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Guest: Author and Editor Nora Peevy
19 Plays1 month ago
Author, Editor, and hedge witch Nora Peevy explains why she doesn't write to an audience. We talk the many shades of witchcraft, how stress and anxiety impact writing schedules (I was shocked, honestly), and why so many girls with ADHD in the 70's and 80's were undiagnosed. Also slush piles, industry drama, and flesh-eating turtles. Nora's book For the Sake of Brigid, is available now.
A transcript of this episode can be found here.
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Transcript
Introduction and Podcast Overview
00:00:02
Speaker
You are listening to The Mentally Oddcast, where we talk with creatives about neurodivergence, trauma, addiction, and all the other things that impact and inform our art. Our goal is to show everyone that no matter what you're going through, you are not alone and you can make art about it.
Meet Nora B. Peavey
00:00:34
Speaker
Hi friends, it's me, Wednesday, late Friday, and you are listening to the Mentally Oddcast brought to you by sometimes hilarious horror. Visit us on Ko-fi, please. This week, we have Nora B. Peavey, who is the author of For the Sake of Bridget, which is available now. ah Nora does interviews for queer horror books and writes nonfiction for the Weird Wide Web. Nora also reads submissions for journal stone publishing.
00:01:04
Speaker
and is an active hedge witch, which we will be talking about in a bit. We'll have some links to her stuff in the description. ah Nora lives in Miliwake, which we know is Algonquin for the good land. Welcome, Nora. Thanks for being here. Thank you for having me.
00:01:23
Speaker
Have you seen Wayne's World? Do you know the Algonquin joke? and I do. Wayne's World is for my generation. Right on. Okay. Well, it turns out a lot of the people I interview are younger than me and I have no idea. So I'll be yucking it up about something that happened in the 90s and they're like, yeah, I was five.
00:01:43
Speaker
we um you too Right.
First Horror Movie Experience: 'Poltergeist'
00:01:46
Speaker
but we We actually ah like to start by asking guests to talk about the first horror movie that you remember seeing. So let's have it. Okay, the first horror movie I remember seeing is Poltergeist. Okay, good one.
00:02:02
Speaker
and And how did that break down? Were you allowed to see it? Did you have to sneak? Well, um let's just say that when my mom left me with my dad, he was not the greatest parent to be left with. And would just do whatever. Didn't really pay attention. He liked to watch horror movies. So I was exposed to a lot of things as a little kid that probably weren't age appropriate.
00:02:32
Speaker
yeah But I was traumatized and had the lights on a lot and didn't really tell my mom. Then when I got older, we kind of shared a love of horror together. Well, poltergeist must be especially rough for a kid to see because there are so many kids in peril, man, that whole thing with the clown and the the tree branch.
00:02:57
Speaker
but like As a kid, I would have been terrified. terrify because i mean For me, Salem's Lot is one of my quintessential childhood scare films, which also has kids in peril. so yeah I think that hits a little harder because in a lot of movies, the kids are safe. Horror movies that are made with adult protagonists, usually it's all about protecting the kid. so When the kid is in peril, that' that's a little more jarring, especially when you are a younger person.
00:03:28
Speaker
It is. The worst part for me was when the little girl got sucked into the television. That that yeah creeped me out. I looked at the television and I thought, could that happen to me?
Trauma, Childhood, and Horror Writing
00:03:41
Speaker
Could the television do that to me? but It was very disturbing. I'll bet. So you were exposed to a lot of horror as a kid. Would you say that put you on a path?
00:03:55
Speaker
I would say definitely. I would say watching all of the Stephen King specials with my dad definitely put me on the path. um I had met somebody whose name was Kelly and then we had hung out in high school and she gave me a bunch of books. Those were the first books that I read Stephen King and after that I was hooked. So.
00:04:24
Speaker
Okay, so when ah when did you write your first horror thing? Actually, I wrote my first horror when I was probably around the age of 13.
00:04:40
Speaker
Okay, could you tell us about it? It was oddly after I had read in the young adult section a book that went and discussed rape at a very young age. And that really stuck with me because I had been molested by my uncle when I was a toddler. Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah, it was it was difficult. um And that book really hit home with me. And I ended up writing something different, but similar, which was very cathartic.
00:05:18
Speaker
never showed it to anyone, eventually ripped it up when I was in my later teens, but I think that's probably the first horror that I actually wrote. Wow, that is huge. And it so speaks to what we do here, ah not only using the arts to to as a catharsis, um but also to talk about things in a way that you can't talk to the people in your life. So it sounds like you were working through that at ah at a really young age and that you were pretty much working through it by yourself. Yeah, as a toddler, you don't
00:05:59
Speaker
really know the words and I grew up I was born in 1976 so we were not taught the way that they are in school now about bad touch and good touch things were different and my parents had left me with my godmom and it was the first time I had ever been away from home So it was an extremely traumatic experience being my first experience away from home. It kind of shaped my entire life until I was older and able to put everything together.
Healing Through Therapy and Family Support
00:06:39
Speaker
And then I got really angry because I kept on asking myself, what if, what if this hadn't happened? What type of person would I have been? Would I have gone away to college?
00:06:54
Speaker
would I have been more trusting of sleeping over at friends' houses than I was? and It was really hard to deal with. And at least when I finally came out to my family about that, they believed me instantly, which that was good. But that was also hard to do because the questions were there. What if I'm not believed? one What do I do then? Yeah, yeah, that's huge. and that's i mean it's it's such a that that is a question that people like I know so many people who have gone through trauma, and that is the most pervasive and infuriating question. Who would I be if this had not happened to me? If this awful person hadn't done this awful, unnecessary thing, how different would I be now?
00:07:48
Speaker
Because, you know, I mean, I talk about my own stuff. Sometimes I was beaten until I had brain damage, you know, by the time I was in puberty, my health was already bad because I had apnea and I wasn't treated. And then, you know, there was a lot of beating and emotional abuse and stuff. And I get super stuck on that sometimes when I am trying to do something and I fail, I'll be like, well, you know what, maybe if I hadn't been beaten until I had brain damage, I would have been able to do this thing, which, you know, there's and there's no answer for that question.
00:08:17
Speaker
Who would I be if this hadn't happened? Because there is literally no way to know. know we and That might be the most frustrating thing about it. Because you pointed out something else that's really important, which is that we are doing better in schools and as a society about using proper words and and giving kids tools and information that they can use to protect themselves from predators.
00:08:43
Speaker
We got a long way to go on that front for sure. We do. Because I know there was a ah girl actually a block down from us and she was taught to call her vulva Kitty. And so when she went to school and said, you know, grandpa touched my kitty and it hurt, no one knew that there was something amiss and to end that this girl needed help. And that went on for much longer than it should have.
00:09:11
Speaker
because people thought they were protecting her from adult information and basically it just left her vulnerable. That's sad. So it it is, um which I mean that's why one of the the many reasons why I think that even though these are like unpleasant topics, it's really important to talk about them because I think The thing, I mean, just doing the show, the thing that I hear the most from people is, oh my God, no one's ever said that where I could hear it before. You know, cause like, I think you and I travel in a lot of the same internet circles where people are are pretty progressive and self reflective. You know, everybody's trying to be a better person. They're trying to be kind. They're trying to know as much as they can. That's not universal. That is something that we have curated because we want it. So.
00:10:04
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, it's it's just, um, and and the thing is, like, I know you as a person from the internet, but I know very little about your work, you know, um which is is kind of embarrassing, because once I started researching it, I was like, What the hell? How am I now reading this? Because, because certainly, some of it is horror, but would you say that it's straight up horror? Or would you say you're straddling a lot of sub genres?
