All The Fabulous Beasts: Priya Sharma Interview

I couldn't have been more excited than when I heard Undertow Press were going to be publishing the debut collection from Priya Sharma. The stories I've read of hers over the last few years have always been superb, by turns creepy, beautiful, tender and terrifying. A whole book-load of them? Count me in. Especially one with such stunning cover art and design as this one.

I asked Priya a few questions about All The Fabulous Beasts, particularly focussing on the two stories new to the collection, 'Small Town Stories' and 'A Son Of The Sea' (spoiler: both brilliant).

So, without further ado...

JE: So, to warm us up, how do you think of your stories? Weird fiction, fantasy, horror? I wouldn’t know how to classify them myself (which I absolutely think of as a good thing). Do you find such categories useful as a writer, or limiting?

PS: Hello James! I find that a hard question, even now. I hope that All the Fabulous Beasts is all of the above. When Mike Kelly of Undertow put this collection together he was very careful about what he felt should go in (thankfully) as I've also dabbled in fairy tales, mythology and alterative history. If they'd been included, certain stories might have jarred with others.

The story that I'm writing dictates the form and flavours. I've had lots of rejections along the lines of "I like this but it's not horror". I certainly don't find strict definitions of genre helpful, but I think definitions are getting broader and more blurred.

My favourite books don't adhere to strict definitions and I think I've drawn on them. Things that are between the lines or bend genre are more interesting, such as novels like Beloved by Toni Morrison, Slaughterhouse Five by Vonnegut, and in the work of David Mitchell, Calvino, Helen Oyeyemi, to name a few.

JE: Regardless of how you think of them, your stories nearly all feature a supernatural element. What is it about the supernatural or surreal that appeals to you as a writer? What does it allow you to do that ‘straight’ realism couldn’t?

PS: I remember listening to Thana Niveau on a panel about horror and she said that she was drawn to it because it was hardwired in there somewhere, which I thought was very thoughtful, rather than it just being about exploring our personal fears. I feel like that about most speculative fiction.

The supernatural allows for a whole new level of allegory. Also, when it's done well it does double duty as there are thrills to be had.

I wish I could write straight fiction, and probably read more straight fiction than genre fiction. When I try and write 'literary' fiction it seems very flat on the page. I feel confined. I think I write speculative fiction because I am, in truth, an escapist. It's the perfect type of fiction for exploring big ideas, feelings, and for extrapolating, but also for having fun and pushing the limits. Human beings are all about the impossible (even at risk to ourselves and the planet).

JE: In both of the new stories in your collection, there’s a very strong sense of place — from the more exotic locations of 'A Son Of The Sea' to the very English, parochial English setting you use in 'Small Town Stories'. So I wondered how important you think a evocation of specific place is, to you as a writer?

It's a crucial part of worldbuildng for me, as important as character. We're all affected by our environments. You can character build in how a person interacts with that world. I always do more research for stories than I need and have to be selective about what I use. It's the same with the world that I'm writing about. There's more happening off page that never makes the cut. Sometimes it's as much as what I imagine for the characters themselves.

I love stories with a strong setting, that's crucial to the story. It's what I enjoyed most about The Loney by Andrew Michael Hurley, for example. The Titus novels by Mervyn Peake blew my mind.

JE: I was especially taken with the titular setting of 'Small Town Stories' — a lot of British horror fiction seems to be either city based urban horror or rural folk horror, but these kind of backwater small towns seem very British and very scary to me. Was it a conscious decision, to write about the kind of place normally ignored?

PS: No, in that it wasn't a conscious decision - I just wanted to explore feelings I had about the town I grew up in- a smallish Cheshire market town, and when I think about that era it brings back the child in me, for reasons good and bad. That place still has a lot of power over me. When I go back I realise that I'm a stranger there.

The thing is, I don't recognise the place that I knew, not really. New build homes are where the industries that employed most of the town once stood. Supermarkets have replaced the veg shop and the butchers. There are more coffee shops and hairdressers, but nowhere to buy books or music. There used to be a thriving market each week but now it's just a carpark. And I'm not sure who shrunk the schools I went to.

