SPEAKER_01 0:00

I think a good horror story is one that makes you confront something that you personally find scary, but makes you feel as though you might have the power to kill your own monsters.

SPEAKER_00 0:11

Welcome to the Write It Scared podcast. I'm your host, Stacey Fraser, a formerly repressed creative soul, turned fiction writer, story editor, and author accelerator certified fiction book coach. At Write It Scared, we tell the truth about why writing a novel is so hard by acknowledging that most writers grapple with two stories: the one they want to put on the page to the best of their ability, and the often subconscious internal story that prevents them from doing it. This show is designed to help you identify and rewrite the internal narrative holding you back while you discover and write the story you want to tell and learn all the tools to help you do that successfully. Join me each week for a new episode where we'll talk about writing to deepen our understanding of the craft and of ourselves as writers. Writing a novel is an inside job that we do not do alone. Welcome to Red It's Scared. I'm glad you're here. Let's dive in. Hi, writer. Welcome back to the Red It Scared podcast. I'm your host, Stacey Fraser, and today's a guest episode, and we're going to talk about writing horror. Why we're drawn to it, what makes a story genuinely unsettling, and how these types of stories are actually empowering. I'm joined by horror and thriller author Nicole Wolverton, whose work spans young adults to adult horror, psychological suspense, and a subgenre that you might not be familiar with, I certainly wasn't, and that is gastro horror. We talk about why the consumption of horror media tends to surge during difficult times and how the genre helps to build resilience and why a great horror story isn't just about being scared. It's about confronting what frightens us and imagining how we might survive it. So if you're curious about writing horror or just about how to write a story that taps deeply into emotional fears while still offering hope, this conversation is going to give you plenty to think about. Let me give you Nicole's bio and then we'll jump into the interview. Nicole M. Wolverton is an unapologetic fear enthusiast who writes horror and thrillers for adults and young adults. She's the author of A Misfortune of Lake Monsters, The Trajectory of Dreams, and the upcoming Meet Sweats through Horror Smith Publishing. She also served as editor for the menopause-themed horror anthology Bodies Full of Burning from Sliced Up Press. Her short fiction, creative nonfiction, and essays also appear in about 50 anthologies, magazines, and podcasts. Nicole holds a master's degree in horror and storytelling from the University of Pennsylvania. Her academic interests center on building resilience through horror media and gastro horror. Hi, Nicole. Welcome to the Write at the Geared Podcast. I'm very happy to have you here. We're going to be talking about writing horror, and I'm very interested in learning why horror might be good for me. And I know you are the person to ask about that. So thank you for being here. Why don't you kick off by sharing a bit about your writing journey? How long have you been writing? And what drew you into writing horror and thriller?

SPEAKER_01 3:15

Sure. So I've had two novels published. One is an adult psychological thriller, and the other is a young adult horror novel called A Misfortune of Lake Monsters, and that came out last year. My third is another YA horror novel, and that will come out in August. It's called Meat Sweats. It's about a vegetarian turned accidental cannibal, as one does. Yeah. My short fiction and creative nonfiction also show up in about 50 or so anthologies, magazines, and podcasts. And as far as how long I've been writing, I've been writing since before I could spell. And what I mean by that is I used to draw stick figure stories about what I'd get up to with my imaginary friend Mona. And I should mention here that Mona was a redheaded girl with curls and she had knives for fingers. Yeah. So even as a little kid, horror was my thing, and it's totally my grandmother's fault. She read the original Grimm's fairy tales to me. It's no wonder horror is so appealing.

SPEAKER_00 4:19

Oh, okay. Yeah, grandma. Thank you, thank you. So what do you think draws people to horror? What drew your grandmother? What draws you? What is it about it?

SPEAKER_01 4:30

All right. So I don't think it's a secret that the horror genre gets more popular during periods when things aren't going very well.

SPEAKER_00 4:38

Which is bizarre to me, but I agree. Like I think it's true.

SPEAKER_01 4:41

Either politically or personally, and obviously that's why horror is having a moment right now, but no one wants to be scared in reality. But horror gives us a safe space from which to experience horror. So it's a cathartic thing.

