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Darrin Doyle
61 Plays1 day ago
Darrin Doyle was born in Saginaw, Michigan. He has worked as a paperboy, a janitor, a mover, a telemarketer, a door-to-door salesman, a Kinko's Copy Consultant, a porn store clerk, a pizza delivery guy, a prep cook, a magazine store clerk, a technical writer, a freelance newspaper writer, an English teacher in Japan, and finally, a professor and an author.
Darrin has a brown belt in Tae Kwon Do and wishes he had stuck with it a little longer to get the danged black belt.
Darrin hoards and plays lots of musical instruments: guitar, piano, drums, mandolin, banjo, bass, ukelele, and a diatonic 4-string stick dulcimer.
He lives in Mount Pleasant, Michigan and teaches at Central Michigan University.
He knows what skeletons do.
This is something rather than nothing
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Transcript
Introduction and Welcome
00:00:02
Speaker
You are listening to Something Rather Than Nothing. Creator and host, Ken Valente. Editor and producer, Peter Bauer. Hey,
00:00:17
Speaker
everybody. This is Ken Valente with the Something Rather Than Nothing podcast.
Midwest Influence in Horror
00:00:21
Speaker
And I'm very pleased to present Darren Doyle, um a writer, a teacher, and And um really love um ah your take in in in the feel of your type of ah horror in the Midwest. um Really enjoyed um The dark ah will end the dark. And so I'm really pleased to have the opportunity to talk to you. And and of course, recording out here in Oregon to the great state of ah Michigan. Welcome,
Midwestern Gothic and Personal Phobias
00:00:56
Speaker
Darren Doyle. ah Welcome to the podcast.
00:00:59
Speaker
Thanks, Ken. I really am happy to be here. Great. It's great to have you. um We're going to want to talk about the conceptual questions, but um right now, like I'm in the mood to to to drop into some of the like ah yeah In talking about your short stories, the horror, the macabre, the strange, there's this there's a Midwest feel I get from it. Now, I lived in Wisconsin for 12 years. so there's something I'm from Rhode Island originally, but there's something I'm picking up that's this Midwest kind of
00:01:40
Speaker
Americana ah horror. um I know I'm onto something with that. um ah But as represented in um The Dark Will End the Dark, a collection of your stories, and for the 10th anniversary, edit the second edition of that book, another short story in there, um a really great introduction for me to your work. But I wanted to ask you about this book. ah um ah ah in in its meaning to you and and and after 10 years. and and And tell us a bit about The Dark Will End the Dark as a collection.
Exploring Midwestern Gothic
00:02:19
Speaker
Well, it's a collection, as you said, of, I would call it Midwestern Gothic. I think that's a good description. um These stories, are a lot of them are pretty firmly rooted in in the Midwest, but even the ones that aren't, um there's a lot of Magical realism. um There's a lot of atmosphere. It's a lot of Gothic elements. um That would be kind of claustrophobic feeling in some of them.
00:02:51
Speaker
The idea of kind of liminality, kind of being in
Embracing Artistic Identity
00:02:55
Speaker
sort of um i yeah moments between states of of being. um so a lot of these are body part named stories of the neck and face and and uh mouth and even penis and like things like that and they ah so that's a number of them and then the other ones even um have to do with kind of i think uh grappling with themes of like mortality death um um i think that's the thing that they all have in common and You know, they, i think they are creepy, like you said. um
00:03:39
Speaker
But I don't know that that was i always my intent. My intent was just to kind of um explore the darker elements of, I don't know, the human condition. um i think I've always had kind of some phobias about body stuff and and medical stuff. and um So a lot of that came through in this collection.
00:04:09
Speaker
Yeah. i wanted to um I wanted to ask you about, um ah you know, with with this book, in When you said like Midwestern Gothic, like I really like attached to
Music and Writing
00:04:23
Speaker
that. and like I want to give you like a little bit of setup in like my head. When you drop into the dark for the Midwest, for me, I'm thinking um a Wisconsin Death Trip, some of these dark stories. um in Wisconsin and the Midwest as as a whole, and like many regions of of the country, but a particular flavor theory, you know, the Ed Keaton stories. And it just, it feels, it's tough to describe that type of horror, but I was like, that's what I was ah bumping bumping into. do Do you like using that term, like Midwestern Gothic, like capture? I mean, sometimes categorically people kind of move away from that. But like that really helped, like for me to kind of picture what I was trying to say.
