Lindy Ryan's Blog, page 5

It's Officially Spring Semester

You can take the dog out of Alaska…

Spring Semester kicked off this week, which means—for me, anyway—that the year has officially begun. Over a hundred graduate students arrived in my classroom, along with one very special MFA mentee, and what time hasn’t been dedicated to preparing for them has been spent managing a chaotic jumble of upcoming book stuffs, writing deadlines, academic responsibilities, travel schedules (so much travel!)—and snow? Yes, SNOW. For the first time in over 20 years (or so long-term residents of the area have told me), there is a layer of lovely white on the ground. It’s been two years since I left the frostbite of Alaska behind, and it’s incredibly surreal to watch flurries land along the pier at the beach where I once cooked myself so badly I almost ended up in the ER with burns.

It’s also incredibly surreal to see my name listed on this year’s Bram Stoker Awards® Preliminary Ballot not once, not twice, but three times! The full list dropped this week, and it stacked with some of the best horror had to offer in 2024: Stephen Graham Jones! ! ! CJ Leede! Josh Malerman! Chuck Tingle! Gwendolyn Kiste! Paul Tremblay! Nat Cassidy! Clay McLeod Chapman! Eric LaRocca! Lee Murray! Osgood Perkins! Vince Liaguno! And so many more. It’s an insane honor to be listed amongst so many talented and inspiring friends and peers in the horror community. I am jaw-dropped grateful. This is a banger of a list. THIS IS HORROR.

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Both of the anthologies I had the privilege of editing in 2024—MOTHER KNOWS BEST, a women-in-horror anthology, and THE DARKEST NIGHT, an anthology of 22 winter horror stories—made the list, along with my debut horror/mystery, BLESS YOUR HEART. All three are incredibly special to me, and I’d be over the moon to see any recognized as an official Nominee when those are announced next month.

But there’s no rest for the wicked, and 2025 is underway! BLESS YOUR HEART arrives in paperback on March 18, and ANOTHER FINE MESS arrives on shelves on April 15 (in the US) and July 17 in the UK. I also turned in my newest project—an unannounced female-driven suburban slasher—to my editor at Minotaur a few weeks ago. I can’t wait to share more on that, but for now, my lips are sealed! 💋🔪

Earlier this month we also announced a new women-in-horror anthology project, co-edited with my incredibly talented bestie : HOWL: AN ANTHOLOGY OF WOLVES! Stephanie and I brainstormed this monstrous beauty late one evening over a bottle of chocolate wine while teaching a MFA residency at The Highlights Foundation in Summer 2022, and I am howling at the moon, pawing at the ground, anxiously awaiting November. This is a DREAM project with many of my favorite women in contemporary horror on the Table of Contents (I literally fangirled putting this one together), and every single one of their stories are phenomenal. The cover and full ToC reveal is coming soon (but not soon enough, ugh!)

Finally, I’ll be back at BookTrib next week with a newly revamped Chill Quill column! Each month I’ll be giving reading recs from the spooky side with brand new books hot off the press, starting with a slightly backward glance at January’s releases before we dive into February.

Until then, keep reading, keep writing—and stay spooky! 👻

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Bless Your Heart: A Love Letter to Librarians

Image credit Adobe Stock Image (not AI-generated)

With the release of the second book in the Bless Your Heart series, ANOTHER FINE MESS, just shy of three months away, my heart is back at home with the Evans women and their small Southeast Texas town. There’s lots more ahead for Ducey, Lenore, Grace, and Luna (and Belle!), but with their next adventure on the horizon, my thoughts return to not only the women who inspired the Evans women themselves (nor my very Evans-y Texan hometown!), but to the many, many teachers, librarians, and booksellers (and authors) who helped me fall in love with books to begin with.

Though it was written in 2023, months before Ducey, Lenore, Grace, and Luna (and Belle!) met readers worldwide, the letter below is a love letter to all those who inspired me to read the books I love(d) to read—and then, to write more of them! In addition to librarians, teachers, and booksellers, this trove of inspiration now also includes the many incredible readers I’ve met over the past year. I’m so very honored and grateful to have so many wonderful bookish people who’ve joined the Evans family, and want to take a moment to share this letter again as we prepare, quite literally, for ANOTHER FINE MESS!

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The following is an excerpt from my Minotaur Debut Week “Letter to Librarians,” which originally ran on September 13, 2023 here.

I know we deal in words but allow me to paint you a picture.

It’s summer 1999, August in rural Southeast Texas. It’s hot out—so damn hot that you begin to melt every time you step into the sun—that you barely notice what’s going on in the world outside of your small town. In these dog days of summer, your makeup smears, your hairspray runs, your leather driver’s seat cushion is enough to scald the backs of your bare legs—but it’s not the heat you’re concerned about.

It’s the roses.

Your late husband, the man you loved so much that you still grieve his early death every single day, he planted a white rosebush in the edge gardens of your family business, and under it you buried your biggest, darkest, most fateful family secret. You’ve kept this secret, this rosebush, for fifteen years. Always feeding, always festering, always worrying about the day that proverbial—or maybe literal—skeleton claws its way out from the dirt.

Then one day a dead woman rises in your family’s funeral parlor, and you know exactly why the roses on your dead husband’s bush have begun to rot—and it’s got nothing to do with the heat.

It’s got everything to do with you and that long-buried secret.

The events of BLESS YOUR HEART are fiction, but the women who bear them—who fight, who survive, who endure—are not. The Evans women are my family. They are me. And they exist, in many ways, because of librarians.

Much like Luna Evans, I was a loner in high school. Before high school, too, and after. I grew up in the shadows and secrets of the women who came before me, and when things got to be too much, too hot, at home, I sought sanctuary in the bookshelves of my local library. It was a librarian who first introduced me to Betty MacDonald and Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle, and later to R. L. Stine and Goosebumps. It was a librarian to whom I showed my flea-market copy of Interview with the Vampire, and who guided me to the horror section—to women like Anne Rice and Mary Shelley, Shirley Jackson and Laurell K. Hamilton and Charlaine Harris.

It was librarians who taught me that little girls can love horror. Can read horror. Can write horror.

Can heal from horror.

