Transcript
Speaker: Greetings friends. Thank you for joining us on the Mentally Oddcast where each week our guests regale us with tales of the creative process through the lens of addiction, recovery, mental and emotional health, trauma, treatment, medication, all that there because we believe that no matter what you are going through, you are not alone and you can make art about it.
Speaker: Art helps. Find us on Ko-Fi, that's K-O-F-I, to support the podcast and get all the back issues of Sometimes Hilarious Horror Magazine.
Speaker: You are listening to the Mentally Oddcast. My name is Wednesday, leave Friday. Do find us on Ko-Fi, that's K-O-F-I, where we are sometimes hilarious horror. We can always use your support. This week, we are talking with Thorne and Cross. Oh, I'm so stoked. ah Tamara Thorne and Alistair Cross met.
Speaker: in an apocalyptic moment 15 years ago and have been collaborating ever since. They have produced two series, The Ravencrest Saga and The Spite House Chronicles, plus standalone horror novels including The Cliff House Haunting and Darling Girls, and they've also written the thriller Mother, which as you can imagine is my favorite. uh alistair cross writes the best-selling vampires of crimson cove series which uh book seven is arriving this fall um and then he's written a couple of uh standalones tamara thorne came on the scene in the early 2000s with bestsellers like haunted and moonfall and a bunch more
Speaker: She is currently writing The Spiral Sea, which is the next book in the Old Wives Tales series. And we talked about that a bunch when I had you on as a so like solo guest, Tamara.
Speaker: which Which you know, I'm not telling you that because you don't know it. I'm just saying. um All right, so so welcome you two. I'm so delighted to have you both here.
Speaker: delighted to be back. Well, you know, scheduling is always one of the trickiest parts of the show, even when it's just one guest. So getting the both of you here is a coup. I'm so pleased. i'm all So, you know, we always start by asking guests about the first horror movie that they remember seeing, but you've already been on before. So I know both of you. your So um I guess what I want to know this week is what is the most recent horror movie that you have seen and enjoyed?
Speaker: um i watched once again or once upon a time in hollywood the other night again because oh nice watching the manson family gets squished in the face and i don't feel guilty right i don't know that's horror or not is it horror um i would i would say that's probably horror adjacent i mean it's certainly bloody like a horror movie but ah a reality where steven parent gets to live that's that's good stuff right there Yeah, it's it's really fun just enjoying watching that violence and feeling good about yourself.
Speaker: Yeah, I feel that way about Inglorious Bastards. Oh, yeah. I watch it just just for that, for the Nazi stomping. Yeah, yeah, it's good. Because who doesn't love a little Nazi stomping? Well, I guess Nazis, but I'm not concerned with their... Yeah, they're all set arms. Yeah. All right. What about you, Alistair?
Speaker: Well, I'm trying to think of something new that I've seen. And, you know, I can't think of anything. Nothing comes to mind. The most recent that I've seen, and I watch it every year this season, is The Changeling. And, you know, the old nineteen eighty The George C. Scott one. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. um That's the most recent one that I watched. I watched it last night, but I watch it every year and it's not new, but ah I just, it's one of my favorites. It's just, it's got that creepy quiet, It's you so good. Yes, yes. Well, there are so many movies from that era that just have a very subtle, creepy, slow burn. um Burnt Offerings is one of my favorites from that era. You know, you got your Oliver Reed, your Karen Black, Betty Davis. I mean, that's that's good, good stuff right there. And yeah, the Changeling is kind of the same because you got George C. Scott. And isn't Marsha Mason in that one?
Speaker: I think briefly. Maybe. She's one of the historical society ladies. Yeah, i think so. I just watched it last night. You'd think I'd know this, but I don't. She was a minor one. Trish Vandiver is the one. he in the Yeah, that's who I keep thinking of.
Speaker: God, that's a good movie. And the music is really good, too. Yes. Yeah, there was such a care put into those those movies. Like, I love low-budget horror. Love it. yeah Made for TV horror. Even made for YouTube even better. yeah yeah yeah I don't... I think the score is one of those things that we've kind of lost in that that that. That type of movie that's made for a very small amount of money. They don't have someone sitting down and scoring it. It's all... You know, it's like Night of the Living Dead. Like, what do they have at the library that we do? Right. Oh, know I know. I was watching The Changeling last night just thinking, I'm like, I bet this really wasn't, I mean, there's, you know, like there's like some special effects and stuff like at the end, like with the fire and stuff like that. But like when he's sitting at the piano and the door opens by itself, I'm like, how much you want to bet somebody from the crew just like pushed the door? yeah yeah It's amazing what you can do with just, and I like that. I like that, you know,
Speaker: much more than you know explosions and you know big fancy things you know i like the simplicity of everything allister at the end i don't know if we ever talk that's we have all the same favorite movies mostly and that one at the end when the old senator comes in and everything catches on fire it sort of changed the whole movie a It was good, but it i seemed weird it had so much special effects all of a sudden. Yeah, I know what you mean. But then they again, i mean they couldn't set the poor old guy on fire, so you know what? They could. Well, that's interesting that like maybe their special effects budget was such that they just saved it all for the end. to to Exactly. yeah exactly
Speaker: Yeah, it just sort of turned into another movie all of a sudden. Yeah, it kind of did, because it's it's really you know just somebody holding a camera, people doing what they do, and then all of a sudden, yeah, I get what you're saying. But to me, I don't know. I think it worked.
Speaker: It worked. Yeah, it worked. It just, it was weird. But, well, like you take another classic. How about, I love Ghost Story, book and movie. Oh my gosh, yes. Yeah, yeah oh it's not just the cast. and But, oh, it's so good. But it doesn't, do they have, yeah, they have fire too, don't they?
Speaker: The house breaks down. I don't remember. Yeah. have yeah Well, the interesting thing to me about ghost story is how it's something I appreciate a lot more now that I'm older.
Speaker: Is this thing of like how people are when they're in undergrad and then what they become when they're adults and how some things, some people chill out and mature a little bit and some people like super don't.
Speaker: Oh God, the canon character. Yeah. that's terrible i don't remember his name and it it rings really true though yeah sure yeah you know it's uh i think some well because we've all met people like that it's like yeah he must have peaked in high school and never really got over it oh you know it yeah alice cridge oh my god she makes that movie yeah she does yeah she's so she's so still and eerie yeah and eerieness about her even when she's not being eerie yeah she's just eerie she is she doesn't move she just stares at you
Speaker: yeah And and that's that's the kind of creepiness that is, I think people underestimate how difficult it is to meet that sort of tone in a movie that gives it a grounding like that. Because you you miss that when it's like a guy with his mom's camera directing his first movie with a bunch people he knows from school. Yeah. They don't necessarily have the time to pull that kind of subtle performance out of someone. Because what I find is all these movies that I loved as a kid, the ones that seem very grounded and realistic, but full of people I've never heard of, it turns out that these are not small actors just because I haven't heard of them. They did Shakespeare for 35 years. yeah Right, right. Yeah. one thing in um ghost story there there's one actor that's kind of overlooked and it's it's the the wiener when the guy falls up oh god i love that all the way down that just thrills me the older movies the uninvited is probably my favorite of the older movie movies that's dana uh what's his name
Speaker: gene tierney i think is in it you've seen that one once and and dana is that dana andrews dana andrews i think wait unless i'm mixing that up with rocky horror i always use his name to look up the name of the movie but this time i remember the name of the movie 1944 i i can look it's don't think i've seen that one Oh, you've not seen The Uninvited?
Speaker: I don't think so. For shame. I know. I think it's on HBO right now because they'll grow up like really old movies. They have the original Wax Museum. Oh, cool. that That the Vincent Price movie is a remake of.
Speaker: And I've gotten into ugly fights on the internet because I say, I love the remake of House of Wax. And they think, I mean, that 90s piece of shit with Paris. Yeah. Yeah. Like, come on now. Well, and it makes sense because I do defend the remake of Psycho, which is not popular opinion in the horror community. It's well done. did a job with Ray Moland.
Speaker: Okay. All right. So she went nuts. Ruth Hessey. It's, oh, you have to see it. There is another uninvited ah streaming right now, and that's not the right one. This usually isn't streaming.
Speaker: This is from a book. And it is fantastic. It's a true ghost story. And you can tell that Spielberg saw it when you see the ghost up at the top of the staircase. And he must have been inspired for his poltergeist ghost at the top of the staircase. I think that's actually why I know that movie, because I have heard people talk about it in relation to Spielberg movies.
Speaker: Yeah, you can see So makes complete sense to me. Yeah. It's fantastic. Now, you guys are not necessarily rabid horror fans. Like, you you do intake some horror, but that's not your main focus, is my understanding. Do might do I have that right?
