Michael David Wilson 0:07
Welcome to This Is Horror, a podcast for readers, writers and creators. I'm Michael David Wilson, and every episode, alongside my co host, Bob Pastorella, we chat with the world's best writers about writing, life lessons, creativity and much more. Today on This Is Horror. We are welcoming back David Moody for the second part of our conversation, and today we talk about his brand new release shadow locked amongst a series of other topics. And if you don't know David, he is best known for his autumn series and hater series, but he has also written a number of stand alones, including last big thing straight to you, last of the living and isolation. And what may be of interest in particular to This Is Horror listeners, is that David Moody actually wrote the first ever. This Is Horror publication, Joe and me, so momentarily we are going to jump in to this episode with David. But before we do that, a quick advert break

Bob Pastorella 1:56
coming October 31 truth Twister by Lydia, graves, seven deadly sins, seven killer novellas. In his chilling debut of the unveiled sin series, lust takes center stage in Hawthorn hollow when wads forbidden desires for stepdaughter chastity manifest as a horrifying physical transformation. The town's dark secrets erupt in a whirlwind of flesh and shame as skin peels away and sin takes tangible form, no one is safe from the truth they've tried to hide.

Andrew Love 2:29
In 1867 the young Samantha gray marries the infamous Captain Jakes, unleashing a series of brutal horrors in this epic splatter Western from Death's Head press Nahan Sam by J, D grays, is a rip roaring tall tale of revenge. Drags a coffin full of gold across the hellscape of reconstruction Texas and explodes at the top of a mountain. You better read this one with the lights on.

Michael David Wilson 2:58
Okay? Without saying, Here it is. It is David Moody on This Is Horror. So continuing to talk about shadow locked obviously a big part of that is the ghost and is Lucy returning their victim of the car crash that we spoke about before. Now I'm wondering, what was it like writing about a ghost as an atheist, and not only as an atheist, but there's like quite a lot in this that the protagonist kind of doesn't really believe in ghosts or an afterlife either, and yet, here he is being presented with one. Yeah,

David Moody 3:53
it's something that I'm increasingly conscious of. I Whenever I'm starting a new project, I end up going down a bit of a rabbit hole and tying myself up in in nuts. As an example, I've been writing a short story for an editor of what we worked with in the past, and it's, it's like a 810, 1000 word thing, and it's about demonic possession, which, by its very nature, I don't believe in. So I struggle, and my brain is far too logical sometimes, and I wish that I could just take off the shackles a little bit, because I'm automatically thinking, Oh, why has that happened? And how can that have happened? Yeah, but if that's happened, then this has happened. And I found that I spent so long preparing this short story, I wound myself up into a loop, trying to work out how this demon could be there, how it could have happened, how it could have been transported there, in a in a box containing a Ouija board. I'm looking at the practicality. Is of it, are missing the point of the story. And I think the same is true of shadow lot. I'm just trying to skirt around revealing whether she's a ghost or not, because we don't actually, actually know, because it's, it's, it's the main character's perception of what's happening to him. That's all we're interested in. I have to accept that there's an element of the of the unknown everywhere, isn't there? Now we've been in the break we were we were laughing about our technology issues and how just refreshing a browser can can sort everything out and get everything back to how it was. But to me, what goes on in my computer box is just, it's black magic. I can make it work, but I don't know how it works. And I think I have to try and take the same approach with ghosts and things. You know, if, if I, I don't believe in ghosts, but I can't categorically say that I'm not going to see a ghost because I might be wrong.

Michael David Wilson 6:02
Kind of depends on our definition of ghost as well.

David Moody 6:07
Yeah, you know, at the moment, I can hear in the rest of the house, but my message is trying to go to sleep. It's like it's it's 10 to one, and I can hear our three cats running around the place, screaming at each other and shouting at each other. And I only mentioned the cats, because animals interpret light differently to us. They interpret sound differently to us. They react to things differently. And I think we do. We just we assume that what we see is what everybody sees, and what we hear is what everybody hears. But that's not necessarily the case. And what I see as blue, you might see as red, we just don't you just don't know. Do you only know what goes on in your own head. And I find it frustrating sometimes that I kind of straight jacket myself into my head. And it's something I'm consciously trying to do, trying to throw those shackles off a little bit and think, forget about trying to explain it. Just deal with what's happening.

I think this is something for me that goes right back to when I wrote the autumn books, the original autumn books, back in the day, because that was kind of a reaction against most zombie stories, where it just seemed really well, why are they walking and why are they eating flesh, and why are they doing this and why are they doing that? So I wanted to write a series that was more believable, but it's still inherently unbelievable, you know. So it's just getting that balance, balance for me, and I think I've fallen into the trap in the past of trying to explain things too much. So with Shadow locked, you won't know by the end of this book whether she was a ghost or not, you won't know. You won't know everything, and you're not supposed to know everything. You're just supposed to follow Adam through his journey to the point where he knows enough, if that makes sense,

Michael David Wilson 7:55
yeah. And I think shadow locked has that commonality with Paul tremblay's a head full of ghosts, that it is ambiguous. You can read it as a supernatural story to a point you can read it as, yeah, she's not a ghost. She is a figment of his imagination and past experiences and grief and internalized regret.

David Moody 8:23
Yeah, I mean, they've got the guys had major head trauma, and he's wrapped with guilt because his wife's died. If ever you're going to imagine somebody coming back, you know that's, that's going to be, he's a prime candidate for it. But again, it doesn't matter. What matters is how he reacts to it.

Michael David Wilson 8:42
Well, I was gonna say, I mean, if we were to take it further and to stretch it out further, you can even argue as to whether he's still alive, Yeah, completely.

