Max Booth is not a psycho. I realized that as he was sitting exhausted at my kitchen table after a long weekend slinging books and speaking about dead stuff at KillerCon. Not even kind of psycho. Behind his beautifully scarred and transgressive horror novels, lurks a guy who is Ozzie-and-Harriet-level supernormal.
It’s one of the many predictable tropes in the world of horror Booth eschews. He doesn’t like skulls or dresses head-to-toe in black. The day we chatted he proudly rocked a pizza-themed Hawaiian shirt hardly touching the can of Lone Star I’d given him earlier.
The whole thing makes you wonder, “what’s this Booth guy hiding?”
Independent horror darlings Cemetery Dance Press recently announced they’d be publishing Booth’s newest book Touch The Night, which in the blood and guts community is a major stamp of approval considering they’re the exclusive home of all things Stephen King. Booth explained it as “two kids who get abducted by demonic cops. There’s a crazy trucker, some blood — all kinds of fun stuff.”
[bctt tweet=”Independent horror darlings Cemetery Dance Press recently announced they’d be publishing Booth’s newest book Touch The Night, which in the blood and guts community is a major stamp of approval. @GiveMeYourTeeth @CemeteryDance” username=”theboldmom”]
The honor of getting published by a press that can make your career overnight isn’t lost on Max Booth.
At eighteen, Both told me he got on a Greyhound headed for Texas with three hundred and fifty dollars he’d scrounged writing Wikipedia entries for self-published authors.
Growing up in Indiana, Booth felt he had nothing. “My brothers were in and out of jail. I didn’t want that. I had to get out. Texas seemed like where all of these cool people I’d met online lived. They’d published things, at that point, I had nothing. I didn’t know where to start other than little writer’s groups. I figured Texas was where I needed to be. I was ditching high school; my parents didn’t care. We were living in a hotel, what were they going to say?
I spent all of my time writing. Once I got enough for a bus ticket, I was a goner.”
Booth paused to scratch my dog, Mia then continued, “When I was growing up, monsters didn’t scare me. Being abandoned scared me. My parents spent all of their time at the casino, and I was left alone. I’d pace the hotel room we were living in, freaking out that they weren’t coming back and I’d be stuck in this horrible place alone.”
[bctt tweet=”I spent all of my time writing. Once I got enough for a bus ticket, I was a goner. @GiveMeYourTeeth” username=”theboldmom”]
That fear hasn’t left Booth and it allows him to take a seemingly ordinary situation and turn into something horrific. Booth’s characters often struggle with identity and isolation from the world they’ve been thrown into.
The monsters aren’t the worst things, rather the hideousness of regular people hiding around the corner.
Booth doesn’t get you with blunt force trauma like a “Scare of The Week” zombie flick. His work delivers death by a thousand vivid paper cuts, through small details that stick with you, that ruin the protagonist in the end.
Booth’s last book, Carnivorous Lunar Activities was released by the iconic horror brand Fangoria, which rose from the dead after shuttering as a magazine, and now operates as a Dallas-based horror media company.
Carnivorous Lunar Activities is a masterstroke, mixing Kevin Smith’s sardonic humor with Stephen King’s tension. The first fifty pages are fast-paced, brilliantly establishing a sense of impending doom looming over McDonald’s cheeseburgers and cases of PBR in a basement smelling vaguely of pee. Two friends hook up after a long separation, only one of them happens to claim he’s a werewolf that’s been killing people and devouring raw meat all thanks to a botched craigslist deal.
There’s also the ramblings of a guy chained to a ship’s anchor. Innocent fun, the book is not, but boy is it entertaining, complete with a few delicious Hitchcockian left turns you didn’t see coming.
“I love Joe Lansdale, he’s a massive influence on my writing. He’s the master, he’s the icon of Texas horror/comedy/sci-fi/crime who can keep you entertained, on every page. Even when the main character isn’t running for their lives, but enjoying a box of Nilla wafers.
He can drop you in a world that’s fascinating, inch by filthy inch. Stephen King is also my other biggest influence. The universe he’s created has spread to every facet of our lives. His DNA is everywhere in pop culture. I collect everything of Stephen King I can get my hands, I have a whole bookshelf of first editions, misprints, signed copies, anything I can get my hands on.”
And that’s no joke, Booth even hosts a podcast dedicated to all things going on in Derry, Maine called Castle Rock Radio. Can’t say that guy isn’t dedicated to his obsession.
In addition to writing novels, Booth is also a devoted editor, collaborating with his partner Lori Michelle, running Perpetual Motion Machine Press and the dark literary fiction magazine, Dark Moon Digest.
Both imprints are something he takes seriously, never forgetting that kid on the bus, “I was broke. I slept in some dude’s kitchen for two months. So I love giving new writers a chance. I know how I felt when I was submitting, getting rejection after rejection, and then someone finally gave me an opportunity. It feels great to give someone else that feeling.” Because of Dark Moon Digest, countless new writers have found that first and all-important “yes.”
One thing that people don’t realize about Texas, Booth explains, is that we have an incredible, thriving horror community.
One of the most celebrated horror films of all-time was shot just outside Austin, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the state has become home to events like KillerCon, one of the weirdest and most entertaining horror writer’s conventions in the country while Gore Noir magazine calls Austin home. Fangoria moved to Dallas, where they also hold the massive Texas Frightmare Weekend.
[bctt tweet=”One thing that people don’t realize about Texas, Booth explains, is that we have an incredible, thriving horror community. @GiveMeYourTeeth” username=”theboldmom”]
“This state is a lifeline to the horror community. Austin, San Antonio, Dallas, Houston, every big city has a scene, and as those scenes are developing, we’re meeting one another, and it’s only getting bigger. It’s awesome. Within a few hours of my house in Cibolo, you can go to the Gas Station, a Texas Chainsaw Massacre-themed bbq joint, there’s a replica Munsters house up near Dallas, around Waxahachie, some of the world’s best haunted houses are here, a top-five attraction is in Austin at House of Torment, and there’s a ton of true crime spots. This gigantic, weird state has everything creepy.”
Texas is a massive, red, white and blue-colored monster where the Lone Stars and Shiners are extra cold, and good ole’ boys refuse to take off their Ropers, even in August. But beneath the blue bonnet-covered surface, there’s a thriving dark underbelly and Max Booth is there to peel the flesh right off the bones.
And he’ll probably be wearing another Hawaiian shirt, and wearing funky sandals when he does it. Though mercifully even Max Booth doesn’t wear socks with sandals – now that would be a true example of spine-tingling terror.
But for now, Booth’s new book, Touch The Night is available for preorder from Cemetery Dance Press. Find him on Twitter @GiveMeYourTeeth – send him to your favorite pizza joint, he’ll appreciate it.
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