Speaker: I thought we were horror, but we're fine. Well, the thing is, your your books, i mean there's there' there um I mean, there's dark comedy there, there's like, you know, not that romantic relationships, but yeah. But that's the thing, is that I wouldn't, I mean, I think Mother is a horror book. um Yeah, absolutely. But I mean, they seem to straddle multiple genres, and yet you're still tackling themes like madness and murder. You know, you've got some vampires in there. That's horror. It's all horror. Yeah, that's what I'd say. I'd say, so when I first got published, this is before Tamara and I started working together. This is way back in like 2012. I didn't really think of myself as any any kind of you know writer. They told me, the publisher told me i was a horror writer and I went, okay, I'm a horror writer. And I've kind of just said so ever since. But I think i think that no matter what I write, and I think I can speak for Tamara with this too, uh it's going to be dark there's going to be there's going to be darkness of you horror elements to it um and i would say that it's horror because i think it gets a little too dark to to be anything else but i think that you nailed it wednesday when you said you know definitely straddles different genres because we do
Speaker: We do like the the the humor. I think that humor is important in in horror. And I mean, but we don't do it on purpose. Exactly. It just happens. If we were to sit down and try to be funny. It wouldn't work. it wouldn't work it's just that we we write and we get having too much fun and we like to do yeah um kind of gipp a lot yeah we like to do kind of like outrageous you know things to our characters watch them react to that and of course the characters don't think it's funny they take they take themselves very seriously on people That is so relatable because i i always thought of myself as a horror writer and then multiple people have said to me, no, you write dark comedies. I mean, yeah, they're they're kind of close, but the there's there's always something to laugh at there. so Yeah, just don't know.
Speaker: it it makes me think of christopher moore who is somebody else who is writing a lot of like oh there's a monster eating the town but somehow it's hilarious because people are walking around naked and doing all these shenanigans so oh god he's good yeah he's a lovely guy too he is good yeah you know i've written to him a few times over the years and i just you know sending him emails and the first one was just like oh i like you so much and then later on it was like oh my first book came out do you have time to read it as if you know he doesn't hear that 11 billion times a week
Speaker: But every time he wrote back to me and he was always kind, he took the the time to say something personal. And, you know, that's that's just so impressive for someone who is as popular and sought after as he is. and And every time I talk about him, it just makes me mad that we've never gotten a movie of one of his books. I know. For real. Because that is so unfair.
Speaker: It is unfair. Imagine imagine Lamb. lamb Oh, Lamb is the one, my very favorite one. If there was a god, that would be his. Yeah, yeah. no Yep, yep. But even his vampire series, the whole might be series would be wonderful on screen. Yeah, um he's great.
Speaker: But yeah, he is. he's He was really nice. We interviewed him, I think, a couple times when we had our podcast. Quinn got us together many years ago at a convention she was guest of honor at. And I spent a lot of time with him. And he's he's this great big goofy guy who's exactly what you think he ought to be.
Speaker: He was so great. That is awesome. I love knowing that. Because, you know, One of the hardest things for me with America being fascist, like ah over and above all the the financial and and cultural things, is the idea that I keep finding out that people whose work I've enjoyed so much...
Speaker: And, you know, I'm um'm autistic, so I respect the person when I when i love their work. it It just carries right over for me. And then you find out that, like, you know, The Rock won't stand up to rapists and Vince Vaughn went to Mar-a-Lago socially and just all these, like, yeah like I don't want to know. i don't want, i you know, I didn't want to know that the guy from The Usual Suspects is, I mean, i didn't want to know that about Kevin Spacey.
Speaker: Why do I have to know? Because like if you ask me, Wednesday, do you want to know what's happening in the world? Do you want to know who these people are? And of course I do. Of course I want to know. i want as much information as possible.
Speaker: I tell people on dating apps that I would rather be annoyed by an irksome truth than charmed by an enticing lie. Like that's who I am. But at the same time, when I hear these things, I'm like, my God, I don't i don't want to know. i don't need to know every sitcom actor who is a racist, homophobic, fascist now. And yet I have to, because they keep telling us.
Speaker: my My favorite is like when somebody asks, one of these people on social media, you know, where they stand on a certain position and they haven't answered yet. And you're just kind of sitting there ah hoping, what waiting to see how they're going to answer. Are they going to say, know, fuck rights or what? When someone is wailing about how they're being persecuted for their beliefs, it's never a good guy.
Speaker: No, it isn't. When you say, oh my gosh, that's terrible. What beliefs do you mean? And then they start talking about men and women's sports or some bullshit.
Speaker: yeah It's silly. it It is. It's hard. It's it's it's a, yeah I think this is the, probably the, one of the,
Speaker: Worst things that I dislike about social media is exactly, I'm i'm with you. I'm like, there are things I did not want to know. There are heroes that I'm so disappointed yeah the one yeah The only one that doesn't, I've always known Tom Cruise was a whack job and I don't like him.
Speaker: But when he starts acting, I forget that I can't stand him because he's such a good actor. Yeah, he seems to agree. But Mel Gibson didn't go, you know, ew, I shouldn't even use those words that I was going to say, right? Yeah.
Speaker: Well, you know, i I would watch Tom Cruise movies all day long before I would give a nickel to Mel Gibson. Exactly. At the same time, I think Signs is a fantastic film. Not because of Mel Gibson, but because of like pretty much everything else. you know You could have put anybody in that role and he would have been fine.
Speaker: yeah and i don't i don't know what people see in mel gibson i mean he's not my type like that's not the kind of quote unquote handsomeness that that i give a shit about but you know he's just a big mean bully he's like if pete hegseth was ah a different kind of actor you know yeah yeah i find simon peg attractive not particularly physically but i like him But, you know, I'm from Alistair, so I don't really look at anything.
Speaker: So I on the screen, okay, thanks, and that's it. So listen, I need to talk about your book, Mother.
Speaker: um I've spoken to you individually about it, but I need to talk to you guys about it together. I mean, I had a bad mom, so it's no secret that I love books about bad moms getting, spoiler alert, a comeuppance. Yeah. Yes.
Speaker: That was a fun book to write. Oh my gosh. I'll bet. I'll bet. So what I want to know, first and foremost, is... i mean, one of the things I like is the authenticity of it. Because it is sort of Christopher Moorish, where you have this town full of people that all interact with each other, and the way those interactions change create a bunch of fun drama and and potato salad. So...
Speaker: um so So where does that come from? do do you know someone like that? Well, we didn't our fathers, so but we both loved our mothers. So that's sort of weird.
Speaker: Yeah. So it it is not based on our mothers. and in fact, we we put that in the front. We wanted to be very clear about that. We dedicated it to our mothers and said it's not based on our mothers. We actually both have really good moms.
Speaker: But we've seen some things. Yes, we have. women. And we've heard stories. and Yeah. and Actually, at least one thing that happened in Mother was taken directly from something my father did to me that made me begin hating him more than just disliking him.
Speaker: And that was... God, I don't even know I have the nerve to say it out loud. The scene where the girl, our heroine, when she's a girl, comes home and finds her underwear that she had hidden because she got her period spread out all over the house, cleaned up, bleached.
Speaker: My father did that to me. And that was the day I began hating him. Yeah. so And rightly so, man. That is fucking vile. It was.
Speaker: He did that when my mother was away taking care of my grandmother, who's hip who had broken her hip. And so, yeah. I didn't like the man, never did, but that was the day hate started. Yeah.
Speaker: that was totally real. That's not a, that's not a parenting mistake and that's not something that is split second wrong decision. That is a very deliberate plan thing that took time to execute. Oh yeah. Cruelty and and and a desire to humiliate. So yeah, I'm with you on that. That's fucked up. Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah. You put your underwear draped all over the living room, the bedrooms, the dining room table and you're 11. and oh my god and i just wonder i just wonder what you know because you've told me that story and i always just wonder what was the goal i wonder what was right like what what is the lesson what's the takeaway supposed to be from that he was a mean little man who was humiliated by his tall handsome brothers you know
Speaker: he got put in the several books, pretty sure that he accident probably accidentally killed his older brother. Um, things like that. guess. And, you know, he basically ran away from home. He, he made quite a,
Speaker: good person out of himself. He was a good provider and all that. and um But I think he was incredibly unhappy. Not that I excuse him, but um and I heard things, you know, from my older siblings. They were 20 years older than me.
Speaker: And he made everybody miserable. Yeah. And I think it's because he was miserable. So um I got to write about it. Hence,
Speaker: it was easy for me comparatively. Yeah. so died When I was 15 and that really helped. Interestingly, mother is more about, you know, more dad stuff than mom stuff, but yeah, but as far as like, as far as any kind of like, you know, therapeutic, you know, personal stuff, there's more dad stuff in it, but it's really kind of a patchwork of, you know, um, things we had heard over the years. Um,
Speaker: Yeah. and And kind of put it through our own filter of, you know, how Alistair, the thing, how she treated her husband, her invalid husband, that was one that we really felt strongly about. And I don't remember, I think you came up with that.
Speaker: I, you know, I don't remember. i just know that it it just, yeah, we, because what's more horrifying than, than care, you know, someone who's supposed to be a caretaker.
Speaker: Someone supposed to be, you know, I mean, really a mother. What's more horrifying than a mother who just doesn't. Mother. Right.
Speaker: Because the very nature of motherhood is that the people in your care are essentially helpless. Exactly. And even if they grow up, there's still that, well, there is supposed to be that bond there. Right. Right.
