Horror Legends with Inigo Mort
The life and times of horror’s greatest living fiction writers. Weekly interviews with Inigo Mort and your favourite spooky scribes!
Horror Legends with Inigo Mort
CJ Leede
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This week I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing the one and only CJ Leede, horror fiction sensation, author of Maeve Fly, American Rapture, and the forthcoming Headlights, a noir chiller about an FBI agent forced to confront the horrors of his past. A very insightful exploration of grief and trauma, all tied up with a strand of hair… around the tongue. If you know, you know.
Welcome to another episode of Horror Legends with me, Inigo Mort, an interview podcast dedicated to exploring the life and times of horror's greatest living fiction writers. Thank you very much for joining me. I recently went through a period of intense anxiety. I've been working very hard in my IRL job. And if any of you are self-employed, you'll know that it's a very freeing lifestyle, but it is also you know, it also comes with massive amounts of uncertainty. And you need to work hard to generate your own momentum. I've got a high tolerance for such things, but at some point the body says enough is enough. Um it reminds me that you know I often think of mental health as a non-physical thing. But let's be real. The brain is part of our body and it's all connected. My anxiety symptoms manifested themselves physically. I wasn't spinning out about anything in particular. My body felt on high alert for no reason. It felt right. It felt like And so I realised I needed to take some time for myself to stop working and grab some rest. Happy to say I'm feeling a lot better now, and hopefully very soon I will have some exciting news to share with you all. Continuing on that theme, I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing the one and only CJ Lead, horror fiction sensation, author of May Fly, American Rapture, and the forthcoming headlights. A noir chiller about an FBI agent who is forced to confront the horrors of his past. Even though it's quite long, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I found it to be a very insightful exploration of grief and trauma, all tied up with a strand of hair around the tongue. If you know, you know. Uh CJ was great. We talk about childhood, grief, stalkers, and the state of the world, amongst many other things. So sit back, relax, and enjoy my chat with the horror author CJ Leed. Please tell me uh where you grew up.
SPEAKER_00I grew up, I well, I've I started life in California, but then I grew up in Austin, Texas. And when I was a teenager, I moved to the Northeast, first Massachusetts, and then uh I finished high school in New York City. So and stayed there for a really long time. So all of those places.
SPEAKER_02What was it like moving around a lot in terms of like fruit like making friends in different places? Did that was that a good thing or was that a kind of a I loved it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I loved it because it was it was always an opportunity to sort of like start fresh and be a new version of yourself, or you know, because when you're young, like you're really trying on so many different versions, and it's hard to know what fits, but um I loved it. Yeah, moving before my senior year, everyone was like, That's crazy. I had the best time.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so I don't know. How old is sorry, English uh brain? How old what how old is senior year?
SPEAKER_00That's your last year of high school. So, like the last year of like non-university school, but um that would be 17. But when I was younger, I mean I moved schools at 10, at 13, 14. I mean, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Wow, no, that is that's quite a lot. I I moved around schools quite a lot. Well, I lived in Scotland for a bit and then came down and moved and was in London and went to a few different schools. And I I found that it uh it helped in a lot of ways. I mean, you know, because the world is full of so many different types of people, and it's good to know how to interact with different types of people, you know.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and not every place is a great fit. No, you know, it's always trying to find that thing.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh, but I did get one semester of like classic Texas football homecoming Friday night lights public school.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And honestly, that was a pretty fun semester. We had a, I don't know, like we had a jumbotron screen on our high school football field, and literally like people who never went to that high school would come every Friday night to watch the game.
SPEAKER_02So you were there, were you were you supporting and you were into it?
SPEAKER_00Uh well, I went to socialize. I don't, I was never too concerned about the football.
SPEAKER_02Um, nice. So uh what about uh, you know, as as a writer, obviously there is a part of all writers' brains which kind of yearns to be kind of on your own as well, or at least kind of escaping somewhere. It doesn't necessarily have to be escaping something bad, but it can just be, oh, you just need to go there. So even though it sounds like you're relatively social, did you did you always have this little kind of pocket for yourself?
