[00:00:00] Speaker A: Welcome back to the Capes and Tights podcast right here on Capesandtights.com, i'm your host, Justin Soderbergh. This episode is once again brought to you by our friends at Galactic Comics and
[email protected] welcome to horror Week. For the first episode of Horror Week, we welcome Tanya Pelz to the podcast to discuss her books, Killer VHS Cicada, as well as her recent release of her wicked roots. Tanya is a former high school teacher and an aerial arts instructor who is an author of books. Like I said, Cicada. Her wicked roots, she says her short stories are in a bunch of different things out there in the world of horror and literature. But yeah, we're here to talk about horror. And so we talked about horror with, with Tanya. We talked about her wicked roots in Cicada and so much more. But before you listen, follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, bluesky, Threads, all those places. You can rate reviews, subscribe over on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you find your podcast. You can also find the video portion of this podcast on YouTube. And as always, you can visit CapesandTights.com for so much more. But this is author Tanya Powell talking her wicked roots and so much more right here for Horror Week on the Case and Tights podcast. Enjoy.
Welcome to the podcast. Tanya, how are you today?
[00:01:18] Speaker B: I'm great. How are you?
[00:01:19] Speaker A: I'm wonderful. It is great. You know, the downside is it's a holiday when we're recording this, and so my kids school is closed, so the closest person to watch my kids during the day so I could work is like 40 minutes away.
So I had to drive them to 40 minutes there and 40 minutes back this morning. So other than that, I'm great.
[00:01:41] Speaker B: I get it.
[00:01:42] Speaker A: I got audiobook listening.
[00:01:46] Speaker B: Mine are here. They're just banished somewhere where I can't hear them right now.
[00:01:49] Speaker A: Well, mine's four in 18 months or 19 months.
[00:01:53] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, that's a little harder to vanish.
[00:01:56] Speaker A: Yeah, I recorded last night with someone with Matt Morris and Anna Dupree, and they had to be banished to the other side of the room with my wife. You take the kids, go to the other side of the house so we can. We can chat on the podcast. No, it's great. It's a great day. It's fall. I love it. I'm here in New England. You're in the Carolinas. You're in North Carolina.
[00:02:13] Speaker B: Yeah, South Carolina.
[00:02:14] Speaker A: South Carolina.
[00:02:15] Speaker B: I'm in that limbo. Region where Charlotte bleeds into South Carolina. So really it's, it's, it's like, it's the limbo region of, of the Carolinas. So I'm technically South Carolina, but really it's Charlotte.
[00:02:29] Speaker A: You're in Carolina.
[00:02:31] Speaker B: I am in Carolina. That's why it's plural. They just say it's the Carolinas. They just, they lump us all together.
[00:02:38] Speaker A: It's a, it's a, it's a beautiful spot down there. My, My brother lives in Virginia, which is getting close to the. Where you are.
And he's, he loves it down that section of the country. It's a little different where you are compared to where he is, but yeah, it's a little different here. Leaves are changing, it's cool, it's crisp. I'm liking it because I'm not a big fan of the super hot weather. So I'm pretty happy where I am now.
[00:03:01] Speaker B: So. You wouldn't be happy with 108°?
No summer?
[00:03:05] Speaker A: No, no, no, no, no. I don't think so.
[00:03:07] Speaker B: We.
[00:03:07] Speaker A: We get in Maine about, I don't know, four days, five days sporadically throughout the summer that hits that close to triple digits.
And like all main, like all Mainers, we complain about it just like we do when it's negative 10. So it's a, it's a whole thing here. The problem I have is that, like, when seasons change, they should just change, Tanya. Like, be done. Because the summer's over. It should be the fall.
No, like we had like a couple of weeks of like 60 degree weather and then all of a sudden I know it was 90 for like three days and I was like, I took my air conditioner out of my window. Like, I don't have an air conditioner anymore. So now it's 90 in my house. It's uncomfortable.
[00:03:48] Speaker B: So I know I just switched out my closets. And so now I've, I've committed, so I have. My fall and winter closet is up. So I've committed now.
So if, if we hit, if we hit 84 again, I'm just doomed.
[00:04:04] Speaker A: Well, I, I know the seasons change with my UPS driver.
Delivers packages pretty much every day to me. He switches to shorts and he doesn't switch back to pants. So, like in the wintertime, he wears pants throughout the, throughout the winter. When the winter, when the summer comes, it's short season. He just switches to shorts. It doesn't matter what the weather's like. It is short season. So the opposite happens now. So when he goes to pants, he's Like, I don't care if it's 90 degrees, I'm wearing pants.
[00:04:27] Speaker B: I think we need to like this is. This should be a thing now. We should like Fire Punxsutani and we should only.
We should, we should only determine seasons based off ups.
[00:04:41] Speaker A: You see them in shorts because it's summertime.
Yes, I think that'd be great. Don't go.
[00:04:46] Speaker B: UPS driver wearing pants today. You know what time it is.
[00:04:50] Speaker A: Well, I hope he's wearing some sort of pants.
[00:04:52] Speaker B: Latte comes out.
[00:04:55] Speaker A: Oh, that'd be amazing. That, that's. I like it. Let's do it. Let's do this now.
[00:05:00] Speaker B: I'd do this short film. Let's.
[00:05:04] Speaker A: It'd be such a boring short film. It's literally just some.
[00:05:06] Speaker B: Oh, definitely based.
Beige and brown. Yes.
[00:05:12] Speaker A: Or the story of it, the lore of it is like this whole long film. At the very end he changes his pants into shorts. And that's the entire. You know, that's the thing.
[00:05:19] Speaker B: But you know, I think so maybe we just need the most boring thing right now to level us all out.
[00:05:28] Speaker A: That's possible. I'm. You know, maybe you could be right about.
[00:05:31] Speaker B: Maybe we all just.
Yeah, we all need to come down and just watch the UPS parade.
[00:05:39] Speaker A: Yes.
The thing about it is we see them every day now. I mean with all the packages we get delivered, it's not like you don't see. I used to see them once a week, maybe once every couple weeks. Now I'm like, yeah, it's like, hey, how's it going?
[00:05:49] Speaker B: Are they gonna stop at my house? And now you're on first name basis and you know like when their kids are going to college.
[00:05:56] Speaker A: Yeah, it's a, it's a, it's a crazy thing. We actually, I think at my work, my. I work a day job at a brewery and. And we, we give him a gift card every year because he's just, he's. So we have, we have his phone number. So like we have. Every once in a while we're like, hey, we have a package to get picked up. Instead of trying to do the whole pickup thing through ups, we just text him and say, I have a package to get picked up. He's a cool swing by. And then if we ever need a package that's supposed to be delivered around 2 o' clock in the afternoon, I'll text him like, can I meet you somewhere? And he's like, yeah, no problem. And I'll like find him at 10 o' clock in the morning somewhere and.
[00:06:24] Speaker B: Get picked up his truck.
[00:06:25] Speaker A: I'm like, this is. This guy better not retire or get put on a different route because I'm not going to be very happy with this.
[00:06:30] Speaker B: I know my, my, my mail lady retired about three months ago and I'm still not over it. And she only gave me two days notice. And I was like, lisa.
[00:06:43] Speaker A: I thought we had a friendship.
[00:06:44] Speaker B: I wasn't, I wasn't ready.
[00:06:49] Speaker A: Oh, man. You text, you're calling her. I mean, like, can you talk to the new person? They're not doing it right. They're putting. I know.
[00:06:56] Speaker B: Okay. You know, give grace. Give grace. Okay. I'm not on a first name basis yet. This is fine.