00:05:10
Speaker
I do. Yeah, because Gothic tropes are, i think, recognizable to a lot of people. um And all this is doing is maybe exploiting some of the the zeitgeist of being in the Midwest. um Like you said, there there's it's sort of.
00:05:27
Speaker
at least in Michigan, there's not a lot of huge cities. There's Detroit, but where I'm, you know, not, I'm not from there. And so there's always kind of, you know, there might be a a city, but there's a rural area right next door. And so it's always kind of that combination of it. And I think of like, you know, truck stops and,
00:05:47
Speaker
and kind of urban decay and things like that. And, um, most of the characters in here, uh, really all of them aren't really wealthy or anything like that. So there's, there's some bad element. of Um, and i think I like the label because it again, it grounds people and it tells people maybe what they're in for, that they're going to be in for something that's atmospheric.
00:06:12
Speaker
It's, you know, kind of using setting pretty strongly, um, is not afraid of the grotesque, um, and the uglier elements of life.
00:06:26
Speaker
Yeah. This is a ah bit of your backstory. I mean, you know, we're just talking now, meeting now, but just reading about, um ah your background ah and hearing folks who have interviewed you chat about the different jobs you've done. And I'm fascinated by work in like such a bizarre way. I've, as a labor unionist, as a worker myself forever, I, yeah I, ah um I really become ah really become fascinated ah by like the different types of work. So related to one of the basic questions I ask on the show, you know, i usually, i ask it, you know, When did you see yourself as an artist? I know with there like a lot of different ways, maybe a few in yourself and talking about things that you've done.
00:07:11
Speaker
When did you see yourself, you know, as a writer, as an artist?
Transition from Music to Writing
00:07:16
Speaker
um Like this is part of my embodiment and identity.
00:07:23
Speaker
Yeah, it's a great question. I think I was... hesitant to use that word because I was, I thought it sounded pretentious. And so i think I resisted thinking of myself as an artist, but when I look back, I think I always had a an artistic mindset as far as just feeling a little bit off, uh,
00:07:44
Speaker
ah just a little off from mainstream ah culture and always feeling a little bit, not intentionally, but just not in the flow of of what most people are into. And so I know that, for example, I used to live in my head all the time with a lot of these jobs that I had, you know, from when I was a paper boy, I would just go on my route and just live in my mind the whole time. i did that I did that. I picked up on the paper boy. Yeah.
00:08:11
Speaker
I know what you mean, riding around your bike and stuff. And as a young kid, everything this buzzing ah everything's buzzing around up there. Make a few bucks. Exactly. And you know it's every single day. um and And then a lot of jobs I had, I was custodian, same kind of thing. I would it'd be working after hours, yeah overnight jobs. So I think a lot of that did lead me to living inside my mind a lot. I also loved music. I played music. um
00:08:41
Speaker
So I was always interested in our artistic things. I read a lot. Yeah. But it wasn't until probably later, um really after I went back to school to finish my undergrad degree, I think I finally decided I'm going to put all my energy into writing. I had been playing in a band for close to a decade. And so I thought I was going to do that for a living. But I came back to writing. I had always kind of you know messed around with it, but mostly just to write goofy, stupid stories that entertain myself. I never once even thought about publishing or anything like that. So probably not till I was in my mid twenties that I think, you know, I'm trying to be a writer. I'm specific. Yeah. Yeah.
00:09:29
Speaker
Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for the answer. Now you play a bunch, a bunch of instruments, so it's not just like a quick, it's not like a quick thing. Um, ah could Could you tell us about your experience, and that initial experience with music and where you even think career there? So um let me just ask you that. Let me just ask you that about that that musical piece and and then your move over ah to writing. What was going on with you as a creator then you What did you play?