David Moody 8:57
You just don't know. I remember, it's a it's become a bit of a cliche now, but again, something that I wrote in one of the early autumn books when I was trying to rationalize this for myself, and I've got characters arguing about why the dead were walking, and one of them says it doesn't matter that they're walking. That's all we've got to think about, and we've got to deal with it. And the line in the book is, if you get knocked down by a car, you don't care what color it is, you know, and that's I've tried to stick by that principle. You don't, don't need to explain everything, but having a logical brain, I also feel a need to explain everything. So it's a bit of, a bit of a conflict. But, yeah, I'm consciously trying to not be, to not restrict myself as much so to be a bit more fantastic, I guess, is the word to use, and just chuck stuff out there, ideas out there, and not worry so much about well, why did. Happen. Why did he do this? Why did he do that? And it's, it's something that the next book I've got hopefully coming out next year, dirty day is it? It was fundamental to getting that book finished. Because there's a guy at the beginning of that book who I can say this much because it doesn't give too much away. He's he's down on his upper so he's not in a good place. Goes for a job interview, doesn't get the job handed by debt collectors. Really pissed off, wants somewhere to hide. He's in a shopping center, goes to the toilets. And while he's in there, hears a phone ringing and finds this mobile phone that's been left in one of the cubicles, and he answers it. And the person at the other end of the phone says, I really need his phone back. You don't know how important this is. You've got an hour and 20 minutes. If I can get it back to me by one o'clock, I'll give you 10,000 quid. I think it is. And so he decides, well, I've got nothing to lose. I'll try it. I'll do it. I'm in London. It's only 10 miles. I can do that in an hour and 20 minutes easily.

David Moody 11:09
I'd be thinking, well, I've got to let Lisa know, and then I've got to sort this out, and I've got to be here at two o'clock, you know, I mean, you can, you've just got to let go sometimes, and just think, Okay, well, we'll do it, and we'll see what happens. And then with this story, it spirals. You know, we've, I've compared it to the book that that you've got coming out, that you haven't yet talked about in, that where you start, you're going to end up somewhere and very, very, very different. And I love the fact that you can get to that you get to the end of dirty day, and you think, how the hell did you get back from there? But the trick with that one, I think the key for me is, is making it believable enough so that people can think, well, if I was in this guy's shoes, I'd do the same thing. Because, because you would, it's just with dirty day is it's given logical decision after logical decision after logical logical decision, which just gets me to a completely illogical place. So I don't know if that made any sense at all. And again, we're talking about books that don't exist well for the general public at the moment,

Bob Pastorella 12:13
it does make a lot of sense, though, because you don't. And to me, when you get into stories, especially ambiguous stories. When you give the baby away, when you give the secret away, it ruins the mystery. There's a show that's on right now, and I know a lot of people are watching it, and I think it's in this third season. It's called from and it's about a group of people who are trapped in a weird town. They're from all over the world, all over the United States, and the problem is, is that they can't every time they try to escape. It loops back. There are terrifying creatures that resemble humans in in a lot of ways, but you find out at the end that they're, you know, that they're not human, and right before they kill you. And for the love of God, please don't ever explain, if you're listening and you're one of the creators, just don't fucking explain what it is. Yeah, okay, because it doesn't matter. It's, it's why del abyss books started with with the cipher by Kathe Koja, because you don't know what the fun hole is, and it doesn't fucking matter. What matters is the characters and their reaction to it. And that's to me, that's what helps me as a skeptic and supernatural I'm like you David. I want to get bogged down the details, because I find a lot of that shit fascinating. I love reading about the occult and stuff like that, and I love, you know, the mechanisms. But I'm not going to sit there and take the time to either one research some type of arcane ritual, or make one up when all that matters are the results of it. And usually, magic doesn't work the way that it should, just like life in general. So, you know that's to me, when you, when you over explain it, you're you're ruining, you're taking away whatever fictional power that you have, things have to make sense for the characters to have to, you know, to be organic. That's to me, that's the most important thing.

David Moody 14:34
I think there's a, there's a great example in popular culture that really that explains this, and that's Star Wars. And I remember being seven years old and going to see Star Wars and being absolutely blown away and seeing all the films fantastic. But then Disney got involved and now, and it's the same with superhero movies. And I know that's that's Disney as well, but the Marvel films that they spend so much time explaining every. Here, and you've got to have seen that one to know who that person is that's coming into this one. And I'm going to give you the backstory of this person. Oh, and here's a character you didn't think was going to come in here, but I'm putting it there to sell a few more toys. And I'm exaggerating a little bit here, but there is so much circumstantial stuff and unnecessary fluff that puts that they put in there that they just forget to tell a damn good story. You know, the whole point of telling the story gets lost, because it's all product placement and character placement and trying to explain this and not break that law and not break this law. I just love, at the moment, why I've really gone on to writing stand alone novels, because I love the freedom of just, here's the story, here's the start to finish, and when you've when you finish this story, or you might ask me, what happens with this character or that character, but I don't know, you know as well as I do, because I'm not writing that book. I'm writing another one there. You know, there's a lot of freedom to be had, I think, with with doing something completely in Schiller like that,

Michael David Wilson 16:00
yeah, and we're gonna go all over the place with this conversation, if you didn't realize, laughter,

David Moody 16:12
Star Wars, mental health, heart attacks, yeah, yeah, books that nobody's heard

Michael David Wilson 16:18
of, right? Well, I mean talking of books that nobody's heard of at the moment, both of us are kind of writing books that you know more so than ever between genres you know you were talking before that you've had difficulty with the sales of shadow locked and it's difficult to know, how exactly do you market this? Because you know it, it is a thriller, but at the same time, it's not what you know somebody stereotypically imagines when they hear thriller. It is a ghost story, but it's not the stereotypical ghost story, and there's certainly an argument that there are elements of horror, there are elements of crime as kind of domestic and social commentary. You've said that the next book that you're putting out is also kind of in this between places, genre, it's a dark thriller, but you know, in terms of that, what, what do you think you know you'll be doing going forward? I mean, are you looking to just kind of continue putting these out yourself and independently? I mean, you did mention it could depend what happens with hater. Would you look at going to a traditional publisher and seeing if you can pitch it to have their marketing team and their distribution behind you, has that ship kind of sailed at this point? I mean, and

