L. Andrew Cooper's Blog, page 5

The Bad Guys of the Hightower Course Correction Center

by Maeva Wunn

A flash of lightning. A rumble of thunder. The villain twirls his mustache on a dark and stormy night…

Rarely are things so cut and dried. In Records of the Hightower Massacre, the bad guys range from menacing to well-meaning. Behind the closed doors of the Hightower Course Correction Center (HC3), volunteers are subjected to varieties of re-education and torture to correct them to the cisgender, heterosexual ideal that is held in such high regard by the powers that be in AMCONS (American Midwestern Confederacy of Order and Natural Salvation). The volunteers become known as sojourners, and today we’re going to introduce some of the bad guys that put our sojourners through the ringer.

Click the pic for more on Amazon!

Our main protagonists, Ash and Aubrey, first encounter HC3 at a job fair. Dan Forsythe, the epitome of business not casual, picks them out of the crowd for a personal sales pitch. He’s proper but friendly, saying all the right things with just the right amount of humor and pathos. He really wants them to sign on the dotted line. Ash and Aubrey are taken in by his carefully crafted persona and his promise of a safe and secure future.

It doesn’t take long for our sojourners to meet the self-righteous and shrill Harrison and Claudia Stout, a married couple who step on stage to welcome the recruits to HC3. They only have smiles and cheerful words, showcasing their perfect marriage and gender representation. Everything they do is to help their charges live better lives, and they have no doubt they’re on the right side.

Working directly with the sojourners are the RM’s (Role Models) – Ty Mercer for those deemed male and Christina Winestock for those deemed female. Their motivations are more muddied than the Stouts, and our good guys wonder if Ty and Christina could be convinced to help them. But any attempt at collaboration would surely be quashed by the likes of Marco, one of the guards who gets a little too involved in HC3’s curriculum.

Overseeing the organized chaos is Samson Cash, the Chef de Projet, as he likes to be called, and his ever-present but silent companion that our sojourners dub The Cook. These two menacing figures seem to be in charge of everything and aren’t afraid to throw their weight around, literally and figuratively. Their intimidating presence is always felt by the sojourners, and whether they believe their own propaganda ceases to matter in the face of their actions.

Writing bad guys can be a lot of fun, though I must admit it’s hard using them to inflict suffering on protagonists we’ve come to care for. But it takes both sides and the spectrum in between to make a good story. Why don’t you join them and see what happens… https://amz.run/9MTc

About the Author Click the pic for more on Chill Subs!

Maeva Wunn is a bisexual, non-binary, neurodivergent writer of poetry and prose, crafter, history buff, and music enthusiast living with chronic illnesses. They have been writing poetry since childhood. They spent most of their life in Atlanta, Georgia and moved to the Midwest after meeting their spouse. They currently reside in Iowa with their spouse and cats.

The post The Bad Guys of the Hightower Course Correction Center appeared first on L. Andrew Cooper's Horrific Scribblings.

Interview with Screenwriter Mike Ede: Those Things, “Team Bonding,” and “All I want for Christmas is… YOU!”

Fresh off another festival victory, Best Short Script from Days of the Dead, Indianapolis for “All I want for Christmas is YOU!,” Mike Ede is here to discuss the recent prize-winner as well as two other celebrated terrors, his feature script Those Things and short script “Team Bonding.”

Those Things

In this feature script, Shaun loses his job and has nothing but problems with his ex-wife, but that won’t keep him from being the best dad to his only son, Jack. Well, nothing except for the fact that he starts to realize that some people aren’t people at all. They appear to be… Those Things! Shaun jumps into action to keep his son (and himself) safe from these otherworldly beings that only he can see. Why is it that only he can see them? Can he keep everyone safe?

“Team Bonding”

This short script follows a group of co-workers on a chartered bus trip to spend time at a corporate retreat to enhance team bonding. As the bus makes stops along the way, picking up more and more co-workers, the group aboard wonders if this retreat is all it was advertised to be. At each stop, we learn more and more that the people on board have disturbing pasts, and the coincidences start to mount. By the time they reach their destination, will the co-workers form the bond that’s intended?

“All I want for Christmas is… YOU!”

This short script centers around two Christmas juggernauts in the music industry who compete each holiday season for the title of Greatest Christmas Entertainer of All Time, one a US Diva, the other a Canadian Crooner. When the Diva books a family vacation at the same resort the Crooner always books with his family, thus bumping his family out of their planned vacation, he takes matters into his own hands (as one does) and decides to go on social media to attack her. While he does so, her fans launch a smear campaign to get him “cancelled.” His loving wife sees the trainwreck approaching due to his carelessness and sends a direct message to the Diva inviting her and her family to their house for a holiday dinner to clear the air. She happily accepts. As they arrive, things aren’t right, and quickly the family realizes this may have been a bad idea. Some things should not be invited into your home, and they may have invited in something they were not prepared for. 

The Interview Click the pic for more on Amazon! Yes, you can get Mike’s scripts on Amazon!

1. Sympathy for Shaun. In Those Things, Shaun seems likable because of his devotion to his son, but he also seems to have some pretty significant… problems… that run deeper than conflicts with his ex-wife. Is the (eventual) viewer likely to see where his ex-wife is coming from, possibly even take her side, or does your script position the viewer to be mostly or entirely pro-Shaun? To pose the question more broadly, how would you describe Shaun in general, and how sympathetic is he? Do you expect attitudes to change toward him as the story develops?

ME: The stories that usually draw me in are ones where I’m drawn into a character (early) but then something happens where I start to question if I bet on the wrong horse lol. That’s exactly what I was trying to do with this story. I wanted people to really like Shaun and root for him from the start, but as the story unfolds, I really hope they waver. Or maybe they won’t. That’s the fun with storytelling. The audience gets to choose what experience they have.

2. Comp Things. Reading the description of Those Things, I thought of two comps (comparable films, useful when pitching a script to a potential producer): Frailty (2001) and, more distantly, They Live (1988), both classics with cult followings. Did either of those films influence you? Those two films have very different tones, the former being rather serious, the latter being a little tongue-in-cheek. Which would you say is closer to the tone of Those Things? Why did you decide on that tone, and how do you establish the tone in your writing?

ME: I’m blown away that you picked up on both films’ influence, especially Frailty. They Live is a true classic and a comp I’d lean heavily toward for this script. The story of a wanderer (John Nada) who stumbles on some special sunglasses that when worn, help the wearer see that people aren’t who they say they are. Then does anything he can to convince others of it. I love that story but felt a drifter/wanderer didn’t pull people in as much as the story of maybe a single father would. That’s where Frailty shines. The relationship between a father and his sons is where this story and mine are similar. Much like Shaun in my story, the father in Frailty (played brilliantly by the late/great Bill Paxton) needs to do all he can to convince his child/children that he can be trusted and has his/their best interest in mind when doing what he’s doing, as vile or horrible as it may seem. I wanted the reader to sympathize with him. Root for him. Help him rid the world of evil, because that’s what any of us would do…right? At least until the end. lol   

3. Which Things? When Shaun realizes that only he sees those things, does he question his sanity? Do you intend for viewers to question Sean’s sanity? Should viewers question the “reality” of what they see onscreen? Perhaps with reference to your cover image (scroll back up), how do you imagine those things will look onscreen? Would they need to be shot from Shaun’s perspective? How does Shaun’s son, Jack, react when Shaun sees them?

ME: 100% lol, as the story unfolds my real hope was that the reader wouldn’t catch all the little clues along the way, but once the final payoff happens and the twist ending hits that it has the reader wanting to go back and see where they may have missed something vital to the payoff. The fact that people may be something other than human is kind of a crazy notion, so I’m thinking readers should question it and Shaun, but my hope is that the clues are subtle enough not to ruin the big mind fuck at the end.  The cover art was a snapshot of what I envisioned. Actually, the idea for this story has been in my brain for years, and it took time to come out, but when it comes to the look of “Those Things,” it took a visit to a museum in Italy a few years back to cement it for me. There was a statue there that had deteriorated quite a bit over time, and it looked like a virus had started to take over. The deterioration started from the neck of the statue and stretched to the mouth. It looked vile. Terrifying, actually. I took a picture of it because I was fascinated by it.  I pictured exactly that in the eyes of Shaun. They looked human but like a symbiote virus was taking over. In that darkness was razor sharp teeth and black eyes that glowed in the dark. I pictured it being something truly terrifying and hoped to have written that way so that the readers follow along for the ride. Jack, on the other hand, doesn’t see the same thing, or does he? Does his love for his father blind him to a certain extent? Much like Frailty, I believe it’s the love the children have for their father that plays a larger role in all of this. I wanted the same thing for my story.

4. Corporate Horror. “Team Bonding” seems to belong to an area in which I think you and I are among the few to have written—I’ll call it corporate horror. Do you think there’s something intrinsically scary about corporate cultures and corporate settings, such as the “retreat?” Why or why not? How about team bonding itself—do you find anything disturbing about the corporate bonding mentality? Do you aim for “Team Bonding” to satirize that mentality by calling attention to it? Why or why not?

ME: Love it. I think it’s an untouched type of horror that has only seen a few instances of great use (Severance, Mayhem to name a couple [I have to offer Cindy Sherman’s Office Killer as a neglected classic–LAC]). The corporate world is filled with examples of pure horror. Personally, I have been part of that world for the better part of almost 30 years, and I draw so much from my experiences in my writing. I really wanted to find a fun way to incorporate this backdrop into a horror story, and I think I captured that. I wanted it to start out lighthearted, with a simple story of employees being taken on a work retreat to find a way to bond as a team, and, without giving away the ending, I think I captured that in a way that hasn’t been overplayed. The corporate world is made of individuals from all walks of life, and I feel like you don’t truly know your co-workers until given a setting for that to come flying out. I feel like I was able to highlight that with the charter bus being the main set piece. Also doesn’t hurt to reduce costs of production, hahaha, since my ultimate goal is to get these made.  

5. Bonding Characters. In our correspondence, you mentioned that you wrote an ensemble of characters that should be very attractive to actors looking for juicy parts. Without giving away too much, could you provide some examples of the characters and their disturbing pasts? What methods do you use for characterization, and how do you work their pasts into the story (and flow of the script)?

ME: For sure. I wanted each character in this story to have their own background. Their own point of view and ultimately their own skeletons since everyone has them (maybe not as dark as these but you never know!). Knowing this was a short, I didn’t have a ton of time (or pages) to go deeper into their back stories, but I felt like I was able to capture these with the limited real estate given before it becomes a feature. I always had a plan for the types of characters I wanted to have in this story, but once I started writing it, I felt the characters start coming out. I needed them to be somewhat relatable for the reader but maybe have a few on the extreme side as we all work with people who are at the opposite end that we are lol. I try really hard to make sure that all my characters in any script I write aren’t just toss away bits. I want readers to remember them.

6. Comic Rivalry. Okay, so I see potential for humor in both Those Things and “Team Bonding”—tell me if I’m way off base—but I really can’t imagine the Diva vs. Crooner scenario in “All I want for Christmas” not being funny, at least at first. How often does comedy make its way into your horror writing? How important is it in “All I want for Christmas?” Again, I sense satire… do you see yourself making fun of holiday celebrity culture, social media wars, cancel culture, and so on? Why or why not?

ME: I find a great deal of humor in horror. Life is terrifying, but we find fun ways to make it less. I try to incorporate humor in all of my horror scripts. It’s my way of dropping the guard of the reader before hitting them with true terror. A great example of that was in Eli Roth’s Hostel. The film starts out with jokes and nudity, so the viewers get comfy as this is a trope they are comfortable with. Then he hits you across the face with a barbed wire baseball bat (figuratively).  I love that. Catch the reader/viewer off guard. When I first started entering into horror script comps the feedback I was getting was: “it’s too funny to be horror!” I was very put off by those comments because I feel like, if done properly, you have a recipe for success. With my latest, “All I Want for Christmas is…YOU!,” I just couldn’t miss the chance of writing the story we all wanted to see/read… or at least I did, hahaha. We deal with it each and every year. Halloween is over, and the stores are full of Christmas stuff. The stores have barely removed the orange and black decorations, and the place is dripping in red and green (and I’m not talking Freddy Krueger!). Then there’s the music. Ugh. Bing Crosby, Nat King Cole, Burl Ives, and that brings me to the Diva & the Crooner. Lol. Both amazingly talented and EVERYWHERE! BUT…what if they hated each other? What if they resented each other’s successes? Better yet…what if they both weren’t what we all think they are? That’s where I revel. It was too good a story to pass on… so I wrote it. Heavily inspired by the two juggernauts of Christmas Music success. I figured, why not make fun of the power of social media? Cancel culture has become quite a movement. Why not play off of that? It really helped my story find a home that makes sense to all readers. It was a ton of fun.