00:10:00
Speaker
Yeah, i thanks. i played I started with the drums, but i didn't have we didn't have the money to buy me a whole drum set, so I was just playing the snare, and that got kind of boring after
Art as Expression
00:10:10
Speaker
a little bit. So I kind of abandoned it, and I came back to the guitar, or started the guitar when I was 15, basically, and I had a real good friend. um And we were collaborators on a lot of things, including like making movies and things like that. He's he's just he was kind of my creative, you know, symbiotic dude that we we just play off each other and entertain each other. And so we you know started playing music at the same time and.
00:10:37
Speaker
you know all the instruments i just i just like to tinker i just uh you know piano drums guitar bass any stringed instrument i'll i'll try to play um but of course you know writing and and writing writing fiction is not too far from writing um songs um it's just a different mode and so so yeah and even a lot of the the the musicians I liked, you know, they tell stories, Bob Dylan, um, Tom Waits, um, you know, Johnny Cash, lot of the old country artists, uh, do that. And so that it's always kind of been, you know, part of the equation,
00:11:20
Speaker
And that's so transitioning into like, for example, poetry, which I used to do a lot of poetry. i don't anymore, but poetry is obviously kind of musical language, basically. So, and I like to make the fiction that way as well. So I think they're they're very closely related.
00:11:39
Speaker
Yeah. I like, you know, I was in in anticipating the the question. I'm going to ask it a different way. it's it's' It's a bit off, but like, you know, for me, in in I was really ah hearing you and, you know, talking about, you know, feeling off step a bit and, you know, those those anxieties. Like, you know, I vibe with, like, I understand that.
00:12:00
Speaker
And just... I was wondering, because I think in music terms, I think of book terms. like People around me say, that's the biggest music freak you ever heard of if they're around me at certain times and my concentration on it. And other people be like, that dude's reading all the time or anytime has.
00:12:19
Speaker
And so as a creator in that realm, i had never played in a banner hat like that outlet. And I've written, but not as concentrated or, you know,
00:12:29
Speaker
the more you know the the way that you would do it, for example. is So when I see creators like that, in my head, I'm like, I want to be like the guy yelling like ah rock, like metal, like doom metal. like i That's what I want. yeah no That would get out certain the the ya-ya's and the energy in my head. But also when I think about like embodying those type of things,
00:12:57
Speaker
and looking at creating through writing, which seems such a, gosh darn, like super, super, super patient. Not that musicians don't have communication, but like different in crafting words and some mind type of thing that you're doing.
00:13:12
Speaker
Is it like, I see the similarities, but like, yeah, what you'd like channel in, in like, how do I ah talk and express and create, you know, am I making it too big or,
00:13:26
Speaker
No, no, that's that's a fair question. i don't think they're exactly the same. Like you said, um
Introduction to 'The Beast in Aisle 34'
00:13:32
Speaker
you know usually music is is a little more communal, yeah you know if you're playing with somebody. And I did love doing that. um But the writing...
00:13:43
Speaker
was a great way for me to be the in charge of my own destiny, so to speak. You know, when you're playing with other people in a band, you gotta, you're all depending on each other and it's just more complicated. And so yeah, you're right that the, but writing it, it is a lot more patience. It's a lot more, um slow going, um to, to come up with something. But I think I was ready for it. Um, at that point when I kind of got the the music thing a little out of my system, I was, um,
00:14:16
Speaker
And I could, there is some instant gratification to it though, because like I would write at night all the time. And that was the the quietest time of day. There was no distractions. And so I would write for two or three hours every night. And then lo and behold, in the next day, I had something to read that I was like, Ooh, I wrote this, you know, and I kind of, even by the time I get around to reading it, I kind of forgotten exactly what I'd written. So it was always this kind of new discovery that, that really kept me going and got me excited about it so those those it's kind of the same way you know you you lay down some recordings and then you go to bed and come back to it and you're like oh yeah yeah you know that's something to build on you know um so they they do work slightly different parts of your creative brain i think but but ultimately i get the same kind of satisfaction out of them
00:15:09
Speaker
yes yeah thanks thanks for Thanks for your indulgence. hey Yeah, no it's a good question. ah Yeah, thank you. um ah so ah Speaking of indulgence, i want to i want to if you could indulge me a bit. um and and then i might have you know prior to recording i might have mentioned the the book the beast in in aisle 34 i had heard you talk on a couple of podcasts um and outside of reading the dark will end the dark um i heard you give an intro uh to that book so as part of the indulgence i was
00:15:53
Speaker
yes ah As I heard on there, did you talk about um you know the the main story or the beginning ah the story, what have you, of the beast in Isle 34?