00:10:30
Speaker
I say I genre bend. I go into fantasy, sci-fi, bizarro, horror, um dark fantasy, dark romance. I pretty much write what I want to. I don't try to limit myself. If the story comes out of me, it comes out of me and it's there for a reason. andm I'm not like some people that I'll only write just in one genre.
00:10:57
Speaker
If I see a sub and it looks interesting and it sparks something in me, then I'll go for it. I like to try new things and challenge myself because I think that's how I grow as an author and as a writer and also as a person.
Genre-Bending and Creative Freedom in Writing
00:11:12
Speaker
And that's fun to me. So yeah I would say classify me more as a weird fiction author than anything else. So when people say you should write to an audience, you should write to you know it's a specific demographic of reader. ah do Do you agree with that on any level? No, I'm pretty selfish. If I don't like what I am writing, it's not going to be good. I will not identify with it.
00:11:42
Speaker
And I know that nobody else will because I'm not having a good time. I'm not enjoying myself. The words are going to be clunky. The story is going to be boring. So I have to be having fun and I have to be able to play in my own sandbox in order for people to enjoy reading it and come play with me. Nice. Nice. I love that. I mean, write the book you want to read is pretty standard reading advice or writing advice as well.
00:12:12
Speaker
um I don't know necessarily it seems like the writers I like the most are the ones that don't give a shit like Christopher Moore, you know, yeah, is is just a big like, like, yeah, you could call those books horror because horrific things happen in them. But they're funny as hell. the the Like I think of myself as a horror writer, but a lot of my stuff is hilarious. I mean, you know, we have the magazine sometimes hilarious horror because While I think a lot of horrific things are happening in the stories that I tell, they're told with just a ripe sarcasm that's like, yeah, isn't this fucking ridiculous. It's scary, but like also what? Yeah. So yeah, but but I love that. um
00:12:58
Speaker
I think, you know what, I actually want to get into like, I know that you live with depression and anxiety. ah You have a borderline. Is that, is that right? And PTSD as well. You know, I use the the the abbreviation BPD, which is borderline personality disorder, but it's also bipolar disorder. So I like, we'll get those confused because guess what? I'm bipolar one. um But I think as a freelancer, some of those things,
00:13:26
Speaker
must inhibit your ability to to focus? I have ADHD too, so that doesn't help. um I was recently diagnosed with ADHD and borderline personality disorder in the past year. And that, since I have been put on medication, has really, really helped.
00:13:53
Speaker
And that's also found me questioning, why did it take so long? Because I've actually spent most of my life in therapy, which I know a lot of people can relate to. And they've asked, what is wrong with me? Why I've tried so many therapists, why is this not working? And they get all these different diagnoses and they're on all this medicine and it doesn't work and they get frustrated and My advice is if you have a therapist that you're not vibing with to find another one and to keep on trying and to not give up. And somewhere along the line, something's going to click with all of the notes and somebody will find something, even if it takes years. I mean, I was in therapy since I was 10 years old and I'm 48.
00:14:51
Speaker
And it took all that time to diagnose me and it has made me angry and frustrated. And it at first totally shocked me, but now I'm sleeping better. So I am functioning better. And it's also made me realize how it's affected my romantic relationships and my friendships and my, my, like my family relationships too. So that's good.
00:15:22
Speaker
And as for my writing, the type of ADHD that I have, it's it's the one where you're very organized. So that's probably the one saving grace is that I'm very organized. So I've been able to to write, but the type of ADHD and borderline personality disorder that I have,
00:15:46
Speaker
also makes me extremely emotional so I feel emotions very deeply and I just want to be loved by everybody and that makes me extremely vulnerable so I have been taken advantage of in the online community and it makes me feel stupid but then I have to realize that I'm just learning my diagnoses and that I'm learning how to cope and how to protect myself. And I just always thought that it was because I was a nice person. And maybe I was just too naive. But now I know what it really is. So I'm able to start dealing with that. And the medication is helping too. Man, that is so hugely
Late ADHD Diagnosis and 'What If' Scenarios
00:16:35
Speaker
relatable.
00:16:36
Speaker
Um, we've actually talked on the show a few times about how women in our age group, you know, growing up in the like seventies and early to mid eighties, they didn't know how to diagnose ADHD in girls. They didn't know how it presented. So if we did not present the same way that a boy would present with ADHD, they didn't even look for it. And I think what you describe is, is more common than anybody would like to admit that if you are a woman and you're not a troublemaker.
00:17:07
Speaker
If you're able to sit down and be quiet and do your work, no one will even look to see if there's anything wrong with you, even if you're not performing and things get dismissed like, Oh, you must be lazy. You must not be trying very hard. Why don't you pay attention? and You know, and yeah, there are reasons for those things. And again, it's a question of, well, what if I was treated for this when I was 11 and not 40 something, you know, like how, how much of a difference would that make? I have a buddy.
00:17:36
Speaker
that I went to undergrad with and he has ADHD, but he was treated. And I'm not going to say his name, but I have on the show before actually, but he is a very popular writer. His output is insane. He invented the podcast novel like he's a huge, huge guy in the industry. And, you know, I can't help but compare myself to him because we were, you know, nobody's together in undergrad.
00:18:05
Speaker
And, uh, and I mean, there's a lot of things that he has going on that I don't like his parents are educated in value education. And mine were kind of the, Oh, I guess you think, you know, everything now that you've been to college kind of people. So, you know, it is this whole, like, I mean, we all are, everybody's story is unique and we don't know what people have been through, but there are also these sweeping generational things of like all these women that were never told they were ADHD and that there are reasons that.
00:18:35
Speaker
We have a tougher time getting our shit together. So that's a thing where I'd like to see us make some progress as a society. Now, let me ask you this. So you're super organized. um So what's your work output like? And do you have a set schedule when you for for writing? I don't. um And when I tend to get stressed, that's when my output tends to get even more ah prolific, I would say.
00:19:03
Speaker
I do work like at least eight hours a day or more, and I don't take any time off. and Everybody always tells me, you need to take ah time off. Why are you working 365 days a year? This isn't good for you. I do enjoy it, but I also find with my ADHD brain that if I'm not busy, then I'll start thinking about things that are not healthy that aren't true about myself. And then that puts me into a deeper depression. And since I have a depressive disorder, that's not good. Then that affects my sleep schedule. And that's the other thing is for years and years and years, I was not sleeping well. And doctors were like, Oh, she just has insomnia. We'll just throw a bunch of sleeping pills at her.
00:19:53
Speaker
It never worked. Then all of a sudden I'm diagnosed with ADHD. They put me on ADHD medicine and for the first time since high school, I've actually been able to sleep.
00:20:07
Speaker
And that makes me so angry that I went all that time from the time I was like 13 until 48 not being able to sleep. I mean, that's the huge thing that that actually you need to function for. Totally. Totally. i They told me I had, they told my mother I had apnea when I was a baby, like an infant before I could even talk. And it was treated when I was 37. And, and it's like,
00:20:35
Speaker
My whole life people have treated me like shit for being fat and the number one thing that apnea causes is fatness because you're not sleeping enough and your body just wants food all the time because you don't have any energy. So I mean, yeah, I get it. That is freaking infuriating. So you started seeing therapists when you were, you said like 10, 10 or 11?
Bullying, Therapy, and Repressed Trauma
00:21:00
Speaker
Yeah, I was really getting bullied at school. um Really, really bullied to the point that I got taken out of the school system and put into a completely different one. that That's how bad it was. so I want to point out that doctors say, oh, they don't know what's wrong with you. They can't tell. They can't tell. The bullies know. The bullies know which kids have something going on. The bullies know which kids are vulnerable. Yes, they do.