SPEAKER_00Um well, I think I grew up an only child, and so I spent a ton of time alone. Uh and I was in that, I am in that generation of like we were very supervised, you know, like it was very like stranger danger. Uh, you know, I I was definitely not one of these kids where like I could get on my bike and go like down the street. Um, I did have a little creek under my house that I could go like play with tadpoles and things, and that was very cool. But I spent a ton of time alone as a kid. And I would say if you asked like kid me, did I love it? I'd be like, no, I wish I had people to hang out with. But in hindsight, I think I did love it. And I now feel like I'm always trying to. Well, it's hard it's a hard balance because it's such a beautiful thing to have like friends and family in this life. And I, you know, I know uh and you always want time with them. But yeah, you I personally feel you cannot write, I cannot write without a great degree of quiet and solitude and being able to really enter another world.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, definitely. And I think I think that's probably true for most writers. And uh did you did you start writing when you were very young?
SPEAKER_00No. Um really yeah, I stumbled into it uh when I was like 23. Really? Um I was in my last semester of undergrad, and I took, I had like an open elective class and I took a writing class. And um, I guess I had taken others, but they I just didn't I wasn't I wasn't thinking about it. And then um I wrote something in that class that was like a very early version of what would later become American Rapture, which is kind of crazy.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that is crazy.
SPEAKER_00Uh but at the time it was like dystopian YA, like totally different. Yeah, and I'd never written anything. And my professor, when I graduated, actually sent those pages to his agent and editor, and then they reached out and requested a full manuscript. And like I had a whole plan that didn't have anything to do with writing because I did not think I was gonna be a writer. Um, but I had a couple months that were flexible. I was working a few jobs to save up some money for like to go on a big hike.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And um, I thought, well, I kind of have time, even though I was working a bunch. It was like, so I thought I'll just try it. And I I wrote a really bad draft in two months of a book, like so bad. Yeah, and I sent it to them, and obviously nothing happened. But I thought back during my hike and I was on the road for a bunch of months, I kept thinking back to that time writing, and I thought, man, I loved that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And then I ended up going back to school for writing and doing this.
SPEAKER_02Was that the first time you'd so that first time that your professor kind of or showed you that they thought you were good? Was that the first time you'd ever received like validation for writing full stop?
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah. Really? I was shocked. Oh my god, I was in total shock. I was literally like working as a fitness instructor and like was gonna I did medieval studies and I thought I would be a career historian. I thought I was gonna go back to school and be an academic.
SPEAKER_01Wow.
SPEAKER_00Um, which actually is kind of a similar life. Yeah, yeah, of course. Well, it's writing and reading.
SPEAKER_01That's what it is.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's writing and reading, and it's it's getting to spend time in beautiful libraries and contribute some something to um all the work that exists in the world. But yeah, uh it was shocking. Like I just thought it was just like a fun thing that I did, but oh, that's incredible.
SPEAKER_02But were creative in your childhood as well? Did you do other creative?
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, yeah. Um, I was acting a lot when I was younger. Um, I actually went to a performing arts boarding school for that. And then when I was in New York, um, I was really into Shakespeare. I did a lot of Shakespeare plays around the city. And um I just never with the acting, like I I always enjoyed it, but I never loved it the way that everybody else did. Like I never was like, oh, I can't wait to rehearse. I was like, rehearsing sucks. Like I just want to do the play. Yeah, yeah. So I think that it's amazing how you can explore these different sort of like artistic avenues, and then finally, sort of it it is such a gift to find yours because I think some people never do even, or some people come to it so much later than I did. And once I started writing, I thought, oh, of course this is it. And I always loved the language of Shakespeare, and this is just language.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, well, I mean, I find loving, I mean, of course, Shakespeare is fantastic, but loving the language of Shakespeare at a relatively young age is you know, it's quite uncommon. I mean, a lot of people want to be act actors, and I'm not saying you you didn't want to become an actor because of like moments and the possibility for validation and all of that, but the language of Shakespeare is definitely something that you have to work quite hard to love. I mean, I'm not you know what I mean? Like it's it requires passion, right?
SPEAKER_00Well, it's so to me, it's just so electric and dynamic. And um I I yeah, I don't know. I find it kind of lights up that part of my brain where I'm just like, uh I just feel so like lucky to get to be experiencing it. And uh yeah, I don't I don't know. I've always I've always been really into it. I'll probably write about that one day.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. I mean, definitely. And and I mean your writing definitely, I mean, I would say that it is pretty much plain English, but is there's poetry in there as well. So that's that maybe that's where it comes from as well. And I I wanted to know like about so as you were when you started writing properly, let's say you kind of committed yourself to it. Was this was this in your like mid-20s?