It was a librarian who, after the deaths of my great-grandmother and grandmother, during the throes of some of the worst years of my mother’s ongoing chronic illness, encouraged me to take all that pain, all that grief, all that love, and write about it. “Put it on the page,” she said. Pour it out and give it back, she meant. Because when you do that, it never really ends, does it, that story? It gets to live forever in the hearts and hands of readers. Like the restless dead, it becomes immortal. It lives on.

BLESS YOUR HEART began as an exercise—or maybe an exorcism—to say goodbye to the women I loved most. A way to bring them back to life on the page, hear their voices again, and give them different endings. And not just my grandmothers, but my friends, those kids who, like me, were too different to fit into the confines of their small towns. Those beautiful boys and girls who grew up scared to be themselves in small minds. Who, unlike me, never left. Whose stories, like the Evanses’, refuse to stay buried.

Ultimately, despite its horror, its gore, its sometimes tongue-in-cheek and other times biting commentary on growing up in a small Southern town at the turn of the century, BLESS YOUR HEART is a story about the power of motherly love. Of the strength of family, the fallacy of legacy, and the lengths to which women will go to protect one of their own—even if she might be a monster.

Even if she is.

I hope this book does my grandmothers and mother proud. I hope that one day a young woman will walk into a library, and, “Bless her heart,” a librarian will say, “I know just what she needs.” And whether it’s my book or one of innumerable others, that librarian will have one the right one in hand. Because it’s not just books, not just words on paper that librarians give to a young reader, or a mourning writer. It’s hope—and what is a more beautiful gift than a ray of hope bright enough to cut through the dark?

Bless your heart.

BLESS YOUR HEART is now out in hardcover and audio from Minotaur Books (and, in the UK, in paperback, from Solaris Books). The US paperback arrives on shelves March 18, 2025.

ANOTHER FINE MESS will be released on April 15, 2025 (US, Minotaur, hardcover/audio) and on July 17, 2025 (UK, Solaris, paperback).

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Chapter One

I’m not typically the sort to go into the New Year with my fists full of resolutions, but 2025 begs for new habits. With a little more breathing room in the upcoming year—which is also chock-full of wonderful creative things, lots of travel, and some fairly substantial life events!—and my perennial effort to reduce time wasted online, I’m spending less and less time slugging through the toxic wasteland of social media, and looking to connect with friends and readers in the quieter corners of online spaces.

And thus, here we are. (Full disclosure: I tried Substack once before and failed (read: forgot), but I am a better, more organized Lindy now, so **fingers crossed**)

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Yes, I’m still on Instagram. Yes, I still have my monthly newsletter. Substack is where you’ll find Thoughtful Things about writing, editing, publishing (and baking and crafting and other silly stuff, and probably a good many pics of my dog). It’s also a trove of my previous (and ongoing) bylines and columns, all posted as reposting rights become available. And, of course, a great place to dish on all the wonderful projects I am lucky enough to be a part of!

So, that’s it. Welcome to my all-new Substack, which I’ve affectionately decided to call Evans Funeral Parlor, because this is where the messy business is done. I like to think Ducey would be proud.

xo, L

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Interview: Author Gwendolyn Kiste Haunts the Whole Neighborhood with "The Haunting of Velkwood"

This interview originally ran on Rue Morgue.

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published"I’ve always been drawn to ghost stories and haunted house tales that are really a bigger metaphor for the way each of us is psychologically haunted."

There’s a reason Gwendolyn Kiste is one of the biggest names in horror. From turning classics on their head to redefining horror tropes, she has made a name for herself as one of the fiercest women in horror today. Kiste’s newest novel, THE HAUNTING OF VELKWOOD, turns the tried-and-true haunted house trope on its head in a suburban ghost story about a small town that traps three young women who must confront the past if they’re going to have a future.

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RUE MORGUE recently had the opportunity to sit down with Gwendolyn Kiste and chat more about THE HAUNTING OF VELKWOOD, coming from Simon and Schuster on March 5, 2024, to bookstores and online retailers everywhere.

THE HAUNTING OF VELKWOOD is a suburban ghost story about a neighborhood that has disappeared from its small town, taking its residents along with it. This unique concept turns the “haunted house” trope on its… doorstep? What inspired the idea of a spectral neighborhood?

It started out in a fairly simple way. During the pandemic quarantine, I picked up several photography books, including ones from Cindy Sherman and William Eggleston. In that stack, there was also a first edition of a book called Suburbia by Bill Owens. It turns out that particular book and its pictures, which depict an interesting blend of suburban malaise in an American neighborhood from the 1970s, was used as a reference for both The Virgin Suicides and Edward Scissorhands. I started thinking about how much I would love to create my own neighborhood like that, but I didn’t want to do another period piece right after Reluctant Immortals, which is set in the 1960s. That’s when I came up with the idea of having the neighborhood itself separated from the rest of the world. THE HAUNTING OF VELKWOOD isn’t a period piece; It’s set in the present day, but the ghostly neighborhood itself is stuck in the past.

The concept of home has always been an elusive one for me. Your home is supposed to be a place that you feel safe, a place that’s a refuge. But unfortunately, that’s not always the case for everyone. So often in haunted house stories, there are secrets from the past coming back to haunt the present, but I couldn’t help but think how it often takes more than one person (and more than one house) to keep those secrets. A whole neighborhood that gets trapped in the past seemed so different to me, and I was surprised that I’d never really seen it done before. It’s always an exciting moment as a writer when you get a chance to do something you haven’t already read, so I definitely seized the opportunity to create this world.

There are so many themes throughout this book, but perhaps some of the strongest are overcoming grief and trauma, both from Talitha’s perspective and that of some of the other characters. After all, there’s more than one way to be haunted. Can you tell us more about how you approached these in the story?

I’ve always been drawn to ghost stories and haunted house tales that are really a bigger metaphor for the way each of us is psychologically haunted. That’s part of what makes Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House work so well. Eleanor is haunted by the specter of the past – and particularly the specter of her own mother – and that’s what draws her to Hill House and vice versa. So, anytime I’m reading a ghost story (as well as anytime I’m writing one), I’m always questioning what’s secretly haunting these characters because that’s often where the most interesting things are happening.

