Bec: Welcome to my blog! Please start out by telling everyone about yourself –
Dan: Hello Bec and everyone else! Thanks for having me.
I’m originally from the UK but am now an official Australian (I have the bit of paper and everything). I live in a tiny town out in the country with lots of emus and kangaroos but lousy internet access. I have four children, work in finance in the day and write…and therefore have no money.
I’ve been writing since I was twenty-three. I’m now a decrepit thirty-four and should know better. I’ve had many, many short stories published, and my novels/novellas are out and about on Amazon, etc. I was lucky enough to be a finalist for the Australian Shadows Award in long fiction a few years back.
Bec: What is your newest, most recent release?
Dan: This week there’s a bit of a party going on across social networks over the release of Grimorium Verum. Actual parties! With drinks and everything! It’s always more fun to have an anthology release and celebrate with the other authors. Grimorium Verum is a collection of stories based around witches, magic and of course grimoires.
My story, A Picture Tells, is horror erotica set in the aftermath of WW2 and is my third war-themed story bought by the editor Dean Drinkel (who is awesome).
And as the story is also a reprint from my collection Tricks, Mischief and Mayhem…and was released individually for promotion…it’s currently available for free RIGHT NOW! Head on over to Amazon for a download this weekend, and if you like it, why not consider a look at the rest of the stories in Grimorium Verum? There are other writers in there that are better, more famous and better looking.
Bec: I know you have a thing for clowns… Have you used them to scare the crap out of anyone?
Dan: I have a clown in every room. Literally. A friend of mine confessed to having the most awkward pee ever while being watched by the porcelain jester in the bathroom. We also have a life-size evil clown that was a Halloween prop. He’s recently come off a stint hanging from a tree in the back garden to try and stop our annoying neighbors leering over our fence.
Bec: If someone were going to buy you a book (or ten), what titles would you hope to receive?
Dan: Right now? Sadly, the four psychology textbooks I need for Monday! The university only just announced what we need. It’s either $400 worth of new textbooks or a 6 hour round drive and get them 2nd hand for $300! Goodbye savings!
Extortionate academia aside, there’s a few Marvel titles I have my eye on as always. I still have a few horror novels from Christmas yet to get through, so they should see me with a book in my hand for the next few months.
Bec: If you were writing a Christmas horror novel, what horrors would the plot include?
Dan: The latest full piece I wrote was a novella set at Christmas, actually. In it, a single mum in the late eighties has sectioned herself from society and is trying to raise her unbalanced son. He’s nuts about the latest Saturday morning cartoon show and is desperate for an action figure. As she has promised him that Santa won’t let him down, his mother tries her best to get her hands on one. I’ve described it was a taut, claustrophobic and emotionally distressing version of Jingle All the Way.
Bec: Of all the books you’ve written, which is your favorite, and why?
Dan: I like my novella Critique, and not just because of the Shadow Awards finalist place. It was possibly my first longer piece wherein it was less about torture and gore and people running around with chainsaws. Critique is a quieter, more reserved horror that taps into abhorrence in a completely different way. When I was writing the book, I knew I was pushing myself in a new direction, and pushing my style to become something a little more refined. It’s that push I remember and have tried for ever since.
Bec: Is there anything you would like to share that I haven’t asked you about?
Dan: I’m as open as you like when asked. No subject is ever taboo! Yet I’m always unsure as to what to share and what people would actually want to know. How about readers ask what they want in the comments? 😉
Bec: Thank you for stopping by and being my interview victim!
Find out how to stalk Daniel I. Russell below:
Australian Shadows Award finalist Daniel I. Russell has been featured publications such as The Zombie Feed from Apex, Pseudopod and Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine #43. Author of Samhane, Come Into Darkness, Critique, Mother’s Boys, The Collector and Tricks, Mischief and Mayhem, Daniel is also the former vice-president of the Australian Horror Writers’ Association and was a special guest editor of Midnight Echo.
http://www.amazon.com/Daniel-I.-Russell/e/B006LGZNGS/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1424213369&sr=1-1
https://www.facebook.com/danielirussell
@danielirussell
Life With Words 