SPEAKER_00 4:56

I did read somewhere that the there was a like a big increase in viewership, I guess you would say, within horror during the height of the pandemic.

SPEAKER_01 5:09

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 5:10

And I was looking for comfort. So I was really surprised that that was a thing.

SPEAKER_01 5:15

So he is comforting though. And if you think about it that way, during the COVID pandemic, right, what were the things that were most popular? It was movies like it was any zombie film. And it was films like, oh god, what's it called? Contagion. People found that comforting to watch because they could see a prediction of what might come next. So it was almost as though they were preparing and getting an idea of what they were going to experience and maybe how they should react. So I have a master's in horror. And part of my master's work was looking at research from a place called the Recreational Fear Lab, which is in Denmark. And they put out a study during the earliest parts of the pandemic that indicated people with a steady diet of horror media displayed more resilience during the early parts of the COVID pandemic versus people who enjoy other genres.

SPEAKER_00 6:14

Interesting.

SPEAKER_01 6:15

The ideas that practice makes perfect, right? So you're watching this horror, you're reading this horror, you're conditioning yourself on really how to regulate those things when you're scared. So when you face something in real life that's scary, you're calmer. And that's the whole thing.

SPEAKER_00 6:34

Makes sense. It's like desensitization or something.

SPEAKER_01 6:37

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 6:39

Okay. So the point horror is good for you. Yeah. And the genre is alive and kicking and has a scope that is the canon is huge here. So I think it's safe to say there's something for everybody in horror.

SPEAKER_01 6:56

You are correct. Yeah. I think it's wider than most people. Like I think the movie Titanic is horror.

SPEAKER_00 7:02

Really? Okay, tell me why.

SPEAKER_01 7:05

So obviously the first half of that movie is a romance, but the second half, everybody dies screaming or frozen.

SPEAKER_00 7:12

Okay, I see your point. It's full-on horror as far as we're gonna get into talking about some specifics here in a minute. But before we do, I want to talk about your books. You said your young adult, which is the misfortune of the lake monster. Yep. Okay, that one just came out in paperback. Yes. Uh not too long ago. And then you have Meat Sweats, which is a gastro horror. And I had to look up what that exactly was, but I get it now. That's coming out next summer.

SPEAKER_01 7:44

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 7:45

All right. So you want to tell us about these stories, what you want readers to know, and maybe a little bit about what inspired these stories?

SPEAKER_01 7:52

Sure. So I think it helps to know that both of the young adult novels that I've written that are coming out are set in rural Pennsylvania. And it's a location I know really well because I grew up in rural Pennsylvania in a small town called Berwick. And a good friend of mine once made the observation that a lot of my work focuses on isolated spaces where creepy things happen. And that totally makes sense to me because my experience growing up in that kind of setting wasn't great. And I think a lot of people don't have idealized visions of their childhood, and I certainly don't. And so, of course, I find more crowded and urban spaces more comforting and safe, which I think is unusual. Most people think of small towns as safer. But it's also why I write fear in isolated spaces. So let's see. A misfortune of lake monsters follows a high school senior who is expected to take over the family business of secretly impersonating the town lake monster to keep the tourists coming in. But when she finds a real lake monster eating its way through the town, she has to figure out how to save everyone.

SPEAKER_00 9:00

No pressure, honey.

SPEAKER_01 9:01

None. None. As though being a senior in high school didn't have enough stress to it, right?

SPEAKER_00 9:06

Yeah. All you need to do is throw in a love triangle and like you've hit all the bells.

SPEAKER_01 9:11

Yeah. Now there's no love triangle. There is a romance, though. Oh, I love it. Which is funny. It's the intersection of horror, humor, and romance. And a reader once told me it's as though Hallmark made a horror film, which I think is the best description of Yeah, that's a hook.

SPEAKER_00 9:26

That's a really good hook.

SPEAKER_01 9:28

I love it.

SPEAKER_00 9:29

Okay. Now what about the one coming out next year?

SPEAKER_01 9:33

So Meat Sweats is about a high school student who is a rising senior. She's a vegetarian-turned accidental cannibal, as I said. And the book is really about coming to terms with that new urge and figuring out the how and why of it while trying not to eat anyone that she loves. It's actually a very sweet cannibal novel. It's the sweet cannibal novel you didn't know you needed.

