Jan. 27, 2025

046 - Incarnate With Richard Thomas

046 - Incarnate With Richard Thomas
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Season 2

Richard Thomas is an incredibly gifted and award-winning writer. His novels include Disintegration, Breaker, Transubstantiate, and most recently, Incarnate. Incarnate is one of the most unique novels I have read. In this episode, we discuss his writing, especially Incarnate, his wonderful prose, and the ideas swarming inside his skull.

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WEBVTT

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You're listening to the Weird Reader podcast, an extension of

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Jason's Weird Reads found on YouTube. Welcome, Welcome to episode

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forty six of the Weird Reads Podcast. I am your host,

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Jason White, and today I have finally got together my

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episode and I've edited it and it's here for you

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to listen to my interview with Richard Thomas regarding his

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book Incarnate, which was quite the trip. I have a

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funny little story about reading this book. I read about

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I don't know how far I read, like, let's just

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say twenty five percent, and I was like, this book

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is Bonker's. And so I went and asked Richard Thomas

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if he would come on the show and discuss it

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with me. But what we planned on was like a

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couple of months ahead, and so or not maybe a

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couple of months, but it was a good solid month,

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maybe a month and a half ahead. So I stopped

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reading the book, and then I returned to it in

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a few weeks and read everything over again. And so

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I read some of it twice, and I do like,

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I know what happens in that book. I think I

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have a good grip of what happens in Kurnits but

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there's still it's like it's almost as though my brain

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still doesn't accept that fact. It's like, no, you don't

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understand anything. And I think it's just the way it's written,

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and I think you need to read it honestly in

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order to understand what it is I'm talking about. But

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this book is filled with a lot of it's filled

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with a lot of hurt, and it's very emotional and

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it touched me any times. That's all I'll say about it.

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But talking to Richard about this process was really really fun.

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I talked to Richard I think it was way back

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in twenty seventeen, so it was good to talk to

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him again to catch up a little bit. And so,

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without further ado, here is my conversation with Richard Thomas.

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Welcome everybody today. I have a guest that I have

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spoken to before, but it's been like eight or nine

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years or something like that. Wow, it's been a long

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long time. So I'm here with Richard Thomas and we're

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going to be talking about his new book in Karnate.

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Can you give yourself a brief introduction?

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Richard? Sure? Sure. So I'm Richard Tom. I've been writing

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about fifteen years I'm a writer of speculative fiction, so

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somewhere under the fantasy, sci fi, horror umbrella. Four novels,

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four collections, over one hundred and eighty stories in print.

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I've edited five anthologies, i added a magazine in a press,

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and I've been nominated for a Bram Stoker Award twice,

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Shirley Jackson Award once, and then a Thriller Award. And

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I currently spend my time writing, editing, teaching, and publishing.

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So yeah, awesome. Now, Richard Thomas is an interesting name

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because I went to research you just to find like

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your website and whatnot. First thing I see is the

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actor from like the IT movie or I forget instance.

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Yeah, yeah, that's what I get all the time. Yeah,

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you wouldn't believe how many many women slide into my

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profile really talking of John Boy and I'm like slower, all,

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it's not I'm not him, but yeah, there's a fan

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of a certain age definitely sees Richard Thomas. And thanks

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John Boy Walton. I had to. I have had to

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battle him on Google for a long time to try

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and get my name to appear above his in any searches.

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It's taken a long time. And then the funny thing,

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like you said, he was also an IT So that

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was I think back when I was in the eighties,

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when I was in high school, maybe yeah, like es

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and then he played the character who was also the writer.

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So it was this really weird meta kind of moment.

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And every night it would have the list of the

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characters and they would say and Richard Thomas, I think

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because it was just alphabetically last, yeah, and so I

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was always like yeah, But that was back when I

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was just a fan of Stephen King, and you know,

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I hadn't even really started writing anything.

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So yeah, are you still a fan of Stephen King?

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I am? I am.

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I mean, I've probably read more of his stuff than

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any other writer. I've probably read, I mean, just about

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everything he's written. The last couple of years. I haven't

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been a big fan of like the Holly Trilogy or whatever.

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I mean, I liked some, but I like it, okay,

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I guess to me, the last really great book he

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wrote was probably eleven twenty two sixty three. That was

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by my last big favorite of his. I like reading him.

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His collections and shorter stuff has been really good, but

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I mean it's it's hard I couldn't imagine. I mean,

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I've been have four books out. I can't imagine trying

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to come up with ideas for forty or fifty or sixty.

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And so I think, I think about how many of

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his books have really been a huge influence on me,

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and you know my favorites, everything from The Stand and

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It to The Long Walk, Dead Zone, you know, all

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the like the word, novella collections, short stories like, He's

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just been a really big influence on my right, although

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I don't tend to really write a lot like him.

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He's more of a story teller and more of a

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story shower. I think. Yeah, it's funny though, because the

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one story of my last short story collection, Spontaneous Human

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Combustion called Notice Tolans, was definitely the most telling I've

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ever had in the story, it was a little long,

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like sixty six hundred words, more convoluted, more plot heavy.

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I'm usually more character driven or atmosphere driven. And that's

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the one that has had more people attached to it

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in Hollywood, screenwriters and people pitching it and trying to

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turn it into something. And I guess that kind of

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voice comes through. So I'm going about to write more

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like him.

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Yeah. Yeah, Uh, there's another Richard Thomas. I think it

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was either Richard J. Thomas or Richard P. Thomas. And

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he actually lives near me. He's an also a writer,

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but he doesn't write fiction. He writes like history books

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about his area. He's about three hours away from me.

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I think it's like going sound or something.

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Yeah.

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I was like looking at him, I'm like, that's not

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Richard Thomas. I am Richard Thomas.

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Yeah, I am Richard G. Thomas. Richard Gordon Thomas, the third.

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My dad was a junior, my son's the fourth. There

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was also an animator for like bug Bunny cartoons. I

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think it was a Richard H. Thomas, and so I

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would get excited as a kid because it was like

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so close, one matter away. But he did he did

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like background design or something whatever for the cartoons. But yeah,

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that's it. Excuse me.

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Yeah, and uh we first talked, as I mentioned right

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at the beginning here, we talked on the Darkness d

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Wells podcast when I was doing that show, which feels

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like forever ago now, and it was way back. It

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was way back when this was released.

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Oh yeah, yeah, I got a beautiful horror story.

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Yeah, I talked to This got me an interview with you,

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It got me an interview with Mercedes Yardley, and I

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believe it also got me an interview with let me

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see if he's in here before I embarrass myself. Uh,

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you know, I'm not sure. I must be thinking of

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something else. Oh no, no, no, he's here. So it

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got me an interview with Ramsey Campbell too.

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Nice.

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Yeah, that was that was an awesome time. But it

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was also funny in that a couple of months after

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I talked to you, I talked to Larry barn for

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something else, and and he said, while we were talking,

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He's like, I listened to your show. It's like I

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listened to that episode you did with with You with

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Richard Tumash.

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Really wow. Yeah, it's amazing. I love Laird. Yeah. I

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think my story in there was Repent, which actually ended

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up being in my last short story collection. And Laird

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is just a gift. He's a saint. I love Laird.

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Amazing writer. I love his work. He also was kind

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enough to write the forward the introduction to the anthology

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I edited The New Black, which was my first anthology

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I edited. It was all reprints, kind of just some

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of my favorite neo noir stories. So funny because when

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I was putting that together and then I was looking

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for somebody to write the intro, I was like, who

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did I leave out? Like whould I forget who? You know?

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I tried, I try to get stories for like Dennis Layne.

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I was like all over the place trying to get stories.

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I did talk talk to A big part like Ben

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Percy's story was. I wanted the title story, a refreshed

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refresh from his collection, and like his publisher, I'm forget

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who was Penguin Random House. They're like one of like

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twelve hundred dollars. I'm like, I can't pay that, and

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he's like, I have his old story. You a dial

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tone if you want No. It actually turned out to

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be a better story, but I ran across the Laird

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and I'm like, oh, I should have asked Laird for

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a story. But then he wrote the intro and it

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was just amazing. So I just really feel blessed. I

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got lucky that ended up getting him to do that,

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because he really understood kind of the intersection between crime

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and horror and what kind of where neo noir sat,

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and that was kind of early in my career, and

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that just really was a just a super cool guy.

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I love his work.

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Yeah, me too, I'm a huge fan. But that that

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was an interesting story with the Gutted anthology because uh.

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Uh, what's the what's the guy.

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Who runs Crystal Like Publishing? It's Mine Minehart. Yeah, yeah, Minehart. He.

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I was in talking with him through emails and he

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was like, Okay, we got this book coming out which

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was Gutted, and he was like, I'd like you to

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help me promote it. And he's like, name like three

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or four people he'd love to interview for your podcast,

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but don't go crazy. And I knew when he said

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don't go crazy that means don't ask about Ramsey camp Yeah.

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Yeah, yeah, exactly exactly.

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And so I put I put his name, I put

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your name, Mercedes Yardly and m Campbell. I was like,

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you know what, I'm gonna shoot for it. Why not? Right?

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Yeah?

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Yeah, And he was able to set it all up

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for me and that was that was a great time man.

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Cool.

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Yeah. Now, speaking of you being like an editor and whatnot,

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you recently you ran Gamut magazine and for how long

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did that go for?

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Well, we had two iterations like the first one. I

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don't even five or six years ago, I did a Kickstarter.

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We raised like fifty two thousand dollars. It was a

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whole crazy thing. I didn't I didn't think it was

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gonna happen.

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Then it happened. I remember when that happened.

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Yeah, it was a really great year. And we're paying

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ten cents a word, which back then not a lot

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of people were paying. I made a lot of mistakes,

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but mostly just I think I didn't realize how how

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long it takes to build a brand, how long it

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takes to kind of build up a body of work.

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And I think if I had, you know, maybe if

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i'd paid people five cents instead of ten, or maybe

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paid little, you know, a little less than ten something.

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Maybe if I'd budgeted for three years instead of one,

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because we had like six hundred people subscribe at like

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thirty bucks ahead and then in order to like stay

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in business and to cover our cost, we had to

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like double that, and we got to about nine hundred

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and just couldn't quite make it happen. And so, you know,

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you'd think I was an advertising for fifteen twenty years

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before I became a writer and you think I would

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understand how long it takes to build up a brand

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and get your image out there. And I at the time,

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raising fifty grand just seems like it seem like a

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lot of money, and so the whole thing seemed crazy

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to me. And so the idea of raising like one

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hundred and fifty, or raising one hundred, or making it

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work on fifty, like I just whatever. I just couldn't

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fathom it. And so we had one glorious year and

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then we shut down. We resurrected it this past year

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with the help of my partner, Richard Wood, and it

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was a great year of quality writing. I think the

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stories are amazing. I'm really proud of the body of

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work we did. We got to publish a lot of

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really great news stories. I just sent out all the

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stories I had. John Joseph Adams sent me an email

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asking about stuff for Best Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy,

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and I sent Ellen Datlow everything for Best Horror, and

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I send everything in for awards and whatnot, and we just, Uh,

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it's just kind of a weird combination of things. I

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think we tried to do too much too fast. I

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think going magazine and classes and publishing arm. I think

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we just were running when we should have been trying

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to walk. When when lit Reactor went under, I thought

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there'd be a real gap in the market for like

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classes and stuff, and so I thought, oh, we'll fill

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that void. Because I've been teaching over there and writing

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a column for like ten years. I thought I thought

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it'd be easy, peasy, you know, throw up some classes

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a couple hundred bucks, you know, with no problem. And

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then just like nobody signed up, and so I don't

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and and then and subscriptions were like very low, and

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so I think I think it's a combination of there's

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just a lot of really great free writing out there,

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and so I whether you're going to some it's like

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tour who has a great backer McMillan, who can kind

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of throw money at it. You know, they have deep pockets.

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I mean, it could be a lost leader for them.

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They can just use that to like set up their

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publishing arm or whatever. But you know, when you can

259
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get the stuff, when there's stuff online, you know, The

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Dark Nightmare, Clark's World, you know, everybody. I think it's

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just so much great quality content out there that people

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aren't gonna pay big bucks for a subscription, which I

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still thought was pretty cheap. Like, I mean, anything under

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fifty two bucks a year to me seems you know,

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it's a dollar a week. It just seems pretty Four

266
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bucks a month doesn't seem like a lot to me.

267
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But yeah, for whatever reason, people people balked at it,

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and so he had to shut down. Richard ended up

269
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taking the books he was gonna do and is rolling

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him into his press, Rudan, and so he's gonna keep

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doing the publishing arm. The teaching didn't work, but I'm

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I'm still you know, through all this stuff, I've still

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been writing, teaching my classes, you know, editing and publishing

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for Gamut. So it was a really great second year.

275
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It was really fun. I got to also reprint a

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lot of really great stories by authors that I love

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as well, and so between like new content from people

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I know and new content from people that were totally

279
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new to me. You know, I know there are definitely

280
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some people that was their first pro sale because they

281
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told me so, and they're very happy and excited about it.

282
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It was just really a great experience. I discovered so

283
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many voices. I was really happy. We got a really

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nice one of the cool things about the original Gamut

285
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and even when I ran Dark House Press too was wet.

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We really got stories from all over the world, and

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so I just kept being more broadly. We have a

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great reprint out of Faia, which you know is black

289
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speculative fiction, and we just you know, really a number

290
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of like LGBTQ plus people all over the world just

291
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really really excited a lot of voices that I either

292
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knew or didn't know or have come to know, and

293
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just I thought it was a really great mix of stories.

294
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So you know, you try, it works or it doesn't

295
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for whatever reasons. You know, I don't think coming through

296
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COVID and everything and everything's just kind of weird right now,

297
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and I think somebody people are kind of hunkered down

298
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a little bit. But you know, we did our.

299
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Best, yeah, and that's all you can do. It sounds

300
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like the the experience was quite stressful just because of money.

301
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You know, it was never stressful to me for money,

302
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because I was never the money. My partner was. But

303
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I think it was I think it was just frustrating

304
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in that I didn't understand why certain things were happening, right, So,

305
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like we even did all these surveys with people and

306
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stuff when they said they want a B and C

307
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and then we do a B and C and then

308
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nobody showed up. So just I didn't know what happened.

309
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Maybe people were sick of looking at my face. Maybe

310
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they want to read other stuff. Maybe price point was

311
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too high. Maybe I don't. I don't know, because I

312
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thought with you know, like I said, with let ractor

313
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going away, I thought we could fill that gap and

314
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fill the classes. And you know, publishing is always a

315
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tricky thing. So I don't know if we were publishing

316
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the wrong things, the wrong way or what, but I

317
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think I think it's a lot of different convergences at

318
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one time just kind of led to it not being successful.

319
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And so I can just try and put it out

320
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there and you know, the public will tell you whether

321
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whether they wondered or not.

322
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Yeah, now it went away before and then came back.

323
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Do you think it'll ever come back again?

324
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Or My first reaction is god no, But I mean,

325
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if the right situation, I guess, I don't know. I

326
00:16:25.399 --> 00:16:29.000
try to never say never, you know, I think with

327
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the right back, in the right setup, with the right

328
00:16:30.600 --> 00:16:33.240
people involved, who knows. I mean, I've worked with a

329
00:16:33.279 --> 00:16:36.080
number of different publishers with my writing as an editor.

330
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You know, I had lunch with Ellen datloud Stock her

331
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con two years ago, and I was like, maybe she's

332
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gonna ask me to come be an editor at TOR

333
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and like, no, she went, she just wanted to talk

334
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and hang out. I was honored and I had great

335
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lunch with her. But you know, I have all these

336
00:16:49.360 --> 00:16:53.320
big ideas, you know, John Joseph Adams. I got a

337
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story into Light Speed magazine this year and I've been

338
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trying to get in there for like fifteen years, and

339
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so I was very excited about that. And then talking

340
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to John, I'm getting to know him a little bit,

341
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like that was just super cool, super cool for me.

342
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And then when I dropped me an email ask you

343
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for the Gamut stuff, I was like, oh, that's cool.

344
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And then I was like, you know, sitting off my

345
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stuff as well, because I had that, I had the

346
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story in Life Speed. I want to make sure it

347
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gets back in front of you know, the whoever's reading

348
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for that as well. And so I'm like, well, maybe

349
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something will happen with John. Maybe maybe John will take

350
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a look at all the great stuff I published a

351
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Gamut and say, you know, I'm getting old. I want

352
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to retire. Why don't you take over? The best Americans?

353
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I don't know, I have these these crazy delusions. That's

354
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what I thought. Elm I did too. I'm thinking about retiring, Richard.

355
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Do you want to take over? You keep out of

356
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did some stuff?

357
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I don't know. I think honestly, that's just a part

358
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of being a creative person and where you'd like to

359
00:17:40.319 --> 00:17:44.559
see yourself, right, because I have similar things. I'm like,

360
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I'm gonna go do this, and this is gonna be awesome,

361
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and all these people are gonna notice, and they're gonna

362
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love me, and and they're gonna want me to go

363
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do this, this and that, and then it never happens,

364
00:17:52.200 --> 00:17:53.759
and you're like, well, yeah, okay, but.

365
00:17:55.240 --> 00:17:58.640
I think it's just stay open to it, you know,

366
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and you never know. I mean enough crazy things have happened,

367
00:18:02.200 --> 00:18:04.200
you know. I think about just my relationship with like

368
00:18:04.240 --> 00:18:07.160
Cemetery Dance, for example, what a crazy roller coaster ride

369
00:18:07.200 --> 00:18:09.359
that has been from being just a fan of their

370
00:18:09.400 --> 00:18:13.880
work to my first pro sale was with Cemetery Dance.

371
00:18:13.960 --> 00:18:17.599
End up being in an anthology called Shivers six alongside

372
00:18:17.640 --> 00:18:20.000
Stephen King and Peter Straw and that was a big

373
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deal to me. I think I cried when I got in,

374
00:18:22.680 --> 00:18:27.039
and then I got into Cemetery Dance Magazine twice that

375
00:18:27.119 --> 00:18:30.319
they ended up publishing my third short story collection. They

376
00:18:30.359 --> 00:18:32.400
did the ebook and then Crystal like did the print version,

377
00:18:32.680 --> 00:18:34.799
and so like I'm batting a thousand. It was this

378
00:18:34.839 --> 00:18:37.519
whole crazy thing. And every time it's happened, I've had

379
00:18:37.519 --> 00:18:39.759
to look at the email to be like, I think

380
00:18:39.759 --> 00:18:41.559
I read the word not, you know, cause you get

381
00:18:41.599 --> 00:18:43.319
you get the form letter, and when you get the

382
00:18:43.359 --> 00:18:45.960
accepted sometimes it's just like it's not that much different.

383
00:18:46.480 --> 00:18:48.079
They take out the word and then you get some

384
00:18:48.160 --> 00:18:49.640
nice words at the end of you know, about why

385
00:18:49.640 --> 00:18:51.920
they took it, while they liked it whatever. Even though

386
00:18:51.920 --> 00:18:53.839
one was like for lf Speat, I was like, I

387
00:18:53.839 --> 00:18:55.200
had to read it three times and make sure it

388
00:18:55.240 --> 00:18:58.359
was true. So I mean, who knows. I mean, I

389
00:18:58.440 --> 00:19:01.799
think it's your work. There's so many amazing writers out there.

390
00:19:01.839 --> 00:19:03.880
Every year when I look at everybody who's nominated for

391
00:19:03.920 --> 00:19:06.960
awards on the Recommended Reading List, all my friends, all

392
00:19:06.960 --> 00:19:10.000
my students, there's just so much great stuff out there.

393
00:19:10.039 --> 00:19:12.200
It keeps me young, it keeps me reading keeps me

394
00:19:12.599 --> 00:19:15.119
inspired to write new stuff. And I tell my students

395
00:19:15.119 --> 00:19:18.079
and my clients just take the shot. You never know,

396
00:19:18.440 --> 00:19:21.279
you know, I go through my process. I always send

397
00:19:21.279 --> 00:19:22.920
it to the dark. They reject me in two days

398
00:19:22.920 --> 00:19:25.119
and I move on. You know, nightmares open over there.