In terms of writing about trauma itself, I wanted to be really careful to never be exploitative about it. Trauma is a tricky topic, and it was important for me that nothing felt gratuitous or done for shock value. This is also a story that deals with queerness and the trauma that too often goes along with coming out and embracing who you are. Being bisexual myself – and not being accepted for it in the past – is something I wanted to write about, but I also didn’t want it to be all about trauma either. There’s so much resilience in the LGBTQ+ community. I wanted that strength to be on the page as well.

While THE HAUNTING OF VELKWOOD is the kind of novel that will certainly appeal to a wide range of readers, it’s a fiercely female story. Sisterhood. Motherhood. Best friends. So many dynamics of female relationships percolate throughout. Can you talk more about what it’s like being a woman in horror, and writing women in horror?

In general, I feel like horror is a really great genre for female authors. There’s a lot of camaraderie in the horror community, and so many female writers are out there supporting each other every single day, which is so incredibly heartening. I love Women in Horror Month, and even though its popularity has waned a bit over the last few years, it’s still wonderful to celebrate the women of horror every March as well as throughout the rest of the year.

Horror has always been a great place for female characters, too. From the early days of gothic literature to the slashers of the 1970s and 1980s, and up until today, you can always find interesting, complicated female characters in the genre. The Brontes, Mary Shelley, Shirley Jackson, and Angela Carter are just a few of the authors who have written amazing characters in equally amazing stories, and it feels very much like we’re standing on the shoulders of giants. In so many ways, horror is the perfect place to be a woman and a writer. This is our genre, and it always has been.

This book really puts the old adage “you can’t go home” into the spotlight. What do you want readers to take away from THE HAUNTING OF VELKWOOD (should they be able to leave)?

I love your caveat, “Should they be able to leave!” You know, I’m never too worried about telling readers what they need to get from my work. I’ve definitely heard from people who have interpreted my stories in wildly different ways than I have, and their perspectives are truly as valid as mine. I feel like, as authors, we’re putting our work into the world, and then the world gets to decide what it means.

That being said, if forced to choose, I do hope that this story haunts readers as well as gives them a different way of looking at trauma. Talitha’s personal journey is all about self-acceptance and self-discovery, and, if nothing else, I would like for readers to have a sense of empathy for what she’s going through because so many of us have had traumatizing experiences that still haunt us.

As always, what’s next?

I’m currently at work on both a new horror novel and a new horror novella. I never like to reveal too many specifics because it always worries me that the story will immediately scurry away from me! But both of the books are coming along well, which means so far, so good.

In terms of what’s coming out next, I’ve got a number of new horror short stories scheduled for release this year, including, of course, in the fabulous Mother Knows Best anthology from Black Spot Books. I’ve always loved short fiction so much, and now that it’s almost the seventh anniversary of my first collection (seriously, where does the time go?), I’m hoping to put together a new collection at some point in the next year or so. Definitely a lot of writing plans, so fingers crossed that I’ll have more to announce very soon!

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Interview: Authors Nick Cutt and Andrew F. Sullivan Get handy in "The Handyman Method"

This interview originally ran on Rue Morgue.

If you’ve read The Troop (currently in development as a film with producer James Wan (Saw X, The Nun II, Malignant)) you know Nick Cutter leaves behind few survivors. And, if you’ve read The Marigold, you know Andrew F. Sullivan knows his way around the bleakest dystopia. Now, Cutter and Sullivan have combined their impressively terrifying chops with THE HANDYMAN METHOD, a brand-new domestic thriller from the spooky folks at Saga Press.

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When a young family moves into an unfinished development community, cracks begin to emerge in both their new residence and their lives, as a mysterious online DIY instructor delivers dark, subliminal suggestions about how to handle any problem around the house. The trials of home improvement, destructive insecurities and haunted-house horror all collide in this thrilling story of domestic terror.

RUE MORGUE recently had the opportunity to sit down with the authors and chat about THE HANDYMAN METHOD, now available wherever books are sold.

Outside of the official cover copy, what is this book to you?

Andrew F. Sullivan: For me, THE HANDYMAN METHOD is a book about self-destruction. That’s at the core of it to me. Attempting to live up to an ideal that never existed and becoming a worse person for it, someone obsessed with the perception of outsiders and the weight of the past on their shoulders. It’s a path that only leads to a dark place. I think that also connects to how desperate people are to find some meaning in their lives. They’ll look to anyone who presents as an authority figure, even if it is just a man on a screen who tells you that you’re doing everything right.

Nick Cutter: I think I mirror Andrew’s thoughts, though I come from a full generation (and a bit) past him. A lot of the fixations the book dwells on go back to the days of the Piltdown man, honestly, but they change and diversify and likely metastasize with each generation of man.

For me, it was written when my son was the age of the boy in the book, so in some ways – not to align myself strongly with our main character or my wife with his wife – but in some ways, it was a mirror of my own family and some of the strange thoughts that go zipping through a (I think!) sane, loving person’s head, regarding how families work now – and need to work now and work better now and more equitably than they did in older generations … So trying to find your current place in it vis-à-vis your father or grandfather or great-grandfather.

How did the co-writing process shape the book’s final form? For example, did one person take point on each character or mold particular plot points, or was every scene a dynamic conversation?

AFS: Early on, it was just about keeping the ball in the air, passing 500 words back and forth to build it into a story. We overlapped on almost everything by the end. It was a very cohesive experience, not one that we intended, but I was happy it turned out that way. Cowriting a novel takes a lot out of you, there’s a level of trust you need to have developed with your co-writer. I am lucky Nick and I are friends and we have that trust. By the time we were closing things out, we’d both left our imprint on every page.

NC: Yeah, we didn’t exactly know what we were getting into! We said we’d write a short story and it kind of embiggened itself as it went along. It’s not like these kinds of collaborations are all that common, there’s no guidebook, so I think we just said to ourselves to let the other person’s work breathe as much as was possible, keep some things sacrosanct and do our best to put the best pages forward.

