HORROR AUTHOR INTERVIEW - SIMON DEWAR

SIMON DEWAR

Simon Dewar was born and bred in Canberra, Australia. He lives there with his wife and 3 daughters.

He has fiction published in the Bloody Parchment: The Root Cellar and Other Stories, as well as the forthcoming anthologies The Sea and Death’s Realm, from Dark Continents Publishing and Grey Matter Press, respectively.

He is the editor of the Suspended in Dusk anthology, available from Books of the Dead Press. 

By day, he is an ICT systems engineer; by night he writes, and edits, the literature of anxiety.

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Could you tell the readers a little bit about yourself?

I’m writer and editor from Canberra Australia. When I’m not creating fiction or helping people perfect their own fiction, I’m a family man. I’ve got 3 girls under the age of 3, and they certainly keep me and the wife on our toes.  I’ve got a number of short stories out with different anthologies and have just edited an anthology, Suspended in Dusk, for Books of the Dead Press.

What do you like to do when you're not writing?

I like watching scary movies. Alone. Late at night. In the Dark.

Reading. Usually horror, sci-fi or fantasy.

Eating out. We don’t get to do it much now, with so many younglings around the house…but the other week I sat down at a Chinese restaurant with a 1kg crab in Szechuan sauce, and I WAS IN HEAVEN.

Trying to keep fit and healthy. If I’m not out gardening, I try to at least get to the gym once or twice a week.

What’s your favourite food?

Pizza, Pasta. Manoush (which is like a Lebanese street pizza people eat for breakfast). Seafood—I have a fantasy about sitting down at a lobster house in Maine and never leaving. Big fat T-bone steaks, well-seasoned.

Who would be on the soundtrack to your life story?

Iced Earth and Blind Guardian—epic badass metal. Music that takes you on a journey and can be soulful, or frantic and crushing.

Do you prefer the term Horror, Weird Fiction or Dark Fiction?

I think they’re separate terms, really.

Generally, we know what horror is… fiction that elicits a sense of fear or dread, or creeping unease. Fiction that challenges or affronts our senses of order, rightness and wellbeing.

Weird fiction being stories that are bizarre/other-worldly/Lovecraftian … possibly including horror, but perhaps not.

Dark Fiction seems to me to be an umbrella phrase that probably encompasses all kinds of things,... from Horror, to Dark Fantasy, to Noir, to Dystopian fiction, etc.

Who are some of your favourite authors?

Stephen King… he writes some great fiction with real characters. Some truly original and ground-breaking stories have flown from his pen… or his word processor. An inspiration.

Jack Ketchum… few know how to put the frighteners on you like he does, and he does it all using the guy next door rather than supernatural element.

Ramsey Campbell … he writes some amazing short fiction, in particular. What he does in a 3000 word short story, is unbelievable. A true master.

Karen Runge … a newish writer from South Africa, currently living in China, that I like to think I “discovered”. Anything she writes blows my mind somehow or really confronts me. A great example is her story Good Help, to be found recently in Shock Totem Magazine.

What is your all-time favourite horror novel, and film?

Favourite Novel, so far, would probably be Hide and Seek by Jack Ketchum. He takes some things we’re all familiar with… the tale of a haunted house, self-destructive teenage girls … and weaves a frightening modern haunted house story. As the protagonist crept through the house, and down into the cellar…my heart was really beating. What a true master.

Favourite film ... Only one? C’mon man. That’s too hard. My top three would probably be:  The Exorcist, The Shining, Alien..

If you could erase one horror cliché what would be your choice?

Vagina Dentata. Demonic toothed vaginas are surprisingly common, and I’ve never read about one that had any real value to the story other than being an attempt to shock. I’m all for  shocking people, and in just about any way you can imagine, but there should at least be some value to the plot. Gross things for the sake of gross things rarely read well on the page. Gross in a context, is great however.

Which fictional character would be your perfect neighbour, and who would be your nightmare neighbour?

A perfect neighbour is a hard one to pick.

Harold from The Stand by Stephen King would be a terrible neighbour. I’d probably have killed the bloke within a week.

What do you think of the current state of the genre? 

I think the current state of the genre is incredibly healthy and, to be honest, I wouldn’t be surprised if we start seeing some more mainstream love for horror again in the coming years. Call me a disgruntled hack or whatever, but I think the biggest opportunity was missed when At the Mountains of Madness was going to be made by Guillermo Del Toro but it fell through. If this had been made, I reckon it would’ve been a top class horror film which would’ve pointed viewers at Lovecraft’s fiction which is a great launch pad into horror fiction generally.