399
00:19:25.160 --> 00:19:27.039
They're reject me in four days. It's just like I

400
00:19:27.119 --> 00:19:29.160
just I used to but I used to not even

401
00:19:29.200 --> 00:19:31.200
take the shot, you know, I think, I don't even

402
00:19:31.200 --> 00:19:33.160
think I even set my stuff to tour for a

403
00:19:33.200 --> 00:19:35.480
long time because I just didn't think my stuff was

404
00:19:35.519 --> 00:19:37.839
good enough. And they take a really long time. But

405
00:19:38.279 --> 00:19:40.680
I'll say that I just i was like trying to

406
00:19:40.680 --> 00:19:42.880
pre qualify and I'm like, oh, this story is okay,

407
00:19:42.960 --> 00:19:44.599
and this was okay, and I'm like I want to

408
00:19:44.640 --> 00:19:47.160
send them something really good. And then they'd also take

409
00:19:47.200 --> 00:19:49.440
like nine months, and so I just I think sometimes

410
00:19:49.440 --> 00:19:51.400
we show ourselves in the foot. But most of the

411
00:19:51.480 --> 00:19:55.319
markets these days don't take as long anymore. They tend

412
00:19:55.319 --> 00:19:57.920
to be pretty respectful about it. And you know, three months,

413
00:19:58.000 --> 00:20:00.200
maybe three six months on Max, you know. I mean,

414
00:20:00.279 --> 00:20:02.880
Cemetery Dance is so weird and so infrequent. I remember

415
00:20:02.880 --> 00:20:04.759
when they opened up. I had a story sitting at

416
00:20:04.759 --> 00:20:07.920
tour and I was like, oh, man, do I do

417
00:20:07.960 --> 00:20:10.759
I simultaneous submit. It was like the last time tour

418
00:20:10.839 --> 00:20:12.559
is going to be open, and I was like, oh,

419
00:20:12.599 --> 00:20:15.240
I have to and then like then they the deadline

420
00:20:15.279 --> 00:20:16.720
was coming. I'm like, I'm gonna send it to them,

421
00:20:16.720 --> 00:20:19.480
and then Tore rejected me. Already I'd already been out

422
00:20:19.480 --> 00:20:21.440
shopping there for like nine active months, and then I

423
00:20:21.480 --> 00:20:23.519
sent to Cemetery Dance and then it was like another

424
00:20:23.640 --> 00:20:25.160
six months before I heard it. Yees. So it's just

425
00:20:25.559 --> 00:20:27.319
a year and a half on a story. It's crazy.

426
00:20:27.359 --> 00:20:29.279
But if you never take the shot, and I think,

427
00:20:29.319 --> 00:20:31.759
if you don't read the publications, if you don't get

428
00:20:31.759 --> 00:20:34.039
a sense. I think one of the things I keep forgetting.

429
00:20:34.119 --> 00:20:36.000
I tell my students is if you look at the

430
00:20:36.000 --> 00:20:39.079
cover of Cemetery Dance, it says a magazine of horror

431
00:20:39.160 --> 00:20:44.519
and suspense, and people forget the suspense part. The two

432
00:20:44.519 --> 00:20:47.039
stories I got in are both kind of paranoid thrillers.

433
00:20:47.920 --> 00:20:50.160
Not the second one definitely has a more horrifying ending,

434
00:20:50.240 --> 00:20:53.160
but uh, they're kind of old school Cemetery Dance. So

435
00:20:53.200 --> 00:20:55.400
I think, I don't know. I think it's always a crapsheet,

436
00:20:55.440 --> 00:20:57.839
but I think if we read the read the work

437
00:20:57.880 --> 00:20:59.640
by people, and I tried to read the you know,

438
00:20:59.640 --> 00:21:02.200
a couple different best of the years every year from

439
00:21:02.400 --> 00:21:04.279
one of my classes I teach. It really helps me

440
00:21:04.319 --> 00:21:07.680
to get a better sense of what's happening, what are

441
00:21:07.720 --> 00:21:10.799
people buying, what's working? Are there any trends, you know,

442
00:21:10.920 --> 00:21:13.680
like who's getting in and why? And that's part of

443
00:21:13.720 --> 00:21:16.000
what I teach in my workshop, is my Advanced Creative

444
00:21:16.000 --> 00:21:17.799
Writing Workshop. You read Best Horror of the Year, Best

445
00:21:17.839 --> 00:21:20.240
American Science Fiction and Fantasy, and Best American for Literary

446
00:21:20.519 --> 00:21:22.440
and then we workshop two stories. So we read two

447
00:21:22.440 --> 00:21:24.759
stories from the best and two stories from students, and

448
00:21:24.799 --> 00:21:27.440
we compare them and we go where are they and

449
00:21:27.440 --> 00:21:29.279
where am i? And how do I close that gap?

450
00:21:29.319 --> 00:21:31.039
And what are they doing right? How can I apply

451
00:21:31.119 --> 00:21:33.160
that to my work? And then when you when you

452
00:21:33.160 --> 00:21:35.759
look at stories and they don't work, ask yourself why

453
00:21:36.079 --> 00:21:38.000
and what do you not want to do in your writing?

454
00:21:38.240 --> 00:21:39.960
And when you read stuff that you really like that

455
00:21:40.000 --> 00:21:41.480
you give like an eight or eight and a half

456
00:21:41.599 --> 00:21:44.119
or a nine out of ten, why what do you

457
00:21:44.200 --> 00:21:46.200
like about it? And can you incorporate it into your work?

458
00:21:46.240 --> 00:21:47.960
And then go read more of their work you know

459
00:21:48.240 --> 00:21:50.599
you mentioned Laird. I've read a ton of layered stuff.

460
00:21:50.599 --> 00:21:52.920
His story Tiptoe is when we taught in class recently.

461
00:21:53.400 --> 00:21:56.519
Loved that story. Super creepy, Stephen Graham, Jones, Brian Everdson.

462
00:21:56.559 --> 00:21:58.160
There's so many people I've read over the years that

463
00:21:58.200 --> 00:22:01.799
have just really blown my mind. And really, Jeff vandermir

464
00:22:01.960 --> 00:22:04.200
changed me as a writer, and I think that's you know,

465
00:22:04.200 --> 00:22:06.440
that's why we read, and that's why I read and

466
00:22:06.440 --> 00:22:08.960
write and edit and teaches. All that together, I think

467
00:22:09.079 --> 00:22:10.440
helps me become a better writer.

468
00:22:11.200 --> 00:22:15.400
I know that you speak of being a teacher, and

469
00:22:15.480 --> 00:22:17.680
I know that you used to run online courses. Is

470
00:22:17.720 --> 00:22:19.839
that something you still do that? Is that what you're

471
00:22:20.359 --> 00:22:21.000
talking about?

472
00:22:21.240 --> 00:22:26.200
Yeah? Yeah, I still have my website, Storyville, and I

473
00:22:26.240 --> 00:22:28.759
teach my short story Mechanics class on there. I do

474
00:22:29.279 --> 00:22:31.240
an at your own pace version you can download now.

475
00:22:31.279 --> 00:22:32.920
Because lit Reactor used to do I did it for

476
00:22:32.960 --> 00:22:35.599
ten years lit Reactor, I teach you like three times

477
00:22:35.640 --> 00:22:38.480
a year, twenty students and would always sell out. Did

478
00:22:38.480 --> 00:22:40.119
that for ten years, and then when they went under,

479
00:22:40.160 --> 00:22:42.240
I didn't have a place to host it. So now

480
00:22:42.279 --> 00:22:43.759
I'm in the process of finding a new place to

481
00:22:43.799 --> 00:22:46.480
do that. But the mechanics class was one I came

482
00:22:46.519 --> 00:22:49.359
out of my MFA program and I was like, well,

483
00:22:49.640 --> 00:22:51.640
I feel like I could teach a basic class now.

484
00:22:51.920 --> 00:22:54.160
And so I've been writing a column for lit Reactor

485
00:22:54.200 --> 00:22:55.680
and I said, hey, I like to teach a basic class.

486
00:22:55.759 --> 00:22:57.319
You guys up for it, and they're like sure. Next thing,

487
00:22:57.319 --> 00:23:01.599
you know, ten years later, you know it's a success.

488
00:23:01.640 --> 00:23:04.240
And been working really well studying Frey Tag's trying gole

489
00:23:04.279 --> 00:23:06.720
freight Tex pyramid, you know, really kind of basic stuff,

490
00:23:06.759 --> 00:23:10.319
but old school, you know, back to Plato and Socrates,

491
00:23:10.440 --> 00:23:13.559
dramatic structure. But it's pretty to me if you aren't

492
00:23:13.559 --> 00:23:15.079
doing these things, a lot of times that's where you

493
00:23:15.119 --> 00:23:19.319
screw up. So you know, inside the incident, narrative, hook, exposition,

494
00:23:19.640 --> 00:23:23.839
your world building, rising tension, internal external conflict, building to

495
00:23:23.960 --> 00:23:27.480
a conclusion, a resolution, change, something has to change, and

496
00:23:27.480 --> 00:23:31.079
then the denoment or Danie Maul, the epiphany, the understanding

497
00:23:31.119 --> 00:23:32.880
of what has happened. That's often at the end of

498
00:23:32.920 --> 00:23:34.960
the story. If you're crying or your move, it's often

499
00:23:35.000 --> 00:23:37.640
that denoment. And I started doing that class. I taught

500
00:23:37.640 --> 00:23:39.920
that for a while and then people were like, do

501
00:23:39.960 --> 00:23:41.559
you have any do you have more advanced class, and

502
00:23:41.559 --> 00:23:43.240
I was like, h I should develop one, and so

503
00:23:43.279 --> 00:23:45.960
I put together my contemporary dark fiction class. And it

504
00:23:46.000 --> 00:23:49.359
was a really nice intersection of was teaching four books

505
00:23:49.359 --> 00:23:53.119
that I loved, Josh Mallerman's Bird Box, Jeff Vandymir's Annihilation,

506
00:23:54.240 --> 00:23:59.119
Sarah Grand's Come Closer, and then China Miable's Perdito Street Station,

507
00:23:59.640 --> 00:24:01.839
and that I taught. Each week would be a column

508
00:24:01.839 --> 00:24:06.960
and an essay and an exercise, and I had the

509
00:24:07.000 --> 00:24:10.000
columns I wrote and then the essay. The stories came

510
00:24:10.039 --> 00:24:12.000
out of the anthologies I'd edited, So I pulled them

511
00:24:12.039 --> 00:24:16.519
from the New Black and Exigencies and the Lineup and

512
00:24:16.960 --> 00:24:19.200
all all the anthologies I've edited, because I knew those

513
00:24:19.200 --> 00:24:22.319
stories really well, I'd edited them, I published them. They

514
00:24:22.359 --> 00:24:24.559
meant something to me. There were personal stories to me,

515
00:24:24.920 --> 00:24:26.839
and so I grab one of those stories and it

516
00:24:26.839 --> 00:24:29.960
would talk about character, talk about studying it, talk about

517
00:24:30.000 --> 00:24:32.519
you know, conflict or whatever, and then we that class

518
00:24:32.599 --> 00:24:35.400
is sixteen weeks, a more expensive class, and then it

519
00:24:35.480 --> 00:24:37.039
did that for a couple of years, and then people

520
00:24:37.079 --> 00:24:39.079
were like, you know, you should do a workshop. I

521
00:24:39.119 --> 00:24:41.119
was like, I should do a workshop. So I was like,

522
00:24:41.359 --> 00:24:43.720
but I wanted to do in like a more advanced workshop.

523
00:24:43.759 --> 00:24:46.160
So like my short story mechanics is like kind of

524
00:24:46.200 --> 00:24:48.880
your basic rud of entary first time student, or like

525
00:24:48.960 --> 00:24:51.839
high school level class. Dark fiction, I'll say, is like

526
00:24:51.880 --> 00:24:54.839
a collegiate level class. It's six sixteen weeks, you know,

527
00:24:54.880 --> 00:24:57.359
it's length of a semester. And then the workshop is

528
00:24:57.400 --> 00:25:00.079
really critical analysis, and that's kind of like a the

529
00:25:00.240 --> 00:25:03.960
MFA program where we assume you understand a lot of

530
00:25:04.039 --> 00:25:06.039
things and we're trying to get better, get up into

531
00:25:06.079 --> 00:25:09.240
that rarefied air where we can publish with these laite markets.

532
00:25:09.279 --> 00:25:11.240
And so I teach that one a lot now, and

533
00:25:11.279 --> 00:25:13.000
then I do like a novel in a year class,

534
00:25:13.000 --> 00:25:15.359
which is a big class. It's a huge commitment, a

535
00:25:15.400 --> 00:25:17.480
lot of time and money and effort, and it goes

536
00:25:17.559 --> 00:25:20.240
all year long, and we have daily prompts and then

537
00:25:20.279 --> 00:25:23.519
we meet the third Thursday of every month and we

538
00:25:23.680 --> 00:25:26.680
write a book. First month is all pre writing, six

539
00:25:26.720 --> 00:25:30.079
months of writing eleven thousand words a month rough drafts.

540
00:25:30.559 --> 00:25:32.400
Then we do four months of editing, and then a

541
00:25:32.400 --> 00:25:35.039
month in December of all exhibisson prompts. So the goal

542
00:25:35.079 --> 00:25:36.880
in the year is to rough draft a book and

543
00:25:36.880 --> 00:25:38.799
then fine tune it, turn it in a final so

544
00:25:38.839 --> 00:25:41.559
I read it twice, get it over that like sixty

545
00:25:41.559 --> 00:25:44.000
five thousand word mark, and then send it out and

546
00:25:44.039 --> 00:25:46.119
shop it and publish it. And so those are that's

547
00:25:46.240 --> 00:25:48.759
kind of the core group of the classes I teach.

548
00:25:49.799 --> 00:25:51.880
And that's that That's been a really good kind of

549
00:25:52.200 --> 00:25:55.359
mini program that I developed over the years. So if

550
00:25:55.359 --> 00:25:57.160
people want to come in instead of spending you know,

551
00:25:57.200 --> 00:25:59.559
thirty grand to get an MFA, you know, they go

552
00:25:59.599 --> 00:26:02.279
through the mechanics of dark fiction to the workshop for

553
00:26:02.319 --> 00:26:04.160
the novel, and you know, you're doing the whole thing

554
00:26:04.200 --> 00:26:06.680
for like seven grand or something. You don't do the

555
00:26:06.680 --> 00:26:09.559
novel in your class even less. And so that's been

556
00:26:09.559 --> 00:26:11.359
a lot of my stuff I'm doing. I also do

557
00:26:11.400 --> 00:26:15.559
some stuff for writers Digest online Writers I just at university,

558
00:26:15.599 --> 00:26:17.000
and then I've been working for a group called the

559
00:26:17.000 --> 00:26:19.680
Gillian Writers Group, where I've been a writing coach. So

560
00:26:19.680 --> 00:26:22.039
that's been a whole new thing I've been doing. Just

561
00:26:22.119 --> 00:26:24.599
been really interesting, trying to a whole different market of

562
00:26:24.640 --> 00:26:26.200
people who are looking for someone to help coach them

563
00:26:26.240 --> 00:26:27.240
through different projects.

564
00:26:27.920 --> 00:26:30.160
That is incredibly awesome. That's a lot.

565
00:26:30.519 --> 00:26:34.640
Thanks. Yeah, Well I'm doing this full time. Now. So

566
00:26:34.839 --> 00:26:36.039
you know, I wasn't like I said, I was an

567
00:26:36.039 --> 00:26:40.200
advertising for like seventeen eighteen years, and of those eighteen years,

568
00:26:40.200 --> 00:26:44.640
I probably was writing for seven five and it basically

569
00:26:44.799 --> 00:26:48.079
over time was trying to kind of, you know, reduce

570
00:26:48.119 --> 00:26:50.839
my advertising and raise my writing. And so my living

571
00:26:50.880 --> 00:26:52.880
now is a combination of what I earned as a

572
00:26:52.880 --> 00:26:56.160
writer an editor. I edit manuscripts and novels just in

573
00:26:56.240 --> 00:27:00.200
an addition to my class work teaching, and then any

574
00:27:00.200 --> 00:27:02.440
publishing I do. So all that together is you know,

575
00:27:02.519 --> 00:27:05.680
how I survive. And it's kind of terrifying because we

576
00:27:05.799 --> 00:27:08.440
all here hustling, but you know, I control my life

577
00:27:08.480 --> 00:27:11.200
to a certain degree. And then you know, I'm always

578
00:27:11.240 --> 00:27:12.759
looking for cool opportunities. And then I you know, I

579
00:27:12.759 --> 00:27:14.640
try to publish, you know, four to six short new

580
00:27:14.680 --> 00:27:17.920
short stories a year and then Incarnate coming out this year.

581
00:27:17.920 --> 00:27:19.160
You know, I haven't had a book out I think

582
00:27:19.160 --> 00:27:20.599
three or five years, so I'm trying to be a

583
00:27:20.640 --> 00:27:22.720
little more a little faster about it. But you know,

584
00:27:22.880 --> 00:27:24.759
really I should be working on the next one right now,

585
00:27:24.799 --> 00:27:25.200
and I'm not.

586
00:27:26.720 --> 00:27:30.240
I think that's every writer's yeah, of course, like there's

587
00:27:30.279 --> 00:27:32.960
that saying, you know, I should be writing and a

588
00:27:32.960 --> 00:27:39.079
lot of writers feel that way. Excuse me, now, Uh,

589
00:27:39.279 --> 00:27:42.519
just to clarify people, if they're interested, they can go

590
00:27:42.559 --> 00:27:46.240
to your website and find that information for classes and whatnot.

591
00:27:46.839 --> 00:27:49.440
Yep, I'm I'm on social media everywhere. I'm on. I'm

592
00:27:49.480 --> 00:27:54.960
on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and blue Sky and

593
00:27:55.160 --> 00:27:58.559
threads and everywhere. But yeah, it's just storybell Online dot

594
00:27:58.599 --> 00:28:02.319
Com is my website and that's where all my classes

595
00:28:02.319 --> 00:28:04.359
are hosted. That's also my editing stuff. It has all

596
00:28:04.359 --> 00:28:07.000
my testimonials, all my students, and it has like a

597
00:28:07.039 --> 00:28:09.519
section for a students work and where they've gone and

598
00:28:09.559 --> 00:28:10.240
what they've done.

599
00:28:10.119 --> 00:28:14.519
And yeah, awesome, Yeah, all right, So moving on just

600
00:28:14.559 --> 00:28:17.599
a little bit. You've written a lot of short stories.

601
00:28:17.720 --> 00:28:20.039
I mean, you have four collections and that that's like

602
00:28:20.119 --> 00:28:23.079
so many more stories than just say novels. Right, So

603
00:28:23.240 --> 00:28:26.240
I when I see that, I assume automatically that you

604
00:28:26.359 --> 00:28:32.000
have a love for the shorter form of storytelling. And

605
00:28:32.079 --> 00:28:34.519
so I'm wondering, and I asked this because I have

606
00:28:34.599 --> 00:28:36.400
a lot of authors on here who do that, and

607
00:28:36.519 --> 00:28:39.319
I'm fascinated by that because I love short stories myself.

608
00:28:39.359 --> 00:28:42.039
So I want to know from you, what is it

609
00:28:42.079 --> 00:28:44.079
about short story that draws you.

610
00:28:44.839 --> 00:28:48.799
Yeah, it's a lot of things. Writing a book is hard,

611
00:28:49.079 --> 00:28:51.559
and what I tell my students is, don't write a

612
00:28:51.599 --> 00:28:54.400
book until you're ready. And what I when I usually

613
00:28:54.440 --> 00:28:56.680
tell them ready is when you've kind of honed your

614
00:28:56.759 --> 00:28:59.039
craft for a couple of years. And usually the way

615
00:28:59.039 --> 00:29:02.160
you do that was short, And so I tell us too,

616
00:29:02.240 --> 00:29:03.680
that's kind of what I did. That's why it's coming up.

617
00:29:03.680 --> 00:29:05.480
I spent a number of years writing short stories before

618
00:29:05.480 --> 00:29:08.440
I wrote my first book, because I think we need

619
00:29:08.480 --> 00:29:10.400
to understand. We need to understand a couple of things.

620
00:29:10.440 --> 00:29:12.920
We need to understand our voice. Who are what are

621
00:29:12.920 --> 00:29:16.079
we saying? Where do we come from, what are our influences?