Speaker: As you know, my my first book is also about a bad mom. And i people have said to me many times since it came out, aren't you worried about being sued? And apparently there there was discussion of a lawsuit, but it's it's one of those things like Trump saying, I dare you to to call me a rapist, I'll sue you. Like, bitch, you can't.
Speaker: you know because suing over that book is essentially saying yeah that's me that's me in there yeah exactly exactly like really you're just gonna say that outright just to take me to court like my goodness that woman is a monster how could you possibly see yourself oh well she reacted to it huh its yeah yeah is she well my family actually it's interesting because i thought i wonder if my extended family is gonna think that that's about my mom and and everybody just like no question we're like wow i didn't realize things were that bad between me and your mom i'm like no no it's a fiction book not not that much of a fiction book
Speaker: Yeah. um But it's it's listed as a fiction book, so I won't get sued. But also, I mean, yeah, it's a it's a pretty ah stereotypical Mary Sue of like, well, if you're wondering why I'm so fucked up, this is basically why. um Kind of debut novel. My my other books are better, i think. but but But the mother stuff is... Well, the thing is that there is... like Mothers abusing their daughters is a very different dynamic than fathers doing it. Because your relationships, that like sets up...
Speaker: you know your your feelings about the the different genders for your whole life. you know you'll You'll view all men either in relationship to your dad and all your friendships with women.
Speaker: you know Your mom influences that. If she's catty and talks about people behind your back, you're going to think that all women do that. At least starting out, somebody will have to prove you wrong. you know That sort of thing. and I think that even though you guys are both kind of talking about like the the acrimony aspect of mother comes from your dads. I think the book does a really good job of of sort of that that knife twisty way that that ba bad moms hurt their daughters.
Speaker: We saw the bad moms. We just didn't happen to have them ourselves, thank God. yeah And I have to point out, I had a brother who was 20 years older than me who I always saw as my real dad.
Speaker: So I didn't get too fucked up. Excuse me. but that's handy yeah that was real handy but yeah you're right what's the name of your book a stabbing for sadie is my first oh okay what kind of stuff did your mom do to you ah Well, she was a narcissistic sociopath that liked to punctuate her points with with violence. And ah one of her main things, a lot of it happened when nobody else was around, but not all of it. Like my stepdad had to physically pull her off me. I remember occasions where she'd be choking me and I would wake up and she'd still be on top of me, like hitting me and stuff. And I mean, this is when I'm like 10 or 11. And that's, wow it's crazy because when you grow up,
Speaker: Like at the time you're just like, oh, I better not get in trouble so that doesn't happen again. But then when you grow up and look at it, like I remember being 30 and remembering what my mom was like when she was 30. Yeah.
Speaker: If I was beating 10 year old to the point where another adult in the room had to pull me off of them, i would commit myself. I would like after that situation and I calmed down, would be like, okay, there's something very wrong with me. I need to figure out what the fuck just made me do that.
Speaker: You know, I wouldn't just go on about my business and be like, those kids are so bad. Why do they make me so angry? Like, what? Right, right. You know? Yeah. so So, yeah, it was that kind of thing. But also there was a like a weird kind of jealousy when i i I lost a bunch of weight in junior high and my stepdad, I heard him say, and my mom also said heard him say,
Speaker: started this weird competitive thing like i it i'm not i'm not gonna get get too into it because maybe some of my family listens to this but it was very strange and there was a lot of comparison with like weight loss and who could wear what size clothes and you know that meant that somebody was like if you could fit in smaller pants then you were basically a better person than if you had you know eaten so much that oh no you need a bigger size of pants you're terrible you should kill yourself like you know well i think so yeah there's a i think there's um and and this is something that we kind of discovered when we were writing mother and i it's it's shocking but i think that there is a lot of jealousy i don't think it's that uncommon jealousy between you know
Speaker: parents and and their children. I don't know if it's the the youth. I don't know. I think there's a lot of vicarious living through them too as well. Like, well, I didn't do this. yeah You need to do this. And I should have done that. So you need to do that. um And I think that can be totally in and of itself. I think what at the root of it, I think what a lot of parents don't realize is that these children are not extensions of yourself.
Speaker: Right. In fact, their own fully developed human beings with their own agents. They are their own person. They're not you.
Speaker: And I think that's where a lot of people get, a lot of parents get mixed up because it's like you're. Well, yeah. I mean, that's the the core of the narcissistic parent is, like you know, it's so like when you get the the parentified oldest daughter and it's, you know, no one says, would you mind staying home Friday to to watch the other kids? They say, okay, you exist. So you'll be staying home Friday to watch the other kids. You don't get to have a life.
Speaker: And as a teenager, it just sounds whiny and ridiculous to be like, oh, I don't have a life. I have to do this thing. But when it's always, you know it grates on you. you know When you start to be known as the kid who can never go and never do anything.
Speaker: that you stop getting invited to some stuff and then you got to feel bad about that so you know it's this whole round and round vicious cycle thing but like i basically grew up thinking that no one would ever love me until or unless i lost weight that i was dumb i was lazy i was weird and that's why nobody liked me and You know, and then you grow up and you go on social media and people who knew you in school are like, man, you were so cool. I don't know why I didn't hang out with you more. yeah why Wait, what?
Speaker: Nobody thought I was cool. What the fuck are you talking about? Do you remember who I am? I'm the fat kid with the weird name. Like, what are you talking about? Isn't that funny? Yeah. It's funny now. at the time, it fucking sucked. Speaking of your name, i've seen you I've seen you on social media more than once defending your name. Somebody accusing you of having a fake name in your life.
Speaker: You think I would chosen Wednesday, Lee, Friday? It's like, oh, really, Trump lover 69? You think I'm using a fake name, do you? Oh, God. ah Gee, Elon Musk sucks 72, I guess. You got me.
Speaker: and the thing is, it's so easy to just, like, Google is a thing. Maybe it's it's better to use quotes if you're if you're Googling me. yeah But but i'm I'm on there. You can find me. I may not have a Wikipedia, but you can Google my ass, for heaven's sake. My friend found, she's another writer, she she sent me a link. She found me on on whatever mustys Musk's ah answer to Wikipedia is, and it's so screwed up, it's hysterical.
Speaker: rockopedia and yeah i think it's i think it's grokopedia yeah yeah i showed that to you didn't yeah i am so fucking mad that he has co-opted the word grok that just makes me feel oh's i'm sick i've been using that since seventh grade when i read that stupid book that i didn't like but i love that like bitch you're not literary don't pretend you are Yeah.
Speaker: And now I can't use it anymore. He took it. Right? Right. Yeah. Yeah. Bastard. Yeah. Got his Nazi shit all over it. now Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah. Oh, God. It just, that was, I did not like Robert Heinlein. I know that makes me awful, but I didn't. And I didn't like Stranger in a Strange Land where he made that word up, but I love that word.
Speaker: You don't have to use three syllables. Understand. i understand. I drop. Yeah. And he took it. And he made it. He took it. Nasty. Give it back. Son of a. We can take it back. yeah We'll have it roll an uprising of three. We will take it back. know We will. ask The Grec Society. That
Speaker: made me angrier than anything else. Right? Yeah. yeah I mean, it's also bad that he killed all those people, but what the fuck? Damn it, don't mess with the language.
Speaker: You gotta draw the line somewhere, right? I know. i know. It's like, what, what do you care about? But okay. So one thing that the two of you can do that I have never done successfully is to write with a partner. yeah And i'm I'm fascinated by the concept. I just ah like, can you, can you walk me through your process?
Speaker: Um, we get together and giggle and write. Um, we, we seem to have some kind of telepathic link. Like we know when we're going to text each other, the phones get picked up before the thing comes. We've always been like that. It's weird.
Speaker: But before that, we each had a collaborator from hell. Mine was several years worth of people telling me to get rid of the person.
Speaker: And i was too wimpy. I learned not to be wimpy anymore. And then Alistair had the same kind of problem. We were both stalked.
Speaker: when Yarbrough helped me through my time of being stalked. And then, you know, years later, this happened again. So we had an understanding immediately. We're both the people who don't like to argue and hate drama.
Speaker: We talk things out. i don't think we've ever argued. We've only fake argued to amuse people. Right. Right. right It just, it's, I think, I think, First of all, shared experience, shared previous experience, we were both cautious of each other and that yeah her being cautious of me put me at ease. Yeah, exactly. And vice versa. I'm like, oh, if you're if you're worried that I might be a psycho, you're probably not a psycho.
Speaker: And I know I'm not a psycho. Exactly. so And both of us hate phones. Yeah. And the first time we talked, I was at my son's house and sat out on the balcony and we were just going to talk for a second because we both hate phones. and And no, we stayed on for hours.
Speaker: There was a big raging storm out there. and My son finally comes out. What are you doing? I'm talking to a friend. oh okay. And we decided to write a short story.
Speaker: And well, that turned into a novel. yeah it turned into a novel that we had to cut like what 150 000 words out of because it was huge yeah it was wow so it really you know it really is a lot of also i have to say this a lot of the same sensibilities um i i think it helps quite a bit i think it helped quite a bit that I'm younger than Tamara, so when I was growing up, I read when I was growing up, I read her books and this was just the kind of thing that I liked.