SPEAKER_00Is that yeah, I was 24 and I had planned to go back to school, you know, for history. And then I thought, well, you know what, I'm gonna give this thing a shot. And I applied to grad school for writing three times, did not get in anywhere until my third time. And then I got into Colombia, which is where I went, and um also found like an amazing friend group and my partner, and like it was a dream. But um, and then when I was at grad school, I was handing in stories and I was one of the only genre writers there. You know, it was a very literary program. And you know, that at the time, like it was not like now. Like it was like everybody was like, Are you serious? You're not gonna ever sell a book. Like, nobody wants genre right now. Um, but I was thinking I was gonna do sci-fi or fantasy or YA or something, and I was handing in stories, and a professor said to me, Um, every story you handed in is horror. And I was like, No way, I don't read that stuff. And he was like, Maybe you should. And um I read my first Stephen King at 24 or five, and I was like, Oh my god, this is it. This is totally what I want to do. And then I ended up um writing a book in grad school that has never gone anywhere. I I will definitely, it's my vampire trucker novel. I love it, I'll revisit one day. And then um that didn't pan out, and then I ended up rewriting American Rapture after I graduated, and I sent both of those to like 80 agents each, uh, tons of rejections, obviously. And then um I couldn't really get anywhere, and then I I felt like I had nothing to lose, and I wrote MAVE during COVID, and a guy saw a photo of me working at the comic book shop I worked at, and asked the person who posted it about me because he grew up going to that comic book store. And the person said, Oh, she's a horror writer you should meet because this guy was a manager, and um, we ended up zooming during COVID, and he read my books that had gone nowhere, and he ended up um like representing me, and then he helped me get a literary like I literally could not get an agent to save my life, and so that's my team is like that manager and agent. But yeah, I took, I mean, if you count the first terrible draft I wrote um of what's later called American Rapture, I think I was writing and sending books out for like seven years.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. But I think that's I I would say that that's kind of standard. Yeah, it's barely too, and it is one of those things that if you have to have love and passion to pursue it despite getting the rejections, and also, as you've just described, a fair amount of serendipity, you know, there needs to be some pushing on until you get that chance encounter someone who used to go to the comic book store. Um, and also just the fact that you were naturally writing things that were um in the kind of area of horror. Did you ever watch horror movies and stuff when you were younger? Was there any part so that was that did you couldn't you identify anything when you were younger that was drawn to the Macabra kind of side of things?
SPEAKER_00Uh probably. I mean, I was terrified of everything. Like, you know, we all had friends who would drag us to the movie theater and make us watch like that, whatever that one movie, the grudge or the ring. It's like it just scared the shit out of me. Um, I was so not into that stuff. Uh for me, it was probably well, one, I did grow up watching Rocky Horror Picture Show a lot. And uh, you know, that's really like camp horror.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um, I loved, I guess the movies, I loved Tremors and Mars Attacks, and those are all kind of like they're they're fun and silly, but I guess they're all kind of in the vein. Um they're freaky, they're freaky, and and I always liked kind of the Tim Burton-y stuff, but um yeah, I loved Halloween. I've always loved Halloween. Growing up in Texas, we didn't get any kind of like seasonal change, except that for six months of summer it was like unbearable. Um, but but you know, we didn't get changing leaves or obviously no snow or anything. And so I would see movies of like fall leaves and Halloween and kids getting to like run around on their own, and it just to me felt like the most magical thing. And so I was always really intense about my Halloween costumes. My parents would help me out a lot, and that was really fun. And I would always go kind of gross and um dark with it, and the other pieces honestly just um I grew up in the Catholic Church, and I think that Catholicism like they don't realize like how dark that aesthetic is, like they just like the starving, bleeding Jesus. Oh no, wounded the rest of it, it's crazy, and like we're like drinking blood out here and talking about demons and hell, and like it, yeah, just possession is always a threat.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and obsess an obsession with guilt as well and shame, and you know, it's which is of course is like within all horror, is that you know, is psychological as well. But I think that's really uh interesting because I think that you know Stephen King definitely also embodies that kind of it's almost like a Christmas-like Halloween, you know, that kind of aesthetically kind of comforting, yeah, exactly. No, and I think and I think that's why Stephen King, for so many readers of horror and writers, is it's a great entry because he does talk about hard stuff, but it is, it has there's a comfort and a familiarity to it, which of course he uses and turns on its heads to scare you. And I mean, I would say that your stuff is actually, you know, there is uh, I mean, certainly with American Ratchet, there is still that kind of dystopian kind of element to it as well. You know, you you do write horror, but I can understand where that there are these other, you know, kind of mixes coming into it. So it makes sense that you weren't maybe just like a pure thoroughbred horror fan your whole life, and actually you've had quite a lot of influences that come into your writing as well.