This story of subliminal possession takes inspiration from classic tales of haunting, and THE HANDYMAN METHOD has been called a “modern twist on the haunted house story” by Library Journal . What’s your favorite haunted house horror, and what inspired you to reinvent this timeless horror archetype?

AFS: There are so many, and they all build on each other. I will have to go the typical route here and say The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson, just to get that out front. You can’t ignore or deny its influence on the genre and the power it still carries to this day. The idea that a place can possess you has always haunted me. For THE HANDYMAN METHOD, I think I wanted to show the home as a site of betrayal, a place that is supposed to protect you and fails to live up to its end of the bargain.

NC: As I said in my side of the acknowledgments, yeah, the haunted house has a hundred variants, a hundred mothers and fathers. I feel like over all the edits, I almost backed us into The Shining, one of my favorite haunted house stories. The idea was to make it more domestic. The initial story was just a guy alone out at this house, fixing it up – give him a wife, a child – and, for me, I ended up feeling comfortable going with my own family unit at the time: my wife, my son, myself and a daughter on the way. So my own family mimics the Torrances, without the axe-murdering. But then, I could have as easily based it on the family from Burnt Offerings, another excellent haunted house book with the exact same family dynamic.

THE HANDYMAN METHOD is a possession-via-algorithm story for our time. Are there ways in which this book can be a paranormal cautionary tale for readers?

AFS: I’m definitely haunted by the parasocial relationships people develop with streamers or podcasters. The idea that you can “know” someone you’ve never met but have experienced as a curated viewing experience, whether it’s TikToks, reels or long-form videos, is wild to me and points to a deep, hungry desire for connection that exists in a lot of us. Handyman Hank is like that in this novel, a comforting voice who provides answers that our lead, Trent, wants to hear. Confusing a product for reality is what really haunts me.

NC: Andrew’s answered that adroitly. You young whippersnappers with your Tikky-Tokkys and so forth and so on…

Finally, what’s next for both of you – future books on the horizon, either together or separately?

AFS: We will probably do another one of these together. I think there are still ideas we want to explore as a unit. I’ve had a pretty crazy year with this book and my other novel The Marigold released back in the spring. Two books in a year can wear you out. I will probably continue exploring my obsessions with entropy, decay and generative rot in my fiction. I want to write another big book about state capture and generational wealth – what hoarding money does to a person’s brain. It can’t be anything good.

NC: Yes, I hope to once again purloin the rich and fertile loam of Andrew’s psyche for my own personal gain someday quite soon. Until then, I’m happy to let those ideas gestate in his very thoughtful, very hirsute head.

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Interview: Editor Lee Murray on the Horror of Landscape in "Remains to be Told: Dark Tales of Aotearoa"

This interview originally ran on Rue Morgue.

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published“There is no twilight in our New Zealand days, but a curious half-hour when everything appears grotesque—it frightens—as though the savage spirit of the country walked abroad and sneered at what it saw.”

For most of us, New Zealand, the land of the long white cloud, is a dream holiday destination, an exotic island in the Pacific, the place you go to visit Hobbiton, sail the harbour, climb a volcano and be mesmerised by steaming bubbly mud. RUE MORGUE’s author-in-resident, Lindy Ryan, caught up with five-time Bram Stoker Awards®-winner, Lee Murray, editor of upcoming Kiwi horror anthology REMAINS TO BE TOLD: DARK TALES OF AOTEAROA (Clan Destine Press) and some of the anthology’s contributors, to talk about the horror inherent in the Aotearoa landscape.

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By its very nature, the landscape of New Zealand “presents myriad terrors, with its towering peaks, rugged coastline, and impenetrable bush,” says Lee. “There is the merciless isolation of small towns and farms, and the cold indifference of our bustling cityscapes.”

In her foreword to the anthology, Lee also speaks of something “inherently uncanny” about the landscape. She refers to the ‘savage spirit’ that Katherine Mansfield described in her iconic murder tale “The Woman at the Store”:

“There is no twilight in our New Zealand days, but a curious half-hour when everything appears grotesque—it frightens—as though the savage spirit of the country walked abroad and sneered at what it saw.”1

Lee claims that ‘savage spirit’ “doesn’t just sneer, it sucks unsuspecting victims into watery graves, yanks them into cosmic hell, or crunches them between bloody teeth.”

“The ocean is angry today,” writes Sir Julius Vogel Award-winner Nikky Lee in “What Bones These Tides Bring” by way of an example. “Its waves pound the sandbar; pummel the beach in a roar of white static.”

“The ground heaved like a great beast trying to shake off vermin,” writes Tracie McBride in “Her Ghosts”, a story inspired by her Māori heritage. “It threw Callie to her hands and knees. She dug her fingers into the soil and clung to the earth as if she might at any moment spin off into space. Time lost meaning as she endured the dual onslaught from the land and the ghosts.”

In “Fires of Fate” Jacqui Greaves takes us back to the late 1800s when New Zealand women had just obtained the right to vote, the first country in the world to afford women this right: “Beyond the crest of the hill, the track cut a straight line through charred, flat land studded with blackened stumps. Moira’s eyes stung from the smoke hanging thick in the listless air. It reminded her of Hades: all it lacked was the burning stench of sulphur in her nostrils and a three-headed dog. She rode on, the horse skittering beneath her.”

Lee’s Path of Ra co-author, Dan Rabarts, whose haunting story “Spare the Rod” opens the anthology, explains the local preoccupation with the landscape: “We live on a string of major fault lines, on the spines of any number of volcanoes, surrounded by violent and unpredictable oceans and everything they bring with them, including regular floods, cyclones and tornadoes. We live with a constant edge of isolation, both in our rural and suburban communities, and even within our own neighbourhoods.”2

Co-contributor Celine Murray agrees: “There is a pervasive external threat posed by the landscape we live on,” she says. Acclaimed screenwriter and playwright Kathryn Burnett, who makes her short fiction debut in Remains to be Told with body horror tale “Hook”, believes the threat resides in “the quiet and the darkness of the landscape,” where there are “plenty of places for people to hide and to hide terrible things,” adding that “it’s also a country drenched in blood – our dark history and the existence of industries that rely on killing such as meat production.”