Speaker: So it I kind of teased on her work, so to speak. And so by the time I you know get old enough and this is what I'm doing, there's a lot of that in there already.
Speaker: things lined up in such a way that it's, you know, and and our sensibilities are the same. We have the same, you know, creative sense, the same you know business sense, our vision one is the same. One thing we both liked the same authors, other authors. It wasn't just me. You liked, we both liked the same.
Speaker: Oh, sure. Sure. Yeah. I don't want you. Yeah. you know That's all. But it it, it, you know, I think, and I, so I think at the foundation is basic compatibility and respect, you know, again, we don't fight people.
Speaker: Don't believe that. But I don't think we have ever gotten nasty, even snippy. We just don't. It's just not what we, you know what mean? Yeah, one of us is bitchy. We just say, hey, why are you bitchy today? Right. You know, we tell each other. And never, you know, at each other. You know, I don't think I've ever, you know, I don't know.
Speaker: I'm probably the bitchier of the two. but you know, when we call each other, you fucker, we'd say it with love. Right. Right. yeah Literally. i I'm not kidding.
Speaker: And if there's something that Tamara wants to do with, with the story and she's like, well, I think we should, you know, do this. I think this needs to happen or whatever. And for whatever reason, I don't agree, which is actually rare because we're both pretty much on the same page, so to speak. Um,
Speaker: you know, figuratively and literally, um a you know, if I don't agree, I'll just say, well, I think, you know, I'll explain why. there's no There's never been a butting of heads where it's like, well, you know, this this needs to happen and bad idea is stupid. we would never say that.
Speaker: We come up with something better together. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Brainstorming is a big deal with us. But I will say, i will say, it's, it's not collaborating is not something that i recommend, not because of my experience. My experience is, is, but, but that's the exception, not the rule. I've heard the horror stories. I've, I've experienced some of that, you know, but, but the thing, not with Tamara, but um aha people want, people want a writing collaborator. And I'm like,
Speaker: I think it's one of those things that, this is going to sound cheesy, but if it's meant to be, it'll happen. If it's not, don't push it. That's what I was going to say. We have a meant to be thing that I'm so grateful for every day. you know But it's rare.
Speaker: i wouldn't recommend collaborating normally. No, because it's you're you're going into business with someone. And not only are you going into business with someone, you're going into a creative pursuit with someone. And so egos.
Speaker: egos are a big part of it. You have to have the kind of ego that can, um, the kind of egos that can merge together, you know, cause you can't just, you can't just, you know, bow down and be like, okay, whatever you say, okay we'll do it your way. Okay. But you also can't be like, we're doing this my way. right There's no bullying or, or, you know, cowing. It's just,
Speaker: It's a union. There's legal stuff normally. Now, we, he has every right to use any of my characters and vice versa, but he's got things in his books that go back to my early books and vice versa, really.
Speaker: And that's, we have to, I guess, put that down somewhere to say it's always okay that our worlds are totally merged. But normally you have a lot of legalese to do with that stuff. Right. And ours is just, it's our stuff and here's what each, we, you know, if one of us kicks off, here's what we'd like the other to do with it.
Speaker: Right. That's it. But that's cake compared to what most people have to do. Right. sort of twins. It's, we're like family to each other.
Speaker: you know In the good way, not the mother way. he's like my identical and only better. you know and yeah we we when we When we come up with the same idea at the same time, um which happens a lot, we even sing with Patti Doe theme song. you know They walk alike, they talk alike at times. Yeah, we sing that sometimes. It's creepy and fun.
Speaker: It sounds like then that by a wide margin, the way to make a collaboration work is to have the right collaborator. Otherwise you're just going to be forcing it.
Speaker: Right. Probably. Right. I think that that's totally fair. And you could you could enter a a business arrangement, a ah rigid business arrangement with anyone, and you know these are the boundaries, and these are the, you you could do that, but that wouldn't be very much fun.
Speaker: And from what we see, most collaborators do it very differently than we do. um And I think even like, um who's who's who are the detective guys? We've had them on.
Speaker: Oh, Preston and Child. Yeah, they even do it differently for the most part. One will outline more, one will write more. We do everything together, right down to, we we write on screen together.
Speaker: ah Frequently one of us is watching the other one and goes you know and goes in and adds stuff. Or we each take a scene, but we do it together. we don't One doesn't outline and the other write.
Speaker: We both do both. Yeah, and we don't do like another thing, another thing, you know, and this is how a lot of people do it too. You take care of this scene or these characters and I'll take care of this these scenes and these characters. We don't do that either. we're we we even develop the characters together. We we sit down and talk about, you know so say we're saying, okay, we need ah we need a newscaster for yeah this scene, for example. um Do we want male or female? do we want what Who is this person?
Speaker: And you know everything. Yeah. Yeah, like this book, we have Dixie. She's horrible. Southern accent, vapid. And then we needed a last name.
Speaker: yeah And he says, Normus. And we have Dixie Normus.
Speaker: um You find a lot of that in our books. And we get, she's Dixie Normus. For DIC TV. Oh, my goodness. Yeah, we're very immature. That also helps too.
Speaker: We're both 10-year-old boys. We are. We are. At all times. Now, I tried to write a screenplay once. It was going to be one of those like sci-fi Saturday giant monster movies with a guy who had more experience with screenplays than than I. my My gift is dialogue, but I don't write entire screenplays. It was a new thing.
Speaker: So we started kind of working on it, tossing some ideas back and forth. And he told me that his 14 year old kid thought my title was stupid.
Speaker: And I never wanted to talk to him again. i hurt my feelings so much that I was just like, nope, F this, I'm out. I don't i don't have the the temperament to have a total stranger's kid. tell Not only to to have a stranger's kid tell me that my title is stupid, but for him to think that that was valuable enough information that he'd better relay
Speaker: it to me. How are you not trying to hurt my feelings if that's what you're saying? so Exactly. Well, and that's one thing that I'm real sensitive about. Like, as I get older, like, if I can tell that you're trying to hurt my feelings, you're not my friend. Get out of my house. I don't want to deal, you know, like, okay, so you're mean.
Speaker: Mean people should be shunned. and And I got watch saying that too, because I can be awfully mean if I'm sure I'm right and somebody else is like being a bully. Like, I will smack you the fuck down. I hope I'm right about this. It better
Speaker: be. It better be right. Oh, God. oh All right. So here's here's what I need to know that need to know what each of you have learned about your own writing through writing books with someone else. Like what does it taught you?
Speaker: um OK, so I would say this is going to sound kind of.
Speaker: How do I word it? I've learned. That I'm not bad.
Speaker: that that i'm that i'm That I'm good at it. That I'm good at what I do. Did you not know that before? Not really, no. I don't know. Because how do you know? i mean, it's just, it's just it's like, it's I've written my whole life. It's just what you do. It's, it's, um,
Speaker: very natural for me. I mean, it's just, it's like breathing. And so it's always been there. It's always been, but to, to, to be able to write something of value that people would enjoy.
Speaker: i didn't know. I didn't know. i really didn't. I'm like, I don't, I don't know. You were someone who, All they did was criticize you.
Speaker: And that when I first met you and read that book, it was obvious you were good. I ended up only reading your stuff because you were the only one who could write. But you get you get like a a certain amount of you know criticism no matter what you do. um Sure. But it I don't know. I think I would just say that that I've learned that um I can do it.
Speaker: Wow. Okay. That's, that's amazing. What about you Tamra?
Speaker: Rather similar, really. I mean, i was confident that I stopped for quite a while while my husband and I were doing a business and I was Alistair helped me get my confidence back because he admired what I was doing. He also made me very aware that I'm good at atmosphere, which made me happy because I teethed on Bradbury. That's what I love, but I wasn't nearly as aware of it before.
Speaker: And he made me see that. And the fact that he liked to write the same kind of things that I do and with the same length, which is you know, lengthy and all that. it It actually, there's this young guy just coming up and he's doing the same stuff as me. It made me a lot more confident again.
Speaker: And i just felt good. Well, I felt like when I, when I met you, I'm like, why are you not, why are you not doing this? You need to be doing this. You know, it's just, it's so, you know, i used to back in the days of dial up internet, go to my mom's house to go on her computer because I didn't have a computer my own. And I would, you know, Google Tamra Thorne. This is before we met.
Speaker: yeah And it sounds very stalkery. I know this, but it was just, you know, your website, because I'm looking to see if you have like, you know, anything new out. Um, It was just, you got me going again. i couldn't see why you weren't still going. I just thought that was just such a ah shame.
Speaker: Yeah. I was basically told, well, we've got do this business and i just didn't. Yeah. You got me going again. Yeah. That's awesome.
Speaker: I love that. i love that for both of you. Me too. Yeah, it's really cool. So we're getting into the work, um let's pretend that I've never heard of the Ravencrest saga. What do I need to know to get started?
Speaker: Well, the authors both love gothics and Rebecca and dark shadows and all that stuff. And if you like that stuff too, you might very well like the Ravencrest saga.