00:16:07
Speaker
Sure. Yeah, it's ah basically a werewolf novel, um but it's got a little bit of a comic comedy horror vibe to it. And the premise is that there's a guy named Sandy.
00:16:23
Speaker
And he is in his early thirty s and he's married and he works at Lowe's and he's a werewolf. And um pretty much the story starts with that that, that he's one night he's transformed. He's sitting on his roof and um and you learn that this werewolf, Sandy, has been werewolf just for a few months and is Trying to be able to sneak and be sneaky about his werewolf life and not let his wife catch on. And they live in a, they bought a house recently in rural Michigan. And so he thinks that they, that he can each month just satisfy his experience.
00:17:09
Speaker
appetite by eating ah deer. and um And of course, that doesn't work. There's some Sasquatch hunters out in the woods that he didn't count on that start putting pressure on him. And he kind of has to keep inventing reasons for his wife to leave town during the full moon. And so the story basically takes off from there.
00:17:32
Speaker
I enjoy the Sasquatch, not Sasquatch hunters. I'm in Sasquatch territory up here, recording pacific Northwest. And I get, I gotta say, I do get to travel a bunch during the state and a lot of wooded areas. And, um,
00:17:47
Speaker
You know, I stop a couple times every every trip and just a good solid look into the woods. And I'm looking for different things and on that list.
Discovering 'The Girl Who Ate Kalamazoo'
00:17:58
Speaker
I would desperately be looking for Sasquatch. Absolutely. you know it yeah You know, it's something good to be about searching, like searching for that particular copy or edition of that book that you had a while ago and you want to find again. arms yeah Speaking of books, um i also get a copy uh i love looking i yeah go up the paul's bookstore great independent bookstore uh and um with uh union labor there as well on the girl who ate uh kalamazoo and i was i was happy to to to share that i think on um instagram but also let let you know about finding that. so It's always a thrill for me. um um you know
00:18:45
Speaker
i like I just adore books and sometimes finding and searching. The thing is with Powell's, it's the type of place where find that sometimes you don't even there. because and so it was it was definitely a nice surprise um ah to find the girl who ate ah Kalamazoo. and Since I brought it up, I was wondering if you might just ah tell tell us a little bit about um about that book. It's a beautifully designed book. and i look to ah i' been I've been grabbing your stuff and now i'm I get to go through it all.
00:19:23
Speaker
Well, thanks for grabbing it. and It's so cool that it was at Powell's. um Yeah, that story is, it's funny because the the beast in aisle 34 is a monster story and there's definitely monster kind of stories in the dark, well, in the dark. And in in some sense, the girl who ate Kalamazoo, I was never thinking of it that way, but ah this person I know, don't know.
00:19:49
Speaker
you know compared it to like a a monster story like a big monster who eats a city and because she that is literally about a girl who eats a city so um the premise is that it's the story is being written by the sister of the girl who ate kalamazoo and you learn that uh the girl who ate kalamazoo whose name is audrey um she started out as a child with uh pika which is when children eat non-food items or adults but um often in children they'll eat crayons or paste or whatever um and so i i imagined that but then took it to absurd lengths where she starts eating desks and you know furniture and and ultimately buildings and things
The Future of Books
00:20:38
Speaker
like that. And so um really the the other siblings in the family also have eating disorders. The brother has a bigorexia, so he's always trying to get bigger. He's never satisfied. And then the
00:20:55
Speaker
sister who narrates the book, whose name is McKenna, um, has what's called rumination syndrome. And it's kind of gross, but it's like, uh, a eating disorder where you swallow food, but then regurgitate it in your mouth, back into your mouth and kind of keep doing that back and forth. Like you, they enjoy the sensation of it going down and never really want to let go of that food. And, um,
00:21:21
Speaker
I thought that worked perfectly for a narrator who is kind of ruminating over and over on this relationship and this whole event. Not your typical tale.