SPEAKER_00 9:58

Oh, I love that. I got some. Do you remember the the show that had Drew? It wasn't on for very long, but a diet. Thank you. Thank you. I would have never thought of that. Did you see that?

SPEAKER_01 10:10

I did love that move or the series love.

SPEAKER_00 10:13

I got vibes. That's meet sweats gave me some of those vibes. But yeah, and it's a super fun blurb. I read your blurb and I was like, Oh, good. Yeah. What did you say? It was Dexter meets yellow jackets.

SPEAKER_01 10:26

Yellow jackets, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:28

There's a sort of vibe of both of those in it.

SPEAKER_00 10:32

Yeah. I that's really that's very cool, very sharp. But what a cool premise. Turned a vegetarian, turned cannibal, high school senior, absolutely exemplary student. Oh, the irony, right? Yeah. Okay. So that is a story. So again, that's that is what we would consider gastro horror, right? Absolutely. So talk to us about that, because I definitely know. I'm not the only one who didn't know what that is. I had to go look it up.

SPEAKER_01 11:01

Oh yeah. I think the thing about gastro horror, which essentially is just horror and food and kind of disgust, right? We have to eat to live. So I love the idea of something so necessary and so totally mundane taking on a sinister aura. And what we do eat is super political. And horror is a politically driven genre. So studying the relationship between food and horror, which I'm doing academically too, just makes a lot of sense. Think about the films that you've seen and the way that they incorporate food. Like I think of some of the earliest films I can remember seeing in theaters, and they're very tied up in food in one way or another. The Exorcist has the pea soup scene.

SPEAKER_00 11:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:48

And it's not lost on me that Reagan writes help me from the inside of her own body, like on the skin of her stomach. Oh wow. Okay. So it's almost as though she's been ingested by the demon and by herself. And so she's the food in that way. And then, like, you think about a movie like Alien, right? The crew is literally having a communal dinner on the Nostramo when the parasite alien burst out of the captain's chest. So the humans are food there again. And everything about both of those films are so uncomfortable. And like I said, I am studying gastro horror academically, and I received notification on Halloween that I was offered a spot in that program.

SPEAKER_00 12:33

Oh, congratulations. That's awesome. And you can just see this is your jam. Like you love it. You are the person to talk to about this. Yeah. One of the things that when I was reading about this genre is what it made me think about is food is often something that brings people together. And I watched, I was thinking about this movie. I was talking about it with another guest. It's called The Menu. Yes, absolutely. Okay. So, like all these people are coming together for this extravagant experience. And the here's the sorry anybody, but here's the kicker. It doesn't end well for them. It doesn't end the end well for them. But it's all about, you know, all these people being brought for different reasons. I think mostly for vengeance. But it was just an example of how it draws people in, but it could also rip people apart.

SPEAKER_01 13:22

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:23

So I love the duality in that. And that about broke my brain, Nicole, but I can tell you love it. And I'm glad that you have the opportunity to share it. One as an educator and just two through your stories, because that's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 13:36

It's fun. It's genuinely fun.

SPEAKER_00 13:40

All right, let's switch over and talk a little craft, okay?

SPEAKER_01 13:43

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 13:44

Yeah. First, what makes a good horror story, in your opinion? Like what lights you up?

SPEAKER_01 13:50

So, as I said, I'm scared of isolated spaces and rural spaces. So when I write something, that's where I start. However, I will also say that a lot of people think that when they read a horror novel or see a horror movie, that they need to be scared. And it's not, and yes, okay, horror is supposed to be scary. However, for me, it's not necessarily just about fear. It's a lot of it's being just made uncomfortable.

SPEAKER_00 14:20

Uncomfortable and settling.

SPEAKER_01 14:22

Yeah. Like for me, like most often, I think a good horror story is one that makes you confront something that you personally find scary, but makes you feel as though you might have the power to kill your own monsters. Which is another reason why I think horror is good for kids. Because that's a message that really resonates with kids because they're so scared of being like the other in a lot of cases. That having that messaging that they have the power to be effective in overcoming what scares them is good. But it's good for everybody.