7. Christmas Horror 1. You’ve written another Christmas holiday short, “Bah Humbug,” and one of the first things I learned about you is that you do Christmas horror. What’s the attraction? Are you a fan of other Christmas horror films, such as Black Christmas (1974, preferably), Silent Night, Deadly Night (1984), I’m Dreaming of a White Doomsday (2017), et al.? The very first Gothic novel was published at Christmas, 1764, and Christmas has been a time for horror stories ever since. Why do you think Christmas is a time for horror?

ME: I realize that Christmas isn’t always a fun time for people. For a holiday so draped in family, religion, happy songs and gift giving. For some, Christmas isn’t fun at all. It’s misery. This is where my stories come from. I like the thought of taking a holiday that’s supposed to be fun and make it not so. “Bah Humbug” was my first real writing success. It got so much attention early on with Coverfly. Making The Red List, as well as winning quite a few competitions. It was a fun story to write, and I truly love that it’s found its audience. I honestly didn’t think I’d go back to another Christmas script. Been there, done that. But as I said above…it was just too good not to write. Lol.

8. Christmas Horror 2. A lot of people would probably agree that awkward gatherings over holiday dinners are a “horror” feature of the Christmas season, and a holiday dinner is where your characters in “All I want for Christmas” end up colliding. In what ways, if at all, is the eruption of horror at your script’s holiday dinner a reflection on the horror of more realistic holiday dinners? Even though events center on celebrities, will more average viewers relate to events, or are they more likely to see what happens as something occurring in the stratosphere (of the rich and famous or… whatever)?

ME: Holiday dinners are pure horror hahaha. Stuck around the table being forced to listen to your grandfather’s old racist jokes or hang out with cousins you barely know but are somewhat close in age. Agonizing hahahaha. I think this story has something for everyone but I think it answers the age-old question for everyone. YES, celebrities also sit down for holiday dinners. Maybe the spread is a bit better lol, but they still do it. The same as the rest of us. I wanted the meeting to center around this because no matter the social status, we all gotta’ eat! I felt it was the perfect set-up for the battle to play out.

9. Access! How can readers learn more about you and your works (please provide any links you want to share)?

ME: Readers can find me on Instagram, username: bahhumbugguy

They can also find me (and my work) on Coverfly, ISA & FilmFreeway, profile: Mike Ede

You can also find a bunch of my published work by going to Amazon and searching Michael K Ede and many of my scripts are there for purchase. Please follow my page or socials for updates on any new work being published. I also find time to attend festivals in Canada and the US (for now) so check my social media for appearances.

Thank you so much.

About the Screenwriter

Mike doesn’t just love watching movies…he writes them!

“There’s no better feeling to be sitting in a movie theatre and hear someone say: Whoever wrote this…is a genius. I love hearing a writer get their props for a job well done.” -Mike Ede

Mike (like many others) took the isolation of Covid-19 to self-reflect. It was during this time he decided to turn his dream of screenwriting into a reality. With only 3 years under his belt and a brain that won’t stop churning out great ideas, he has written over a dozen scripts to date (spanning genres like Horror, Comedy, Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Thriller and even a TV Pilot). Mike spent the first couple of years fine tuning his craft through online writing courses, reading any script he could get his hands on and taking the time to re-write and re-write his own scripts. He dug in and buried himself in his writing. After putting in the work he started seeing the fruits of his labour as his scripts began being chosen, selected and awarded in contests and festivals around the world.

His latest script “All I want for Christmas is…YOU!” has been taking the festival world by storm. You can grab a copy of this and many of this writer’s other works by heading over to Amazon and searching Michael K Ede. You won’t regret it.

The post Interview with Screenwriter Mike Ede: Those Things, “Team Bonding,” and “All I want for Christmas is… YOU!” appeared first on L. Andrew Cooper's Horrific Scribblings.

The Sojourners at the Hightower Course Correction Center

by L. Andrew Cooper

Records of the Hightower Massacre develops what I think is a surprising number of characters for a novella. Since most of the story takes place at the Hightower Course Correction Center (HC3), an isolated facility where the staff does things less and more… and then much more… insidious to help program participants get on the cisgender, heterosexual “course,” at first dividing characters into good guys and bad guys, pretty much the same as participants and staff, seems like a simple task.

Click the pic for more on Amazon!

I want to introduce you to some of the good guys, HC3’s volunteer participants who come to realize they’re prisoners. From a tradition started by participants from the past, they’re called “sojourners.”

The key sojourners for the story are the book’s alternating narrators, Ash and Aubrey, who volunteer for HC3 because they believe they’ll never find employment without HC3’s certification that they’re on the course. Both characters change profoundly through the narrative. Young Ash starts as shy, introverted—after a lonely childhood spent reading books banned by the tyrannical government in AMCONS City, they dream of painting and a more colorful life than society allows. Aubrey is more outgoing, at times aggressive. He grew up on a farm with three brothers on the outskirts of AMCONS, learning to shoot (surprise! this bit becomes important) but also getting an education. When the story begins, he lives in AMCONS City and takes black market testosterone, an advantage he doesn’t have once he gets to HC3.

HC3 splits the sojourners up according to their genders assigned at birth, so Ash ends up on the Men’s Ward and Aubrey ends up on the Women’s Ward. Ash quickly forges relationships with some of the men, particularly Hu’u and Bill. Hu’u is a bit imposing at first, somewhat secretive (and he does have a hidden agenda). However, he cares deeply for others. Bill has a survivalist streak. He wandered the ungoverned territories for years, but after his left leg was shattered in an attack, he made his way to HC3 hoping to qualify for regular employment. His background in art makes bonding with Ash a cinch. Another notable in the Men’s Ward is Dr. Miles Goodman, a psychiatrist who lost his practice and signed up for HC3 hoping one day to get it back. He takes a special interest in the medication HC3 feeds the sojourners, and though he has a mild demeanor, he has a dangerous combination of curiosity and bravery.

We had to invent characters we couldn’t develop a great deal, but we do know a little about Yichen, Kurt, and Robert on the Men’s Ward and Katherine, Patricia, and Leah on the Women’s Ward.

As for the Women’s Ward, Aubrey primarily makes allies out of Helen and Julia. Helen is the oldest of the sojourners and the only one to have participated in the last war, in which she fought against the forces that would establish AMCONS. She was married and played at being on the course for many years, but she finally had enough of it. She’s only at HC3 because people off the course at her age tend to disappear. Helen kicks a lot of ass. Julia, by contrast, hates violence, but she’s happy to conspire once the sojourners realize they’ve volunteered for a nightmare. She’s soft-spoken but not meek. She was also married, but her lack of interest in having children led to her downfall and succumbing to the pressure to enter HC3. She has her own ideas about getting out.

Maeva and I came to care about all these people quite a lot, and we hope readers do, too. Caring makes the horror more horrifying… heh heh heh…

About the Author

There’s enough about L. Andrew Cooper around here. Scroll down. Check the CV, Books, Short Stories, Screenplays, Links, About. You get the idea. It’s his site.

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Records of the Hightower Massacre and Representation on the Bookshelf

by Maeva Wunn

I always wanted to be a writer. I remember scanning my bookshelf in college, searching for inspiration. Almost every volume was by a man. My heart sank. I felt defeated. Yes, there were a few works by women. But over the thousands of years of written works I had collected, none of them were by someone like me. In the 90’s, I looked at popular novels, stories, and poetry, and none of it was by someone like me. I was too niche, too abnormal, too far outside the mainstream.

Click the pic for more on Amazon!

When Andrew and I started writing Records of the Hightower Massacre, we wanted to tell an engaging story and feature diverse characters. I wrote Ash’s portion of the book, making them nonbinary (like myself) but also black and asexual (unlike myself). I can see parts of myself in Ash, but so can a lot of other people. Likewise with Aubrey, who was written by Andrew. As a gay trans man, Aubrey gives representation to another set of voices. When thinking about creating these and other characters, I kept thinking back to those shelves of books. Maybe our book could provide the representation someone is looking for.

Twenty years after I sat pondering that shelf, the internet has evolved, and I once again look at novels, stories, and poetry for inspiration on my own writing journey. This time I find works by people from across LGBTQIA+, people from all over the world with different appearances and languages and ways of life. Seeing oneself reflected in a piece of art has always been an edifying and necessary part of experiencing the world. It helps us with empathy and understanding, fantasy and wish fulfillment, and expanding our horizons. But what do you do when you don’t see anyone like you at all despite searching through books and games and movies and shows and songs?

Write it yourself. And share it with the world. You don’t know how many other people are searching for your voice.

About the Author Click the pic for more on Chill Subs!

Maeva Wunn is a bisexual, non-binary, neurodivergent writer of poetry and prose, crafter, history buff, and music enthusiast living with chronic illnesses. They have been writing poetry since childhood. They spent most of their life in Atlanta, Georgia and moved to the Midwest after meeting their spouse. They currently reside in Iowa with their spouse and cats.

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Interview with Author Mona Kabbani: The Color of Blood

Highly articulate author Mona Kabbani devotes some of her dazzling prose to sharing thoughts on art, psychology, violence, and other topics as we delve into her novella The Color of Blood, a read I highly recommend.

The Color of Blood

LOVE, LUST, ART, AND BLOOD.

Void’s greatest fear is being seen as a monster, not an artist. He revels in his fame but hides his greatest secret: his success is attributed to his uncanny ability to see the color of a person’s soul. This color not only infects a person’s aura but their anatomy, turning their insides into dazzling pigment. Void targets those with the rarest colors and drains their blood for his paint. None know of his secret, and he has found solace in the solitude of his life. That is until he meets an unprecedented muse who is more than happy to bleed for him.

“The Color of Blood sees Kabbani dip her toes into extreme horror, then submerge herself fully in its gore and depravity. This horror novella is highly original, shocking, and disturbingly erotic. One should need no further proof that she is a rising star in the world of horror fiction.” — Kristopher Triana, author of Gone to See the River Man

The Color of Blood is the cosmic, psychological horror novel from Mona Kabbani.

Click for more on Amazon!The Interview

1. Artistic Ego and/or Male Entitlement. Your narrator, Void, is a successful artist with a gallery devoted to his work, and he seems to think being a successful artist makes him too good for the students and academics interested in him and, well, just about everyone else, too. What inspired your representation of this artistic ego? Of course, he has the power to perceive colors others can’t, evidence of his superiority strong enough to justify killing for his art… but he wants to be perceived as an artist, not a monster. Then again, as an artist he is expected to make something “cataclysmic:” is there any difference between an artist and a monster? As the book’s description reveals, Void meets “an unprecedented muse,” and he feels she “is owed” to him. He later longs to “conquer” aspects of her that impress him. He has a problem with her having “agency” over him. What’s the relationship between Void’s artistic ego and male entitlement? How do you view his attitude toward women?

MK: Void is a character riddled with conflict, a narcissist susceptible to bouts of terrible self-doubt and debilitating existentialism. ‘Monster versus Artist’ exemplifies his tortured existence: the cognitive dissonance of behaving transgressively whilst wishing to be perceived in a god-like light. I wanted to showcase the push and pull of his mental experience thus creating the “tortured artist” trope at a level so granular, I’m hoping for readers to both empathize with and hate him, therefore creating a kind of cognitive dissonance of their own. There was no gender binary at play when I wrote this book. I do not see this as a male-versus-female mentality but simply the behavior of someone in a peculiar predicament.

2. The Color of Sex. When Void’s color perception picks up a rare, exquisite color, it exerts a sensual attraction on him, already erotic but explicitly sexual when combined with physical attraction or touch. To what extent does the sensual, such as vivid color in art, actually blur into the sexual, physical arousal and even stimulation? For Void, the blur into the sexual—with men as well as women—also blurs into violence, and erotic scenes in The Color of Blood certainly blur that line. What’s the relationship between sex and violence? How comfortable are you with the implications of blurring that line?

MK: Void is not, at his heart, a sexual being, at least, not in the way a normal being would invest in such an act. He understands the appeal of sex at a fundamental level, but his glory comes from witnessing the ‘light show’ put on by bodies engaged in motion. He’s more interested in a person’s color, what he can create, than their actual body and spirit. When he meets Zahra, or his past amour, Alexander, only then does he find some value in acts other than the creation of art. Few can crack through his narcissism to be seen as actual people and not colors for his palette. I’m not comfortable with blurring the lines of sex and violence in a realistic sense, but for this specific supernatural instance alongside the metaphor of toxic romance where both parties aren’t in any kind of physical distress, it sure does make an interesting visual.

