Latinx Heritage in Horror Month 2024: An Interview with M.M. Olivas
What inspired you to start writing?
I started writing fiction around my junior year of high school. Unlike many of my writing peers, I hadn’t grown up doing it, nor was I much of a reader. I was dyslexic and gravitated more toward visual media: comics, shows, and movies. Oh, so many movies. I didn’t have a ton of adult supervision growing up, so I saw Alien and The Exorcist when I was six or seven—having one parent hospitalized due to lung cancer while the other tends to them will do that to ya. I watched a lot of horror films on AMC, or I’d rent whatever Showa Godzilla or Universal monster films I could find at Blockbuster or my local library. I probably rented Alien a good dozen times, and I still have the DVD of Predator 2 (Look it was the only Predator film they had) which I never returned to Blockbuster. Those movies drew me to narrative storytelling and the horror genre—particularly monster stories.
I’m not sure if it’s more endearing or embarrassing, but I also got my start with writing through playing with action figures. Transformers or Star Wars characters, or the old Alien vs Predator toys from Kenner. I’d mimic the narrative structures that I was observing in movies: the three acts, slow openings, character conflict, rising action, etc. I created little stop-motion films as best a middle schooler could, and then I wanted to write scripts for them. I fancied myself a screenwriter, maybe a future director. The thing is I didn’t know a thing about writing. I just accidentally started writing fanfiction for my toys.
By junior year, I’d been activated by the works of Edgar Allan Poe and Mary Shelley, and when I tried my hand at writing my own short horror stories, I found that the process of it—the plotting, character motivations, the pacing— felt totally natural to me.
Tell us about your work in 25 words or less.
I write gothic westerns. My debut novel, Sundown in San Ojuela, features Aztec gods and conquistador vampires in present-day California.
What was it about the horror genre that drew you to it?
Like I touched on earlier, horror captivated me from a very young age, and I think what captivated me most about it had to do with the use of monsters. I’ve always been drawn to their innate tragedy of them: these things with fangs and claws, deemed monstrous by the very people who seek to destroy them. Growing up queer and a person of color, that otherness is a feeling I know intimately. Whenever the monsters are treated as more than just killing machines, I’m instantly locked in. It’s like having a sleep-paralysis demon sitting on top of me! And I love the opportunities for visual character design that come with monsters.
What also compels me about the stories I enjoy is watching protagonists wrestle with personal, internal conflicts. I’m a character person, first and foremost. And monsters are such tragic, only things.
Do you make a conscious effort to include LatinX characters and/or themes in your writing and if so, what do you want to portray?
Yes, absolutely. To me, there is no point in writing if I cannot use my art to explore and express my own emotions. And I’m Latina, I’m Chicana, I’m a transwoman; my worldview has been shaped by my experience of those identities. I want to portray the horrors of colonization and the possibility of liberation. I want my work to be revolutionary and anticapitalist, because I’m not sure if there’s anything more important to write about for me right now. I feel like it’s my responsibility to write about that; to make meaningful change somehow. We’re not free till we’re all free. And you know, there’s that one Toni Cade Bambara quote, “The role of the artist is to make the revolution irresistible”.
What has writing horror taught you about the world and yourself?
Horror has taught me a lot—how our insecurities manifest both within ourselves and in how we treat others; what compels us to do horrible things. I’ve never been drawn to cozy or neat characters that are easy to root for. I’ve always preferred the “edgy” characters, lol. But no, for real, I resonate so deeply with the type of character who has to battle with—and often lose to—their worst impulses. I have a lot of awful impulses and thoughts, and I’ve acted on them before and dealt with a lot of self-loathing because of it. I want that messiness, those broken and irredeemable characters because I learn more about the roots of my own insecurities through them. It’s why I chose to depict the protagonists in Sundown as so problematic: I wanted to explore the complicated and often unpalatable choices that get made for survival, especially within the queer and Chicane communities.
How have you seen the horror genre change over the years? And how do you think it will continue to evolve?
When it comes to literature, I’m not the most well-read. Like I said, I’m dyslexic, so it takes me a while to get through even slim books. I’m always reading, but I watch and process films more efficiently. But what I’ve seen in both literature and film: so, so many more writers of color, and queer writers, really starting to use the genre to explore horrors from our own marginalized experiences. For example, I think the best movie of 2024 that I’ve seen so far is Jane Schoenbrun’s I Saw the TV Glow, which is a VHS/analog style horror film that explores trans-ness and living closeted. Very Lynchian. But so original in its style and form. Carmen Maria Machado’s stories Help Me Follow My Sister into the Land of the Dead and Inventory push the medium of prose, really leaning into what prose can do that film or poetry cannot. We’re seeing so many more intimate and unique horror stories that are specific to the lived experiences of queer and BIPOC writers, and from what I can see, this is only the beginning.
