J.M. REINBOLD a person I highly admire and respect. She has written some pretty creepy things such as THE FUTURE OF FLESH which appeared in ZIPPERED FLESH 2: TALES OF BODY MODIFICATIONS GONE BAD! by WELDON BURGE, which I had the pleasure of reading. She's a creepy girl, a woman with a great mind and a huge heart.
- When did you start writing horror?
1996, my last year at university, I started working with a group of writers who wrote dark fantasy and horror. I was writing vampire stories, role playing/storytelling game adventures, and weird fiction, the kind of stuff you saw on the X Files back in those days. I wrote and sold my first story, “The Mark of Cain”, with that group. I also started and didn't finish a lot of stories, some I which I'm just coming back to now.
- Have you written in any other genre?
Yes, quite often, actually. I write literary, mystery, suspense, weird fiction, and haiku poetry. “Transfusions” for example which appears in STORIES FROM THE INKSLINGERS (Gryphonwood Press, 2008) is weird fiction. “The Future of Flesh” in the anthology ZIPPERED FLESH 2 (Smart Rhino, 2013) is a mash-up of horror and weird fiction. “Missing” in SOMEONE WICKED (Smart Rhino, 2013) is one of my uncozy Britcrime mysteries, while “Evan James” in WANDERINGS (Fierce Grace Press, 2014) is literary fiction. Truthfully, horror isn't my primary genre, although most of my stories contain elements of horror or horrific scenes.
Total silence. Total darkness. Extreme cold. Being alone, and a host of other things, unfortunately.
My son reads some of my stories; he’s also an author. My mother-in-law and a cousin have read work I’ve published. If any other family members or relatives have read my stories they’ve never mentioned it. I think it freaks out most of my relatives to have writers in the family. I have no idea why. It’s as if we are some kind of unpredictable exotic beasts.
In general, no, though I suppose it probably should. Every once in a while I’ll write something and think, “Hmm. Do you really want to go there?” Most of the time, though, I’m hyper focused on the writing and getting the story the way I want it. I suppose I don’t experience the story the way an editor or a reader might experience it. On the other hand, that might mean I’m not writing about what really gets under my skin. Good question. Bears more looking into.
I write like myself, not anyone else.
I have many favourite authors in all genres: George R. R. Martin, Christine Morgan, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Simon Green, H.P. Lovecraft, Robert Dunbar, Susan Hill, Philip Pullman, and Lisa Mannetti to name a few.
Joe Lansdale, Christine Morgan, Robert Stone, Thom Jones, Flannery O’Connor, and Caroline Graham all have strongly influenced my writing.
The very first were fairytales, Red Riding Hood, Hansel and Gretel, Rumpelstiltskin and such. Fairytale sounds quite benign, when in fact these were quite frightening stories. After that, Edgar Allan Poe and Arthur Conan Doyle: The Fall of the House of Usher and the Hound of the Baskervilles were favourites. Those were followed by the stories of H.P. Lovecraft: The Dunwich Horror, Dreams in the Witch House, and others.
I remember my grandmother telling me the fairytales; I must have been three or four. I read Poe and Conan Doyle on my own. I was an early and advanced reader so probably around age six or seven. Lovecraft I discovered as a pre-teen.
In fiction writing, cruelty to animals and child abuse are subjects I wouldn’t write about.
Get a complete draft of a story written no matter how bad it is or how bad you think it is so that you have something to work with. You can’t improve what you haven’t written.
I would have started writing fiction sooner and been more diligent about submitting my work for publication. For a long time I was pretty lackadaisical about getting my work out for publication. I don't know why. I wrote a lot. I'd submit a story or poem here and there, but not in a serious way. Finally, one of my writing friends asked me why I didn't try harder since I was writing publishable work. I didn't have an answer. So, after some self-evaluation, I came up with a plan and started submitting my work with intention.
I don’t keep track, but my guess is maybe twenty or twenty-five novels and non-fiction. I also read quite a few novellas and short stories.
Yes. I work on writing projects every day. I’m not always creating new fiction, some days I’ll rewrite or revise or make notes or edit. I’m always working.
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