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and and even now, I mean, I read everything. Like there's no genre that I don't maybe I don't read a lot of self-help, but everything else.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00I think um I think there is so much to learn from other genres and that we can bring into like I I like to think of a book as having like a color palette kind of. And there are many books that are sort of like black and gray only. And I think that I actually love, I enjoy that. But for me, what I wanted to write is like I want I want it to be dark, I want that black and gray, but I also want like reds and pinks, and I want I want it to be, I want every book I write to have funny moments. I want every book I write to have like sexy moments and have romance and have um an adventure element, and um I think I I really try to draw a lot. I love Arthur Coman Doyle, I love Sherlock Holmes, I try to draw a lot, yeah. Who doesn't? From um the way that he built mysteries, and so I think there's like so much to learn from everybody. I I mainline romance, like I I binge so many romance novels because you know exactly what's gonna happen, and yet we keep buying them. To me, that's so amazing, is just to see the ways in which people keep something fresh that is like largely like we know it's always gonna have the same ending. And so, yeah, I I just it's so thrilling.
SPEAKER_02No, totally. Well, I mean, romance, I think romance and horror have similarities, and that they're both kind of like body genres, they both are designed to make be. I mean, I'm not saying obviously literary fiction and all the other genres, they maybe are a bit more cerebral. These books are kind of you kind of want to dig into that, and also it's important, I think, to have light and shade in things as well, right? It's like you can really bring out darkness if you have the lightness, and like you saying that you liked you know, Mars attacks and rocky horror picture. I mean, obviously, there is there is kind of a bleakness, and and and especially in someone like what who did you say? Uh the uh Tim Burton stuff. I mean, yeah, it's that that's there's a comic element, but it is is dark, it's you know, it really helps bring the darkness out. So I understand that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. I want it, I want books to feel like a full meal, you know, like every every kind of I want you to feel everything a little bit at least.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, no, and I think well, I think that definitely comes across. So, in terms of when you kind of got your first literary agent and you were may flies your first kind of book that was sold, I'm presuming. Yes, what was what was it like receiving the validation after seven years of working and maybe kind of having absolutely no idea how it was gonna happen? But then suddenly it did happen, and the response was very it was very good. You know, but pretty much every horror fan I know will at least have heard of Mayfly, if not read it. Like, what does that feel like?
SPEAKER_00It was crazy. Um I mean, you can't know when a book sells, if anyone's gonna read it, or you know, and we ended up we sold May two years before it came out, and so there was a very long ramp up period. Um, toward the end of which I was so nervous about the book coming out, I couldn't like eat for like I mean, I was just like so wound up. But um the night, so we ended up having an auction day, um, in which we basically my agent said we we'd had I'd had a bunch of meetings, and which is amazing and insane after everything. And uh some of them were very good, and some of them felt like this is not the right fit, but if it's the only offer I get, maybe I just do it, you know, and that's kind of the conversation you have to have. Um, and then my agent set a day, and it was sort of like there was one week leading up to it, and I was just a wreck. And um, we got one offer at 6 a.m. that day. Uh and it was a good offer, and I really felt it was amazing. And but I had totally fallen in love with this one editor, uh Kelly Lonesome at Nightfire. And I just I thought, oh my gosh, okay, but what if she comes in? Like that's I really hope hours passed, and like right before the end of the like day that we had set the deadline, uh, we got the Nightfire offer. And uh it was it was perfect. It was like a dream. And I went to dinner with some. Family. I had set up this dinner either way because I was like, either way today, I'm gonna be like devastated or like elated, and I just want to be with my family. So we went down to the South Bay and had this dinner, and I drank a bunch, and it was so fun. And they had balloon, they had a uh, I'm not gonna say the D-word, but you know, that park in Anaheim, they had like balloons that were the ice princess themed, and it was so funny and sweet. And um, I remember the Uber back up to LA, and it was, I was like, had been drinking, it was a great night. I had the window down, the ocean was on my left, and I just like closed my eyes and thought like this is it. Like this, this is what everything is like has been leading to. So it was awesome.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, that's amazing. Well, that's lovely. And uh, and have you ever been able to kind of hold on to that feeling as well since? I mean, with because obviously it's a bit like I've spoken to a lot of other authors who have said that, for example, their first moment of validation, like whether it be a teacher saying you did well, it's they spent they've spent a lot of their career kind of trying to get back to that feeling somehow. I'm not suggesting that's your experience. I'm just asking, wondering that that moment of calm and serenity where you're able to go, oh, it paid off. Like, do you still get to feel that when you because obviously American Rapture, very well received, your next book will undoubtedly be very well received. Do you still get those moments of calm?