3. The Color of Gore. Kristopher Triana refers to how you “dip your toes” and then “submerge” yourself into extreme horror with this book. For those of us unfamiliar, is this your first foray into the extreme? Which of your previous works is most comparable to The Color of Blood? How do you feel about writing extremely violent imagery? What aspects of the extreme do you prefer? Is gore art?

MK: This is my first extreme horror story! And I can’t say that any of my past works are comparable. Maybe VANILLA, which has some scenes of gore and violence but isn’t what I would call “extreme.” Writing THE COLOR OF BLOOD was an incredible experience: the story flowed out of me with ease. I enjoy writing extreme horror from what I consider to be a more romantic lens: a bit more purple, a bit more floral, without sacrificing the transgression. I do find gore, or this contortion of the human body, to be an awe-inspiring visual but only in a specific, fictional context. It was important to me that THE COLOR OF BLOOD dealt with willing parties, where the conflict was betrayal and not assault. This is simply my preference, and future stories may take on different contexts.

4. More Ordinary Colors. Sometimes when I was reading Void’s perspective, I was fascinated by its alien characteristics, and sometimes I found myself groaning because he felt like such a familiar asshole. To what extent are you using his serial killing as a reflection on more ordinary, narcissistic people who engage in serial monogamy/monandry? Your bio (below) says you’re obsessed with psychology. I’d say Void’s behaviors, using and discarding people, suggest a narcissistic personality disorder. Did you have any diagnoses in mind, or would you venture any now?

MK: You hit the nail on the head! I answered this in a previous question, but Void is a narcissist with a god complex who also suffers the very human feeling of self-doubt, bringing him back down to Earth and thus making him a walking conflict. You can find this conflict at every angle of his character: from his belief system to his obsession with color despite wearing exclusively dark clothing to his moniker. I think there is something to say for someone who is given an amazing gift that, at the same time, isolates them. Only Void can experience the world the way he does. If someday his egotism were to be alleviated, the same fate would befall him. As much as he might like to, he can never share the truth of his experience with anyone. I’ve always found it such a head-scratcher that it is impossible to describe a color to someone who has never experienced that color for themselves. What about the whole world? It is lonely, in a way.

5. Cosmic Colors. Your book’s description calls it a “cosmic… horror novel,” which strikes me in a couple of ways. First, Void thinks of “the universe” bringing him his unprecedented muse. Do you want readers to think cosmic forces are really at work, or do you prefer for readers to consider more specific forces that might draw the two characters together? Why? Second, the idea of colors beyond human perception, along with some other ideas that appear later in the story, could make this novella qualify as “cosmic horror” in the sense of horror exemplified by H.P. Lovecraft. Would you put your book in this category? If so, what other cosmic horrors inspired you? If not, why do you use the word “eldritch?”

MK: Whether it’s the universe, fate, or coincidence, I leave this to my readers to decide. How do you think you stumble upon that perfect person? There are billions of people on this planet. What guided them to you? As for your second question, I was more inspired by Junji Ito’s work, Uzumaki, than anything. Junji Ito’s work is Lovecraftian, so by this second degree of association, yes, cosmic in the sense of Lovecraft.

6. Art Imitating Art. Art about art demands these sorts of questions. To what extent is your novella, The Color of Blood, like Void’s art, especially (avoiding spoilers) the “The Red” exhibition? To what extent is the audience for your novella like his gallery’s attendees, who love “buckets of blood?” Do any similarities reflect on the moral standing of you, your work, or your readers? Why or why not?

MK: This is an interesting question! Quite meta. Although I do exhibit some irrational bouts of self-doubt that drive me momentarily mad once in a while, I can’t say I personally relate to Void’s experience or rhetoric regarding his art or his viewers.

7. Aestheticism and Decadence. Your themes and imagery bring up some of my nineteenth-century hobbyhorses, Thomas De Quincey’s essay, “On Murder, Considered as One of the Fine Arts” (1827), Charles Baudelaire’s Flowers of Evil (1857), and Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891). Do you see yourself playing with or even critiquing the ideas in these sorts of works in The Color of Blood? Do you think an actual murder can be considered beautiful from an aesthetic point of view? Should more people recognize beauty in the horrible? Is all art quite useless?

MK: THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY is one of my favorite books. I appreciate its horribleness imbued with beauty. I find it incredibly inspiring. I don’t think I’d ever want to critique a classic but rather add my own flair. I hope to find new ways to break the mold by bringing to life grotesque stories people read in wide-eyed awe. My voice wouldn’t be possible without the foundation of those before me, so if anything, it’s homage or tribute. I do not think actual murder can or should be considered beautiful: this is merely an exploration through a fictional lens, and even then, I prefer for my characters to be willing.

8. Void’s Void. À propos, Void tends to wax philosophical, particularly about how his understanding of the void is changing and about how meaninglessness is taking over his life. How seriously should readers take this philosophizing about art and existence—is the novella posing any or all of these ideas for serious consideration? What do you think of Void’s voidiness?

MK: Void is a brooding artist. His musings are the afflictions of a troubled mind attempting to make sense of a lived cognitive dissonance: his extreme egotism mixed with doubt. It’s up to the reader to decide what is and isn’t valid. What do you value in your own life? What makes you happy? I think it’s okay if a reader pulls a philosophical nugget of truth from a character as awful as Void. We all have our lived experiences: what might click for one, may detonate for another.

9. Access! How can readers learn more about you and your works (please provide any links you want to share)?

You can buy my books off Amazon: they’re available in paperback and ebook (free with Kindle Unlimited). THE BELL CHIME audiobook was just released from Tantor Media. I’m hoping to release audiobooks for my other titles soon.

MK: I am most active on my Instagram: @moralityinhorror. (I also have a TikTok under the same handle.) I share reviews about horror books I’ve read, writing snippets, my life: feel free to reach out and say hello!

https://www.instagram.com/moralityinhorror

You can sign up for my newsletter on my website,

www.moralityinhorror.com,

where I share early access information about upcoming books or exclusive sneak peeks of my WIPs. Readers can also purchase signed, personalized copies from my website!

Thank you for your insightful question and for featuring me on your website!

About the Author

Mona Kabbani is a horror fan, writer, and reviewer obsessed with psychology and the human condition. She emulates the conflict of the good versus the bad and all of the in between in her work while providing an entertainingly horrifying experience. She is the author of The Bell Chime, which won the award for Best Horror Novella of 2020 from LoHF, Vanilla, and For You. She is a Lebanese immigrant living the dream in New York City where much of her writing is inspired. You can follow her on Instagram and TikTok @moralityinhorror for more and sign up for her mailing list on her website, www.moralityinhorror.com.

The post Interview with Author Mona Kabbani: The Color of Blood appeared first on L. Andrew Cooper's Horrific Scribblings.

The (Un)Importance of Politics in Records of the Hightower Massacre

by L. Andrew Cooper

If a book makes heroes out of people you’re inclined to dislike no matter what they do, and if the same book makes villains out of people whose views you at least partially share, you’ll probably see that book as pushing an agenda, preaching at you. On the other hand, if you’re pro-protagonist and anti-antagonist, the book might seem less didactic and more realistic.

Click the pic for more on Amazon!

Records of the Hightower Massacre assumes that LGBTQ+ people have a right to exist (as such), and it makes such people heroes in a struggle against rather nasty villains who assume LGBTQ+ people don’t have the right to exist (and act on their assumption). If you’ve got a problem with any part of LGBTQ+, the book will seem to have a “message” for you. If you don’t, the book will seem more like a mirror—of the funhouse sort, certainly—but it’s not trying to tell you anything you don’t already know.

What it is trying to do (and I humbly submit that it succeeds) is create an exciting, horrifying story out of the fact that people have in the past and might in the future act on the assumption that LGBTQ+ don’t have a right to exist. My co-author Maeva Wunn and I chose the future direction, taking an unspecified leap forward to a post-American dystopic city in what was the Midwest and a slaughterhouse on its outskirts that has been converted into the Hightower Course Correction Center (HC3). HC3 recruits desperate LGBTQ+ people, promising to put them on the cis-het “course” so they can find employment and survive, but they soon reveal that their methods include brutal psychological and physical torture as well as other “treatment” that makes mere murder look mild.

So, yeah, it’s obviously political, except the politics don’t matter much to what happens in the story, which is a sequence of escalating horrors as the alternating narrators, Ash and Aubrey, discover new depths of HC3’s depravity while gathering allies and learning to fight back. Maeva and I did not plan story beats according to political ideas; we structured a series of horrific mini-climaxes, each more gruesome than the last, leading up to the big bang at the end. Beyond what’s intrinsic to the premise, the only political bits I baked into the story, actually (I leave disclosure of any other hidden agendas to Maeva), don’t appear clearly until the denouement, but their purpose is to introduce ambiguity, not a moral.

You don’t need to have read Fredric Jameson’s The Political Unconscious (though it’s an awfully good book) to have encountered the idea that all stories are on some level political, that storytelling is a political act whether you want it to be or not. I agree with that notion, so I tend to smile and nod when anyone claims a piece of writing isn’t political. My point about Records of the Hightower Massacre isn’t that it’s an apolitical story if you look at it the right way—that makes no sense to me—but that it’s a story about people fighting to survive extreme horrors. Unless your prejudices make them unavoidable, think about the politics as much or as little as you want. Enjoying the ride is more important.

About the Author

There’s enough about L. Andrew Cooper around here. Scroll down. Check the CV, Books, Short Stories, Screenplays, Links, About. You get the idea. It’s his site.

The post The (Un)Importance of Politics in Records of the Hightower Massacre appeared first on L. Andrew Cooper's Horrific Scribblings.

Interview with Filmmaker Justin Best: Sheryl

Fantasy, adventure, comedy, even YA–filmmaker Justin Best applies his considerable talents in many areas, but we’re talking about his edgy horror feature Sheryl, which took home the award for Best Thriller Feature at this year’s Miami International Science Fiction Film Festival.

Sheryl

After she’s dumped by her serial killer boyfriend for not being “hot enough,” Sheryl, a beauty-obsessed woman, goes on a murderous, blood-soaked quest to create the perfect face while simultaneously navigating her new relationship with the cop investigating the murders. In the end, she must try to learn to accept herself as she is… even if that means she is a looks-obsessed psycho-killer.

Click the pic for the trailer on YouTube!The Interview

1. Opening Eye. Sheryl’s opening shot is an extreme closeup of an eye, which seems appropriate for a film deeply concerned with appearances. It also seems to tap into a long tradition in horror movies of focusing on eyes, particularly killers’ eyes but also victims’, when dealing with matters of perspective and the vulnerability of viewers. What does the opening eye of Sheryl convey? Sheryl’s eye is having eyeliner applied—why throw in makeup as part of this initial impression? In what ways is and isn’t Sheryl’s eye a traditional horror movie eye?

JMB: First of all, thank you thank you for taking the time to watch Sheryl and for this great question. Yes, there does seem to be a great tradition of eyes in horror movies, whether it’s looking through the eyes of the victims/killers or grotesque enucleation or other damage to the eyes. For me, I think this plays into the idea that the eyes are both very physically sensitive and emotionally expressive. 

I believe opening scenes are very important in movies and the opening eye scene of Sheryl was created with the goal of conveying a few things – (1) It was meant to create an uncomfortable feeling from the beginning and to let the audience know that we are watching a horror movie and (2) to your point, letting the audience know that this is perhaps not your traditional horror movie. There’s nothing especially sinister going on in the opening scene; the act of applying eyeliner is something that many people do every day. Yet, the idea of jamming a sharp object so close to such a sensitive part of your body is something that is very uncomfortable to me.

Additionally, the opening eye is followed up by the hair, the lips, the nails, etc. Again, my thought process here was twofold: (1) We see Sheryl in pieces, not as a complete woman, which I think is sometimes how women are viewed – not as actual people but as legs, eyes, lips, and so on. This is also how Sheryl herself views other women. And (2) here is a woman who is willing to inflict a type of violence upon herself – pointing a sharp stick towards her eye, burning her hair, wearing uncomfortable shoes, etc. – in her pursuit of external beauty. What might she do to someone else? By incorporating this makeup ritual, I hope that we can make the audience uncomfortable, while at the same time create a connection between the audience and Sheryl by showing her doing things that, if we zoom in (in both the literal and metaphorical sense), might be unusual, but in their usual context, they are normal to a lot of people.

