Weird Fiction Review interviews Gemma Files

Gemma Files, author of the Hexslinger trilogy, sat down with Weird Fiction review to discuss her story "Blood Makes Noise", her outlook on horror and when weird is too weird.


WFR: What do you think is the appeal of weird fiction generally? The scare? Catharsis? Something else?
Files: For me, the appeal is the idea of creating something that will make the person reading it look over their own shoulder uneasily, but also feel as though they recognize it on some inmost level…to create an unnatural concept which nevertheless seems part of of the natural order. You never saw it before, but the minute you do, you realize it’s always underlain everything. So emotional catharsis, yes, but better than that, a sense of completion which dissolves upon closer examination. The closest we can come to a primitive religious experience, maybe — a true Mystery, in the ancient Greek sense.

Read the whole interview! 

The Hexslinger books include A Book of Tongues, A Rope of Thorns, and the final volume, A Tree of Bones, releasing May 15.