622
00:29:16.319 --> 00:29:18.720
Who are the authors that influence us? What kind of

623
00:29:18.720 --> 00:29:20.799
stories are we trying to tell? When I came up,

624
00:29:20.839 --> 00:29:22.759
I was writing a lot more kind of neo noir

625
00:29:22.880 --> 00:29:27.519
transgressive realism. And that's what my second third book, Disintegration

626
00:29:27.559 --> 00:29:30.160
and Breaker, were a lot of my short stories were

627
00:29:30.200 --> 00:29:31.960
like that, you know, the thing with like thrillers and

628
00:29:32.000 --> 00:29:34.880
crimes that can easily lean into horror, realism can lean

629
00:29:34.960 --> 00:29:37.400
into horror doesn't have to be supernatural. I did that

630
00:29:37.440 --> 00:29:39.200
for a long time, and then one day I realized

631
00:29:39.240 --> 00:29:43.160
that there weren't a lot of markets for mystery crime

632
00:29:43.240 --> 00:29:46.799
thriller short stories. There's like Ellery, Queen and Hitchcock, and

633
00:29:46.839 --> 00:29:48.279
like that's it. It's like they are in a whole

634
00:29:48.279 --> 00:29:50.799
lot of places. But if you just push a little

635
00:29:50.839 --> 00:29:53.440
bit into the dark, if you push into horror, if

636
00:29:53.480 --> 00:29:56.160
you push into fantasy and science fiction, then opened up

637
00:29:56.160 --> 00:29:59.960
this whole other realm of possibilities. So I write fantasy,

638
00:30:00.039 --> 00:30:01.839
science fiction, and horror, and then every other kind of

639
00:30:01.839 --> 00:30:05.400
subset under them. I write magical realism and new weird

640
00:30:05.480 --> 00:30:09.359
coming out of the old weird, transgressive, Southern Gothic, you know,

641
00:30:09.400 --> 00:30:13.480
you name it, and literary fiction too. Writing short stories,

642
00:30:14.759 --> 00:30:17.119
you get to experiment. You can try out new things

643
00:30:17.240 --> 00:30:20.000
once you figure out what your voice is. I was

644
00:30:20.039 --> 00:30:22.079
doing a lot of kind of leaning into the new weird,

645
00:30:22.079 --> 00:30:24.960
I think, you know, post Pretty Dell Street Station, post

646
00:30:25.400 --> 00:30:28.079
Jeff Vandermers Annihilation. I had this new love of the

647
00:30:28.160 --> 00:30:31.680
uncanny and the weird, and I just started pushing in

648
00:30:31.720 --> 00:30:34.440
that direction a little bit more, and so I just

649
00:30:34.440 --> 00:30:37.279
started You can experiment with things first person, third person,

650
00:30:37.599 --> 00:30:40.599
one point of view, multiple points of view, past present tense,

651
00:30:40.960 --> 00:30:43.759
second person. You can try out write a vampire story.

652
00:30:43.759 --> 00:30:46.799
You can write a zombie story. You can write psychological horror,

653
00:30:46.799 --> 00:30:48.519
you can write supernatural horror. You just start. There's so

654
00:30:48.559 --> 00:30:50.240
much There's so much room in there to play and

655
00:30:50.240 --> 00:30:52.640
write these different stories. Write a couple of the last

656
00:30:52.640 --> 00:30:56.920
stories of a full corror story, like Puritanical Times that

657
00:30:57.039 --> 00:30:59.279
has like a biblically accurate angel in it, that was

658
00:30:59.319 --> 00:31:03.400
partly inspired by like Ted Chang's work, his story Hell

659
00:31:03.480 --> 00:31:05.519
Is the Absence of God, with a story that kind

660
00:31:05.519 --> 00:31:08.640
of blew my mind. And so you know, I you

661
00:31:08.720 --> 00:31:11.680
know coming I'm post post Black Mirror. My work changed

662
00:31:11.720 --> 00:31:13.279
a lot too, right, there was so many different places

663
00:31:13.480 --> 00:31:15.720
where my voice change. Coming out of my MFA program,

664
00:31:15.720 --> 00:31:18.559
my work changed a little bit. So short stories they

665
00:31:18.599 --> 00:31:21.119
allow you experiment, to have fun, to play, and you

666
00:31:21.119 --> 00:31:23.240
don't spend as much time on them, you know. I

667
00:31:23.319 --> 00:31:25.440
might spend anywhere from a day to a week to

668
00:31:25.519 --> 00:31:27.279
a month on a short story. But I'm not too

669
00:31:27.319 --> 00:31:30.079
precious with my work. I'm kind of a feast or

670
00:31:30.119 --> 00:31:33.119
famine kind of writer. I've been lucky enough to get

671
00:31:33.119 --> 00:31:35.200
to know Stephen Graham Jones over the years and we've

672
00:31:35.240 --> 00:31:37.880
become friends, and I consider him kind of an informal mentor,

673
00:31:38.359 --> 00:31:40.240
and every time you've got to hang out and talk

674
00:31:40.279 --> 00:31:42.240
about stuff, I just love talking shop because he's just

675
00:31:42.279 --> 00:31:45.440
so down to earth. We're both like that. I think we,

676
00:31:45.519 --> 00:31:48.240
you know, somewhere around like the fortieth or fifty story,

677
00:31:48.279 --> 00:31:49.359
we were what we thought, Oh, I think I know

678
00:31:49.400 --> 00:31:51.839
how to write short story now, and we're just also

679
00:31:51.880 --> 00:31:53.759
not that precious with it. So, I mean, I've written

680
00:31:53.799 --> 00:31:57.119
stories that I've started in the morning, you had a

681
00:31:57.160 --> 00:32:00.000
deadline at midnight, you know, wrote a rough draft five thousand,

682
00:32:00.200 --> 00:32:02.880
six thousand words, put it aside for an hour, came back,

683
00:32:02.920 --> 00:32:05.759
reread it, cleaned it up, turned it in, got accepted.

684
00:32:05.799 --> 00:32:08.759
The anthology ended up being the anchor story and an anthology,

685
00:32:08.759 --> 00:32:11.319
and the anthology wins a Bram Stoker Award. So I mean,

686
00:32:11.400 --> 00:32:13.880
but and then I have days I get absolutely nothing,

687
00:32:14.039 --> 00:32:17.640
you know. So but I think I think part of

688
00:32:17.680 --> 00:32:19.359
it is, you know, I don't know if you can

689
00:32:19.359 --> 00:32:21.359
tell I have a little adhd I have a little

690
00:32:21.519 --> 00:32:23.519
I'm a little bit of a spass. I a little bit,

691
00:32:23.559 --> 00:32:25.039
you know, I get a little I can spiral and

692
00:32:25.039 --> 00:32:28.440
get a little excited about things. But I like to focus.

693
00:32:28.559 --> 00:32:30.400
And so like when I'm my short story. Once I'm

694
00:32:30.400 --> 00:32:31.960
in that world, once I figure out where it is,

695
00:32:31.960 --> 00:32:34.000
and when I understand what I'm doing, I want to

696
00:32:34.000 --> 00:32:36.240
stay with it. Once once the cameras rolling, I can

697
00:32:36.240 --> 00:32:38.240
see it all happening, like I just want to buckle

698
00:32:38.319 --> 00:32:40.480
up and write it till it's done right. And so

699
00:32:40.960 --> 00:32:43.160
I type pretty fast. I have like seventy words a minute,

700
00:32:43.160 --> 00:32:45.119
and so I can, you know, I can. I can

701
00:32:45.160 --> 00:32:46.559
do a story in a day. It doesn't happen all

702
00:32:46.559 --> 00:32:49.279
the time, but I like that. The same thing with

703
00:32:49.319 --> 00:32:52.839
books like I you see Me a long time. I

704
00:32:53.240 --> 00:32:55.440
wrote the first half of my novel, Just Disintegration in

705
00:32:55.480 --> 00:32:58.680
my MFA program, went to my second semester. My first

706
00:32:58.680 --> 00:33:01.519
professor loved it. He didn't like it. He said he

707
00:33:01.599 --> 00:33:04.519
thought that it was not it was that thesis material,

708
00:33:05.160 --> 00:33:08.599
which means not good enough, and wanted me to write

709
00:33:09.039 --> 00:33:11.400
literary short fiction with him. And I almost left the

710
00:33:11.400 --> 00:33:15.000
program because I was so freaked out and bummed out,

711
00:33:15.000 --> 00:33:17.519
and I realized it was an opportunity, and so I

712
00:33:17.519 --> 00:33:20.720
studied with him and I learned a lot, and I'm

713
00:33:20.759 --> 00:33:22.160
glad I did because it was kind of a little

714
00:33:22.160 --> 00:33:23.599
bit of a gap in my knowledge, and I'm glad

715
00:33:23.640 --> 00:33:26.400
I did not just authors that wouldn't have read, literary

716
00:33:26.440 --> 00:33:29.119
authors that wouldn't have read, you know, I discovered on

717
00:33:29.279 --> 00:33:32.200
the way, you know, Joyce, Carol Oates and Margaret Atwood

718
00:33:32.359 --> 00:33:36.640
and Tony Morrison and Huuki Murakami and Cornracke McCarthy and

719
00:33:36.720 --> 00:33:39.640
Dennis Johnson and Mary gate Skill, all these dark sheep

720
00:33:39.680 --> 00:33:43.200
in the literary world. When he introduced me when I graduated,

721
00:33:43.240 --> 00:33:45.279
like he he made me cry. I thought he hated me.

722
00:33:47.119 --> 00:33:48.920
And he said, Henbane's gonna be the next even king

723
00:33:48.920 --> 00:33:50.480
came out of this program, It's gonna be Richard Thomas,

724
00:33:50.519 --> 00:33:52.200
and I was like, wow, I was like, I just

725
00:33:52.279 --> 00:33:54.759
like it turns out that he was harder on than

726
00:33:54.759 --> 00:33:58.640
people he he thought had a chance to. Yeah, and

727
00:33:58.680 --> 00:34:01.680
so he really kind of cracked the whip. But my

728
00:34:02.039 --> 00:34:06.599
work changed. It became more more, more weird, more uncanny,

729
00:34:06.640 --> 00:34:09.440
and then kind of I think during COVID, I couldn't

730
00:34:09.599 --> 00:34:13.239
just I couldn't be as bleak anymore because so much

731
00:34:13.280 --> 00:34:14.800
was bleak around us that I kind of leaned a

732
00:34:14.800 --> 00:34:17.320
bit more into hope punk So I started having more

733
00:34:17.360 --> 00:34:21.119
hopeful maybe the ending, maybe the outcome, Maybe it's justice served,

734
00:34:21.119 --> 00:34:24.840
maybe it's vengeance. Maybe it's just surviving the horror. Sometimes

735
00:34:24.840 --> 00:34:27.320
the horror wins. But I couldn't just have bleak bleak,

736
00:34:27.360 --> 00:34:30.519
bleak down, bleak, stay down, everybody dies everything was. I

737
00:34:30.519 --> 00:34:32.559
can only write so many of those stories, right, Yeah,

738
00:34:32.679 --> 00:34:35.639
So I think that it's very nature kind of leaned

739
00:34:35.639 --> 00:34:40.079
more into the uncanny, lean more into a sense of wonder. Right.

740
00:34:40.239 --> 00:34:41.800
I want the light and the dark. If you look

741
00:34:41.800 --> 00:34:44.480
at the word awful, it just means full of awe, right,

742
00:34:44.559 --> 00:34:45.880
And so that all can be a good or a

743
00:34:45.920 --> 00:34:48.159
bad thing. And so I think along the way. You know,

744
00:34:48.199 --> 00:34:50.599
my last short story collection is Spontaneous Human Combustion, was

745
00:34:50.639 --> 00:34:52.800
a finalist for the Bram Stoker Award, and there was

746
00:34:52.840 --> 00:34:54.519
a lot of hope punk in there, and it made

747
00:34:54.559 --> 00:34:56.559
me feel really good to make that final ballot because

748
00:34:56.559 --> 00:34:58.599
I wasn't sure how this stuff was working for the

749
00:34:58.599 --> 00:35:00.440
people out there and how people in a wa you

750
00:35:00.440 --> 00:35:02.800
felt about the horror I was writing. Was it horror enough?

751
00:35:03.880 --> 00:35:05.639
And so that made me feel really good out of

752
00:35:05.679 --> 00:35:09.480
like whatever sixty four collections that were recommended that you

753
00:35:09.599 --> 00:35:12.960
be in the final six is pretty cool. So you

754
00:35:12.960 --> 00:35:15.840
can write different stuff, you can experiment, you can dabble

755
00:35:15.880 --> 00:35:18.519
in different genres, you can try out different genres you can,

756
00:35:18.679 --> 00:35:21.760
and then you can connect with a huge group of people.

757
00:35:21.960 --> 00:35:25.559
You connect with editors, you connect with publications, the art staff,

758
00:35:25.639 --> 00:35:28.880
the not just the editors who acquire the work, but

759
00:35:28.920 --> 00:35:31.960
the editors who edit the work. I've met so many people,

760
00:35:32.079 --> 00:35:34.039
got to know so many editors, and met so many

761
00:35:34.079 --> 00:35:37.079
authors and shared table of contents, and they help boost

762
00:35:37.079 --> 00:35:39.360
your signal and they get your name out there, and

763
00:35:39.440 --> 00:35:41.159
all of that is beneficial to you as you kind

764
00:35:41.159 --> 00:35:43.239
of build your platform. If you build your you know,

765
00:35:43.719 --> 00:35:46.119
your body of work, get your name out there, try

766
00:35:46.119 --> 00:35:48.239
and get discovered, try and get invited into things, try

767
00:35:48.280 --> 00:35:50.280
and you know, make a name for yourself. And so

768
00:35:50.719 --> 00:35:52.760
all of that is why I write short stories. Plus

769
00:35:52.760 --> 00:35:54.840
I just love doing it. It's the kind of thing

770
00:35:54.880 --> 00:35:57.679
I can do between books what I'm writing a book.

771
00:35:57.679 --> 00:35:59.480
I don't write short fiction at all, because I tend

772
00:35:59.480 --> 00:36:02.159
to write my book. It's pretty fast. The last one, Incarnate,

773
00:36:02.239 --> 00:36:04.760
I wrote fifty two thousand words in two weeks, four

774
00:36:04.800 --> 00:36:07.320
thousand words a day. It was just four one thousand

775
00:36:07.400 --> 00:36:09.440
words scenes, and then it was like three acts of

776
00:36:09.440 --> 00:36:11.840
those you know, six chapters. Each chapter had four scenes

777
00:36:11.880 --> 00:36:14.360
each seen thousand words, and it just it just seemed

778
00:36:14.360 --> 00:36:16.280
to work really well for me, and once I got

779
00:36:16.280 --> 00:36:18.960
the But I mean, I've been doing research for two years,

780
00:36:19.679 --> 00:36:22.480
you know, watching the Thing and watching the entire TV

781
00:36:22.559 --> 00:36:24.920
series of The Terror, and reading the book The Terror,

782
00:36:24.920 --> 00:36:29.960
and like reading anything on Arctic and sin Eaters and Alaska,

783
00:36:30.360 --> 00:36:34.000
and I watched documentaries and YouTube videos and I had

784
00:36:34.000 --> 00:36:36.079
to fill my head with all the imagery so I

785
00:36:36.079 --> 00:36:38.400
could push everything I learned aside, everything i'd read and

786
00:36:38.440 --> 00:36:41.159
forget it and then just be in that space, right. Yeah,

787
00:36:41.599 --> 00:36:43.519
And that's and that I think when I got it rolling,

788
00:36:43.599 --> 00:36:46.159
that's that's how it works for me. That it's feast

789
00:36:46.239 --> 00:36:48.320
or famine that works. But I tell my students, don't

790
00:36:48.320 --> 00:36:49.960
write a book until you really have a strong sense

791
00:36:50.000 --> 00:36:52.159
of who you are, because the biggest thing people don't

792
00:36:52.199 --> 00:36:55.679
understand is it's like ten or fifteen times longer than

793
00:36:55.679 --> 00:36:57.880
anything you've ever written, as far as the short story

794
00:36:57.960 --> 00:37:01.880
five six thousand words, and the pace, the depth, the layers,

795
00:37:01.920 --> 00:37:04.679
how much you have to talk about, how much meat

796
00:37:04.719 --> 00:37:06.400
needs to be on the bone, and how much story

797
00:37:06.480 --> 00:37:09.159
you have to tell and not just wander for you know,

798
00:37:09.239 --> 00:37:13.039
seventy thousand words. Purposeful writing is hard, it's a marathon.

799
00:37:13.280 --> 00:37:16.440
Whereas short stories, Stephen King said short stories like a

800
00:37:16.440 --> 00:37:19.280
stolen kiss in an alleyway, I think stories are more

801
00:37:19.400 --> 00:37:22.920
like a one night stand or a plank slash fiction.

802
00:37:23.039 --> 00:37:25.440
Maybe a stolen kiss in an alley. But it's a

803
00:37:25.440 --> 00:37:28.320
whole different beast. And I love writing books, but man,

804
00:37:28.360 --> 00:37:29.920
they take a lot out of you. They take a

805
00:37:29.960 --> 00:37:32.599
lot of work, and I just can't do them all

806
00:37:32.639 --> 00:37:35.320
the time. And so in between those or be creative

807
00:37:35.480 --> 00:37:37.679
and to connect with other people and get my name

808
00:37:37.719 --> 00:37:40.079
out there and get recognition and make a little extra

809
00:37:40.159 --> 00:37:42.760
money and connect with all these wonderful people like I

810
00:37:42.800 --> 00:37:46.239
write short fiction. YEAHY has a long answer.

811
00:37:46.960 --> 00:37:50.920
No, No, great, you know, it's an awesome answer. But

812
00:37:51.000 --> 00:37:53.639
I have to wonder, especially with writers, and I always

813
00:37:53.679 --> 00:37:56.519
ask this too, who have a lot of collections out,

814
00:37:56.599 --> 00:37:58.960
how is it that you go about choosing the stories

815
00:37:58.960 --> 00:37:59.559
for a collection.

816
00:38:03.199 --> 00:38:08.800
It's interesting, spontaneous human combustion. I'd been, as I mentioned,

817
00:38:09.000 --> 00:38:10.559
I've been kind of going through this kick where I

818
00:38:10.559 --> 00:38:13.400
was writing a bit more hope punk, and so a

819
00:38:13.440 --> 00:38:15.679
lot of the stories from just those three years just

820
00:38:15.760 --> 00:38:18.679
made sense together because they all were kind of coming

821
00:38:18.719 --> 00:38:21.280
from a very similar place and so they felt like

822
00:38:21.320 --> 00:38:24.159
they belong together. Now there are some stories, and they're

823
00:38:24.159 --> 00:38:25.360
the one you were just talking about that was in

824
00:38:25.400 --> 00:38:28.800
Gutted Beautiful Horror Stories. Repent is a realism story and

825
00:38:28.840 --> 00:38:32.320
it has kind of a heartbreaking ending to it. There's

826
00:38:32.360 --> 00:38:36.079
hope in there, just not necessarily for a protagonist. And

827
00:38:36.119 --> 00:38:38.719
so depending how you look at it. So there was

828
00:38:38.760 --> 00:38:41.280
a grouping of stories, it seemed to fit together pretty well.

829
00:38:41.360 --> 00:38:45.000
I'm putting together my fifth one now, and it seems

830
00:38:45.039 --> 00:38:47.840
like I just kind of work in these clumps of

831
00:38:49.079 --> 00:38:52.199
perspective for a while. And so I'm looking at everything

832
00:38:52.199 --> 00:38:54.679
I've written in the last couple of years going into

833
00:38:54.679 --> 00:38:57.679
this story, and they seem to all fit well together.

834
00:38:57.719 --> 00:38:58.119
There are a.

835
00:38:58.039 --> 00:39:01.119
Couple I'm not putting in stories that are just a

836
00:39:01.119 --> 00:39:04.599
little weirder or don't quite fit the theme, or there's

837
00:39:04.639 --> 00:39:06.880
like one I just have never really believed in. I

838
00:39:06.920 --> 00:39:08.519
just don't think it's good enough, so I'm just not

839
00:39:08.559 --> 00:39:11.960
gonna put it in. But aside from that, it's I mean,

840
00:39:12.039 --> 00:39:14.760
I usually it's my stuff's always kind of a weird combination.