Time to daydream: what are some aspects of LatinX history or culture – stories from your childhood, historical events, etc — that you really want our genre to tackle? (Whether or not you’re the one to tackle them!)
I want more narratives about the radical and revolutionary histories of Latin America! Recently, for some writing projects of mine, I’ve been reading into Mexico’s Municipios, these totally self-governing communities that are associated with the Purépachan people. My family has Purépachan roots, and trying to learn more about that specific part of my Indigenous Heritage has been incredibly difficult, especially as someone who’s not only from the Mexican diaspora but also from a family that’s historically distanced itself from Indigenous roots (as have many other families, due to the colorism that came with colonialism).
But I’ve been fascinated by the municipality of Cheran for quite some time. Cheran is a city in my family’s home state of Michoacán where, in 2011, the impoverished indigenous community organized to expel corrupt politicians and cartel loggers from the area. They established a new self-run communal government from the ground up. The Mexican constitution allows self-government within indigenous communities, and Cheran is a great example. It’s a rich place for storytellers to explore what’s possible beyond the confines of over-industrialization and capitalism. How can we live as part of the ecosystem instead of only taking from it? How can we create communities where people are incentivized to help one another? What kind of monsters would we find in these stories?
Who are some of your favorite LatinX characters in horror?
I’d like to say Private Vasquez from Aliens, but it’s so unfortunate that a Latina actor couldn’t have been hired for that role. So it’s soured on me a little.
What does it convey when I say that this is actually a hard question to answer? I’ve been sitting here thinking about Latine horror protagonists in literature and film, looking for the characters that really stand out to me, the ones I’ve gotten attached to. I’ve yet to find the Latine protagonist that I can truly latch on to, whose name I remember long after reading the book or watching the movie. I love my final girls, my Ellen Ripleys and Laurie Strodes, and I don’t think we have enough of our own yet. There’s Jenna Ortega’s character from the 2022 Scream, I guess? The Latine renaissance in horror is still rather in its infancy. While not horror, I do love the Batman villain, Bane! Not Tom Hardy or any of those pastiches, but the Latino Bane introduced in the Nightfall story arc, who matches Batman in both intelligence and strength (and then some, with venom added)—who even bested our caped crusader. Growing up, he was one of my first experiences of Latine rep, and he holds a special place in my heart.
I also love the character of La Llorona. Specifically, the version from Jayro Bustamante’s film La Llorona. The movie follows a fictional dictator, a stand-in for Efraín Ríos Montt, during a trial against him for orchestrating the Guatemalan genocide. With so much civil unrest, the former dictator and his family isolate in their mansion, and that’s when the character Alma, played by the incredible María Mercedes Coroy, is hired as an extra maid for the house. As the narrative progresses, strange and horrifying things increasingly torment the family into madness, with all of the events indicating Alma is more than she claims to be. It’s a film I think everyone should watch. It uses the tropes of the horror genre to highlight the bureaucratic banality of evil and show the ruling class suffering the repercussions of its casual atrocities. I think that’s so important, so ever relevant. And we—the Latine community—owe it ourselves to speak out against such atrocities wherever they are, because we know what it’s like to be dehumanized through rhetoric, policy, and border walls.
Who are some LatinX horror authors you recommend our audience check out?
I want to first plug my friend Cynthia Gómez, whose radical and rageful short story collection The Nightmare Box and Other Stories recently debuted. I also want to mention Gabino Iglesias, whose work in this community needs no introduction, and his novel The Devil Takes You Home. There’s Silvia Moreno Garcia, who showed me what politically biting Latine horror could be with Mexican Gothic. Carmen Maria Machado, who will always be a much more clever writer than I could ever hope to be, and whose work actually helped me figure out I was trans. Her short story collection Her Body and Other Parties and her edition of Carmilla cracked my egg WIDE open by depicting feminine desire in a way I deeply resonated with. If she ever reads this: ma’am, thank you for your service. (Her comic book The Low, Low Woods, illustrated by Dani, is also just so, so brilliant.)