00:21:30
Speaker
Let's see what we could do about getting doctors that are as perceptive as a third grade bully, shall we? yeah So so when you went to therapy, it was because other people were treating you bad and they wanted to give you coping mechanisms. Am I understanding that right? Yes. And also um I was having nightmares and I hadn't had the breakthrough nightmare all the way through that I was molested by my uncle. I used to every single night have the same nightmare, but it stopped at a certain period.
00:22:00
Speaker
And I never understood why I didn't fully like my uncle and my uncle passed away. And I felt really weird at his funeral and I didn't know why. And that combined with being bullied at school, I got sent to therapy at 10 years old. And um then around my freshman, between my freshman and sophomore year,
00:22:27
Speaker
I wanted to commit suicide. So over Thanksgiving break, I was institutionalized in the children's section for about a week. And my parents told everybody that I just was really sick. And only my two best friends knew where I was, because it was such a shameful thing, I guess, for my family and for everybody.
00:22:54
Speaker
to know that i was suicidal and and that was i was in a children's ward at the psych hospital but it got that bad with the bullying by then and with how i felt about myself that i just didn't want to be around anymore so i was still in therapy at that time but it just seemed like between being 10 up until then nothing worked and nothing worked all the way through high school and Up until I was 19, finally when I was 19, the nightmare that I had every night like came to the end and then I realized what had happened. And I told my therapist and my family and I thought, okay, now everything is fine, but no, it wasn't fine.
00:23:44
Speaker
I still had a lot to deal with and I hadn't been diagnosed with the ADHD or anything and nobody talked to me about PTSD with things like that, which I think is pretty stupid that nobody mentioned that. it's I think a lot of things were missed. i mean from 10 years old until you're 19, nobody notices that you're not sleeping and you might have other behaviors going on because I always was obsessive about certain things. And partly that was because my dad was a type A personality. So my parents always thought maybe it's that. But when I get upset, I tend to clean a lot.
00:24:32
Speaker
And I can't stop myself or I tend to like purge a lot of my items that I don't use. And that makes me feel good. But that's also a really unhealthy way of dealing with things. Well, that's, that's about exercising control right over your. Yeah. Cause it's the only thing that I can control at that time or I'll write like a lot. Um, like say in June, I was going through something really bad.
00:24:59
Speaker
I sent out 26 submissions that month, which is a lot. Yeah, it is. Goodness. Yeah. I was writing a lot and sometimes the insomnia gets really bad. Um, and I'm still working. I'll work for like three days and I won't sleep. And it's crazy. So even with all the pills that I'm on,
00:25:26
Speaker
I don't want to make any sort of judgment calls about the adults that were around you during childhood. But man, it would be nice to get to a point where things like trauma and PTSD are common
Failures of Therapy and PTSD Treatment Options
00:25:40
Speaker
knowledge. I mean, yeah, you you've repressed this thing that happened to you, which is I mean, that's knock knock PTSD calling. um And the idea that even after it became known what had happened to you that you weren't given like just baseline information and treatment about PTSD. I mean, I don't want to throw around the word, word malpractice, but that's, that's a big fumble from, from everyone who was supposed to have your back at that time.
00:26:15
Speaker
it's ah it's It's really disappointing to hear because the thing is, I mean, maybe not so much back then, but even now there are treatments for PTSD that actually work and help people and improve their lives. I cannot shut up about EMDR. I love it so much. And I maintain that I would not be in my current relationship without it because I was a flincher. You know, I grew up in a place where we would just get hit for reasons we did not understand at any time. And so anytime anyone reached for me, I would flinch because we weren't, you know, hugged. Nobody was like kissing us goodnight and stuff when we were kids. You know, it was any physical contact that we had was either medical or or violent. So I when I started hanging out with a man who treated me well, he'd go to put his arm around me and I and I would flinch and he would feel terrible about it.
00:27:08
Speaker
ah you know, and I'm like, No, no, it's not you. It's not you. I'm i'm just broken. I'm just, you know, I'm, I'm that that chewed up piece of gum. They used to tell girls not to be this person that's just been like, had all these awful things happen. And now I'm just this big broken lump of nothing. And it turned out that like, no, you're a person that you could get better. And there's ways to do that. And I don't think enough people know that I don't think enough people know that good mental health is even an option. That nothing can break you all the way that if you are still alive, it is possible to come back from it. Um, yeah, sorry, getting a little soapboxy there. that there But but it's it's just so huge because I i spent and I would imagine you to spent a fair bit of time just thinking, well, this is what life is. This kind of sucks. But I guess life just sucks for some people.
00:28:06
Speaker
And it it doesn't have to be that way. So, and and so you mentioned, um like, I know when I got diagnosed with ADHD, I made a pretty sharp shift from long form work to to short stories. And I ended up doing a lot more ah ah work for it. but But you're still writing both, right? You write long form and short form. Well, I'm starting to get into long because I want people to recognize my name more for myself. ah But I particularly really do love the short story form. And I don't know if that's just ADHD or if it's just me, but I think it really is an art that is getting lost.
00:28:54
Speaker
and I love flash fiction too. I find it really challenging to be able to do a good story in a short amount of time and I just I like anthologies. I love reading those before bed because I can just read one or two stories if I want to and then I can put the book down and I'm not up late going Oh my God, what's happening? I have to read another chapter when before i lord it's four o'clock in the morning. Yeah, definitely, definitely. um So, but but your book, ah For the Sake of Bridget, so that's that's a ah novel, it's a long form thing.
00:29:36
Speaker
Yeah, I guess they classify it as a novelette. It's almost a novella. And it was supposed to be um included in a B charity book, which there's been a lot of controversy on on the internet and Facebook. So I had that going on. And it just it that anthology didn't go anywhere. And I felt that my story needed to be put somewhere.
00:30:06
Speaker
And ah I really feel for the bees, and I felt the story was good enough. So I was going to self-publish it, but then I found Unveiling Nightmares, and I had them publish it instead. So I did that. Ooh, loud noise. Oh, sorry. Somebody came into the kitchen. Sorry.
00:30:29
Speaker
Yeah, ah so it. I guess I'm a little fuzzy on the whole like what is considered novel length versus a novelette or a novella. I know people argue about it during the nano every year like, hey, that's not a novel. How dare you? um How long is it?
00:30:47
Speaker
well I'm fuzzy on that too, but usually a novella, as I understand it, is less than 40,000 words, a novel starts around 40,000 words, a long short story can be 10 to 12,000 words, and a novelette can be like, I think 12 to 20,000 words, and flash fiction goes anywhere from
00:31:19
Speaker
Well, if you talk to people 500 only or they'll say 500 to 1500.
00:31:29
Speaker
Okay. Well, that's wild. Yeah. Yeah. I get so confused. I have to look it up every time because somebody will say, Oh, you have a magazine. Do you take dribbles? fuck is a drabble? I don't know. I think people might be 200, but I'm not really clear on that. I think I see I thought a drabble was 100. But there's also this weird rule where you can't use the same word twice. And I know, right? That's just mind games at that point. Like I'm intrigued by it. But I don't think I would seek it out to read. I don't think that that's that's like as a reader, I don't think that's a selling point for me.
00:32:09
Speaker
There's microfiction, too. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, and the thing is, like, for the magazine, for for my mag, we um don't pay by the word. We pay by the piece. And that's basically why we do it, because I don't want to send the message that this poetry is less valuable.
00:32:28
Speaker
than a 10,000 word short story because it's not. If it knocks my socks off, i I want it and I want to publish it and I don't want to have to count words to find out what its value is because the number of words is not where the value is. I agree. I think sometimes publishers focus too much on that. And the other thing I don't like Um, and I am part of these groups, unfortunately, because I really liked the idea of the magazine, but I hate it when people have a closed group sometimes and nobody knew is ever allowed in because I feel like then it's just a popularity contest.