SPEAKER_00Um, totally. I think for me, you know, everybody wants to talk about film and TV deals, and obviously that's where like big money comes in and uh and is very cool. But for me, like I just always wanted to see my books in bookstores. Like since I started doing this, like to me, the most magical thing is the idea that I could walk into a like an indie bookstore and go over and see my book on the shelf and then sign it. And so I think those moments still always, always hit me in the coolest way. Uh the the like Comic-Con and like the events and the panels. When I first started, I would it's funny because I had so much like stage experience, but I think being on stage as somebody else versus as yourself is very different. Uh, so I was like so insanely nervous when I started, I would like to take a shot before I go.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Which my great thing about being a writer is actually it's a job where you can do that, and people are like, oh, these writers. Um that's actually more professional, maybe as a writer to do that.
SPEAKER_02More trustworthy, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um, and then I got used to it, and those are fun, and like they can be they can be really amazing. Uh, but but in general, like and and signing lines and doing all that stuff is awesome in events, but like I just getting to see it in a bookstore is freaking amazing.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, well, you're I mean, in England, I pretty much every every book, I mean, I go around London like reviewing horror sections in bookshops, and you're always there. So don't worry, you're everywhere. Um, so tell me about so about the actual writing. What is you said before it's like that kind of sense of kind of peace or being away from everything? And obviously, you live in a country, and I don't know how tuned in you are. Some people aren't tuned in out of choice, but it's obviously a very fucking chaotic and you know over stimulating place. And your writing, I mean, your last I mean, American Rapture is heavily about the kind of breakdown of society and all that. So do you do you do you find that writing is a kind of refuge from all of that stuff?
SPEAKER_00Well, it's it's interesting being asked that today because the last uh the last year here has been insane. Um the last few months and especially the last you know few weeks. Uh I feel like I've been like the la this week I've just been glued to my phone because it feels like every day there's a new uh freaking atrocity. And and every day I'm like, where is this five-year-old kid they took? Like nobody's seen him. So, you know, where is this two-year-old? Like, you're just everything's insane. So um, yeah, not to be well, whatever. It's happening, it's it's horrible. Uh, so I feel very um it's very easy to get lost in that and think, like, how am I supposed to just write a book? Like, who cares? You know, and especially my fourth book that I'm working on, which is very early for me to be talking about it at all. But uh it has felt uh I was feeling like it was feeling a little frivolous. And I was like, you know, it we said, why don't we just put out like a BOP? Because American Rapture and Headlights are both so heavy, they're both really big books, they're kind of behemoths, and um especially headlights is all about death and grief. And so we were like, let's just put out a fun book. And to be honest, I'm not sure I'm capable of just putting out a fun book, and and maybe that's okay. And so um, I did think of something yesterday. If my project is sort of writing America and uh and and this Americana culture, and um what you know, figuring out kind of what our culture is here in a crazy time, um, I think I think I just need to incorporate that in everything. And it can still be kind of a bop, but it's how can you not talk about this stuff? It's so major.