Speaker: yeah we're both Yeah, we both have a theme for eerie, you know, well, you know, the the creepy mansions and the naive governesses and the, you know, um mercurial men of the manor who may or may not love the governess, you know. we For some reason, we both really like that. So that's where this concept for this series is rooted. But of course, we put our own, we couldn't
Speaker: we couldn't fairly call it, you know, Gothic romance. We, it's more like Gothic horror because we get, you know, too horrific. And the vibe is like turn of the screw is, is what I always think of. Yeah. And, and, you know, turn of the screw is very much in line with the the whole, you know, foundation of that, that genre. It's, they're all kind of the same.
Speaker: yeah We've had people write to us and say, oh i I just saw this, you know, or I just saw this movie or I just read this book. What was it? It was um my Crimson Peak or something like that. Oh, yeah, Crimson Peak. They totally stole your idea. It's like, no, no, no. No, these are the tropes. This is what you do in Gothic stories. And they have certain beats and tropes and certain things that you just do. And and they are in many ways yeah the same. They are. And then we turn it on its ear. right Our governess may still have that sweetness about her, but she's badass. Yeah, she can be she can be dangerous. and Yeah, she's she's learning to use her powers. and Right.
Speaker: and The genteel butler is actually a, he's called, he's a knight of the mandrake. He's it steeped. He's a sorcerer. And then we have tons of ghosts. We never ran out of supernatural creatures. There's this Mrs. Keller. She's a witch that has been around since the sixteen hundreds and she's really awful. We love her. And I think that's one of the, one of the big differences. I think that's where we kind of you know, merge away from,
Speaker: typical Gothic, you know, say romance stories is our series is supernatural. Um, you're reading a lot of these Gothic, you know, books, it has that vibe, but it always ends up you know, getting explained, you know, Oh, you know, there's a, you know, wishes you are in the attic We're you know are recording that somebody made to scare you, to but you know to gaslight you, or whatever. Yeah.
Speaker: I hate that. we do We do real ghosts. We do real monsters. We do real... even did zombies once. Yeah, we even did zombies once. Dope. Dope.
Speaker: Yeah. So this is this is book six that's coming up, right? Yes. Or is it out yet? Is book six out already? No, it's not out yet. Okay. It's coming up. kind but but We're still writing it. We're basically at the tail end. I think just yesterday we sat down and plotted out what we really needed to do next to get to the end, and it's it's not a whole lot.
Speaker: No, we're almost there. 40 pages, maybe. Oh, my God. I'm so jealous. Well, you know, I started writing my trilogy in 2017. you know, the first book came out in 2020. And then the next one was 2022. And the third one is is still not out. how do How do you maintain a writing schedule that lets you write six freaking books in a series?
Speaker: We do it every day. Ew. Ew. I know, right? Yeah, right now we're only, normally we were dividing us into three books.
Speaker: Like we do Ravencrest, solos, we stay on together even when we're doing solos. but We read each other and help each other brainstorm. And we we keep our office in the sky basically. And that keeps us honest.
Speaker: And then we do, you know, some other book like the, the Spite House Chronicles, but that got too busy. so normally we do two books during the day, Ravencrest and our solos right now, because we're so close to the end of Ravencrest and because we have a number of other things that are interfering with our output daily.
Speaker: We're just doing Ravencrest. We want to finish it and it's going to need rewriting more than normal because boy, is this a complicated one. Yeah. And, or The whole town that lives beneath the manor of Ravencrest has gone insane.
Speaker: And so there's all these characters and all this wackadoodle stuff is going on. And we're just we're having a hard time stopping writing it because it's too much fun. But that's all we're writing right now.
Speaker: Exactly. yeah So i finished I finished... So the Red Scarab is... the seventh book in my solo vampire series and that came out in october october 1st so that's been out for about a week and but blood but the thing is is as soon as we were done with as soon as i got done with that i wanted to put some time into that because um i usually do i we try to release a solo novel and a collaborative
Speaker: you know novel at least every year and I wasn't able to I missed last year in my in the Vampires of Crimson Cope series um it took me two years to write book seven and that's not because of the book that's because of you know stuff that was going on yeah and um so I needed to hurry and finish that and get it done and I did and so now I'm like okay we're going to just focus on Ravencrest I just want i want to get that done Yeah, that'll be out early spring.
Speaker: i would think so. Because we want to do the right rewrite. We normally just go lightly over things, but this time we have enough stuff that we we need to go in and add add and subtract a few things. And that's unusual. We don't usually have to rewrite. Yeah.
Speaker: Boy, do we have a few pages of notes. know Now, I definitely want to get into the Spite House Chronicles, but before we do, I have to mention the names of our sponsors, because these are the people that help us out, help us pay for the website and the equipment and, you know,
Speaker: All the stuff that we need to keep the show going. So we want to thank Allison Huff, Kathy Martin, Nemu Ravenfall, Bradley and Fred, ThatOneFool, SupporterX, Shannon Fleckenstein, Lowkey, Brianna Simmons, and ThatDamnJim.
Speaker: So thanks to all of those folks. If you would like to become a supporter, You can find us on Ko-Fi. That's K-O-F-I. i we're listed as sometimes hilarious horror, but if you search for the Mentally Oddcast, we'll come right up and we'll read your name on the show. And if you want to do a message, some people have given me messages in the past. I don't have any this week, but we'll read a one-liner to say hi to your mom or say Trump sucks or whatever it is is that you would like to have us say that isn't terrible.
Speaker: so So that's that. Now, we definitely want to talk about the Spite House Chronicles. I have not read any of these yet, so I need information.
Speaker: Well, the first thing to know is it's actually one gigantic book, you know, like Lord of the Rings. Okay. Well, not quite like that, but. It's not three.
Speaker: It's part one, two, and three. We just really got carried away. and yeah, he giggles. And it doesn't have the best giggle. um Well, they're chronicles. That's how chronicles work, right? all Right.
Speaker: Sure. OK. That's OK. It's basically our take. Everybody does one on. um Wait, it's not not right to call it 10 Little Indians anymore. And then there were none, you know, where you include all the writers together. Oh, no, I'm sorry. And 10 little indigenous individual individuals. That's it. Yeah. Who are non-gender specific. Exactly. Exactly. It's a really long title. Yeah. Right?
Speaker: It rolls off the tongue. um We were talking. and I was working for my friend's house, Q. and um she She's a kid's writer. You wouldn't know what to listen to her, though. and she mentioned the word She showed us a picture well us because she brought it around so alistair could see too a picture of a spite house and then we just oh that's interesting and then we said we should call a book spite house and so wait wait so a spite house is a thing because i don't know what what ah that is well what is it you want to tell her well so
Speaker: basically like it. Okay. So if somebody builds kind of, well, you tell her, I get it. Yeah. Yeah. It's usually a little bitty skinny house that shoved in between two big houses, like in the city.
Speaker: just saw a picture of one. It was a house that people, a skyscraper wanted to be put up. Well, it didn't want to be put up, but you know what I mean? Right. And, but they wouldn't sell this piece of property that was maybe two or three stories high. It was very old.
Speaker: And so the sky skyscraper is built around it. And the first part of the skyscraper is an in is indented. And then it comes out over the little house. And so you would call that a spite house because it's either built out of spite to ruin a view, or it was already there and wouldn't be taken down.
Speaker: But, um, Wow. Yeah, it's a it's a real thing. And yeah I had never heard of it either. I had never heard of it either. And I was like, that's a great title right there, Spite House. Yeah. Yeah. so Yeah, when when a push came to shove at the very end and we found out somebody else was using that title too, we hurried up and got ours out. We were kind of scratching our butts and taking our time. no. So, um, it's about this.
Speaker: It takes place in the same town as mother, but up on snap dragon lake, the town of snap dragon up in the mountains. And this family has this house and it's not, it's this huge house and it's called spite house by the town because People that worked there ah and all that, the the people were mean, that owners of Spite House.
Speaker: And that's why it's called Spite House. It's not little. But you tell them, Alistair. I need to drink that. So it's it's it's actually... kind of mother adjacent it takes yeah all of our books take place in the same universe okay yeah so we've got like you know syndications that go across you know it's it's all the same universe but um the spy house chronicles are much more mother adjacent um because it's in the same area and basically it's
Speaker: how do I say it succinctly? it's It's about a really twisted family. And that's another way that it's like mother. I mean, we've got inbreeding, incest. um It's just, it's just, oh yeah it's supernatural. um All kinds of just twisted family stuff. I don't know why we always come back to the weird family stuff, but we do. We like it.
Speaker: Yes, we do. Come on now. I think it's because family should be safe, and when you take that away, you've got to follow. Right. Yeah. The writers are a... There's one, Holly Tremaine.
Speaker: She's actually... as a 11 year old, I think in my novel Brimstone, she's the, the little girl, it's a coming of age ghost story.
Speaker: Brimstone is, and she's the heroine of it and, or the protagonist anyway. And so now she's a 60 ish woman in, um,
Speaker: a mystery writer. So I got to take her from her childhood to that. And there's a ah male writer that's her friend and Nathan. And what does he he's a mystery. or He's the male Agatha Christie. Yeah. And then we have Bernie Bridges.