I also want to highlight Cynthia Pelayo, Isabel Cañas, E.G. Condé, and V. Castro, all of whom are doing great work using Latine history and culture to create subversive and daring new horror.
What is one piece of advice you would give horror authors today?
Who am I to give advice to other horror authors? Look at the absolute state of me. I only gained consciousness like a fistful of years ago (an awful experience in this world, I might add; I should return it). I’m just some wannabe goth who likes things with teeth, if you can believe it.
One of the rules I’ve always given myself is to let the reader do the heavy lifting. Don’t answer all their questions. Withholding full view of the monster, the shark, or the xenomorph, or having the violence happen off screen, can be far scarier than showing it. You don’t want the audience of the movie to see the wires, or the reader to see the writer’s hand. You can’t compete with the individual human imaginations of your readers when confronted with the fear of the unknown. Learn what to depict in scene and when to let the reader’s mind betray them and fill their thoughts with the dread of the unspeakable horrors happening just behind the prose.
What is one piece of craft advice you’ve gotten that has really worked for you? Alternatively, what’s one that you’ve happily rejected?
Last semester at SJSU, my poetry professor Marcelo Hernades gave a micro lecture during a workshop about artists leading their art versus allowing the art to lead them. As an author who spends a lot of time drafting novels with outlines and playlists and storyboards, I often know exactly where the story will go and I’m actively leading it in that direction. The problem is that when one is leading their art, they cannot take it anywhere they themselves have never been before. Whereas letting the art lead you places is what causes that sense of discovery, of tangible creation embodying whatever abstract feeling or vibe you initially sought out when you started writing. I can be rigid with my craft, and while that’s useful for the structured and high concept stories I like to tell, I often get stuck or run out of steam once I’m no longer discovering anything new that compels me. So I love the advice to let the art lead you. Lately, I’ve been spending more time just playing, letting emotion and curiosity guide me rather than narrative logic. That’s been worthwhile for my relationship with my own art.
The advice I absolutely reject is trying to write for an audience that isn’t me. I’ve been told by many professionals and educators to consider my audiences, and I’ve always found that so bizarre. I am not a wholly unique person, whose lived experiences are totally dissimilar to anyone else’s on this planet. I write from my own frame of reference, from my own experiences, because writing—creating any art, really—for me is about self-exploration and expression. I trust that if I’m honest about my experiences, the art will find its audience: other people with similar experiences, whether queer, or Latine, or other.
And to the LatinX writers out there who are just getting started, what advice would you give them?
Like I said, I feel like I’m just getting started myself! I barely know how to do my taxes (my frontal cortex only JUST finished cooking) I don’t have ten easy steps to change your writing life. What I can do is share with you something many writers have told me. If this is the first time you’ve heard it, then good! Take it. Guarda estos entre sus costillas y sus corazónes. Write specifically. Trying to write a brand new thing that’s never been done before is a fool’s game. You’ll kill yourself before you think of that perfect concept. But if you write about the many things that make you the unique, exciting, and interesting human you know you are—your hobbies, your niche historic interest, your favorite ecosystem, the shops you passed out in as a child, your mother’s accent, your tía’s laugh—only you can compose a fresh arrangement of all the facts of yourself, however common or rare these experiences are. In that composing, the creation of a new whole, you’ll find a story that reaches its audience through the specificity that makes it feel real.
A friend once told me about this high concept story set in a future Mexico City, about food culture, and classism, and social media. He was sure about everything except making it bilingual. As if that would be too much. I told him that if that’s his reality, it’s no less valid than any other writer’s. If any of you ever feel you need permission to write fully, and wholly, and truly from the parts that form the vast multitudes of you, hopefully I can at least give you that.
M.M. Olivas is an alumna of the 2022 Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers’ Workshop and the 2023 Under the Volcano Writers Residency. Her short fiction has appeared in several publications, including Uncanny Magazine, Weird Horror Magazine, Apex, and Bourbon Penn. As a trans, first-generation Chicana, she explores the intersection of queer and diasporic experiences in her fiction. She currently resides in the San Francisco Bay Area, earning her MFA in Creative Writing at San Jose State University and collecting transforming robots. More information about Olivas and her fiction can be found at olivasthewriter.wtf. Olivas’ debut novel, Sundown in San Ojuela, a gothic spaghetti western that follows Aztec Vampires in California’s Inland Empire is available for preorder online and through indie bookstores, and will be released in paperback, kindle, and as an audiobook on November 19th.