00:33:11
Speaker
and it just becomes a click. So if you do allow new people to try to get in, that's great. But if it's just the same people and nobody ever, ever, ever is even allowed to try to get into the group, that's really awful. Oh, yeah. I didn't even know that was happening. Yeah, I know. Happening right under my nose? and It can happen sometimes. And sometimes like you can suggest somebody And if they think they're good enough, then they'll let them in. But if they don't think they're good enough, then they won't let them in. And it's frustrating. And I could name a magazine, but I won't because I don't want to give because I don't want to cause any controversy. Well, it doesn't sound like you'd be the one causing it. But yeah, I get that. I mean, we
00:34:06
Speaker
I try to not name drop people if I can help it. But I mean, you know, we had an issue with somebody in the in the community that was they were doing a little smack talk and I was really concerned about it and I think this might even be related to the anthology that you had mentioned earlier, you know, this this person. and Yeah, it's it's this situation what the Well, the thing is that the person in question has been in the industry a lot longer than I have. And they've worked with much bigger names than I have. So when this person came out and accused me of ah what what was the phrase, a campaign of terrorism, an ongoing campaign of terror. Like, first of all, I am not motivated enough to engage in an ongoing campaign of productivity. I just don't have it in me, let alone ah terrorizing someone. That is just not who I am as a person.
Community, Trust, and Personal Boundaries
00:34:58
Speaker
I'm not motivated enough for that. Just ask Don Jr. Or don't. But um but but when that happened,
00:35:06
Speaker
I was terrified because, you know, when you don't have a name for yourself, anything that happens can be the thing that people remember you for. Exactly. And I didn't want to be the the horror version of like the Hawk-Taw girl or whatever. Like i if people know who I am, I want it to be for something that I'm proud of. And I was actually, I felt really fortunate because anyone who contacted me about what happened was coming from a place of, Oh yeah, man, don't, don't worry about this. You're fine. We got you. People know this isn't true. You know, this other person, that too is a history whatever. And I was so like touched and moved by that. Like people I barely knew were like, no, no, don't worry about it. It's just your turn. Yeah. I was editing for that person and they kicked me off.
00:36:00
Speaker
because I refused to not be friends with people that they didn't like. And then later on- I was like, yeah, yeah. Well, and when I had heard from that person who contacted me pretending to be their own legal representation, one of the things they said to me was, and you may not discuss this with Nora. And I'm like, what?
00:36:26
Speaker
how dare yes i'm very bad because apparently i accuse this person and this is funny i accuse this person of being a nazi and that has been put on the internet for everyone to see and i'm just like What? It worries me too, because I'm like, what if there's somebody that actually believes this? I mean, I'm not exactly like a huge name like Stephen King or anything. Exactly. but Thankfully, nobody really does. But still, I think it's sad because I really think that this person needs help. And nobody is helping. And
00:37:12
Speaker
It just makes me feel bad because the person needs help. Yeah, I agree. And I did talk to people that have known this person for quite a long time, actually, and had a lot of of respect for them. And for whatever reason, that has waned be because of of behavior like that. And it it is a shame. and And the thing is that there are various mental ah conditions that can bring about behavior that cause people to lose their social circle, you know, whether it's paranoia or constant anger, or, you know, whatever, man, unless you're, you know, some kind of cult leader, people just aren't going to stand for certain behaviors on a regular basis. And it is a shame because I would certainly
00:37:59
Speaker
Like, I mean, but whatever I encounter, like super angry people or paranoid people on the internet, I'm like, damn, they must be so unhappy. That must suck to feel that way, to feel that like that's what's going on in the world. Like, if you thought half of your country was molesting children or eating babies or something, like, how would you even function? Like, I don't know how, I don't know how how that can happen. And it's a pretty sad state of affairs.
00:38:29
Speaker
But in the end, the only person that I really get to work on is is me and and anybody else that like that i I live with who asks for my help.
00:38:40
Speaker
you know i can't I think i'm I'm trying to step away from caring a whole lot about people that aren't going to care back. And it's a tough thing to do because anytime you have to extract yourself from a situation, there's guilt, there's those little voices in your head that are like, oh, what makes you think you're so special that you shouldn't have to deal with blah, blah, blah, you know, or it's it's just, ah it it feels like there's always a cost when you stand up for yourself in front of, you know, in it in with regard to other people. I know, you're always seen as
00:39:19
Speaker
being defensive and being whiny and... Emotional. Don't be emotional. Especially if you're a woman. Yep, yep, yep. So okay, now I know that your book, I've read some reviews on it for the sake of Brigid, and ah part of the the theme is is one of revenge.
00:39:42
Speaker
yeah I had a my foray into paganism was actually a phase. um I wanted to learn a whole lot about it and see if it fit into my life. And I i don't think it it really did in most ways, but I am not really remembering Brigid being a vengeful goddess. What's the story there? She isn't really, she's more of the goddess of the hearth and more about love, but she is the goddess of bees. And in my story, one of the neighbors, because they're feuding neighbors who get into this horrible, horrible thing where they hate each other, and they just go back and forth doing these really bad things,
00:40:24
Speaker
And the character Lydia gets to the point where she goes over to Nora's house, who is a beekeeper, and she sets all of the beehives on fire. And- Hold up, hold up. You gave a character your name. I did with an H instead of- That is, that is balls out. I've never, never done such a thing. I mean, obviously my name's a little weirder, but I love that so much. I love your name. I think it's cool.
00:40:54
Speaker
Well, it's tough when you're a kid and you don't have any self-esteem and all you really want is to be normal. it's It's kind of a thing to be saddled with. But yeah, I grew into it eventually. I embraced my oddness, so it it ended up working out in the end.
00:41:09
Speaker
Hey, i they had that series Busy Body Nora when I was younger. So ah I hated that series at the library. but Now I like my name. I was named after my grandma, but I was named after my grandma.
00:41:29
Speaker
but But back to the story, so Lydia goes to Nora's house and burns all of her beehives, which is when Brigid gets angry and shows up because she's also the goddess of bees. And she's like, well, you know, I've had enough because she's also a nature goddess and a nurturer and mother nature. and And with everything else that has happened, she's just like, okay, it's gone too far.
00:41:56
Speaker
Now you've gone after my bees, which is one of my symbols. You've done this horrible act and i I know how horrible it was for my bees to die this way because, yeah, I researched how bees die and and it's pretty icky and pretty horrible for the way that they look after they die and stuff. Really? I know nothing about it. so So she shows up and she's just like, this is it. I'm just so tired of you two. I'm just going to exact revenge, which is not what she normally does. But after that, she's like, I've had it. And she just goes on this rampage because
00:42:38
Speaker
She's the goddess of bees and she's like, that's it. So that's how she became who she was. And since it was supposed to be like ah a nature vengeance, I wanted to go for something that had to do, it had to be a bee thing because it was a bee charity anthology.
00:42:56
Speaker
And I love writing about goddesses and gods and mythology. So I was like, well, what am I going to do? So I looked up all these different goddesses and everything, and I settled on Brigid because I didn't know she was a goddess of bees. And I was like, well, what would she do if? Because that's how a lot of my stories start with the one question, what if? And so that's how that story came about. Wow. I love it.
00:43:26
Speaker
So um I think it it sounds like, I guess what I was thinking about was if you have like a nurturing feminine presence that sufficiently provoked, that's what, I mean, are are you making a commentary about nurturing women in general when when you tell that story?