841
00:39:14.840 --> 00:39:17.679
I mean, even spontaneous human combustion. There's like the last

842
00:39:17.960 --> 00:39:19.800
story the novelette in their Ring of Fire is like

843
00:39:19.840 --> 00:39:23.039
a it's a science fiction horror story, and like, you know,

844
00:39:23.079 --> 00:39:25.320
but I think the heart of it is similar to

845
00:39:25.400 --> 00:39:28.000
the heart of the other stories, even if they're slightly different.

846
00:39:28.000 --> 00:39:29.800
So I like having a little bit of a variety.

847
00:39:30.039 --> 00:39:32.199
I see it like a fifteen course meal. You know,

848
00:39:32.679 --> 00:39:35.280
we're all gonna work well together, but you know this

849
00:39:35.400 --> 00:39:39.119
amused boosh in this dessert and this you know soup

850
00:39:39.199 --> 00:39:42.360
course versus this you know meat course. Is they're different flavors,

851
00:39:42.360 --> 00:39:44.880
but they're all coming from the same chef, right. Yeah,

852
00:39:44.880 --> 00:39:46.480
So I think I think a lot of what I'm

853
00:39:46.519 --> 00:39:49.320
doing now is is again kind of in that uncanny space,

854
00:39:51.000 --> 00:39:53.880
maybe pushing a little bit more into some places I

855
00:39:53.920 --> 00:39:58.159
haven't been before, like the couple full core stories and

856
00:39:58.199 --> 00:40:01.480
then a little science fiction here and there. I think

857
00:40:01.480 --> 00:40:03.159
the Live Speed story will fit. It might be the

858
00:40:03.239 --> 00:40:04.559
kind of the odd ball in the collection, just that

859
00:40:04.599 --> 00:40:06.960
it's a little slightly different flavor. But I think I

860
00:40:07.039 --> 00:40:08.880
think the heart of it is what feels the same

861
00:40:08.920 --> 00:40:09.079
to me.

862
00:40:09.639 --> 00:40:13.320
Yeah, your answer there kind of reminds me of something LARRD.

863
00:40:13.320 --> 00:40:17.320
Baron said once, or at least compared, you know, putting

864
00:40:17.480 --> 00:40:20.760
together a short story collection is sort of like, at

865
00:40:20.880 --> 00:40:22.960
least I think it was. Laireder said, this just sort

866
00:40:23.000 --> 00:40:28.400
of like making a record, a music record, you know,

867
00:40:28.480 --> 00:40:30.199
the songs, and you always have like a bunch of

868
00:40:30.480 --> 00:40:33.079
stuff that you can choose from, but you always gather

869
00:40:33.159 --> 00:40:35.519
the ones that make sense to go in that And

870
00:40:35.559 --> 00:40:38.000
that always makes me think of B sides, Like, do

871
00:40:38.039 --> 00:40:39.920
you think you could ever release like a B sides

872
00:40:39.920 --> 00:40:43.320
where it's just like there's no theme or feeling. It's

873
00:40:43.400 --> 00:40:45.280
just like all the ones that didn't make it into

874
00:40:45.280 --> 00:40:45.760
a collection.

875
00:40:45.960 --> 00:40:48.559
There definitely are some oddball ones out there that probably

876
00:40:48.559 --> 00:40:50.599
could be B sides. Yeah, I like what you say

877
00:40:50.639 --> 00:40:52.159
about an album because it is kind of it is

878
00:40:52.239 --> 00:40:54.599
kind of an orchestral movement is kind of a progression

879
00:40:54.639 --> 00:40:55.960
for one thing the next. They have to have a

880
00:40:56.000 --> 00:40:58.840
relationship to each other. You know, they're by the same band,

881
00:40:58.880 --> 00:41:00.519
but doesn't mean they're gonna have the same flavor of

882
00:41:00.559 --> 00:41:02.679
the same emotion. You know, it might be an upbeat one,

883
00:41:02.760 --> 00:41:04.400
it might be a ballad, it might be you know,

884
00:41:04.480 --> 00:41:07.239
a hard driving one. And you know, I'm one of

885
00:41:07.280 --> 00:41:09.880
my favorite My favorite bands are probably like Radiohead and

886
00:41:09.960 --> 00:41:12.159
like The Cure, and like, you know, The Cure has

887
00:41:12.239 --> 00:41:14.400
kind of a strong flavor that usually is indicative in

888
00:41:14.480 --> 00:41:16.679
most of the work. But Radiohead, it's such range and

889
00:41:16.760 --> 00:41:20.320
such weirdest from album the album. You never know what

890
00:41:20.320 --> 00:41:22.360
you're gonna get, right, So I think if I could,

891
00:41:22.400 --> 00:41:25.159
if I could compare myself to anyone, well, I'm probably

892
00:41:25.159 --> 00:41:26.599
more of the Cure than I am Radiohead, but I

893
00:41:26.639 --> 00:41:28.039
would like to think I would like to think I

894
00:41:28.039 --> 00:41:28.639
had Radiohead.

895
00:41:28.679 --> 00:41:31.719
I mean, well, you know, there's nothing wrong with saying

896
00:41:31.760 --> 00:41:34.559
you're like the Cure. That's pretty damn good too.

897
00:41:34.679 --> 00:41:36.639
Yeah. Yeah, well, but I mean I think I'm probably

898
00:41:36.679 --> 00:41:38.880
a bit more email, probably a bit more dark in moody,

899
00:41:38.920 --> 00:41:39.239
you know that.

900
00:41:39.760 --> 00:41:41.960
I don't know, honestly. If I were to put your music,

901
00:41:42.199 --> 00:41:46.480
your your work to music, I would go with more Radiohead. Yeah, yeah,

902
00:41:46.559 --> 00:41:50.159
because it has that dark undertone Radiohead that I mean.

903
00:41:50.719 --> 00:41:53.159
Obviously the Cure can too, but they do have like

904
00:41:53.239 --> 00:41:56.480
their pop poppy songs. When Radiohead do their poppy songs,

905
00:41:56.920 --> 00:41:58.599
it's still dark as shitty, you know.

906
00:41:59.400 --> 00:42:03.880
Yeah, it's funny to say that. We'll during COVID one

907
00:42:03.880 --> 00:42:05.599
of the things my family did, my wife and my

908
00:42:05.639 --> 00:42:08.039
son and my daughter, we would listen to albums together

909
00:42:08.239 --> 00:42:09.960
and that was a really cool experience because I can't

910
00:42:09.960 --> 00:42:12.519
remember the last time when I was a kid, you

911
00:42:12.639 --> 00:42:14.920
drive around and either had a cassette tape or you

912
00:42:14.960 --> 00:42:16.440
had a CD, but you pop it in and you

913
00:42:16.480 --> 00:42:17.880
just played the whole thing, right. You know, if you

914
00:42:17.880 --> 00:42:19.960
had a cassette tape, you aren't stopping and picking songs.

915
00:42:20.199 --> 00:42:21.760
You're putting a cassette tape in and you're just letting

916
00:42:21.760 --> 00:42:23.320
it go. It hits the D and it flips over

917
00:42:23.360 --> 00:42:24.920
and then it keeps going, like you just listen to

918
00:42:25.000 --> 00:42:27.400
the whole fucking album, right, And so I can't. I

919
00:42:27.480 --> 00:42:29.880
was just so funny because my son's just starting to

920
00:42:29.880 --> 00:42:32.000
get into some of my some bands I like, and

921
00:42:32.039 --> 00:42:35.000
I was looking at some old You two and R E. M.

922
00:42:35.079 --> 00:42:37.239
And I was like, I was like, thinking about the album.

923
00:42:37.239 --> 00:42:39.840
I what's the orange cover on the album? One of

924
00:42:39.840 --> 00:42:42.079
the albums I listened to college, listened to it over

925
00:42:42.119 --> 00:42:43.360
and over and over again. I'm like, I listened to

926
00:42:43.360 --> 00:42:45.599
the album front to back all the time. And so

927
00:42:45.639 --> 00:42:49.880
I think the experience of a collection, it should be

928
00:42:49.960 --> 00:42:54.119
this progression, it should be this relationship from the same chef,

929
00:42:54.159 --> 00:43:00.440
from the same band, the same painters, series of war artworks,

930
00:43:00.480 --> 00:43:02.840
you know, there's a relationship to each other. But I

931
00:43:02.840 --> 00:43:04.679
think I think you can have a little fun with it.

932
00:43:05.480 --> 00:43:07.559
I mean, I think people people who've been reading If

933
00:43:07.559 --> 00:43:09.679
people have been reading my work for years and this

934
00:43:09.760 --> 00:43:11.639
is not their first of my work, if there they've

935
00:43:11.639 --> 00:43:13.519
read a number of my collections, I think they have

936
00:43:13.559 --> 00:43:15.119
a pretty good idea of what they're going to get

937
00:43:15.119 --> 00:43:16.800
when they re won my stories. And so I try

938
00:43:16.800 --> 00:43:19.119
to give them what they come to me for, what

939
00:43:19.159 --> 00:43:20.840
they come to expect. What you know, I want to

940
00:43:20.840 --> 00:43:23.119
satisfy and make them happy, but I also want to

941
00:43:23.159 --> 00:43:25.079
kind of do something I don't want to keep disregard

942
00:43:25.159 --> 00:43:27.360
to chain the same old story. Yeah, so you know,

943
00:43:27.400 --> 00:43:30.039
I was really happy to write this puritanical horror story

944
00:43:30.239 --> 00:43:33.079
because I don't write a lot of historical fiction because

945
00:43:33.119 --> 00:43:35.159
I find it hard as to do the research. But

946
00:43:35.280 --> 00:43:37.639
I kept seeing the movie The Witch and it really

947
00:43:37.679 --> 00:43:40.840
just drove that vision. And so that, paired with the

948
00:43:40.840 --> 00:43:43.400
biblically accurate angel, turned into a pretty cool story. Thought

949
00:43:43.440 --> 00:43:46.159
was quite weird. I liked that quite a bit. And

950
00:43:46.199 --> 00:43:48.719
then I had like another some other folk coreps I

951
00:43:48.760 --> 00:43:51.840
was doing too, So I think, you know, I like

952
00:43:51.920 --> 00:43:54.079
to I think at the end of the day. It's

953
00:43:54.079 --> 00:43:57.119
still going to be me, you know, but I want

954
00:43:57.119 --> 00:43:58.960
to be able to surprise you a little bit too, right.

955
00:43:59.119 --> 00:44:03.079
Yeah, absolutely, Keeping your Toes now recently released in Karna.

956
00:44:03.440 --> 00:44:06.280
Yeah that that came out? Was it early October?

957
00:44:06.559 --> 00:44:07.039
September?

958
00:44:07.159 --> 00:44:10.800
December eleven's actually oh wow, okay, what what a date?

959
00:44:11.199 --> 00:44:14.960
Yeah? Yeah, I don't know what we're thinking.

960
00:44:16.199 --> 00:44:19.400
Well, well, you know what, it doesn't matter because it's

961
00:44:19.400 --> 00:44:22.000
a good it's a great book. Can you can you

962
00:44:22.039 --> 00:44:24.480
please give us a synopsis? What's what's the.

963
00:44:26.079 --> 00:44:29.719
Yeah. When I think of the word incarnate, I mean,

964
00:44:29.800 --> 00:44:33.159
to me it means made flesh and so part of

965
00:44:33.159 --> 00:44:35.199
what inspired this book, it was a couple of different things.

966
00:44:36.559 --> 00:44:38.280
There's a short story I teach in one of my

967
00:44:38.360 --> 00:44:42.519
classes by Mikayla Moore. Mikayla Moore a set called the Familiars.

968
00:44:42.719 --> 00:44:47.159
It was in the Van and Vandair Giant Bible called

969
00:44:47.159 --> 00:44:50.320
The Weird. It's like eight hundred pages, that one. When

970
00:44:50.320 --> 00:44:52.119
I was looking for stories for The New Black, the

971
00:44:52.119 --> 00:44:54.960
first anthology I edited, that's one of the stories it took.

972
00:44:56.000 --> 00:44:59.400
And there's this entity under the bed of the young boy.

973
00:44:59.480 --> 00:45:01.960
It's easy to I say, it's an imaginary friend. It's

974
00:45:02.000 --> 00:45:04.559
a creature under the bed. It's a ghost or a

975
00:45:04.599 --> 00:45:07.960
spirit to me, it's something else. To me, it's a

976
00:45:08.000 --> 00:45:11.239
manifestation of grief and loss from his dead father. And

977
00:45:11.239 --> 00:45:12.920
so it's not just a ghost or a spirit, it's

978
00:45:12.920 --> 00:45:15.719
something else entirely. So that had been in something I've

979
00:45:15.719 --> 00:45:17.679
been chewing on for a long time that I wanted

980
00:45:17.679 --> 00:45:22.039
to put into a book. Pair that with the idea

981
00:45:22.039 --> 00:45:24.719
of the sinator, and I've been fascinating with the idea

982
00:45:24.760 --> 00:45:28.320
of a sinator, and then the idea of like Barol, Alaska,

983
00:45:28.360 --> 00:45:31.239
in like the sixty eighty Days of Darkness, I thought,

984
00:45:31.239 --> 00:45:34.199
what would grow, what would flourish the darkness living in

985
00:45:34.280 --> 00:45:36.440
Chicago and the cold winters, and so it all came

986
00:45:36.800 --> 00:45:40.000
together in kind of this perfect storm of I want

987
00:45:40.039 --> 00:45:43.039
to tell a story about a sinator who lives in Barrel, Alaska,

988
00:45:43.480 --> 00:45:47.920
and he's there to kind of help the community. So

989
00:45:48.000 --> 00:45:52.400
the book is three acts, three different characters, and Sebastian

990
00:45:52.480 --> 00:45:55.519
is the first protagonist, and he's been doing this a

991
00:45:55.559 --> 00:45:59.079
long time and this is his latest assignment. There's a

992
00:45:59.119 --> 00:46:02.360
tear in reality, and through the terear come these monsters.

993
00:46:03.280 --> 00:46:05.079
What we're not sure of is is this a bad

994
00:46:05.159 --> 00:46:08.280
place is drawing the creatures to it? Are the creatures

995
00:46:08.320 --> 00:46:10.559
by coming here? Are they making it bad? The other

996
00:46:10.599 --> 00:46:13.400
thing that happens when he absolves people of their sins.

997
00:46:13.800 --> 00:46:16.840
He goes to their deathbed or after they've recently died,

998
00:46:16.880 --> 00:46:19.559
and he eats a meal, something special, and then he

999
00:46:19.639 --> 00:46:22.079
absolves them of all their sin so that when they

1000
00:46:22.320 --> 00:46:24.360
die or when they can move so they can move on,

1001
00:46:25.239 --> 00:46:28.480
whether they move on to heaven or reincarnate or valhalla,

1002
00:46:28.559 --> 00:46:31.400
whatever you believe. His job to make sure that they

1003
00:46:32.000 --> 00:46:34.719
are forgiven and can pass on to wherever they need

1004
00:46:34.760 --> 00:46:36.639
to go next. But then he has to do something

1005
00:46:36.719 --> 00:46:39.039
with that sin he eats, so instead of ingesting it

1006
00:46:39.079 --> 00:46:42.199
and keeping it, he bursts it into life. And so

1007
00:46:42.280 --> 00:46:45.719
that's kind of the incarnate part of it is these

1008
00:46:45.719 --> 00:46:50.239
people's souls made into flesh. Now there's no tear in

1009
00:46:50.280 --> 00:46:52.360
reality because there are rules of when he could do

1010
00:46:52.400 --> 00:46:54.599
this and when he can't do it. If the terror

1011
00:46:54.679 --> 00:46:58.559
is closed and he bursts something into existence, there's nowhere

1012
00:46:58.559 --> 00:47:02.599
for it to go. Sometimes bad things happen and people

1013
00:47:02.639 --> 00:47:05.679
betray him, or things or whatever goes on in the community,

1014
00:47:05.920 --> 00:47:08.159
and he might birth the creature into existence that has

1015
00:47:08.199 --> 00:47:09.840
nowhere to go but to stay there. And so that

1016
00:47:10.000 --> 00:47:13.239
also accumula helps to make the place this kind of

1017
00:47:13.320 --> 00:47:15.960
dark stain, this eighty days of darkness, and all the

1018
00:47:15.960 --> 00:47:17.960
bad things that happened there. There's enough already going on

1019
00:47:18.000 --> 00:47:20.559
there in Alaska as it is, you know, being alone

1020
00:47:20.599 --> 00:47:23.639
for so long, they're locked in. It's frozen, no cars

1021
00:47:23.639 --> 00:47:25.119
in and out, no boats in it and out, no

1022
00:47:25.199 --> 00:47:28.440
planes in and out. You know, it's like isolation. The cold,

1023
00:47:28.880 --> 00:47:32.239
the drinking, the death, the violence. It's just it's a real,

1024
00:47:32.679 --> 00:47:35.840
a really dark place to be. And so that seemed

1025
00:47:35.840 --> 00:47:38.000
like a fun thing to write about. And so I

1026
00:47:38.039 --> 00:47:40.400
wanted to write about the sin, eating and the creatures,

1027
00:47:40.400 --> 00:47:42.159
and so I knew it was gonna be like one, two, three,

1028
00:47:42.280 --> 00:47:46.639
four meals. I'm also I like to cook. I have

1029
00:47:46.679 --> 00:47:48.639
been a bit of a foodie. I love food, and

1030
00:47:48.679 --> 00:47:50.840
so every meal in the book is something I cook.

1031
00:47:50.880 --> 00:47:54.039
The first meal he has is my chili recipe, down

1032
00:47:54.079 --> 00:47:56.599
to every ingredient I have in there. And so it's

1033
00:47:56.639 --> 00:47:59.559
just again it's this balance of beauty and horror, right

1034
00:48:00.239 --> 00:48:02.760
back to the magic lightness and the darkness of wanting

1035
00:48:02.800 --> 00:48:05.599
you to eat the meal and to salivate and enjoy it,

1036
00:48:05.639 --> 00:48:08.480
and then things turn sour, things go bad. The rules

1037
00:48:08.480 --> 00:48:10.440
are he has to also eat whatever they put in

1038
00:48:10.440 --> 00:48:12.239
front of him. He has to finish the whole thing,

1039
00:48:12.280 --> 00:48:14.840
no matter how bad it is. And so you know,

1040
00:48:15.320 --> 00:48:17.239
that is his own experience of what he has to

1041
00:48:17.280 --> 00:48:20.760
go through. And so his whole first act is all about,

1042
00:48:20.840 --> 00:48:22.960
you know, creating these creatures. He's trying to send them

1043
00:48:22.960 --> 00:48:25.519
through this tear to battle these other creatures. But by

1044
00:48:25.559 --> 00:48:27.480
the nature of what he's doing, he can't take a

1045
00:48:27.519 --> 00:48:30.199
knife till gunfight. He can't, you know, take a puppy

1046
00:48:30.280 --> 00:48:32.880
dog to battle this like kaiju dinosaur like creature that's

1047
00:48:32.880 --> 00:48:35.639
coming through. He's gonna lose. And so he has to

1048
00:48:35.679 --> 00:48:39.079
work with the worst people in the community because they're

1049
00:48:39.119 --> 00:48:41.480
the ones that have these nasty, tainted souls and here

1050
00:48:41.519 --> 00:48:44.639
are the ones that give birth to these the worst monsters, right,

1051
00:48:44.880 --> 00:48:47.760
So it's this really tough relationship he has. The second

1052
00:48:47.800 --> 00:48:51.920
act is a switch over to a desert wasteland with

1053
00:48:52.039 --> 00:48:55.639
this creature, this mother monster, and how she's trying to

1054
00:48:55.719 --> 00:48:57.599
save her children and save the land. And there's a

1055
00:48:57.639 --> 00:48:59.559
connection with that that comes back to the first act.

1056
00:49:00.119 --> 00:49:01.800
I don't want say any more about that, and then

1057
00:49:01.840 --> 00:49:03.840
the third act comes back to the young boy Kalik,

1058
00:49:03.880 --> 00:49:06.519
who'd been studying with our protagonist in the first act.