David Moody 18:10
I don't know, is the answer to that? I i still have an agent, but to be honest, he's, he's dealt with more of the film stuff for me in the past, rather than than books. I love independent publishing. I love the freedom of it. I love the control of it. But, yeah, I think that there are, there are things that traditional publishers can do that I just can't do. And to be honest, I'm, I'm getting a bit tired of the admin as well. You know, I don't I'd rather just sit here and write a strong novel every year or every six months, or however long it takes, and then let somebody else deal with all the the production side of it. So I don't know, because there are pluses and minuses, positives and negatives to all approaches. With the book that I've just written, dirty date I've that's with my agent at the moment, and I'll be completely guided by him. If he says, I think I can sell this, then I think, great, you go ahead and try and do that for me. You know, I've got enough behind me now to be able to earn an income from from my independent books, or earn some money from my independent books. So, you know, having the hybrid approach really helps, because your other stuff gets carried along by the traditionally published stuff. But then, you know, the position I've got into that I talked about at the beginning with hater, is really difficult, because I would like nothing more at the moment, but I'd like the film to be made, because that'll obviously have an impact on sales. But if the film isn't going to be made, I'd like nothing more than to have those books back and to be able to put them out independently again, and. Have more control over them and make them more available, and do it on my terms. So it's it's difficult, and it has to be a business decision at the end of the day, where am I going to make most money, and where am I going to get the biggest audience? And I don't know which way it's going to go. I think the key thing for me, we were, we were joking earlier. I can't remember it was when we were talking, or in the in the break, when we were recording, or in the break, but we were talking about writing stuff that's going to sell, look, that it's just going to appeal to the mass market and and I can't do that. I had this conversation with a friend earlier in the year who said, Well, why don't you, why don't you just write something that everybody's going to love? I've been not slagging off, but talking about Star Wars and superheroes, why don't you just write something like that? And the answer is, because I can't, because I don't care enough about those stories, I can only write the stories that I give a damn about. You know, you're investing a lot of time and effort into writing a book, and I can't write something that I'm not 100% behind. It might not turn out to be the right thing, and nobody else might like it, but I know that I've got a better shot at making a book that writing a book that will appeal to people if I believe in it, than if I'm writing something just to tick all the boxes. So it really is. It really is difficult. I'm just grateful that we live in a time where we've got various options available now, self publishing, independent publishing, is is really on a level, in a lot of respects with traditional publishing. I think the only thing Well, I'm crap at marketing, so I'd always love to have a marketing department working for me. But apart from that, and books and mortar, bricks and mortar bookstores, really, there's not a huge amount to choose. You can if you can, if you invest the time and the effort to find the readers and find the audience, and you've written a book of sufficient quality, then you should be able to do enough with that book, regardless of which route you take. Yeah,

Michael David Wilson 22:02
I think what we're seeing from our conversations over the years is, you know, there's no definitive route in terms of, Should I do the hybrid? Should I go independent? Should I go with a traditional publisher, and not only do different authors have different routes, but there are different seasons within the author's career. So there was a time when you know you were completely independent right at the start of your career. Then there was one where the balance was almost exclusively with the traditional publishing right now, you've shifted more towards independent. But as you're saying, if the opportunity arises, then you might go a little bit back the other way. And I think it's just looking at what your needs are and what your wants are at the time. You know sometimes is, and and also it depends on, you know, what the whole kind of financial portfolio and life picture is like. For for some people, writing is the only financial concern that is the job. For others, actually, there's another job that they have, and that could, you know, be sufficient. So then, if they so choose, they can be a lot more kind of just purely creative with the decisions they don't have to worry so much about, you know, what? What are the financial concerns? And I mean that the stage that I'm at with my books at the moment is, you know, each time I write one, I will show my film manager who who kind of almost serves as an agent as well. He certainly gives me a lot of advice, and then I'll see what he thinks in terms of where I could be pitching it. If I think there's a traditional publisher that I could have a shot with, then I will contact them about it. But if I can't sell it to a big publisher, then I will put it out independently. So kind of the current plan is either go big or go Indy. So then it's a binary. I don't have to worry about all the other options, because it's this or it's that. And I think that simplification actually makes it quite a bit easier. Yeah,

David Moody 24:35
no, I think you're right. I'm very fortunate to have had the experiences that I've had with traditional publishing, but at the moment, there's a part of me that thinks, as I said, Oh, I wish I'd got all the rights myself, because I know that I could do more with it. Because, I mean, hater came out 15 years ago now, and it's of no can until. If and when the film thing happens, it will just sit there. Now, it's not there's there's no reason for them to start pushing those books again, because they're old. They're there. They're still in print. You know, they've got print on demand now, so they're never going to go out of print. People can always get them and but they don't have any reason to to push them at the moment, whereas I do, and it's it's quite frustrating. So I'm very glad to have had the experience with traditional publishers. I think it made me a better independent publisher, being able to look at how the nuts and bolts of book production work and really pick apart the books think I've probably mentioned before, but gallant in the UK, they changed their mind about publishing one of the autumn books in hardback, but they let me do it through infected books and sent me all the files that they got prepared so I'd got the publishers files, and I could look and think, Oh, right. So you use that font, oh, and you put, you put numerals in that font now, and you do this space between the lines, and I learned so much from picking apart their book that I was able to elevate my books to my independent books to a different level. I've lost my thread now. I can't remember what I was saying. Sorry. It's it's late or early today, depending on who you're talking to, right,

Michael David Wilson 26:22
right? Well, I mean, one thing you said about dirty day is that it's set in London, or at least it starts in London. We know that there is an element of London. And then, relatively recently, you put out the autumn London trilogy, which begs the question, why are you writing about London so much it that

David Moody 26:49
is a very good question, because I also I mentioned the bleed books earlier, the ones I wrote with Tufo and Philbrook, and my part of that began in London as well. I don't really know I can answer the question with the autumn books, as I said, I took a period of time I was writing full time, and then I went back to work, just for my mental health and just to get a different perspective on things again for a while. And I ended up going to quite a few meetings in central London. And I remember just walking through by by the monument, so very close to the Thames and the embankment, all that kind of area. I remember walking around now on the way to Terra bridge, and you've got all these iconic things and so many people and so many cars and so much stuff going on. And I just thought to myself, this would be a really shit place to be, at the end of the world. And that's where the autumn trilogy came from, because the the original books were always Oh, I'm over here on my own, and there's nobody else around. Oh, and now with the dead of walking, but with this one, it was it. I'm stuck in London, and there are about 7 million Corps is all around me, and they were all moving and where am I going to go? What am I going to do? So that's where, where that came from. But there's, can't really be too specific about why dirty Day takes place in London. It does take place completely in London. But there's a very there's a big reason as to why that would happen, which kind of ties into another series of books that I've been talking about writing for a long time, which start off with something pretty horrible happening in London, so that it's it's a bit connected with that, so that the location is integral, really. Plus people know London, and they know the landmarks of London. And I think it people can, can, how many people have been to visit London for the day? And, oh, yeah, we went to the shard. Oh, we saw the London Eye. Oh, we walked around parliament. You know, I think it's, it's a lot of people can, can identify with the places where the books take place, which is easier than writing about a backstreet of harbor or Longbridge or wherever happened to be in Birmingham or Kidderminster.