00:21:32
Speaker
ah no yes Oh, yeah. thank't it they oh thanks thanks Thanks so much ah for telling us about for telling us about these books. i want to get back to... um um ah A couple other questions um And it's a variation of the one An art question I ask um What's the role of books 2025 Like You know you and I we love books And lot of folks around us might and but Like it's 2025 You know What's the role of books 2025 going recording here late
00:22:15
Speaker
Oh, gosh, if I had that answer, I'd be a millionaire. No, I um i wish I knew. I could tell you my optimistic answer is that... um You know, storytelling is such a a human tradition that goes back to you know the first civilizations. And I feel like there is a deep need to tell stories. And obviously now we have many different vehicles for those stories, um ah many of them visual stories.
00:22:49
Speaker
television and movies and so on but i hope you know and like to believe that there will always be a place for the written word because it just is an entirely different way of experiencing a story that allows the reader to bring some of their own imaginations into
Technology and Storytelling
00:23:11
Speaker
play. And so um maybe it'll you know change form. I mean, back they used to think that the the physical books were just done because of the the e-readers and things like that. And i i don't think that's really come to... I've hearded times i have life what have you i've heard it a couple of times of the demise of something that's you know been around as long as you can print. like yeah
00:23:38
Speaker
and um no yeah so um no i i i hope there's like that that vitality that's like for a lot of people do you think it's like some of that tactile is the smell it's the other aspects of like maybe the whole thing and one of the things would point out like even for me digitally um There's a way that they interface um comic book and comic book panels electronically. There's actually, for me, feels kind of nifty to move through. Again, like ah for me, i i i love ah love that print one. It's probably my go-to. But there's an interactivity or some fluid mode. It seems like comics, like in moving that way,
00:24:23
Speaker
um so I was pleasantly surprised myself in having that positive experience through it. It opened my mind just a little bit more being like, yeah, maybe tones or colors, you might want to move through it in a different way or interact with
Authenticity in Art
00:24:43
Speaker
it.
00:24:43
Speaker
yeah yeah it doesn't have to be technology doesn't have to be the enemy or the ah the death knell for these story forms um hopefully there's a way to to kind of bring them together like you said um but and i'm kind of in a bubble you know i teach and i teach creative writing um and so the students that i teach um are readers um but If it's any indication that the program is very popular and and my students also love physical books. And so, and you know, these are people who are way younger than me. And I'm hoping that there's at least enough people to to carry the tradition on.
00:25:27
Speaker
I think print's going to explode at least in in in certain sense, at least in the political situation of like small print, zine, where it's not just like a tactile, but it also could be a quick, cheap distribution thing of being able to communicate that isn't electronic. so like you know it's like Nothing is like seems like the absolute annihilation of you know like the whole other thing. it's like ah so like kind of looking for that weird you know ah that you know maybe that weird interplay.
00:26:01
Speaker
um um darren was wondering what you thought ah to the question what is art
00:26:13
Speaker
ah What is art? Gosh. um I think of art as artifice, like short for artifice. um It is a version of reality than that is kind of better than reality in its ability to express the human experience um it's like a distilled way that is always filtered through the artist's eye so you're getting the individual's experience which is something that is not replicable I tell my students that all the time. i'm like, there's no, there's not new stories to tell. You know, there's probably, probably every concept you have for a story has been around in some form or another, but there's always your version of it. And like, nobody has ever been
00:27:11
Speaker
you know, Joe Schmo, you know, born in Saginaw, Michigan on this particular date and has surrounded by these particular people with these particular
Why is there something rather than nothing?