Complaints aside, there are so many good writers out there producing fantastic stuff… whether it’s just slasher or bizarro stuff ... or deeply emotional stuff that’ll rip your heart out and challenge your beliefs. It’s all there and it’s all good.

What was the last great book you read, and what was the last book that disappointed you?

I’ve really been enjoying Little Deaths collection by John FD Taff. It’s my current read and I’m very impressed. There is a wide range of styles in these collection... from Sci-Fi time-travel type horror stories, to portal-to-dimensions of evil type, to demonic children stories.

John’s characters are all real people in real places, albeit sometimes with some pretty surreal things happening to them. It’s a great anthology and I can’t wait to get a copy of his new work The End in All Beginnings.

How would you describe your writing style?

Because I both write and edit, and because my most recent project was editing an anthology, I’ll answer this two ways.

With my own writing, I try and juxtapose horrors against each other to challenge a reader’s perception of the world we live in. And I’ll use anything that pops into my head to do it. I give you the cannibal children who, when deprived of comfort and sustenance for long enough, eat their tormentor—their own father. So who’s the bad guy? The kids who ate a fucking human being, or their dad who tortured them like animals and starved them half-mad. Or both?

As an editor, my job is to fix your damn grammar, highlight the poignant moments in your work and uncover any hidden gems. Under scalpel-like incision of my red pen, writers find their character’s hopes and fears brought to the fore, the trauma of the character’s experiences to cut deeper and the little things that give lift to their story uncovered for the readers to see.

Are there any reviews of your work, positive or negative that have stayed with you?

Jack Ketchum labelled my first horror anthology an “auspicious debut”! That is a big compliment and a good kick in the pants to make me want to raise the bar even higher.

What aspects of writing to do you find the most difficult?

I come from a short story background, where you need to keep your writing very tight and flense a lot of the blubber off that whale of a story to make it really lean and mean. In novels, there is actually a lot of writing that is there to add depth and flavour but is not strictly plot critical and is effectively fluff around the edges. When done right though, this is what gets your word count up and what really helps make a story and characters real. This I find particularly challenging.

Is there one subject you would never write about as an author? What is it?

Probably sexual abuse of children. I can envision hinting at it in a story, but I could never write about it explicitly. Freaks me the fuck out just thinking about it. In a perverse roll of the dice, my wife is actually a child protection caseworker and I refuse to let her tell me anything about her work. How she deals with the horrors of the stuff she sees on a daily basis, I will never know. What a woman.

If you could kill off any character from any other book who would you chose and how would they die?

Maybe one dimensional do-gooders. Or maybe character’s that can’t see the forest for the trees and just won’t listen to others. Maybe Egwene al’Vere.

I’d probably flay them and serve them with a red wine jus.

What do you think makes a good story?

This might sound a little elementary, but:

A good story is well written… the language is suitable to the context and it uses the language to effect. When you read a well written story, you know what the authors meant and you know he meant what he said.

A good story has a beginning and a middle and an end, and across that spanning of time SOMETHING HAPPENS. (You’d be surprised how many stories there are where nothing actually happens).  Usually, that something happens to people or a person. They grow, they change. They improve their lot in life, or it all goes down the gurgler.

In a good story, shit gets real… the stakes are raised. Suspense is created for the reader. Will he make it out alive? Will she get the man she loves?

A good story is about people and events, together; and no matter how fantastical those people or events may be, they’re presented in way that the reader can understand, find credible and relate to.

 How important are names to you in your books? Do you choose the names based on liking the way it sounds or the meaning?

I spit out some names and choose the one that seems to fit the most and doesn’t seem too dorky. In my current work in progress I’ve chosen a few of the name as “Easter eggs” for popular culture fans and horror fans.

How do you think you’ve evolved creatively?

I’ve evolved a lot so far as an artist and chiefly through two avenues:  Expanded depth and breadth of the kind of fiction I read, and through collaborating with other writers and editors.

What tools do you feel are must-haves for writers?    

Learn the English language, or whatever language you write in. Learn Grammar. It helps you know what you mean and mean what you say.

Develop thick skin:  People aren’t going to like you work. Some of your work won’t sell. Get over it. Keep writing and keep submitting. Every acceptance or good review is worth 100,000 rejections (anecdotally).

A certain fearlessness:  Throw away your concerns... forget about levels of difficulties... throw yourself at your work. Submit in competitions. Email people whose work you admire to collaborate with them. Submit to anthologies and publishers.  

Just do it ™.

What is the best piece of advice you ever received from another author?

Angela Slatter once said “Don’t be an ass”. This is great advice.  Be nice to people. It’s free. Good manners and kind words will get a lot further than pushy behaviour or your big ego.