Every small town has its urban legends and outsiders, and I wanted to explore that concept as well. Births, deaths, affairs. Nothing was secret for very long.

I wanted to write my own love story to it all.

JE: As well as a strong sense of place, both of these new tales seem to be about the past being something we can’t escape from, or even move on from - was this a conscious theme?

PS: Sometimes it is, sometimes it just seeps in there. It's a form of haunting, isn't it? The past is important to most people I know, whether they're trying to recreate/relive it or escape from it. I read a lot of Fay Weldon in my teens (thanks to The Lives and Loves of a She-Devil) and one of my favourite lines by her is "Wherever we go, we take ourselves with us". We can't escape our pasts. We can only learn to live with the horrors and joys of it.

It's funny that you've brought that up. I don't think I've ever started a story at the beginning of a character's journey. I'd actually find that too difficult to chart, in some ways. I like flawed people, in the thick of their struggles. What does that say about me?

JE: And finally, can you tell me a secret - name an author who’s an influence on your work that no reviewer or commenter has ever picked up on...

PS: Jim Crace. I think he's woefully neglected in the UK. His novels vary widely in subject matter but there's something about his prose that is poetic. It has a rhythm that I find addictive, almost iambic pentameter, which some people will mock. Reading his work, I get the feeling that every single word is considered and deliberate. I think his style is unique, and can only hope that one day, if I work hard enough, I might develop a unique style too.

My favourite works of his are Arcadia, The Pesthouse, Being Dead and The Devil's Larder.

You can buy All The Fabulous Beasts from the Undertow Press site, in both paperback or hardback editions.

Author Priya Sharma has picked a selection of 'Halloween Reads' over on her site. Lots of great suggestions to add to your 'to read' pile if you're a fan of the spooky and horrifying (and there's a nice shout out for The Quarantined City, too).

Priya is a superb writer of the spooky stuff herself; her debut collection is out from Undertow Publications in 2018.

FantasyCon 2015 - After...

So, Fantasycon 2015. What a weekend.

This year it took place in my home town of Nottingham. Despite my being local, somehow Steve Byrne got to the venue before me, so when I saw on Facebook he was hanging around in the hotel bar I set off. We were soon chatting away over a pint and gradually other people arrived and joined our table: Ross Warren, Lisa Childs, Phil Sloman, Alison Littlewood & her partner Fergus, Simon Bestwick, Cate Gardner, Priya Sharma (who it was lovely to meet for the first time), Theresa Derwin, Steve Shaw and Dean R Drinkel.

Neil Williams, Wayne Parkin, me, a glass of free wine

The latter three were here for the unofficial launch of Masks (which features my story Porcelain) which we'd been planning to do in the bar... unfortunately the constant flow of people coming to check in and the unpromising acoustics meant we couldn't do any readings as planned, but the books looked great (the artwork is by the late James Powell, who sadly passed away earlier this year) so a number of people bought a copy and asked for signatures from me & Phil, which was great.

They'd been a stir of excitement in the hotel when Joe Hill (a late addition to the convention) entered, wearing a Haunting Of Hill House t-shirt no less. When I came back from the bar I found he was stood talking to our little group; Theresa was somewhat flushed and flustered, and managed to introduce me to him as if I were the important celebrity writer: "Joe, have you meet James Everington?" I could see in his eyes he was thinking 'who the hell is this guy?' but he was charming enough not to say it out loud. I just played it cool and told him I liked his t-shirt.

Me and Steve Byrne then went to get signed in and pick up our free books - in terms of choice it was far superior to last year, and I got some lovely hardback editions of Alison Littlewood, Joe R Lansdale and Sarah Pinborough novels, a Conrad Williams collection from PS Publishing as well as several interesting looking paperbacks.