SPEAKER_00 14:59

True. So in the horror genre, there is this common denominator or element. It's there is a defeat of a monster, at least from all the horror I've read. Not that I've read all the books, but That's fair.

SPEAKER_01 15:15

I will also say though, that one of the reasons I love horror is because it doesn't have the rigid barriers that other genres do have. If you're thinking about romance, right? When you read a romance novel, the average romance reader is going to insist on a happily ever after ending. And if it doesn't, they will not consider it a romance novel. True. Yeah. So whereas in horror, if you don't have that concept of overcoming the thing that is scaring you, it's okay. It's still in the horror genre. There are plenty of books and films that don't have that sort of upbeat or more up-beat ending. Uh, I can't think of any right off the top of my head because I'm having a menopause moment. I can't either.

SPEAKER_00 16:06

I mean, I think it's fine to leave it undone, too. I mean, but look at the shining, for example. Yes. Okay, they overcome, they get away, but the monster lingers. There's that kind of vibe and idea. But when a writer is thinking about writing in this genre, what are some of the conventions that they need to consider to be able to be incorporated into that horror space?

SPEAKER_01 16:30

Because horror is so personal to every single individual person, like when you're writing it, I think you just have to start with what scares you. There's a thing about horror where there's always that element of other. It's either the person who is fighting the monster or the monster itself can be other. It's really an interesting concept where you can go so many different places with it.

SPEAKER_00 16:56

As far as your process goes, how do you go from an idea to actually digging in and writing the draft and then into your editing process? What's it look like for you?

SPEAKER_01 17:07

Like I said, I start with something I'm scared of. Everything that's scary starts in the brain. Why is the dark scary? Why is dead silence scary? And like I said, what is why is that smell scary? And everything builds from there with me. So it's all very psychological. We'll say that I am a crazy outliner. Almost everything, even if it's like this little weird kernel of an idea, I need to know every piece of a story before I can start writing it. And I know not a lot of people think that's bonkers. I took a class, I guess last year, maybe with Nova Rensuma, who's a local writer here. She's wonderful. She writes a lot of great speculative fiction. And she encouraged me to try to write the first chapter before outlining. And I tried it and it was such a failure for me. So, like I appreciated the exercise of it, but really it reinforced for me that I need to outline everything. And the reason for that is because when I have a full outline, I have a guide about where I'm going next and I never get stuck. And it's not to say that I don't deviate from the outline when I'm actually writing, but because I like to have that outline and those guidelines, those guardrails so much, I will go back and re-outline the whole thing. It's helpful for me, but it's also one of those things that does take a lot of time. So I recognize that and I always try to give myself enough time to deal with that. The second reason that I like to outline so much is because I am not someone who enjoys the editorial process. And I will go and obviously edit when I'm done, and I can play surgery on my manuscripts as well as anybody else, but I don't enjoy it. If I can take care of getting those pieces in line and correcting things that I know are going to be a problem before I write, it cuts down on the amount of work I have to do on the back end.

SPEAKER_00 19:12

That makes sense. Each to their own. Everybody has their own process. I know writers that it feels like they've already written the story if they do a really significant or detailed outline. I know, like for my first book, pants the whole thing, and it was a mess.

SPEAKER_01 19:28

Yeah, I admire people who can pants. Oh yeah. I don't know how they do it. I think it's magical.

SPEAKER_00 19:34

I do too. I do too. And brave too. For me, like I wanna I like security blankets. It's like I want to know where I'm going, but not too much. I don't want to, I don't like to know, but there's a point, right? There's a point where I get I'll feel bored if I've figured too much of it out. So everybody's different. And sometimes every book is different. Oh, for sure. For their process. So basically, who knows? It all depends. Find what works for you.

SPEAKER_01 20:05

Yeah. It's funny that you say that you get bored if you know the story, because I'm someone when I read mystery novels, I will immediately turn to the back page to find out what the end is. So it makes a lot of sense that like I do that, plus I really like to outline and know the ending.