SPEAKER_02No, exactly. And I no, and I I think that's I think that's right. And after all, when you're writing about you know things like fear and grief and and and yeah, death, it's like the the way that kind of society is changing at the moment, it is also it's also reshifting the way that we talk and explore these things as well. Like I've always it's interesting to look back and like in history, when you look at when like horror fiction actually kind of took off in the 20th century, it was post-Vietnam and it was you know financial crisis. And obviously, I'm not saying it's like as on the nose as when bad stuff happened, people kind of want to dig in. But you also look at how successful horror movies are now, and I think that it is probably a way that people do in a world where you feel like there's no control over your own emotions, like you and me, glued to our screens being kind of force-fed horrible stuff that we can't change. It's probably right. I mean, I'm not saying it's right in a prescriptive way, but it's it's probably very fair to channel your own kind of intense feelings into what you write.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and it almost feels I don't know, it it's so it's so hard to, you know, and then you also ask yourself the question of like, will I be able to continue writing what I want to write? You know, how far is this gonna go? And um even we have these platforms online that we're using for our careers and to reach readers, and yeah, and that could be gone in a second. And uh yeah, so there's always this question of kind of obviously the the future is very uncertain for everyone, but asking the question of like what place does art have here? Yeah, and does art have responsibility, or should should there also be art that is like total catharsis and escape? And all of this feels like the conversation that every artist is having right now. I feel terrible for writers whose books are coming out right now. You know, I know somebody had a book come out um like a day or two before 9-11, you know, back in the early 2000s. Like you just can't predict. And obviously the things happening in the world are are the way more important thing, but and also, you know, people's people's work is coming out, and so it's an interesting, you know.
SPEAKER_02No, there's no right answer, but I definitely I mean, I could for me when I read, I do need to have that space in order to decompress. And I'm for some reason I find myself, you know, escaping into more horrible situations, but you know, in my in my imagination when I'm reading, because I love horror, but I think that it I'm basically like I said, I'm working out how to deal with the constant pressure, and books are a great way to kind of work out. So I think that the service is definitely there, but it's understandable that you'd be insecure about it. Um, in terms of like the way that you kind of see yourself as a writer, because you're talking like maybe you have like you're having this kind of awareness of yourself as a person and the world and then your art. Like, are you aware of the the things that you give to other people in like I just described, that kind of freedom? Are you kind of have you experienced that people telling you that you know you help, you know, I know help is a funny word, but you know, you can kind of make people feel better.
SPEAKER_00Um yeah, it's uh with American Rapture, I had I've had a lot of folks reach out um who grew up in all all different religious, um, I mean, mostly Christian denominated different denominations, but uh and um kind of share that maybe they had a lot of the same like internal struggles that uh Sophie did in my book and also that you know I did. And uh that has been incredibly powerful and humbling and the way that people will really kind of put themselves willingly into a book that kind of is uh, you know, I don't know that my books my books are hopeful and they are full of love. I don't, they're not always kind, you know. I mean, I think that life is really hard and can be very cruel, and I put that in my books. Um and so the fact that readers would sort of like willingly sit there in that in order to reach anything. I don't know. I I just I feel really I feel very humbled, I feel very grateful. Um, but yeah, it's been I cried so many times on the American Rapture Tour with people telling me things and show I mean it was just amazing. Um and then with MAVE, MAVE is funny because it it's a book that really activates people a lot, like one way or another. And uh there is a big response of folks being like, oh my god, she's just like me. And you know, I'm I imagine they don't mean every part of her, but like, you know, I don't know. Um but there is something about, and I think people who feel that way are obviously it's all the weird girl stuff in her interest, but I think it's also just like she's a very loyal person. Yeah, and so I think people see that in themselves, and I love that. Um, also makes people very angry, certain people um very angry. I had threats after Mave. I had like people who wouldn't leave me alone, I guess like Starker and really oh yeah, yeah, you had to get involved at one point.
SPEAKER_02You had a stalker, did you?
SPEAKER_00Well, I had I had somebody I did have I did have folks who were sort of it, it was like towing the line. And then um I had someone who made a bunch of accounts online threatening me, but the uh every post was about me first name, last name, stabbing chairs, all kinds of weird oh that's horrible making up nursery rhymes. That was the weirdest one, yeah. Um, with my name in them.
SPEAKER_02But yeah, it wasn't even about the book, it was just about you.