Stephen & Mark

We went into the convention venue proper then, and in the space of another drink or two meet Graeme Reynolds, Lynda E Rucker, Peter Mark May, Paul Feeney, Ray Cluley and his partner Jess, Mark West, Sue Moorcroft, Paul Feeney, Wayne Parkin, Stephen Bacon, Steve Chapman, Clover & Dion Winton-Polak and Emma Audsley. We then went to the first book launch, The Lost Film, featuring a novella apiece by Mark West and Stephen Bacon - two talented writers I'm proud to call friends. They both did a reading, watched over by publisher Chris Teague. It was a really good launch - a big queue for the book, which it deserved given the quality of both Mark and Stephen's previous work.

We then went off for some food, which given the rather poor quality of food in the hotel (already notorious even on the first day) and lack of other options nearby meant a walk to a Toby Carvery. The glamorous life of a writer. So let's gloss over that - back at the convention, Mark had a panel/mock gameshow to attend called The Atrocity Exhibition, which was different to say the least, and got some laughs. I had to leave that before the end to get to Victoria Leslie's reading. I've not managed to review it on here as yet, but I consider her collection Skein & Bone to be among the finest released over the last few years and her reading of one of the stories was predictably brilliant. Later, Victoria and I had a good natter at the bar about all things horror - these kind of conversations that you can't have with 'normal' people are why I relish events like Fantasycon. Somewhere in the midst of the next few drinks I meet both Nina Allen and Simon Kurt Unsworth, who I wanted to say hello to as they were on my panel the next day, and also Neil Williamson, a fellow Infinity Plus author who I've know online for awhile; we've been talking about meeting up at some point for ages.

It was then time for Simon Bestwick's reading, the late night atmosphere suiting his rather bleak extract from his forthcoming novel. After that (I think - bit hazy by this point) I spoke to Alex Davis who will be publishing Trying To Be So Quiet soon and we discussed some of his ideas for the design of the hardback, which sounded amazing.

Saturday started with the launch of Adam Nevill's new novel Lost Girl, complete with a free bottle of local ale - lovely. Adam's a great guy and very supportive of other writers - a fact shown by the fact he let a few of us take over the last fifteen minutes of his launch for a surprise event...

Jim McLeod is the man behind The Gingernuts Of Horror website, one the best sites out there, and he's been a tireless supporter of the horror genre for years, both of the big stars and us lesser names working in the small press. So Phil Sloman put together a book for Jim... a very special book, of which they'll only ever be one physical copy printed. Jim McLeod Must Die! features stories from over 20 different horror authors; in all of them a character called Jim McLeod dies or suffers a fate worse than death. My own story is called Peephole and it was an absolute pleasure to be asked to be included in something so special. The look on Jim's face when he realised what was going on was priceless and for me a moment that sums up Fantasycon: the friendships made at conventions really do lead to great moments like this.

Jim McLeod, Mark West, Phil Sloman (with Sue Moorcroft in the background)

Then followed the launch of the second Spectral Book Of Horrors, in which a huge number of the authors were in attendance to sign, including many I've already mentioned, plus top gents Robert Shearman and Stephen Volk - and of course editor Mark Morris and publisher Simon Marshall Jones.

The it was on to my first panel. Gulp. Which I was moderating. In the main theatre. Double gulp. British Horror Present & Future featured myself, Simon Kurt Unsworth, Nina Allen, Stephen Jones, Cate Gardner, Alison Littlewood and Adam Nevill. Of course, with a lineup as good as that I didn't really have to do much as moderator - we got through less than half the questions I had prepared because everyone's answers were so good. Someone said later that it had the feel of a proper discussion rather than just a back-and-forth Q&A so I was really pleased with that. And as with all these things, once you're actually doing it your nerves vanish.

Me, Simon Kurt Unsworth, Stephen Jones, Cate Gardner, Alison Littlewood, Nina Allen, Adam Nevill

After that a bunch of us went to Priya Sharma's reading, which was excellent, and confirmed what I already knew: that I need to read more of her work. I think it was just after Priya's reading that I said hello to Laura Mauro for the first time, another writer who I know online but was glad to meet in person. (Nearly all horror authors turn out to be lovely people, in my experience.) Then myself and Mark bumped into Andrew David Barker, whose novel Dead Leaves was being launched at the con. Andrew's a great guy but very modest and he couldn't have looked more abashed as me and Mark praised his book to heaven and back...