[00:07:03] Speaker A: So we're here not to talk about shipping and receiving in mail routes, but that's, that's what it's become. So we're talking now about what shipping is like in the world of, of Tanya Pelt. No, the. We're here to talk about. So this is part of our horror week. And you, you, you read or wrote Cicadas for. Or Cicada for killer vhs. You have her wicked roots that just hit shelves recently too. But let's talk like, what, what does horror mean to you? You know, we have this book that just came out from. Edited by Becky Spratford, the, the why I Love Horror part, which is, which is a phenomenal book. So. So stealing a little bit from that, you know, horror obviously means something to you.
A little bit that. What does that mean to you? Why. Why horror for some of these things? Why things like cicadas and the horrors vibes that come into her wicked roots? Why does that mean so much to you?
[00:07:59] Speaker B: He's gonna get so tired of me, like, quoting him.
So my, my horror bestie is Josh winning. So Heads Will Roll, Burn the Negative, the Shadow Glass.
And he wrote this line in Heads Will Roll, and I read it on a plane and I literally just like, stared at the book, shut it, and then, like, looked out the window for an indeterminate amount of time sipping my drink. It's like, okay. And it was just so simple. But I think it's probably the most effective summary for horror there is. Horror doesn't lie.
And I absolutely love that. And I always come back that time and time again is. I think that horror is possibly one of the most honest representations of the human spirit, the human condition, the world at large that artists can create.
And I think what horror does is it channels all of our emotions, not just fear. I mean, we, we lean into the fear aspect, but it channels everything. And it heightens it to, to all the degrees that we can feel.
And we, when we view those things through a horror lens, we come out on the other side seeing the truth of things. I mean, we put. We put. We put masks and give. Give teeth and fangs to the things that we're afraid of.
And by doing that, we're highlighting also the things that we're afraid of losing and the things that we are afraid in regards to ourselves, our own insecurities and our own inadequacies or just the. The feeling like we're going around masking ourselves.
And so I think that horror does such a wonderful job of being honest.
[00:10:04] Speaker A: Mm.
[00:10:05] Speaker B: And so I think that's what it is for me.
[00:10:08] Speaker A: It's a, It's a. What I've gotten out of the number of books that I've read over the years is that there's real life horrors, and that's some of my favorite books that have supernatural horror or any sort of monster horror or body horror, but that has that through line of some sort of realistic thing that's happening in world that's actually horrific to deal with, you know, or horrific in general. I just read Trad Wife by Saratoga Schaefer, and it's like this whole Trad Wife social media influence, it's just scary to think about and then not understanding in my mind, I don't grasp why. And then Sarah Toga writes a book that's like that, but there's other horrors that happen within the book. And so like that mixture of the two Anna Dupree was mentioning, and this is actually episode. This episode comes out before that one. But she'll mention on the next episode, it's a little teaser for the next episode about watching real life horrors on tv. Tv, like this true haunting stuff and all that stuff. And I'm like, oh, yeah. I'm like, that's cool. That's awesome. But in the same sense, I'm like, I get my horror. I want to be able to be like, this is fake. Like, yeah, I just read her Wicked Roots and it's not real. It's. It's got some realness. There's some truth to it, but there's not. Like this is not an actual factual, you know.
[00:11:19] Speaker B: Yeah, you can close it, put it back on the shelf, and my life can move on. Yeah.
[00:11:24] Speaker A: But I, for some reason I, I like to, to. To read things that, that have this. Like, okay, this is really a horror that's happening in the real world that someone took and said, we need to talk about this.
Discuss this, but I don't want to just have a book that's a historical fiction book. I want to have some sort of horror vibe to it as well. And I think that's great. And I think that, that you mentioned the honesty of it, and that's part of that honesty of it, I think. I think it's about talking about real, like, horrors, but let's throw some supernatural elements or some, some.
[00:11:53] Speaker B: And I think that's what we do. We mask them so that we can unmask them at the end.
[00:11:58] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:11:58] Speaker B: So layers upon layers, is it?
[00:12:02] Speaker A: So outside of just specifically the books themselves, the community, we talk a lot about this. When you go to, like, we saw each other at Spooktastic Book Fair in Massachusetts. The community of people there, the people that walk in that door. I mean, I've been used to it for many years, going to comic conventions where you walk in that door and like, you can shed, you know, any sort of preconceived notions about you or anything, any bullying that you maybe have gotten because you like a specific genre or a specific thing. But like, seeing that this is the first time I've ever gone to a, like a horror specific book show or fair and just seeing people like, hey, how's it going? They all love the same thing. They love this horror genre. And whether it's horror, romance or gothic horror or, you know, body horror, whatever it is, it's still this horror and people talking to each other and hanging out and having a good vibe.
Is that part of the reason why that this is like a space that you like to live in?
[00:12:55] Speaker B: I think absolutely a reason. I think because we all recognize nice early on and, you know, it's kind of funny. I always make this joke anytime I go to a horror, like a horror con, not, not necessarily a horror book con, but a horror con, except like Mad Monster or something. Yeah. And there's always wrestlers.
There's always like one or two wrestlers in as like signing alongside the, the, the horror stars and the scream queens.
And it's because you have this crossover fandom the same way you do with comics and same at Heroes Con when I go to comic conventions and I do in my cosplay.
And you have these crossover and you have some. You have tons of horror artists there and a wrestler. Yes, it's because I think you have these, these passion, like these, these things that people are so incredibly passionate about that they don't get to really express in, like you said, in, in every single environment.
And yet here, surrounded by Other people that have similar or the same passions or just the degrees of it. You feel comfortable and you feel safe and you feel seen.
And there is this whole unmasking that happens at these events. I was speaking to someone who had. Who went to Stoker Con for the very first time this past year, and she was remarking on how it felt absolutely insane the. The second day, not the first day, but the second day. Because the first day she's still like, kind of like, okay, I'm not sure how I'm supposed to.
To be.
And the second day, it's the complete shedding of all the masks, and it's just like, okay, now I'm ready to be the complete unhinged nerd that I am inside. And I joke about how I run around with, like, my golden retriever puppy energy.
Like, hey, hey, everybody. Everybody doing good?
Like, not a volunteer. I just want a good time.
[00:15:19] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly.
[00:15:21] Speaker B: But we're. And we're all like that. I.
Everyone is just so excited to see everybody else. And almost more importantly, everybody is so excited to promote everybody else. Like, I think that's one thing that we all do really well is everybody is.
Is no one's stepping on each other to get up the ladder. Everyone's reaching down and, like, hauling people up with you. And I love that about the horror community. That it is a community. It is, it is friendly. There are, there are inside jokes and there are jabs, and there's, like, flipping each other off across the room.
So, I mean, it's.
[00:16:10] Speaker A: I, I come. I. I was into comics and comic conventions before I got into to reading, you know, novels and books and things like that. I, I dabbled it in a little bit, but that I was just. I focused and put my. All of my energy into comics and so doing comic conventions and doing comic things, there was always this, this community that I saw that people like promoting each other's comics, and I saw that. Now when I go over to the horror, horror side of, you know, genre fiction, this, this, this.
People reading other people's books and getting arcs and doing pull quotes and doing all this stuff for each other, like, yeah, building this all up, being like, as if, like, you know, we all will float higher if everybody does well. But I always have felt like I've always had to explain. I've been a part of a book club that's a graphic novel book club for a couple years now. And every time I go, like, leave work, and I'm like, hey, I'm going to my book club. Like, oh, what'd you guys read? And, like, well, it's a graphic novel book club. And they'll, like, shun me off, like, whatever. Like, okay, that's not real literature. You're. You know, move over to that side.
[00:17:06] Speaker B: Literacy. Yes. Valid form of literacy.