SPEAKER_00Well, it was it was it started with the book, it started with Maeve. So yeah, it Mave did something weird. Like whatever, whatever I put into that book, which was at the time feeling like very out of power in my life, and a lot of rage and a lot of also what I viewed as like total feminism, but you know, some folks critiqued as like not. Um that book, that book has, yeah, it but overwhelmingly people now I think just kind of have they enjoy it and they're like fun book, thank you, and move on.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but it is a fun book, but it is also, I think rage is and anger is one of for me, it's one of the things, the reasons why I read horror is because I in my life find it quite hard to access those feelings. And so it's good to read something which puts the voice of anger in your head, and then I can kind of like role-play in my head, you know, as I remember reading and really enjoying obviously. I mean, it's not really I mean, it's kind of nihilistic, but it there is definitely more purpose to it than that. It feels it felt a lot more. I mean, in the same way that Headlights, I think, is is a grim book, but the way that it talks about grief and the way that you know, it's it's obviously got this very kind of entertaining mystery that goes alongside it, where you're kind of working out what is this thing and who's doing it, who are these people who are appearing on the road and stuff. And did you how what was it like writing um something that was yeah, dealing with I mean, one of the biggest and most profound experiences that human can have, which is great.
SPEAKER_00Good question. Yeah, like what is yeah, where do they go? What is death? Um well, I think my philosophy on horror in general, because people are always so like, why do you choose that? You know, why would you do that? Yeah, and I think for me, death is a massive part of life. I mean, it's you could argue it's like the biggest part of life because our mortality kind of dictates everything, yeah. It does, and it's such an uncertainty, and we it is the one thing every single one of us will experience 100% every one of us, you know. And um so to me, I feel like I'm very comfortable sitting and looking at death, and I think it's important that people who are do it and then you know, kind of stumble around in the dark and sort it out and try and metabolize it and kind of give it back to everybody else in a way that might help a little bit because this grief thing can be so so just blindsiding and overwhelming, and uh I think I think it's hugely important. I mean, I was struggling obviously with grief for the whole writing of this book. Um I had a very strange, like my childhood, like nobody died. Like I was so lucky growing up and I didn't really have anybody die until I was in my 20s, and then it was about 10 years of death, constant. It was crazy. Yeah, like every year, um humans and like my dogs, and just it was just brutal. And um, and and still I'm so lucky because I got to have this childhood, you know, mostly without that. And that is like actually pretty rare, I think. Uh so all to say it's a huge part of life. I feel it's important uh to look at, and also I think it's important to get comfortable with and kind of find find um hope in. And I think we can in a way. And so that was kind of headlights was like stumbling around in the dark, which is also what grief feels like to me. And it was a weird book because these characters appeared to me very suddenly, and I knew I had to write it, but I couldn't quite it took me a long time. I think it took me like five years to get this book finished. Oh, really?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and I kept starting over and I didn't quite know how to tell their story, and it kind of felt like this thing of like it was like they were like lights in the dark, and I was just trying to follow them, but you know, I would lose them sometimes and be like, where do they go?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00And where do they want me to go? And then ultimately I think I've found it. And it's a weird book. Um, I think it'll be interesting to see if folks will kind of like I think a lot of readers approach reading these days as like, I was expecting I'm expecting it to be this. So if it's this, I'm really happy. And if it's not, then I'm not.
SPEAKER_02And um maybe, maybe my experience of it, because I read it, I read it last uh month, and I I really enjoyed it. And I'm a big fan, you know, of like the noir kind of stuff as well. So I really and I and I really liked the kind of dual timeline, and I I've appreciated the way that the character development unfolded, and it's I I really enjoyed it. I think I I don't I guess for me, it's like with horror, I'm I'm always surprised, or not anymore, but people often who read horror are they have experienced sometimes or oftentimes something quite profound, and it's and in terms of loss. And it's often the people who don't like horror, who are maybe a bit like I don't want to think about it, I don't, but you know, of course that makes sense. Like, you know, you don't want to think about death, so you're not gonna read horror, but there are so many people who really engage with it. So I think because of the way that I felt when I read it that it explores grief all in an authentic way, I'm sure many people will read it. And even if it's not what they were expecting from you, I'm sure it will nourish them in in another way. And third book as well, that's a hard it's a hard one. I mean, second book's hard, but third, you know, is you've got you've got to have a little bit of a license to go a little bit outside.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I mean, I it was important to me that we did. I keep saying we, you know, it feels like your team is so much a part of like it because they are like they're a huge part of creating this book. Um, and and strategy and like marketing and all these things. So um it was very important to me, and luckily my my team were on board that uh we I didn't want to write MAVE every book, a book a year forever. And I love writing MAVE. I would like to write a sequel, um, but I didn't want to get pigeonholed. I just wanted to create a space where like moving forward, I can write anything I want to write, as long as it's in horror and as long as it has some kind of like element of a feeling of one of my books, which is probably gonna be like Americana backdrops, um, and also like hopefully like a little bit of like humor. Yeah, yeah, definitely all those other things.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and and you can't, I mean, it'd be probably quite hard for you to see it, but you definitely have a voice, you know, it's you have a clear kind of vibe, even if you are writing in in kind of different tropes and stuff. But you know, it's all marketing at the end of the day, and it and it really your voice is always, I would say, having read all of your books, that it comes through. So it shouldn't be, but you know, there's fucking marketing, that's what they do. Um, I want to get finish by asking you do you do you you said that you read widely, and you are you do you blurb a lot?