SPEAKER_00 20:21

Yeah, a really good takeaway is that here you recently tried a new experience of writing a first chapter before you decided to outline. Hey, and it didn't work out for you. Yeah, that's a try. But you have to try. You gotta try new stuff. And that's what's cool about writing, is that this is the practice. And what's a practice? A practice is just like doing something over and over again, trying to improve on it. Not because we got it figured out or do it perfect, it's just we just keep growing.

SPEAKER_01 20:51

So that's perfect.

SPEAKER_00 20:53

That's what I love. Yeah, exactly. And perfect is a myth, and perfect, even if we made it there, wouldn't protect us from being uncomfortable.

SPEAKER_01 21:00

That's for sure.

SPEAKER_00 21:02

As your book meets sweats, makes a point of. Even if you're a perfect vegetarian, it doesn't mean that you're not gonna turn into a cannibal and try to resist eating your little brother or something.

SPEAKER_01 21:12

Happen.

SPEAKER_00 21:13

Anything could happen. Right on. A big piece of the podcast is dedicated to talking about when the writing gets tricky and hard. And, you know, how those internal voices that we have, the the inner critic, the the stuff that's not helpful to us, comes up and says things like, eh, this is not good. Why are why are you bothering with this? This has already been done, or some somebody did it better, or I'm wasting my time, or whatever those those internal voices say. So I'm just wondering if you think back over your writing journey, if there was ever a particular time when it was really hard for you and when you battled with some uncertainty and what you did to move through it, if you'd share an experience with us.

SPEAKER_01 21:58

Yeah. It's Necessarily the writing itself that's the struggle, I think, in a lot of cases. It's everything else that sort of comes with trying to get published. Like everyone has this moment or two where they're ready to give up after their 50th rejection on a story, or when some celebrity gets like a two million dollar advance for a novel that was likely ghostwritten.

SPEAKER_00 22:18

Or when the book that you're writing actually just comes out and is published. Oh yeah. They're very similar, some similar. It's oh good. Well, good for them.

SPEAKER_01 22:27

Yeah. So I will say that something that has happened to me recently that I think is hard, that it's in that sort of genre about trying to get published. So last year when A Misfortune of Blake Monsters came out, it came out through a small publisher called Camcat Books. And I guess around that time when maybe a few months before the book came out, the woman who owned the press had an accident in her house and passed away, and it was horrifying. And the estate decided they didn't want to keep the press. And so they ended up seeking a buyer, and the buyer ended up being Baker and Taylor. And if you've been watching the news lately, you know that Baker and Taylor's wholesale arm, which sells to libraries and schools, went belly up after something ridiculous, like a hundred years. So right now, no one is quite sure what's going to happen with Camcat. So anybody who has had their book published through Camcat is in this weird limbo. Apparently, they're trying to sell the imprints that Baker and Taylor holds to another entity. But there's no guarantees. Like we could get our rates reverted to us, and in which case I don't know what is going to happen. Our all of our books could be sold to a new entity. And if they are sold to a new entity, there's no guarantee that the new entity will keep all of our books. Maybe they'll buy the imprints and only keep the romance novels or some some other novel that, or you know, subsection that mine will get booted. And yeah, we just don't know. So that's been a lot for me lately. And I don't have an answer. I don't even have a time frame, which is driving me a little bit bonkers. But I'm just, I'm very good at compartmentalizing. So I'm trying not to think about it while I do other things.

SPEAKER_00 24:29

That makes sense because it is clearly out of your control.

SPEAKER_01 24:33

It is. But those are the things you worry about. It's mostly the stuff that you don't have control over that are the worst.

SPEAKER_00 24:38

Oh, 100%. A long time ago, somebody told me about an acronym for fear that has always stuck with me, and it's false expectations appearing real. Yes. And so I think about that. When I when it comes to like my work, whatever I'm writing, or whatever I'm trying to accomplish, right? The thing that holds me back is usually the outcome I'm afraid of happening that I have no control over anyway. In the writing lane, the only thing I have control over is whether or not I show up and put words down. And how diligent diligent of a student I am of the craft. That's in my wheelhouse that I can control. I can't control what the small press does, right? Or any of that stuff. However, I will say, you're a great example of somebody who just from what you shared with me, you went with a small press. There's not a marketing budget for that. And you take your reins, and you went out, and I can't remember how many events you told me that you it's a lot.