[00:17:09] Speaker A: And then I joined a horror book club, like an actual horror novel club. And we're reading books, like physical novels. And I'll say, I'm going to book club tonight. And they're like, what are you reading? I'm like, lots of horror novel. I get out there. I'm like, you're doing the same thing to me now with the same exact. It's just like, I've always lived my life on this. Like, I've been part of the outskirts of things and have to explain to myself. And it was funny. At Spooktastic, Brian McCauley was part of the Splatter in Slasher panel. I believe it was right after your panel, honestly. And there were. People were asking the question, do you have to explain to people? Like, is it hard to explain to people what you do for a living? Like, what you do? Like, how you write. You write books where people get. People die in pretty, you know, terrible ways.
He laughed and he joked about the whole Fuller House thing is. No, I actually have more of a time explaining to people that I wrote an episode of Fuller House than I do that I write horror because people are so much more accepting to it now in his life. And I laugh because I'm like, that's true. I mean, if you look at your history of writing, Fuller House does stand out as the one that stands out as an odd thing. But. Yeah. So I've always been on this fringe part of it. I think that the acceptingness of the internal part of it makes it a lot easier to be part of this thing, part of this industry in this world of horror.
[00:18:25] Speaker B: Well, you know, and it's funny, too, how people are so dismissive of it. And I was not this last four. I did Librarians Day, and we talked about fairy tales and everything, and they asked if anybod had suggestions for.
For librarians or educators. And I used to teach high school, and I taught Stephen King in my high school class with my Gothicism unit, and the kids loved it.
And, you know, people were kind of dismissive. Oh, you're. You're. But that's not literature.
Okay, well, what is this? So we've not had any. No one is worthy of being in the classroom unless they died.
[00:19:08] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:19:08] Speaker B: Before 1950, they needed to be White. They needed to be alcoholic and they needed to have tuberculosis, is my theory. Or syphilis, you know, that would have worked as well.
[00:19:20] Speaker A: Or all of them.
All of the top of the list of they'd. All of them.
[00:19:25] Speaker B: Yeah. But I, I mentioned this in the panel and I was just like, you know, to this, this sea of educators, and I was like, y' all do not go home and relax in the bathtub with Moby Dick. Yes, y' all don't do it. You do not read Ulysses for fun. In fact, my personal theory is no one has actually read Ulysses. And it is the biggest con game in the, in all of English literature is everyone is pretending to have read it.
No one knows what it's about.
Everyone can keep masking this.
So I'm like, if you aren't in, if you aren't reading those things for fun and you aren't enjoying those things in your downtime, why do you expect children to enjoy them and get something out of it and, you know, force them through this? Yes, absolutely. We should. I'm, I'm all for canon. I love literature. Like classic literature. Her wicked roots has so many Easter eggs, classic gothic literature in it. But it's not the only literature out there. It's like, what is it? Inherit the Wind? There's the wonderful quote. That's a book. It's a good book, but it's not the only book. And I think with horror you get the dismissive attitude with horror books that you don't even necessarily get with horror cinema is everybody wants to go, you dress up for Halloween and you go see the big horror blockbuster. But if you sit down with a horror book, it's like, it's a little low brow. Okay, well, what are you reading, James?
[00:21:10] Speaker A: Well, it's true.
My wife doesn't ever have to explain to people why she reads romance. Like, what do you read? Oh, Reman, the latest Nicholas Sparks book, which I have read because it actually was co. Written by M. Night Shyamalan. So I will say I have read Nicholas Sparks book recently, but for horror, I've always been like, why do you do that to yourself? But I've always been, I listen to heavy music streaming in the music I listen to. So people have always been like, well, why do you do that? And then the same thing with comics and so on and so forth. So my entire life I've dealt with this. So it's fine with me. I'm like, I'm just used to it at this point. But. And I'm happy now because, and I mentioned this, I think, to you, spooktastic, about the middle grade and young adult aspect of these things nowadays too, with people coming up with these books and books, adult horror authors writing books for younger people. So hopefully we can breed these young horror fans and have them come to their. And question their own teachers and like, why are we reading Moby Dick when we could be reading it?
Not, not that. That would be. Willful. Yeah, willful, exactly. It's a good, good size.
[00:22:14] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah.
[00:22:15] Speaker A: Well, the truth of the matter is half these books that are also written, they don't even allow you to read in school anyway because. Because of what they're about. So it's like nowadays, like, okay, what can we read for these things? You can't read something current. You can't read some from historical side of things because it's about subjects you guys don't want to touch or talk about. And then there's like this myth in the middle. But like, to me, some books are. I mean, Stephen King writes better books sometimes than some of these older books, in my opinion. Or Christopher golden or Joshua Winning, which by speaking of Joshua Winning, he was. My first pull quote on the back of a book was Heads Will Roll. The hardcover of Heads Will Roll was my first pull quote on a book.
So, yeah, that was.
We have this love for Joshua.
[00:22:54] Speaker B: My horror. Messy.
[00:22:55] Speaker A: Yes, exactly. But no, it's just, it's a, it's a, it's a unique thing. And I think that this, this, this horror week that I'm doing, and I've done it for, this is the third year in a row and discussing this horror genre as a whole. And we're talking to you. We talked to some bookstagrammer people like Matt and Anna. Becky Spatford actually is coming on the podcast to chat about why I love horror. And then I had Dave Shillings on at the end of the week, which Dave Schilling wrote the book I don't have. It's why I know Horrors New Wave. It's about Blumhouse productions and movies like Paranormal Activity and Get out and stuff like that. And so there's a mixture of things in this week. And I just think that this horror genre, like, you know, has so many different threads to it, different sub genres and different styles and all this stuff that it just makes a lot of fun to live in this. But, you know, before we get to her wicked roots, which I want to get into, let's chat quickly about Cicada from Killer VHS series at Short Wave. First of all, how did you get to be part of the few, well, now, ever growing group of people that get to write these killer VHS stories for shortwave?
[00:23:58] Speaker B: So I had. I love Alan. First off, shortwave. I'm short wave. Stand for life.
I had written a couple of stories for Alan, one for Obsolescent, which was like my very first.
Well, it's my second, I guess, slush pile.
And I had written a couple others for him, and he liked my work. And he was, you know, if you have any other ideas, I would love to hear anything that you have. And I, you know, I threw a couple of things out because he was just getting started with the killer VHS series, and I threw a couple of ideas at him and he's like, okay, I like this one, but. I like this one, but this one's a little similar to what one thing we have going. And I said, okay, well, I mean, I have this novel that I'm 15,000 words into about a road trip with this girl and her gaslighting boyfriend, and they end up in this, like, backwater town in Mississippi.
And he's like, give it to me.
Can I have that one? And I was just like, yeah, I can do that.
So I was like, okay, it's now going to be a novella. And it actually worked so much better as a novella. Like I.
Which is why I joke. It has this big cast of characters because it was supposed to be a novel. And yet it still seemed to work.
People still liked it with this larger cast of characters. They felt like they got enough information to care, but not, you know, you didn't need everybody's backstory.
[00:25:44] Speaker A: Yes, exactly.
[00:25:46] Speaker B: So that's. That's how it happened. Was just this run of the little discussion discussing things that I wanted to write. And this was just an open word doc that I had while I was writing a million other things.
And he was just like, that.
That one.
Yeah. And I. It worked because it was my. It was my ode to, like, Saturday morning B movie. You're sitting up in bed and you're watching the Sci Fi Channel. You've watched, you know, MST3K, and then you're gonna watch something else, and your tremors is inevitably gonna come on at some point during the day.
[00:26:22] Speaker A: So.
[00:26:24] Speaker B: And so, yeah, it was just fun. It was a fun book to write.
[00:26:30] Speaker A: It's. And I. We mentioned, you know, you and I mentioned it's spooktastic. I just read Laurel High Terrace, Long the Whistle. And you were. There's like, one of those things is like, try hard to find Your favorite. Like, finding your favorite Goosebumps book was also kind of hard for me. It's like there's so many of them, but there's. But there's, like, so many that you're like, oh, but that one's good. And that one's good. And. And I just read Werewolf Fever Swamp again, and that one's amazing.