1059
00:49:06.960 --> 00:49:09.519
So now he takes over as a sinator. But much

1060
00:49:09.679 --> 00:49:12.400
like kind of my generation or my parents' generation to

1061
00:49:12.519 --> 00:49:17.639
my children's generation, now klik Uh he feels he feels

1062
00:49:17.679 --> 00:49:22.800
like the absolution is bullshit, right, He's He's like, uh so, basically,

1063
00:49:23.119 --> 00:49:25.480
you're a bad person. On your deathbed, he ask God

1064
00:49:25.519 --> 00:49:27.719
for for goodness, and you know, you get forgiven and

1065
00:49:27.760 --> 00:49:29.079
you could come back and do it all over again.

1066
00:49:29.079 --> 00:49:30.599
And he's like, no, no, I'm not gonna do that.

1067
00:49:30.760 --> 00:49:34.039
He's like, if you're bad, I'm gonna there's gonna be consequenced.

1068
00:49:34.039 --> 00:49:36.519
And so he changes it the way he practices his

1069
00:49:36.639 --> 00:49:40.639
magic to amplify whatever you are. And if you're good

1070
00:49:40.800 --> 00:49:42.960
with flaws, you're gonna get into heaven anyway you're you're

1071
00:49:43.239 --> 00:49:46.599
you're always going to get in. God's not asking for perfection, right,

1072
00:49:47.760 --> 00:49:50.079
But if you're bad, then there's gonna be consequences. And

1073
00:49:50.119 --> 00:49:52.239
so he changes things. And so that's his own journey

1074
00:49:52.280 --> 00:49:54.559
of what he does and how he feels about his

1075
00:49:54.760 --> 00:49:59.119
community and the ride that he goes on. It was

1076
00:49:59.119 --> 00:50:00.719
a lot of fun to write. It was a hard book,

1077
00:50:00.760 --> 00:50:02.320
I think, one of the probably the hardest books. I've

1078
00:50:02.320 --> 00:50:04.760
had to write. So much research, so much I had

1079
00:50:04.800 --> 00:50:06.800
to learn before I could really feel the confidence to

1080
00:50:06.840 --> 00:50:08.239
write it. But then I also wrote, like I said,

1081
00:50:08.239 --> 00:50:10.960
fifty two thousand words in two weeks and remaining like

1082
00:50:11.800 --> 00:50:13.639
it was a total seventy eight the ust. I wrote

1083
00:50:13.639 --> 00:50:15.519
every Friday for the next like six weeks and got

1084
00:50:15.559 --> 00:50:18.559
it done. So it just kind of came spilling out

1085
00:50:18.599 --> 00:50:19.320
of me for the most part.

1086
00:50:19.599 --> 00:50:21.679
Does it feel like maybe like all the work you

1087
00:50:21.800 --> 00:50:25.519
did for like the two years before you started writing,

1088
00:50:25.599 --> 00:50:28.880
it just built up until when you started writing it

1089
00:50:29.000 --> 00:50:30.280
just kind of exploded at it.

1090
00:50:30.400 --> 00:50:34.599
Yeah. Yeah, it's a weird thing because I don't know

1091
00:50:34.679 --> 00:50:37.360
how much you've written stories and books and whatnot. But

1092
00:50:37.760 --> 00:50:41.519
it's it's a process and it's a it's I never

1093
00:50:41.639 --> 00:50:45.039
feel confident writing anything, whether it's flash fiction or five

1094
00:50:45.119 --> 00:50:47.119
thousand or a novel it or a novella or novel

1095
00:50:47.280 --> 00:50:48.719
if I don't know what the hell I'm talking about,

1096
00:50:49.000 --> 00:50:51.199
and I have to know it so well that I

1097
00:50:51.280 --> 00:50:54.719
can write to it without having to constantly stop and

1098
00:50:54.800 --> 00:50:58.440
do research. I did. I even hired a guy RepA Kemp.

1099
00:50:58.719 --> 00:51:01.559
We wrote a short story together that actually made Ellen

1100
00:51:01.599 --> 00:51:03.360
dat Loo's long list for Best Hour of the Year.

1101
00:51:03.519 --> 00:51:05.199
He's a great writer in and of himself, but he

1102
00:51:05.280 --> 00:51:07.239
spent time in Alaska in the Arctic, and so I

1103
00:51:07.400 --> 00:51:09.719
hired him to help me get it right, you know,

1104
00:51:09.760 --> 00:51:12.039
like Stephen king Hire is like a firearms expert. I

1105
00:51:12.119 --> 00:51:14.360
heard rebuilt to let me know what I was screwing

1106
00:51:14.440 --> 00:51:16.760
up and then to give me, you know what else

1107
00:51:16.800 --> 00:51:18.880
I've been missing. You know. There was a great example

1108
00:51:19.039 --> 00:51:22.119
he talked about this ritual of when new people came

1109
00:51:22.239 --> 00:51:25.519
to the Arctic or Alaska, depending where are, they would

1110
00:51:25.559 --> 00:51:29.119
be gifted with a block of this pure like glacier ice.

1111
00:51:29.320 --> 00:51:31.079
So they just you come out on your front porch

1112
00:51:31.079 --> 00:51:32.760
and then be a big block of ice with like

1113
00:51:32.800 --> 00:51:35.239
an ice pick in it. And it was actually when

1114
00:51:35.280 --> 00:51:36.599
you chip it off and let it melt, it's like

1115
00:51:36.639 --> 00:51:40.840
this really pure, amazing water, like glacier water. And but

1116
00:51:40.920 --> 00:51:42.679
if you didn't know better, you'd be like, what's this

1117
00:51:42.840 --> 00:51:46.760
threat of ice? And a picture? So yeah, so it

1118
00:51:46.920 --> 00:51:48.599
was it was a lot of research, and I think

1119
00:51:48.639 --> 00:51:51.199
it's it's one of those things that you went I

1120
00:51:51.320 --> 00:51:53.119
prefer not to do research I really like to write

1121
00:51:53.119 --> 00:51:54.880
from a place of one emotion or I like to

1122
00:51:54.920 --> 00:51:57.920
write from things I feel I right to have feeling

1123
00:51:57.960 --> 00:52:01.480
to drive my work. But it's like, know, hours of

1124
00:52:01.519 --> 00:52:04.119
research to get a page of material, a page of

1125
00:52:04.199 --> 00:52:06.559
notes to give you a sentence of detail. So I

1126
00:52:06.599 --> 00:52:08.719
don't know what all I absorbed over, you know. Then

1127
00:52:08.880 --> 00:52:11.599
visual mediums worked better for me, Like watching The Terror

1128
00:52:11.679 --> 00:52:13.679
for like three years or however long it was. There

1129
00:52:13.800 --> 00:52:17.280
was so much imagery and so much winter and ice

1130
00:52:17.559 --> 00:52:19.760
and wind. It just really helped fill my head. So

1131
00:52:19.920 --> 00:52:23.079
when I sat down to write the story, I knew

1132
00:52:23.079 --> 00:52:25.280
exackly where I was and it was just a matter

1133
00:52:25.360 --> 00:52:29.280
and I knew the characters. And then depending on the act,

1134
00:52:29.480 --> 00:52:33.039
like the first act or twenty four chapters, I knew

1135
00:52:33.079 --> 00:52:35.280
that one the most, and so out of those twenty four,

1136
00:52:35.320 --> 00:52:38.679
there are maybe sixteen scenes that I knew. The others

1137
00:52:38.800 --> 00:52:40.400
I had to find along in the way, and there

1138
00:52:40.519 --> 00:52:42.440
was a lot of really fun, happy accents. I like

1139
00:52:42.480 --> 00:52:45.360
to find things kind of organically as I go, and

1140
00:52:45.440 --> 00:52:47.360
so when I run into something, I'm like, oh, that

1141
00:52:47.440 --> 00:52:50.679
makes sense. Besides the three characters, the fourth character in

1142
00:52:50.679 --> 00:52:56.760
the book is really the place, the land, the Arctic wasteland,

1143
00:52:57.000 --> 00:53:01.400
this really cold, dangerous place. Sure that doesn't care about you.

1144
00:53:01.880 --> 00:53:03.760
If you go outside and you're stupid, you're just going

1145
00:53:03.840 --> 00:53:06.679
to die. Yeah, no one's looking out for you. You're

1146
00:53:06.719 --> 00:53:10.320
just gonna freeze to death, right, And so that's whenever

1147
00:53:10.400 --> 00:53:12.519
I got stuck, I would just lean into you know

1148
00:53:12.719 --> 00:53:14.440
what I what I like to do, what I think

1149
00:53:14.440 --> 00:53:16.519
I do best. You know, I'm a maximalist writer, so

1150
00:53:16.559 --> 00:53:19.159
I would lean into setting and sensory detail, and I

1151
00:53:19.199 --> 00:53:21.840
would lean into the setting, so the place and the

1152
00:53:21.960 --> 00:53:25.360
danger and nature. There's a scene early on in the

1153
00:53:25.400 --> 00:53:28.679
book where Sebastian is walking from his house down to

1154
00:53:28.840 --> 00:53:32.079
the diner and he's talking to a local guy about

1155
00:53:32.159 --> 00:53:33.840
you know, this this pool and when they're going to

1156
00:53:33.880 --> 00:53:36.920
close the bridge, and this woman's unloading your trunk and

1157
00:53:37.000 --> 00:53:38.840
her toddlers just kind of behind her in a little

1158
00:53:38.880 --> 00:53:42.079
pink snowsuit, just kind of you know, bobbling along, and

1159
00:53:42.159 --> 00:53:44.880
out of the woods come tumbling these two feral dogs, yea,

1160
00:53:45.079 --> 00:53:47.599
and they're attacking each other and they're rolling around and

1161
00:53:47.679 --> 00:53:49.719
it happens so fast, and then next thing you know,

1162
00:53:49.840 --> 00:53:51.960
they're like they tumbling to the girl and it's just

1163
00:53:52.079 --> 00:53:54.719
his ball of fur and pink and fluff and everything,

1164
00:53:55.239 --> 00:53:58.320
and they're like, holy shit. And so he's like Sebastian's

1165
00:53:58.320 --> 00:53:59.920
talking to this guy. The guy run and gets his gun.

1166
00:54:00.039 --> 00:54:02.280
It comes over, he takes it. He's like, take the shot,

1167
00:54:02.360 --> 00:54:03.760
Take the shot, you know, and it's like he shoots

1168
00:54:03.760 --> 00:54:06.199
one dog, shoots the other dog kills him. It's bastard

1169
00:54:06.280 --> 00:54:08.519
runs over, you know. The mother comes, run over my baby,

1170
00:54:08.639 --> 00:54:11.079
you know, like it gets like he pulled right, you know,

1171
00:54:11.159 --> 00:54:13.000
the fluff and the coat and like there's a smear

1172
00:54:13.039 --> 00:54:14.960
of blood across her head. And he checks her out

1173
00:54:15.039 --> 00:54:17.800
and she's totally fine. Yeah, it's his blood from the

1174
00:54:17.840 --> 00:54:19.840
dog or like a scratch on her head, like all

1175
00:54:19.880 --> 00:54:22.000
the padding and all stuff. Like they could never really

1176
00:54:22.079 --> 00:54:24.400
get to her, and she was just totally fine. But

1177
00:54:24.480 --> 00:54:26.400
in that moment, you think, oh shit, she's dead, right,

1178
00:54:27.159 --> 00:54:30.440
tearing her to piece. And so I I purposely this

1179
00:54:30.599 --> 00:54:33.199
is me leaning away from the bleak and towards the

1180
00:54:33.239 --> 00:54:35.519
badgup in wonder, I didn't want to kill this girl,

1181
00:54:35.559 --> 00:54:38.840
this little baby girl, toddler, both the rabbit dog, but

1182
00:54:38.880 --> 00:54:40.920
I wonder remind people of how dangerous it is if

1183
00:54:40.960 --> 00:54:42.760
you're not paying attention. You're unload the truck of your car,

1184
00:54:42.800 --> 00:54:45.800
and you let your daughter wander away. Bad things happen,

1185
00:54:45.880 --> 00:54:47.320
so they got to pay attention and so that like

1186
00:54:47.400 --> 00:54:49.119
that was a scene I hadn't planned on writing, but

1187
00:54:49.199 --> 00:54:51.159
it felt organic to the moment and seemed to work

1188
00:54:51.199 --> 00:54:51.360
for me.

1189
00:54:51.559 --> 00:54:58.760
So yeah, I just wanted to mention that Inkurnate is

1190
00:54:58.840 --> 00:55:02.440
one of the most unique books I have ever read,

1191
00:55:02.880 --> 00:55:06.840
thank you. The three parts are all very different from

1192
00:55:06.880 --> 00:55:09.199
each other, well, the first and the third have obviously

1193
00:55:09.320 --> 00:55:12.920
they're similar for a reason. Yeah, but they're still very different.

1194
00:55:13.960 --> 00:55:17.559
But what really kind of threw me at first was

1195
00:55:17.639 --> 00:55:21.400
the second act. And I want to mention also that

1196
00:55:21.480 --> 00:55:25.119
there's a lot of heartbreak in this book, Like, especially

1197
00:55:25.199 --> 00:55:29.360
in that second act, there's like so much heartbreak, but

1198
00:55:29.519 --> 00:55:31.480
there's also a lot of hope too, like there is

1199
00:55:31.519 --> 00:55:34.679
a balance, And I was really impressed with that, Like,

1200
00:55:34.760 --> 00:55:37.599
how do you that's got to be hard to write.

1201
00:55:39.199 --> 00:55:43.280
Yeah, when you understand what's really going on in the

1202
00:55:43.639 --> 00:55:46.239
second act, which I'm sure you do, you understand it's

1203
00:55:46.280 --> 00:55:49.480
connection back to the first act. There's a lot of

1204
00:55:49.559 --> 00:55:51.840
sympathy for the mother Monster on what she's going through.

1205
00:55:52.639 --> 00:55:55.440
She comes into that story talking about the loss of

1206
00:55:55.559 --> 00:55:57.880
her family and her children and all these things, and

1207
00:55:57.920 --> 00:56:01.079
it's just like she's alone, and she's become kind of

1208
00:56:01.280 --> 00:56:04.480
bitter and angry and doesn't give a crap about anybody.

1209
00:56:04.559 --> 00:56:09.880
But that realizes that, yeah, yeah, but as is the

1210
00:56:09.960 --> 00:56:12.079
way of the Arctic, as is the way of the desert,

1211
00:56:12.199 --> 00:56:13.840
you have to survive, you have to be kind of,

1212
00:56:14.280 --> 00:56:17.199
you know, cold hearted at times. But what she discovers

1213
00:56:17.199 --> 00:56:19.800
along the way is that she cares about this land,

1214
00:56:19.920 --> 00:56:22.159
and she cares about the animals. She realizes she's a

1215
00:56:22.239 --> 00:56:24.559
part of something bigger than her, right, and so she

1216
00:56:24.719 --> 00:56:28.920
works hard to try and save that that place. And

1217
00:56:29.480 --> 00:56:31.320
over time, as you really you start to understand her

1218
00:56:31.400 --> 00:56:34.079
connection with the other side and the connection with the

1219
00:56:34.119 --> 00:56:36.639
first act and what's going on, what's passing back and forth,

1220
00:56:36.679 --> 00:56:38.800
how that works. And so she goes on this journey,

1221
00:56:38.800 --> 00:56:41.079
and if you're paying attention and the second act, you'll

1222
00:56:41.079 --> 00:56:42.920
also pick up on what her journey is really about

1223
00:56:43.039 --> 00:56:45.719
and where she really comes from. Right. And then when

1224
00:56:45.719 --> 00:56:47.880
we flip back over to kind of like like he's

1225
00:56:47.960 --> 00:56:50.559
taking over based on what happens to the first act,

1226
00:56:50.639 --> 00:56:52.880
and he feels that things should be different, and so

1227
00:56:54.400 --> 00:56:56.960
that it's a really interesting journey because I think it

1228
00:56:57.079 --> 00:56:59.599
all the first act is kind of everything I thought

1229
00:56:59.639 --> 00:57:02.280
of be in a Sineator story, Like it was kind

1230
00:57:02.280 --> 00:57:05.599
of the conventional point of view and the conventional way

1231
00:57:05.599 --> 00:57:07.960
I thought this book would play out. Switching over to

1232
00:57:08.039 --> 00:57:10.320
her act was a departure, but I just felt like

1233
00:57:10.440 --> 00:57:13.400
I couldn't do the whole thing in the Arctic. I

1234
00:57:13.440 --> 00:57:15.880
felt like it was too much, too cold, too much

1235
00:57:15.920 --> 00:57:19.920
for repetition and redundancy. And when I realized who she was,

1236
00:57:20.559 --> 00:57:23.400
it really pushed me to I wanted to write a

1237
00:57:23.440 --> 00:57:25.519
desert horror story. I wanted to write, you know, a

1238
00:57:25.639 --> 00:57:27.920
dying land story. And so it gave me a chance

1239
00:57:28.000 --> 00:57:30.519
to have a different flavor on this trip, right, you know,

1240
00:57:30.599 --> 00:57:32.360
as opposed to all the cold. And then when it

1241
00:57:32.440 --> 00:57:34.960
comes back to Calik, he's like he's a different person,

1242
00:57:35.079 --> 00:57:39.639
So he sees the community differently than Sebastian does, and

1243
00:57:40.280 --> 00:57:42.519
he has different goals and yet there's still a lot

1244
00:57:42.599 --> 00:57:46.119
of threats to the people that live there, and he

1245
00:57:46.239 --> 00:57:47.800
decided to do his own thing there. I think some

1246
00:57:47.920 --> 00:57:49.960
of the more chilling moments of the book come in

1247
00:57:50.039 --> 00:57:53.119
some of his passages. I will say though, and first,

1248
00:57:53.159 --> 00:57:54.960
I appreciate the compliments. That really means a lot to me,

1249
00:57:55.000 --> 00:57:58.039
because I was very worried that this structure in the

1250
00:57:58.119 --> 00:58:00.800
format was going to be a problem for people. And

1251
00:58:01.000 --> 00:58:03.280
my agent even said she wasn't entirely sure about it,

1252
00:58:03.280 --> 00:58:05.000
and I said, I said, well, let me finish it.

1253
00:58:05.400 --> 00:58:07.880
Let's see how it goes. I like it where it is.

1254
00:58:07.880 --> 00:58:09.559
I know it's a little weird. I don't know how

1255
00:58:09.599 --> 00:58:12.280
the movie would work. Maybe the middle section will just

1256
00:58:12.360 --> 00:58:14.719
be it be an a twenty four film. It'll be like,

1257
00:58:14.840 --> 00:58:16.920
you know, yeah, weird Arctic in the first half. The

1258
00:58:16.960 --> 00:58:18.840
second act will be all animated, and then the third

1259
00:58:18.880 --> 00:58:22.559
act will I think I have an idea of what

1260
00:58:22.599 --> 00:58:23.760
they could do, but I want to say out loud

1261
00:58:23.760 --> 00:58:25.440
because I might spoil some pots. But I think getting

1262
00:58:25.480 --> 00:58:27.519
to the third act with Klik, like some of the

1263
00:58:27.599 --> 00:58:30.360
things that he sees, the way he's connected to his people,

1264
00:58:30.960 --> 00:58:33.599
and the way he changes and decides. You know, I'm

1265
00:58:33.639 --> 00:58:37.440
not gonna you could say it it's a progressive push

1266
00:58:38.199 --> 00:58:40.559
left in this country or left in the world towards

1267
00:58:40.639 --> 00:58:43.400
you know, just more more community, more support for people

1268
00:58:43.440 --> 00:58:46.000
in general, towards socialism or whatever you want to call it.

1269
00:58:47.000 --> 00:58:49.199
Of the support and community and then he he says,

1270
00:58:49.239 --> 00:58:50.480
you know, if you do bad things, you're gonna be

1271
00:58:50.559 --> 00:58:52.519
punished and if you need help, I mean, we're gonna help,

1272
00:58:52.760 --> 00:58:54.360
but we need you know, we're doing this together, but

1273
00:58:54.400 --> 00:58:56.400
you're not gonna be forgiven. You know. It's like there's

1274
00:58:56.400 --> 00:59:00.360
a difference between the difference between you know, salacceees somebody

1275
00:59:00.559 --> 00:59:03.960
and just a consequence of your actions. And you know,

1276
00:59:04.039 --> 00:59:06.519
I think we're starting to see some things happen in

1277
00:59:06.559 --> 00:59:08.719
this country. And I didn't write it as a political

1278
00:59:08.840 --> 00:59:11.280
manifesto of or any but there are some issues at

1279
00:59:11.280 --> 00:59:12.639
the heart of it that do mean something to me.

