 Suitably labelled “The Queen of Filth”, extremist author Dani Brown’s style of dark and twisted writing and deeply disturbing stories has amassed a worrying sized cult following featuring horrifying tales such as “56 Seconds”, “Sparky the Spunky Robot” and the hugely popular “Ketamine Addicted Pandas”. Merging eroticism with horror, torture and other areas that most authors wouldn’t dare, each of Dani’s titles will crawl under your skin, burrow inside you, and make you question why you are coming back for more. Could you tell the readers a little bit about yourself? I think I did one of these a few years back but it was heavily edited, not by me or gingernuts. I would say it’ll be interesting to see how I’ve changed as a writer in that time, but it wasn’t a true representation. For those that don’t know, for the past ten years of my life, I have been under continuous and worsening stress. It only lifted in very late December of 2017. I’m currently picking up the pieces from those years of stress. I’m actually a pretty boring person. I like it that way. Boring is stable. Right now, my body can’t handle much excitement, so I like to save those spoons for positive excitement that doesn’t have negative long-term consequences. I get annoyed when people project their own warped views on me and I absolutely hate creeps (the men and women that try to pick me up – I’m not interested, that is not to be challenged). And I don’t like people who cause a lot of drama around me. I tend to keep things like my political and religious views to myself as I have better things to do than argue about it. What do you like to do when you're not writing? I enjoy knitting. That is one skill I never lost. I’ve been working on getting back the skills I lost from the time I graduated university until the #metoo movement. Some of them I lost before university. Drawing and circuit bending right now. You can follow my progress on social media. Other than the horror genre, what else has been a major influence on your writing? Music plays a large role. I don’t want to give too much of Sparky the Spunky Robot away, but the way the story is told was influenced by a particular album (in a few months, after more people have the chance to read it, I will send something into gingernuts about the album). I did write a massive article about Placebo’s Without You I’m Nothing album for gingernuts. As I’ll be back in the world of Ket Pandas later on this week, I’ll be asking for people to send me their favourite black metal and dance music links. 2018’s music themes were pop music from the 90s and 00s – best move I ever made in terms of what to listen to while writing (it came about because I got really drunk at a New Year’s party and declared the Sugababes only ever sing about masturbation and woke up hungover the next day with a slip of paper with that written on it in my bag). And industrial music, which really set the flow of the words across the page. The pop music helped introduce some fresh themes and ideas into my writing from March 2018 onwards. 2019’s drunken New Year’s writing theme was bad 80s synthpop (I’ll reveal the actual music video on 31/12/19 which helped decide this theme) with showtunes being added in February (while sober). In some places, I’m still using industrial music to get the words to flow across the page but using musicals for story structure. For updated playlists, follow facebook.com/danibrownbooks. The term horror, especially when applied to fiction always carries such heavy connotations. What’s your feeling on the term “horror” and what do you think we can do to break past these assumptions?. I don’t really think about it, especially while writing. I say my stuff has “elements of”. Horror itself can be very beautiful or it can be outright disgusting and disturbing. I think people need to understand that it is fiction. I run into that problem a lot, when people think what I write is real or some sort of window into my inner world, even when I take the time to explain. It is very frustrating. It is art. If you don’t like it, look away. I suppose people are always going to look at something they don’t like on a personal level as something that is evil and totally overreact about it. As I’ve had so many pointless problems and drama related to what I write, I release author notes, etc. onto my website. I don’t have the time or desire to be dealing with people who tell me why I write something instead of listening to me when I say I wrote something a certain way because. I’m not suggesting anyone else does the same. A lot of good horror movements have arisen as a direct result of the socio/political climate, considering the current state of the world where do you see horror going in the next few years? I’m really not sure. It is going to be interesting at any rate. Hopefully some sort of collective healing from Trump and Brexit through art. Looking at horror now, there’s so much of it and it is all different. What are the books and films that helped to define you as an author? I think my early stuff was influenced by Lord of the Rings. There’s a lot of description in there. These days, I’ve been trying to cut down on description and focus more on the flow of words. Sunset Boulevard. Norma Desmond’s house probably features in one form or another in everything I have ever written. These days, she’s influencing characters. I try to leave myself open to be influenced by everything, especially during Era Two (Tainted Love/Push the Button). What new and upcoming authors do you think we should take notice off? I read something by CL Raven a few months back which I enjoyed. There’s probably loads more, but my brain hurts from finishing a novella in the early hours of the morning. How would you describe your writing style? My writing style changes from book to book, even without stress, or with the normal stresses a single mother living in a strange country faces. I would like to write more prose poetry like 56 Seconds but every time I’ve deliberately set out to emulate it, it hasn’t worked. I’m trying to relax, not worry about deadlines (there will always be something else if I miss a particular one) and let the stories carry me and the flow of words instead. My best stuff is written that way. Are there any reviews of your work, positive or negative that have stayed with you? I don’t search out reviews, so I’ve probably missed some. I’m finding reviews for Sparky the Spunky Robot interesting. One review said it would work better as a short story and another said it would work better as a novel. Reviews are obviously subjective to the reviewer’s tastes. There will only be one Sparky the Spunky Robot though. The ideas that appeared in the book have evolved into Era Two (Tainted Love/Push the Button). 