[00:26:53] Speaker B: That's one of my favorite. Fever Swamp. Yeah.
[00:26:57] Speaker A: And so what's funny is on my shelf over here, I have my Goosebumps books. And then 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 of killer VHS. They're literally. They're not supposed to be in the same spot. They don't go alphabetically. They don't go off, you know, nothing. It's just they have to be next to each other because they get my. They are my. My kids, my. My young generation of myself horror novels. And you get your novellas and you got your, you know, your. Your killer vhs. But, yeah, you're part of this group now. It's funny because it's like, it used to be when I Talked to Brian McCauley when. When Candy Cane Kills comes out, it was like a few people.
Now it's starting to grow to, like, okay, now there's like, seven books, six authors. It's starting to grow, and there's more coming.
It's kind of cool. You're one of the OG people for this. And I love the COVID Alan's a fantastic designer, and so you have this ability to. To put these things together in the. In the. When you order it from them and it comes in the. The box, like, it's like a movie and all that stuff. It's so cool to see. And that's where I first got introduced to. To. To you. And you're right.
[00:27:54] Speaker B: You know, he.
For the paper, he. He spent, like a couple of months looking for the Goosebumps paper.
[00:28:02] Speaker A: Really.
[00:28:03] Speaker B: He wanted it to be as close to Goosebumps, like, the feel as you could get. So he actually looked for months trying to get that specific Goosebumps favorite. It's the little details that Alan does.
[00:28:17] Speaker A: The thing I want to say. I love Alan because I think that what he does over at Short Wave is fantastic. But I also want to say I hate Alan because of the fact that what he puts into this, what he's doing, it shouldn't work. This should not be working for him. Like, the fact that the potential bills he has to pay because of what he. Because of getting that paper or doing that timing or the time spent on designing and all that Stuff like that should not work, but it does. And it's so amazing. And the new deal with Simon and Schuster so that people get to read the book a little bit more and things like that. Like, that's all fantastic and I love the success story that is. But again, looking at, if I try to do that, I'd be bankrupt. I'd be like, you're doing stupid things. You need to be cheap. You need to be printing these overseas. All this stuff and a little minutia. He just, I don't think he sleeps. That's the thing. I think he just slept all night.
[00:29:04] Speaker B: No, I don't. I'm. I've decided that he does absolutely nothing but hustle.
[00:29:09] Speaker A: But that's one of those things that I would say about when I watched Shark Tank every once in a while was like them saying people are like, oh, you have a part time job and you're doing this. And it's like, no, quit your job and do this fully if you really want to do it. And I think that's really what Alan gets out of this. Alan is doing this. Like this is what he wants to do. He has other stuff he's doing, obviously, but like this, he's like focusing so much on this. And that's where you get this killer VHS series. That's where you get obsolescence. You get these other books that are coming out. One of my favorite books that's come out from Short Wave in the past couple years is D7 by Philip. He was fantastic. And so these books are coming and they're fantastic. But yeah, this killer VHS series brings in that nostalgia that you want, you know, with the joy, the joy of reading a Goosebumps book, but as an adult. But also the joy of looking at 80s films and, and older movies and things that have to do with VHS or, or screens or things like that. It's fantastic. But you did Cicada on this. So you're talking about bugs. And then you move over to her wicked roots, which is, which is botanical stuff.
Are you trying, what are you trying to like, just make you not want to go outside? Is that the, that the goal? Like to make it so I don't go outside at all? Because you got bugs and plants and like we're just like, okay, stay inside, Justin. You know, lock the door, don't go anywhere. But yeah, so. So her wicked roots just came out October 7th in bookstores everywhere. It's beautiful. We talked about it before, you know, it's got all these purple.
[00:30:32] Speaker B: So pretty.
[00:30:33] Speaker A: Oh, so Pretty. So, so gorgeous.
[00:30:35] Speaker B: Actually, your wife had had questions.
[00:30:37] Speaker A: Questions.
[00:30:38] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:30:39] Speaker A: Why? And it's got the foil on the foil spine and everything. No, it's, it's, it's.
First of all, it's fantastic.
Yeah. And so it's wonderful. It is really wonderful.
I flew through it. We talked about scheduling this interview and discussion and I hadn't read it yet and I was like, oh, let me get on there. And so I quickly went on to netgalley and they press request and I got it immediately and I was like, oh, this is amazing, let me read this. And I just sat and started railing through it. But no. So a queer gothic retelling of Rapsini's is how you say it?
[00:31:17] Speaker B: Rapaccini.
[00:31:18] Speaker A: Rapacini's daughter.
What drew you to this story specifically? I mean, is this something you've been working on for a long time?
What to me, a little bit of behind the scenes creation of her wicked roots.
[00:31:32] Speaker B: So I had actually been. I'd been working on something else and I always have. Have at least like two things I'm working on at the same time because I'm insane.
But I was back in the, in the Twitter days.
Was. Was doom scrolling one day, as you do, and I happened to see a post that said, why hasn't there been a gothic fairy tale novelization of Rapachini's daughter? And I genuinely went, why hasn't there been?
Because I used to teach Rapuccini's daughter. And it's a, it's a very short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne about the, the. This girl Beatrice, who is cultivated by her father Rapachini. And this guy who lives next door sees her over the wall where she's like sequestered from the world and he's like, she's hot.
And like there's lots of red flags but you know, we ignore those in gothicism.
And I was also like listening to the like Evanescence Fallen album. I think around like the, the same time as reading. It's just kind of hit. And then a couple days later I see this weird skipping rhyme about belladonna and nightshade and I was like.
So I think within three days I had an outline and then I was just like, okay. But it's. I knew exactly who the characters were. I knew it was going to be a queer God. They knew there was going to be a momster instead of a dad. I wanted it to be a very Miss Haversham meets Poison Ivy, but make her mother sort of situation going on.
So yeah, it was. If Cicada was my love letter to the B movie.
Then her wicked roots is my love letter to the Gothic.
And so every. I joke about every high school had the Phantom of the Opera girly and the. The, you know, who read Jane Eyre for fun. And it was an Edward Rochester apologist again, despite all the red flags. Because every Gothicism girly was just like, we could fix them at least once.
Like, Nosferatu worked. Because everybody was like, no, but we could fix.
Like, that's horrific. Yeah, but no, we could make it better so that it ended up being like, I put all of my. All of my.
All of the red flags in this book and wanted people to think about what it was like being in your early 20s and thinking you're so smart and that you know everything and that, you know, the first sign of real attention is, you know, like, true love.
Just like. Because that's how a Gothicism. That's how Gothics work. You know, had Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre, Rebecca, all of these. And yet you also had the yellow wallpaper. You had Dracula, you had family opera. Red flags abound.
[00:34:53] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:34:54] Speaker B: So, yeah, so that's how it happened.
[00:34:58] Speaker A: And it's funny because the thing I got out of talk about real life horrors or real life things that happen. The funny thing is Cordelia, the beginning of the book, obviously I said, I don't want to spoil anything, but that's the beginning of the book. So, like, Cordelia is going on a search for her brother, and that's where she ends up. Where she ends up. And from that point on, I don't like my brother enough.
[00:35:21] Speaker B: I remember that in your review, I was like, I like my family enough. I don't like.
[00:35:26] Speaker A: That's like, I like my brother. But like, at some point, like, you mentioned red flags. You mentioned at some point when you go into things like, although the traditional cheesy horror tropes of things where you're like, you hear the noise in the other room and the person goes to look at it. No, no, no. You get the hell out of the house and you run. If you hear something in your house and you think it's really, don't stay nearby. So the things that happen to someone along the way when you're looking for your brother, I'm like, my brother can handle himself. He's an adult.
