Just a quick note to say Supanova was a blast with the team at IFWG Publishing. Our panel was great, with a lot of news from IFWG including the publication of Killer Creatures Down Under, which has my story “Boyfriend Material” in it.
Focused questions from the audience led us to discuss the scariness of human versus non-human monsters. I find human monsters the scariest, because humans can achieve a certain level of intentional malevolence which you rarely, or never, see in nature. Even when cats toy with their prey there’s a certain innocence to it.
I didn’t express this at the time, but human intelligence and creativity allow us to take monstrosity to whole a new level. Which makes me smile … because all the horror writers I know are delightful people, but the stories they write can be so dark that it’s almost difficult to reconcile that darkness with such gentle people.
I talk about monsters in my essay in A Vindication Of Monsters, edited by Claire Fitzgerald—coming out in October. This is actually a book of essays about Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley, two of the most important writers ever. Claire recently published a behind-the-scenes piece by me, which you can read by clicking here. It’s called An Emu’s Perspective, and talks about my process and experience of writing my essay.
Deb Sheldon has also recently curated behind-the-scenes author commentaries over at Gingernuts of Horror. These have been penned by writers with stories in Killer Creatures Down Under. Here’s a link to the most recent ones. The anthology is soon to be released however it was available ahead of time at Supanova, and proved very popular thanks to the great cover, which I would love to have printed on a T-Shirt.
Killer Creatures Down Under will be available online and in bookstores which stock it. You can also ask your local library to order it.
If you have any thoughts on the similarities and differences between human and non-human monsters, let me know in the comments.
HK Stubbs 