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Post by Jim on Jun 20, 2009 17:19:08 GMT
Please everyone feel free to ask away.
For someone who has been in print for 21 years, do you think genre fiction has become more mainstream in this time?
And do you think it has been a good thing? Are we running the risk of saturating the market with teenage angst desperate housewives and shiny vampires
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Post by Jim on Jun 20, 2009 17:22:34 GMT
Do you feel more at home with short stories or novels
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Post by Jim on Jun 20, 2009 17:24:31 GMT
How do you feel about the collector markets. Is it fair play for authors to only release stories as expensive ultra limited editions, or should everyone get a chance to read it?
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Post by ian on Jun 20, 2009 17:29:33 GMT
Hi Conrad.
I have a few questions for you.
What single piece of advice would you give to any aspiring writer wishing to break into the horror market?
Have you ever met anybody in real life who was the spit in looks and behaviour to one of your made up characters?
Is there any book that you have read and thought 'I could have done better'
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Post by Jim on Jun 20, 2009 17:30:53 GMT
Are there any authors out there you would love to collaborate with?
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Post by Jim on Jun 20, 2009 17:33:53 GMT
You don't have to answer this one if you don't want to.
Have you ever based a character who die a horrible death, or who is just a total jerk, on someone you really didn't like? if so did they ever figure it out?
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Post by conrad on Jun 20, 2009 20:22:57 GMT
Wow, that was fast. Okay, I can post a couple of answers now before I hit the hay. Thanks for inviting me, and thanks for questions...
Jim: I think it has become more mainstream, insofar as publishers are more likely to put a novel out that, in another era, might have been classified horror but, due to audience tastes, marketing nous, whatever, it possesses crossover appeal. I'm thinking of House of Leaves, Let the Right One In, The Road, Heart-Shaped Box... you can probably come up with a few yourself. I think it's also to do with writers perceived as being on a more rarefied literary plane (Cormac McCarthy, say, or Jim Crace, or Brett Easton Ellis) turning their hand to fiction that would sit quite happily in the horror corner of your local bookshop.
There is a downside, of course, which you allude to in the supplementary part of your question - and 'shiny vampires' is a perfect pejorative term... It's that we have writers diluting the genre with horror-lite, horror that kids can read. I'm not against those books per se, but it's not horror as I know it, or want it. Any 10-year-old nourished on a diet of Buffy and Stephanie Meyer is going to get a shock if they pick up The Unblemished, for example. The only problem is that separating it from the tap root leads to yet more categorisation, which I'm broadly against.
Novels or short stories... Well, I've got three short stories on the go and I haven't a clue how to finish them. I've lost my short story mojo. Well, I probably haven't, but I do feel that my way of thinking about stories in recent years has changed. I find myself coming up with ideas that have a more novel-sized feel to them as opposed to the tighter, more intimate short story hit. I always wanted to be a novelist, so I'm happy with that, but I hope to still knock out some short stories each year, although I probably won't be as prolific as I used to be... A good thing too, some might say...
Collector markets. I've got a few books out by publishers who produce staggeringly gorgeous volumes, but it's usually coincided with a larger (and cheaper) paperback release. I'll take a large print run over a limited edition every time. It's all about the text. If it isn't being read it might as well not have been written.
Okay... I've got to be up at - probably, knowing my 18-month-old boy - 5am tomorrow. So I'm off. Will get back here to complete this some time tomorrow or Monday.
Best, Conrad
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Post by Jim on Jun 21, 2009 7:37:32 GMT
I love collector editions, I just don't understand people who buy them, never to read them.
I love kids horror stories, Campbell is only 5 but we already share a love for Goosebumps, Vampirates, and The Beastly Business series
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Post by danielirussell on Jun 21, 2009 9:01:32 GMT
I have a few signed books and am on pins when I read them, expecting to drop them in the bath or curling the cover or something, but I still HAVE to read them!
I think we need to think of the term horror. dictionary.com says:
an overwhelming and painful feeling caused by something frightfully shocking, terrifying, or revolting; a shuddering fear.
You can have that in kids' horror, appropriate to that level (ie, something we, as adults. might not perceive as horror can instil this feeling in a kid). But if I write a book about, say, a group of people that form a band and attempt to make it big, but the drummer is a werewolf and this causes friction in the band...is that horror? Or is it merely mainstream with an element that is considered from the horror genre?
Good questions, Jim, and good answers, Conrad. Been a nice read thus far.
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Post by Jim on Jun 21, 2009 9:30:22 GMT
"an overwhelming and painful feeling caused by something frightfully shocking, terrifying, or revolting; a shuddering fear."
maybe i should start publishing my bank statements
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Post by danielirussell on Jun 21, 2009 10:27:53 GMT
why do you think I don't have my author pic as my avatar?
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Post by conrad on Jun 21, 2009 21:41:08 GMT
What single piece of advice would you give to any aspiring writer wishing to break into the horror market? Don't be discouraged by the apparent lack of interest in the genre. It is there, especially in the small presses. And it's there too in the majors; it's just often referred to as something else: dark fantasy, urban fantasy... any fig leaf they can think of. Horror's popularity tends to be cyclical too. And we're due a new wave. Have you ever met anybody in real life who was the spit in looks and behaviour to one of your made up characters? Nope. Thank God. Is there any book that you have read and thought 'I could have done better'. Yes. Mine... But seriously, no, although I know there are writers who start out because they think that way. Are there any authors out there you would love to collaborate with? I've never collaborated, but I'd quite like to. There are a couple of writers I'd consider sharing a byline with, but I'm not going to tell you who they are... If it happens, then you'll know. Have you ever based a character who die a horrible death, or who is just a total jerk, on someone you really didn't like? if so did they ever figure it out? My first boss, who was a complete twunt of a man, died in an insanely painful way in my first, unpublished novel, written in 1989. A good thing it was unpublished, because he would have been able to recognise himself. I'd probably still be in prison... Thanks for your time. Drop by at www.conradwilliams.net for updates if you're interested! New novel, DECAY INEVITABLE, out from Solaris books some time in August, I think... Plug over. Cheers Conrad
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Post by garryc on Jun 23, 2009 6:39:26 GMT
Conrad... do you have that dream novel in your head... the one you want to write but don't feel ready to do yet?
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Post by Jim on Jun 23, 2009 19:25:48 GMT
As a writer of horror fiction, do you believe in he things that go bump in the night
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Post by Jim on Jun 23, 2009 19:36:28 GMT
WHAT TO YOU LIKE TO DO IN YOUR SPARE TIME?
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