“We invent new things to be afraid of, and oftentimes we barely even understand why we are afraid of them. There is simply an uncanny wrongness to certain advances, something at odds with the soul.” James D. Mabe
Can you tell us a couple of lines about yourself?
I’m a NC native and grew up in a small town near the mountains called Walnut Cove, which was somewhere between idyllic and a cesspool of despair. I graduated from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro with a bachelor’s in philosophy, which was as useful in my various career paths as one might imagine. I’ve been a freelance painter and author for several years, and briefly worked as a tattoo artist.
How long have you been in horror? How do you see your evolution as a creator?
I’ve been fascinated with horror for as long as I can remember (the first films I remember watching were Godzilla 1985 and A Nightmare on Elm Street part 3). This was further nurtured by Twilight Zone reruns, various monster movie magazines, poorly dubbed Japanese imports, and I would eventually spend my weekends wandering the horror aisles at the local video stores. I had an interest in art early on and originally wanted to work as an effects artist, but settled into being an oil painter. My subject matter is generally macabre, so it still scratches that itch. I started writing while in college and managed to get a few stories published here and there, most of which were in the cosmic horror vein. Over time, I’ve hopefully improved as both an artist and a writer, but anything beyond technical skill is hard to gauge. I certainly haven’t matured as a human being, as my interests are pretty much the same as when I was a teenager: creepy shit and abrasive music.
What’s the greatest lesson you have learnt along the way?
Never quit. Learn to appreciate the struggle (thank you, Albert Camus). Never give up on whatever creative spark you might have, despite every obstacle in your way. Responsibilities, mental health, the general trajectory of society, these things will try to push back against you at every turn. There has to be a core to your being that is untouchable, and that is the place where you protect the things that really matter to you. Success is partly defined by expectation, so what satisfies you as a person (creatively) should come first and foremost. The universe doesn’t care, other people largely won’t care, so you have to make damned sure that you care. Learning to be satisfied with yourself and simply creating something you are proud of is immeasurably valuable. Life without passion is drudgery and emptiness. This isn’t an abyss even worth considering.
Tell us about your most recent work, can you give us some insight?
The title Dirt Maul came first, and I thought the idea of a horror comedy set in a flea market was really amusing. I happened to have some time off of work due to the whole pandemic thing, so I guessed I should make the most of it. I had a basic outline finished in about a week and the story flowed pretty naturally out of that, which is always a nice surprise. The location is heavily based on an actual place which I frequented, Cook’s Flea Market, so there was a lot of real world experience to draw upon. I decided early on to write something that was just fun for me, rather than trying to craft a straight forward horror story (which is mostly what I’ve done in the past). Writing comedy presents its own difficulties, but it was a great experience overall. I enjoyed walking the line between absurdism and cosmic horror, and then populating the story with characters who were pretty much all failures who could barely cope with existence before everything turned to cosmic shit. That they were ill-equipped to deal with life, but could somehow fumble their way through an eldritch god armageddon was very entertaining for me as an author, and hopefully that translates to the reader. There is a lot of *me* in this book, and it’s largely a love letter to gory B-movies, bad taste, and philosophical navel gazing.
Whose string do you think it will pull?
Fans of Evil Dead, Return of the Living Dead, The Venture Bros, and 80’s industrial music should have a pretty good time with it.
What’s the strongest message the audience will find in your plot?
Determinism can be funny.
Are you fond of any character?
# Certainly, there are aspects of several characters which resonate with me. Cooper’s indifferent fatalism, Jordan as an amiable metalhead, and pretty much everything about Crystal. They were all a lot of fun to write, and have a lot of similarities to myself and people I’ve known over the years.
Do you plan to make a spin-off about any of the characters?
No definite plans, but I’ve got a few ideas simmering.
What’s been the most challenging scene to write or film?
The ending involved a lot of moving parts and I had to bring several characters together for a final confrontation. It was difficult to keep so many plates spinning without interrupting the flow of the story, but I’m proud of the end result. I think I managed to keep the pacing suitably frenetic without sacrificing clarity..
Who is your perfect audience?
That broad cross-section of people that are fans of both avante-garde industrial music and schlocky horror films.
SciFi, thriller and horror. How do they combine?
I don’t really consider thrillers to be all that different from horror, so any decent horror story should be thrilling in some regard. Horror might go a little more full frontal with the violence, but the implications are there, regardless. But there isn’t enough SciFi Horror, which is a shame because it’s a fantastic subgenre. Arguably the best horror films ever made fall into that category with Alien and The Thing, as well as more recent classics like Annihilation, Possessor or, in a more literary vein, Peter Watts’ Blindsight. SciFi Horror is interesting in that it pushes the genre beyond the tropes of cultural heritage and into a modern/post-modern landscape.
We invent new things to be afraid of, and oftentimes we barely even understand why we are afraid of them. There is simply an uncanny wrongness to certain advances, something at odds with the soul. Any feasible technological advance is rife with potential downsides and unintended consequences, and those can be exploited to great effect with the right creator.
Cronenbergian or Tsukamoto-esque body horror can exist alongside something more subdued like Ex Machina without any friction, and there is almost always an undercurrent of the same terrible suspicion: we are our own undoing. Humanity’s own curiosity, lack of ethics, and egotism will assuredly lead to its own demise. There are no ghouls or ghosts, just man’s boundless ability to destroy himself. Perhaps we discover an entity that is beyond our supposed mastery over the natural world, or perhaps we create it through our own hubris. Either way we are a problem that solves itself.