And like, to me, like, that was the beginning part where I'm like, I kind of want to read this because I want to be like, what is it like for someone who actually cares?
But I love my Brothers, Like, I have two of them. They're, they're awesome dudes.
[00:36:01] Speaker B: I, I, they're on their own, but.
[00:36:04] Speaker A: They'Re on their own. I'm sorry to say this, but, like, I feel like they feel the same way. My brother, My brother lives in Virginia. He's not a survivalist, but he has that mentality. And I feel like he would end the world. He'd be, take care of him and his wife and we'd be on my own, too. So I don't, like, it's not like it's a feeling. I think feelings are mutual. But I just thought to myself, I'm like, that's, I want to read this just because of that. Just because I want to see what, how far Cordelia will go to see if she can find her brother. And obviously things don't go as planned and things happen, obviously, throughout the book that I don't want to spoil, but I just laughed at that. I was like, this is, this is amazing. I want to see how someone loves their family that much. And it's different time, different people, different things.
[00:36:42] Speaker B: But, like, so much that, I mean, yes, different time, but for, for 40, it was. This is all she has.
[00:36:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:36:51] Speaker B: In the world. This is the only affection that she's ever known in the world.
And that can, she can remember because she can't remember their parents, but she remembers her brother and how he's protected her for years and years, and then he's gone.
And to, to lose the one positive thing, the one piece of hope that you have in the world and to just let it go, she's like, I have to try. And then, because when she goes, she thinks everything's going to be fine. This is, you know, she's the fool in the tarot deck. She thinks it's all going to be fine if she just makes it there.
She makes it there.
It's not fine, but she's like, oh, well, I still have a clue as to where he is. And if I'm good enough and if I try hard enough, which I think is, you know, and no offense to the male listeners, but I think this is such a female yes, coded thing, is if you're good enough and you are kind enough and you try hard enough, you will be rewarded.
And again, we're back to the we can fix it.
[00:37:59] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:38:00] Speaker B: If we, if we do xyz, we can fix it again. Ash was the exact opposite. She's like, I don't care to fix it this, I mean, along the way.
[00:38:12] Speaker A: Even in the journey There. There was like flags of people being like, you shouldn't be doing this kind of stuff. So it's just like one of those things. It's like also like blinders on. Just, I gotta get this done. And I'm just. So. I don't. To me, I'm like, I don't know if I'm focused enough on anything to do that much work to get something like, to have that much ambition to it. And again, people are built differently in a sense that, you know. Obviously the one person that Cordelia remembers and loves and trusts and so on and so forth is her brother.
But like. So there is that part of it, but it's just for me, I'm like, I. Okay. And again, there is that. I'm glad I got to read it. You know, I have a different point of view as a CIS white male to read this story.
And I liked it. And that's the thing. It's like, it is. Part of it is. Is like, would I have picked it up? It wasn't an author that I enjoyed that kind of thing. Like, you don't know. Like, I have my certain, you know, style of book I like is gothic, romance, horror. Like, is this.
Is this my thing?
[00:39:06] Speaker B: Is that your bag? Probably not.
[00:39:08] Speaker A: But hey, I'm glad. And that's why I love book clubs. It's one of the things I've always said to people. I join a book club and I don't always say, hey, I want to read this book. Let's read this book in the book. But honestly, sit back a little bit and have them recommend books to you. Because a lot of times there's so many times I've read comics or novels that I never would have picked up that I've absolutely loved because I was not forced to but like guided someone suggest it.
[00:39:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:31] Speaker A: And then I have to. Then we're going to talk about this. So I have a. I have to answer. This is my homework, in a sense. I have to go to the book club next month and answer to what book we were reading. And so that's one of those things. It's like sometimes if you do like an author and they, you know, just something different. Flip Fricasse had this with. With third rule of time travel. Knowing that how much he was known for his horror and all this stuff. And then also I know he does this like sci fi. Sci fi time traveler book. And people are like, what the hell did you just do? It was fantastic. It was amazing. But then people are gonna be like, well, why Isn't this horror? What's going on here? So like, stepping outside your comfort zone a little bit helps. So like, maybe I wouldn't have picked up her record roots if it wasn't for Cicada and what I liked about your previous stories. But I'm glad I did because I got so much out of it. I enjoyed the experience so much. And again, it's. It's outside my comfort zone, but my normal purview of reading.
[00:40:20] Speaker B: Oh yeah. I had to explain to my editor the, you know, she. She bought her wicked roots in another book because it was a two book deal. And then she was like, picked up Cicada at Spooktastic. The first, like not this last one, but the year before. She picked up Cicada while there because she was there just hanging out with me. I was like, I can't wait to do this. Like, I need to tell you something.
I swear I wrote all of them.
[00:40:47] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:40:49] Speaker B: Like, because you're gonna read this.
[00:40:52] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:40:52] Speaker B: And you're gonna be like, hang on the bait and switch happening right now.
[00:40:58] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:40:58] Speaker B: So. And she was also looking at like mother Knows Best, the story in that and obsolescence. And these are all like these extreme. I go from extreme horror to comedy horror to gothic. And I'm like, I promise I wrote them all. But.
[00:41:14] Speaker A: But I love that. I mean, one of my favorite authors of all time is Daniel Crowe.
And Daniel has this ability to write horror or angel down or you know, like there's this different Will Fall. They're all have a kind of vibe that's a Daniel Krause vibe, but they're just different stories.
[00:41:30] Speaker B: The Teddy Bear saga.
[00:41:31] Speaker A: Yes. And so there's this. And he's right. Comic books. And he just wrote a superhero horror story, folk horror.
[00:41:37] Speaker B: Pay the piper.
[00:41:39] Speaker A: There's all this in it. And so like to me I'm like, that makes it.
You don't know what you're going to get next kind of thing. I liked also. I'm sorry, but look at this. And look at Tanya. This is you.
Like, this is like. This book screams Tanya Pell. That's the thing. Cicada wouldn't, you know, if, you know, holding your cicada book up in your pink room probably doesn't match as much as. So people probably more apt to see this, you know, getting to know you and meeting you than they are. Cicada, in my opinion.
[00:42:05] Speaker B: You know what's hilarious is my husband loves cicada. I dedicated cicadas to my husband because I am, I'm I'm bisexual. Married a man. That was a choice.
You know, you do things sometimes, but I joke about, like, you know, being in a heteronormative relationship. My queerness had to go somewhere, and that's.
It was quite gothic. But he loves Cicada. And the next book that hasn't been announced yet are his two favorites because he says, those sound like me talking.
[00:42:47] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:42:47] Speaker B: He's like, this is. This is what it sounds like when you are talking. And I'm like, I know, but you don't understand.
[00:42:55] Speaker A: This is what it sounds like when I'm thinking, but this.
[00:42:57] Speaker B: Exactly. But this is what. This is what everybody pictures again with my. I get all the time. And I think I just posted it on Blue sky or Threads. One is every time I was at a signing and I showed up, they'd invited me, and I show up and I'm like, where am I supposed to go? And they're like, who are you? And I was like, I'm the author.
You don't look like a horror author. And I'm like, I don't look like a serial killer either. What. What does that mean?
[00:43:26] Speaker A: I don't understand.
[00:43:27] Speaker B: Yes, but it's always, I. You don't look like the horror author. I know.
[00:43:33] Speaker A: That's the fun part.
[00:43:34] Speaker B: That's.
[00:43:34] Speaker A: Don't judge a book by its cover. It's. It's the whole, you know, I love this aspect of it that you get this, you know, back and forth on that. Because again, read the book and find out more about it than actually just looking at the author and going, oh, I don't know.