Speaker: Bernie Bridges. Get it? ah He's awful. And we have what Louisa? She's yeah. picking yeah sort of We're poking fun at certain, you know, things, certain types. But yeah, we did the whole mystery writer's retreat thing on an island. But it's an island of a twisted family with with inbred children running around.
Speaker: Yeah, they were circus folk. And they lived there for a time. Boy, it's all coming back to me now. Yeah, me too. I'm like, I can't remember. I've got to think about this. but We should reread that.
Speaker: Now, another thing about your books that I think is very worth mentioning is that your covers are stunning. so um But you guys aren't artists, so is that AI? No.
Speaker: No, I mean, it's a really we have not used we have not used AI. I'm joking. I know you wouldn't use AI. We don't platform AI artists, so you can use AI covers. like Like everybody else in this business and probably every other business, we have been accused.
Speaker: God. no, we actually have an artist. he's He's actually what he is mainly is he's a website designer. He designs websites and he and he does all the artwork for the websites that the company designs. Yeah. and he tells our websites too yeah I saw some of the stuff he did and I loved the way he played with color. I loved the simplicity, you know, simple, but powerful, which I think is important in a cover. It's just, you know, bold, but not. you But anyway, and and I thought, I wonder if he could do, you know, book covers. And he does. And he does them well.
Speaker: And yeah, that's that's... Yeah, he does. I mean, they're all bangers, seriously. yeah They're fantastic. he says he enjoys doing this because it's different than doing websites but yeah he and he really he does a lot of fun with it because when you're doing a website you know of course you have to you know he he he gets to get you know kind of dark and spooky with our covers and we kind of let him do his thing we kind of just say you know here's the basic idea here's what the book is about i've learned that because we watch him do them in real time like you know
Speaker: we're on it on the computer and we're like on the share screen thing or whatever. And we watch him in you know Photoshop or whatever he's using, we watch him you know do it. And I've learned that you kind of let the artists do their own thing. I think that by by pushing your vision too much, you're robbing yourself of your the artist's ability. I'm not an artist. You know what i mean? I'm going to tell put this on the cover, put this on the cover, put this, oh, and then do this and then do this and then do this and going end up with this ugly ass
Speaker: I used to learn. You give him a general idea. It would be like if the artist wanted us to write something, he might say, oh, write something about a spooky haunted house with somebody peering out the window.
Speaker: And that's fine. We can do that. But if he started telling us and then make these certain kind of curtains and all it would be a problem. And that that's, yeah. Right.
Speaker: So you turn the artist loose. Exactly. You basically, you find a good artist, you you give them the basic idea of what you're trying to do get make sure the tone is right, and then just let them do their thing. And if they're the right artist, they're going to, they're going to.
Speaker: Yeah. good that That makes a lot of sense. I remember but when my first couple of books came out, i didn't I was with a small press, but I didn't have any input on the cover design.
Speaker: That's normal. yeah yeah yeah i I did not know that. But yes, I found out that that was quite typical, that unless you were publishing your own book, you you probably would have very little to say.
Speaker: And my first cover for A Stabbing for Sadie, it's a really cool cover, but I had to like warm up to it because I had a pretty distinct picture of what I wanted the cover to be. And I had told my publisher about that, but for whatever reason, he, I think that the the style at the time was that he would give the book to the artist, the artist would read it And then come up with a cover and send it to the publisher for approval. So that was the process as far as I know. And so I got this cover back and was like, okay, so, so that's it, huh?
Speaker: And, you know, I had to, cause I mean, again, it's a really cool cover, but because it wasn't what I was expecting, I really had to spend some time warming up to it. Cause you know, it's your first book. So every revelation, everything that happens is like, Oh, wow.
Speaker: Yeah. ah First of all, you can't fucking believe that any of it's happening to you, you know, depending on like where your imposter syndrome is when your first book comes out. But yeah, i guess i think I think the important thing, and this is one of the things that i learned early on, is the cover is the packaging. The cover needs the cover needs to sell the product, not necessarily tell the story.
Speaker: And what I mean by that is, okay, so like for for my book, sleep Savannah Sleep, it's a paranormal murder mystery. And we did this cover um and he did like this this kind of like ghostly looking woman in the woods and she's got this long black hair and the ghost in the story is a blonde.
Speaker: And I'm thinking, well, But she's blonde. That's not Savannah. Savannah's a blonde, you know, and I'm kind of getting hung up on this and it's like, okay, well, let's, let's make her hair blonde. I'm all boy that loses off. It just, it doesn't have the same vibe at all. And I'm like, okay, you know what?
Speaker: You're right. This is, this is, this tells the prospective reader what kind of story this is exactly what they're in for. Yeah. Um,
Speaker: by making the ghost this you know beautiful blonde, which she is in the in the book, um It just loses some of that. It just loses the vibe. The sinister.
Speaker: Yeah. yeah but So, you know, if anybody writes to me and says, well, I found Savannah was a blonde. I don't care. that yeah it still is jarring.
Speaker: I started with the big five publishers. Yeah, exactly. but The stuff I saw from the big five, you know, you can't argue with Simon & Schuster. They're going to do what they want.
Speaker: And they change titles, too. And lay there was nothing to say. One of them, which turned into bad things, was originally called Panic at Simon & Schuster. And it was...
Speaker: they gave me a cover that was all blue and purple with or magenta, which I love those colors, but it looked like a plant pulling Bruce Willis and in a white shooter t-shirt out the window. It was just like, okay, but I couldn't do anything about it. And they just do what they want.
Speaker: And then when Moonfall came out, it turned out everybody loved the cover but me. A big gargoyle. I think that's where you just... That is the one. that is yeah And you know what? I have a great big poster in my Oh, you do? I gave it to you. Yeah, I'm looking at it right now, and it's a great big poster of i glad you like it fat cheesy of that cheesy gargoyle. Yeah.
Speaker: i'm glad it has love wow it does i love it yeah But they do things and like haunted was um that's always been my biggest hit. And I think it's the title and my title, which my editor, who's still big pal of mine, loved as well was Saint. No, that was Moonfall with Saint Gruesome's. They made us change that. Haunted was Body House. Body House. Yes. B-O-D-Y House.
Speaker: And that was the nickname of the haunted house. They even made a cover for it. And then they said, no, we can't use that title. And they wanted to use haunted. And at the time I didn't realize that it was okay to use the same title over and over because I'm going, no, that's James Herbert's title. I love that. right right can't and Of course we can.
Speaker: Well, it was the best thing that ever happened. And, and, the and the tie, the cover, the cover we have now um is sort of an homage to the cover that um they used because it sold so well yeah and so sometimes they make really good choices and sometimes you get bruce willis being eaten by a plant
Speaker: is that always the way love that cover though but i don't know that i would have necessarily seen it that way but i'm like oh my god it does it looks like as it looks like a like a post-it for die hard except for with plants wow
Speaker: so you guys are giving us a reading that we will be putting on the end of the episode um and it's it's a short story right like what what do you have for us oh no we don't write short stories if we're not capable of that um we'll give you it's a long story
Speaker: it's an excerpt from a chapter we don't even write short chapters usually um we'll figure out what it is exactly and it'll be from the new should we say the title yeah we can we can do the title drop it's book six six of um the Ravencrest saga it's called The Curse of Devil's Wood Okay.
Speaker: All right. we So we'll have that after the, uh, the close of the episode. So what I need to know though, is like, let's say someone has not read any of your stuff. Okay. Any Thorn and Cross book, and they have decided that they're going to pick up one. They're going to read it And that is going to make or break whether or not they read more of your work. So which book would you recommend?
Speaker: Depends on what they like. If they like supernatural and gothic, the ghosts of Ravencrest. If they like thrillers, Mother. If they just like a big old ghost story, um it could be the Cliff House Haunting. It could be so Spite House. that's That's a big investment, though, because that's really three books.
Speaker: What else, Elaston? I don't know. I mean, because, oh, and if you like vampires, you can do Darling Girls and Darkin Girls. Yeah, that goes with both our books. It's an interesting merging of my characters from the Vampires of Crimson Cove series and Tamra's characters in Candle Bay because, of course, they're vampires and they all know each other, right? Yeah. So Darling Girls is is kind of a continuation of Candle Bay and kind of a companion novel to the Vampires Crimson Cove series. Yeah.
Speaker: So I don't know if you could read that one first without reading. I guess you could. i mean, you could, you could, but you're going to get the whole story. You're going to get, you know, I believe you can pretty much read, you know, any book.
Speaker: Yeah. And, you know, because there's going to be, if the writers, if the author is, is doing, you know, ah a good job, there's going to be a basic premise, you know, you know, the whole, the, the story arc and the, the climax, you're going to get all that. And anything that, you know, you read of ours, there's going to be a main story that is resolved.
Speaker: Uh, but there will be side stuff that that you'd want to read the other stuff for. If you like the shining, go for the cliff house haunting. If you like gothics, go for Ravencrest, ghosts of Ravencrest. If you like thrillers, go for mother.