1280
00:59:12.719 --> 00:59:15.239
And I you know, at my heart, I care about people.

1281
00:59:15.360 --> 00:59:19.199
And it's really frustrating when we realize we have enough

1282
00:59:19.199 --> 00:59:21.440
food to feed everybody, we have enough for everybody, that

1283
00:59:21.559 --> 00:59:23.599
this country isn't doing the things a lot of developed

1284
00:59:23.679 --> 00:59:26.079
nations are already doing. I just feel like we're just

1285
00:59:26.159 --> 00:59:28.760
falling short to where we could be. So this is

1286
00:59:28.800 --> 00:59:30.880
a horror story, and it's a weird horror story, but

1287
00:59:30.960 --> 00:59:34.159
there's no there's underlying meaning in there. I also try

1288
00:59:34.199 --> 00:59:36.039
to I try to write my books Jason kind of

1289
00:59:36.480 --> 00:59:38.599
on different levels. I try to write it body mind

1290
00:59:38.639 --> 00:59:41.400
and soul, in that. If you just want to be entertained,

1291
00:59:41.480 --> 00:59:43.039
if you don't want to think about stuff, if you

1292
00:59:43.079 --> 00:59:44.519
don't want to look at politics, you want to look

1293
00:59:44.519 --> 00:59:46.840
at symbolism, you don't have to. You can just read

1294
00:59:46.840 --> 00:59:49.960
the book, be entertained, watch the chest pieces, little around

1295
00:59:50.159 --> 00:59:52.280
and be entertained. That's my first goal is can I

1296
00:59:52.719 --> 00:59:55.320
grab your attention, get you turning the pages, and then

1297
00:59:55.960 --> 00:59:59.159
be an exciting read. If you want more, I then

1298
00:59:59.199 --> 01:00:01.400
try and write it another level where there's emotion, where

1299
01:00:01.440 --> 01:00:04.960
if you're open to it emotionally, I will try and

1300
01:00:05.079 --> 01:00:07.320
move you. I will try and scare you, turn you on,

1301
01:00:07.519 --> 01:00:09.280
freak you out, like whatever's happening. I want to have

1302
01:00:09.280 --> 01:00:11.639
an emotional connection with you if you're open to it.

1303
01:00:12.119 --> 01:00:13.920
And then intellectually is I want to try and do

1304
01:00:14.000 --> 01:00:16.079
something that will kind of blow your mind, stimulate your

1305
01:00:16.119 --> 01:00:18.119
brain pan so that when you're done reading the book,

1306
01:00:18.119 --> 01:00:20.400
you're still thinking about parts of the book later. And

1307
01:00:20.559 --> 01:00:24.079
so yeah, that's that's what I'm trying to do. You

1308
01:00:24.199 --> 01:00:26.880
talked about writing and how you know what it takes

1309
01:00:26.880 --> 01:00:29.079
out of us. I think when I do my best work,

1310
01:00:29.199 --> 01:00:31.920
I feel spent when I'm done. When I wrote the

1311
01:00:31.960 --> 01:00:34.599
second half of my book Disintegration, forty thousand words in

1312
01:00:34.679 --> 01:00:37.639
a week. I tried. I thought I was going to

1313
01:00:37.719 --> 01:00:40.079
throw up. I was like, I was empty. I'd been

1314
01:00:40.159 --> 01:00:41.639
that guy, I'd been through hell with him, and it

1315
01:00:41.679 --> 01:00:43.760
took a lot out of me. Same thing with Incarnate,

1316
01:00:43.800 --> 01:00:45.760
you know, writing the bulk of that in two weeks

1317
01:00:46.119 --> 01:00:47.639
took a lot out of me. When I write a

1318
01:00:47.719 --> 01:00:50.440
really intense short story in a day, I'm it's method writing.

1319
01:00:50.559 --> 01:00:53.480
I'm in there, it's a character, it's myself, it's a camera.

1320
01:00:53.559 --> 01:00:57.280
We're all together watching this thing. It's unfolding, and I'm

1321
01:00:57.719 --> 01:00:59.880
I'm in that moment. I'm living it right. And when

1322
01:01:00.039 --> 01:01:04.039
you go through these really traumatic, intense, wondrous experiences, man,

1323
01:01:04.119 --> 01:01:06.519
it takes a lot out of you. So I feel

1324
01:01:06.599 --> 01:01:09.199
like when I'm writing, if I don't feel spent at

1325
01:01:09.199 --> 01:01:10.559
the end of what I've done, but I don't feel

1326
01:01:10.559 --> 01:01:12.320
like vulnerable, if I don't feel a little sick, a

1327
01:01:12.400 --> 01:01:15.440
little exposed, a little uneasy about what I've done, then

1328
01:01:15.880 --> 01:01:17.880
then I feel like I probably haven't pushed myself hard enough.

1329
01:01:18.920 --> 01:01:23.400
Awesome, like, this book will stick with me for a

1330
01:01:23.480 --> 01:01:26.320
long time. I think it might make my like my

1331
01:01:26.679 --> 01:01:28.320
top ten list at the end of the Year isn't

1332
01:01:28.519 --> 01:01:30.239
necessarily a big deal, but I think it's going to

1333
01:01:30.280 --> 01:01:33.039
make It's going to make it a spoiler earliert, it's

1334
01:01:33.039 --> 01:01:36.800
going to make it because this book, this book haunts

1335
01:01:36.880 --> 01:01:39.039
me for various different reasons.

1336
01:01:39.400 --> 01:01:41.320
Yeah, can you talk about that. I would love to

1337
01:01:41.400 --> 01:01:44.719
hear what your experience has been like in what ways.

1338
01:01:44.599 --> 01:01:45.360
In reading the book?

1339
01:01:45.519 --> 01:01:45.679
Well?

1340
01:01:45.760 --> 01:01:50.800
Yeah, well, while reading it, the language and the things

1341
01:01:50.840 --> 01:01:53.880
that happened in the book, just my brain was able

1342
01:01:53.960 --> 01:01:56.599
to just latch on and hold on for the ride.

1343
01:01:57.079 --> 01:02:00.840
So when the emotions came, I felt the emotions. But

1344
01:02:00.960 --> 01:02:04.360
there are certain scenes in this book that are really

1345
01:02:04.480 --> 01:02:08.239
hard to read, especially in the third act, and I

1346
01:02:08.320 --> 01:02:09.760
think you probably I don't want to say it in

1347
01:02:09.800 --> 01:02:13.199
case I spoil something, but there's a certain situation with

1348
01:02:13.320 --> 01:02:16.880
a dog that was really hard to read through. I

1349
01:02:17.000 --> 01:02:19.239
was like, oh my god, I remember, I remember where

1350
01:02:19.320 --> 01:02:21.840
I was reading that, and I think I'll always remember

1351
01:02:23.199 --> 01:02:26.559
and uh, it's just that scene. But the ending too,

1352
01:02:26.880 --> 01:02:30.599
just with the I'll just say the mob Boss that

1353
01:02:30.920 --> 01:02:36.400
was fascinating and interesting. The whole ride itself. It's such

1354
01:02:36.440 --> 01:02:38.760
a roller coaster. You're up and then you're down. You're

1355
01:02:38.840 --> 01:02:40.480
up and then you're down. Then for a little while,

1356
01:02:40.519 --> 01:02:43.559
you're down a lot. There's a lot of dread and sadness,

1357
01:02:43.599 --> 01:02:45.000
and then you go back up, and then you go

1358
01:02:45.119 --> 01:02:47.719
back down. It's just a ride, man. It's like it's

1359
01:02:47.760 --> 01:02:49.920
like every time I sat down to write, I didn't

1360
01:02:49.960 --> 01:02:51.199
know what drug I was going to be.

1361
01:02:53.280 --> 01:02:55.719
Thank you, thank you. Yeah, I try to well. I

1362
01:02:55.760 --> 01:02:58.079
talked to my students about it. You know, when we

1363
01:02:58.199 --> 01:02:59.880
move on to books, I say, let's let's do that

1364
01:03:00.000 --> 01:03:02.960
one hundred and twenty crayon box, right, Let's lose all

1365
01:03:03.000 --> 01:03:05.199
the colors, the burnt sienna, all the weird color. I

1366
01:03:05.280 --> 01:03:07.239
wanted to I want it to be a tapestry, right.

1367
01:03:07.239 --> 01:03:09.039
I wanted to be the full experience. And when you

1368
01:03:09.800 --> 01:03:11.679
when you write all, I didn't want it to all

1369
01:03:11.760 --> 01:03:13.719
just be the one note, the one dark note, the

1370
01:03:13.800 --> 01:03:15.920
one piece of dark chocolate, just the banging the gong,

1371
01:03:16.400 --> 01:03:19.599
just the heavy metal on the ending. I want that

1372
01:03:19.760 --> 01:03:22.000
in moments, but I want it to be balanced by

1373
01:03:22.079 --> 01:03:26.000
the balance, by bird song, balanced by magic and light.

1374
01:03:26.119 --> 01:03:28.440
Because whatever you do, if you do it too much

1375
01:03:28.519 --> 01:03:30.639
in a row, you just it just deads your sentence

1376
01:03:30.719 --> 01:03:33.280
to that experience. And so there is a lot of dread.

1377
01:03:33.320 --> 01:03:35.039
There's a lot of darkness, there's a lot of bleakness,

1378
01:03:35.079 --> 01:03:36.079
but there's a lot of hope in there too.

1379
01:03:36.119 --> 01:03:37.079
There's a lot of hope too that.

1380
01:03:37.519 --> 01:03:39.800
I tried with every story to find a way to

1381
01:03:40.039 --> 01:03:43.480
at least speak to what they've been through, if not resolve.

1382
01:03:43.760 --> 01:03:45.440
And you know, some people are gonna win, some people

1383
01:03:45.440 --> 01:03:47.360
are gonna lose, but I think there's also a lot

1384
01:03:47.400 --> 01:03:52.920
of awareness of their place in everything. And I purposely

1385
01:03:53.000 --> 01:03:54.800
did try to put some hope at the end because

1386
01:03:55.280 --> 01:03:58.800
I had to right yea these days especially right.

1387
01:03:59.280 --> 01:04:01.559
But that's that's part of the thing. I'm used to

1388
01:04:01.639 --> 01:04:04.480
reading dreadful stuff because you know, I read a lot

1389
01:04:04.519 --> 01:04:07.039
of horror, and some people never leave that dread.

1390
01:04:07.639 --> 01:04:08.119
They stick.

1391
01:04:08.239 --> 01:04:11.159
They stick there, which is fine, honestly, But I love

1392
01:04:11.239 --> 01:04:13.480
it when you have those sprinkles of hope or good

1393
01:04:13.599 --> 01:04:17.679
things thanks that that really changed the way you feel

1394
01:04:17.800 --> 01:04:18.440
while you're reading.

1395
01:04:19.119 --> 01:04:21.559
Yeah, I wouldn't compare this to the books I'm going

1396
01:04:21.599 --> 01:04:23.639
to mention, but when I think about epic sagas, when

1397
01:04:23.639 --> 01:04:25.480
I think about Perdida, when I think about The Stand,

1398
01:04:25.480 --> 01:04:27.440
when I think about the when I think about like CLIVEE.

1399
01:04:27.440 --> 01:04:30.360
Barker's Weve world. I think about McCammon swan song, like

1400
01:04:30.440 --> 01:04:33.480
these are journeys, these are epic sagas that it should.

1401
01:04:33.679 --> 01:04:35.440
It puts you through the ringer, and like, you know

1402
01:04:36.119 --> 01:04:38.000
this while this is only seventy eight thousand words, like

1403
01:04:38.079 --> 01:04:40.360
I want the full experience for you, right, And so

1404
01:04:40.639 --> 01:04:42.679
I wanted to. I want to. I want you to

1405
01:04:42.760 --> 01:04:46.639
come away from it, you know, as broken and moved

1406
01:04:46.880 --> 01:04:49.800
and hopeful as I was writing it. Right. Yeah, I

1407
01:04:49.920 --> 01:04:52.400
remember reading the end of it. My daughter. She used

1408
01:04:52.400 --> 01:04:54.199
to walk around the block with me when I was

1409
01:04:54.239 --> 01:04:56.559
writing the book, and I talked to her throughout the

1410
01:04:56.599 --> 01:04:58.480
whole process. She and I talk about my writing a lot.

1411
01:04:59.000 --> 01:05:00.880
She's read a lot on my work. Now that she's older,

1412
01:05:00.920 --> 01:05:03.320
she can read it off. She read my last collection.

1413
01:05:03.400 --> 01:05:06.639
She likes my work. And I wanted to read the end,

1414
01:05:06.840 --> 01:05:08.360
and I wanted to. I was worried it was gonna

1415
01:05:08.360 --> 01:05:09.960
be too preachy, too sappy. I don't want to be

1416
01:05:10.000 --> 01:05:12.960
pushing anything down anybody's throat. And I read her the

1417
01:05:13.000 --> 01:05:14.440
last couple of scenes and I look over and her

1418
01:05:14.519 --> 01:05:16.679
tear your eyes are tearing up, and I was like,

1419
01:05:16.840 --> 01:05:18.280
I was like, oh, was it good? She's like yeah.

1420
01:05:18.519 --> 01:05:19.159
I was like Okay.

1421
01:05:19.360 --> 01:05:21.280
I was like, okay, because I want to. I want to.

1422
01:05:21.400 --> 01:05:25.480
I'm reaching for that. You know, Chuck Pollinick says, you know,

1423
01:05:25.599 --> 01:05:28.119
teach me something, make me laugh, and break my heart

1424
01:05:28.920 --> 01:05:30.559
if you're not a humorous I think there is some

1425
01:05:30.719 --> 01:05:33.199
humor in this book, but it's dark humor and not

1426
01:05:33.280 --> 01:05:35.840
a lot of humor. But I also like to teach

1427
01:05:35.920 --> 01:05:38.159
me something, you know, scare me, freak me out, and

1428
01:05:38.440 --> 01:05:40.119
break my heart. And so I think it's it's the

1429
01:05:40.159 --> 01:05:42.719
heartbreaking stuff I think that I like to work towards,

1430
01:05:42.800 --> 01:05:46.440
because that's just compassion, that's just feeling, that's emotion, and

1431
01:05:46.559 --> 01:05:49.119
so you know, the opposite of love is not hate.

1432
01:05:49.119 --> 01:05:51.519
The opposite of love is apathy. And so whatever I

1433
01:05:51.760 --> 01:05:53.960
want you, I want you to experience some strong emotions.

1434
01:05:54.519 --> 01:05:56.400
My wife won't even read myself. She won't read my

1435
01:05:56.480 --> 01:05:58.400
literary stuff from my MFA because she said she can

1436
01:05:58.480 --> 01:06:02.119
feel herself being manipulated. And I made her cry with

1437
01:06:02.159 --> 01:06:03.679
the stuff I've written, and I'm like, well, that's one

1438
01:06:03.719 --> 01:06:05.960
of my literary stories. I'm like, well, you definitely don't worry.

1439
01:06:06.039 --> 01:06:08.440
Although I will say I will say that she has

1440
01:06:08.519 --> 01:06:11.159
been reading Incarnate. She came to a reading I did,

1441
01:06:12.599 --> 01:06:15.760
and I was like, you sure people gonna be reading horror?

1442
01:06:15.760 --> 01:06:17.119
Are you okay with this? And she's like, yeah, no,

1443
01:06:17.159 --> 01:06:18.400
I want to come support you. I was like, okay,

1444
01:06:19.199 --> 01:06:20.920
and I read. I read the opening of the book

1445
01:06:21.000 --> 01:06:24.280
and she she's like, that's like really good. You think

1446
01:06:24.360 --> 01:06:26.280
she has read myself for like ten years. She's like,

1447
01:06:26.480 --> 01:06:28.119
you've gotten a lot better. She's like, I would like

1448
01:06:28.159 --> 01:06:29.920
to read your book. And I was like, what we're

1449
01:06:29.960 --> 01:06:31.599
getting on the plane we're coming back from Stoker Can

1450
01:06:31.639 --> 01:06:33.039
and she started reading the book and I was just like,

1451
01:06:33.960 --> 01:06:37.840
I've arrived. So I get it. And I know it's

1452
01:06:37.880 --> 01:06:39.920
not for everybody, but you know, when I look at

1453
01:06:39.920 --> 01:06:42.079
the comps on this book too, obviously the thing in

1454
01:06:42.159 --> 01:06:45.079
the Terror, but you know John Language, the Fisherman, Stephen Graham,

1455
01:06:45.159 --> 01:06:47.519
Jos the only good Indians, but also Lois lottery is

1456
01:06:47.559 --> 01:06:49.960
to give her. And so there's like a rural kind

1457
01:06:49.960 --> 01:06:55.920
of native kind of folk horror kind of gif there's

1458
01:06:56.440 --> 01:06:58.920
a hopeful part to the story that I wanted to

1459
01:06:59.000 --> 01:07:01.280
weave into it that was important to me. And so

1460
01:07:01.360 --> 01:07:03.159
I think if you and then the Giver, if I

1461
01:07:03.239 --> 01:07:05.079
remember correctly, was kind of a set of three or

1462
01:07:05.119 --> 01:07:07.840
four novellas. Each book was really short. There were a

1463
01:07:07.880 --> 01:07:10.679
couple and they continue the story, which is kind of

1464
01:07:10.719 --> 01:07:12.920
how I did mine. And so I I think some

1465
01:07:13.000 --> 01:07:15.679
of that literary stuff, you know, got folded in as well,

1466
01:07:15.760 --> 01:07:17.320
because I wanted I wanted it to be there, and

1467
01:07:17.360 --> 01:07:20.199
I didn't want it to be just even going through

1468
01:07:20.239 --> 01:07:22.280
the first act where you're starting to see the repetition

1469
01:07:22.360 --> 01:07:23.920
of some of the things of the meals and the creature,

1470
01:07:24.000 --> 01:07:25.920
even then, I had to look for a variety and

1471
01:07:26.039 --> 01:07:27.960
obviously building up to the climax at the end of

1472
01:07:27.960 --> 01:07:30.400
the first act. But yeah, I don't like I don't

1473
01:07:30.519 --> 01:07:33.880
like repeating things, but I understand repetition for effect. I

1474
01:07:34.000 --> 01:07:36.400
love a progression of things. I like the rule of threes.

1475
01:07:36.440 --> 01:07:38.599
And then I have a thing called the Brian Evanson

1476
01:07:38.679 --> 01:07:41.360
rule of four where he or he often does, we'll

1477
01:07:41.360 --> 01:07:42.880
do the rule of threes and the fourth thing he

1478
01:07:42.960 --> 01:07:44.800
does is like really weird and abstract, and so I

1479
01:07:44.920 --> 01:07:47.719
try to follow that as well, and so, you know,

1480
01:07:47.760 --> 01:07:50.559
I want it to be all those things, which is

1481
01:07:50.599 --> 01:07:51.760
a lot to ask of a book, I know.

1482
01:07:51.880 --> 01:07:55.559
But yeah, one final question about this, and actually this

1483
01:07:55.679 --> 01:07:59.719
could go to all your work, is the pros now

1484
01:07:59.840 --> 01:08:03.599
I've read dense pros where my brain just it kind

1485
01:08:03.599 --> 01:08:05.800
of repels it. It's like, I don't like this right,

1486
01:08:05.920 --> 01:08:08.679
and it's a struggle. Your pros can be kind of

1487
01:08:08.760 --> 01:08:11.199
dense too, but it's dense in such a way that,

1488
01:08:11.360 --> 01:08:14.199
like I mentioned earlier, my brain just grabs onto it

1489
01:08:14.400 --> 01:08:17.239
and suddenly I'm there. I'm not saying that your writing's

1490
01:08:17.319 --> 01:08:20.239
like Margaret Atwood, but it kind of because Margaret Atwood

1491
01:08:20.279 --> 01:08:22.880
has a similar sort of her pros can be kind

1492
01:08:22.880 --> 01:08:25.479
of dense, but my brain will latch onto it in

1493
01:08:25.520 --> 01:08:29.079
a similar way. So I can't write like that at all.

