Let's make it real

Immersive isn’t just a marketing term: it’s a way to work. It’s the way I love to work, opening the door to a fictional world that we make real together—isn’t that what readers and writers have always done? But communicating and collaborating takes it to another level.

Have you read DARK FACTORY? Why not create your own version — an avatar, a poster, a video — and share it to win a one of a kind prize?

Have you read TALK? Want to stage it as an immersive performance? Let’s make that happen.

Want to talk in real time? Come join the online conversation at Space Cowboy Books.

Let’s have fun together! Because that’s what fiction is meant to be.

[Photos of the artist Quinine Hours’ work for the Dark Factory Detroit launch party.]

Dark Factory is live and launched

The studio with producer Kevin Williams, the bookstore live and the bookstores virtual, Tricia Reeks of Meerkat Press and me decked out in boas, the dancer dancing: Dark Factory is 100% launched into the world!

And the Detroit launch party is in process. And Space Cowboy Books is right behind. And now it’s time to make some art! Because the party’s just begun.

Ready for launch

The preorder print copies have arrived, the launch events in Atlanta and Asheville and Tulsa and Detroit are in process, the merch - including a brand-new t-shirt design - is available! Meerkat Press has been an amazing collaborative partner every step of the way, and Tricia Reeks and I hope to see you at one of these events, either in the bookshop or virtually.

And the launch day in-studio event live from Blue South Studio in Atlanta: get ready to dance!

MAY 10 2022

MAY 10 2022

Making the party together

Artists created their wild, thoughtful, glittering masks - the Dark Factory Mask Contest winners are Charlie Athanas, Rena Hopkins, and Ghazal - and Sofia Zakia created the stunning first prize, inscribed with lines from the novel.

This contest was an invitation to be part of the party. Because that’s what Dark Factory is all about, why I wrote it, what it’s made for: a story that happens in multiple ways, a story you’re invited to join, to make, to play, to be part of. Because here on earth, you already are.

Everybody came to dance

“ . . minds that see a thousand worlds at once, lives lived at 150 beats per minute . . . ”

Totally delighted by this review from PW, and by the author quotes we’re receiving: it’s time to DANCE.

And you can get your preorder groove on here . . . and here.

Immersed in the words

Immersive fiction is such a widening way to practice writing; and a way to look at the world, too, the real one, the roiling, changeful cornucopia we live in every day, from our first word to our last. We can use words to reveal and excavate that world, and the experience of making Dark Factory has taught me there are a lot more ways available to extend that immersion.

This will be my only LitReactor class for 2022 - the Dark Factory pub date and launches are coming up fast - so if you’re inclined to come and play with words in the wild world, let’s do it!

(Photo: Rick Lieder.)

"While we live, let us live"

A year-end post looks back: this year was tumultuous, furious, static, let it end with whatever grace we can gather. Now I’m looking forward . . .

. . . to the masks and the horns and the antlers

. . . to reading new work by writers like Maryse Meijer, Mike Thorn, Lindsay Lerman, Elvia Wilk, and others whose voices I don’t yet know, but will find, be surprised by, go wild for

. . . to dancing again

. . . to more discussions like these

. . . and to DARK FACTORY’s launch in May 2022

Happy holidays, and a very happy 2022!

When we make our masks together

A mask reveals as much as it hides: that’s what happens to Felix the DJ in Dark Factory. And when we make the mask ourselves, it’s even more potent.

As I write this we’ve been wearing masks for awhile, to keep us safe, but they remind us too of our own fragility, our mortality: another reason why making a mask just to make us happy seemed like a very good thing to do.

Dark Factory is meant to be something we create together, which is what the mask contest is all about. The template mask, downloadable here, can be worn as is, can be decorated, can be anything you make it to be. Or another template can be used and decorated. I made the first and third masks: one very simple, representing how it feels to me to be immersed in nature, the living silence of the trees; the other how it feels to be on the dancefloor, riding that moving line between chaos and paradise.

The contest prizes are very cool - first prize features a one of a kind wearable from Sofia Zakia (I’ve seen the piece in process and it is gorgeous) - and all skill levels are very welcome. Come and play!