SPEAKER_01 25:44

You went to it might have been my 36th last weekend. Yeah. I mean, that it's part of the whole thing where you have to. All right, most of my adult life was spent in nonprofit fundraising. And the thing that you hear in nonprofit fundraising over and over again is if you don't ask, you won't get. And so you have to put aside the fact that maybe you're with a publisher who's not like a big five, or maybe that you as a new author are not super well known. You just have to pretend you deserve everything and that you're just gonna ask for it, no matter what it is. And it works for me though.

SPEAKER_00 26:29

I think it's just a great reminder to move forward as if, even if you have to be in that space of fake it till you make it. Oh, yeah. Right? Yeah, as long as it's you're moving forward with integrity.

SPEAKER_01 26:42

Yeah, but if you don't know what people are gonna say yes to you, like I I put in an application last year for Iceland Noir, and they were like, Yeah, hell yeah. So I did a discussion panel at Iceland Noir last year.

SPEAKER_00 26:55

That's so cool.

SPEAKER_01 26:56

Who would have known? And this year I did a discussion panel at the American Library Association annual conference about why young adult horror is psychologically good for teen readers, and that was with several of my local writing friends, and it was great, but who would have known that someone would say yes to that with me on the panel?

SPEAKER_00 27:20

I think it's very cool, and you're a great example for all of us to just reach for it for it.

SPEAKER_01 27:26

Never sell yourself short or just think that you're not gonna get something that you want.

SPEAKER_00 27:32

Yeah. So it's like that saying, everything you want is on the other side of fear.

SPEAKER_01 27:36

Yes, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 27:37

Are you willing to and just are you willing to step over it? And I had another guest, her name's Kristen off. She was on the podcast, I think it was last season, and she said, Don't be the first person to tell yourself no.

SPEAKER_01 27:48

Yeah, absolutely. I'm writing that down. I also tell people, and I'm actually going to an old professor's class of mine tonight to talk about pursuing publication through submission of your short stories. And so one of the weirdest things that ever happened to me, I was on Twitter before it turned into a cesspool. And I just threw it out there on a on a tweet. I'm like, I would really love for someone to let me do an anthology of menopause and horror. And like literally a day later, a publisher was like, Yeah, I'll let you do that. I was like, Really? Are you sure? And so we did it. And it really taught me a lot, serving as editor of Bodies Full of Burning through Sliced Up Press, which came out in 2021. That often when you get rejected, it's not about the quality of your work. It's more about the theme or the messaging that the editor is trying to build, or maybe they've just bought a short story that's a little too similar to the one you've submitted. So like just the difference between someone who's published and not published is that they just didn't give up. Stubborn people get published, and you just have to get past all of your fears and just keep going.

SPEAKER_00 29:08

Yeah. And uh maybe re-jigger the idea of success on some level because just you because you wrote something and it didn't get anywhere doesn't mean it doesn't have merit or that it wasn't a worthy investment of your time. Definitely. I I think there's just a danger of burning out and being unhappy if the publishing is the only metric of success that we use.

SPEAKER_01 29:43

So even when you are going to be published, last year when Lake Monsters came out, I was part of a Slack group for debut authors. And one of the things that the previous year's debut authors said to us is define what success looks like for you. Because you're like me as a small press person, I'm not going to get the same accolades or attention or whatever it is as someone who might come out with a big five. Or I might not get the same marketing support, even within my own publishing house. But if you can define what success is going to look like for you even before you get published, and you keep that list and then you go back later and you look to see if you've accomplished those things, it reframes, as you were saying, what success looks like.

SPEAKER_00 30:33

I love that. And also, have you heard the what is it, the good, better, best? Yeah.

unknown 30:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:39

I love that. You set up your success metrics and you're like, okay, if I hit this, I'm happy. If I but if I hit this, whoa, and then here's my stretch, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:48

And if I hit that stretch, like I my stretch goal, by the way, was doing an international event. So I hit my stretch event bull. So that's fine.