Community, Nature, and Writing Influence
00:43:50
Speaker
I think more of like, I'm making a commentary that you don't really have control over nature, that nature has control over us. And also that we should be respectful of nature because it can turn on us at any time and bad things can happen. And just- Well, yeah, we're we're kind of getting slapped in the face with that right now. And there's a lot of people who still don't get it.
00:44:23
Speaker
And just in general, that we should value bees and that just in general, people can be really, really horrible to each other for the smallest little thing. And and we should be better to each other than we are, especially the neighbors that we live around. it's It's so different. I mean, we don't really even get to know our neighbors most of the time. We don't even talk to them anymore.
00:44:51
Speaker
And I find that hard because where I grew up, we knew our neighbors and we talked to them all the time. and And now it seems like nobody wants to talk to each other. And it's weird if you talk to each other, which is an odd concept to me. i Yeah, I have to agree with that. I grew up in a neighborhood with like lots of different families with kids and everybody had at least a passing acquaintanceship with everybody. And you knew their names and whose kids were whose.
00:45:20
Speaker
um I've lived in this apartment with my husband for almost 20 years. Right around 20 years we've been here, I could not tell you the name of anyone else in this building. Not one person. you know Even when I look at people's mail mail and I'm like, oh, well, that's not me. So I don't care who it is. you know Look through the packages or whatever. But yeah, and and i don't I don't love that. i mean Because obviously you don't get to choose who lives near you.
00:45:49
Speaker
but I mean, it it seems like you could strike up a conversation with just about anyone and find some sort of common ground to agree with, even if it's like, you know, this weather sucks. Like, there's always a path to having some sort of relationship to the people around you just because we're all humans, you know? But at the same time, we've all met humans and some of them suck and we're all really busy and, you know, you don't always want to take the chance.
00:46:20
Speaker
So it could be a tough line to to walk, but yeah, i think I think you're right. I think people in general do better when they have community, not just on the internet, but like in real life in a physical sense. And I think we tend to care more than about our neighborhood and the way it it looks and the trees and the plants and the playgrounds.
00:46:47
Speaker
in common areas where people can meet them because we do want to socialize then. So we take care of those places. Whereas if we don't care about socializing, then we don't seem to take pride in things like that as much. And we let those things go.
00:47:10
Speaker
So you don't get community gardens and you get a lot of littering and you get a lot of people who don't care about the trees that are in their yard, which are really important to the environment. and And people don't care about the bees and things like that. And you get people using a lot of bad fertilizers because they don't educate themselves and just, I think just so much comes from not being a real community. Yeah, I think that's that's really accurate between that, ah like the the lack of community, because for the oligarchs, it's much better for them if we all hate each other, if we don't talk to each other, you know, similar to bosses that don't want anyone to discuss their salary. You know, they don't want people to sit around and say, hey, look, we're kind of getting screwed.
00:48:07
Speaker
And there are some really small steps we could take to have people screw us less. You know, if we grew our own groceries, it wouldn't cripple us every time they jack up food prices for no reason, stuff like that. But the thing is that at its most basic, it requires people to trust each other and rely on each other. And there are so many forces right now that are so, so opposed to that.
00:48:33
Speaker
for their own reasons, you know, this whole divide and conquer thing where they get all the proles furious at each other and pointing fingers and and freaking out about social issues when really, you know, I mean, you could to turn your your neighborhood into stone soup, you know, that that could have happened during COVID. We could have just all got together and said, let's all pitch in and figure this out. And we didn't. Instead, we fist fought each other over toilet paper.
00:49:01
Speaker
and called people communists for going to the doctor and getting vaccinated. so yeah yeah it's ah It's pretty frustrating. Now, let me ask you this. As someone who practices witchcraft, what can you do for the rest of us? I think I've been doing a lot of praying to the goddess about Being more of a service to my community and trying to help my community as much as I can and trying to be as respectful of nature as I can. Trying to be as understanding as I can of my fellow man and realizing that they're just like me. Maybe they're having a bad day when I run into them.
00:49:58
Speaker
instead of just thinking, Oh, that person's an asshole. Maybe I'm meeting them on a day when they just got fired from work and I don't know that. So that's why they're really bitchy when they're at the grocery store, you know, or maybe somebody died and they're having a really hard time dealing with it. Um, as a, as a witch, I meet in a park around a really old, Oh,
00:50:26
Speaker
And every single time that we're there, we you know give a little tithing to the tree and we thank the mother goddess for what we do have in nature. And all of us are trying to forage and trying to make more green places in our neighborhoods and make people more aware of what they can do and trying to educate them.
00:50:53
Speaker
And I think that's really important, especially for young kids to make them more interested in the environment instead of them for them to think it's not a place to be and just to stay indoors. Because I remember going outside and not coming in until the lights were going on, yeah you know, or my mom called my name and then I knew it was dinner time. And now kids are like,
00:51:22
Speaker
what? You're sending me outdoors to play? What am I supposed to do out there? There's no video games outside. Yeah, that's, that's huge. Because I know when I was hanging out with ah with witches, so much of it was about ritual and ceremony and tradition and getting into the old traditions. And I don't like I find all that interesting. But I don't necessarily think that looking back hundreds of years is the way to to fix anything that's happening today. And it sounds like what you have been up to is a lot more proactive and a lot more community spirit based. Because I would also say that being a solitary witch seems,
00:52:09
Speaker
ah ah the the phrase that comes to mind is is up your own ass. um not not like the you you but the yeah I mean, obviously, that's that's a very judgmental statement. But I i do question the the the usefulness of doing something. I mean, you're like a personal spirituality that doesn't extend beyond yourself, I guess is is what I'm getting at. But You know, some people, ah even Christians do that, that thing where they say they have a personal relationship with Jesus. And and I always want to ask whether or not Jesus is aware of of that. But that's because I'm disdainful towards so many religions and the way that they're practiced. I'm not religious. I would say that I'm not. I'm pagan and I am solitary.
00:53:01
Speaker
And that is because covens are a power hungry thing where everybody's trying to be the leader. So kinding yeah, my pagan group is, I mean, some of them are pagan and they're also Christian or they're pagan and they're Buddhist. and We pretty much accept anyone. It's just, we get together to celebrate the full moon and it's really, um, some of us will grow too many tomato plants.
00:53:28
Speaker
So we'll bring tomato plants and be like, Hey, who wants a tomato plant? Or we grew too much of this herb. Hey, who would like some of this? So it's, it's really nice because we do share things and we have, uh, events and parties and it's not, it's not a power thing. And we're not about tools, really expensive tools. We believe that.
00:53:53
Speaker
You know, just being in nature is being spiritual. You don't need to buy like fancy wands. Well, yeah, that will just cripple you. I mean, people what when I was was hanging out with pagans, they were really super smug about that. Like, oh, well, if you were sincere, you would have blah, blah, blah.
00:54:13
Speaker
That's gardenian. I'm not less sincere because I can't drop $300 on crystals today. Yeah, yeah it's the gardenian and that's the very, very old following of witches where you have to have very expensive tools, very expensive wands and the ceremony is really, really long and really flowery and I guess I'm what you call a dirty witch. All I need this is me and myself and out in nature and teeth or a coil would be horrified.
00:54:50
Speaker
That's how I describe myself. And when I do tarot, like I just use my kitchen table. I don't have anything fancy. I don't have a crystal ball or a ton of crystals and or a ton of candles. It's like you really don't need any of that. All you need is yourself to connect to something. It's it's the same with any path.
00:55:11
Speaker
It's just you, I mean, a religion is just a tool to follow some type of creation. And that isn't faith. Faith is something totally different than religion. So i'm religion just perverts things and tries to control people, in my opinion, and I'm against that. so Cool. Well, I'm glad that that we talked about this. I actually did not know that ah You were a solitary witch or I probably wouldn't have set up your own ass. um but
00:55:47
Speaker
Whoops. that's okay It's fine. Well, but I mean, I think that um like any religion can get into that with, you know, with the trappings that that you fall into that, like, I mean, the first time someone gave me a a crucifix that was solid silver.