Michael David Wilson 29:07
I think everyone should write about Kidderminster, if only to disparage it. But we're not gonna talk anymore about kiddie what we are gonna hopefully talk about is, can you tell us anything about this trilogy of of London books, or this trilogy, I should say, set in London, where something very horrible happens? I want to know what happens.

David Moody 29:33
Oh, what do you mean the future books I haven't written yet? Yeah,

Michael David Wilson 29:36
gave us a little teaser there. Yeah,

David Moody 29:40
it's a series that I've been planning for, literally for a decade. And you mentioned earlier that sometimes you can't write books until you get to a specific point, and and this is one of those occasions. The series is called the spaces between, and that the spaces between really refers. To the fact that it's the gap between what we're told and what's actually happening, and the the it's very Quatermass like, and if you remember quatermas, but I think so during an email recently, I'm fascinated by quatermas. I just love the whole premise of it, because you've got this Dodger and old professor who knows a hell of a lot more than anybody else, and he's having to save the world from an alien invasion or a deadly disease or something that's been planted in the subconscious by Martians hundreds of years ago. And he's got to deal with all of these things, but he's also got to cut through the bullshit of British bureaucracy and politics and all that kind of nonsense. And I've always loved the idea of those two things going together. So the basic premise of the spaces between is that the thing that happens at the start or has happened, and this isn't necessarily what happens at the end of Dirty Day, but London is nuked in a terrorist attack. So everything that was in London, because, you know, it's so central to the way the UK runs, is suddenly not there anymore. So Sarah kind of devolves a little bit, and a billionaire builds, and it was building a new city. There was going to be this luxury pad, but it ends up being this place called Elysian Fields, which is where a lot of people who have been displaced from London end up. And it and rather been than being this utopia, it becomes a ghetto. And the stories are about. It's five novels that are there's an overarching theme, but each one is individual, and they're written from the point of view of a social worker who goes into this place, which is hell on earth, and tries to do a little bit of good. And the deeper he digs there, the more he finds out. Or what? Why is this place here? What's going on there? Why is this place got subway tracks when it hasn't got a subway, just weird things like that. So it's kind of a, yeah, it's a, it's this. It's dystopia wrapped up as a utopia a little bit. But that will be very, I think, prime orientated and action orientated. But gradually, as the series progresses, it'll move more into horror and science fiction. I can't say much more than that. I've been talking about it for years, and I haven't written a word yet.

Michael David Wilson 32:31
And it occurs to me too that earlier, you were saying how freeing and enjoyable it is to write stand alones, and just as you're getting into that groove, you decide to also throw a trilogy in

David Moody 32:45
so true, but I did say that it's standalone stories with an overarching theme. Okay? Because So, yeah, I really do want to keep writing stand alone stories, and I love the idea of of a series where this guy sorts out this problem, and then he sorts out that problem, and then he sorts out this problem, and then joins the dots and thinks, oh, shit, this is all connected. And if that's all connected, then it means something really bad is about to happen.

Michael David Wilson 33:14
And I'm being really vague here, yeah, it also occurs to me, yeah, I said that you, you've been interested in writing about London, but I think as well, you're just interested in destroying London or changing the entire map of the situation. I mean, if we look at autumn London, then yeah, everything that has worked has become completely meaningless. And yeah, that there's a very thinly veiled, thinly disguised politician is clearly, you know, a Tory politician. I think that something like Dominic Gove, which is very

David Moody 34:00
dominant. Grove, yeah? Dominic Grove, yeah,

Michael David Wilson 34:02
that's it. So, so very much a combination, or a near combination, of two Tory politicians. And I would say that his behavior is somewhat similar to,

David Moody 34:16
yeah. No, that that's very true. And a guy, after what the Tories have done over the last decade, and a bit they deserve it, you know. But yeah, I think I do have, I guess, a kind of fascination with London in that it doesn't quite fit with the rest of the UK, or it doesn't fit at all Londoners do. But there's something about London and the political class there, and the Royals and everything. It's like a separate world that's kind of been bolted on. It's like its own little country in some ways. I do love it. It's nice to visit, but it doesn't feel like home to me, you know, so and so it's not so much about. London, destroying London. That's not what I really write about. It's about just changing the dynamic in the country a little bit. You know that over the last few years, certainly last few decades, governance has been so heavily focused on London that other areas have just been forgotten. And it's nice to be able to level that out a little bit without getting too boring and political.

Michael David Wilson 35:23
Yeah, I totally agree with what you're saying about London feeling like a different country within the UK. And you know now that I live in Japan and so I only visit the UK occasionally, I do find that different areas have a different feel, to a point where they could be a different country. I mean, you know, Cornwall, I feel, is another obvious one. And I mean, even, you know, you go to the Lake District, for example, that's gonna have a very different feel to a day in Warwick, even a day in Warwick compared to a day in Coventry, is going to have a different feel.