2. Killer Standards. Sheryl’s serial killer boyfriend, Ted, tells her she isn’t “hot enough” and treats her abusively, sending her into a spiral in which she kills in a quest for greater beauty. Do Ted’s standards, the standards of a sadistic killer, reflect on the standards for beauty that men impose on women? Why or why not? Why don’t questions about Ted’s hotness enter the conversation? To what extent is Sheryl’s beauty obsession an internalization of patriarchal expectations?

JMB: Ted is, to use Sheryl’s words, “just an asshole,” but perhaps one of the worst kinds of assholes in that he is, to everyone other than Sheryl, quite a catch. He’s well-off; he’s handsome; he doesn’t swear; we never see him be physically abusive with Sheryl. He’s also incredibly charming, and I think it’s this last part that makes him relatable to a lot of women (And shoutout to Shaan Sharma for bringing Ted to life in such a way that people hate Ted, but also see the attraction to him). He’s extremely emotionally and verbally abusive towards Sheryl, but he has a way of making her think that it’s her fault, and, in that way, she’s sort of battling herself in regard to whether or not she’s going to trust herself or trust him.

I do think that his standards for beauty and the way he treats Sheryl are something that a lot of women seem to be able to relate to. In talking with the women in my life, and just trying to be aware of what’s happening in the zeitgeist, it appears that women, regardless of what they may accomplish, are still judged largely by their appearance, and there are certainly a number of men out there who have no concern for their own appearance, while at the same time, they expect women to look their-version-of-perfect at all times.

As you mentioned, Ted’s hotness is never even considered, and that’s because he knows that he’s not going to be judged in the same way that he and everyone else in the film judge Sheryl. In my own life, I will throw on a hat and a t-shirt and be ready to go, while my wife might change outfits several times and spend a significant amount of time doing her hair and makeup. This is because she knows that other people will be judging her in a way similar to how Ted judges Sheryl.

I’m not an expert by any means, but I think patriarchal expectations are so ingrained in our society that it’s very difficult to see that they are even there or where they might begin and end. I do think that Sheryl has internalized a lot of patriarchal/societal/cultural expectations, as have a lot of people. It’s how she reacts to these thoughts and expectations that make her a killer.

I did not write Sheryl with the intent of saying that one should or shouldn’t care about their appearance. Overall, I want to say do what makes you happy (as long you’re not actually a serial killer. Don’t do that.), but I do think it’s also important to think about why we do the things we do.

3. Killer Sympathy. The film tells Sheryl’s story from her point of view, exploring her emotions and motives in ways that make them at least somewhat understandable. She’s a killer, but… do you think viewers will find her sympathetic? Why or why not? She presents herself as an average woman tired of being shit on, tired of people not seeking to know her true self, tired of not being free. Do you think her frustrations with the world, which are a little off kilter considering her murder habit, are part of her psychopathy, or do they make her a kind of everywoman? Why?

JMB: Definitely we spent a lot of time discussing how we can create sympathy/empathy for Sheryl. We really wanted viewers to think just that – She’s a killer, but… Overall, it seems that we have been pretty successful in that as many fans have expressed to me that she’s more of an anti-hero than a traditional horror slasher. I hope that people will leave the theatre and have a conversation about Sheryl and why she does what she does.

I think that one major way that we create this empathy for her is by putting her in normal situations (such as going on a date, talking to her friend, interacting with her boss), and then we make the people that she interacts with horrible people. I think it’s these common interactions and frustrations that make her very relatable, and that’s a credit really to the performance by . There was a version of Sheryl that we called “Sterile Sheryl” where Sheryl was very cold and obsessed with everything in her life being perfect, such as having perfectly organized rows of makeup. Not only was this very challenging from a production standpoint, but it put a wall between Sheryl and the audience. Playing her as an everywoman helped the audience to really connect more with Sheryl, which was our goal.

So I think her frustrations are regular frustrations that many people can relate to, and part of the fun of the movie is that Sheryl is able to live out this revenge fantasy for us.  We know that we can’t – and shouldn’t – murder the jerks in our world, but Sheryl is able to do this for us, and that catharsis is part of the appeal of the film.

4. Killer Comedy. Though it has serious themes, Sheryl is often quite funny, especially when depicting the dynamic between Sheryl and Ted and in murder sequences from killers’ perspectives that give the grotesque dimensions of the casual and the absurd. “Comedy” is even one of Sheryl’s categories on IMDb. Why add laughs (or at least wicked smiles) to the film’s mix? How does the comedy combine with horror, and how do you expect the combination to affect audiences? If the film contains an element of satire, what are you satirizing?

JMB: I love comedy and laughing, so anything that I write is most likely going to have some element of comedy in it. For me, movies have always been a way to escape the horrors and drama of real life, so when I watch a movie, I like to have fun, and to me, fun means laughter.

To me, comedy and horror are very closely related. They both are very visceral, and they both rely on timing and an element of the unexpected to achieve their affect. To me, Sheryl is very funny at the beginning of the film and, while the comedy never goes away, it lessens as the film goes on. My hope is that the comedy will hook the audience so that they want to go on this wild ride with us. It also helps to relieve the tension on what might otherwise be a really heavy film. In this way, the darker or more serious moments hit even harder when juxtaposed against the funnier moments. When we see Ted get serious, we can see actually how evil he is. When we see Sheryl get serious, we see how much things have affected her. I believe this all contributes to helping us tell the best story we can.

5. Killer Romance. Sheryl could just be a collection of gory set-pieces, but instead it devotes a considerable amount of screen time to character development, a lot of that time to developing the relationship between Sheryl and her new cop boyfriend, David. What does this romance storyline add to the film both as a viewing experience and as the story of a woman trying to cope (homicidally) with the pressure to be beautiful? How does the romance combine with the horror and comedy?

JMB: This is another way that we create empathy for Sheryl. The whole reason that Sheryl does what she does is because, at the end of the day, she really just wants to be loved for who she is. I think that’s what we all want. In the film, Sheryl has a few chances to choose between David and her victims, and she makes her choice. So many people chase beauty or wealth or status because they think that it will earn them love from other people, but it doesn’t. It might temporarily, but I believe that what so many of us are searching for is that inner self love that doesn’t depend on external circumstances. In her own way, Sheryl finds this, or at least thinks she does.

I think the romance is another primal emotion that matches well with the comedy and the horror. Plus, it adds another fun layer to the mix. David and Sheryl are essentially lying to each other, and we know they’re going to find out the truth. We just want to know what’s gonna happen when they find out.

6. Killer Style. The film’s stylization helps the genre blend to feel more natural. A contemporary, well-mixed soundtrack carries the mood, and the camera’s presence announces itself, creating an aura of self-reflexivity, as when labels appear to name characters in the beginning, text messages appear not on shots of phones but on the screen itself, and lots of splatter dirties the lens. I’ve named a few details that stood out to me—what would you say defines the style of the film and perhaps your style as a director more generally? What are your favorite techniques for crafting the experiences of your audience? Do you think of your style as self-reflexive? Why or why not?

JMB: Thank you for saying this. I don’t really think of myself as self-reflexive, but I could see why that might come up. For me, I generally thought about what I would like to see on the screen. What would make this fun to me? And what would help to tell the best story?

My background is music, so sound and audio are very important to me. I felt very fortunate to find a great group of songs that fit the film for the soundtrack, and a great sound engineer in Chris Woll at Downmix Studios who made it boom! We really worked to mix the movie almost like an album. I wanted the audience to feel it as much as possible.

You really hit the nail on the head – For me, I want to create an experience. When you watch a Justin Best film, I want you to see it, hear it, feel it, smell it. I want to bring people in so that they can forget about life for a while and just enjoy what they’re seeing on the screen. Our time is the most valuable resource, so I want to honor the audience’s choice to give me their time with the best movie I can give back.

For me, things like the labels on the screen are both fun and purposeful. As you said, it adds some stylization but also helps people get the lay of the land very quickly. The dialogue moves fast by design, so I really wanted to help people understand who is who and how they’re related. Same with things like the blood splatter – we couldn’t always do the blood practically, so adding some on the screen gave me the feeling I wanted while also helping to bring the audience into the experience.

Everything in Sheryl was done for a reason. We really wanted to use everything in the film to help tell the story. One area where this is most representative is in the wardrobe, and again, this is a testament to the work that our costume designer, Stephanie Nguyen, put in. At the beginning, Sheryl is wearing dark, constrictive dresses with a huge purse, but as time goes on her outfits change until, at the end, she’s wearing an all-white pants outfit.

Overall, Sheryl is pretty representative of what you’re going to get from a Justin Best film. From the killer music to the quippy dialogue to the heart, this is the kind of film that I am excited to make more of in the future. We like to say that it’s the most fun you can have with your clothes on.

7. Franken-face, Leatherface, et al. Since one of Sheryl’s primary goals in the film is to sew together a “perfect face” from perfect parts, a face she can wear, people make offhand comments about her creating a “Franken-face” and her trying to be a “female Leatherface” (she does use a chainsaw at one point). I’m pretty sure I caught a reference to Buffalo Bill, too. Though these references aren’t at all belabored in the film, they still strike me. To what extent do you see Sheryl engaging with the styles and/or themes of Frankenstein, Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Silence of the Lambs, and perhaps other precursors? I’m on tradition again—where do you see Sheryl taking this tradition of stitching and skin?

JMB: I’d be very happy to see Sheryl mentioned in the same breath with those classic stories! I never thought consciously of any of these stories when I was writing Sheryl, but I believe they influenced me on some level. Frankenstein depicts a creature seeking companionship before turning to revenge. Silence of the Lambs depicts a woman overlooked in her profession who has to deal with a charming psychopath. Texas Chainsaw depicts a person wearing someone’s else face and wielding a chainsaw. These stories are a part of our modern mythology now.

I hope that Sheryl helps to build on this mythology and push it forward. My goal with Sheryl was to take these commons stories and tropes and tell them in a new way. Of course, when we were making the film, we never thought about any of this – we just wanted to make a badass movie.

So, if people just want to watch a badass woman hack up bad people, they can do that and have a great time. Also, I think it’d be great if someone watched this film, and it inspired them to make their own addition to the skin-stitching pantheon.

8. True Knowing, True Beauty. Sheryl is concerned about people not truly knowing her and about finding her true self; Ted is over-confident about truly knowing Sheryl; David truly wants to know Sheryl, or at least thinks he does. Although Sheryl is cautioned not to seek perfection and about being too obsessed with appearance, she wants the perfect face, true beauty. How might the movie answer these questions: can a person ever really know another person? Can a person ever really know themselves? Is perfection possible? Does true beauty actually exist?

JMB: These are some deep questions! And are exactly the kind that I’m excited for audiences to discuss after seeing the film. I personally believe that what a lot of us humans are searching for is connection – both with ourselves and with each other. Part of the beauty of life is making progress towards that connection.

There are a lot of things vying for your attention today, and a lot of these things, whether consciously or unconsciously, are working to separate you from yourself. To me, that’s basically what marketing is: You’re not good enough. Buy our stuff and you will be good enough. Sheryl is cautioned not to seek perfection, and she ignores this warning, but she’s hardly the first. Countless individuals, both in real life and in fiction, have chased wealth, fame, beauty and more, much to their detriment.

Sheryl says to one of her victims that when she is with her that “there’s a connection.” Sheryl seems to think that killing is the only way that people notice her – the only way that she can connect with herself and others. Obviously, this is a movie and an extreme example, but many people do seek love and connection in unhealthy ways.

I believe that when you’re able to see past all of the distractions of the world, and discover who you are at your core, this leads to fulfillment. From there, I believe that you’re more likely to go out and find people that you truly connect with on a deeper level, whether that’s friendship or a romantic relationship.

I’ve been with my wife for 13 years, and we’re still learning new things about each other, and we’re both learning things about ourselves. So, I don’t know if it’s possible to completely ever know another person or yourself, but that growth is, to me, the purpose and joy of life.

Today, it does seem like perfection and true beauty are more attainable. We can photoshop or facetune a picture to death. In a music studio, you can autotune every note until it’s perfect. On set, we could shoot over and over until we got it “perfect” because we weren’t limited by film. But, often, when we listen to these “perfect” songs or look at a “perfect” picture, we can sense that it’s off. It’s lost its soul.

As Sheryl says in the film, there’s always someone prettier. When you’re seeking external validation, there’s always going to be someone who’s better/richer/prettier/whatever-er. So, I don’t know that perfection or true beauty exists in the way that it’s usually marketed to us.

On the other hand, we live on a rock spinning through the galaxy at just the right speed and just the right distance, and our parents had to meet and their parents had to meet and so on – all these conditions had to be perfect for us to even be here. At the same time, we’re surrounded by trees and mountains and oceans and amazing structures. We get to witness the smile of children or the joy of accomplishing a goal or the connection of looking in a loved one’s eyes. To me, that’s pretty beautiful.