Māori people trace their lineage back to the ancestral landscape that nurtured them; this notion is more than just a metaphor as this statement from Merata Kawharu’s landmark paper reveals:

“For Māori, landscapes are imbued with metaphysical values as well, not least when tribal groups’ stories tell of gods, mythological heroes or ancestors carving or shaping the environment. The stories of the demi-god Maui are well-known throughout Aotearoa and in wider Polynesia, and it was he who fished up the North Island. Tribal groups have many traditions about more recent ancestors who achieved great feats in relation to the environment which are recalled in proverbs, songs, place-names and in the landscapes themselves. Stories are remembered because they tell of protocols, practical and ethical ways to care for places and people.”3

Since 2014, laws have been established in which give legal personhood to natural features of significance to Māori, much in the same way a registered company operates as a legal entity separate from its owners. These laws offer iwi (tribes) the means to protect their ancestors. Examples of protected areas include Te Urewera Forest rohe (region), the Whanganui awa (river) and more recently Taranaki maunga (mountain).

The official wording from section 3 of the 2014 Te Urewera Act which saw the forest region gain personhood provides vital insight into the importance of landscape to all New Zealanders:

Te Urewera is ancient and enduring, a fortress of nature, alive with history; its scenery is abundant with mystery, adventure and remote beauty.
Te Urewera is a place of spiritual value, with its own mana [prestige] and mauri [life force].
Te Urewera has an identity in and of itself, inspiring people to commit to its care.

Fulbright scholar Gina Cole, the author of acclaimed Pasifikafuturism novel Na Viro, says, “As island dwellers on very narrow strips of land located in the South Pacific Ocean, Kiwi horror is grounded in our relationship with the environment, including whenua (land) and moana (sea), and how those elements impact on us humans.”

Yet it isn’t only those with Māori and Pasifika heritage who acknowledge an underlying spirituality in the New Zealand landscape. In his 1998 book, Mapping the Godzone, American William Schafer noted the significance of Māori mythology and culture in the development of Aotearoa gothic:

“A common cultural link between Pākehā [European] and Māori is a belief in the hauntedness of the landscape, the sense that Aotearoa New Zealand is a land of sinister and unseen forces of imminent (and immanent threat), of the undead or revenant spirits.”4

Writer Tim Jones, author of the forthcoming climate fiction novel Emergency Weather, tells of just such an incident from his past: “What comes to mind is the stairwell leading to the Unemployed Rights Centre in Dunedin, back when I was in my early twenties. Once, leaving last after an evening meeting and descending the stairs in half-darkness, I was struck with a powerful sense of an unfriendly presence, watching. Was it just a cold night, just the wind, just an old building? I don’t think so—but I never went back to find out.”

Gina Cole also recalls an incident that reveals the universal respect New Zealanders afford the land and its spiritual guardians. “One time hiking in the bush in Aotearoa, the guide told us there was a guardian sitting on a rock in front of us and he was angry because no one spoke to him or greeted him as they walked past the rock. We made sure to greet him as we walked past.”

Tracie Mc Bride says, “I talked to my father once about this peculiar sensation whenever I returned to Northland after a long absence; while I was away, I would be perfectly content, but as soon as I returned, I would be filled with a powerful urge to stay. He told me that it was my Māori blood calling me home.” Given the land embodies the spirits of Māori ancestors, it seems likely McBride has been affected by the hauntedness of the landscape that Schafer mentions.

The artwork for the book also reflects the haunting atmosphere of the New Zealand landscape. Sir Julius Vogel Award-winning artist, Emma Weakley, who created the cover and interior artwork said working on the anthology was her dream job, and that she’d felt vindicated in keeping thousands of photographs of the New Zealand landscape taken during various road trips, which she then used as her inspiration for the images. “From the perspective of a visual artist who loves to draw lonely, unsettling landscapes, Aotearoa/New Zealand is an endless [source of] inspiration,” she says. “For me, it’s about contrast and isolation. The contrast of such peaceful and beautiful islands that any darkness stands out starkly, every detail sharp and clear. If all you hear is birdsong, a cry of fear or anger is piercing. The isolation creates a sense of unease and vulnerability. There’s no one else to turn to, nowhere to run. We are stuck with each other on volatile land in a huge, harsh ocean.”

Letters from Elsewhere author, Jacqui Greaves, sums it up the conflict posed by the landscape beautifully when she says, “Aotearoa is isolated. This distance and separation from the rest of the world has resulted in a unique environment. Where both land and waters are violent. This country is beautiful, but deadly. Only the naïve wander our wild areas unprepared. Everything about the country is imbued with meaning—nature, place and people. Much violence has been perpetuated in our short human history. Our stories find their birth in myths and legends, waves of immigration, the consequences of colonialism and the landscape. This isolation, this violence, this history, this land, contribute to an underlying darkness. Those of us who live here, who call this place our home, embrace that darkness in our sense of humour, in the way we dress, in our resilience and in our stories.”

Featuring uncanny disturbances, death, and the dank breath of the native bush, Remains to be Told: Dark Tales of Aotearoa is an anthology of dark stories and poems mired in the shifting landscape of the long white cloud, and deeply imbued with the myth, culture, and character of Aotearoa-New Zealand. Laced with intrigue, suspense, horror and even a touch of humor, and comprising a range of subgenres, the volume showcases some of the best homegrown and Kiwi-at-heart voices working in dark fiction today, including stories and poems by Neil Gaiman, Owen Marshall, Gina Cole, Tim Jones, Lee Murray, Dan Rabarts, Marty Young, Debbie Cowens, Paul Mannering, Tracie McBride, Kirsten McKenzie, Jacqui Greaves, Nikky Lee, William Cook, Bryce Stevens, Kathryn Burnett, Celine Murray, Denver Grenell, Del Gibson and Helena Claudia. Foreword by six-time Bram Stoker Award-winner, Lisa Morton.

References

Mansfield K. (1912) The Woman at the Store. Rhythm. Spring.

Rabarts D. and Murray L. (2017) Underworld Gothic. HWA Halloween Haunts.

Kawharu M. (2009) Ancestral Landscapes and World Heritage from a Māori Viewpoint. Journal of the Polynesian Society. Vol 118, pp319-320.