1494
01:08:29.479 --> 01:08:32.600
I've tried and it just doesn't work. So I'm wondering

1495
01:08:32.680 --> 01:08:35.520
how how how do you do that? Like how when

1496
01:08:35.600 --> 01:08:38.439
you get into the language, the meat then the potatoes

1497
01:08:38.479 --> 01:08:38.600
of it.

1498
01:08:39.000 --> 01:08:42.760
Yeah, it's it's tough. I think it's a lifetime of learning.

1499
01:08:42.880 --> 01:08:46.319
It's a lifetime of reading the people that I ape,

1500
01:08:46.399 --> 01:08:48.479
the people I look to. You know, when I read

1501
01:08:48.520 --> 01:08:50.720
Cormack McCarthy when I was in my MFA program and

1502
01:08:50.840 --> 01:08:53.039
so like Blood Merdian is a book that had a

1503
01:08:53.079 --> 01:08:55.199
profound effect on me. And that's a very dense book.

1504
01:08:55.199 --> 01:08:58.039
I can read that in small bites. I would say

1505
01:08:58.039 --> 01:09:01.399
the same thing for other maximalism people like China Milk

1506
01:09:01.840 --> 01:09:04.960
mihaibles A. Prettio Street Station was a big influence on me.

1507
01:09:05.399 --> 01:09:07.880
That book is such a perfect mix of fantasy, science fiction,

1508
01:09:07.920 --> 01:09:10.800
science fiction, and horror. And then more recently Jeff Vandermire's work,

1509
01:09:10.920 --> 01:09:15.159
especially Annihilation. There is stuff in there I've never seen before,

1510
01:09:15.680 --> 01:09:18.239
echo horror, environmental horror, the stuff he does with things

1511
01:09:18.279 --> 01:09:21.199
that are not blood and guts violence but are ash

1512
01:09:21.359 --> 01:09:25.920
and moss and fungus and greenery, and the things he does.

1513
01:09:26.079 --> 01:09:29.319
I'm just really the crawler. I think about Perdido with

1514
01:09:29.359 --> 01:09:32.800
the Weaver and all these different Really, for me, it's

1515
01:09:32.800 --> 01:09:36.880
all those people I've always loved, like you know, dense music.

1516
01:09:36.880 --> 01:09:38.560
You can look at people like like I mentioned Radiohead

1517
01:09:38.600 --> 01:09:41.680
and The Cure, like poetry. I've always appreciated music. I'm

1518
01:09:41.880 --> 01:09:44.399
I'm a I used to play saxophone for a number

1519
01:09:44.399 --> 01:09:46.880
of years. I'm a class trained tenor. I sang in

1520
01:09:48.119 --> 01:09:51.520
choir in high school and college. I went to Bradley University,

1521
01:09:51.560 --> 01:09:53.800
performed with the pure A Civic Opera and the orchestra,

1522
01:09:54.199 --> 01:09:56.479
and so I my whole life, I've sought out these

1523
01:09:56.560 --> 01:10:00.279
moments of these larger than life, you know, experiences, right,

1524
01:10:02.159 --> 01:10:06.720
And so I think when I write, it's it's me

1525
01:10:06.880 --> 01:10:09.399
trying to tell the story but in a way that

1526
01:10:09.520 --> 01:10:12.720
goes as deep as I can without without it being

1527
01:10:12.880 --> 01:10:15.239
patting and without it being purple. I don't know if

1528
01:10:15.279 --> 01:10:17.960
that makes sense, but it's yeah, it's exactly part of

1529
01:10:18.000 --> 01:10:18.239
it is.

1530
01:10:18.439 --> 01:10:18.520
Uh.

1531
01:10:18.920 --> 01:10:21.079
It's been a long time kind of figuring out my voice,

1532
01:10:21.159 --> 01:10:23.479
and I think I'm different. If you read some of

1533
01:10:23.520 --> 01:10:25.840
my earlier work, is it probably a little more stripped down.

1534
01:10:26.800 --> 01:10:29.720
This book was definitely me leaning into all the sudding

1535
01:10:29.880 --> 01:10:33.039
and sensory because, like I said, the backdrop, the place

1536
01:10:33.199 --> 01:10:35.680
in nature is like the fourth biggest character in here,

1537
01:10:35.760 --> 01:10:37.960
and it's in here a lot. It's the tapestry upon

1538
01:10:38.000 --> 01:10:41.079
which I hang all of their stories. So I wanted

1539
01:10:41.119 --> 01:10:43.119
it to be immersive. I wanted all these you know,

1540
01:10:43.439 --> 01:10:45.239
I tell my students when it comes to setting in

1541
01:10:45.279 --> 01:10:49.000
sensory detail, you know, it's all five that sight, sound, smell, taste,

1542
01:10:49.079 --> 01:10:51.279
touch all of them. And so I just I've gotten

1543
01:10:51.439 --> 01:10:54.920
used to looking for those opportunities to use all five

1544
01:10:55.000 --> 01:10:57.600
senses whenever I can, and then I just I try

1545
01:10:58.760 --> 01:11:00.640
on my rough drafts, I just try and get it down.

1546
01:11:01.119 --> 01:11:03.279
But on my edits, I try and improve, and so

1547
01:11:04.359 --> 01:11:06.159
on the first draft maybe I say, you read, and

1548
01:11:06.199 --> 01:11:08.199
maybe on the next draft it's you know, it's it's

1549
01:11:08.239 --> 01:11:10.920
a different shade of red, or it's a color that's

1550
01:11:10.920 --> 01:11:15.880
really an emotion or something else. I try to create

1551
01:11:16.000 --> 01:11:18.600
things that don't exist. I like juxtapositions, like putting things

1552
01:11:18.600 --> 01:11:22.000
together that are a weird combination, because I think, like

1553
01:11:22.119 --> 01:11:25.399
in poetry or other dense maximalists, you're creating something that

1554
01:11:25.479 --> 01:11:28.000
nobody else is created by not in your verbs and

1555
01:11:28.079 --> 01:11:30.039
verbing your nouns and just kind of shoving things together

1556
01:11:30.119 --> 01:11:33.880
in weird ways. Because I'm trying to create something original,

1557
01:11:34.039 --> 01:11:36.279
something new and fresh and different at the same time

1558
01:11:36.880 --> 01:11:40.560
trying to be accessible and be familiar in a way

1559
01:11:40.600 --> 01:11:42.960
that you can read my work, you know, without it

1560
01:11:43.039 --> 01:11:45.800
being too much. I've had people call my work purple.

1561
01:11:45.960 --> 01:11:47.439
I've had people say it's too much, and I know,

1562
01:11:47.479 --> 01:11:49.760
I'm sure I am not for everybody, but I try

1563
01:11:49.800 --> 01:11:51.640
to make sure that you know. I think it's vonnega

1564
01:11:51.720 --> 01:11:54.359
It says every sentence must advance the plot or reveal character,

1565
01:11:54.800 --> 01:11:57.439
and I think Legwin or somebody said, or build the world,

1566
01:11:57.479 --> 01:12:00.640
you know, setting so between the I'm constantly going between

1567
01:12:00.680 --> 01:12:03.039
those three things, and so I'm always looking at the

1568
01:12:03.079 --> 01:12:05.239
place I'm in and the people I'm with and what's

1569
01:12:05.279 --> 01:12:07.079
going on in the moment, and then I try and

1570
01:12:07.159 --> 01:12:10.199
play up what's happening in that moment. So like you'll

1571
01:12:10.239 --> 01:12:12.039
notice there isn't a lot of food in the book

1572
01:12:12.119 --> 01:12:14.439
until we get to that first bowl of chili, and

1573
01:12:14.520 --> 01:12:16.960
then it's like hyper focused on the food. When we

1574
01:12:17.000 --> 01:12:19.000
get to like calic later or the first time we

1575
01:12:19.079 --> 01:12:22.279
go into the diner, it's like suddenly everything's cold and

1576
01:12:22.479 --> 01:12:25.319
like blue and white and just like empty and sterile

1577
01:12:25.399 --> 01:12:26.800
out and then you come into a space and it's

1578
01:12:26.880 --> 01:12:29.600
warm and it's colorful and it's all these smells and

1579
01:12:29.680 --> 01:12:32.079
garlic and onions. Like I just try to be open

1580
01:12:32.359 --> 01:12:35.039
to what I see in the world when I write it,

1581
01:12:35.119 --> 01:12:37.439
and if I'm really if I'm channeling it, well, then

1582
01:12:37.439 --> 01:12:39.560
I'm kind of a method writer. I kind of I'm

1583
01:12:39.600 --> 01:12:42.119
in that moment. So I just try to record and

1584
01:12:42.680 --> 01:12:45.800
recount what I see. And then the last edit I

1585
01:12:45.880 --> 01:12:48.359
do when I edit something is like down to like

1586
01:12:48.479 --> 01:12:52.319
the ed versus I how does it read. I either

1587
01:12:52.399 --> 01:12:55.319
read dialogue out loud or have a very loud internal voice.

1588
01:12:56.199 --> 01:12:59.159
They have noticed tonight I'm very talkative that I can

1589
01:12:59.199 --> 01:13:01.119
hear dialogue very They don't have to read it out,

1590
01:13:01.159 --> 01:13:03.159
but I will see what words that trip over, and

1591
01:13:03.239 --> 01:13:04.960
I'll change a needy to an i g if it

1592
01:13:05.039 --> 01:13:07.479
flows better, or if I see a repetition of words,

1593
01:13:07.479 --> 01:13:09.920
I'll change every book, I'll have one word. I mean,

1594
01:13:09.960 --> 01:13:11.760
obviously this one it was like ice and snow and

1595
01:13:11.880 --> 01:13:15.359
I had to change. Poor repo helping me get this

1596
01:13:15.439 --> 01:13:17.279
book right. But I had a book where they used

1597
01:13:17.279 --> 01:13:20.600
the word sheen like twenty seven times for no reason.

1598
01:13:21.279 --> 01:13:24.800
Maybe it was a hot book. I look for opportunity

1599
01:13:24.880 --> 01:13:28.000
to be weird. I look for opportunity to be you know,

1600
01:13:28.359 --> 01:13:30.119
I want to be human. I want to be emotional,

1601
01:13:30.920 --> 01:13:32.680
and I try to just tap into whatever's happening in

1602
01:13:32.720 --> 01:13:34.880
that place in time, so that you know, I haven't

1603
01:13:34.960 --> 01:13:36.760
been to the Arctic. I also haven't been to Mars.

1604
01:13:36.840 --> 01:13:38.880
I also haven't killed anybody. So I just try and

1605
01:13:38.960 --> 01:13:41.600
absorb everything I've ever seen. That's why I constantly go

1606
01:13:41.920 --> 01:13:43.680
and like see all these E twenty four films and

1607
01:13:43.760 --> 01:13:46.319
Neon and Bluemhouse, and that's why I'm constantly reading all

1608
01:13:46.359 --> 01:13:48.239
his anthologies. Is I'm trying to pick up what I

1609
01:13:48.319 --> 01:13:50.880
can from all the people around me, surround myself with

1610
01:13:51.039 --> 01:13:54.000
geniuses and just kind of absorbed through osmosis what they're

1611
01:13:54.039 --> 01:13:56.039
doing and see if I can't get a small model

1612
01:13:56.039 --> 01:13:56.800
that back on the page.

1613
01:13:57.199 --> 01:14:00.159
Absolutely, that's a great answer. That's something what I've I'm

1614
01:14:00.159 --> 01:14:02.720
trying to do to surround myself with people who are

1615
01:14:02.760 --> 01:14:05.439
smarter than me, is what I The way I like

1616
01:14:05.560 --> 01:14:05.920
to say it.

1617
01:14:06.279 --> 01:14:08.840
Yeah, but if I walk into a room and I

1618
01:14:09.159 --> 01:14:10.439
think I'm the smartest guy in the room, I need

1619
01:14:10.479 --> 01:14:11.199
to find another room.

1620
01:14:11.560 --> 01:14:14.159
Yeah, absolutely, because I don't.

1621
01:14:14.159 --> 01:14:15.960
I don't learn that way, you know. And I love

1622
01:14:16.239 --> 01:14:19.600
I definitely love teaching. I love helping people. And I

1623
01:14:19.720 --> 01:14:22.319
hold open doors and windows because people did that for

1624
01:14:22.439 --> 01:14:24.600
me for many many years and still are and so

1625
01:14:24.680 --> 01:14:27.640
I try to, you know, pay that forward. But you know,

1626
01:14:27.720 --> 01:14:29.880
I have to keep reading. You know, there was a

1627
01:14:29.920 --> 01:14:33.000
time I couldn't read Cormack McCarthy. I'm still trying to

1628
01:14:33.000 --> 01:14:35.239
get through House of Leaves. There's a lot of Ted

1629
01:14:35.359 --> 01:14:38.119
Chang's work I just don't get, but I try. And

1630
01:14:38.159 --> 01:14:40.279
then you know, when stuff works for me, it works,

1631
01:14:40.439 --> 01:14:42.239
and you know that's those are the moments where I

1632
01:14:42.279 --> 01:14:44.319
have epiphanies. That's why we have you know, changes, and

1633
01:14:44.359 --> 01:14:46.680
that's where I have an evolution of whatever we're trying

1634
01:14:46.720 --> 01:14:46.840
to do.

1635
01:14:47.119 --> 01:14:50.880
Right. Yeah, all right, So we have a question, yeah,

1636
01:14:51.000 --> 01:14:54.079
from the audience, just just one sure, and I'm not

1637
01:14:54.159 --> 01:14:56.880
too sure I can answer this one myself. We'll see

1638
01:14:56.880 --> 01:15:00.720
if you can. I usually I usually ask a question

1639
01:15:01.000 --> 01:15:05.039
at the end of each interview to each guest, asking

1640
01:15:06.359 --> 01:15:09.039
what authors you think you should people should be talking

1641
01:15:09.079 --> 01:15:11.640
about more. So I'm gonna kind of combine that with

1642
01:15:11.760 --> 01:15:15.960
this one. And the question is readings. Gentlemen looking for

1643
01:15:16.119 --> 01:15:19.439
some scary reads just started to read more again? What

1644
01:15:20.000 --> 01:15:23.199
top five horror books would you suggest to pick up? Thanks?

1645
01:15:23.239 --> 01:15:26.640
And this by Steve Mayers. Thank you Steve for asking

1646
01:15:26.720 --> 01:15:30.479
that question. This is tough for me because I get

1647
01:15:30.520 --> 01:15:36.000
creeped out sometimes, but I don't typically get scared when

1648
01:15:36.039 --> 01:15:38.720
I read horror. I can get scared when I'm watching

1649
01:15:38.760 --> 01:15:42.720
a horror movie, but not so much when I'm when

1650
01:15:42.760 --> 01:15:45.800
I'm reading. It's not easy question to answer, but I

1651
01:15:46.680 --> 01:15:51.000
guess first I would put I think, honestly like Stephen

1652
01:15:51.119 --> 01:15:54.439
King's Pet Cemetery was the last half of that book

1653
01:15:54.560 --> 01:15:58.199
is pretty scary. It's scary for many different reasons though,

1654
01:15:58.319 --> 01:16:02.720
So I don't know if that would if that's something

1655
01:16:02.760 --> 01:16:04.039
you would be looking for, Steve.

1656
01:16:04.560 --> 01:16:11.359
Yeah, So the books I teach teaching my dark fiction class,

1657
01:16:11.399 --> 01:16:13.600
I teach him because I love them. So I'll give

1658
01:16:13.640 --> 01:16:15.439
you five books I don't and then we'll see which

1659
01:16:15.479 --> 01:16:17.680
one works for you. But if you haven't read Josh

1660
01:16:17.720 --> 01:16:20.479
Mallerman's Bird Box, it's a great book. When I read it,

1661
01:16:20.520 --> 01:16:22.319
I read it the day after Thanksgiving. I read it

1662
01:16:22.319 --> 01:16:25.159
in one setting at my mole's house, by the fireplace,

1663
01:16:25.279 --> 01:16:26.760
sweating for like three hours.

1664
01:16:27.600 --> 01:16:29.920
So that book, you know what, you're right? That book

1665
01:16:30.039 --> 01:16:31.359
is pretty spooky too.

1666
01:16:31.439 --> 01:16:34.119
Yeah, goes back and forth with the two timelines. I

1667
01:16:34.199 --> 01:16:39.479
love that. To me Josh's work, it was like a

1668
01:16:39.560 --> 01:16:42.199
rebirth of Stephen King. So I read that book like

1669
01:16:42.319 --> 01:16:45.319
I had read you know, the Shining back in the Day, right,

1670
01:16:45.800 --> 01:16:48.840
So that's one if you like stuff it's a little weird.

1671
01:16:49.359 --> 01:16:52.600
Jeff Vandermeer's Annihilation is a wonderful book. It's really strange,

1672
01:16:52.600 --> 01:16:55.119
it's really unsettling. It's quite creepy, also quite moving. I

1673
01:16:55.239 --> 01:16:58.159
love that book a lot. I would put Annihilation in

1674
01:16:58.199 --> 01:17:00.079
my top ten books of all time maybe.

1675
01:17:00.079 --> 01:17:02.600
Of that product. What did you think of the movie adaptation?

1676
01:17:03.279 --> 01:17:04.880
I wasn't happy with it. I should have listened to

1677
01:17:04.920 --> 01:17:06.720
Jeff because I saw him post on Facebook and he's like,

1678
01:17:06.800 --> 01:17:09.159
it's in maligny, it's all. It's kind of everything, put

1679
01:17:09.199 --> 01:17:13.600
the kind of go into it thinking inspired by theos.

1680
01:17:14.079 --> 01:17:15.960
I wanted the book and I'm like, just do the

1681
01:17:16.000 --> 01:17:20.239
goddamn first book and didn't, And so I was disappointed

1682
01:17:20.279 --> 01:17:21.960
because it wasn't what I wanted. But there were some

1683
01:17:22.079 --> 01:17:27.039
cool moments, the bear, the the flowers of the Bear,

1684
01:17:27.880 --> 01:17:31.319
There's some good stuff in there. I'm working. I'm refinishing

1685
01:17:31.399 --> 01:17:33.640
the trilogy I teach. I teach Aniolation in my class

1686
01:17:33.680 --> 01:17:36.840
a couple of times a year, but I just recently

1687
01:17:36.960 --> 01:17:40.239
reread Authority, and I'm working through the third one because

1688
01:17:40.239 --> 01:17:42.199
I want to work up towards Absolution. The new one.

1689
01:17:43.039 --> 01:17:44.640
I don't second third I don't like as much. They're

1690
01:17:44.680 --> 01:17:47.479
very different, but I'm enjoying them. So I would say

1691
01:17:47.520 --> 01:17:53.319
Jeff's work Sarah Graham's Come Closer. I put Bird Box

1692
01:17:53.399 --> 01:17:58.079
and Come Closer as straightforward, fairly simple, straightforward reads, but

1693
01:17:58.199 --> 01:18:00.920
so many am Come Closer. The Possession book gets under

1694
01:18:01.000 --> 01:18:03.279
my skin and freaks me out. It's gonna work, Art's not,

1695
01:18:03.600 --> 01:18:05.600
and it may not work for you at all, But

1696
01:18:06.600 --> 01:18:08.159
if it does, I think, I think that's a really

1697
01:18:08.199 --> 01:18:11.680
good fun read. I used to teach Stephen Graham Jones

1698
01:18:11.720 --> 01:18:14.880
All the Beautiful Sinners in that slot, but going from

1699
01:18:14.880 --> 01:18:18.159
Annihilation to All the Beautiful Sinners to Perdida was too

1700
01:18:18.239 --> 01:18:20.680
much for people, and so I put Sarah shorter and

1701
01:18:20.760 --> 01:18:23.920
more straightforward. But I will say All the Beautiful Sinners

1702
01:18:24.000 --> 01:18:26.319
is my favorite Stephen Graham Jones book. It's a more

1703
01:18:26.439 --> 01:18:29.239
serious book. It's kind of Silence of the Lambs meets

1704
01:18:29.279 --> 01:18:31.359
No Country for Old Men with a Native American slant

1705
01:18:31.399 --> 01:18:33.960
to it. It's brilliant. I think they're reissuing it, but

1706
01:18:34.039 --> 01:18:37.960
I have the old book hardcover, paperback, get it. And

1707
01:18:38.039 --> 01:18:40.319
then Perdido Street Station is a book I love. It's

1708
01:18:40.359 --> 01:18:43.119
a it's an epic one. I would put that out there. Fantasy,

1709
01:18:43.199 --> 01:18:45.680
sci fi, horror. It's complex, but he's just so original.