9. Access! How can readers learn more about you and your works (please provide any links you want to share)?

JMB: We are on all the social media platforms at @SherylTheMovie, but the best place to keep up with all things Sheryl is on Instagram at www.instagram.com/sherylthemovie. We’re currently making our festival run, and we have a comic book version of Sheryl coming soon, so follow us on IG and the other social media sites to find out when we’ll be coming to a city near you. Readers can also learn more about Sheryl, the cast and crew, and more at www.sherylthemovie.com. Also, if you’ve seen the film be sure to leave us a review on letterboxd and IMDB, as those things really help a grassroots, indie film like Sheryl.

Also, I want to say thanks again to you, Andrew, and your readers for supporting the indie horror arts. Time is the most valuable thing we have, and for ya’ll to take the time to watch our film and want to learn more about it, it means a lot to myself and the whole Sheryl team. We worked hard to create the best film we could make, and we want people to see it. Liking, subscribing, going to a festival, interacting on social media – it may sound trite, but it really means a lot, so thank you again for your time and your support! I look forward to making more creepy things and sharing them with you in the future!

SHERYL: LINKS

Website and Social Media 

WEBSITE: www.sherylthemovie.com 

INSTAGRAM: www.instagram.com/SherylTheMovie 

FACEBOOK: www.facebook.com/sherylthemovie 

TWITTER: www.twitter.com/sherylthemovie 

TIK TOK: www.tiktok.com/@sherylthemovie 

IMDB: www.imdb.com/title/tt13117642 

LETTERBOXD: https://letterboxd.com/film/sheryl-2023/ 

Watch the Trailer!

 www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLIN6FI0Sh4

JUSTIN BEST LINKS

Website: www.justinbest.rocks

Instagram: www.instagram.com/jmichaelbest

Twitter: www.twitter.com/jmichaelbest 

About the Filmmaker

Justin Best is a writer and director who studied feature film writing at UCLA Extension under Michael Weiss (Journey to the Center of the Earth) and improv comedy and sketch writing at Upright Citizen’s Brigade. His debut feature film, SHERYL, recently won the Jury Award at the Crimson Screen Film Festival, and won Best Horror Feature at the International Horror & Sci-Fi Festival/Phoenix Film Festival and the Miami Sci-Fi Film Festival. SHERYL was also nominated for 11 awards at the Spring HorrorHound Festival. His script for SHERYL was a quarterfinalist in the Academy Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting, and he was also the writer for The Living Remain, a virtual reality horror video game called the “best VR campaign since Resident Evil 4.” Justin is also the founder of BxB Studios, a multimedia production studio designed to create fun, empowering stories with heart.

The post Interview with Filmmaker Justin Best: Sheryl appeared first on L. Andrew Cooper's Horrific Scribblings.

Interview with Filmmakers Terry and Larry Ziegelman: “Committed,” “Little Man of Steel,” and “Broken Vessels”

Accomplished filmmakers Terry and Larry Ziegelman’s horror/thriller short “Broken Vessels” captured my imagination at this year’s Miami International Science Fiction Film Festival (and also captured the award for best actress in a short for lead Alicia Blasingame). “Broken Vessels” takes a dark, unusual look at superheroes, as do the brothers’ shorts “Committed” and “Little Man of Steel,” so here we discuss all three.

“Committed”

“Committed” explores the complex, chaotic and kooky relationship between two popular DC comic characters, the Joker and Harley Quinn, as well as the unseen third person always seeming to get in between them. This multi-award-winning fan film stars Aaron Gaffey as the Joker, Brandi Price as Harley Quinn, and Matt Stevens as the hapless doctor. “Committed” was the proud recipient of multiple honors, including Best Fan Film for both Dragon Con Film Festival and the Superman Celebration Film Festival, Best Screenplay at LA Shorts Awards, Best Actor for the LA Shorts Awards, and Best Actress for Superman Celebration Film Festival to name a few. We were honored to screen across the USA, from California to Rhode Island, to even Hawaii.

Click for the complete film! (Scroll down to the fourth option.)“Little Man of Steel”

“Little Man of Steel,” a sexy and raunchy romantic comedy directed by award-winning filmmaker Larry Ziegelman, had its West Coast premiere at the prestigious 16th Annual “Dances with Films” Festival. It won multiple awards at the St. Louis Filmmakers Showcase, including Best Comedy as well as Best Fan Film at Atlanta’s DragonCon Film Festival. It has also played in festivals in New York, Los Angeles, St. Louis, Atlanta, Chicago, and Miami. Please enjoy watching the film that ComicBastards.com calls “…possibly the best Superman fan film you will ever see.”

Click for the complete film! (In the image bar at the bottom, it’s second from the left.)“Broken Vessels”

While fighting a deadly blood cancer, Jane contends with the effects of “chemo-brain”, attempting to discern reality from fantasy, as she summons up her newfound strength to face-off with an abusive husband. “Broken Vessels” stars Alicia Blasingame as Jane, Cathy Vu as her new “super” friend, Naomi, and Aaron Gaffey as Scott, Jane’s husband. “Broken Vessels” has screened in numerous festivals in Los Angeles, Chicago, St. Louis, Miami, Jacksonville and will soon screen in Seattle and New York, too!

The Interview

“Committed” (A Film by Terry Ziegelman)

1. Bad Guy Fandom. These days fans of various superhero universes seem to have at least as much interest in villains like Harley Quinn and The Joker as they do in heroes like Batman. Why do you think that is? Do you think Harley Quinn and The Joker make more interesting film subjects than Batman? Why or why not?

TZ: In my opinion, the fascination of the “bad boy” and “bad girl” began way before the comic universe. Whether it’s Dionysus or Medusa in Greek mythology, Iago or Lady Macbeth in Shakespeare, the interest in being bad permeates literature. There’s something about being free from the norms of polite society, the willingness to do whatever your heart desires, at any given moment that captures our attention, and allows us to live vicariously through those characters.

Comic book culture simply continues with this age-old fascination. Not surprisingly, I grew up reading comics, and it was hard not to empathize with certain villains. Magneto is a wonderful example of when a villain is fully fleshed-out; you understand his motivations and care about his cause. Even my nine-year-old son, Blake, is familiar with the concept of an “anti-hero.” A great character or anti-hero has so many shades of gray, Deadpool, Tony Soprano, or Walter White, to name a few from recent pop culture.

Are The Joker and Harley Quinn more interesting than Batman? That would depend on the reader/viewer. Perhaps the reader/viewer who is disillusioned with where we are as a country is looking for a hero that stalwartly upholds the ideals of the heroic Batman, or maybe a reader who wants a “walk on the wild side” will enjoy the chaos of The Joker and Harley Quinn. 

2. Criminally Coupled. The song that plays over the end credits mentions Bonnie and Clyde, whose relationship is a possible forebear of the relationship between Harley Quinn and The Joker. Why is the criminal couple such an enduring figure in American popular culture? In your film Harley Quinn and The Joker’s relationship combines sex and violence—The Joker is abusive, but the film emphasizes joy in their connection. What’s significant about their violent sexuality?

TZ: Thank you for noticing the end credit song! Curtis Cameron wrote that wonderful song, and it makes me happy to hear it every time. It’s just so smart, funny and easy on the ears! The answer in regards to the enduring quality of the criminal couple is very similar to the bad guy/ bad girl mystique. They live a life of danger and criminality, and we get to ride along for free.

Colin Costello, the creator and co-writer of “Committed,” and I are referencing the long and tangled history that The Joker and Harley Quinn have in both the animated series and the comics. Without a doubt, it’s an abusive relationship, but Harley is so in love, she either can’t see that, or she interprets pain as love. However, since she’s the psychologist, she would be better suited to answer that question.

3. Therapy? Perhaps the hero of the film is the therapist, who makes great strides with Harley Quinn and The Joker during a single session… but he seems a little ridiculous trying to do so. What’s the film’s take on therapy, especially for a couple like this criminal pair? How seriously does the film take Harley Quinn and The Joker as people with mental illnesses? Ought they be committed for being committed to each other? Why or why not?

TZ: My approach to “Committed” from the beginning was always, these are simply two people in couple’s therapy that just happen to be The Joker and Harley Quinn. I wrote it from that perspective, which is why the inclusion of jokes of everyday annoyances between couples arise, albeit, to the level of this criminal duo. I feel it adds a layer of relatability for audience members.

The casting of Dr. Leslie Thompkins, wonderfully played by Matt Stevens, was an interesting dilemma. During casting sessions, many actors in their later years showed up for the role, and they were amazing. However, I was concerned that the audience would bond too much with the wise, old grandfather type, and feel upset if any harm would befall him. So I needed a younger actor with comedy chops that the audience could identify with, but not too much, otherwise, that could kill the funny.

The good doctor has his task cut out for him: to “cure” the criminal pair within one therapy session. As the director, another concern of mine about the session was that people sitting on a couch talking, even The Joker and Harley Quinn, can easily be boring. So it was important to keep things lively and give them fun, physical activities to do, like the “trust fall.” Although, because it is a dark comedy, it’s still a light-hearted take on couple’s therapy, and in no way should any conclusions be drawn about the efficacy of therapy for those criminally insane. However, I would say that therapy is now more important than ever, especially after the pandemic.

“Little Man of Steel” (A Film by Larry Ziegelman)

4. Longstanding Questions. “Little Man of Steel” explores a longstanding philosophical debate about whether Superman could have sex without his super-ejaculation hurting, perhaps even killing, his partner. I don’t want to spoil where the film goes with this debate, so I’ll ask about both sides. Why might super-ejaculation be damaging to Superman’s partner? Alternately, how might Superman avoid damaging his partner when he ejaculates?

LZ: Clearly, I’m not the first Superman fan to theorize the potential dangers of Superman’s sex life. In fact, another “Larry”, Larry Niven, wrote a piece on it called “Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex.” I discovered this article after my co-writer and I shot the film. I would highly recommend reading it or listening to Bronson Pinchot narrate the audiobook! What I can summarize is the fear of “super-sperm” riddling a woman’s reproductive system with holes as they are ejected out at supersonic speeds and swim up and/or through the Fallopian tubes. This would most likely cause irreparable damage and, most surely, death. So, what’s a poor, horny Kryptonian to do? And that’s where my story begins. 

To answer the second half of the question, well…he can’t. At least not with a human. We explored ideas of kryptonite laced condoms. But would that just kill him or at the very least, make him, ahem, soft? The best solution would be for Superman to create a room that would emulate the rays of the red sun, thus, losing his powers. And then, no longer be a superman. But where’s the fun in that?

5. Super Sexy. Your film asks an even more fundamental question. Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman all have their love interests, but except for some kissing, their relationships seem far more conceptual than sexual. Is it time for us to see these characters as actual adults with sexual identities, even if, as Lois speculates at one point in “Little Man of Steel,” that identity happens to be asexual? Is your film a call for more adult superheroes? Are you taking a step in that direction, leading the way?

LZ: Well, how I’d love to take credit for creating a more “adult” superhero story! But I have to say I was inspired by The Incredibles. I loved how they made two superheroes just another suburban couple dealing with their marital woes and their family problems. Yes, my film takes that a step racier for sure. But movies like Deadpool really created a trend for adult themed super-stories as well as shows like The Boys and Gen V. And I’m so glad they did. Comic book nerds like my brother and myself were raised on superhero stories, and while we get older, it’s nice that those stories are maturing with us. Of course, I’m not looking forward to the stories of superheroes dealing with their swollen prostates, incontinence and hot flashes just yet.

6. Open Secret. About your version of Superman’s world: Lois seems to know who Clark is, and Clark seems to use super-speed in his Clark persona where other people could see him. Is Clark totally “out” as Superman? Does his ability to be open about his (formerly) secret identity relate to his ability to be open about his sexual desire? Why or why not?

LZ: In the world of “Little Man of Steel” we have a Lois that knows that Clark is Superman. We decided that she either used her journalistic powers and figured it out, or that Clark revealed it to her. But they do keep the secret to themselves. Did Clark use his superpowers a little recklessly this one particular evening? Absolutely. But perhaps any surveillance footage might have been destroyed by the end of his date. Is his secret safe with the Pharmacist? Only time will tell.

“Broken Vessels” (A Film by Terry and Larry Ziegelman)

7. Dark Undercurrents Erupt. “Committed” and “Little Man of Steel” both have their dark sides, but when you two joined forces and created a work with characters entirely your own, you went way dark. The other two films are closer to comedy than horror, but even though it deserves to be considered alongside your superhero films, I wouldn’t hesitate to call “Broken Vessels” horror. Why did you turn to darker material as you left the world of DC fan fic? How have audiences responded to the film’s combination of a somber tone with tense, believable scenarios and inspirational insights? Do you see a dark streak continuing in your future work? Why or why not?