Schafer. W J. (1998) Mapping the Godzone: A Primer on New Zealand Literature and Culture. University of Hawaii Press.

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Interview: Author Charlaine Harris Returns with "All the Dead Shall Weep"

This interview originally ran on Rue Morgue.

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published"I would hate for any of the things I’ve written to come true."

It’s hard to be a horror reader and not know the name, Charlaine Harris. Really, it’s hard to be a reader and not know Charlaine Harris, regardless of your genre of choice. From her wildly popular series The Southern Vampire Mysteries, adapted into the hit TV show True Blood, to the supernatural Harper Connelly Mysteries series and the slightly sweeter Aurora Teagarden, Harris is the reigning queen of mysteries, and her gripping Gunnie Rose series is packed with enough post-apocalyptic thrills and dark magic to keep horror readers’ blood pumping, too.

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RUE MORGUE recently had the opportunity to sit down with Charlaine Harris to talk about ALL THE DEAD SHALL WEEP, the fifth installment of her Gunnie Rose series, coming to bookshelves near you this September.

For RUE MORGUE readers who may be unfamiliar with Gunnie Lizbeth Rose (or more familiar, perhaps, with Sookie Stackhouse), can you tell us a little about the series and the world these books take place in?

I’d love to. This is my attempt at writing alternate American history. [Gunnie Rose is] set in the 1930s in an area that used to be Texas and Oklahoma but is now a country called Texoma. My protagonist is a female gunslinger, very young, who has one sellable skill: She’s a very accurate shot. And that’s how she’s making her living.

And that’s Gunnie Rose?

Yes, Lisbeth Rose, otherwise known as Gunnie.

You mentioned that the series is set in an alternate version of 1930s America, and in that version, the attempted assassination of President Roosevelt was successful. Add in real events like the Spanish Flu and the collapse of Wall Street, and we have a whole new world. What inspired you to write in this alternate history?

I didn’t really set out to write alternative history. That wasn’t my goal. I just wanted to tell the story of this character I dreamed up. But I had to build a world that could support her to do what she does, and that turned out to be an alternate America. So I kind of backed into it by accident.

But all the best things happen that way, don’t they? And, of course, there’s the Wild West and wizards and magic and Russian influence – part post-apocalyptic, part urban fantasy. What is the role of gunslingers like Gunnie Rose in this world?

It depends on which country you’re in. In her country and in the area that used to be the Great Plains, which is now New America, her role is essential because those areas are basically lawless, or at least the law is very flexibly enforced in those areas, and defenders of goods and people are in high demand because travel is precarious. And there are many roving bands of ruthless people who will do anything to get their way.

Gunnie Rose is a fierce and flawed heroine – a little rough around the edges but smart and dedicated, with so much of her personal life mixed up in her adventures. What is it like to write a character like Gunnie?

You know, sometimes I think that getting really into a character is what I suppose being a method actor is like. You get into the character and see what has shaped her, and you have to assume the same conditions when you’re writing. You have to write from the place [the character] sprang from, and sometimes, that’s easier, and sometimes it’s more difficult. With Gunnie, it just seemed to flow once I figured out what her world was.

ALL THE DEAD SHALL WEEP is the fifth and newest book in the series. What’s the latest for Gunnie Rose, and the family?

Oh, my goodness! Well, Gunnie and her sister Felicia are spinning up a little vacation together, along with Lizbeth’s husband, Eli, and his brother, Peter (who has a crush on Felicia, Lizbeth’s sister), and terrible things start happening, of course, since this is, you know, one of my books. Terrible things. And Gunnie is instrumental in figuring out who is behind all this and what she can do about it. Her husband and his brother don’t help a bit because they get captured, and Gunnie and Felicia have to free them, but in the process, we learn a lot about what’s happening with Felicia as her maturing happens rapidly. She’s free of the spell her father cast on her to keep her little and quick. And Felicia is growing up at an amazing rate, her hormones kind of going crazy, and then her magical ability just roars in … and it’s kind of terrifying. Absolutely terrifying. It’s a shock to everyone, and they all have to adjust to this new girl with her terrifying abilities, and Gunnie learns that she’s going to have to defend her sister for a while yet.

So I can only assume there’s more coming in the Gunnie Rose universe?

Yes, I’m writing the sixth book now.

Outside of Gunnie, you’ve written several different series and several standalones. Which is your favorite: series or standalone?

My heart is in my series. I wrote two standalones first thing, and after that, it’s been series all the way, though I do write a lot of short stories, too. I like to write series because I love to stick with the characters for a while and develop them. Writing a standalone can be fun, but it’s also like reinventing the wheel every time. You have to have your cast of characters. They have to be different. They all have to work to move the story along. And sometimes, it’s just fun to revisit characters and find out more about them.

How about a crossover, either your worlds or your characters? If that’s even possible, would you consider it?

The closest I’ve come is the Midnight Texas trilogy, where there are characters from every single series I’ve ever written – which I think is five or six now. Oh, that was just so much fun. It’s like a tip of the hat to my older work, and that was just pure fun for me.

Before we go, is there anything you’d like to share with readers?

I’m sorry I’m not traveling as much as I used to. I have to become more of a bionic woman before I can do that – replacing some joints and this and that. But it would be lovely to see my readers like I used to. And even with this long hiatus in American history, there are always books inside with you. I think a lot of people have come back to reading through the COVID experience, and I think that is probably the only good side of it.

I think it’s definitely a silver lining. I only hope, as a society, we aren’t creating our post-apocalyptic world.

I would hate for any of the things I’ve written to come true.

I love that! That’s a great, great quote.

So true. When I think of something terrible to do to one of my protagonists, I always go, “Oh, that’s too bad. I really should not do that.” But then, I kind of have to now that I’ve thought of it.

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Interview: Grady Hendrix Tells Us "How to Sell a Haunted House"

This interview originally ran on Rue Morgue.

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published"We all have very complicated relationships with inanimate objects."