David Moody 36:10
I absolutely agree, and that's something that should be embraced. I think I mentioned earlier about traveling, honestly, my couple of weeks spent in Japan last year. So it transformed my mind. It was just incredible. And all the places I've been fortunate enough to visit over the years have really altered my perspective. I spent been to a lot of Scandinavian countries in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and it's just a whole different way of life. And it just, it's incredible. I love just sampling different cultures in different places, and I think it's the same in the UK. I think the issue I have with London is that there's this, there's this superior class, or this, this, these elites who've who've done a hell of a lot of damage to our country now, the public school boys that were running the government for the last, however, many years, who have no experience of life, no understanding of life, but have been bred to be rulers, and they use this in a royal family. I can't, oh, don't get me started on the royal family. What's the point? Then, leeches. You know, they have no relevance to my life and to a lot of people's lives. And I just, I really take offense at the fact that there's so much control that emanates from that and that class and that organization and that strata, whatever you want to call it. But I, I absolutely embrace the fact that there are so many different communities in the UK, and it's like even we're joking about Kidderminster, but even Kidderminster, stourbridge, everywhere, it's got its own different feel. And that's brilliant, and that's incredible. But the point it gets difficult where this part here is saying, Well, this is how we do it, and everybody has to jump to that tune. Does that make sense?

Michael David Wilson 37:58
Yeah, it does. That's my London issue. It does make sense. And I could imagine, you know, even some Londoners listening might take a little bit of um bridge at some of the comments too. Because, you know, I think what you're talking about is mostly central London, but that has become absolutely different for you, or, you know, for South London, as they're like, Well, hang on a minute. This isn't really reflecting my life at all. And I mean, in terms of of the the monarchy and the Royal, isn't it? This is getting dangerously close to the kind of things we just talk about off air in a pub, not for public consumption. But my understanding would be really, I mean, these days they are a commodity. They are a way of bringing money in. Because, you know, to some people, they're an attraction. They're a novelty. And, you know, back in the day, they did have power, they did have control, but it's almost just for show now. But, yeah,

David Moody 39:06
that is true. It's a bit of a sore subject this weekend, because there's been a lot on the news about how the royal estate, that's probably the wrong term, but that are, there's stuff like, there's, they're charging the NHS an extortionate amount to use some part of their grounds for storing ambulances. And you think, Well, hang on, why we're paying you this fortune. And then you're then you're then charging our health service to increase your fortune. It's just, it's crazy.

David Moody 39:37
I don't get it. I appreciate that people like to go to Buckingham Palace and that kind of thing. But I think we've, we've just, we've, we've deviated to a ridiculous extreme, yeah,

Michael David Wilson 39:49
so I think you know what, what you said there, it doesn't feel right at all. You know what what they're doing is like, by, by all means. Let's kind of charge people in terms of bringing tourism into the country and making some money off the royal family. But for goodness sake, if you've got an area where we can store some things for the NHS that is under crippling strain at the moment, then what you know you we should be taking money from from other countries and from tourists. We shouldn't be then taking it from the people who you're purporting to help.

David Moody 40:30
No, but you, you're absolutely right. And I'll, I'll be honest, that that stuff does get recognized in, in the books, in in dirty day, in particular, when a character finds herself in an underground car park that's gleaming and it's never been used. And there's a conversation about, who can afford to drive in London, who can afford to park in London? And it's, it's, yeah, there's plenty of money in London, but it's only in a few people's pockets. Yeah, we never go the direction we're expecting to in these conversations, do we?

Michael David Wilson 41:03
I mean, the trick there is to just not expect any thinking, not that I don't expect anything, but not to have a specific expectation.

David Moody 41:17
Honestly, sometimes I forget. Occasionally I'll go for a walk and I'll listen to the podcast with you, interviewing authors and and then. But when we're talking, it's just like three mates in the pub, like you say. And I'm thinking, I have to keep thinking, oh shit. People are gonna listen to this. Whatever said, yeah,

Michael David Wilson 41:34
yeah. But I do find and I'm sure this is the listener experience too. You know, each episode is wildly different, so you'll have somewhere we don't really talk much about, you know, the book that the author has recently released because, because there isn't a specific set agenda. You know, this isn't like the Richard and Judy book club or anything like that. Thank goodness. Yeah, thank goodness. But then you will have other ones where it's like we actually do pretty much just talk about the book. I tend to find interestingly that's more with short story collections, because there's so many stories you know, within that book that if you were to talk about other topics, you're not going to do it justice.

David Moody 42:30
Anyway, you give him some air time to shadow locked. And I'm very appreciative for that, so thank you, yeah,

Michael David Wilson 42:35
yeah. Well, I mean, it's a fantastic book, you know, it is up there with the best that I've read this year. I kind of want to say it's one of, one of your best books, but, but, you know, it's so radically different to autumn and hater that is like, wow, how do you even compare? Anyway? It's like comparing an extreme metal band with, like a rock band. They're they're from a different genre altogether, but it is a hugely enjoyable experience. It, as I said, it went in directions that I didn't think it would go in, and I was hooked from start to finish. There was no point where I got bored or felt this is filler, which, unfortunately, sometimes can happen, you know, with books, but it just I wanted to keep reading, and you know, Surely that is job done with any story. I really appreciate that. Thank you. But, I mean, you know, we've said that it's difficult to market. Has there been a difference with your approach to marketing? And then linked with that, what kind of things are you doing for marketing, and what might you do for the future?

David Moody 43:55
I am rubbish at marketing. I think I'm getting worse at it. I don't know whether I I just just ate it even more. Now it's so frustrating, because I love writing, and if I could just sit here all day, every day, and just write stuff, I'd do that. And sometimes I have my to do list every day, and I get to the point, oh yeah, you've got to send a tweet about autumn today, or you've got to post something about this book or this recommendation. I find it a real drain, and it shouldn't be. So I'm consciously trying to get more visible and just put more stuff out there, so more if I haven't got I'm not going to keep beating people around their head with my my book. If I haven't got anything new to say on that. I'll talk about what inspired it. I'll talk I'll just do general film recommendations or just loads like that. But it I'm just trying to be more more visible, so that people see my stuff more the time. But I'm acutely conscious that i. I feel like I'm just talking to the same people all the time, and that's not going to serve any purpose for me, and it's not fair on them. It's going to alienate, alienate them, if, if anything. So I'm just trying a few different new approaches. One big thing that I'm doing right now is I'm serializing a new novel as I'm writing it, and the only criteria for getting your hands on chapters as and when they come out is to join my mailing list. That's the hook. That's, you know, that that's that's the trick. If you join my mailing list, you you'll get to read this book. It's not quite as it's been written, but it's each month I'll be uploading chapters. There'll be then the second lot of chapters will go on this week, and the new newsletter will go out. And that's a very different book. Again. That's a more, more traditional horror kind of novel called Ken Burton, which is about a lad who suffers with selective mutism, which I don't know if we've spoken about before, but our youngest daughter was selectively mute for about nine years. And basically it's an anxiety disorder where, because of some trigger in their life, they they it, it becomes, they become too anxious to talk, and other than in certain situations. So our daughter would talk to us, and she talked to us her sisters, but only in the house. Whenever she was outside the house, from the age of about three until she was over 10 years old, she wouldn't speak at all. So that's huge challenges for them, and huge challenges for everybody is trying to interact with them and talk to them. And so the main character in this book is selectively mute. He's a nine year old kid who went through a real trauma when he was just just a just a little baby, and he stopped talking, and it's how the rest of the world interacts with him. And again, I can't say too much because I've said literally nothing about the direction this story is going in. But it's going in a very random direction, and you won't expect what's going to happen to this little boy that sounds terrible.

