The Horror Writers Association (HWA) and the University of Pittsburgh Library System (ULS) are excited to announce a new chapter in their collaboration leading up to StokerCon. Building on their roles as Marquee Sponsor in 2023 and Raven Sponsor in 2024, the ULS has committed to a ground-breaking 10-year Legacy Sponsorship starting with StokerCon 2025.
The market is crowded, the rules of social media are constantly changing, and the logistics of building a catalogue are more complicated than ever. The good news, according to author Clay McLeod Chapman, is that time-tested strategies such as supporting other authors and finding a unique voice will still get the job done. In this month’s edition of Nuts & Bolts, he gives advice for beginning authors about getting their material in print.
Before he could create Vietnam veteran John J. Rambo in First Blood, thriller and horror author David Morrell had to find that pesky “ferret.” That’s how his mentor Philip Klass, aka legendary science fiction author William Tenn, used to describe it. Professor Klass, who’d taken David under his wing at Penn State University, used to say that if you’re a writer, a dominant emotion fuels your craft. No exceptions. It could be anger or joy. Sorrow or lust. Like it or not, you’re stuck with it because it’s an integral part of you. The professor compared it to a ferret rooting around in your psyche. Elusive. Ravenous. And worst of all, unwilling to be found.
Taking a creative writing course is a concept that some of Ray Cluley’s fellow authors seem to find puzzling. Even objectionable. If you’re calling yourself a writer, shouldn’t you already know how to write? Since it’s such a personal endeavor, how can it even be taught?
In this month’s edition of Nuts & Bolts, Ray discusses the full range of benefits from a creative writing course, and how even seasoned professionals can use one to hone their craft.
What inspired you to start writing?
To be honest, it was a group of alley cats. Even before I could write, I’d literally scribble and loopity-loop in a composition notebook about the cat families I saw outside from my window. The way I portrayed their stray lives was often like an anthropomorphized telenovela and I remember being frustrated when no one could read what I’d written.
What inspired you to start writing?
I was inspired to start writing because of the ghost stories I would hear as a kid, in particular, La Llorona; they sparked my imagination. I made up worlds in my mind and found myself lost in them—still am most days. Then one day, I decided to bring these worlds to life by actually putting them down on paper.
What inspired you to start writing?
For a long time, I wanted to be a comic book writer/creator. I wrote various stories in the comic book medium. Unfortunately, the search for an artist/collaborator was a difficult task. After quite some time of fruitless searches, I did some deep soul-searching and made the jump to writing genre fiction where I had no one but myself to rely on. It has turned out to be the best decision I could have ever made for my creativity.
What inspired you to start writing?
It was a combination of two things: reading, and my day job. After I started working full-time, I developed the terrible habit of not reading anything longer than a magazine article. Then, per my mother’s recommendation – which is odd, considering how not into horror she is – I picked up The Books of Blood, short story collections by Clive Barker, those slim American paperback editions with the monstrous faces on them. The stories The Midnight Meat Train, The Forbidden, and In the Hills, the Cities tore a hole in my brain. I could barely believe people could write such things. I became a lifelong fan of his work. Meanwhile, my career took me in the direction of audio production for TV, movies, and video games. If you combine high-concept short-form story ideas and my fascination with sound, you get the lion’s share of my fiction.
What inspired you to start writing?
I’ve always been a voracious reader, and I dabbled a bit in high school with a creative writing class, but I never really considered tackling anything substantial until I went through a bout of major depression that left me grasping for anything that could bring a bit of relief. Writing did that for me. I began with free writing, choosing a word at random and scribbling everything that came to my mind without stopping or correcting myself for five minutes. I’d then try to transform the themes I spilled on the page into poetry. It was purely therapeutic at first, but as I started filling notebooks, I began sending some poems out to a variety of journals and e-zines. Surprisingly, editors liked them. It all kind of spiraled from there.
What inspired you to start writing?
What actually inspired me to start writing was my sister. She has two children’s books out. One is called, I’m Hungry but No Bugs, Please, and Hello, Pretty Cloud, both available on Amazon. She was trying to write her first horror book and asked for my help. I gave her advice and helped with the editing. She asked me why I had never tried to write a book myself. She knows how much I love to read. I couldn’t believe I’d never thought of trying this before. I was also about to undergo major surgery and would have weeks of recovery time. I used that time to start brainstorming plot ideas. I instantly fell in love with writing and have been making time for it ever since.
What inspired you to start writing?,/p>
My parents are avid readers, so they instilled that in me from an early age. We always had lots of books in the house, and they would often read to me. Trips to the public library were frequent, and something I very much enjoyed. By age five I asked where books and stories came from, and my mother explained that there were these people called “writers” who created stories in their imaginations and wrote them down for other people to read. I knew instantly that this was what I wanted to do with my life.
What inspired you to start writing?
When I was 12, I became addicted to John Le Carré’s novels. At that age, I had read everything because at home my parents didn’t censor my reading. I read Flaubert, García Márquez, Zola, and Homer, terrifying stories about the Tower of London, and comics about Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and Snoopy. And all this mishmash of heterogeneous readings added to Le Carré’s novels, created in me the need to write a spy novel that mixed suicidal women, walled-up children, incestuous relationships, and of course, a political crisis. I read it to my friends at school who didn’t pay much attention to me and I think the manuscript, which was in several ring-bound notebooks, was lost during a move.
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.
What inspired you to start writing?
I have been writing since I was a kid, but it wasn’t until I went to Acting School in New York that I had to write a one-act play. That assignment focused on how to create compelling characters and situations, and how to tell a story. Years later, play/scriptwriting shifted to short horror stories for anthologies.
What inspired you to start writing?
I loved to read. I mean, I still love to read, but I was a voracious reader, and that’s what drew me to writing. I love stories.
Tell us about your work in 25 words or less.
Strange, off-kilter, disturbing, sometimes absurd.
What inspired you to start writing?
I’ve dreamed of being a writer since I could form sentences but what really ignited me was a Halloween short story I did back in the 5th grade. As I advanced through middle school, high school, and college, my passion for writing increased into an obsession almost. I truly felt that I would cease to breathe if I could not put pen to paper and bleed out my imagination all over the page. Writing is my sanctuary; it always has been a way for me to deal with my living nightmares.
What inspired you to start writing?
I’ve been storytelling since I was a little girl and knew I wanted to be a published author from the time I could write. I’d cast my family and friends in productions I’d created and make everyone from family fiestas to block parties and watch all the kids put on my shows. Yes, I was a bit of a showboat, but that passion has carried me through the writing life of rejections and disappointments, deadlines, and poor sales or sunken platforms. I’m still crossing my fingers and writing my heart out every day that I can, despite a chronic illness that sometimes impedes my process but has also allowed me to adapt and transform. More than anything, I write because I’ve felt deep in my heart from a young age that Latinas and Indigenous women have been systemically overlooked and underappreciated in our society, and I’ve wanted to change that and empower other women and femmes of color to share their stories and voices.
What inspired you to start writing?
Reading books I loved.
Tell us about your work in 25 words or less.
My work is queer, monstrous, and playful.
What inspired you to start writing?
I guess the same thing as every other writer: I couldn’t find what I wanted to read, so I decided to write it myself.
Tell us about your work in 25 words or less.
I’m chaotic and don’t stick to any literary genre: I write everything from horror to romance.