How did you come up with the idea for your first creation?
Depends on what you would qualify as “first”, but Lovecraftian cosmic horror and comic books were huge influences on my work as a whole. Though, my first (self published) novel All the Lights in the World was basically a mix of Night of the Living Dead and Lord of the flies, with a dash of J.G Ballard.
What kind of horror do you think your work falls into?
It varies, but Dirt Maul specifically is definitely a cosmic horror comedy.
Which is a scene from a horror movie or book that has terrified you?
Zelda in the original Pet Sematary and the final reveal of BrundleFly in The Fly always unsettled me. Something about disease, the monster being inside of you and turning you into what it wants you to be is really disturbing.
What’s the best and the worst about being a creator?
I’m lucky to have the ability to create at all, not everyone has that sort of outlet. But beyond that, it’s the rare moment when I finally manage to craft something that I actually appreciate, that is everything I wanted it to be and which resonates with me in ways I might not have anticipated. It’s an amazing feeling, and I think it’s perhaps one of the things I value most in life.
On the flip side, there are all of the other times when a painting or a story didn’t live up to what I had imagined. It’s easy to fall into a spiral of self doubt and begin to question why you even bother in the first place. The only way I’ve found to beat back that impulse is to simply try again. Wash, rinse, and repeat. And the poverty, that sucks, too.
What would be your advice for people who want to jump into this world?
Create what you’d like to see. Don’t worry about other people’s tastes, just be true to your own vision. Even if you don’t find fame or fortune or whatever, your work will be authentic, and you can always be proud of that. Besides, there’s a non-zero chance we will see an ecological apocalypse in our lifetime, so why make any concessions to popular opinion?
Who’s your biggest supporter?
I have a very close circle of friends, and they have always been there to support whatever weird thing I try to do. I don’t like to imagine what my life would look like without them.
If you started over your career in this industry, would you do it differently?
I’d spend a lot less time moping about and wallowing in misery. Depression is a motherfucker.
What is one thing you regret during your experience in the horror community?
Not really sure. I have tons of regrets, but they’re far more personal. I actually enjoy creating in this field. Maybe I could have gotten an editor for my first novel and shopped it around a little more, but it was mostly a learning experience anyway. If I were to write it again today, I’d make a lot of changes.
How do you think horror is evolving?
It’s seemingly being taken a little more seriously, by both critics and creators. Most of us are familiar with the term “elevated horror” and it strikes me as a kind of silly distinction, but still worth considering. There has always been high quality and low quality horror content, but there does appear to be an effort in recent years to put out media that uses horror as a way to tell substantive stories. Perhaps we’re just taking fear a little more seriously these days.
There’s no shortage of it, after all. Regardless, we’re fortunate enough to live in an era that produced It Follows, Get Out, The Babadook, The Witch, Hereditary, The Lighthouse, The Wailing, Annihilation, Mandy, Possessor and a number of other films which are wonderful in their own right. These are all hefty works that deal with sexual anxiety, race, unaddressed trauma, religious fundamentalism, madness, etc (okay, Mandy might just be really fucking cool, whatever). There is also a surprising willingness to experiment in films like Skinamarink and The Outwaters. While definitely not for everyone, I appreciate the vision required to make something so specifically weird.
On television/streaming we have standout series like Hannibal, Channel Zero, The Haunting of Hill House, and Midnight Mass. In the literary world we have Laird Barron, John Langan, Philip Fracassi, Brian Evenson and a multitude of other authors of such quality that it’s hard to even keep up. Seriously, there are so many good books recently available that I just haven’t found the time to read. It’s a great problem to have.
Of course, this is probably a consequence of the world we live in. The last couple of decades have been rough, and they don’t seem to be improving all that much. Those fears and anxieties have to come out somewhere. Thankfully, I count myself among the lucky few who can enjoy the creative side effects of societal collapse. Until we get around to guillotines, I’ll take the bread and circuses for all they offer.
What’s the last horror movie that surprised you liked?
Deadstream and The Outwaters were both wonderful, and could not be more tonally different.
What’s your unpopular opinion about a horror movie or book?
Terminator is a slasher film and is a better movie than Terminator 2. Kathe Koja’s The Cipher is the best horror novel of the 90’s. Also, I Drink Your Blood deserves way more love.
What are your next projects?
I’m going to paint for a while, probably work on some short stories. I try not to make plans.
If your last work was a song, which one would be?
I actually thought about this question longer than I probably should have. So, I have a couple of options (apparently I do not listen to much comedic music, so these aren’t wholly reflective of the book’s tone. Good shit, though):
My Life with The Thrill Kill Kult – A Daisy Chain for Satan
White Zombie – Welcome to Planet Motherfucker
Ministry – You Know What You Are
Bo Burnham – That Funny Feeling
Skinny Puppy – Convulsion
What piece of your work are you more proud of?
As far as what I’ve written goes, Dirt Maul is everything I wanted it to be. I think this book is funny as hell.
Where can the audience find you?
https://www.instagram.com/jamesmabeart/
Probably at some NC based horror conventions, if I find the time.
