Welcome back for this week’s featured interview! Today, I’m pleased to spotlight Richard Writhen. Richard is the author of A Host of Ills, The Hiss of the Blade, and his latest novel, The Angel of the Grave.

Recently, Richard and I talked about his favorite authors as well as his new book and all about his writing plans in the future.

A couple icebreakers to start: when did you first decide to become a writer, and who are some of your favorite authors?

I had always toyed with the idea, and wrote on and off throughout my life, but would usually just wind up deleting everything. I really didn’t get down to brass tacks until I became a copywriter for a retail website. That was very good writing practice. I had turned thirty-six. Then, I saw an ad on Craigslist that was looking for blog posters, and I thought, what the heck, go ahead and submit. When it comes to literature, I like noir, darkness. Poe, HPL, Dennis Lehane, Richard Price, Paul Tremblay, Daphne du Maurier, Gillian Flynn, Paula Hawkins.

Congrats on your forthcoming novel, The Angel of the Grave! What was the process like writing this book? How long did it take you, and were there any unexpected roadblocks along the way?

Thank you, very much. This book was like a miasma, a quicksand. It took over two years to write. Thankfully, I had some experience with this, as my first novella took 28 months to write as an amateur. As the second and third one took eight months apiece, I thought this one would be easy. But alas, that was not to be. Every time I wrote a couple hundred words, it became more complex. I almost thought that I was going to die before completing it, that it would go unpublished. One of the narrative arcs in the book was actually part of The Hiss of the Blade originally, but I came to feel that it didn’t fit in with the overall tough-guy-ness of the rest of the book, so I pulled it and used it in the new novel.

Your novel incorporates many aspects of the occult, including witchcraft and divination. What draws you to these subjects, and do you have any strange experiences with the supernatural yourself?

I have always been drawn to those kinds of subjects. I grew up reading Stephen King and Clive Barker, Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman. I wanted to do my take on witchcraft for this book. The first three novellas feature magic, but it’s not really the focus. So, this one was different. Also, my last novella was about toxic masculinity, and I wanted to address femininity, as it were. I remember going to see Sucker Punch and being very disappointed, as it’s very much a girl power film. Maybe Zack Snyder didn’t set out to create that, but it was the result. A vanity project. In hindsight, I feel that it will probably gain a cult following in the future. It’s kind of an experience, not so much a narrative. I think that my first novel will be like that as well, in a sense. I set out to create art. I’m sure some men will read it and probably be like, “What is this s**t …?!” But, I don’t care.

You’ve written novellas and now a novel. Do you find that the length of a project affects your approach to writing at all? Is there a certain length of story you prefer, either as a writer or a reader?

Jack London set out to write a short story, and it became The Call of the Wild. You have to be true to the work, that’s all, IMO. Length is inconsequential.

If forced to choose, which is your favorite part of the writing process: crafting dialogue, establishing setting, or developing characters?

For me, it’s connections. Easter eggs. Little flourishes that probably no one will even get. But yeah, I also enjoy all the usual processes. I don’t write like most people. I am not only writing the books out of sequence, I literally write the content of the prose out of sequence. Kind of weird. I’m going to try and work in a more linear fashion next book.

What projects are you working on at the moment?

I have one short story that I know I want to do, and after that, I will probably start book two of The Celestial Ways Saga. The title of book two will be The Crack of the Whip. I have some notes, some dialogue written, but I don’t really outline.

Big thanks to Richard Writhen for being part of this week’s author interview series. Find him online at his author site and on Facebook.

Happy reading!