56 Seconds has only positive reviews at this point in time. I’m still waiting for someone to hate it. What aspects of writing to do you find the most difficult? Writing while dealing with manufactured drama around me. But all of that has changed. These days, I get a bit frustrated if something is taking too long to write or the words won’t flow in the way I want them to. And I’m still in the habit of writing whenever I have spare time. I need to learn to take a break. Over one year out of having to write in secret, I’m still anxious that someone will come along and sabotage my projects or cause some drama because it looks like I’m doing nothing or whatever their reasonings are. Is there one subject you would never write about as an author? I think I’ve crossed most of the boundaries now. How important are names to you in your books? Do you choose the names based on liking the way it sounds or the meaning? Sometimes name are important and sometimes not. I couldn’t write Ketamine Addicted Pandas until I had the last name that began with the letter “C”. I think Cody was the first panda given a name, with Corey next. But it took a few days for “Casey” to come to me. Marcy’s name is weird. It sounds like it might be the feminine of Mark. There was a Mark who played the Angel of Death, I’ll reveal more about the name after Era Two (Tainted Love/Push the Button) is done. Honey came about because honey oozes down the walls in 56 Seconds. And sometimes characters are given names like the Tentacle Queen and Stolen Daughter. The Forest of the Dead was named because that’s where the dead reside. It is Marcy’s world. Touching it is the Neon Dream. The Neon Dream was shiny and new in the 1980s. I must admit, writing the Neon Dream is fun. As I’m in my thirties, I don’t remember the 80s, so I’ve been watching lots of documentaries and music videos for things to put into the Neon Dream and subvert it somehow. Writing, is not a static process, how have you developed as a writer over the years? I didn’t have a natural writing evolution. I graduated university with a degree in creative writing and the belief people would back off me and let me write and create now that I had an expensive slip of paper saying I can. As people are so intent on “helping” someone they see as less than them (or whatever their reasons are) with me pointing out that their help was more of a hinderance than anything the entire time, that didn’t happen. Right now, I’m basically picking up where I left off when I graduated in 2008. As laws and society have changed to an extent, I should now have that natural creative evolution. I obviously kept writing during that time and had an awful lot published. Keeping me away from writing and creating in general has only created stress and physical health problems related to prolonged stress. What tools do you feel are must-haves for writers? An extensive music library and advanced Google skills. Post-it notes and pens. What is the best piece of advice you ever received with regards to your writing? Just write the story. Worry about everything else once the idea is down. Getting your worked noticed is one of the hardest things for a writer to achieve, how have you tried to approach this subject? It depends on the book. With 56 Seconds, I’ve been slowly tweeting out the entire book and cross posting it across my social media accounts. But that doesn’t work with any of my other titles. With Sparky the Spunky Robot, I’ve been doing the more traditional sending out review copies and interviews. I’ve also been recovering my Photoshop skills, at least on my phone and taking pictures of toy robots to post across social media. I did a public reading of it as well, the video is on my facebook page. It is in two parts because I messed up the order of my papers. Reptile is one that doesn’t do so well on amazon, but it sells really well at events. I tell people to open it to any page and it’ll be the most extreme thing they’ve ever read. It is on kindle unlimited, if anyone wants to find out. Ketamine Addicted Pandas is the first book I started posting about on social media as I wrote it. When that came out, it sold right away. And I did a few interviews in the run-up to release. I will be re-watching the Lords of Chaos movie and giving a run-down of it (I never realized people cared so much about my opinion of black metal related things) on social media and my website. I imagine that’ll sell some copies of Ket Pandas. I maintain a website and I post free short stories on there with links to my books that readers might like if they enjoyed the story. I also write about characters as I develop them. And I try to keep very active social media accounts. To many writers, the characters they write become like children, who is your favorite child, and who is your least favorite to write for and why? My current favourite child is Faded Star. He doesn’t appear in 56 Seconds, although he was conceived while I was writing it. He is Honey’s midnight lover. Marcy also seems to be having an affair with him. He’s fun to write. The Tentacle Queen has a piece of him trapped in the Neon Dream and milked him for a third daughter. The Neon Dream is falling apart. It has a brothel with twitching, broken sexbots and lips in the walls, but only cockroaches to eat. He’s considerably older than Donnie, Marcy and Honey and will be dying eventually. And the sun shines out of his arse, which is fun. He is light, where Marcy is darkness. All the characters in Era Two are fun