00:56:08
Speaker
And everybody that i that saw it couldn't shut up about, oh, it's so beautiful. It's this, it's that, it's the most majestic thing I'd ever seen. I didn't want to wear it, man. It was a half naked man being tortured and I didn't want it around my neck. And and i the the whole thing was so macabre. And then for a while we had to go to Catholic school and it was this whole thing about Like i didn't I didn't realize that there were people who took religion literally. I really thought it was like Santa Claus. It was something they told kids to make them shut up and behave. So as an adult, looking at other adults and being like, what do you are you are you literally saying you think that person has a demon inside of them? Because I don't want to, I mean, that's that's ten terrifying. It's terrifying to me. that an adult person would think that it is the stuff of horror stories. I was in a ah therapy group once, and one of the women would talk all the time about demons. And I thought that she was just you know being philosophical about it, like how people talk about it addiction as a disease that wants to kill you. um you know So I thought it was all figurative. And then one day she warned me that when she looked at my husband, she saw a demon inside of him, and that if I needed help,
00:57:30
Speaker
you know, neutralizing him that I should let her know. And I mean, that's terrifying. That that goes well beyond like, you know, tithing even when you can't afford it and stuff like that is and and again, she was a Christian. So that's a major religion in this country. A lot of people are doing that. And yeah, I have to say I was raised in the Methodist Church um from the time that I was baptized until I finally stopped believing it around 14. And that's when I started exploring world religions. And then I became an atheist. And then after that, I sort of was like, maybe I might be pagan. And for a while I thought about it. And then I was like, maybe I might be a witch. I don't know.
00:58:28
Speaker
And then finally I was like, yeah, I'm a witch. So I've had an interesting journey, but it was a spiritual journey and my mom was supportive of it. But my dad, like he's, he's gone already. He would have just died. Wow. Yeah. He would not have liked it. So it it was interesting that I went from Methodist to atheist to questioning everything and then decided on this. And I honestly, I left the Methodist Church because I didn't like the questions that they answered um about the way that gays were treated and I didn't like having to read the same prayers as everybody else at the same time. And I didn't like being told that I was a sinner and that I needed to ask
00:59:20
Speaker
to be worth worthy of God's forgiveness. There were so many things that just really bothered me. I didn't like it that women couldn't run a service. I didn't like the amount of money that you had to give every week. There were so many things wrong. I saw the pastor being really corrupt.
00:59:40
Speaker
I mean, he promised that he would pay the organist back for the piano light, and then he never did. And I was like, what? This is Christianity? I'm so out of here. and Well, and that's why if if you are not sure whether or not people really believe what they're saying, like as a kid, I would watch the behavior of these Christians that would say, oh, you should be kind and nice all the time. And then they would call their kids assholes right in front of us.
01:00:09
Speaker
you like You're not doing the thing you said you were doing. like I had a friend who had a friend and they were supposedly a Christian couple and they were engaged and they couldn't shut up about how like bad it was not to be Christian and it's so important and this and that. They were having all kinds of sex before they were married.
01:00:29
Speaker
like I mean, I don't mind that you're doing that. I don't think there's anything wrong with that, but I'm pretty sure your guy in your book and all of what you guys do say you're not supposed to do that. Well, why are you in a church that says not to do that? If you're going to go ahead and do it like I don't. That's that's one of the things that just blindsides me about Christianity is that even at its best.
01:00:55
Speaker
People are preaching things that they have no intention to practice. Now, I have a friend who is an Episcopalian minister. I have tremendous respect for him. I believe that his faith is absolutely sincere. I think deep down he's an atheist. I don't think he believes that there's a God. I think he uses the church as a way to encourage people to live better lives. And if that's what it takes, I'm for it, but it'd be nice if you didn't have to play mind games with people to get them to be nice to each other.
01:01:24
Speaker
Yeah, I think the church has perverted what Jesus really said. Jesus was a political figure and he was just trying to get people to be nicer. And I think, you know,
01:01:38
Speaker
The Romans didn't really like that because he was trying to take money away from the rich and he cared about the poor and he cared about prostitutes and he was saying, hey, this is wrong. We should not be doing things this way. But then along came people who wanted power and money. And so they used it to create the church and then they perverted what he said. And now we have these weird churches going on. I think if he were alive today, he'd be like, no, no, this isn't what I meant. And I think it's really hypocritical if you look at the Catholic Church and they're all like, yeah, yeah I mean, they have so much gold on altars and everything, but they want you to help the poor. It's just like,
01:02:28
Speaker
What, what is going on? Like, why do you have that? But you talk about helping the poor and how you need to give more, but you have that sitting in your church. It's like, and ah so I separate like the church from the man and I separate the church as being like not faith, but being the religion and the tool that has been corrupted but to follow the faith. And that's how I look at it because I really think Jesus would not have said those things. And plus a lot of the the Bible was written after he was gone. So I think he would have been like, hey man, um what are you dudes doing? I know i don't think he would have been very happy. Well, I mean,
01:03:26
Speaker
I don't think he would have been that white either. Like that the Jesus that people have been taught is not really, yeah yeah, I think we could probably talk all day about that. um What I do want to focus on though is that, like you you mentioned your dad and that he would not really be down with ah your your journey through paganism. um And I know a lot of people will say that like, oh, of course I don't believe in witchcraft. Of course that's not real.
01:03:55
Speaker
um But the the need for men to stomp out witches and witchcraft and any sort of woman who is self-possessed and has power and agency, um what what are your thoughts about that in particular with regard to um to paganism?
Power Dynamics in Covens and Solitary Practice
01:04:16
Speaker
Because I know there are still the problems that you see with ah other religions in paganism.
01:04:24
Speaker
you know people being exploitive, people trying to get money out of you, people trying to make themselves a little harem, you know whatever. um is Is that part of what led you to be a solitary practitioner? um No. What led me to be a solitary practitioner is really because covens, um I don't really trust covens because it is really a big power play that everybody wants to be able to lead a ceremony and people are very judgmental and they want to be the high priestess and they want to get to that point where they have out all the power to lead the ceremonies and I don't think that that is the way that it should be um and also
01:05:15
Speaker
There are some groups that are into sharing sex magic, and I am not okay with that. I'm okay with being sky-clad, which my group doesn't do, but i'm I'm not okay with doing a bunch of sex stuff in front of other people. And there are some groups that do do that. I have not really seen them.
01:05:42
Speaker
But I've heard that they still exist. I don't have a problem with sex rights between you and the person that you're with. you know and But I think that's a private thing, not a group thing. Well, and certainly consent is an issue with things like that because people sometimes forget that like bringing people into your sexual situation is It also has to be consensual, like people that do things in public.
01:06:13
Speaker
Everybody that can see you needs to be in on that. Otherwise, there's you know that's not okay. It's not consensual. It's it's borderline abusive. Those kinds of things are not are not pure. you know that There's ah a sexual component there that that exists separately from anything religious or spiritual that's happening when you get into like open sex in a circle.
01:06:40
Speaker
Um, I want actually to, to move on to another topic if we can.
Upcoming Horror Novel: Turtles and Experiments
01:06:46
Speaker
Um, you've got a book coming up called flesh eating turtles in my head. I got to know more. Uh, I encountered snapping turtles in a lake once when I was at camp and they'll mess you up. They they're, they're nothing to to sneeze at. Um, just, just a regular old snapping turtle. So what's going on here?