[The beautiful beast, last image, is called Mister Minos, created by talented artist friends for an event I staged called “The Future is Fun.” And I saw the metal sculpture on a trip to northern Michigan. When I hopped back in the car after taking the picture, this artist was playing on the radio . . . ]

A conversation with you

Whether it’s a book or a script or a story, everything I write is my half of a conversation, with readers, patrons, the audience: with you.

When readers make a video review of my stuff, as one does here, and another here, that conversation is in progress. Or when a book group leader says “Clearly, our last meeting was one for the yearbooks, as we're still talking about it week later. After . . . Lily said The Cipher was like a weird episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Justin mentioned this clip, in which the characters discover a bottomless hole in the men's room.” Or when readers have strong reactions, positive or negative, that’s the conversation too.

Here at the desk, every day, I’m writing, because one day, you may want to have that conversation too.

What IS Dark Factory? A quick Q&A

Readers who watched the trailer and browsed the DarkFactory.club site, and readers who haven’t yet, and fans of nightlife in general, are asking me what exactly IS Dark Factory, anyway? Is it a novel, or a site, or an event, or a real club, or what?

Q: Is Dark Factory a book?

A: Yes! Dark Factory is my newest book, coming out in May 2022 from the mighty, and mightily creative, Meerkat Press.

Q: Is Dark Factory a club?

A: Dark Factory is a wildly popular dance club, with DJs, drinks, and totally customizable reality. Ari Regon is the floor manager (and an excellent dancer), Max Caspar is a stubborn DIY artist who once believed that games could change the world, and Marfa Carpenter is a freelance culture journalist who’s on the trail of a very big story.

Q: How can people experience that story?

A: The Dark Factory project combines my writing with my work as an immersive event producer, to create this story in multiple ways and across multiple platforms. Readers can read and interact with the posts, they can follow Dark Factory on Instagram and Twitter and Facebook, they can make Dark Factory art, they can go as far into this world as the party takes them.

Q: So is it real?

A: Max Caspar says “Reality creates itself.” So, yes.

Dark Factory and all that swag

Preorders for Dark Factory are LIVE, and can you tell we had a complete blast putting together the preorder swag gifts? Some are physical - the VIP lanyard, the coaster, the swirling temp tattoo, the sticker - and some are downloadable - a poster, paper doll, mask template, and a Dark Factory short fiction piece, written especially for this preorder package. And all of them accompany a signed copy of the novel.

Meerkat Press hosted a cover reveal today and the scene-setting audio was created by me, Josh Malerman and Chad Stocker, having a ton of fun once again. Because fun in the dark is what Dark Factory is about. Preorder your copy and have fun with us!

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Shirley Jackson and VELOCITIES

It’s an absolute thrill to announce that VELOCITIES has won a Shirley Jackson Award for Single-Author Collection! The finalists made up a stellar ballot, and a must-read reading list too. Delighted to add that fellow Meerkat Press author J.Ashley-Smith won as well, for his novelette THE ATTIC TRAGEDY! Watch the awards ceremony here. The beautiful award itself (photo courtesy Rick Lieder) references Jackson’s mordant and comic The Sundial.

VELOCITIES has also been a finalist for this year’s Bram Stoker Award, is on the final ballot for the World Fantasy Award, and the preliminary ballot for the Locus Award. Stories are written to be read, and the judges’ and readers’ acclaim for these stories is a joy for me. And the congratulatory flowers from a dear friend and collaborator are the cherry on top!

Dark Factory is LIVE

darkfactory.club is LIVE.

Dark Factory is all about life: club life, life as a game, the game of transformation: how do we know what’s real, how will love find us, how do we make our nights and days?

Dark Factory is a story, told online and on the page, that’s been in the works for over two years, a process of creation that was exhilarating, confusing, and as wild as its subject: I wanted readers to be immersed in the lives of Ari and Max and Marfa, but I needed more than the usual novel format to do that. So I put my experience creating live immersive events into the mix . . .

Now, in collaboration with the totally game and innovative Tricia Reeks/Meerkat Press, darkfactory.club is here for readers to explore, read the characters’ posts, keep up to date on project news as we head towards pub date in May 2022, and best of all, share your own thoughts, reactions, and creativity, to help create the whole story of Dark Factory . . . Now it’s time to open the doors. Come and dance with us!