to write in their own ways, even Honey who is very empty and hollow, but purposely so. My overall least favourite character is Rae from Middle Age Rae of Fucking Sunshine. There was too much negativity and drama going on in my life to really develop the character the way I wanted her. With Era Two, she might reappear as I first imagined her. What piece of your own work are you most proud of? Sparky the Spunky Robot. It isn’t my strongest writing, but it is my favourite story. It was the last book I wrote while under intense stress from outside sources (I detail some of this on my website, as it is over and I’m picking up the pieces, there’s no need to go into details). To get the book finished, I ended up with a tattoo of the toy robot that inspired the story on my arm. 56 Seconds is probably my strongest writing. And are there any that you would like to forget about? I used to want to forget Middle Age Rae of Fucking Sunshine, but readers seem to like that book. I wrote it over the course of many months while the stress I was under intensified and no one around me would let me sort out my own goddamn problems, but it was demanded of me to act as a social worker to others. At any rate, what was happening in my life at the time and the people around me made no logical sense. For those who haven’t read any of your books, which of your books do you think best represents your work and why? I’ve divided my books into three groups. The time of the intense stress, Era Two (Tainted Love/Push the Button) and books that transcend that time. Out of the books written while I was under intense stress, I recommend Night of the Penguins. It is pretty extreme and perfect for anyone that has ever worked a job they hate. If readers want the most extreme thing ever, try Reptile. The last book written of this time was when the stress was over and I was adjusting, Crackhouse in the Desert. Era Two books, only 56 Seconds and one short story have been published so far. 56 Seconds was very fun to write. It was the second story of Era Two and what I imagined writing would be while finishing my degree. I still don’t know how I arrived at it from “Sugababes only ever sing about masturbation”. I went to an EBM night and nursed cheap gin for the entire night. The DJ kept adding fog to an empty dancefloor. I took a picture. I knew the picture would be important one day, and it was, about five weeks later. Sparky the Spunky Robot I somehow managed to cut myself off from the stress and drama going on around me to get it written. It was me trying to figure out what motivates people to behave in the ways they do and interfere in other people’s lives. Ketamine Addicted Pandas is a bit of a mix of stress and no stress because I kept it running in the background on my computer while writing it. Ket Pandas is violent and extreme but still very fun. Sparky is a bit more meaningful than Ket Pandas, but both are entertaining. Do you have a favorite line or passage from your work, and would you like to share it with us? “out-narc frenemies on social media” That line became the evolution of the residents of Suburban Hell from Sparky the Spunky Robot having a tier system of garden decorations. It is a line that appears a lot in Era Two (Tainted Love/Push the Button). It came about, like the garden decorations in Sparky as a simple way of showing people aren’t living for themselves and in-tune with their true life paths because they care about what others think and post stuff online for validation. Can you tell us about your last book, and can you tell us about what you are working on next? My last published book was Sparky the Spunky Robot. Matthew was once a popstar. His band went on and made it without him. Now, he works an office job he can’t describe with any level of accuracy. The only thing that keeps him going is his keytar in the garden shed. Karen has been nagging him into getting rid of it for years so she can have higher tier garden decorations. Every night, Matthew goes out to the shed to jerk off. He can’t cum on the keytar. She might break. So he built Sparky to take his load. One night, Sparky comes to life. He doesn’t have a voice so breaks into neighbouring sheds in search of one, leaving Suburban Hell’s lost dreams scattered across gardens. If you could erase one horror cliché what would be your choice? I’m not so keen on Instagram coming up with a warning when clicking on a horror hashtag. Horror fans are as dynamic a group of any other fandom. I don’t think singling out horror fans is fair. What was the last great book you read, and what was the last book that disappointed you? Oh gosh, I’ve just finished writing The Daisies That Open at Midnight (like at 2 o’clock this morning) and whenever I’m finishing something, I stop reading. I don’t even remember what I was reading when I hit the final stretch of The Daisies That Open at Midnight because it was such a slow write. Guess I’ll either be finding out tonight or picking up a new book. What's the one question you wish you would get asked but never do? And what would be the answer? Would you like me to buy you a burrito? Yes, please. FOR MORE INFO AND TO FOLLOW DANI ON SOCIAL MEDIA CHECK OUT THE LINKS BELOW Website: https://danibrownqueenoffilth.weebly.com/ Patreon: www.patreon.com/Danibrown Facebook: facebook.com/danibrownbooks (best for real-time updates, be sure to click “follow” to not miss a post) Twitter: @danibrownauthor IG: dani_brown_author Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Dani-Brown/e/B00MDGLYAY/ SPARKY THE SPUNKY ROBOT
One night, Sparky comes to life, but soon discovers he has no voice. And why would he? Matthew built him to swallow spunk, not to speak. Left in the shed after he serves his purpose, Sparky sets out on a journey to find a voice. Along the way he meets Sandy, a robot like him, only Sandy is powered by a different man, an evil man. Together, Sparky and Sandy scour every inch of their neighbourhood, breaking into nearby garden sheds, exposing the neighbours, all in search of a voice for Sparky the Spunky Robot.   Comments are closed.
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