If you read horror, then you should be reading Grady Hendrix. From fiction to nonfiction, Grady brings one of the sharpest voices to the genre—along with a special talent for penning tales that horrify and humor in equal measure, always bubbling over with nostalgia. His newest novel, HOW TO SELL A HAUNTED HOUSE, released this month from Berkley and “takes on the haunted house in a thrilling new novel that explores the way your past—and your family—can haunt you like nothing else.”

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Rue Morgue recently had the opportunity to sit down with Grady to talk more about HOW TO SELL A HAUNTED HOUSE, the intersection of horror and humor, haunted houses, and our complicated relationships with creepy childhood toys.

You’ve covered everything from vampires to demonic possession to hellgate DIY furniture shops in your novels (and more). What inspired you to tackle puppets?

To me this is less of a killer puppet book and more of a haunted house book, but I totally get that the second killer puppets appear onstage they pretty much reduce everyone to a gibbering wreck and take over the show. The reason I wanted to inflict them on people is that ghost stories and haunted house books are about the things we leave behind when we die, both physical and emotional. And I was thinking about that task we’re all going to have to do one day: clean out the house of a dead loved one, and deal with all the things they left behind, from their clothes to their collection of Hummel figurines. That got me thinking about our complicated relationship with inanimate objects, especially our stuffed animals that we loved so much as kids, and from there it was a short leap to killer puppets.

Are you haunted by any childhood toys, or any nostalgic objects you find particularly personally disturbing?

My wife’s childhood stuffed friend is named Snocchio and he’s still with us. He served as a model for Pupkin in the book, although Snocchio is much nicer and less murdery. Snocchio just kind of appeared in my wife’s crib when she was 2, and he’s been with her ever since, and I’ll confess that the first time I met him I definitely had a fight or flight response. But now that I’m used to him I’ve grown to appreciate what he brings to the table. He’s very much enjoying his moment of stardom, too.

Familial drama and past trauma provide emotional subtext that amplifies the horror your characters experience in HAUNTED HOUSE, but true to form, there’s a level amount of humor and camp in the story—so very Grady Hendrix! How do you think these elements (humor, horror, and emotion) work together to draw readers in?

My job is to keep readers turning the page, so I’ll use anything I’ve got at my disposal, whether it’s an emotional hook, a joke, suspense, or something disgusting and horrible. That said, humor and horror are joined at the hip. You can’t have one without the other. I can’t think of a single good horror movie that isn’t funny on some level. Alien is as grim as it gets, but the filmmakers get a lot of mileage out of the Harry Dean Stanton/Yaphet Kotto double act. The Blair Witch Project has a really funny opening 20 minutes that sends up documentary filmmakers, and The Thing has one of the funniest lines in movie history that absolutely brings the house down every time it screens. I’m not sure we should talk about humor and horror like they’re two separate things anymore?

Scary clowns and possess dolls are quintessential horror tropes, but you’ve made them your own by injecting real opportunities for empathy for the villainous Pupkin and many of the other puppets in this household’s collection. I’d love to know more about your thought process on this, and what inspired you to reimagine scary dolls (and even the not-so-scary dolls, but dear god the squirrels) in this way.

We all have very complicated relationships with inanimate objects. We praise our cars, we curse at our laptops, we step on a stuffed animal and automatically say “sorry!” We all grew up with stuffed animals or blankets or something that served as a comfort and a friend when we were little kids. And yet these objects get outgrown, they break, they get replaced, and that all brings up a bunch of weird feelings for us. Something about these things hits us on a very vulnerable emotional level.

At the same time, we all automatically feel queasy at the first mention of a scary doll, yet we surround ourselves with Funkos and action figures and dog toys shaped like people and bobble head dolls. We invite the possible architects of our own destruction right into our workspaces and living rooms. Dolls are, after all, the only inanimate objects that can make eye contact, so they already exist in this weird space where we know they aren’t alive, but are we really sure about that?

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Interview: Thommy Hutson on His New novel "Write Christmas"

This interview originally ran on Rue Morgue.

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedI have always been a fan of horror stories, and Christmas is my favorite holiday.

From Hallmark screenplays to films including Truth or Dare and Animal (and even Scooby-Doo!) and the documentary Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy: The Making of Wes Craven’s A Nightmare on Elm Street, author and screenwriter Thommy Hutson is known for blending the holidays and horror. Recently, Hutson took some time out of his busy schedule to speak with RUE MORGUE and share more about his new dark holiday fantasy, Write Christmas.

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You have such an interesting background, writing everything from sweet romance to horror nonfiction. How do you balance writing horror with the holidays – what appeal do these two very different genres hold for you as a creator?

I have always been a fan of horror stories, and Christmas is my favorite holiday. I adore A Christmas Carol. It’s a tale that has heroes and villains and ghosts and death and the fear of realizing if we don’t understand who we are (and who we can and should be), that lack of self-awareness may destroy us. It’s scary stuff – and heavy for Christmas – but that’s what makes it so special and effective. It touches readers deep down.

As a writer, I look at how Christmas appeals to people in so many different ways—just like the horror genre does. So it felt natural to combine them and find a way to tap into what the holiday means and why it has such an effect (positive or negative) on so many. I also believe that looking at stories, no matter the genre, through the lens of character allows one to write almost anything. Just because it’s Christmas doesn’t mean it can’t be scary, thrilling or even a little sad. And just because something is horror doesn’t preclude it from taking place at “the most wonderful time of the year,” as we have seen many, many times. In fact, the combination of Christmas and horror almost feels more immediately compelling and fantastical. It’s why I wanted to craft something that pulls at the heart of the holiday but still has a hint of darkness.

Your newest novel is Write Christmas , billed as a contemporary, holiday fantasy with a new twist on A Christmas Carol and It’s A Wonderful Life . Can you tell us what it’s about?

Write Christmas is about what happens when a woman loses her belief in what the (Christmas) holiday was and can be, both for herself and everyone around her. She is myopic in thinking that because of tragedy occurring during the holiday, that if she ignores Christmas and what it meant for her and her family, somehow everything will be okay. In fact, by abandoning the holiday she once loved the most, she has done the opposite: When Christmas disappears, she sees that everything and everyone has changed for the worst. It becomes clear she must embrace the things she was running from and bring back the spirit and magic of the holiday – or her family, friends and the town will never be the same.