The Funhole arrives at the archives

It took more than a few months to gather, sift and sort through all the notes, research pages, drafts, editorial letters, foul matter, cover flats, and manuscripts manuscripts manuscripts, of my first horror novels - The Cipher, Bad Brains, Skin, Strange Angels, and Kink - to properly list and re-box and ship to their new home at the University of Pittsburgh’s Archives and Special Collections.

I’d been talking, through those months, with Dr. Ben Rubin, director of the Horror Studies Collection, and Ben’s enthusiasm as much as his erudition made me certain that Pitt was the right place for my work. And knowing that scholars, writers, and readers will now be able to access that work is a wholly terrific feeling. if you’re a horror writer reading this now, you’ll already know that the Horror Writers Association has placed their own archives at Pitt, too. What a wealth of material! I’m so pleased and proud to be part of this growing and important archive of American horror literature.

Opening soon . . . DARK FACTORY

Coming in May . . . The club opens its doors.

All the new growth

Is it too early for spring growth? Not when things have been in process for awhile, and then suddenly find their way to the surface. My spring growth, in no order and all fun, is here:

A Bram Stoker nomination for VELOCITIES, which was a surprise and a thrill. This year’s ballot is particularly strong!

The Cipher was chosen to be part of this year’s Summer Scares program, that works each year to introduce librarians to notable titles in horror lit. Another immensely strong group of books I’m delighted to join, among them Alma Katsu’s The Hunger and Ahmed Saadawi’s Frankenstein in Baghdad.

This year’s summer commission is already well underway: our theme is “4Seasons.” Due to Covid, the performances will be all filmed - the winter segment has already wrapped, and spring (a time lapse animation with ambient sounds) and summer (“La Vie en Rose” sung in a bespoke Sun King mask) are in progress.

SMOLfair welcomed over 160 indie presses, a perfect way to showcase a lot of cool, diverse indie writers, and I had a lot of fun with my keynote talk/conversation with Tricia Reeks of Meerkat Press. And the first public reading of DARK FACTORY! #goSMOLorgohome

My LitReactor Immersive Fiction class is on the horizon for April. The students learn a lot from each other, and I read and critique all students’ work, which means I get to hear new voices, some at the beginning of their writing life, some already on the path. If you’re a writer who wants to make it real, come and join us.

I’ll be appearing with one of my favorite writers ever, the brilliant Maryse Meijer, as part of the University of Pittsburgh’s Horror Studies program. She and I are going to discuss mentorship and the horror canon, then read from each other’s work, but neither of us knows which piece the other has chosen . . .

Welcome spring, in with the new!

Thinking SMOL, or why the indies do it best

A new year is a good time to declare independence: from old habits and old regimes, and old ways of making books, too.

So I’m especially excited to be giving the inaugural keynote for SMOLFair, a virtual alt book fair that runs March 3 - 7. There will be readings, book giveaways, and associated lit events, and a long list of cool and surprising indie publishers to peruse (including the mighty Meerkat Press).

Being nimble, thoughtful, and brave are three virtues the small press has in abundance, virtues that make them the ideal partners for writers who want to make sure their work is read, not lost or overlooked in some long and random list. If you’re a new writer, a writer looking to make a change, a reader who adores adventurous work and the people who help it grow and flower in the world, it’s time to think SMOL.

A portrait like haiku

In a masterful haiku, a few words can say a great deal. This new portrait of me by Rick Lieder says a whole lot with pen and ink.

SILENT BURN showcases more of his spare and vivid work (and yes, he does accept commissions).

The words get around

Exile in Bookville with the one and only Maryse Meijer . . .

Show Me Your Shelves with Leza Cantoral of the badass Clash Books . . .

A Little Too Spooky hosted by Jeff Milo of the Ferndale Library . . .

The Scream Queens panel at Pitt University, with Gwendolyn Kiste, Michelle Lane, Sara Tantlinger . . .

Horror of the Humanities VII at DePaul University, with Maryse Meijer and Stephen Graham Jones . . .

A busy month! Performing, reading, talking with other writers - we all may be in lockdown, but the words still get around.

Meerkat Press + DARK FACTORY = 2022

That pop! was a virtual champagne cork, because the adventurous and badass Meerkat Press, home of the CIPHER and VELOCITIES, has just acquired DARK FACTORY for 2022 publication.

It’s a novel like nothing else I’ve done, and Meerkat is the perfect house to bring it to you. You can read a sneak peek excerpt here. And there will be lots more to share in coming weeks and months.