Monthly Archives: October 2021

Infestation Unpacked: Influencer

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My recently released book Infestation: A Horror Anthology features my Infestation novella – a six-chapter sci-fi horror tale – along with five other short stories. Continuing this series unpacking each story in the collection, this week I expound a little on Influencer.

Janice Hopper is a young, Oxford-based social media influencer with a considerable following. Manufacturing an online persona that is on-trend and relevant, her writing has proved popular and lucrative. However, to say she is prone to exaggeration in her writing, stretching the truth to breaking point, would be an understatement. When an online commenter accuses her of lying in a piece about sexual abuse, events escalate into a nail-biting tale of stalking and revenge.

A previously unpublished story exclusive to this volume, Influencer draws on themes of wealth, privilege, and self-deluded, self-justifying narcissism. A series of shocking and satirical twists make this a distinct, singular take on the overall theme of guilt running through the stories in the Infestation volume.

Photo by Cristina Zaragoza on Unsplash

Influencer draws inspiration from noir novels and the cycle of psycho-horror thrillers from the late 1980s and early 1990s – think Fatal Attraction, The Hand That Rocks the Cradle, Single White Female, and Martin Scorsese’s remake of Cape Fear. It also nods to satirical elements in recent TV thrillers such as Netflix’s You. Influencer is certainly the most darkly comic tale in this collection. However, I’d argue the undercurrent of suspense and dread, not to mention the bloody finale, push it firmly into the horror bracket.

Infestation: A Horror Anthology is available on Kindle and paperback from Amazon here (in the UK) and here (in the US). It can also be ordered via Smashwords here.

Infestation Unpacked: Once in a Lifetime

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My newly released book Infestation: A Horror Anthology features my Infestation novella – a six-chapter sci-fi horror tale – along with five other short stories. As I stated in my article last week, I’m going to expound a little on each story in the weeks to come, continuing in this article with Once in a Lifetime.

After inexplicably awakening inside a different home with a different wife, Hayden Jones experiences an existential crisis, as memories of a new life, that of another man named John Hunter, gradually replace those of his old life.

In desperation, he tries to write down all that happened in his old life – his wife, his children, friends, and acquaintances – when he finds in his new life, he is unable to contact them. He also finds he has awoken in London, miles from his country home near Dartmoor.

Previously published by Dragon Soul Press, as part of their All Dark Places horror anthology, Once in a Lifetime is based on a surprisingly well-plotted nightmare I had some years ago. Continuing with the recurrent theme of guilt contained within this volume, the story also touches on issues such as childhood bullying, abuse, and denial. Like several of my horror stories, it is designed with deliberate ambiguity, leaving room for the reader to separate reality from fantasy; a process they undertake based on their own personal baggage.

Photo by samer daboul from Pexels

On a lighter note, I’ve had it suggested to me that the story is an endorsement of living in the country versus living in the city. That isn’t consciously the case, although I do confess that I wouldn’t want to live in London instead of southwest England. London wouldn’t suit me at all (except for the many cinemas, and arts scene in general).

Influences for this include David Lynch films such as Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive, and Twin Peaks, which also deal in existential themes of people being subsumed into different lives/universes. Once in a Lifetime was also slightly informed by lyrics in the classic song of the same name by the seminal band Talking Heads. (“You may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife… You may ask yourself: How did I get here?”) Most of all though, I wanted to tell a story about the unconscious, sometimes self-destructive impulses of middle age, where it is common for people to wonder about paths not taken.

Unlike the physical, external, creature-based horrors of Infestation, Once in a Lifetime is a much more psychological piece, though emphatically still designed to rattle and disturb, especially in the shocking finale.

Infestation: A Horror Anthology is available on Kindle and paperback from Amazon here (in the UK) and here (in the US). It can also be ordered via Smashwords here.

Infestation Unpacked

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Recently, I’ve been making a lot of noise about my newly released book Infestation: A Horror Anthology. It features my Infestation novella – a six-chapter sci-fi horror tale – along with five other short stories. Over the next few weeks, I’m going to expound a little on each story, starting in this article with Infestation itself, which I consider the collection’s main attraction.

In the near future, no one knows where the giant spider nests came from, but nations are adjusting to the challenge of living alongside dangerous oversized arachnids.

A mercenary desperate for money to purchase medical treatments that can save his wife is hired by an influential businessman. His objective: Infiltrate a spider nest on a mission of vengeance.

There is a lot more to this story than just giant spiders. The protagonist, Jonah Seymour, is deeply troubled by the nature of his mission, and throughout the story experiences doubts and dithering about whether he should go through with it. Thematically it deals in issues of denial, guilt, revenge, and punishment. The story is also open to a number of different interpretations. I have deliberately designed it with a certain degree of ambiguity, so the reader can bring their own piece of the puzzle that completes the picture.

Photo by Anthony from Pexels

For instance, I have had it suggested to me that the story is an allegory about Covid. I didn’t intend it as such. For one thing, I wrote the story back in 2017. However, I am pleased that for some readers, the narrative also has contemporary resonance, as a reflection on human attitudes and actions concerning the recent pandemic.

My influences for this story mostly came from cinema rather than literature, with films such as Them! (1954), The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957), The Fly (the 1958 original, rather than the more famous 1986 David Cronenberg remake), and Aliens (1986) informing the story. There is possibly a touch of Stephen King’s The Mist in there too. I should add that much of the inspiration came from a nightmare I had a few years ago.

For all its loftier aims, in the end, Infestation is a story I wanted to grip, thrill, and disturb, with plenty of action and scares along the way. If you enjoy a blend of science fiction, action, and horror, this story is definitely for you.

Infestation: A Horror Anthology is available on Kindle and paperback from Amazon here (in the UK) and here (in the US). It can also be ordered via Smashwords here.