00:27:21
Speaker
experiences. So whatever you have seen and done and thought and felt um is going to let it come know you got to let it come through you know be your own voice and um so that's to me what what art is is is a true and like immersion into um another person's soul kind of and that and that they're they have made it like a packaged it in a way that's um able to communicate to anybody that's that's the hope anyway
00:27:54
Speaker
Yeah, well, that's a powerful that's that that's a powerful description. Thank you. um Yeah, like i I feel the the vitality in that. um ah Well, let me let me hit you up with the let me hit you up with the big one, the the the name of the show, because you get a crack at it.
00:28:17
Speaker
ah why Why is there something rather than nothing? And we're talking with Darren Doyle. author from michigan why is there something rather than nothing
00:28:29
Speaker
gosh i think you'll have to read my book to find the answer to that no ah redirect them yeah that's right It's a scary question. And it gets to, um you know, the whole idea of faith to me when I hear that question. It's like, can you attribute the something to something?
00:28:52
Speaker
um Do we attribute the nothing to something or nothing? I'm getting lost in other words. that's I love that question, but I also hate it because I think it kind of terrifies me and I think I don't have an answer. But luckily, as a fiction writer, um like Flannery O'Connor said, we we embrace mystery. We embrace the not knowing.
00:29:15
Speaker
And I'm happy to not know why there's something rather than nothing. But
Upcoming Work and Conclusion
00:29:21
Speaker
it's true. Yeah. but it's but it's true Oh, not necessarily. In my mind, one of the things i' I've liked about like in the Buddhist tradition and response to this, there's like unknowable questions. They're like, don't waste your time. they you like like what's the first thing or anything like that. And so it's like, you know, there's strong traditions of being like, well, you know, be ah be contemplative. Yes. There you go. Exactly. That's right. In a productive spiritual way. But that's a whole argument ah in and of its in and of itself right there. um
00:30:02
Speaker
ah Darren, ah just wondering, ah we'll have the opportunity here, what, um what, the what you got anything in in the works, what you're thinking about, anything to know about with your writing?
00:30:19
Speaker
Oh, yeah, i have a um another novella coming out. um Sorry, my phone camera came on. Okay. um Yes, I have a novella coming out in ah summer 2027. So it's a little ways off, but it it's called The Boy Behind the World. And it's a another sort of horror or horror adjacent story of a of this so woman who lives in, it basically starts with a a crime scene and and there's a murdered, desiccated corpse in the basement of a house and some occult stuff around it. and um
00:31:03
Speaker
And the manuscript itself is is the story written by the woman who is presumably dead in the basement. and um yeah it's got it's got some california stuff in it it's got it takes place a lot of it it it's set in being written in 2015 but um the a lot of the action takes place in the 70s oh dig it yeah yeah thanks Thanks for letting us know about it. It's been it's been really super chatting with you. I wanted to ask you too,
00:31:37
Speaker
um like ah places for people you know to find your books, ah like you know things you you write or wish to present you and you know in a more public fashion?
00:31:51
Speaker
Yeah, ah thanks. um Pretty much, I'm lucky all my books um are still in print, and so they're all available um pretty much at any bookseller. I always recommend bookshop.org, which is a ah good place to You can also go to the web websites of um like Tortoise Books, which who published The Beast in Isle 34 and The Dark Will in the Dark and another story collection of mine called Scoundrels Among Us. And um so Tortoise Books dot com is good place. And Regal House Publishing did my recent novella as well. So their website is a good place.
00:32:31
Speaker
So also you can just ask at your local bookstore and they'll order it for you. Fantastic. um Really great chatting with you, Darren. um it's It's a particular thrill a thrill and recording you know in October and talking about some of these stories. and I just really like the vibe that comes through in the words that you write and like the the fantastical the fantastical that you throw in there and present that I always like.
00:33:03
Speaker
It's not easy to do, but I love it. And that that's the piece that that that really drew me. So I really appreciate you coming on to the to the podcast and kicking around, you know, books and and philosophy and art.
00:33:18
Speaker
Yeah, thank you so much for having me. It was a really, really enjoyable conversation. Appreciate it, Darren. you Take care. Yeah, you too. Thanks, Kent.
00:33:40
Speaker
This is something rather than nothing.