Michael David Wilson 47:13
I mean, you know, often I've noticed you say that like you don't feel that you've explained something well, but every single time in this conversation you've mentioned a story that you're working on or that you've written, I want to read it so

David Moody 47:31
you know that's good. Thank you.

Bob Pastorella 47:34
My credit card is ready for this one and for the series that you haven't written yet.

David Moody 47:41
Free For All. So get get in there. Yeah,

Michael David Wilson 47:43
you don't need to give your credit card details. And one assumes, for people listening to this, and one hopes that you know, if they're not subscribed now, and they do subscribe, there's a way that they can go back and they can view, oh, yeah, the previous chapters. It's not like start now in chapter seven.

David Moody 48:09
No. So, so what I've done is say, I think I'm smart, but I'm not tech savvy at all. So what I've done is there's a subscriber specific website, which will get updated every month. And there's like a repository for I've put some old short stories on there that aren't available anywhere else, and I'm putting the chapters of kenberton. All of them will be up there. The whole book will appear on there. I don't know how long it will stay there, because if it's any good, I'll take it off and rewrite it and publish it, possibly, but yeah, it's so it's always going to be there. The hook is that there's a password, and the password will change every month, so you've got to stay subscribed to the newsletter if you want the password.

David Moody 48:56
See, there's a key marketer in here somewhere, but it just struggles to come out.

Michael David Wilson 49:00
You said you hate admin, but it is more more admin work for you because you got to change the password. But

David Moody 49:09
yeah, that's that's fun. It's a character. It's a character from one of my books with with a random two digits at the end. So there

Michael David Wilson 49:18
you go. Now there might be people who are trying to hack it, but it would be much more efficient for them just to subscribe and

David Moody 49:26
sign up to the bloody newsletter for goodness sake. Yeah, you also get Yeah. You get like, there's free releases that people can sign up for as well, and every month there's a signed book discount. So that will only be there for a month, so you can get a certain title at a reduced price, and this month, it's going to be this little beauty, which I'm very proud of.

David Moody 49:53
This is the autumn London trilogy, and it's a proper door stop. It's amazing. I don't know if it looks amazing. I saying the writing's amazing, but this is 800 and something pages of zombie

Michael David Wilson 50:07
nonsense. There you go. That's how they made horror books back in the day again. But

David Moody 50:14
if anybody gave me a book like that to read, I'd say, Well, no, I'm all right. Thanks. Have you got anything shorter? So three novels, seven short stories in there. Poor old Aubry, long suffering audio book narrator, got through 33 and a half hours recording that damn thing for me.

Michael David Wilson 50:33
Yeah, yeah, I've listened to the first in autumn London trilogy is very, very good. And I mean, Autumn's narration in general is just superb. I mean, people may know that off the back of your recommendation and me hearing him narrate your stuff, he did have some bad memories for me, but he's also done the book that we mentioned by Dan Howarth last night of freedom, he did shadow locked well, he does everything by you. If you if you write a book, chances are Aubrey has narrated it well,

David Moody 51:14
certainly over the last couple of years. But he's an amazing talent. He really is. He's this one in particular. There's something like 60 characters across the three novels and seven short stories, and each one of them has a different voice. And you can, you it's quite incredible to hear the way that he does. It is so skillful. And he has messed up with accents a couple of times, and I've caught them. And you can just the software he uses, William, sure, you know from your experience with him, he just says, Oh, I changed that line. Bang. It's done. And it's, it's just, he's a force of nature. He really is.

Michael David Wilson 51:53
Yeah, yeah, he's a funny, funny guy too.

David Moody 51:58
is a funny guy. If anybody in the UK is interested, I haven't watched it yet, but Ben Wheatley has made a zombie TV series on Channel Four called Generation. Said, I don't know very much about it at all, other than it's old people who become zombies. And Aubrey is actually in it, so I'm going to be checking that out. That's amazing. Yeah, he plays a singing soldier. He's very he's a very good singer as well. Yeah, yeah.

Michael David Wilson 52:27
I mean, my understanding is he used to do singing before he got into narration. I mean, everyone, I'm not meaning to plug another episode, but everyone can kind of find out about that backstory, because we did on This Is Horror, an episode with him. And I, I'm pretty sure it's the most in depth interview there's been with Aubrey pass. And so you can, yeah,

David Moody 52:52
he's absolutely brilliant, and he certainly is well worth your time having a listen. Oh,

Michael David Wilson 52:58
yeah, definitely. Well, I mean in terms of this novel that you're serializing, we haven't told people what is the website, where can they go to actually subscribe? We've said about five times subscribe. We haven't told them how to

David Moody 53:17
you can just get to it from, from my main website, which is David moody.net, and at the bottom of every page, in the footer, you'll see a little graphic for the infected. The website is called the infected. And honestly, there's nothing untoward will happen with your data at all. I just want to share this stuff. So yeah, there's there's no hook. If you don't like it, unsubscribe. You know, it's just, it's just a way to get, I think, more people interested in what I'm doing, and hopefully, as the story of kenberton progresses, more and more people will get involved. It's also really interesting writing another like this, because it's very much not what I wanted to do. It's not it goes against everything that that I normally do. I like to sit here in isolation and just write a story. But with this one, it's the, you know, this instantaneous feedback every time a chapter goes up, which is a new experience. So we'll see how it works out. It does feel a little bit pressured already, because, you know, when you write in something, you think, Okay, well, next time, next draft, I can just change that in chapter two or chapter three. And now I'm thinking, oh shit, chapter two and chapter three, they're already up there. I can't change it now. I've got to work with it. So it's a it's an interest, interesting experience, and I think intentionally designed to push me outside my comfort zone, a little bit, a big bit, actually,