Then I went to see the Weirdness, Darkness & Madness panel, which was obviously right up my street. It was moderated by Terry Grimwood and featured Mark West, Kim Lakin Smith, Helen Marshall, Deborah Walker and Timothy J Jarvis. It was a great panel, one of the best I've seen at a convention.

Outside, we gathered in the foyer for one of the most important parts of any con - curry. Before setting off I had a quick chat with Timothy Jarvis - some of what he had said on the panel had been really interesting, and he gave me a copy of his book. He had a reading later, which I said I'd attend after the curry - after all we had nearly three hours, so what could possible stop me?

Unfortunately it wasn't to be - despite having booked, when so many of us turned up at the restaurant they were woefully unprepared. It was nearly 90mins before starters arrived, never mind the main course. (To be fair, my food was great.) So with the 20min walk either way, we were gone for hours, meaning I missed both Timothy's reading and the Undertow launch of Skein & Bone and Aickman's Heirs. Still, during the loooooong meal I was introduced to Simon Clark and had some good chats with Phil, Dean, Jay Eales & Selina Lock and Benedict Jones.

Paul Woodward, Phil Sloman, Stephen Bacon, Mark West, Alison Littlewood, Jim McLeod, me, Gavin Williams (front)

I had a late night reading slot (11.30) and I was thinking that at that time hardly anyone would turn up, especially as it clashed with the infamous Fcon disco (where I'm reliably informed Mark owned the dance floor for the second year running). But there must have been 20, 25 people there and I read part of my story The Man Dogs Hated which seemed to go down really well - I sold a number of copies of Falling Over afterwards with one person even turning straight to the story to see how it ended. My reading was followed by one by Kit Power (and his flamboyant trousers) which was really enjoyable. Outside, not fancying the sounds of the Timewarp bellowing from the dance floor I sat and had a few beers with Steve and Laura & Peter Watkinson, Stephen King (not that one) and Katina Bill.

I only attended one event on the Sunday, but it was a corker: a reading by Helen Marshall. Like all her work the story was simultaneously funny and moving. I saw a lot of great readings this year, but against tough competition Helen's was the best. I then perused the Dealers Room, having a chat with Terry Grimwood and then the boys from the Sinister Horror table. And then after a few more beers it was time for goodbyes. It took about an hour to say goodbye to everyone there at that point. 

Reading back, somehow I've not even mentioned meeting Ruth Booth, Gary Couzans, KT Davies, Paul Holmes, Fiona Ní Éalaighthe (and her ear!), Andrew Hook, Carole Johnstone, Tom Johnstone, fellow Outsider Rosanne Rabinowitz, John Travis, Tim Major, Ren Warom (we'll have a proper chat next time!) or Paul Woodward. Which just about sums FantasyCon up - there's so many great people there, so many friendships to forge or renew that's it's impossible to remember it all.

A special mention must go to Adele Wearing though, who I didn't manage to see all weekend, despite the fact that she apparently waved at me on a few occasions. That's my professional networking skills for you - completely blanking an award winning publisher (Fox Spirit deservedly won this year's Small Press award) even when she beckoned me over... 

There was a nice coda to the convention when myself and Phil headed into Nottingham to have some food and a few pints before his train. Phil had never been to Nottingham before, so I took him to The Broadway cinema (largely on the basis it has The Shining quotes on one window) and then, of course, to Ye Olde Trip To Jerusalem (or 'The Trip' as everyone in Nottingham calls it) which is meant to be the oldest pub in the UK, and is built into the cliffs under the castle. We had a great chat about our hopes for our writing in the future and then Phil left to get his train and it was all over...

I got home, dumped my bag... and later that night logged on and order my ticket for FantasyCon 2016.