T&LZ: For us, “Broken Vessels” has always been difficult to categorize. We’ve had discussions about exactly what genre category it actually belongs in. It checks boxes in superhero, fantasy, sci-fi, thriller, horror and even psychological drama. And in fact, we’ve submitted the film into many different purely genre film festivals, and it’s actually only gotten into one sci-fi and two superhero/geek film festivals. All the rest have been more all-genre film festivals, in the short film category. 

We’ve been working on comedic short films and web series for many years and wanted to try our hand at a different genre. Films like Unbreakable, Carrie, and even Sleeping with the Enemy were all inspirational to us as we were writing the screenplay. We are all just fragile vessels holding 1.5 gallons of blood, hoping not to get stuck by a sharp object and start bleeding out. If you think about it that way, it’s truly a fine line between life and death. So with Jane’s blood powers, it really lends itself to a darker, more visceral story. 

The audience reaction has been very positive. Often when you sit with the audience, you don’t watch the film anymore, you watch the audience. You notice the scenes they laugh at, gasp at, and, at the end, cheer at. The ones that come up to you afterward are the viewers who are moved by it. They enjoy the VFX, the twists and turns, the emotional scenes and finally the retribution.

It seems that our films have often dealt with themes of life and death and continue to do so. Larry just shot a romantic comedy short that takes place in a cemetery at night. And together, we just wrote a comedic pilot called “Mort ” about a timid actuarial that is accidentally visited by “Death” a day early. So yes, we are continuing our dark streak!

8. Bloody Fantastic. Jane, the protagonist, has a relationship with blood that creates opportunities for dazzling special effects. Where did your ideas about blood in this story originate?

All three films look like they have high production values. I’m about to treat your styles as if they’re very similar—is that fair, or do you see significant differences in the ways you make movies?

 As for the similarities, all three films expertly frame close shots to build characters while maintaining immersive senses of carefully colored spaces through longer views and almost seamless editing. That’s my take, but enough about me. Be more specific: what is the “look” of “Broken Vessels,” how did you work together to create it, and how does it relate to the Ziegelman brand?

T&LZ: Thank you for your kind comment about the special effects!. Terry did most of the VFX compositing over the course of three and a half years, supervised by Marvel MCU veteran Bob Homami. 

In terms of the origin of the story, we’d have to flashback to our junior high years in the early eighties, where we’d either be fantasizing about casting the perfect actors for an X-Men movie or coming up with our own superheroes and villains. Jane, our protagonist in “Broken Vessels,” is based on our character, a very deadly assassin, named Bloodbath. In a cheeky nod to our Bloodbath character, we added the important bloody bath “rebirth” scene. We would note this character was created way before Bloodbenders from Avatar or Marie Moreau from Gen V! 

In terms of our style of moviemaking, we both arrive at similar styles, but from different paths. We both set the bar high for production values. Larry has a background in advertising and is used to high production values from making expensive, live action commercials for clients such as McDonalds, Anheuser Busch, Dell Computers, etc. Terry has classical art training and has worked since 2002 in feature animation for Blue Sky Studios, Sony Imageworks, and Dreamworks, so also has high expectations for production values. We should also note that during the course of any solo project, we frequently reach out to each other for comments and ideas, so it is rare that our opinions are not shared, thereby affecting the solo effort in some minor way perhaps. 

In regard to our differences, in the script writing process, Terry can be more verbose in dialog, while Larry leans toward a more terse, tighter dialog. On shooting days, Larry is normally hyper-focused on performances, while Terry focuses on the visuals, lighting, mood and composition to emphasize those performances. Terry is also more knowledgeable about what is best done in post-production and VFX, while Larry is more experienced in the area of editing. In this way, our differences complement each other. 

We’ve collaborated together since childhood. We have a shorthand, and usually agree. However, if we don’t agree, we argue it out, until we can convince each other of our side. The only difference now is that our projects are more expansive and expensive! While Terry did the initial script, we both worked on subsequent versions to improve it. We storyboarded together. Larry took photos, while Terry hand-drew frames, and then we pieced them together. Larry edited 85% of the movie, while Terry gave notes. Terry created the composited VFX scenes, and Larry gave notes. 

In terms of the look of “Broken Vessels,” we both pulled references for the locations, remembering the emotions we were going for: isolation, sterility, helplessness, loneliness, connection and ultimately, empowerment. Those references were then used as inspiration for color grading, expertly done by Carbon.

We hope our “Ziegelman” brand is slightly dark and geeky, with a high production value, a smart, tight, surprising script, and solid performances. And often funny, if called for. 

9. Adult Empowerment. A commonplace (positive) criticism related to superhero storytelling is that the empowerment of lead characters helps young viewers (and readers) feel empowered to find their own identities and greater security in the world. Although it offers little to offend, “Broken Vessels” deals with cancer and domestic violence, not typical youth market fare. I see it as a film for adults, but it still deals with empowerment. What is superheroic for adults?

Why might adults need empowering images just as much as younger people—and how do you think adult-oriented images should look by comparison? All three films we’re discussing put characters related to superhero fantasy into unusually realistic and grown-up situations, the first two to mostly comic effect, “Broken Vessels” to darker but also more profound ends. I’ll rephrase an earlier question: do you see yourselves bringing in a new type of mature superhero film? Why or why not?

T&LZ: We would argue that adult themes and stories have been around since Stan Lee started taking control at Marvel. As kids we read comics that had complex and flawed characters in very mature story lines, like Magneto in the X-Men series. During the Golden Age of the 80’s there were comic series like The Watchmen by Alan Moore and The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller that appealed to adults and kids alike. They really opened our eyes to what a comic book can do. Think of Maus by Art Spiegelman, telling the story of Nazis persecuting Jews through the art form of comics. 

Empowerment is needed for any age or race that is being put upon and treated unfairly. Now more than ever, adults need reminders of right versus wrong, good versus evil. Think of some recent social movements that empowered us: #metoo, #blacklivesmatter, etc. Just because we’re getting older doesn’t mean we don’t need creative reminders to do the right thing and follow our better angels.

I’d love to say that we are ushering in a more mature superhero film, but rather, we are simply telling stories that interest us, and hope to bring the audience along for the ride. 

10. Access! How can readers learn more about you and your works (please provide any links you want to share)?

TZ: Readers can learn more about Terry Ziegelman, his movies, and see his traditional painting as well, through the website, www.terryziegelman.com and on IG: @TerryZiegelman. 

LZ: You can find all of Larry Ziegelman’s short films, web series and commercials here:  larryz.com/director
And follow his latest on IG: @ugspugspictures

About the Filmmakers

Larry and Terry Ziegelman were born (9 minutes apart) and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. While they were not connected by the hip, they might as well have been. They did everything together when it came to creativity: drawing, painting, creating superhero stories, acting and even co-directing one act plays in high school.

For his undergraduate studies, Larry received a degree in Art Direction, and then he went into advertising, where he created prizewinning campaigns and Super Bowl spots at DDB Chicago. Though he loved thinking of the ideas, he soon discovered that he loved directing them even more. So, for the last few years, Larry has been directing commercials along with creating his own celebrated short films, web series, and music videos.

As for Terry, he earned a degree in illustration. For his graduate studies, he focused on technology and received a Master’s degree in Computer Animation. He has been in the animation industry ever since, working on memorable feature films such as Robots, Ice Age, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, and Puss in Boots: The Last Wish. In addition, he has also written and directed his own highly lauded short films.

Like they did during their childhood, they are still collaborating—just this time, by creating original and award-winning short films. Each of their unique work experiences and talents meshes as they use these skills to push their inventive narratives forward.

Andrew’s Review of “Broken Vessels”

Written and directed by Terry and Larry Ziegelman, “Broken Vessels” tackles somber subjects far from usual horror fare: cancer and domestic violence. The film begins with the terrors of a chemotherapy infusion, which Jane, the lead, faces with quiet dignity, and gradually reveals more about Jane’s struggles with an elusive form of blood cancer and a husband who abuses her verbally, emotionally, and physically without regard for her weakened state. Jane’s situation is horrifying, and the film builds tension and suspense as it unfolds. Taking full advantage of how sympathetic and likable Jane is as she faces such adversity, the Ziegelmans create a rich emotional world.

Figure 1. Jane quietly suffers through the insertion of the needle for chemotherapy.

Much of this richness of feeling stems from Alicia Blasingame’s exceptional performance as Jane. Her highly emotive facial expressions, enhanced by well-framed close cinematography by Daniel Gomez Bagby, tell much of the story, conveying her dread of the needle involved in her chemotherapy and, more deeply, her dread of her husband, revealing his abusiveness long before it appears onscreen. The other actors provide excellent support, with Aaron Gaffey playing her husband, Scott, as believably creepy and revolting, and Cathy Vu playing her partner in chemotherapy, Naomi, as an inspirational voice who dresses as Wonder Woman and Batman as she fights stage four colon cancer. Naomi says at one point, “Cancer makes you strong, a fighter,” and though Naomi’s costumes make her look the fighter part, the film makes clear that Jane has an enormous well of strength. Indeed, simply surviving both cancer and Scott makes her a hero.

The title, “Broken Vessels,” is provocative because it refers to several aspects of the story, one of which Jane and Naomi defy through their heroism: though they might at times feel broken, they ultimately refuse to be vessels broken by their illnesses when they choose to fight. If anyone is a broken vessel, it’s Scott, who looks forlornly at a framed news article about his past glories before settling into his abusive patterns.

“Vessels” also refers to Jane’s blood cancer, presumably the blood vessels broken by the mysterious disease, but the film has some tricks to perform beyond its realistically horrifying foundation. As the short runtime progresses—it clocks in at about twenty minutes—a storyline that qualifies as sci-fi or supernatural (take your pick) comes to the fore. Jane has a peculiar relationship with blood that might just work in her favor; it certainly works in the film’s favor, providing opportunities for dazzling effects.

Figure 2. Jane begins to explore her unusual relationship with blood.

As Jane’s potential grows and the film’s other tensions escalate, subtle, somewhat ethereal music by Ryan McLean becomes increasingly intense, preparing a final conflict that is thoroughly satisfying. There’s an added twist from the notion of “chemo brain”—likely familiar to viewers who have been or been close to someone going through chemotherapy—and knowing that Jane hallucinates, but one way to understand the film is as less of a horror story and more of superhero’s origin story. You’ll have to see for yourself if that idea fits with how the film strikes you.

However you end up feeling about the characters and events of “Broken Vessels,” the film is unquestionably a thoughtful and moving experience admirable for its adroit handling of sensitive subjects. It’s also visually engaging and exciting, likely to meet demands for fun as well as reflection.

The post Interview with Filmmakers Terry and Larry Ziegelman: “Committed,” “Little Man of Steel,” and “Broken Vessels” appeared first on L. Andrew Cooper's Horrific Scribblings.

Interview with Filmmaker Alexander Deeds: “Jumpin’ Jacob” and “Butterscotch”

I first encountered Alexander Deeds’s filmmaking while I was working with the Miami International Science Fiction Film Festival (MiSciFi), 2024, where his film “Butterscotch” took home the prize for Best Horror Short. Here we discuss “Butterscotch” along with his earlier short “Jumpin’ Jacob,” which is also brilliantly creepy. You can watch both films by linking through their posters–highly recommended!–and then enjoy insights from an artist who is definitely one to keep watching.

“Jumpin’ Jacob”

“Jumpin’ Jacob” is a film about haunted music, where the focus is just as much on the silence as it is the sound. In a genre so filled with loud bangs, we wanted to make a film where the gasp of the audience was the loudest part of the soundtrack.

Click for the full film, runtime ~10 minutes“Butterscotch”

“Butterscotch” is a bite-sized horror short, centered around a Bully who picks on the wrong person: a seemingly comatose Old Man in a nursing home. This is our take on a Grimm-style story, and we hope it follows in that tradition of teaching a moral in a deliciously scary way.

Click for the full film, runtime ~ 7 minutesThe Interview

1. Nonverbal Horror. Though neither is silent, and “Jumpin’ Jacob” involves significant and significantly creepy song lyrics, both “Jumpin’ Jacob” and “Butterscotch” are dialogue-free and nearly nonverbal. What draws you toward the nonverbal? Did you bother with conventional screenwriting for these shorts? Why or why not? How does the absence of speech relate to horror in the scenarios that play out in your films?