Michael David Wilson 54:44
yeah, it sounds very similar to what Chuck Palahniuk did with greener pastures on his blog, and then he rewrote it and reimagined it a shock induction, which just came out about. Month ago. So, yeah, that's another good reason for people to subscribe and to read it. Now, you know, you've said that there might be a kind of book version of it, but it's invariably going to be much different, or at least it will be different. And so to almost in reading both of them, you get a kind of insight into that creative process and how things change. And I'm, I'm always fascinated by that reading, like older versions and different drafts, and seeing, you know what happened. I mean, with Haruki Murakami, the wind up bird Chronicle. It was originally just a short story that then evolved into this massive novel. And even with Eric La Rocca, he put out the book everything the darkness is, and then he's going to be putting out a revised edition. Brian Asman is going to do the same with the brilliantly titled man fuck this house. So Brian, yeah. Brian Keene Raph, James White, I'm going to stop listing offers, or it's going to become a very weird conversation. The point is that is, it's a very interesting process, but particularly for the people listening who are creatives, because you're going to learn more about writing in the reading and be entertained at the same time.

David Moody 56:37
100% I've actually, a year ago, sorry, 10 years ago, I released a book called strangers, which is, it's it's good, it's okay, but I wanted to go back and have a look at it, so I've just looked at that and re edited it and really tightened it up. So I'm going to put out a new edition of that early next year. But again, yeah, people can look at the differences between the two and just see how I've progressed or regressed, whichever way they they want to look at

Michael David Wilson 57:05
it. Yeah, and I'm sure different people will have different opinions on the basis that you can't satisfy everyone, nor should you try to that's why we're not writing generic by the numbers books, as alluded to on air and mentioned very explicitly off air, you can't

David Moody 57:25
please any of the people any of the time. That's my philosophy.

Michael David Wilson 57:31
Yeah, yeah. And I mean, you mentioned that the serialized novel is dealing with a protagonist who has selective mutism, and then your own daughter having it from three years old to 10 years old. I mean, when did you find out that she had it? Because obviously at three years old, you know, communication is limited anyway, so I can imagine that maybe it took a while have having it for you to actually realize what's happening. And you Yeah, sometimes a kid just decides they're going to be a bit quiet. So yeah,

David Moody 58:16
that's one of the real frustrations for people who've got selective mutism is that they they are often people think they've just been difficult, and they're really not. It's a it's an anxiety. They just, it's a phobia, almost, of talking in certain certain situations. With our daughter, it was down to an event that happened to do with one of her older sisters. And the upshot was that she just, we just noticed that she stopped talking to her grandparents, to my parents, first of all, and then we realized it was a wider group. And then we realized, Oh, hang on, she's only talking to us. And then she started at nursery, and nursery, tried to get a support, and then it wasn't until she got to school, so five years old, maybe that we had say a diagnosis is that, is that right? You know, that's, that's the first time, I'm loath to use the word label, but that's the first time we had, we had any kind of idea of what it actually was, and that it was a thing, and then we could get some support. Things are a lot better. Now that was 2005 that we first heard the term selective mutism. But now it's much there's a lot more knowledge of it. I think I wrote something on my website last week about it, and there's there was even a BBC article last last week about teenagers that suffer from it, that to all intents and purposes, that their kids, who've developed normally, they just have this phobia of communicating. And it. It becomes an enormous issue for them and for the people around them. It's not the main crux of kenberton of the story. It just so happens that this poor kid is cocooned effectively, and it's just the effect that it has on him and then various events that take place later on in the book.

I'll leave that for it for a newsletter subscribers to discover in about a month's time, right,

Michael David Wilson 1:00:33
And I wonder, with selective mute ism, and I've had like, a number of students in my classes over the years who have had selective mutism, yeah, and, I mean, I'm wondering for people listening. I mean, what advice would you give for those who want to support people who you know that they interact with or they come across that have selective mutism. I mean, firstly, if they're in a situation similar to you, where maybe it's happening with someone really close to them, and they are talking to you, but not to other people, and then, on the other hand, you know, if you're one of the people that they're not talking to. What? What can you do best to support them?

David Moody 1:01:26
I think the key is take your lead from from Neb. The absolute worst thing to do, the thing that you don't do, is try and fix them, because you won't. Because that, in my experience, kids who were selectively mute. They they hate attention, and that's that, you know, that's part of the problem. They don't want to draw attention to themselves. So if, if they make that, all of our daughter's classmates were told that when she speaks, because she wrote that most, most kids do. Eventually, when she speaks, you just shrug and you just carry on like she's always talked. You don't make a noise out of it, because if she'd suddenly said something in the class and everybody had reacted, she'd just go back into her shell again. So it is about just not punishing them for it and not drawing attention to it. What we ended up doing, my wife in particular, she was absolutely brilliant. She'd go into school every day at the end of every day. And the term for it that we were given is sliding, I think, sliding in where she would just make it with each session, just easier for our daughter to speak. So first of all, it would just be my wife and daughter in a classroom with nobody else, and then they'd have a conversation, and then my daughter's closest friend would come in a few weeks later, and then we'd see if she would talk while her friend was in the classroom, and then, you know, over the course of months and years, even it got to the point where she talked to this group of kids, and then eventually a teacher came in and she spoke there, and then it was just, it was almost overnight, once we'd got to that point, and she was suddenly just talking. It was just, it's the most bizarre thing, but when it is a phobia, and when, when they get over that phobia, they communicate as they as they've always wanted to, and that's the key, I think it's they want to talk. They're just too scared to and our daughter used to say, every day, I try and do it, but every day I'll blow it, they put so much pressure on themselves. It really is the strangest situation for a kid to be in. And it just Yeah, it was so yeah. It was really hard going. And I just thought that it would be interesting to put a character in a book who's in the same situation with a lot of horrific stuff going on around him, and he can't talk. He can't say, help we can't say, I'm going to do this. You know, he he's got no he literally has got no voice. Yeah,