SPEAKER_00 30:57

And you already know what space spells like. So I don't really know where you have to go from here. Right?

SPEAKER_01 31:04

There's nothing better.

SPEAKER_00 31:06

Okay, last couple of questions for wrapping up. What do you think the best piece of either creative or writing advice is that you've ever received? Something that you've held on to, it's kind of like a North Star.

SPEAKER_01 31:17

Honestly, it's what I learned as a nonprofit fundraiser. You don't ask, you don't get. That to me is the best piece of advice I've ever gotten. And really, it's okay to be delusional. It's really okay. Be delusional enough to confidently ask for what you want. Be delusional enough to write the stories you like. You have to make your own fun.

SPEAKER_00 31:43

Okay. Last two questions. What is your wish for your fellow writers who are out there working on their stories? What would you like to impart to them?

SPEAKER_01 31:53

Write what scares the crap out of you. Really. Do the things that scare the crap out of you because that's how good things happen.

SPEAKER_00 32:01

That's so true. I was terrified to start this podcast. Terrified, terrified, terrified. But now it's been on for a year and I think a year and a half now. But just do the shit that scares you. Oh, yeah. This has been a lot of fun, and I have really enjoyed having you on the podcast. Do you want to share anything that you have coming up that you want to talk about? And then absolutely, where can listeners find you? Yes. Tell us.

SPEAKER_01 32:28

So I am working on a couple of things right now. I was recently commissioned to write a novella that will go along with it. This unbelievably gorgeous and wonderful Oracle card deck. Ooh. The publisher sent me another Oracle deck that they had done, and it's just beautiful. It's like foiled cards, it's in a gorgeous little clamshell box. It comes with a little object of art from the novella that comes with it. Really, I'm super excited about it. My main characters are in high school, but it's not necessarily a young adult story, which I think is interesting. I don't know when it's going to be out yet. So find me on socials or on my website and look for that. And I'll share those in a minute. I'm also working on an academic book proposal, which is related to gastro horror, which I'm really excited about. And of course, I'm always working on a new novel and new short stories. And the novel that is a work in progress is another young adult horror novel, of course, set in a rural Pennsylvania town. And it's a locked door situation in an organic grocery store, which I'm thrilled about. It really gives me a lot to work with. And also in December, I will be starting a year-long monthly series on gastro horror for macabre daily.

SPEAKER_00 33:50

Cool.

SPEAKER_01 33:50

Yeah, I'm really super excited about it. It's going to be a lot of fun. And it's really like a great thing for me to do as I'm waiting to see meat sweats come out in August of next year.

SPEAKER_00 34:01

Is it episodic or is it serialized? Whatever you're going to be working on for the first time.

SPEAKER_01 34:08

It's more like a look at gastro horror through an academic lens.

SPEAKER_00 34:12

Oh, okay. So it's that's the thing, fiction.

SPEAKER_01 34:15

Yeah. It'll be a lot of fun. A lot of people like you, you see the word gastro horror and you understand maybe what it means, but this will break it down looking at different films, short stories, books, and how gastro horror plays out, what it looks like psychologically, why we're scared of food, that sort of thing. Like it's just gonna be so much fun.

SPEAKER_00 34:36

That's so awesome. Awesome. Thank you for sharing that. And then what's the best place for people to find you online?

SPEAKER_01 34:42

Right. On social media, I'm Nicole M. Wolverton on Blue Sky and Instagram. You can also find me on TikTok, although I'll be damned I can remember what my name is there. Just look me up, Nicole Wolverton on TikTok. I should come up. And also my website is Nicole Wolverton.com.

SPEAKER_00 34:58

Okay, thank you so much for your time and your sharing this journey and your experience. It was a blast. And yeah, thanks.

SPEAKER_01 35:06

I'm so grateful for you having me on.

SPEAKER_00 35:08

This was fun. Thank you for listening to the Write It Scared podcast. If you enjoyed today's show, please make sure to hit the follow button so you never miss an episode. And please leave a review. Reviews help other writers like you find the voices and messages they need to hear to continue to write their stories. Let's lift each other up. Remember, you can be scared and still be unstoppable. I'll see you next week.