Speaker: Yeah. Okay, cool. Cool. Yeah. Mother was definitely the one that, that sucked me in. And, uh, Yeah. and We're talking about doing more of those, the family series. so Yeah. Wow. Yeah, we fall we thought, what if we did mother? What if we did father? What if we did, you know not that we would necessarily call it that, but what if we did one? Well, no, you'd obviously call it the potato salad chronicles. Right.
Speaker: but The Chesapeake cookie mystery. But since we always come back to these twisted family dynamics and these you know sick buried family secrets and these you know twisted sat in place for horror lovers exactly yeah do it up exactly since we always do that we thought what if we did that in the same vein as yeah we've we've got one in the shoot ready to go but we also have a new ravencrest going right me and so it's really hard especially when we're pressed for time to decide what to do
Speaker: Oh, sure. Sure. So yeah we're actually nearing the end of our question list. So I need to know, was there anything you guys wanted to cover that we have not gotten to?
Speaker: Well, I got to tell you about Alistair's new book, really. Oh, do it. The. the
Speaker: Okay. The Red Scarab. She doesn't even know the title of it. That's how good it is. No, I was going Crimson Sparrow. That's not right. Crimson Cove.
Speaker: um No, I've just finished reading this book at least three times because we read everything out loud over and over and you know all that. And I got to tell you, it's it's the best yet.
Speaker: Alistair does the most of incredible monsters. He branches out. He doesn't just write about vampires. that's why I like is I'm not a big vampire fan honestly but he oh my god he's good but this book has something for everyone we meet his main character Cade who's a vampire hunter now but a monster hunter with his with his pal the priest um he goes on a road trip after a monster and in the process he meets his grandmother
Speaker: And his aunt. And Wednesday, you're going to love this grandmother. Oh, she's a cooker. Oh, talk about a monster. More twisted family stuff. Yeah.
Speaker: Super twisted family stuff. he He has stayed away from his family because of all this other twisted family stuff that his brother Brooks, who's this really hunky guy who's also been turned into a vampire, but he's a good guy.
Speaker: um
Speaker: had things to do with that they hate the family you know and their parents are dead but the grandmother is the key to it all and we find out more stuff than you would believe not only about why the family is hated but about cade <unk>ed is a vampire hunter.
Speaker: It's in the blood. wow. Which we know already, but we don't know how deeply it's in the blood. But the twisted family dynamics is just fantastic here. It's so much fun to read and to watch poor Cade twisting every which way.
Speaker: And then there's a... Can I say the monster's name? Sure. Andymion. We meet Andymion. That's the monster they're after. And he is totally...
Speaker: more interesting than you would ever suspect a monster to be and if any of your listeners have read the black wasp he's related to the black wasp only he's even better and she was my favorite until now now endymion is and he's not a vampire he's something else and i can't say what Wow.
Speaker: God, you gotta to read Alistair. He's the best thing since sliced bread. I'm not kidding. I can hear him blushing now. I don't know, man. I'm, I'm really into sliced bread. It's, it's like one of my main things. Um, see this is gar like i'm yeah this is the other great thing about having a collaborator. They can do your pimping for you.
Speaker: yeah He didn't know was going to that. I was giving her cue cards. No, just now he had no idea. No, I did not. Thank you. Wow. to me And even to this day, also, I have to say, even to this day, hearing Tamara, you know, whose books I grew up loving and hearing her say that, see, that's what I mean right there. When you asked me, you know, what did it teach me about my writing? You know, if someone like her thinks that what I do is good, I'm happy.
Speaker: ah No, I get it, man. That's totally relatable. You know why? Because I once asked a writer that I admire to write a foreword for one of my short collections.
Speaker: And the things that he said, initially I said, oh, how kind. How kind that this person would say all these nice things about our story, or my stories. And my husband said,
Speaker: he's he's not being kind he's saying what he likes about them oh and and that person was was you Alistair and I loved it and i loved i did and it was it was so heartwarming and validating because I always perceive things like that as people are so nice they're so kind and my husband will correct me in saying no they legitimately like your work they're not just being nice You sure are are married to a good guy.
Speaker: i I really am. I really am. I love what you say about him.
Speaker: Yeah. he's But yeah, i truly I truly meant it. I loved i loved the book that that you had me blurb on, and I you know if i would have hated it it would have been like oh you know kept me turning the pages or whatever that's when you use the word interesting yeah boy if you like her here is it's interesting yeah real generic but i like reading those things because sometimes sometimes you can actually sense that you're like i don't think they were that impressed
Speaker: boy this sure is book ah yes this is horror there is a vampire in there by god oh boy is that bad
Speaker: oh boy is that bad i Before we get to the Mad Lib, we always give guests a chance to ask me a question if they have one. So if you do, now is the time for that.
Speaker: Yeah, we do. We want to know about Halloween. for you the movie what's your favorite thing well no um do we want to make it precise like your favorite movie or do we want to know about your favorite halloween memory i think that let's do the halloween memory yeah oh gosh favorite halloween memory whatever pops in your skull wow um
Speaker: Please stop there, Alistair. I'm sorry. mike No, well, kind of. I mean, my family sucks, so a lot of my Halloween memories are like me building it up in my mind a lot, and then... It doesn't have to be childhood.
Speaker: No, um well... But then, like, I mean, I've been to some some wild Halloween parties. I love being, you know, I'm usually either a witch or a zombie, depending on what's clean in my laundry, depending on whether or not I can find my hat. um But, um you know, it's it's weird because as ah as a horror person without children, Halloween as an adult...
Speaker: isn't as remarkable a day as you know it's it's the busy time for the business because we do those those trick-or-treat packs of soaps so people can hand them out to trick-or-treaters and it's great too because every time somebody complains about how they don't want to You know how they have to take all these allergies into consideration. Like it's you don't have to. Because I guess that is hard if you have like school age kids and you've got to bring a treat and you've got to avoid like peanuts and tree nuts. And some kids can't have chocolate.
Speaker: Some kids are diabetic. There's gluten issues like there's a lot going on there. So if you say like, these are soaps, they smell like cherry almonds, but they're labeled so kids won't eat them. And they're in all these cool horror shapes. Like that's actually what I love about Halloween now. I love that time of year for the business and that I get to make, instead of like filling very specific orders, I can make things any color I want. I can pull out all my crazy little molds.
Speaker: So that is a lot of fun. Scared Soapless Halloween is where it's at. Plus, we always make a bunch of leftovers because at Christmas time, we do helping families. So people will contact us and say, hey, I know a family that can't afford a lot of gifts for their kids. Can you help them out? And then we make up kid soaps and lip balms and, you know, little resin things, shakers and candle holders and stuff. so we can send out a nice package to these families that, uh, cause the thing about being poor is that it's not just about the poverty itself. If you're poor for a long time and you feel like you kind of always have your hand out, you don't get like extras. You know, it's like when you go to the food bank and there's no spices there and it's like, okay, great.
Speaker: I have a whole bunch of minute rice and that's going to keep us alive, but ah it's a big thing, a minute rice. It's not going to taste that good. So that's, that's our thing. We want to,
Speaker: give people something fun that they wouldn't get anywhere else that just says hey man people care about you we want you to be well and happy and please enjoy this whimsy courtesy of us how wonderful so yeah i i hadn't that hadn't really occurred to me but that is what i like about the the halloween through through christmas actually or through uh through uh you know the end of up up till epiphany so like january 6th i guess is the yeah the 13th day of christmas or the 12th or whatever you know oh yeah we covered that once in in the reagancrest yeah yeah yeah i love that i love that you're doing that that matters
Speaker: Well, you know, they say that, like, I mean, I wish I was a millionaire. I wish I had, like, Bezos money, because, man, no one would ever be poor or hungry again. um Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, that would be so great. But yeah, it's it's a great thing to be able to do. Because a lot of times when people tell us about families, they'll offer to cover the shipping, which is kind of the biggest expense now. Oh, yeah. Because the post office is so borked. And honestly, that's not entirely Trump. Because Biden did fuck all about DeJoy in the post office his entire time in office. And as someone with a small business that relies on mail order,
Speaker: that really kind of fucks us yeah it's really hard to mail anything boy so yeah if if just a note if if you're going to contact us about a family it's super wonderful if you can chip in for the shipping um that seems very that's all out of pocket for us Alright kids, I hope you're ready for this because it is time for the Mad Lib and because we have two guests we're going to go every other person. Tamara, we're going to start with you.
Speaker: i need adjectives. I want you to give me one, two, three, four adjectives, please. Four in a row? yep um Yep. oh Let's see.
Speaker: Tumescently. Wait, that's an adverb. That's an adverb. Yeah. Tumescent. We could say tumescent. That is an adjective. Okay. Let's say that. um Dripping.
Speaker: um Smelly. I'm really high class here. Oh. um oh ah What else is there that's disgusting?
Speaker: um Disgusting. yeah Oh, good. She laughed. All right. Alistair, I need one noun and then two plural nouns.
Speaker: Okay. Let's see a noun. Kitten.
Speaker: and then two And then two plural nouns. um
Speaker: Dildos.
Speaker: of course see how unfazed i am i'm just writing it down quietly and um cock rings
Speaker: that poor kitten okay oh i know now that i think about it i hope the kitten is okay Well, I guess we'll see what camera. I need a place.