Robert Jordan once said:  You’ll catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.

Truer words were never said.


How do you market your work? What avenues have you found to work best for your genre?

At the moment I’m promoting through twitter and my blog site, and Books of the Dead Press are promoting through their own site. I plan on running a competition giveaway on my site and

Who is your favourite character from your book and why?

My favourite character from the Suspended in Dusk anthology would either be Esther the vampire from Anna Reith’s stunning Taming the Stars. She’s broken and complex. A vampire trying to hide her monstrous secret, yet yearning for something beautiful in a cruel world. She’s bad ass but vulnerable.

How about the least favourite character?  What makes them less appealing to you?

I wouldn’t say that I have a least favourite character. Even the unsavoury ones are there for a reason. The only thing I don’t like is when characters are there for no reason.. just consuming space on a page, stealing oxygen from the other characters that matter. They can all die in a fire.

Fame, fortune, or respect?

Infamy, Fortune and Fear.

What piece of your own work are you most proud of?

Quite proud of novelette that I co-authored with Karen Runge, which is coming out in the Death’s Realm anthology from Grey Matter Press. It’s called High Art and it’s about guy who decides to have his wife murdered so he can be with his lover. It brings the creepy best of Karen Runge with some of my crass blunt edge trauma.


And are there any that you would like to forget about?

I’m not ashamed of any of my work, per se... although I am ashamed at the state of some of my work when I’ve submitted it to magazines or publishers. Every rejection makes you revise and reassess though, and ultimately makes your work stronger.


For those who haven’t read any of your books, what book of yours do you think best represents your work and why?

My stories in The Death’s Realm anthology and The Sea anthology both encapsulate my work. Dark, a little violent and hopefully confronting.

My recent anthology that I edited, Suspended in Dusk from Books of the Dead Press, is a display of my editing skills and the kind of writing I like to read.

Here is the press release for Suspended in Dusk which includes the table contents etc:

http://www.booksofthedeadpress.com/2014/09/new-release-suspended-in-dusk.html

Can you tell us about your last book, and can you tell us about what you are working on next?

The most recent project that was released was the Suspended in Dusk horror anthology from Books of the Dead Press. Currently available on Kindle from Amazon, Smashwords, Barnes and Noble etc. It features an introduction from Jack Ketchum and stories by:

Ramsey Campbell, John Everson, Rayne Hall, Shane McKenzie, Angela Slatter, Alan Baxter, S.G Larner, Wendy Hammer, Sarah Read, Karen Runge, Toby Bennett, Benjamin Knox, Brett Rex Bruton, Icy Sedgwick, Tom Dullemond, Armand Rosamilia, Chris Limb, Anna Reith, J.C. Michael. 

I’m currently working on 3 projects. Another collaboration with Karen Runge, a horror novella set in the New South Wales Southern Highlands called The House of Waite, and an unnamed horror novel with all the good things. Y’know.. Witches; Bikers; Beauty Parlours.

What's the one question you wish you would get asked but never do?  And what would be the answer?

Would I be willing to write an epic fantasy/horror trilogy based upon the Setian mythology in the metal band Iced Earth’s assorted albums?

Jon Shaffer, I’m awaiting the call.

Website

http://simondewar.wordpress.com

Twitter


@herodfel

Goodreads:

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7145303.Simon_Dewar


 

Purchase Suspended In Dusk

“Disquieting and at times terrifying, SUSPENDED IN DUSK shows that horror can, and should, have substance.” ~ Kaaron Warren, Shirley Jackson Award winner, and author of Slights, Mystification, Walking the Tree. 

“SUSPENDED IN DUSK offers a delicious assortment of chills, frights, shocks and very dark delights!” ~ Jonathan Maberry, Bram Stoker Award winner and New York Times bestselling author of Fall of Night and V-Wars 






DUSK 
A time between times. 

A whore hides something monstrous and finds something special. 
A homeless man discovers the razor blade inside the apple. 
Unlikely love is found in the strangest of places. 
Secrets and dreams are kept… forever. 

Or was it all just a trick of the light? 

Suspended in Dusk brings together 19 stories by some of the finest minds in Dark Fiction: 

Ramsey Campbell, John Everson, Rayne Hall, Shane McKenzie, Angela Slatter, Alan Baxter, S.G Larner, Wendy Hammer, Sarah Read, Karen Runge, Toby Bennett, Benjamin Knox, Brett Rex Bruton, Icy Sedgwick, Tom Dullemond, Armand Rosamilia, Chris Limb, Anna Reith, J.C. Michael. 

Introduction by Bram Stoker Award Winner and World Horror Convention Grand Master, Jack Ketchum. 

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