After the over-excitement of announcing Occult Detective Quarterly, back to our usual business on greydogtales – chatting to creative people, signposting new stuff and chasing lurchers. So today we have an interview with author Rich Hawkins, who has surged onto the serious horror field in the last few years. This may be due to his strong, imaginative writing, or it may be because he keeps manufacturing hordes of plague-ridden monstrosities to back him up.
Possibly the result of a Government genetic experiment to see if humans really could thrive in the South of England, Rich lives in Salisbury, and has a dog. Which is a good start. But when we say horror this time, we do mean horror – the post-apocalyptic struggle for survival, buckets of despair and nightmarish creatures, not just a bit of the old weird. Be warned. We’ll talk about his work in the interview, so let’s listen in…
greydog: Welcome to greydogtales, Rich. You’ve had a fairly packed couple of years recently in terms of output, so let’s see if we can do you some sort of justice. You started your writing career with short stories in anthologies, is that right?
rich: Yeah, that’s right – my first published works were in various small press anthologies. My first anthology acceptance was in Rainstorm Press’s ‘Signals from the Void’, for my short story ‘The Lost’. It was about an alien invasion, if I remember correctly. I was deliriously happy when the editor told me I’d got in. After that I just kept plugging away at more anthologies – with some success and a few rejection emails. It seems like such a long time ago.
greydog: Your first novel, The Last Plague, came out from Crowded Quarantine in 2014. Did the idea of that book spring from anything in your short stories, or was it an entirely fresh venture?
rich: It was a new idea, for me. I thought it would be pretty cool to mix 28 Days Later with John Carpenter’s The Thing. They’re my two favourite films. Plus I’m a massive fan of zombie/apocalyptic films and books, so it just seemed like the best thing for me to write about. I’ll let the readers judge if I was right…
greydog: This became part of a trilogy, with the final volume The Last Soldier being published earlier this year. Had you sketched out a trilogy right from the start?
rich: Sort of. I had a vague idea for more than one novel, and with the scope of the Plague’s fictional world there was always room for more stories. Who knows, there might be room still for another novel or three…?
greydog: In between plagued monstrosities, April Moon brought out your novella Black Star, Black Sun (2015). It’s very good. To us it has touches of English folk-horror to it, along with a terrifying inevitability. It would also be easy to call it Lovecraftian in overall theme, but that’s a term which is probably over-used. Do you see it as influenced by HPL’s tales?
rich: Thanks, man. I was heavily influenced by Lovecraft’s work. I basically tried to out-bleak him. There’s even an excerpt from his poem ‘Nemesis’ at the start of the book.
greydog: Your writing style certainly isn’t Lovecraftian. You go for strong, clear prose which is light on the eldritch, squamous adjectives. Have you ever thought about dabbling in the more purple areas inhabited by writers such as Thomas Ligotti?
rich: There’s always a temptation to indulge in letting loose with the adjectives, and sometimes I do on the first draft. But it doesn’t really fit my writing style. However, if it works for Ligotti, one of the legends, I can’t really say much.
greydog: Black Star, Black Sun describes a small, inward-looking community. You were raised in a small village, as were we. Does that sort of upbringing do something dark to the head, or are we just the wonky sheep in the flock?
rich: Probably a bit of both, to be fair. I was a weird child, anyway.
greydog: Your landscapes are gritty and full of menace; your characters face constant loss and despair. Much of your work seems pretty bleak in tone – not a criticism, because you handle it so well – but do you never feel like writing happy (or happier) endings, though?
rich: Sometimes. A little bit. The Last Plague has some humour in it, before the shit hits the fan. I’ve been criticised for being a bit too bleak. I don’t mean to be bleak; it’s just the way my stories invariably end up. Plus, I like bleak anyway…
greydog: Tell us about the recent Year of the Zombie project. You’ve contributed one of what will be twelve novellas this year from Infected Books, is that right?
rich: Yes, my novella is called ‘The Plague Winter’ and it’s set in the same world as my Plague novels. It takes place in the UK, sometime between the second and third novels. It’s bleak. I’m honoured to be a part of Year of the Zombie, especially as it’s published by one of my literary heroes, David Moody. He’s given me some great writing advice over the last few years. When he asked me to contribute a novella to the series, I was over the moon. I ate a lot of cheese in celebration.
greydog: Cheese is always good. And you’ve just self-published a short story, The Fallen Soldier. That makes three different presses and your own venture. The idea of the hybrid platform is a very current one – authors using large presses, small presses and their own self-published output to hit all markets. Do you see this as the way forward?
rich: For writers working in the small press, I think it’s the best way to go – for me anyway. I don’t hold out much hope of getting a deal with one of the big boy publishers, so I have to use different means to get my work out there. Anyway I think being a hybrid author suits me just fine.
greydog: Finally, what might we be seeing from you over the next year or so? Get us stoked up.
rich: This month will see the release of my self-published story ‘Fathoms’, which is about the revenants of those lost at sea rising from their watery graves and returning to land. After that, hopefully in July or August, I’m releasing my novella ‘Scavengers’, which is a nasty little tale about demonic, transformed children running amok in the woods. After that, my vampire novella ‘King Carrion’ is due out, then Dark Minds Press are publishing another novella, ‘Ruin’, which sees the south of England quarantined after the outbreak of a terrible virus. That one will drop in September. There’ll be a few more short stories in-between, plus a novel. Just listing them all has tired me out!
greydog: So not a lot going on there then. Rich Hawkins, thanks for your time, and good luck with your busy year!
You can find out more about Rich’s work on his website:
And his Author Page on Amazon is here:
In the next week or so – a cool interview with writer,editor and publisher Scott R Jones of Martian Migraine Press, and all sorts of goodies. Lurchers will be back, folklore will be back, and don’t forget to subscribe if you want to be warned. We’re away…