Speaker: A place. Um, well, in honor of Alistair's new book, salt lake city.
Speaker: All right. And Alistair, I need a silly word. Um,
Speaker: Clamorillis.
Speaker: He named a cat that. I do have a neighborhood cat that comes around i call it Clamaryllis.
Speaker: Clamaryllis. You can spell out. right, I need each of you to give me a part of the body. Earlobe.
Speaker: I'm not going to go too far with this. I want to, but I'm not going to. um My lap. yeah Alright, you know what? I need one more part of the body and this one should be plural. Tamara.
Speaker: Nostrils. but
Speaker: Okay, I need... Alistair, it's your turn, so you are going to be person in room.
Speaker: And i need i need two... Okay, one animal from each of you, please. Hmm. Awesome. Ostrich.
Speaker: yeah
Speaker: Okay. And finally, i need a celebrity. Stevie Nicks. Okay. Let me make sure I have them all.
Speaker: Good. Okay. So this is called Breaking News, Lost City found A tumescent archaeological team working in the remote jungles of Salt Lake City have reportedly discovered the dripping ancient city of Clamaryllis
Speaker: buried under about 10 miles of cock rings.
Speaker: What were they doing there? The team said they knew that they had stumbled onto something disgusting when they unearthed weapons, tools, and dildos handcrafted from pure gold and bearing the city's symbol, a mythological creature with the earlobe of a possum and the lap of an ostrich.
Speaker: If that weren't proof enough, chief archaeologist Dr. Stevie Nicks said they were certain it was the ancient city when they found a tomb marked with the name of the city's legendary smelly ruler, Ah Achooey Kaboom Boom, which roughly translates to one who sneezes as explosively as a kitten erupting.
Speaker: It's incredible, said junior archaeologist Alistair. i never would have believed this place existed if I hadn't seen it with my own two nostrils.
Speaker: And there you have it.
Speaker: Oh, that was excellent. Right? Right? Yes. All right. So big, big thanks to both of you for being here. Do stay tuned, listeners, after the closing music for an excerpt from Thorn and Cross. It's going to be totally dope and you don't want to miss it. um I'm so glad you guys could be here and we could do this and I could have you both on here together. um I won't, I'll refrain from using the phrase tag team because I'm classy. Oh, we enjoyed it.
Speaker: ah we enjoyed It's my lucky day. joy day My husband, Hay, is ear hay. Oh, okay, okay. All right. So, yeah, we're going to see everybody next week.
Speaker: Bye-bye.
Speaker: um see So we have Alistair and Tamarai here to read for you. And here they are.
Speaker: In The Curse of Devilswood, the sixth book in the Ravencrest saga, the town below Ravencrest Manor is going mad. People have been behaving oddly. and They've gradually lost their inhibitions. And at this point, they're losing their minds. They're seeing things, hearing things, feeling things that defy normal explanation. And no one knows what's real and what isn't any anymore.
Speaker: It's Christmas time in Devil's Wedding, Loudon Fiddler III of Fiddler's Department Store, is having some troubles with his Christmas ornaments, specifically his prized balls.
Speaker: December 16th, Great Balls of Fire. As dusk gathered, holiday lights began twinkling to life all over Devilswood. Loudon Fiddler had called his wife and told her to keep his supper warm because something had come up at the store.
Speaker: Fondly, he patted his lap. He tarried in his inner office before the bank of cameras that gave him views of the ladies' dressing rooms. Business had been extra brisk today because the high school's winter dance was this weekend.
Speaker: He was always late for dinner when the winter dance, prom, or homecoming were imminent, and Millie expected no less. His sweet little wife never questioned his need to provide service to his clientele.
Speaker: He stood and stretched, pressed the intercom. Miss Dollop, are you here As expected, his secretary was gone for the day.
Speaker: He glanced over the bank of dressing room cameras again. Only three rooms were occupied, two by frumpy older women. The third held a long-limbed young lovely who was trying to find the perfect gown for the winter dance.
Speaker: e The buxom young miss was taking her time. Her mother sat outside the room tapping her foot and scanning her phone. Loudon turned to a camera that showed the store beyond the dressing rooms.
Speaker: Just outside, there was Miss Furbisher, efficiently straightening clothing that needed to be returned to the racks. Beyond that, he saw shoppers strolling, but none coming his way at the moment. Business would pick up again after the dinner hour.
Speaker: Leaning forward, he returned his attention to the lithe young lady in the dressing room. me He had removed her bra, preparing to try on a halter top gown.
Speaker: Loudon took in every curve. The young miss was a D-cup, but just barely. Her boobies would benefit greatly from one of our new Maiden Flex filibuster brassieres.
Speaker: he thought as he watched her bend and twist, admiring herself in the mirror. Mmm. Her nipples were as pink as the roses Mrs. Caliban kept on her desk back in the fifth grade.
Speaker: e Mrs. Caliban. A frisson of fire ran through his groin. He freed little Lord Loudon and began a slow stroke.
Speaker: ought to be young again, this isn't bad. The young lady picked up her cell phone and began taking selfies of her nude, naked, naked, very naked, naked, naked breasts as her mother sat waiting just beyond the door. She was so naked, naked, naked, just as little Lord Loudon's blast-off began walking. From somewhere above there arose such a clatter that he let go of the little lord, who he continued shooting with explosive force, even as Big Loudon stood to see what was the matter. What the hell?
Speaker: Paying the little lord's fireworks no mind, he glanced at the dressing room's cameras. Miss Tits was zipping her dress while her mother still sat staring into her phone. Beyond, Miss Furbisher was chewing gum as placidly as a Teutonic cow as customers strolled by, unconcerned.
Speaker: The clatter came again, thumping, crunching, metallic sounds right overhead. The phone-reading mom didn't even look up. My balls! Loudon cried. My balls!
Speaker: Dingle, still dangling free, he made for the stairs next to his luxurious private bathroom. My balls! He cried again. Don't catch my balls, you bastards! Someone's playing with my balls!
Speaker: In the name of all that's holy, leave my balls alone! his trio of christmas balls were huge stunningly beautiful golden orbs held together with clouds of brilliant curls of gold wire ribbons the balls themselves were decorated with weatherproofed ornate and very expensive gold leaf he displayed his balls every holiday season but the fiddler star was what had drawn everyone's attention this year at least until those tricksters had made off with it it amused him that someone thought the star was valuable enough to steal
Speaker: was nothing but a big flashbang. His magnificent balls, however. Because they were on the roof, people didn't suspect they were anything more than plastic ornaments, and that was why he dared display them.
Speaker: No one could come near them. no one can touch my balls. No one knew how wonderful they really were, and that thrilled him. Another crunch of metal.
Speaker: What's going on? My balls! My balls! He cried. Don't touch my balls! He stepped through the doorway and raced up the stairs to the roof to see what was the matter, chasing scratching noises, metallic thrashings, and odd clicks. The chill evening breeze greeted him as he stepped onto the roof. Once there, Loudon Fiddler stared in disbelief.
Speaker: His beautiful gold Christmas balls set on the raised platform he'd had specially built for them. Their twirled metallic ribbons like sponge sugar, dotted with thousands of golden fairy lights, while the trio of huge bulging balls were lit from three sides by floodlights.
Speaker: But there was something wrong. Something blocked his view. "'My balls!' his voice strangled. "'My balls!' Long, gleaming, iridescent black feathers shone in the floodlights. He saw a black beak below eyes that reflected fiery light. Black talons tugged at the thick wire ribbons. The creature was intent on stealing his balls!' "'Mega Raven, it's real.
Speaker: My balls, my beautiful balls!' Loudon Fiddler felt faint. His vision swam and his legs turned to rubber. Little Lord Loudon had long since lost all his pride, deflating like a sad clown's balloon. "'No, my balls! Shoo!
Speaker: Shoo, you filthy beast!' He clapped his hands and stamped his foot. "'Shoo! Shoo!' The massive bird cocked its great head, blinked oil-black eyes, and loosed an ungodly sound the likes of which Loudon had never before heard.
Speaker: Caw! That unholy cry exploded through the night, bringing on an icy chill that burrowed all the way into Loudon's marrow. Caw!
Speaker: The bird was looking right at him, and now little Lord Loudon made a different kind of mess. You're in fountain freely as mega raven, quick as a housefly evading a swatter, lurched at him.
Speaker: oh Loudon screamed, still peeing, as the thing's giant talons locked onto him, caging him in a steel grip, lifting him off the ground, even as the beast yanked his golden balls free with the other talon, then took off, shooting into the night like a rocket. And then, as they flew out of sight, Loudon Fiddler's voice could be heard echoing over the town.
Speaker: balls!
Speaker: It was almost Christmas for all, but for all, it was not a good night. The end.
Speaker: My mic was off the whole time, but I assure you, I was laughing my ass off. We were trying to. We've been enjoying rehearsing that. we Sweet, sweet. All right.
Speaker: Trying to figure out that would a good one, and that's what we came up with. Awesome. Awesome. All right. So yeah, I'm going to stop recording.
