and-true favorites such as lawyers, forensics experts, and big-city detectives."

For Nicholson, motivations of "ordinary people" are more revealing of human nature than the high-profile struggles of more glamorous types of characters.

"I don't think there is any such thing as an ordinary person, and my characters are individuals with their own hopes, fears, weaknesses, and strengths, " said this winner of the 1999 Writers of the Future Award.

Readers will certainly agree that Mama Bet McFall, Archer's mother, is about as far from sanity as she is far from ordinary.

Nicholson's story collection "Thank You For The Flowers" was recommended for the Bram Stoker Award, and he's published over 40 works in six different countries.

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