[00:43:48] Speaker B: Romance. Yes, he's coded romance at Barnes and Noble. And I'm just like, let's. That's one get mad at me because I didn't do it.
[00:44:00] Speaker A: That's the tough thing about book shopping in store. I love local bookstores and I love, obviously, even Barnes and Noble and places like that. It's just tough because, like I mentioned earlier, there's certain books by certain authors that are young adult versus adult and so on and so forth. And so they go into different sections. I mean, Adam Caesar's one of my favorite authors, and Clown in the Cornfield is a young adult horror. But, like, it easily could be in the adult section, too. And I remember him saying one time when Clown in the Cornfield one first came out that he would go over, there was like six copies in the young adult section. He'd take three and move them over to adult horror without them knowing. He just take them and move them and so that when people can find them in both places, and it's like, it's true. And so, yes, putting this in one spot, it's kind of hard. It's. It's. I work at a. For a brewery, and I program the menu sometimes on the computer, and sometimes I'm putting, like, things in multiple sections because wherever the person going to ring up on the computer might think it is at, I also want to put it there because I want to make sure they can find it. And so the same thing would be books, like, it should be like, okay, it's romance, but maybe there should be four copies, two in romance and two in horror. And that way people can find the book easily.
[00:45:00] Speaker B: And with this, though, I understand, because it's gothic.
[00:45:04] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:45:04] Speaker B: And I tried to make it, you know, a true gothic. And even on the inside, it's not on that. It's not on the COVID but on the inside title page. It's a gothic novel.
It didn't make the COVID because of to. For sizing.
[00:45:18] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:45:19] Speaker B: But because Gothicism is many things. It's not one thing. It is horror. It is romance. It is fantasy. You can kind of put it under different umbrellas and it fits. And so I. Even though I. It is unlikely you're going to see it in the horror section very often, unless it's been coded like, you know, Doylestown, where, you know, pegging everybody is. They're gonna put it with horror, but, you know, other stores are going to code it romance. And I'm like, that's fine. It's. Or other. And some stores are going to code it as exclusively lgbtq.
[00:45:56] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:45:57] Speaker B: And I'm like, that's fine, too, because it fits. It fits everywhere.
[00:46:02] Speaker A: Yeah. Speaking of that. So. So what do you say? Like I said, so. Speaking of that, you have your horror readers and you have your gothic romance readers without spoiling much. But what do each. Each of those sections get out of this book? Like, is there. Is there. What's the horror? Is there a horror vibe to people that you'd like to explain to people or romance? But obviously you mentioned the queer romance in it that, you know, at some point happens in this story.
What do both sides of this get out of it?
[00:46:33] Speaker B: I think for. For gothic, for. For the.
The people that love a true gothic. You're going to get, like I said, you're going to get the Easter eggs. You get the atmosphere, the isolation, the. The.
The gaslighting that goes on where even Corey is gaslighting herself.
You get your. Your dark hallways and your lone candle and girls wandering in the night. Night gowns. Because why wouldn't you?
[00:47:00] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:47:02] Speaker B: You.
And you get the cult like vibe that comes with the secrets when, when everybody else seems to know what the secret is. But to you, which I think is a, is a, is a nod to Gothicism. If you, if you look at Jane Eyre, for example, everybody knew that. I, I think it's been long enough that I can spoil Jane Eyre for people, but I think I love that people. I think it may be okay.
It's like maybe I should wait a few more seasons of Game of Thrones before at some point spoil things.
[00:47:44] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:47:45] Speaker B: Everybody knew. Everyone in the house knew that Bertha's in the attic and that Rochester's buried, but no one's telling Jane.
[00:47:57] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:47:58] Speaker B: Because Rochester's like, this is our.
And everybody's like, okay, sir. Yes, you sign our paychecks. Absolutely.
Which is why, you know, without spoiling, when you get to the attic scene in the book, if you know, you know.
[00:48:19] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:48:20] Speaker B: But the, I think you, you have all those aspects that people are going to recognize as a, as a Gothic, especially the, in regards to the atmosphere and the pacing is, is, it's building on creeping tension because that's one thing that gothic did well. So horror tends to rely. And not all horror, but a lot of horror relies on fear and horror, whereas Gothicism relies on creeping terror, so. And slow dread. So I think you get that as well for the horror aspect. I mean, not only do you get the horrors that revolve around the dichotomy of womanhood.
So sorry, this gendered white man.
You get the horrors, the economy of womanhood and what it means to be a woman in the world who is told what her place is. And you have this house of just women. And you think, you'd think that things would work out.
No, because when you introduce things like hubris and you introduce things like zealotry, it's never going to work out.
So you have, you have the, you have the horrors of zealotry, which I think is something we can all appreciate in the year 2025. Yes, you have, you have body horror in this. And again, back to the. The horrors of gaslighting and what that does to you, not just when you're gaslighting yourself, but when others are gaslighting you. And what you are willing to do, the lengths you're willing to go to at that age to be right and to, to, to right the wrongs and what, what you perceive as. Because again, you know, these, these Characters, all of them, all of them exist in a petri dish.
So fun.
But Cordy had this petri dish of the city, and she comes to this, this new world with her knowledge. The girls and Evangeline and all the other women have a petri dish of Edenfield, a smaller one even.
And so. But they have their knowledge. And the idea of the perverted Eden as well, like, that's what this is, is a. Is a perverted concept of what Eden might have been if you had granted your. Your subjects knowledge. Okay, sure, you granted them knowledge, but you didn't grant them truth. So it's not the same thing, is it?
So I think. I think there's something for everybody in it. And if you. Again, if you. If you just are into the romantasy, if that's your vibe, then I think there's enough. Sure. There's not like 10 pages of smut.
[00:51:36] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:51:37] Speaker B: And I mean, we can all appreciate, but there's 10 pages of smut. But.
[00:51:43] Speaker A: But the funny thing is, I read this physically, so I read the digital copy of it, you know, but I've done it. Like, I read Mayfly on audiobook and I was in the car on a hill, like, in traffic listening to it. You know, like, you can listen to someone on their phone, the next car over in the parking lot or something like that. Like, I'm like, not realizing what's going on in the egg scene. I don't know if anybody's ever read. Yeah, there's a scene about an egg was, like, playing, and I'm like, oh, shit. People in the heart, like, someone can hear me do this. Like, sometimes I'm like, I gotta depend on where I want this smut or the. Or this dirtiness in a book. Because, like, if I'm reading it, I'm still, like, looking around like someone watching me read this book right now. But yes. So there isn't that aspect of it. But yes, there's. There's. There's enough to. To. To maybe check the box off for people in certain situations. But, like, I think it's great about that. I think that's one of those things that I meant. Again, this book wasn't written for me specifically, but I do get a lot out of it. I do think that if I only read books that are within my purview in my section of the world, then I'm not gonna learn much. I'm not gonna get this thing. And so to me, it's also one of those things. Paul Dwarin is an author From Maine, who writes these mystery novels about Game warden in Maine. And they're very straightforward. A mystery. Something happens, he has to solve the mystery. It's in the backwoods of Maine. And the reason I like them is because I'm from Maine, so I kind of get the ideas and the places he's in, so forth. But I sporadically put those in because it just like cleanses the palette of what I'm reading. And so, like, if anybody's like, I'm gonna read all the Stephen King books. If you read Stephen King book one to now in a row, you. At some point you'd get tired of it. You know, there's themes and there's ways that he writes and things like that that you just get. Okay, you have to kind of like cleanse that palette. And I feel like to me this is a different cleansing of palette, a way of changing things things up. And again, I think that's the big thing that I. Maybe not. I'm glad I was introduced to it because again. And so that. That to me changes things up. So. Yes. Was this. I wouldn't be. If it was in romance, I wouldn't have found it. I don't know where the romance section is at Barnes and Noble.