Bob Pastorella 1:04:13
it's very strange how we can see something that, something like that, and immediately think that there's something wrong you know here, and realize that the reason why they can't talk is simply a symptom of something else. And you have to to broaden your perspective and go, Okay, what? What you know, what is causing this? I'm so glad there's some support for that now, because that sounds like something that initially would be horrifying for not only for, you know, the parents and friends, but the actual person suffering from the symptom. There's something, you know, underlying there. Yeah,

David Moody 1:04:54
you're absolutely right. It is. It was horrific for our daughter to. Start with, and the nursery that she went to didn't buy into this at all. They thought, no, she's got developmental problems, and we're saying, No, she hasn't. And we ended up videotaping her reading a book. And then Lisa took the tape in and said, Hey, watch this. And so the teacher sat there and watched her interacting normally and reading a book and doing all the things that they said that she couldn't do, and that's the only way that we could convince them that there really was an issue. But yeah, as I said earlier, the one of the saddest aspects of it is that people just think they're being difficult, and that they often get overlooked because they're quiet. And people think, Oh well, they're just going to sit at the back of the class and they're not going to be a nuisance. They're not going to say anything, so I'll just ignore them. We have been all round the houses in this conversation tonight, haven't we?

Michael David Wilson 1:05:55
Yeah, yeah. And it sounds like with selective mutism, you know, as let, let's say, for teachers in in the classroom, you know, there's a balance to be struck, whereas you don't want to completely ignore them, but you also don't want to draw attention to them. And I mean, for me, like I'm thinking of someone specifically, who has it. And you know, you just like, give her the work that has to be done. But you know, you certainly don't call on her when you're looking for volunteers, or you're like, nominating people to give an answer. But yeah, she's very bright. And if you explain the work and then you put the work in front of her, then it's gonna get done, but she's just not going to talk, so that there's, yeah, giving that balance, but not not ignoring her and being like, oh, okay, she doesn't talk, so I'm not gonna bother you know,

David Moody 1:06:55
finding finding a happy compromise is a good thing, and I know one of the things that the school did with our daughter was to give her a little chalkboard so that is, rather than give an answer, she could write it down and show them, or if she needed help with something, she could write a question down. So it's about finding ways to communicate. Just I think the ultimate aim has got to be to put that person in as comfortable enough a position that they feel that they can start talking, but it could be a long haul. It was for our little one, yeah.

Michael David Wilson 1:07:31
Well, as you said, I mean, this has been a wide and varied conversation, as it always is. They always are. Yeah, thank you so much, though, for taking the time and for staying up so late for this conversation here.

David Moody 1:07:49
No, it's been, it's been an absolute pleasure talking to you both again. I really enjoy it every time we do it. I've just gone tiptoe into the bedroom now and not wake her up.

Michael David Wilson 1:07:57
Yeah, yeah, that's it. Well, I mean, where can our listeners and viewers connect with you?

David Moody 1:08:05
The easiest place is my website, as I've mentioned, David moody.net, or one word, there's links to all my social media there, and I'm on all the usual and unusual social media sites. So I'm not going to call it anything other than Twitter, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and all the more obscure ones, blue sky and threads. I even opened a tick tock account and tried that, but we'll it's going to take a bit more getting used to that one I think, yeah,

Michael David Wilson 1:08:41
yeah. All right. Well, do you have any final thoughts for our listeners?

David Moody 1:08:49
How could a somewhat that conversation up with a final thought?

Michael David Wilson 1:08:53
Could be a completely different thought? Well, the

David Moody 1:08:57
one thing that I would love to say is it would be great if people would check out shadow lot, because I'm very proud of it. I'm really pleased that you two enjoyed it, and it would just be lovely if I could expand its audience a little bit. So yeah, please check out Shadowlocked.

David Moody 1:09:17
All right, that's not, that's not a thought. That's an advert, isn't it?

Michael David Wilson 1:09:20
Well, you get that one for free. Thank you very much for joining us.

David Moody 1:09:26
Thank you again. It's been a pleasure.

Michael David Wilson 1:09:32
Thank you so much for listening to David Moody on This Is Horror. Join us again next time when we will be chatting to LP Hernandez. But if you would like to get that and every other episode ahead of the crowd, then become our patron, patreon.com, forward slash. This Is Horror. Not only do you. Get early bird access to each and every episode, but you can submit questions to the interviewee, and coming up soon, we will be chatting to Richard gizmo, so if you have a question for him, then patreon.com, forward slash. This Is Horror. Is the place to do it. And I am also aiming to reach 150 patrons by the end of the year. That is one of my 2025, goals. So it would mean an awful lot if you could help me out without one. Okay, before I wrap up, a quick advert break

Andrew Love 1:10:40
in 1867 the young Samantha gray marries the infamous Captain Jakes, unleashing a series of brutal horrors in this epic splatter Western from Death's Head press mayhem. Sam by J, D grays is a rip roaring tall tale of revenge. Drags a coffin full of gold across the hellscape of reconstruction Texas and explodes at the top of a mountain. You better read this one with the lights on

Bob Pastorella 1:11:10
coming October 31 truth Twister by Lydia graves, seven deadly sins, seven killer novellas in his chilling debut of the unveiled sin series, lust takes center stage in Hawthorn hollow when wads forbidden desires for stepdaughter chastity manifest as a horrifying physical transformation. The town's dark secrets erupt in a whirlwind of flesh and shame as skin peels away and sin takes tangible form, no one is safe from the truth they've tried to hide.

Michael David Wilson 1:11:41
Well, that about does it for another episode of This Is Horror, but I would like to leave you with a little bit of stoic wisdom, a stoic reflection from eptitis. First ask yourself who you want to be, and then do what you have to do. I'll see you in the next episode with LP Hernandez. But until then, take care of yourselves. Be good to one another. Read horror. Keep on writing and have a great, Great Day.