Calista - my first horror novel

When my mother was pregnant with me and living in Senegal, her favorite thing to do was head to the cinema and watch a horror movie. I often joke and tell her, while feigning admonishment, that the horrors she experienced as she rode on waves of suspense and scares would have chemically passed to me, her vulnerable foetus. In what drugged state would I have existed, I wonder, as I floated about in that cushy womb, dreading another traumatic rush of adrenaline... Would I have become as addicted as she was? Would I have ached for similar thrills in my youth to compensate for the loss of this potent mix of chemicals? And was this perhaps the reason why as a young child, I was fascinated by the macabre and why as early as four years of age, I sat quietly with my mum and grandmother, watching supernatural horror movies like The Entity and Audrey Rose? Mind you, I was not spared the ensuing nightmares, but then again, what we love is not necessarily good for us.

Years later, I married a horror screenwriter and while I know from observing him and his many horror filmmaker friends, that horror writers are the sweetest people on earth – counterintuitive but true – I also knew that it would be just a matter of time until I'd try my hand at a wicked tale. (Because I'm also very sweet like that.)

Sheridan Le Fanu, Arthur Machen, Charlotte Dacre, Stephen King, Mary Shelley, Anne Rice, Daphne du Maurier and Wilkie Collins, are writers I admire in the suspense/horror genre. I'm a lover of atmosphere and ambiguity so these authors have been my go-to for gaining inspiration and for that general feeling of, "whoa, I want to write like that". Apart from Stephen King and to a degree, Anne Rice, their material is also delightfully old-fashioned which suits my historical novelist bend. I also love nasty women in novels. My greatest scare in this department is still Madame de la Rougiere in Uncle Silas but Wilkie Collins and Charlotte Dacre have nothing to envy. 

For almost two years, I had been wanting to write a novel about a certain [secret] topic that is dear to me. It was my novel XX. I didn't know what it would be about but I knew it had to feature that topic.

While in Greece this year, a horror story came to me and suddenly it made so much sense to merge this wicked tale with my topic of choice, that I wondered why I hadn't thought of it earlier. So you could say that I decided then and there to write a horror novel as a vehicle for my pet topic. I'm really happy to have made that decision. (And Greece was fun too.) 

But when should it be set? And where? I looked up a period of Greek history that is distinct for its political situation, and decided based on this research that my novel would be set after the Greek War of Independence, and – due to some other logistic details that I will not reveal – well before 1853. I settled on the period between 1836 and 1850. This historical horror novel would take place in both England and Greece; a Victorian novel with a Greek influence!

I titled it, CALISTA, like my female character.

I've just about completed the first draft. It is shorter than all my other novels and definitely shorter than my debut novel, The Ming Storytellers which totalled at 610+ pages. For Calista, I had initially envisaged a novella but there was so much I wished to say that I realised it couldn't be less than 50k words. So a novel it is. 

I will be launching a cover early in the year but in the meantime, I'm loving this creepy experience. I'm right back in that womb, so to speak, the hormones are rushing in, and I've a devilish smile on my face.

See you next year.