It's. It's somewhere over there. It's probably where I see my wife at. She's over there doing that thing. But like, to me, it's the. I would. I gravitate towards the horror and then maybe some of the straight ahead fiction section. So I wouldn't have seen it if I didn't see that too. But. But that's why I think that the benefit of the Internet too helps with people nowadays. It's like if you're a fan of or you met you at Spooktastic or Heroes somewhere, you met you and you're like, oh, she has a new book coming out and you want to find it. You can just Google it and then it tells you where to find it. Whether you order it on bookshop.org, or your local bookstore or wherever you order it, you can get this book. And that's the thing. I think wherever it's coded at Barnes and Noble isn't going to change where people find it. Yeah. And I nowadays, I do like that someone.
[00:54:26] Speaker B: Yeah, it's.
[00:54:27] Speaker A: But people that work there.
[00:54:29] Speaker B: It is. It is something that I think is for everyone. And I've. I've actually been enjoying because I did worry a little bit because it is so, like, you know, the first thing is this. No men Thing.
[00:54:39] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:54:39] Speaker B: And I've been enjoying how many men have enjoyed the book, so.
[00:54:44] Speaker A: Because I get it. Men shouldn't be in certain places at certain times. I tell you right now, I. There's days that I'm sad. I'm part of this community that I have to be part of because of how some people treat other people and are.
You know, I live in Maine, so there's definitely some. And I live in not rural Maine, but fairly rural Maine, where people still have Trump signs up and things like that. I'm not gonna get too political on this, but I'm like.
[00:55:07] Speaker B: I mean, I'm in South Carolina, so.
[00:55:09] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. So to me, I'm like, okay, okay, enough's enough. So I'm sad. I'm part of that community sometimes. So sometimes it's nice to be able to get out to the other side. I'm like, no, I understand. With you, I relate. I can see where you're coming from on.
[00:55:20] Speaker B: But again, you're also looking at this and you see it. And I. Like I said all the all women thing, it doesn't work either.
[00:55:26] Speaker A: It doesn't. Like, it's.
[00:55:27] Speaker B: It doesn't work. Some of the kindest, the. Some of the only kindnesses Cordy gets from the. From the. From the book are from two men.
[00:55:36] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:55:37] Speaker B: So the coach driver and Edward. These are the people that she wishes that she'd had in her life. So there is no.
That's the one thing I wanted to make very clear in this book is that, yes, this is the rule, but this is for people that live in a black and white world, not a color world. It's not even shades of gray. This is a color world.
And if you try to put it into yes or no categories. Right. Wrong. Black, white, you're missing all the nuances. And. But yeah, I think yesterday I did a signing, and this older gentleman came in to get a coffee at the Starbucks. He's a truck driver. He was going to Detroit like this, you know, big old truck driver with his backpack, getting his coffee. And he sees the book. He asked me what's. What's it about? And I tell him. And he's like, that sounds all right. I'm gonna get one. And I was like, ah, yeah.
[00:56:38] Speaker A: Yeah.
How do I.
[00:56:42] Speaker B: You reading this with your. No dose, sir?
[00:56:44] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly.
I just like. I love the. The picture. I just picture someone the opposite. Like, someone looking at. Going and trying to say, no, I'm all set. But not be offensive or like, it seems.
[00:56:54] Speaker B: No, I like. So, yeah, I'm glad he walked up to me, saw me, he's stirring his coffee, like, what's this about?
And I tell him, and we just have a conversation for a few minutes, and then all of a sudden he's like, yeah, I think I'll get one.
[00:57:11] Speaker A: That's awesome.
That's awesome.
[00:57:13] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:57:13] Speaker A: I mean, so here, think about physical looking at it. I wanted to touch on that really quickly while we. While we kind of wrap things up. Here is. I mean, how well do you think that this is gonna sell your book?
This is not me being sarcastic. This is me being serious, beautiful and thinking about it. It's so gorgeous.
And selfishly, as a designer myself by trade, you know, I mentioned earlier, don't judge a book by its cover. But, I mean, everybody does because you see the book cover first. So if the COVID sucks, you may not actually be, you know, drawn into actually reading this. I sell beer for a living. If my beer label doesn't look good, no one's gonna try the liquid that's inside the can to see if they like it or not. It's gonna draw you in, you know, is there. Does it have the right description on it? Does it have the right poll quotes on all that kind of stuff on the book?
Makes sense. But, yeah, this, like the, The. The embossing on the front, the color, the sprayed edges, like, all this stuff is gonna do wonders for it. I mean, are you happy?
[00:58:08] Speaker B: I keep saying, and I take zero credit for this, is. They spoiled me. They spoiled me horribly for this book. They.
They asked, you know, my. My editor and I. I think you met my editor at Spooktastic, because, like, we hang out. I'm like, one of the few people that have this, like, dream editor where we can text each other on, like, unhinged. Her boyfriend bought. Brought baked goods. He bakes. So he.
And they asked me, you know what, who do you want to work with, art wise? Do you have anybody in mind? I was, yes.
I want Tropical Gloom Marcella. She's an amazing floral horror artist. She just did the. I think I. I'm gonna say Owlcrate. It might be wrong, but I think it's the owlcrate version for King Fisher's what Moves Dead. And it is, yeah, stunning. It is absolutely stunning. She. This juxtaposition, which, again, works so well with the book with. With beautiful body, with florals, botanicals, and body and skeletons.
I think she is unmatched at this.
And so I said her, and she agreed immediately. And this we'll do a little bit Lore this is one of four possible covers.
I have the other three and just know that they exist in the world.
[00:59:37] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:59:37] Speaker B: The three that could have been.
But. And they. I. I asked for sprayed edges because I said, you know, people especially because I knew it would fit into multiple categories. And I said, you know, the Book Talk girlies, the Instagram girlies, they love their sprayed edges.
And I'd asked for just amethyst edges, and they said, do you want stenciled? And I was like, is this a trap?
[01:00:01] Speaker A: Yes.
[01:00:03] Speaker B: What do I have to give up to give that.
[01:00:05] Speaker A: What's going on?
[01:00:05] Speaker B: No, no, we just. And then they did the foil and the. I didn't. The embossing. And it's anti. It's anti fingerprint covers. It's like, it doesn't.
[01:00:13] Speaker A: The technology is absolute.
Yeah. What they could do now, it's like.
[01:00:19] Speaker B: I opened that box. I was like, is this real?
[01:00:22] Speaker A: Do you ever pick up books nowadays after seeing this and go, why didn't they do all this? Like, what is. You must not. Your editor and your publisher must not like you. Because.
[01:00:31] Speaker B: No, I just love everyone. I did. I got lucky. I got spoiled. I.
No complaints. It was.
They were very kind. Everybody has been very kind. And artists are magical, and the art department did an incredible job, you know, putting it all together with the, with the words. And I just. It is. It is a pretty book. And yes, a pretty book will sell.
I hope people like book.
[01:01:04] Speaker A: It's scary. It's a scary pretty, though, like, I mean, like, it has this.
The darkness to it.
[01:01:09] Speaker B: Like, it's a haunting. Yeah.
[01:01:12] Speaker A: Yeah, but. But I, I can see where you see it. It fits next to other people's books that are similar in the sense of the gothic romance, the romance side of things. I can see that we'll know whether or not it did. Well, if your next book is a paperback with a very boring cover and no sprayed edges. Right. Like, that's.
[01:01:28] Speaker B: Oh, I already know. So.