1710
01:18:46.039 --> 01:18:50.039
I love Clive Barker's Weave World. I would say American

1711
01:18:50.119 --> 01:18:52.800
Psycho something about that. That's the only book that ever

1712
01:18:52.880 --> 01:18:56.199
made me gag. But it's it's weird, it's a weird voice,

1713
01:18:56.239 --> 01:18:57.920
a lot of pop culture and stuff, so I don't

1714
01:18:57.960 --> 01:19:00.439
know it either. Again, it's like house, it leaves either

1715
01:19:00.520 --> 01:19:02.640
works for people or it doesn't. Those are some of

1716
01:19:02.680 --> 01:19:05.159
the ones that pop out to me. And if I

1717
01:19:05.199 --> 01:19:09.199
could give you a couple of short stories, because out

1718
01:19:09.239 --> 01:19:12.119
of my like my workshop, every year I pick like

1719
01:19:12.680 --> 01:19:14.880
anything I give like a nine rating or higher, I

1720
01:19:14.920 --> 01:19:17.439
put on a special list. So I'm gonna throw some

1721
01:19:17.600 --> 01:19:21.119
names of authors and stories at you. Guys, hunt them down.

1722
01:19:21.520 --> 01:19:26.640
So Steve Rathnicktam Between the Pilings, Alyssa Wong's Hungry Daughters

1723
01:19:26.680 --> 01:19:30.239
of Starving Mothers, Stephen Graham Jones, Daniel Sirian Dolls one

1724
01:19:30.279 --> 01:19:33.239
of my favorite stories of his. Brian Hodge, I love

1725
01:19:33.319 --> 01:19:35.279
his stuff. Check out It's all the same Road in

1726
01:19:35.359 --> 01:19:38.600
the End. Lyvia Llewellen's Bright Crown of Joy A c

1727
01:19:38.760 --> 01:19:41.800
Wise's Harvest Song Gathering Song is one of my favorites.

1728
01:19:42.079 --> 01:19:43.560
A lot a bunch of these are free online. They

1729
01:19:43.600 --> 01:19:45.560
might be up at like Nightmare of the Dark and somewhere.

1730
01:19:46.760 --> 01:19:48.840
Kelly Robson is a human Stain. I love that one.

1731
01:19:48.920 --> 01:19:54.800
That's a tour ousman. Maelix's work. He has a story

1732
01:19:54.840 --> 01:19:57.600
called dead lovers on each blade hung, both parts are up.

1733
01:19:57.640 --> 01:19:59.920
I think it's a nightmare of the dark. I'm trying

1734
01:20:00.039 --> 01:20:02.520
and focus on horror. Rich Larsen has a story called

1735
01:20:02.560 --> 01:20:06.640
Painless is a tour that I love. Victor Lavalle's Up

1736
01:20:06.680 --> 01:20:12.000
from Slavery was amazing. Uh what else? Catrion Awards a

1737
01:20:12.039 --> 01:20:15.000
hotel in Germany. I like a lot. Sarah Pinskers to

1738
01:20:15.159 --> 01:20:19.079
Truth and a Lie. Oh another Steve Toast Dancing Sober

1739
01:20:19.159 --> 01:20:21.479
in the Dust. Love that one I mentioned. Larry Barn's

1740
01:20:21.479 --> 01:20:25.880
Tiptoe Kelly link Skinders Veil was really great. All of

1741
01:20:25.920 --> 01:20:28.239
these were either in Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy

1742
01:20:28.439 --> 01:20:33.000
or Best Horror of the Year or Best American or Tour.

1743
01:20:34.600 --> 01:20:38.920
What else? Danielle at Tabova has one a tour called

1744
01:20:38.920 --> 01:20:41.359
The Lowthliness of the Long Distance Reporter. That's really great.

1745
01:20:41.399 --> 01:20:43.399
Rich Larson has another one. It's a funny one, but

1746
01:20:43.479 --> 01:20:46.479
it's really great called Quandary Eminu Versus a butterfly Man.

1747
01:20:47.560 --> 01:20:50.640
Jemiphiles the story B Sharp Minor Or The Suicide Choir.

1748
01:20:51.279 --> 01:20:56.039
Luigi Musolino has won the Last Box. It's great. Yeah,

1749
01:20:56.079 --> 01:20:57.960
those those are all stories I think that would really

1750
01:20:58.159 --> 01:21:00.760
so those authors in general check it out and then yes,

1751
01:21:01.800 --> 01:21:04.079
if anybody out there in the sound of my voice

1752
01:21:04.279 --> 01:21:07.560
wants this list, I will give it to you. I

1753
01:21:07.640 --> 01:21:09.800
also have like a recommended reading list of like books

1754
01:21:09.840 --> 01:21:11.720
and stuff, but you know, happy.

1755
01:21:11.560 --> 01:21:14.279
Would you be willing to email me that list, especially

1756
01:21:14.279 --> 01:21:17.199
if the short stories, because like the books, the books

1757
01:21:17.239 --> 01:21:20.640
I'm familiar with. I really love Perdato Street Station. That

1758
01:21:20.760 --> 01:21:25.159
book is so it's out there. It's so good though, right.

1759
01:21:25.720 --> 01:21:27.079
And then the ending you just like want to throw

1760
01:21:27.079 --> 01:21:31.479
the book across the room. I'd read that book fifteen

1761
01:21:31.560 --> 01:21:35.119
years ago. Had an advertising agency. I walked to a

1762
01:21:35.199 --> 01:21:37.039
bus to a Blue Line l to a metro train

1763
01:21:37.119 --> 01:21:39.159
station out to Elgin. It's like two hours each way.

1764
01:21:39.159 --> 01:21:41.079
And I worked with this like boutique of an agency

1765
01:21:41.119 --> 01:21:42.840
out there, and every day I go down to this

1766
01:21:42.960 --> 01:21:45.039
little Thai restaurant and get my little lunch for ten

1767
01:21:45.079 --> 01:21:47.119
dollars and then read a chapter of the book. And

1768
01:21:47.239 --> 01:21:49.439
that was an epic book. I just loved it, but

1769
01:21:49.560 --> 01:21:51.760
I forgot the ending. So when I taught it for

1770
01:21:51.800 --> 01:21:54.680
the first time, I was like, oh God, I was

1771
01:21:54.720 --> 01:21:57.279
just like, why it is so intense?

1772
01:21:57.359 --> 01:22:02.439
Yeah, yeah, Steve says, great, we appreciate the recommendations. He

1773
01:22:02.520 --> 01:22:04.920
hasn't read any of those, but he appreciates you. Or

1774
01:22:05.039 --> 01:22:06.840
he mostly reads King and Koonts.

1775
01:22:07.039 --> 01:22:09.479
Yeah, yeah, a lot, definitely. So then I kind of

1776
01:22:09.520 --> 01:22:10.399
got off Kuons for a while.

1777
01:22:10.439 --> 01:22:13.720
But yeah, me too when I actually Kont's kind of

1778
01:22:13.800 --> 01:22:16.760
got me. Him and McCammon, Robert R. McCammon got me

1779
01:22:16.840 --> 01:22:20.000
started in reading and John Saul That's what I was

1780
01:22:20.039 --> 01:22:23.039
reading when I was like fourteen, and then I moved

1781
01:22:23.079 --> 01:22:25.279
on to King, and then in my twenties I got

1782
01:22:25.399 --> 01:22:28.439
like to uh uh, you know, love Craft and all

1783
01:22:28.520 --> 01:22:29.560
the more weirder stuff.

1784
01:22:29.800 --> 01:22:30.880
Yeah, for sure, for sure.

1785
01:22:31.800 --> 01:22:32.000
Yeah.

1786
01:22:32.399 --> 01:22:33.119
All right, Well.

1787
01:22:34.840 --> 01:22:36.880
Before we go, what are you working on right now?

1788
01:22:37.359 --> 01:22:39.560
Just out of curiosity and what do you have coming

1789
01:22:39.600 --> 01:22:41.239
out soon that you can talk about?

1790
01:22:41.439 --> 01:22:44.960
Yeah? Uh so obviously Incarnate came out in September, so

1791
01:22:45.039 --> 01:22:48.840
that's been taking up a lot of my attention. I

1792
01:22:49.119 --> 01:22:55.279
am trying to think what I have coming out. I

1793
01:22:55.359 --> 01:22:58.399
have a couple of throats come out this year. What's

1794
01:22:58.479 --> 01:22:58.880
next year?

1795
01:22:59.079 --> 01:22:59.199
Oh?

1796
01:22:59.520 --> 01:23:02.640
Because I like speed? And then yeah, I was in

1797
01:23:02.720 --> 01:23:06.600
the the off Season anthology a short story called Sunk

1798
01:23:06.960 --> 01:23:09.239
and then next year there's an anthology called The Earth

1799
01:23:09.319 --> 01:23:11.760
Bleeds at Night. I have a story in there called Supplication,

1800
01:23:12.439 --> 01:23:16.439
and then there's this cool anthology called in One Day

1801
01:23:16.520 --> 01:23:19.439
We Will Die strange stories inspired by the music of

1802
01:23:19.520 --> 01:23:22.000
Neutral Milk Hotel. And so I have this story in

1803
01:23:22.039 --> 01:23:24.960
there called Naomi a Sens And that's the puritanical which

1804
01:23:25.720 --> 01:23:29.279
biblically accurate angel story. Other than that, I'm gonna be

1805
01:23:29.279 --> 01:23:30.960
writing a new one for three Low, Bernie and Eye.

1806
01:23:30.960 --> 01:23:32.279
I don't know what I'm gonna do yet. I have

1807
01:23:32.359 --> 01:23:34.199
to figure that one out. Trying to figure out something

1808
01:23:34.239 --> 01:23:36.840
I haven't done before. I was thinking about maybe doing

1809
01:23:36.880 --> 01:23:38.800
a baton handoff story where you kind of go for

1810
01:23:38.880 --> 01:23:40.279
one to two, three to four to five and you

1811
01:23:40.359 --> 01:23:41.960
never go back. I haven't done that a long time.

1812
01:23:42.279 --> 01:23:43.760
Someone had a story like that, and I thought that

1813
01:23:43.880 --> 01:23:46.760
was cool. I was also thinking, I have teaching a

1814
01:23:46.800 --> 01:23:49.119
story in class that was like, it was just an

1815
01:23:49.239 --> 01:23:53.560
unlikable character from start to finish. How was it, sarahlanagain?

1816
01:23:53.720 --> 01:23:58.079
Was this a this? Really? U? I have to add, sorry,

1817
01:23:58.119 --> 01:23:59.520
I have to tell you what story is because it

1818
01:23:59.560 --> 01:24:03.439
was such an intense story and people were so divided

1819
01:24:03.560 --> 01:24:06.720
on it in class, but it was just really intense.

1820
01:24:07.840 --> 01:24:11.640
Let me sure get the name right. Telltale Tit by

1821
01:24:11.760 --> 01:24:15.840
Margot Lanigan, and it's this whole story like it's about ceiling,

1822
01:24:15.920 --> 01:24:18.800
about tongues, and it's just it's a brutal story. But

1823
01:24:19.239 --> 01:24:22.439
what it made me think of was, have I written

1824
01:24:22.560 --> 01:24:25.520
like a really unlikable character that was just unlikable and

1825
01:24:25.640 --> 01:24:27.399
mean and evil from start all the way to finish?

1826
01:24:27.640 --> 01:24:29.520
Because usually I have a bad guy turns good or

1827
01:24:29.560 --> 01:24:31.880
a good guy goes bad, like I like the strong reversal,

1828
01:24:31.960 --> 01:24:34.439
But ever, have I written one recently that was just

1829
01:24:34.640 --> 01:24:37.199
start to finish just a real piece of crap? And

1830
01:24:37.319 --> 01:24:39.319
then how do I write that in a way that

1831
01:24:39.680 --> 01:24:41.439
people don't want to eject from the story? Right?

1832
01:24:41.720 --> 01:24:44.439
Yeah? I think honestly my opinion on that. You got

1833
01:24:44.560 --> 01:24:48.239
to make it interesting. Yeah yeah, if it's interesting at least,

1834
01:24:48.399 --> 01:24:52.319
that's my point of because I've read plenty of unlikable characters. Yeah,

1835
01:24:52.319 --> 01:24:54.399
and if it's interesting, I'll keep going. But if I

1836
01:24:54.520 --> 01:24:58.119
really can't stand them and it's just repulsive, then I'll

1837
01:24:58.199 --> 01:25:03.039
sometimes kick out. Yeah yeah yeah, all right, So, uh,

1838
01:25:03.359 --> 01:25:06.840
you were a phenomenal guest. I had so much fun

1839
01:25:07.000 --> 01:25:12.199
picking your brain over everything. Man, So where can people

1840
01:25:12.239 --> 01:25:14.640
find you online? You mentioned earlier where we are all are,

1841
01:25:14.800 --> 01:25:18.199
but uh sure if you can mention it all again.

1842
01:25:18.840 --> 01:25:23.079
Yeah, So I'm basically Richard G. Thomas three everywhere. So

1843
01:25:23.119 --> 01:25:26.640
I'm on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and blue Sky

1844
01:25:26.720 --> 01:25:29.279
and threads, and then my webs website for my classes

1845
01:25:29.439 --> 01:25:32.920
is storyville Online dot com. And so that's got all

1846
01:25:33.000 --> 01:25:35.439
my classes and everything up there. I feel interested any

1847
01:25:35.479 --> 01:25:38.439
of that stuff. Yeah, must you be? Oh and I

1848
01:25:38.479 --> 01:25:42.319
have a website sorry, yeah, called what does Not Kill

1849
01:25:42.359 --> 01:25:45.119
Me dot com? A big Kelly Clarkson fant no kidding,

1850
01:25:45.399 --> 01:25:47.079
it's a it's a Nietzchure quote. But you know, I

1851
01:25:47.119 --> 01:25:50.439
don't like claim me me stronger, study philosophy in college,

1852
01:25:50.600 --> 01:25:53.079
battle out with monsters. Let's you become a monster for

1853
01:25:53.159 --> 01:25:54.800
when we stare into the abyss, the abyss.

1854
01:25:56.520 --> 01:25:58.319
It would be funny if you're like, I want all

1855
01:25:58.399 --> 01:26:01.039
my my stories to be like Kelly Clarkson.

1856
01:26:01.439 --> 01:26:04.680
Yeah, yeah, one of the time.

1857
01:26:05.840 --> 01:26:08.000
Not that I'm anti Kelly clark like, no, no, no,

1858
01:26:08.119 --> 01:26:10.680
there's nothing wrong with that, but it would just be

1859
01:26:10.800 --> 01:26:14.000
funny after everything we talked about it, right right right right, yeah,

1860
01:26:14.600 --> 01:26:18.680
all right, well, thank you. The invitation for you to

1861
01:26:18.720 --> 01:26:22.319
come back anytime is out. Just let me know and

1862
01:26:22.479 --> 01:26:24.520
I'd love to talk to you again, and I want

1863
01:26:24.560 --> 01:26:27.439
to thank to everyone who came out during the live

1864
01:26:27.479 --> 01:26:32.439
stream here to watch and listen and ask Thanks to

1865
01:26:32.560 --> 01:26:35.520
Steve for asking a question, and also thanks to the

1866
01:26:35.640 --> 01:26:39.399
future people who will be coming along and listening. And

1867
01:26:40.199 --> 01:26:43.239
thanks to you Richard for coming and giving me an

1868
01:26:43.279 --> 01:26:48.159
awesome conversation, and we will see you well again shortly cool.

1869
01:26:48.239 --> 01:26:53.520
Thanks Jason, thank you. If you like what I'm doing

1870
01:26:53.640 --> 01:26:57.000
here and want to support the channel without involving any

1871
01:26:57.119 --> 01:26:59.680
money on your part, you can do so by sharing

1872
01:26:59.760 --> 01:27:03.279
the on social media. You can also write a review

1873
01:27:03.399 --> 01:27:07.159
on Apple Podcasts or rate the show on Spotify. I

1874
01:27:07.239 --> 01:27:10.279
can't stress enough to you how much I would appreciate

1875
01:27:10.479 --> 01:27:13.680
that alone. Please please, I don't want to bag here,

1876
01:27:13.760 --> 01:27:18.520
but please leave a review on Apple Podcasts or rate

1877
01:27:18.560 --> 01:27:21.359
the show on Spotify. As I just said, each and

1878
01:27:21.560 --> 01:27:24.680
every way you can help out the channel and podcast

1879
01:27:24.800 --> 01:27:29.520
grow would be greatly appreciated. Thank you so much, Thank

1880
01:27:29.560 --> 01:27:33.600
you so much for listening. That was a fun interview,

1881
01:27:34.720 --> 01:27:37.239
So thank you all for listening. If you want to

1882
01:27:37.239 --> 01:27:39.359
support the show, it's very easy to do so. You

1883
01:27:39.399 --> 01:27:42.479
can join the Patreon links for that or in the

1884
01:27:42.520 --> 01:27:48.840
show notes. But o there basically at this time is

1885
01:27:49.000 --> 01:27:51.319
just to support what I do. But there will be

1886
01:27:51.399 --> 01:27:55.279
some exclusive content coming up shortly in the Patreon, but

1887
01:27:55.359 --> 01:27:59.039
there's only like, there's not very many paying patreons right now,

1888
01:27:59.199 --> 01:28:01.640
so I kind of want to get the numbers up

1889
01:28:01.680 --> 01:28:05.039
maybe just a little bit before I start working on that.

1890
01:28:06.359 --> 01:28:09.119
Maybe maybe not. There's some things I want to talk about,

1891
01:28:09.279 --> 01:28:11.640
and I have ideas of what I want to do

1892
01:28:11.760 --> 01:28:15.279
for the Patreon exclusive content, so maybe you will see

1893
01:28:15.319 --> 01:28:18.359
something there even before that. But it's easy to do,

1894
01:28:18.520 --> 01:28:21.239
and there's a couple of different tiers. Some of them

1895
01:28:21.279 --> 01:28:24.000
are quite cheap, so feel free to jump on board

1896
01:28:24.159 --> 01:28:27.439
and help me out with the costs, because doing these

1897
01:28:27.479 --> 01:28:30.880
things does cost money. But if you don't have money,

1898
01:28:30.920 --> 01:28:33.000
and I totally understand if you don't want to support

1899
01:28:33.039 --> 01:28:36.000
me with your money, you can do so easily for free.

1900
01:28:36.159 --> 01:28:38.319
All you have to do is go to Apple Podcasts

1901
01:28:39.239 --> 01:28:42.880
and go to my show and leave a five star review.

1902
01:28:43.359 --> 01:28:46.880
Now I know that some people have stipulations like why

1903
01:28:46.920 --> 01:28:49.479
do you ask for five star reviews? Is because if

1904
01:28:49.520 --> 01:28:53.439
you get a five star review on Apple, Apple is

1905
01:28:53.520 --> 01:28:58.439
more appt to share this show with other listeners. And

1906
01:28:58.720 --> 01:29:00.840
so if I get a lot of five star reviews,

1907
01:29:01.039 --> 01:29:06.079
then a lot more people will find me much more easily,

1908
01:29:06.319 --> 01:29:10.439
and that helps the show grow. All right, so thanks

1909
01:29:10.479 --> 01:29:13.039
everyone for listening. You don't know how much I appreciate

1910
01:29:13.279 --> 01:29:16.960
your support and just doing that alone. So we will

1911
01:29:17.039 --> 01:29:21.560
catch you next time. Until then, keep being weird my friends,

1912
01:29:22.560 --> 01:29:24.960
and keep being safe and I'll catch you guys in

1913
01:29:25.039 --> 01:30:25.960
the next podcast. Ly