SPEAKER_00Um yeah. Complicated question. Um, I was blurbing a ton and I got really burnt out and kind of um felt like I was unable to keep up with my workload. So I stopped. And and also we we evacuated after the fires this last year, and we've been living on the road for a year. So it was it had new life had new complications that took a lot of brain space for me and time. But um uh I stopped for a while and then I've basically opened it back up to um I will blurb debut authors because I think they are the ones who really benefit from it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um, and also I mean my friends, because they're my friends and I'm reading the books early. But in general, I do think uh I don't know if I don't know if you've seen, but um I I post, I've I've actually been asking people not to blurb headlights because um it's my third book, yeah, and I really benefited from the blurbs, especially on MAVE, but on American Rapture 2, when I was kind of coming onto the scene. Uh I don't need that now. They can easily repurpose old blurbs. And when I see my friends who are authors, every one of them, every time, talks about how burnt out they are, how they've their relationship with reading has totally changed. Like you it feels it starts to feel so transactional. You're not even typically talking to the authors, it's like editors and agents emailing you constantly. Like I have there are certain editors who and and no shade, like they're doing their job, they're crushing it. But like I will literally get emails every week. And um, it's just I think publishers should be paying. I it's a controversial opinion. I think authors should be paid to blurb because it doesn't make it any less authentic. It's already a barter system and already kind of a lot of times. And additionally, uh it is free labor they're asking for. These are like huge operations, a lot of them. I know not indies, but like, you know, they can, it's just silly and it it puts so much burden on authors.
SPEAKER_02No, totally. I mean, uh the same kind of feeling I think can be attributed as well to book reviewers these days, you know, like people reading, and I mean, great. Um I mean, I wish I could read 150 books in a year. Um, but you know, people that I think there's a kind of gamification to it as well, and and there's a kind of anxiety about reading as soon as you start kind of tapping into that anxiety about I must be reading, it doesn't work well. It definitely ruins your relationship with reading, I think. So that's understandable. But what about so but you still have you found managed to since Obviously, the upheaval in your life, you've kind of found a space where you can read for pleasure.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I'm just starting to again, and it's really nice. I actually went, I went to my P.O. box and I picked up, I have like 20 uh debut novels in there. And I was like, let's go. Hell yeah. And so I'm having a lot of fun and I'm feeling very inspired. And I'm I am listening to on audio all of the Heated Rivalry books. So that is great. And also King Sorrow, which is a behemoth. Uh but I'm loving it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. It's a are you listening to that or are you reading it?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, listening. And it's like a full cast. It's cool.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I love full cast audiobooks. And also I'm intimidated by well, I mean King Sorrow. It's got to be was it 700 pages? Oh, it's maybe even longer than that. I don't know.
SPEAKER_00It might be longer. It's a big old book. I get a bit scared of it.
SPEAKER_02But that's what audiobooks are great for that. Um, but yeah, no, that that's great. I I'm yet to read King Sorry. Um, well, thank you very much for talking to me. It's been a pleasure.
SPEAKER_00Thank you.
SPEAKER_02That was lovely, wasn't it? CJ really is very cool. I deeply appreciate the time she took to chat with me. Uh, I will never get tired of speaking to my contemporary horror heroes. Uh, next week, join me again for a chat with TJ Payne, whose modern classic Intercepts has just been reissued. I was meant to release this a while ago, but I decided to hold off until his re release, um, which he thoroughly deserves. Can't wait to see it in Bookshops. Another self published to Trad success story. Until then, have a nice week, and I will see you next time for more Horror Legends.