AD: On Jumpin’ Jacob, the initial idea was to make a horror film that was centered around sound and silence, and where the music itself was the main character. When you want the song to be the main focus, you quickly realize that any other music you include can start to fight it for attention. That’s why we ended up not using any kind of score, and why there’s only one fairly simple song on the Girl’s CD player. We want JJ’s song to be the star. And with that in mind, if you consider dialogue to be its own form of music, then going nonverbal just made sense. It was a great lesson for me: What you remove strengthens what you keep, and we carried that lesson over into Butterscotch. The central idea of that film was the creepy tension of sustained eye contact; it’s awkward and strangely tense, and I think a lot of people would talk to alleviate that tension. But remove the dialogue, and that tension just keeps building. I did initially try to write a couple lines of dialogue to explain why there’s a kid walking by himself, but everything I wrote just felt unnecessary. You get the idea just through the visuals and the characters’ blocking, so that’s ultimately why it’s another silent film. 

2. Tenterhook Tension. Both films build tension masterfully—how do you do it? We’ve already started talking about playing with silence and sound. What additional techniques do you use (cinematographic, editorial, etc.) to create suspense, dread, and fear? The “Jumpin’” in “Jumpin’ Jacob” had me bracing for a jump scare from the beginning, and you deliver effective jumps in both films. What attracts you to jump scares, and why do you think they’ve become so popular in contemporary horror?

AD: When it comes to building tension, I think one of the most effective ingredients is to trap the audience in the character’s very limited subjective experience. In both my films, the visuals and editing are almost entirely from the character’s POV, and you’re just as clueless and in the dark as they are. There’s no objective camera giving you nice establishing shots of the house to orient you. We’re living in a shot/reaction-shot world, where we see the character look at something off-screen, and then we cut to see what they’re seeing, and then we cut back to see the character’s reaction.

To elaborate further: I watch a lot of horror movies, but I rarely ever get so scared that I need to turn the lights on. If I do, it’s always because I’m watching a “found footage” movie (something like The Blair Witch Project, for example). In those films, you’re only seeing what the camera sees, and nothing else. No musical score. No cutting to ten different angles around the room. Nothing we’ve come to expect to remind you you’re just watching a movie. That very limited point-of-view can start to feel claustrophobic to an audience member, to the point where it can trick your lizard brain into thinking it’s your point-of-view, too. I like to live in that world even if I’m making a more traditional horror film, because they’re the ones that can viscerally grab you in a way that’s truly unique to horror.

3. Accented Eyefuls. In both films (but perhaps more pronouncedly in “Butterscotch”), set design and color palettes seem painstakingly planned and carefully detailed. With specific reference to the settings and color palettes you use, what effects do you expect these aspects to have on viewers of “Jumpin’ Jacob” (the yellows, for example)? Of “Butterscotch” (the blues, for example)?

AD: Jumpin’ Jacob’s yellow theme was to reference the aged paper of the titular sheet music – and JJ’s “skin” by extension. It was my way of keeping his presence on-screen, even when you don’t see him. For Butterscotch, the intention was the complete opposite: I wanted the candy’s presence to be small but *pop* out of the screen. (If you’ve seen the movie, you know that *popping out* is a recurring theme.) That intention led us to remove all other yellows from the film, and to really lean into the cooler blues.

It was the most I’d ever played with color in a film, and it really reinforced the lesson I learned on JJ: What you remove strengthens what you keep. As a bonus, the blues also helped create an atmosphere of a rainy, overcast day, even though we never look out any of the windows.

4. Attempts at Alignment. What I like most about both films’ narratives is that they have that ineffable quality of being genuinely different, yet I cannot resist the urge to connect them to traditions (it’s a thing I do). Both deal with the sudden eruption into the ordinary of something supernatural, monstrous, and deadly. Campfire tale? The erupting force has an aura of lore. Urban legend? Creepypasta? Something more surreal and/or disturbing? What do you make of any or all of these possible kinships with your films? You call “Butterscotch” “Grimm-style:” would you also liken “Jumpin’ Jacob” to a fairytale? Why or why not?

AD: I really appreciate the compliment, thank-you! Between the two titles, Jumpin’ Jacob was definitely our contribution to the classic boogeyman and haunted house traditions, though with a musical twist. I think it would feel at home in any of the traditions you mentioned, especially in the Creepypasta world, which we were definitely conscious of (Slenderman walked so we could jump). But where JJ is the more traditional story, I wanted Butterscotch to feel like it could exist in its own weird corner, in good company with something like Courage the Cowardly Dog. In fact, the thing I’m most proud of with Butterscotch is that we were able to pull off that off-kilter tone, and I am beyond proud that we assembled a team where everyone was committed to making the same weird movie.

5. Morality Moves In. In “Jumpin’ Jacob,” The Girl doesn’t seem guilty of any moral infraction, but in “Butterscotch,” Bully is, well, a bully, and (speaking of fairytales) as your description emphasizes, “Butterscotch” delivers a moral. What difference does the absence or presence of a moral make to the horror factor in each film? Are we supposed to take pleasure in the fate of Bully (schadenfreude!) that we can’t in the fate of The Girl? If we take pleasure in either, what does that pleasure say about us?

AD: Having a moral or message in my films has never really been a goal of mine, unless it’s what felt right for the story. For Jumpin’ Jacob, for instance, I love that the Girl stumbles into the horror innocently; her only fault is being in the wrong place at the wrong time. There’s a great quote from The Mothman Prophecies, where Richard Gere’s life has turned upside down after a car accident puts his wife in the hospital: “One day you’re just driving along in your car, and the universe just points at you and says, ‘Ah, there you are, a happy couple. I’ve been looking for you.’” It’s one of my favorite quotes, and that horrific randomness helped to inform what happens to the Girl. For Butterscotch, on the other hand, I wanted to try something different. Watching movies as a little kid, I was always the most scared when the bad guy was about to get their comeuppance. I can’t really explain it; there was just something about seeing them meet their horrible end that affected me more than the other characters. Beni’s death at the end of The Mummy was one that really got under my skin (If you’ve seen the film, you’ll appreciate the pun). And I wanted to bring that creepy crawly morality to the Bully in Butterscotch. But also, in all honesty, I think I made the Bully so cruel because it would’ve just been mean-spirited to pick on a little kid who did nothing wrong.

6. Fear of Age. In “Jumpin’ Jacob,” scares start when The Girl discovers worn sheet music for an old-fashioned, Jazz Age style song. In “Butterscotch,” Bully, a boy, gets in trouble when he picks on the aptly named Old Man at a nursing home. Youth encountering age, with the old eventually becoming the source of something scary, lies at the center of both films. Is this connection deliberate, and whether or not it is, what do you think about it? What specific fears about the old do you think your films might draw on?

AD: When I was a little kid, there was an old woman who lived next door to us; she was a very sweet old lady – who would sometimes scare us by popping out her dentures. That image of her laughing, holding her teeth in her hand, was burned into my brain, and I’ve been returning to older characters ever since. Of course, Butterscotch follows in a long lineage of creepy old people, most notably the witch in “Hansel & Gretel,” whom you could see as a direct predecessor. But beyond just the body horror element, it’s also the Hector Salamanca archetype: the quiet old man in the wheelchair who was something completely different, and maybe even monstrous, in a previous life. There’s just something haunting about what’s come before, and I’m drawn to stories where that something reaches out to grab us.

7. Jazzy Jacob? Speaking of the song in “Jumpin’ Jacob,” why did you choose its particular style, and why is the design for Jumpin’ Jacob right for it? What makes JJ so scary looking?

AD: I can’t really explain why, but if ghosts were a genre of music they would be 1920s jazz, calling out from beyond the crackling vinyl. It probably has a lot to do with The Shining and Jeepers Creepers. There’s just something about jazzy music that lends itself to JJ’s creepy swagger: the jaunting, the creeping, and the jumping musicality of his limbs in the dark basement. Even his bowtie suit feels like he could’ve come over straight from his own funeral.

There’s actually a fun cameo in Butterscotch: the custodian sweeping the floor is Ryan Rael, who wrote the music on Jumpin’ Jacob, which is also what he’s listening to on his headphones.

8. Power Cycling. Speaking of age issues, “Butterscotch” stages a power struggle between young and old that’s kind of funny… at first. Does the power struggle have larger significance? What does the humor add to the dynamic between Bully and Old Man? The film’s ending makes the structure as a whole feel almost cyclical. Should viewers think that what happens has happened before and will happen again? Why or why not?

AD: To be honest, I never really considered the power struggle in the film. As for the ending, I’m a big fan of cyclical storytelling, and I love the idea that this Old Man has been sitting in this chair, gobbling people up, for so long that the staff just knows to leave him alone and give him a wide berth.

9. Access! How can readers learn more about you and your works (please provide any links you want to share)?

AD: Readers can find me and links to my current/upcoming work on my Instagram @goodsirfilms, as well as my website: alexanderdeeds.com. Thank you, Andrew, for these awesome and very thoughtful questions!

About the Filmmaker

Alexander Deeds grew up in Miami, FL, where he discovered filmmaking in high school. He made a feature-length horror film during his senior year, as well as countless shorts and music videos during his time at the University of New Mexico. After graduation, he moved to LA in 2015, where he spent several years editing movie trailers professionally. 2019 marked a return to filmmaking, and his two most recent shorts (“Jumpin’ Jacob” and “Butterscotch”) have played and won awards at some of the biggest genre festivals in the world. He is now excitedly working on the script for his new feature film.

Andrew’s Review of “Butterscotch”

Alexander Deeds’s “Butterscotch” packs an exceptionally satisfying punch not only because it delivers an unusual, unpredictable, and creepy scenario that unfolds between two compelling characters in a well-rendered world, but also because it does so in just a little more than seven minutes.

The first shot announces the film’s careful color coordination, showing hands in light blue gloves extending from darker blue sleeves. The hands rest on a light blue surface and frame a wrapped, butterscotch-yellow candy. The hands belong to a character named “Old Man” (Chad Sommer) in the credits; well-dressed in a blue outfit, he sits with the candy on his blanket-covered lap in a well-furnished room of a nursing home where a TV shows a black-and-white movie that, due to what appears to be catatonia, he looks toward but does not actually seem to see. The Old Man looks dignified yet pitiable.

The room’s paint and furniture offer more blues to coordinate with the Old Man’s apparel, and soon a child, credited as “Bully” (Reid Mcconville) enters wearing the same blue palette and a visitor tag. The Bully’s red hair, like the yellow candy, contrasts with all the blues: the primary colors of the costumes, set dressing, make-up, props, and cinematography are telling us something.

The story takes off when the Bully starts to, well, bully the Old Man. Using virtually no dialogue, the film uses the actors’ performances, nonverbal sounds, and music to build the relationship between them. The Bully makes faces at the Old Man, wads up and throws his nametag at him, approaches him, and sticks his tongue out at him, seeming to get no reaction at all. The Bully’s behavior is atrocious, repulsive, and it’s all the more cringeworthy because Megan Pham’s cinematography is generous with close-ups and extreme close-ups. He’s a brat who needs an adult to stop him from picking on a helpless old man.

Figure 1. The Bully teases the Old Man in one of many strategic close-ups.

The situation changes, however, and the characters get new dimensions when the Bully steals the Old Man’s candy. Loud crunching fills the soundtrack, and the boy returns to his chair opposite the Old Man. Suddenly, the Old Man looks toward him and seems to mimic his obnoxiousness. After that, things get scary.

Figure 2. The Old Man mimics the Bully’s obnoxiousness.

Expert cutting in shot-reverse and other patterns (editing also by Alexander Deeds) builds tension as images convey that the Bully is not in the position of power he thought he was, and the Old Man is not what he initially seemed. The close camerawork shows fear in the boy’s eyes, and a sound equivalent—his heavy breathing—communicates fear overtaking his body. He might be obnoxious, but he’s just a kid, and he’s vulnerable. Music bolsters dread and assists with at least one jump scare as the situation becomes more twisted. Sound and image transform the initially placid blue world of the nursing home into a nightmare.

You have to see what happens for yourself, but it’s delightfully weird and pleasantly chilling, with an ending that is nothing shy of perfect. In both concept and execution, “Butterscotch” is an excellent film, a model for anyone who doubts that a stylish, unique, and thrilling horror story can come in a very small wrapper.

The post Interview with Filmmaker Alexander Deeds: “Jumpin’ Jacob” and “Butterscotch” appeared first on L. Andrew Cooper's Horrific Scribblings.

