Hello all!
This time I am talking to horror author Jason Davis who has had a full interesting life. I guess the simplest way to describe him would be, that he is a person who has always found ways to achieve what he wanted out of life.
Jason founded the Chicago Horror Film Festival, the Indy Horror Film Festival, published his first novel “Inside the Mirrors,” has made a couple of films, and has done more than he is sure he is forgetting. Now, he tries to concentrate heavily on his writing and time with his family.
Q: What got you interested in writing?
Jason Davis: I can’t really say. I have written stories for as far back as I can remember. I just love to write stories. Likewise, I am always coming up with ideas and if I wasn’t putting them to paper they would just go to waste.
Q: What attracts you to horror?
Jason Davis: I got into horror largely because I used to be so afraid of it. I pushed myself to get over my fears and in turn, found an appreciation for the genre.
Both in film and in fiction, I feel it takes more skill to create a good, fearful tale. There is a lot of crafting involved, and a true craftsman can weave a tale to make a person keep their lights on. In getting over my fears of the works of the genre, I started to study the craft and enjoyed it.
Q: Can you tell us a bit about your book “Inside the Mirrors”?
Jason Davis: “Inside the Mirrors” is a novel largely about my greatest fear. While there is a lot that goes on in the book and has a lot of its own complexities, at its core, it’s all about my fear.
Q: What is it you fear?
Jason Davis: My fear? That somehow, one of my actions would somehow hurt my family. What could be worse than that? That while I watched from within myself, I had no control over what I was doing.
Q: Did you need to do any research for the book?
Jason Davis: I did do a lot of research on Hobos. I researched their culture and different things about the life of hobos.
Q: How did you come up with the story for the book?
Jason Davis: That came from my daughter. When she was much younger, we had this large dresser mirror that for some reason never got put up. It would just sit in the hallway.
My daughter would sit in front of the mirror, talking to someone in it. She called him, “Bob.”. And whenever she did anything bad, she would say Bob told her to do it. She would sometimes even speak in “Bob’s” evil voice.
It freaked us out for a while and had us convinced that she was possessed. There had been stories even before on how the mirror had been haunted, so yeah, we weren’t sure what to do. Eventually, we threw the mirror into a dumpster and Bob went away.
Q: Are you working on something new at the moment?
Jason Davis: I have few things going on. I am working on my next novel, “Invisible Spiders.” which is a much longer Zombie Apocalypse novel. That one is taking a while, so I have also started a few side projects. I am working on a short story collection as well as a rewrite for a script that should be going into production in 2013. I am also working on a film script for “Inside the Mirrors” that I’m hoping to find a production company for soon.
Q: You are also the founder of the Chicago Horror Film Festival and the Indy Horror Film Festival. Can you tell us something about that?
Jason Davis: What do you want to know? I am a large supporter of independent artists. I believe with modern methods and technology we don’t need large studios or publishers to dictate what we like. CHFF and the IHFF were founded to promote independent horror filmmakers.
Q: Where do you see yourself in a couple of years in relation to writing?
Jason Davis: Writing. I don’t do it for fame or money. As long as I’m writing, I am happy.
Q: Do you have any tips for aspiring writers?
Jason Davis: Write, Read, Write some more. Even with self-publishing, don’t rush to put it out there. That was a mistake I made. Write, then wait and read it. Wait some more and read it again. Some people object to this, and they may be right.
I guess the only true advice I could say to any aspiring author is to not listen to anyone’s advice about writing. There is no right way and no wrong way, just find what works for you. Don’t get caught up in what others do and their practices.
Q: Where can people go and read your work?
Jason Davis: Last I checked it was available just about everywhere. I did limit the digital version to kindle for multiple reasons. The most significant is Kindle Select, but also because of the business practices of some of these other companies.
Q: Where can people find you on the internet?
Jason Davis: Everywhere. However, I am mostly on Twitter.
@iamjasondavis
I also have a Facebook fan page.
Below is an excerpt from his book “Inside the Mirrors”!
Samantha sat there staring into her bedroom mirror. It had been drawing her in, and now she had been sitting there for longer than she could remember. She was lost in staring at her own reflection, her silver hair glowing off the sunlight for most the day. Now she sat there, with her hair now just a twinkle in the dark room, illuminated by the little light coming into the room from the outside street light.
“God, how long have I been sitting here.” She thought to herself. She tried to blink; too pull her gaze away from the mirror, but it was as though she was trapped their by some invisible force, keeping her bound to her chair, repeating the relentless motion of brushing her hair.
Through her reflection she could see the rest of her bedroom and it looked just how she remembered it when she had woken up that morning. The bed was yet to be made and her clothes were tossed onto the sheets that she had been in the process of gathering for the morning.
She looked back to herself, at the nightgown she was still wearing. She had to have been sitting there for the entire day, but how? She barely remembered seeing something move out of the corner of her eye as she was pulling out her jeans. She had planned on spending the day in the garden. The rabbits had been going after her tomatoes, and she was going to start putting up a chicken wire fence around them to keep them out. She loved it when she worked in the garden. In her retirement it still gave her something to do to make her feel productive.
She had just set her jeans on the bed and then had noticed something move just out of the corner of her eye. She looked up at the mirror. Something had moved in the background, she was sure of it. A shadow had moved behind her, somewhere on the other side of the room. She quickly scanned the room and then turned to look back at the mirror.
She stopped there when she was herself. She wasn’t sure what made her stop to look at herself. There was just something in how her reflection was looking back at her, something alien about it, that made her want to just continuing to look at it. The look in her eyes, the gaze she looked back at herself with, it was so distant. She saw herself looking back at her, but it was that far off look. It was her, but it wasn’t.
Then her reflection started to move. At first, she thought her reflection was moving by itself, that it had separated from her and now had a mind of its own. But then she watched as her reflection lead her to sitting down in front of the mirror, and sat her down. If she hadn’t watched herself lowering into the chair in front of the mirror, she wouldn’t have known she had been walking. It was as though she had no control left over her body as it was moving without thought.