I have a new novel coming May 29th. It will be my first published by Unveiling Nightmares, a relatively new publishing house out there. Crystal Bynam created it and she also does those interviews like the one I did and you can find on my homepage. The novel coming this May i called FERAL and you can now pre-order the ebook version for you Kindle fans out there.
Everyone always wants to know: Where do your ideas come from?
This one came from listening to a podcast about The Donner Party. That is, of course, the group of people in the 1800s who tried to make a trek from the eastern part of the U.S. to the relatively new California territory. They were told by a man who was a con-man to take a different route from the ones others who had made the trip had taken. They were told it would be faster. It was not. They got bogged down in the Sierra Nevada and then the snows came and then, well, the cannibalism started.
I thought - what if it was the children?
There is very little creepier than kids in horror stories. From Village of the Damned to The Omen to the twins in The Shining, kids are just creepy. Horror turns things on its head and kids are usually seen as innocent and angelic. Well, in a world of horror, turning that on its head means the kids become menacing, and dangerous.
So, FERAL started out as a retelling of the Donner party, but with supernatural elements. Then, as it worked itself out in my brain, it took on its own life. It is still about a group of people in the 1800s trying to get to California to start a new life, but I created my own family here. I did not want it to be the Donner Part, but a parallel group. And then I wanted to add something terrifying.
Something is wrong with the children. Once the group gets stuck in the snow, as several men head off to try and find rescue, and the children and some others stay behind to shelter during the snows, an evil invades the minds of the children. As the hunger grows, the children start communicating telepathically, their teeth grow long and sharp, and an ancient entity that inhabits the woods begins to tell them to feed.
It is a pure horror story. No humor here.
And it is one of the rare cases when writing it scared me, too. Yep, the opening I wrote for this novel actually creeped me out so much I had to put it aside for a bit.
I am happy this one is coming out in 2024 and proud to be part of Unveiling Nightmare's new publishing venture. The novel arrives May 29, but you can pre-order the ebook now at Amazon!