But Jackson has always been noted for her truly terrifying tales. These masterful stories are often populated with women and children or set in supposedly safe small towns and politely ordered society. As an author, she instilled fear by taking the rational and inserting the irrational, by having the unfamiliar intrude into the familiar. Her life was as much baking cupcakes as making up stories. Each balanced and enhanced the other.
Writers often feed their creativity through several coexisting personalities.
Horror writers, when you meet them, are a pretty nice bunch. They can breathe the stench of evil, reach out and touch wickedness, because there is good and innocence in their lives to counter it. In fact, I suspect there's more freedom to explore the depths of depravity if you know the siren call of the soccer field will demand you drive the goalkeeper to it and then wash his uniform later. Without a lifeline forged of balance, responsibility, and the need to find shin pads to bring you back from the abyss, you might never venture close enough to the edge to know its monstrous depths. Shirley Jackson had the lifeline and knew the abyss.