01:07:08
Speaker
Okay, um this is kind of a schlocky campy type of Splatterpunk extreme horror novel where there is a lab and they are using CRISPR in science to try to figure out how to better use the growth hormone that they are with cows to see if they can use that with humans and with other animals and they ran out of rats because of other different groups that are testing. So they ended up with turtles and what they don't realize is that the turtles are very dangerous and some people that work there that are very low on the totem pole
01:08:01
Speaker
they end up taking some of the turtles out of there, which is pretty horrible because some of the turtles get away and the food chain is affected because when one of the turtle bites and another, they end up passing along that DNA that is in their saliva and they just grow. So all these animals grow, so they become like part turtle and part larger, whatever they are.
01:08:30
Speaker
and they just take over and they just end up biting one other. So they're biting all themselves and the turtles and all the different animals and they just get larger and larger and they just go on a raging campy eating humans and hunting everything. oh yike yeah It's kind of like them and those other 1950s, 1960s things where you have very, very large large animals running around, eating everybody. Well, that was ah like a 70s theme too, because there was Day of the Animals, there was um The Prophecy that had Armand de Santé in it, and it had those like bears that were getting the mercury poisoning or something. Yeah. All big and mean. do Do you watch a lot of those like CGI B movies?
01:09:20
Speaker
I do, and actually I love researching and putting science, if I can, into my stories because it makes it more believable. And I talked to somebody who actually works in a lab, and she said that um I had understood CRISPR well enough that this actually, the CRISPR, the way that I used it, she's like, that actually could happen, the way that you use it. So I was like, yay!
01:09:45
Speaker
and ah Yeah, that is great. Well, the thing is that the more scientifically grounded the story is, the more fun and terrifying it is when it all goes to hell. Yeah. I love that. So I have to ask, I bring up this movie a lot because I can't get over it. There's like two B movies that are my all time faves. there' but There's Velocipaster, which has Voltaire in it. Have you seen that one?
01:10:13
Speaker
Because they're not. They're working on a ah sequel, actually. Velocipastre is must see. I mean, it's it's even worth watching if you can only see it with commercials. Like it it is well worth sitting down to to see it. It has Voltaire in it and I love Voltaire. So cool. But also Inhumanwich.
01:10:35
Speaker
I haven't seen that one either. Inhumanwich, it was on YouTube. I don't know if it still is, but it's it really looks like it was made for about $45. The backgrounds are like poster boards with drawn on with Sharpie. It's so funny. And everyone involved is having the best time. Like it's there is such joy in the making of this film. And I mean, I can't because it's about astronauts and they in no way had the budget to do a movie about astronauts and they're in space. And and yeah, something happens to one of their um apparently their their wives made their lunches before they went off into space because that's how astronauts works. Right. um And
01:11:20
Speaker
Yeah, so there's some kind of mysterious Romero-esque radiation that impacts their sandwiches and they become carnivorous sandwiches. what Well, what's your favorite B-movie? My favorite B-movie is Frank and Fish. Oh, nice. Okay. Yeah, I could certainly appreciate that. Are you Sharknado Fan?
01:11:47
Speaker
Yes! I've only seen the first one, but yes. Yeah, I actually got a signed a script from Thunder 11. He was he was putting them up on eBay and a body of mine bought it for me. And that guy cracks me up because he wrote, I think, the first four Sharknados. And then after that, they take a giant nosedive because the new writers made the movies ridiculous. You know, the Sharknados are in like colonial America and Ben Franklin and shit, but they're not funny.
01:12:20
Speaker
You know, it it can't just be ridiculous. It also has to make you laugh. Um, and obviously in sharks have to be in the weather and and eat people. Um, so, so what, what do you, uh, what are you working on right now? What are you writing these days? so Um, I'm actually working on a story with Thomas Stewart and it is a dark fantasy romance that,
01:12:48
Speaker
There are fallen angels. One of the angels realizes that he is an angel. The female the female angel, she doesn't realize it. she's um She's kind of just going through the motions of being a human and she's finding all these feathers and the guy angels following her. There are demons that want to keep them apart because if they're together, they might be able to save the world. um The male is named Adam and the female is named Evelyn. um We might throw in some more biblical stuff, we're not sure. ah Let's see, I have a collection that I'm doing called Safic Divinity, which is just like it sounds, it's all woman, sapphic
01:13:47
Speaker
lesbian, um, it's mostly goddesses that have interacted somehow with humans. And then I am working, I just got put into the author syndicate for thrill ride magazine. So that's kind of cool. Cause I've never worked in the spy fast cars gadget, James Bond world. That'll be fun. Um,
01:14:15
Speaker
I'm going to be doing a couple of Splatterpunk anthologies for unveiling nightmares, which we haven't decided on names. One I think is called Splatterdome. I'm not sure what the other one is. And then I'm working on a witch story with Hedy Johansson. And it's about a witch who was executed during the Salem witch um trials and she has come back and is living in the modern day and loggers have come to her family's ancestral land and they're clear cutting everything and she's very angry and she meets two young people one who is reincarnated and is actually a witch and doesn't know it and another is her boyfriend and there's when to go in the story too.
01:15:10
Speaker
So ah those are the things that I am working on right now. Wow, that's so much. And you have writing partners? You have people that you write with? This is the first time I'm actually writing with anybody. um I also have a witch story that I plotted out myself that's fantasy. So we'll, we'll see what that comes out to. But I've never written with anybody, but I decided that I wanted to write with two people.
01:15:35
Speaker
um around the same time. So and actually both of them are going really well and I like the experience a lot. um Usually I'll write and get to a part in the plot where things are going really well and I get exhausted and I'm not sure what should happen next and I hand it over to the other person and they'll write until they're like okay now I don't know what should happen and then I take over And that's usually how that's going or we'll decide to write 1500 words or two chapters and then pass it back and forth. Wow. It's working out really well. It's um just trying to blend the voices and make sure that you keep the plot points the same so they don't change. So wait, so when you do that, are you writing first person or third person?
01:16:32
Speaker
Um, writing third person. Um, at one point I was writing first person for the one that I was working on the angel on with Thomas Stewart, but we decided it was, it was too hard to write first person for the two characters switching back and forth. So we went to third person. Okay. Though it would be interesting to do a first person and flip back and forth between two people.
01:17:02
Speaker
I might want to do that at some point. Oh, I love that. I have a couple of of novels that are multiple perspective, first person, just because I like to kind of like the Sopranos does. I really like to explore how people misunderstand each other and how that, you know, how that can ripple out into various types of consequences.
01:17:24
Speaker
um Let me ask you this, if somebody is completely unfamiliar with your published works, where should they start?
Where to Find Nora's Work
01:17:33
Speaker
With my published works, I think where they should start is with Eighth Tower Publishing, which is going to probably say Eighth Tower Bandcamp. I know that's going to be confusing, but the reason it says that is because every single single anthology that Raphael Pizella puts out
01:17:55
Speaker
has an accompanies CD that goes with the anthology. So you can either buy like the book and the CD or you can just buy the book. So that's probably the best place to find me. Um, I've done two podcasts of my book, like of stories for the wicked library. I have done three podcasts for sudden fictions podcasts.
01:18:22
Speaker
The Wicked Library and Sudden Fictions podcasts are free, so you can find me on there. And and i I think that would be the best place. um For the sake of Bridget, if you have Kindle Unlimited is free, and it is only 99 cents on godless.com. Oh, wow.
01:18:44
Speaker
Do you have a link tree so I could like put all that together for people? Yeah, I do have a link tree. Okay, cool. Then we'll put that in the description so that anybody that wants that information will have it handy. um yeah we're We're actually nearing um the end of our question list. Is there anything that you wanted to talk about that we have not covered?