[01:01:32] Speaker A: Just see that people like, oh, the first book came out beautiful. Next book is like, yeah, let's just get this out of here. We have a contractual obligation to get though. No, I think that people are gonna like it. I think I, I, you know, it's been out for a couple weeks now or a week. As of recording this. As recording this. By the time it's actually goes on on podcast, it will be a couple weeks. But so far I've heard good things and this. Other things. I'm like, so, Matt, I want to call out Matt, Matt Morris out here. Matt Drams. And reason drams on Instagram. You. You gave him our copy. He hasn't even read it yet. I'm like, dude, you got this copy. You got to read it immediately. TBRs and obligations. Obligations. I understand that because we talked a little bit about that on our episode with them, is that you get a lot of them. You have obligations and time constraints and all that stuff. But I was just like, the second I got approved for it, I was like, I don't care what I'm reading right now. I just, like, went over and started reading this. And that was weeks ago. And so it wasn't even like, oh, I got to read this because you're coming on the podcast. It was like, I just want to get this because I want to read this. And. And I think that that is what people will get. The beginning of this and start to read into this book. In the vibe, I pictured what was going on, the beautifulness of this place, the setting, without much descriptive or. You did do very good descriptive words. But, like, even in the moments there wasn't. I was like, in my mind, picturing where I was. It was somehow transporting while reading this, this book that the moments where you describe some things stayed with me as I went through the book and finished off the book. That in my mind, I'm, like, living in this other world, which was really cool to see, but, I mean, I don't want to live in that world, I'll tell you that much right now.
[01:03:03] Speaker B: I mean, yes, fair.
[01:03:04] Speaker A: Well, I wouldn't be allowed to, but, you know, fair.
[01:03:06] Speaker B: But still fair.
Valid.
[01:03:09] Speaker A: Yes. I'm not allowed to, but yes, I think it's cool. October 7th, it hit shelves, and I think people are going to love it. And it's also an audiobook, right?
[01:03:16] Speaker B: Fiona Hardingham voiced it, and I'm listening to that right now, and that is surreal. That is surreal. And it is. So.
Sorry. It is.
It's incredible what she does.
So I'm. I'm super happy all the way around.
[01:03:34] Speaker A: And you can get that. I recommend. I believe. I'm just making sure. I think it's on.
Yeah, it is on Libro fm.
I recommend getting it from Libro FM if you are a fan of audiobooks, because that helps Support local bookstores as well as bookshop.org supports local bookstores. If you wanted to buy it online there too. But my caveat to the whole thing is shop local when you can. If you can. Oh, yeah, get the book.
Don't. Don't steal the book.
And don't pirate the book or anything like that, great. And local bookstores. But if all those things are not. And you just. I'm just ordering something on Amazon, then order it. Just get the book and read the book. That's my big thing. It's like. It's. It's.
[01:04:14] Speaker B: It's.
[01:04:14] Speaker A: The more people buy this book who are really interested in reading it, the more Gallery is interested in doing work with you as well. So I think that's one of those things that, like, I don't think, you know, some people. I'll get to it.
If you can afford to buy the book, put it on your shelf and then read it when you get a chance, but get it in your library sooner than later. And that's not. I'm saying that people need to. I recommend this book highly. And this is not just because Tanya was coming on here or anything like that. You know, I just. It's phenomenal book in the first place, so I'm glad you came out and talked to me on this podcast. But, you know, the book alone was worth it. And so, you know, we'll get you back in the future when you talk about something else, too. We'll just chat if you want to, too. We can just nerd out in chat.
[01:04:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:04:55] Speaker A: But. Yeah, so I appreciate you taking the time out to talk to me about her wicked roots, Cicada and all the things horror. And I really do appreciate it.
It's available at bookstores everywhere.
Her wicked roots.
Yeah. So it's all.
[01:05:07] Speaker B: Thank you.
[01:05:07] Speaker A: You worked hard on it, and I'm glad it's out in physical copy and people can hold it. It's a physical, physical beauty. How about that?
[01:05:15] Speaker B: Can I do a quick, shameless plug? Yeah, quick shameless plug. Is this Friday the 14th, the anthology fever Dreams comes out.
And I have a story inside with my Stephen King, Christopher golden, who penned the story with me.
It is in there along with CJ Lead, because we mentioned CJ and Clay McLeod Chapman. So a bunch of.
A bunch of Biggins. And then.
[01:05:45] Speaker A: That's amazing.
[01:05:47] Speaker B: They let me see that, too.
That comes out Friday.
[01:05:51] Speaker A: Yeah, it does. And it's funny about it. I was laughing because I'm seeing CJ next, not this coming Wednesday, but the Wednesday after that in New Hampshire.
And I laughed because I was like, CJ barely did any short stories, and then now all of a sudden, I know they're all over the place.
It was just.
[01:06:09] Speaker B: We were on a panel at Stokercon, CJ and she was talking about how she was in Fever Dreams. I was Like, I'm in Fever Dreams, too. And then Philip was also on it. Phillip was on the panel. He's like, oh, yeah, I'm in that. I was like, yay.
[01:06:22] Speaker A: That's amazing. No, because CJ was just in the aardvark collection, too. And then I was, like, laughing because I'm like. And there was something else. I saw C.J. on. I'm like, wait a second. Yeah. Like I said, all these other people in clays and every anthology.
[01:06:35] Speaker B: Clays and everything.
I've told him, I think there's 10 clays.
[01:06:39] Speaker A: Yes.
[01:06:40] Speaker B: And, like, well, he has the energy for 10 clays. Yeah.
I think four and six do appearances.
So I have theories. I have theories.
[01:06:51] Speaker A: That's amazing. No, I'm. Clay's gonna be there. Clay's actually. It's gonna be Clay and C.J. in New Hampshire.
You know, Clay's obviously acquired taste just came out. And his new shiny, happy people, which is amazing as well, that comes out in November. But, yeah, Clay is awesome. I brought Clay up to Bangor last year in May with Christopher golden, and they're awesome. People know it's just a great job.
And so in one of these days, I'm gonna get to Heroes Con, and so when I get to Heroes Con, we'll be looking you up, but we'll see. I mean, I went to. We wanted to go to Stoker this past year, but we bought a house and. And that.
[01:07:30] Speaker B: That's changed.
[01:07:31] Speaker A: That changed everything.
[01:07:32] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:07:32] Speaker A: My kids are getting old enough that I can actually go away for a little bit here and there, so. So I'm gonna go to Stoker next year. I want to go to Heroes. I don't know if Heroes is in the cars for next year, but soon Heroes is one of the.
[01:07:41] Speaker B: My friend Bridget Connell, who is a comic artist for Dark Horses, she did Lady Baltimore and a bunch of others. She lives here, and she. You know, we didn't know that we had each done with Christopher golden when we met, and. Or we knew Christopher Goldman when we met. And so now we call ourselves the Golden Girls, and we're trying to. We're gonna. We're gonna try to get him to come to Heroes Con.
[01:08:05] Speaker A: Do it.
[01:08:05] Speaker B: We're gonna be like, come on. You can see he'd love to.
[01:08:08] Speaker A: I think. I think, you know, he's over abroad right now. Just. Just visiting.
[01:08:12] Speaker B: Oh, no, he's in the uk, but he's going to be back because we're doing New Hampshire. Okay. In the end with Paul and Bracken and Krista Carmen. So I'M excited for that.
[01:08:24] Speaker A: It's awesome. That's so cool. Like I said, I love this community. I love this. Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to chat here.
[01:08:30] Speaker B: Thank you for having me.
[01:08:32] Speaker A: It was a wonderful conversation, and I can't wait to talk to you again in the future and see you again in the future.
So I can have you actually put your name. Well, draw your name on the inside of this book, because your name is on the inside of this book multiple times. But yeah, I'm excited. So thank you so much, Tanya. And have a great rest of the fall, spooky season, all that stuff, and continue writing amazing novels. How's that sound?
[01:08:53] Speaker B: Absolutely. Thank you for having me.
[01:08:56] Speaker A: Thanks, Tanya.
[01:09:06] Speaker B: It.