It’s a story about redemption as much as it is about understanding why people are the way they are – that running from the past and thinking that will solve everything is the ghost that can follow you forever. I wanted to create something that hints at the idea that it’s never too late to put a little holiday in your heart … even when there are people who’d rather see your hopes and dreams destroyed.

Based on that description, Write Christmas sounds like it takes Dickensian holiday hauntings and puts them through a modern lens! Why do you think readers need a little bit of a chill during the holidays?

Christmas is billed as the most wonderful time of the year. And it really can be. But to quote “Darkness” from Legend, “What is light without dark?” The Christmas holiday is a time for joy and light and love, but to truly appreciate those things, you must understand that a hint of darkness may be just around the corner. Maybe the shadows on the wall in between the red and green glow of Christmas lights have an agenda all their own. It’s fun to look at something we think we all know and turn it on its ear, and that’s why horror and darker stories at Christmas are so effective. The juxtaposition of anything other than perfect and happy at the holidays is striking and a wonderful playground to be on as a writer.

At the end of the day, it’s understanding that shadows and darkness at Christmas might be coming from within, so it’s about finding our way back to the light, whether that be by ourselves or with friends and family. (Note: a good cup of hot cocoa with marshmallows helps!)

What are you currently working on? What’s next for Thommy Hutson?

Currently, I’m wrapping up the sequel to my first novel, Jinxed, which will have a sort of revival in 2023 as the sequel gears up for release. I’m excited to continue that story in bloody, thrilling and fun sequel fashion and have readers wondering who is behind the mask! I’m also wrapping up interviews and gearing up to begin post-production on another multi-hour, behind-the-scenes horror documentary that has been a really fun project so far. Aside from those two projects, I’m writing a story for an upcoming anthology that will allow me to once again combine two things I love – horror and Christmas! It’s a fantastic lineup of authors, and I am proud to be included with them. Lastly, I’m also writing the screenplay for a remake of the classic ’80s horror film Happy Birthday to Me. Having grown up with the film, being able to revisit it in new and exciting ways is both challenging and exciting. Aside from that, lots of reading, watching Christmas movies, horror movies and wrapping presents!

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Interview: The Boulet Brothers Crown Victoria Elizabeth Black First "Dragula" Titan

This interview originally ran on Rue Morgue.

THE BOULET BROTHERS’ DRAGULA: TITANS debuted in a two-episode premiere on Shudder on October 25th, quickly becoming the most widely viewed debut for the franchise to date. The ten-episode spin-off series starring drag icons from the show’s previous seasons aired weekly on Shudder and AMC+ and saw contestants competing in a grand championship of drag artistry and physical challenges for a $100,000 grand prize along with the headlining spot on the Boulet Brothers’ upcoming world tour.

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This week, Victoria Elizabeth Black was crowned the first-ever DRAGULA: TITANS winner. RUE MORGUE had the opportunity to sit down with Victoria just hours after the results aired (“It still doesn’t feel real!” says Victoria) to discuss her time on the show, her win and the world tour coming next spring.

First off, congratulations ! I’m so excited to hear about your experience on the show. What was it like?

It was so incredible! I was able to reunite with some of my favorite people on the show and working with Kiki to create art together was amazing. Pushing each other’s art is such a fun environment to be in. You’re literally with the best of the best, and there’s so much inspiration by your side.

I believe it and love that you thrived in such a creative, fast-paced environment. What was your reaction when you heard yourself declared the winner?

Oh, incredible. We had some friends over for a little viewing party at home. There was so much to anticipate. It could go any way. But when it happened, the room erupted. I was screaming. We were crying. All the emotions, all right at once. I still can’t believe it.

I understand this is something of a culmination of your long love for all things horror. Can you share a little about your history with horror and drag?

It started out when I was very young – like 4, 5, 6. My grandfather had owned a party store in Miami that went all out for Halloween. The store closed by the time I was born, but he had a garage full of Halloween, and every time I went over, I was completely enthralled. That kind of started the journey of my horror obsession as a child. Before I knew it, I was making corpses in the kitchen and all kinds of crazy stuff, working on Halloween every day of the year until the day of Halloween. When I was 9, I went to the Halloween Horror Nights for the first time and became obsessed with all the haunted houses. I knew this was what I wanted to do, just like that (I even worked on the set team for Halloween Horror Nights the past couple of years)! I learned all my monster make-up working for home haunts doing character makeup, and my love for it grew. From there, I discovered drag and then was able to combine drag with my love for horror. Everything changed. I became a monster. Bringing all of that knowledge to the show was amazing.

Well, it has certainly paid off. Your costumes and performances on the show were absolutely phenomenal. And more importantly, it looks like you had a lot of fun too!

Absolutely. One of the best parts is meeting all of the kind people in this community, seeing their smiling faces and how joyful they are. I’m like, “I’m not worthy,” but it’s so amazing.

Who’d have thought that the world of monsters would be full of such wonderful, kind, passionate people – and you, their reigning Titan ! It’s the time for drag. We’re seeing a surge in awareness and excitement and enthusiasm that I don’t think we’ve ever experienced before, so this feels like extra special timing for you.

It feels incredible – being able to showcase our type of drag to the world, the amount of art and conceptualization and merging the glamour with the grotesque. It can be anything you want. There’s no limit to this sort of drag. And it’s great to be able to show people that there are no limits in that sense. It’s spreading, and I can’t wait to see where it goes. The show has been incredible and the love and respect from everyone is amazing. I couldn’t be more thankful.

I will absolutely be watching and rooting you on. Speaking of no limits, not even the bounds of geography can hold you! Tell me about the upcoming world tour.

The world tour is coming up, and the first stop is actually my hometown, Orlando! It’s going to be incredible to kick off the tour with all my sisters. I couldn’t be more excited. [It’s] a dream that’s so special, so special. Get your tickets!

And let’s not forget the fabulous Boulet Brothers themselves, who said in an exclusive quote for RUE MORGUE, “Victoria Black has taken the art of drag to places no one before her has, and we are excited to see where she takes her career,” adding, “We are very proud to call her our first Titan on THE BOULET BROTHERS’ DRAGULA: TITANS.”

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