Interview with Author David-Jack Fletcher: Raven’s Creek and The Count

Bestselling, award-winning, and (most importantly) scary and super-fun author David-Jack Fletcher discusses his novel of science run amok, Raven’s Creek, as well as his recently released shocker, The Count.

Raven’s Creek

2023 Bookstagram Winner for LGBTQ+ Novel of the Year

An abandoned motel.

A woman flees an unknown danger, taking refuge in a motel. She is never seen again.

A mad scientist.

A geneticist stretches the boundaries of nature. His experiments, once human, are now something else. Something new. Something hungry.

The couple.

Michael and his husband Geoff have lost something precious. Their search takes them to a motel. What they find there will reveal a cruelty neither knew existed. And creatures beyond imagination.

Welcome to Raven’s Creek.

Click for more on Amazon.com! The Count

When Sam’s ex, Danny, winds up gutted beyond recognition, Sam has no memory of where he was at the time. He can only remember the strange comfort of his new house. The endless ticking of a clock he can’t find. The bloody knife he woke up holding the morning Danny was killed.

Sam’s guilt over Danny is undercut by the endless ticking, a growing desire to drink from the dead, and anonymous GPS pings that lead him to corpses. The stench of them rotting makes him hungry.

He begins to feel the ticking inside him, feeding a darkness he’s long ignored. It compels him to take what he wants, regardless of the price. When he begins to act on his bloodlust, the ticking leads him to the death of a loved one.

The clock begins to point to more of Sam’s friends and family, begging for their blood. Fueled by a deep desire to feed, and compelled by the power of the ticking clock, how far will Sam go to get what he wants?

The Interview

1. Gay Plots 1: Surrogacy. To discuss too much of Raven’s Creek’s storyline would give away some of the delightful twists that keep coming throughout the novel, but we learn early on that Michael and Geoff are using a surrogate mother to have a child. This aspect of the story seems at once especially gay—if two men want a baby using some of their own genetic material, surrogacy is a prime method—and also sort of heteronormative, as it makes reproduction and saving a child seem like primary narrative values. At least early on in the story, do you see the involvement of a surrogate as increasing the queer quotient, or do you think it brings the story closer to classic tales of men saving women and children in distress? What are the consequences of taking either of those perspectives?

D-JF: Wow, this is an incredible question!! For me, surrogacy was an important part of the narrative, because it draws attention to the very real scenario a lot of gay male couples face today. I’ve known people who are rejected for surrogacy because they are gay, and this has serious implications for how some of these organisations view ‘family’.

To answer your question, though, I don’t see Geoff and Michael as driven by a need to save the women and children in distress; it’s more about their unquenchable desire for a family. They have a bond with Adelaide, as well, who very much takes a heroine role throughout the story.

I think you raise a really interesting point, though, about the parallels in Raven’s Creek with man = hero, woman = victim. I tried to minimize that, because there are a few very powerful women in the novel (without spoilers!). It is something I try to be mindful of in my writing, because I don’t want to reproduce heteronormative stereotypes; I want to highlight and explore queerness.

2. Acceptance, West Virginia. If I understood the navigational details correctly, Raven’s Creek is a backwater in West Virginia, USA, the kind of place where at least my husband and I wouldn’t expect to be universally welcomed. Nevertheless, though Michael and Geoff face all kinds of trouble, homophobia isn’t really one of them. Is your depiction of acceptance one of the fiction’s fantasies or a reflection of how far you think the culture has come? How did you reach that point of view? Do you think the story would work as well if more characters reviled Michael and Geoff for being a same-sex couple? Why or why not?

D-JF: Oh no, not at all. I think we all face homophobia, and culture has not come very far at all. Literally yesterday on the news there was a petition about banning a same-sex parenting book from libraries. We are definitely not ‘there’ yet with acceptance. I tend not to focus too much on homophobia in my work because I want to be beyond that point, and in order to get there, in my view, presenting gay and queer couples / people as simply here, existing, and doing what we do, is a critical step.

3. Science and Ethics. Raven’s Creek comments directly on the consequences of scientific research unrestricted by ethical boundaries, and it uses sci-fi/horror classics such as H.G. Wells’s The Island of Dr. Moreau (1896) and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818), as well as Frankenstein’s film adaptations (especially James Whale’s Bride of Frankenstein, 1935) as touchstones while getting into much more contemporary issues such as genetic manipulation and nanotechnology. One character even has a god complex arguably bigger than Dr. Frankenstein’s. Why do you evoke these touchstones? Do you see yourself carrying on their cautionary traditions? Why or why not? Do you think contemporary scientific research overreaches ethical boundaries? Why or why not?

D-JF: Raven’s Creek is about morality and what it means to be ‘human’. One of the creatures in the book is arguably more human than anyone else, just like our old pal Frankenstein’s monster. I have an interest, generally, in what makes us human, and how people justify cruelty at the expense of compassion and morality. Is it okay to experiment on people if they are in the lower socio-economic classes, as has been done historically, and how can we possibly justify that?

Our mad scientist in Raven’s Creek is driven by power, despite his initial good intentions, and I see his character as a representation of what can happen when we put the ends before the means. I don’t see myself as carrying on any traditions per se, but I definitely think there are unethical practices in several scientific processes these days. I did a lot of research on anti-aging for my PhD, and while the research might be useful, it can often be done in questionable ways.

4. The Filthy Rich. Speaking of ethical boundaries, some of the transgressions in Raven’s Creek are enabled by people whom one character rightly calls “the filthy rich,” people who funnel huge sums of money into making bad things happen for their own gratification. Sometimes Raven’s Creek is, um, a little tongue in cheek… does the book level a sincere critique at the excesses of the wealthy? Given the opportunity, do you think a significant number of rich people would do the sorts of things (no spoilers!) they do in your fictional world? Why or why not?

D-JF: I like to think the filthy rich wouldn’t do these things, but that part of the novel was heavily inspired by The Purge 2. I do think the filthy rich are often above the law, which is really what is being commented on there—they are untouchable, or seemingly so, because their wealth makes them too powerful. Adelaide’s ‘rich old man’ is based on a certain Weinstein we know, which I think really sums up how I feel about the potential for evil among the rich.

5. “He wasn’t in a bad movie, despite all appearances.” Raven’s Creek is not without a good supply of cameras and other means of spectatorship, and watching recorded moments factors significantly into the plot. What is your book saying about the desire to look and the effects of being looked at? Characters are sometimes aware of their movie-like conditions. Is this awareness postmodern reflexivity (à la Scream), or does it do something else/more in the story? Do you think that almost anyone who found themselves in situations as bizarre and frightening as those in Raven’s Creek would compare their experiences to movies? Why or why not?

D-JF: To answer the last question first, I know I do this a lot. I’ve seen some car crashes and often compare them to the freeway scene in Final Destination 2. I genuinely do this a lot, so I feel like it’s in the realm of possibility. If my life were in danger, I probably wouldn’t sit there and think, ‘Hmmm, this reminds me of that movie’ , but certainly in hindsight if I were to survive (which I probably wouldn’t).

The book, in general, is about morality, as I say, and a key question I have is, what do we do when the cameras turn off? What are our guiding principles when we know we’re not being watched? Do we maintain our sense of morals and ethics, or are they predicated on being disciplined if caught? It’s very much a panopticon situation there.

This plan of Jeremy Bentham‘s panopticon prison was drawn by Willey Reveley in 1791. Totally linking to Wikipedia.

6. Gay Plots 2: Blood-drinking. Vampires in modern fiction have always been a bit queer, from John Polidori’s Lord Ruthven (“The Vampyre,” 1819) to J. Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla (1872) to Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897: you can’t convince me Drac’s relationship with Jonathan Harker isn’t erotic). The Count isn’t a typical vampire tale, but it deals with the vampiric: do you see yourself building on this queer vampire tradition? If so, what can you reveal about the new twists you’re giving it? If not, where are you coming from with your story about a man who wants to drink from the dead and gets hungry when he smells rot?

D-JF: In a way, I really did see myself as building on the queer vampire tradition. I know that sounds a bit obnoxious—who am I to do that, really? I’ll be honest, I don’t really like what vampires have become in modern fiction. True Blood, Twilight… no. Sorry. I wanted to explore the themes I see as crucial to vampirism without actually having a vampire. So, bloodlust was important for me, as well as the idea of possible immortality at an incredibly high personal cost. Probably the biggest vampiric theme I see, without the drinking of blood, is giving ourselves to a power we can’t fathom, without really understanding why we’re doing it, except perhaps from fear.

For me, I think the twist I give to vampire traditions is that there is no vampire in a physical sense: it’s a presence that anyone really can fall susceptible to.

7. The House and the Ticking. People often say that horror featuring a house important to the plot makes that house into a character. Is Sam’s new house a character? If so, how would you describe its personality? If not, what is it—what function does it serve? The ticking seems to go hand-in-hand with the house, and it also seems to have a tell-tale heart quality. Without giving away too much, how does the ticking operate in the story: supernatural phenomenon, psychological phenomenon, countdown, metaphor, all of these, none of these?

D-JF: The house is definitely a character. It is characterized purely by its desire to feed. It has no morals, it has no qualms about forcing people into servitude, and it somehow outsmarts everyone without necessarily being conscious.

The ticking works on multiple levels, as does the book title itself. It’s psychological because Sam feels connected to the sound, it’s supernatural because he eventually finds a clock, and it also serves a very real function—it tells him when someone is going to die. The fact that the ticking becomes part of him is kind of metaphoric in that he becomes the body the house needs in order to feed. I’m not sure that makes sense, but it makes sense to me.

8. End of the Line. The description of The Count reveals that the ticking leads Sam to the death of a loved one. Another tidbit from vampire lore (the “real” stuff) is that vampires tend to return from the dead and hunt their own friends and families. Are you playing with this aspect of blood-drinking lore? Of course, gay people are supposed to be anti-family because gay sex isn’t reproductive… are you playing with this aspect of homophobic lore? What’s the significance of Sam facing the deaths of people close to him?

D-JF: You’ve really hit on a few different interpretations there, and I’d love to say I’m making a really powerful comment on that one. However, for me, this book is grief horror. Sam has just been dumped by the person he thought was his ‘one’. His grief has overtaken him, and the implication that he’s powerless to stop the deaths of his loved ones is a crucial tension throughout the novel.

9. Sympathy for the Afflicted? The growing numbers of glowing reviews for The Count praise your characters and insist that Sam is sympathetic despite his questionable moral path. What makes Sam sympathetic? Other than a guy who might have killed his ex and who has a hunger for corpse juice, what kind of person is he? Why will readers cheer and fear for him?

D-JF: I’ve been really surprised about the response to Sam. I had a friend message me in the middle of night to say how devastating the ending was. He is a complex guy, despite his downward moral path. For me, he’s sympathetic, because he often questions what he is doing, but seems powerless to stop what’s happening. The ending, too… I can’t spoil it here, but to me, the ending made him sympathetic because of his platonic love for Patrick.

Sam isn’t someone I see as being particularly fearful, but more someone to pity because he is a good guy who is enveloped, and ultimately blinded, by his grief and fear.

10. Access! How can readers learn more about you and your works (please provide any links you want to share)?

D-JF: Author website: https://www.fletcherhorror.com

Slashic Horror website, where all our titles are available: https://www.slashichorrorpress.com

FB: https://www.facebook.com/davidjack.fletcher OR https://www.facebook.com/fletcherhorror

IG: https://www.instagram.com/fletcherhorror

Twitter: https://twitter.com/fletcherhorror

I’m always keen to connect with readers and authors, so feel free to reach out at any time.

About the Author

David-Jack Fletcher is an award-winning Australian author, specializing in LGBTQI+ horror fiction. He dabbles in comedy-horror and dark fiction, but his true love is body horror.

His debut novella, The Haunting of Harry Peck, is a 2022 Amazon international best-seller across several lists including Gay Fiction, Horror, and Two-Hour Literature. Raven’s Creek (2023) won the Bookstagram Award for LGBTQ+ Novel of the Year and is also a best-seller.

He has also appeared in several anthologies across the US, Canada, and the UK. David-Jack’s newest novel, The Count, was released in 2024. It involves psychological body horror, focusing on bloodlust and the looming certainty of death.

He is also a qualified editor, operating a small online business, Chainsaw Editing, where he specializes in copyediting and developmental editing for horror/thriller, dark fiction, mystery/suspense, and the occasional historical romance. More recently, David-Jack co-founded Slashic Horror Press, which focuses on queer horror.

When not writing and editing, David-Jack can be found on the couch with a book, cuddling his dogs and his husband.

The post Interview with Author David-Jack Fletcher: Raven’s Creek and The Count appeared first on L. Andrew Cooper's Horrific Scribblings.