I’ve been writing since I was a kid, and I’ve always enjoyed reading horror. With that being said, I never tried to write in the genre. I primarily read fantasy when I was younger, but my second most-read genre was horror. I’m not sure why I never tried to write horror stories. For some reason, the idea just didn’t seem that interesting at the time. I labored under the impression that one couldn’t do much world-building with horror or create expansive interconnecting story lines.
Enter Stage Left: Jacob Romines
Jacob is a fellow horror author, my longtime best friend and business partner, and the man I hate most in the world. Okay, maybe I don’t hate him, but we’re extremely competitive with one another. I mean, how can you not be competitive with him. Just look at that smug little face. Any reasonable human being would want to beat him into oblivion. This history of competition stretches back to our high school days when we’d fight over who was smarter and had the best grades.
(Spoiler: I’m smarter.)
(Addendum: Don’t tell him I said that.)
Anyway, Jacob and I bonded over many things, our mutual love for horror among them. This resulted in him publishing a collection of horror stories back in 2019. (You might have read it. If not, check it out). Of course, I read it. And to my disdain, I found that it was good.
Which pissed me off.
In an act of pure spite, I wrote my first horror collection – Things Undone. Perhaps it wasn’t an act of pure spite. But I probably wouldn’t have done it if it weren’t for Jacob’s book. The thing is, I found out that I absolutely love writing horror. I soon became even more enamored with the genre and the community. I used to primarily read traditional horror, the kind you usually see in movies. However, I soon discovered the world of cosmic horror and weird fiction. In doing so, I realized that it was entirely possible – maybe even preferable – to create large interconnecting stories with large amounts of world building. The way I see it, horror is fantasy with all of the fantastical elements relegated to things that normally terrify us. While my protagonist (*cough* victims *cough*) may not have awesome powers or sword-fighting skills, I could still create equally compelling and awesome monsters. The only difference is that they’re usually inherently malevolent.
Now I write every day – most of that writing dedicated to horror and fleshing out my Shattered God Mythos.