01:19:09
Speaker
Well, I don't know if you had any questions for me about submission reading and how that goes or and he anything. Oh, we could definitely talk about that because I've i've actually, I mean, i we don't get a real robust lot of submissions when I was running eHorror.
01:19:27
Speaker
We had like a team of people that would go through the slush pile and I wouldn't look at anything unless the slush pile people said it was good. is that what Is that what you're doing? You go through like the this the whole like everything to see what's what's worth picking out and pursuing? um Usually I get the slush pile, but sometimes I get some from the editor that says, this is priority. We've published this person before, read this. Generally with the slush pile, the rule that we have is you go through the first 10 pages. If you are interested in the first 10 pages, then you read another 10 and then you tell the editor, yes, and they will have somebody else read the entire thing before any type of contract is signed. um It's really, really painful when you get things that don't have very good grammar.
01:20:25
Speaker
or people that don't know a good dialogue that can really suck. um I'm usually the only one that does a lot of reading for them. I sometimes read up to 300 manuscripts per season, which is a lot, but I really enjoy it. I've been working there for over four years now.
01:20:50
Speaker
that's That's at Journalstone? Yeah, Journalstone trepidatio. Yeah. So is that that's Christopher Payne? Is that the guy running things over there? Scarlett LJ is who I'm, she's my boss. Okay. yeah i did I was with ah in an anthology through Journalstone years and years ago, and that was my contact Christopher Payne. And I thought that he was the head guy over there at the time, but that seems that was a while ago.
01:21:19
Speaker
I'm not sure, but I think he still is. And I know that they're out of Chicago, which is pretty close to me. Aren't you in Chicago? I'm in Ann Arbor. Ah, OK. Why did I think you were in Chicago? oh I went to Chicago for my honeymoon, and I can't shut up about it, because I got to see a ah Komodo dragon in person. Oh, my gosh. That's so cool. And a green anaconda, man. That aquarium is there, man. It is the shit.
01:21:49
Speaker
Yeah. The, the aquarium is very cool. I've gone there too. Like I'm an hour and a half away from Chicago. So I am very blessed and we have a lot of stuff here in Milwaukee. That's cool too. We have our own opera and orchestra and theater and a lot of stuff. Everybody thinks we're just cows and beer.
01:22:14
Speaker
But we're more than that. Yeah, I mean, my associations with Milwaukee are like Happy Days and Laverne and Shirley. that's That's pretty much what I know about Milwaukee. Everybody says that. Well, do you have any questions for me? Because sometimes guests like to ask me things. Are you still doing your soaps? Because I remember you were doing soaps for a while. Oh, my God. I am getting my ass kicked by Halloween orders because we do the trick or treat packs, which are the little and It's just little gash soaps in a lot of different shapes, skulls and body parts and brains and little tombstones and stuff. And we put them into little bundles so people can hand them out for tricks or treats. and Wow. Yeah. And it's great because the thing is so many kids have allergies and so many schools have rules where you can't bring peanuts, you can't bring tree nuts, chocolate, gluten you know sometimes, or you get kids, you know diabetic kids that just sit there and can't have any candy and that sucks.
01:23:13
Speaker
So, giving out little soaps is fun. and and it's The thing is, when you give out soaps, it's not like you're giving out pennies and people think you just forgot it was Halloween. you know It's still a fun, colorful, festive little thing. Which, i mean granted, soap is probably not quite as good as a Snickers, but if you can't have a Snickers, then yeah.
01:23:35
Speaker
we actually have a separate coffee for our soap site for Scared Soapless. And so that's where you can find not just soaps, but all of our lip balms, which are delicious. And we do Nail Lacker too. We have a couple of great shades of Cat Lady Blue just in time to be a a cat lady who likes blue things. um Wow, I didn't know you did Nail Lacker. Is that like new?
01:24:02
Speaker
It is. It is. We added that to the line just over the summer, actually. I got a bunch of stuff and tried it out to see if I was good at it and if the stuff I could get from my supplier was of high quality. And after about three or four months of wearing my own stuff exclusively um and really digging it, I did open up a line. We have a set of pride.
01:24:22
Speaker
nails so you could get five different colors at a lower price, which is nice. um wow We have stuff that changes colors, stuff that glows in the dark. um So yeah, and that's coffee ah coffee dot.com slash scared soapless.
01:24:38
Speaker
And coffee is KO-FI, just like we have one for sometimes hilarious horror. But we we keep them separate because, you know, sometimes I do take time off from the soap business. We were off for a while in 2022 after I got sick. And then this is the first year that we really came just roaring back with new products and stuff. So, and we also have, like we had a Hollywood sculptor make us soap molds. Our ah Reggie Nadler.
01:25:04
Speaker
Um, we have Kurt Barlow from the first Salem slot, you know, the original or the, the Nosferatu looking guy. We have a soap of that dude that was, it's from a mold carved by the guy. Uh, you know, that movie, uh, the black phone, the guy that does the masks for that movie, he, he did our, our Kurt Barlow. And he also did, um, the Zuni fetish from trilogy of terror.
01:25:28
Speaker
We have Blinky the Three-Eyed Fish. um So we have some really cool custom soaps that you just cannot get anywhere
Conclusion and Madlib Game
01:25:36
Speaker
else. They don't exist because there's like one or two molds and we have them. So yeah, and it it's so fun. You branched out since you first started. I remember when you first started that. That's a lot.
01:25:50
Speaker
Yeah, we've been we've been kicking ass at it, even with COVID, because we were just about to be in restaurants and bars, and then COVID hit, which super sucked. um But, uh, but yeah, yeah, we're, we're back and we are still doing it, but guess what? It is time for the Madlib. So I hope you are ready for this. Um, you know, Madlibs, right? You know, like how this all works. Okay. Cool. Well, then let's start with adjectives. I need one, two, three, four adjectives, please. Cool.
01:26:29
Speaker
Mysterious, fuzzy, pointy. Okay. I need a celebrity. Madonna. Nice. Nice. And ah let's see. One, two, three, four, five, six plural nouns. Okay. Sexes. but Just came to mind.
01:26:58
Speaker
Dinosaurs.
01:27:01
Speaker
Dinosaurs. Uh-huh. Sharks. Aliens. Pizzas. What, I think that leaves one more? Yep, one more. Forks. Okay, and one singular noun. Nope, I lied too. I need two different singular nouns.
01:27:26
Speaker
Plants and microwave.
01:27:32
Speaker
And a number. Nine. Okay, this is called Pizza Party. Clerk, hello Madonna's Pizza Shop, how can I help you?
01:27:48
Speaker
Girl, I am having a cool party and I would like to order enough pizza for nine mysterious pizzas. Oh wait, nine mysterious people. Okay. The clerk says, five large sexes should be enough. What dinosaurs would you like on them? Tonight's special pizza is topped with plant cheese, ew, fuzzy tomatoes, and green sharks.
01:28:14
Speaker
Girl, can you add sliced aliens and pointy onions too? Clerk can do. Since you're ordering more than 50 pizzas worth of food, you get free forks for dessert. Girl, thanks. And please hurry. We're so hungry, we could eat a microwave.
01:28:38
Speaker
Yes. Irreverent. I can't help it. I love Mad Libs. Nora, I am so glad that you could be here and that we could we could do this interview. This was a great conversation. So thank you so much.
01:28:52
Speaker
Thank you for having me. It was fun. Cool. Well, I'm glad. So and and thanks to everybody for listening. ah Don't forget to check us out on Ko-fi slash sometimes hilarious horror. When you support us there, you support the magazine and the podcast and everybody who submits. So it's huge. And we have a $2 level now.
01:29:16
Speaker
So for $2 a month, you can show us more love than that we could ever express thanks for. All right, so see everybody next week.