Next up on our continuing "behind the scenes" series is Simon Petersen, all the way from New Zealand. He's a travel blogger, beer connoisseur, and horror movie fanatic, the latter evidenced by his outstanding horror debut, Slasher Sam. We'll have him answer the hard questions about his latest work, such as his inspirations, his feelings when writing it, what he liked most and what he felt was most challenging while writing.
| Simon's Thoughts On: Slasher Sam If they ever made a documentary about the writing of Slasher Sam – and I expect they will any day now – there’d be a lot of shots of me, its author, sitting around and watching movies… sitting around staring at a blank page… sitting around and tap-tap-tapping on my laptop. Okay, so it probably wouldn’t be as riveting as Crystal Lake Memories, the nearly seven-hour-long documentary on the Friday the 13th film series (is it just me who thinks this is the greatest doco ever?), but readers, wannabe authors, and especially my concerned family members might want to know why on earth I decided to write my blackly comedic horror novel, so let me give you the low-down on the inspiration behind it. Well, they say you should write about what you know, so I wrote a novel about a horror movie-loving psycho killer with a blog. But before you call the police, I assure you that I’m not actually a killer named Sam – just a blogger named Si, and a horror movie-loving psycho. That’s where the comparisons end, I promise. Then, because the hardest part of writing is starting – and continuing – I signed up for National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). But instead of writing a novel in one month like you’re supposed to, I was so afraid of not getting it finished by the end of November that I started writing mine in February. So, by the time the actual month rolled by, I’d already half-written it. I guess that makes me a cheater, but the important thing is I finally wrote my first novel. And now I feel amazing, and a little guilty, but mostly proud that Slasher Sam has been published by Darkwater Syndicate. I’m sure you’d feel just as good if you bought a copy today. About The Author Simon Petersen is an experienced journalist and popular blogger from Auckland, New Zealand. By day he writes about craft beer, world travel, and professional sport; by night he dreams up horror movie scenarios that’d scare the striped sweater off Freddy Krueger. Visit him at www.SlasherSam.com. |  Simon Petersen  Slasher Sam |