AUTHOR BIO: Weston is the author of Scarecrow Gods, Recalled to Life, Vampire Outlaw of the Milky Way and a slew of short stories and non-fiction articles that have appeared in comic books, professional writing guides, magazines and anthologies. He won the Bram Stoker award for Superior Achievement in First Novel in 2005 and was nominated for the Pushcart Prize for Fiction in 2003. He lives in Southern Arizona with his wife, Yvonne Navarro, and Great Danes, Pester Ghost Palm Eater and Goblin Monster Dog. For entertainment he races tarantula wasps, wrestles rattlesnakes, watches Border Patrol Death Race 2000 and bakes in the noonday sun.

Author’s Website: The online Universe of Weston Ochse

DNW: Your work shows an incredible range of influence. There is philosophy, supernatural, and occult flotsam washed about on a sea of literary device (I love flowery prose). In all of that, there appear to be some pretty strong influences. Can you tell us about those - the words that move you - the things that helped make your voice what it is today? Are there bits and pieces you can point out as having been borrowed or renovated or reworked from particular sources?

WESTON: The flotsam and jetsam of my literary life, these are the things that move me. As I’ve mentioned in many interviews, I came to horror late. Not because I didn’t want to read horror, it just wasn’t what was available growing up. I came from the home of two English teachers, filled with books of poetry and enough erudition to make my head spin. Still, I read what I could. Like most kids I read and loved Lord of the Flies and Catcher in the Rye, the latter I had to buy in a brown bag from the Walden Bookstore at the mall because it was blacklisted back then. My parents would press a book in my hand, and I’d read it. Hell, my mom had me read Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo when I was only ten. Ever read that book? It’s about a soldier wounded in World War I who can’t see, hear, smell or talk. All of his senses except feeling were taken away from him, yet he lived. What a book for a ten year old-more on that later.

I liked adventure stories first. I was given a volume of Jack London when I was very young and read that several times. The Sea Wolf was my favorite. I also read all the Horatio Hornblower volumes that belonged to my grandfather. I remember wanting to be a sailor, even when old Horatio lost his leg to the twelve pound cannon ball, I still wanted to sail the seas. I also began reading Tarzan about that time. Wow. Talk about opening up new avenues.

So imagine me reading a Joy Harjo poem in the living room, then racing downstairs to see what Tarzan was doing next, then reading Steinbeck, only to grab the latest issue of The Defenders or The Avengers comic books. I read Kipling like it was a bible and Howl-ed with Ginsberg as if I was old enough to be doing what everyone else was in the ‘70s. Heinlein groked me running until I discovered Tolkien and Brooks and then Stephen King with The Stand. As a first book to read of his, that one was a damned doozy that has stayed with me, as it has many of us, forever.

As you see, I had so many influences. Some forced upon me, some snuck into my room and some I couldn’t help but seek out and read. Catfish Gods has the feel of Bradbury summers. Scarecrow Gods owes Peter Straub and Stephen King a nod for their unabashed melding of fantasy and horror in The Talisman. There are stories in the Scary Rednecks collection that came into being from a verse of a poem from Joy Harjo, or Robert Stern, or Langston Hughes. Funny how the words of an “Indian,” a jew and a black man could inspire this Southern boy to write about rednecks. If that isn’t a bit of ironic synchretic inspiration, I don’t know what is.

DNW: You have done a lot of collaborative work, starting with the Scary Rednecks and Dave Whitman and moving on to the very cool interactive website you and several others put together. What do you get from the experience that brings you back to it? Are there ups, downs, things that you’d like to go on and on about? Would you do more Scary Rednecks if the chance arose?

WESTON: I’ve told the story of Scary Rednecks and Appalachian Galapagos so many times, I’m sure everyone has heard it before, so I won’t bore people by telling it again. I owe a lot to the success of the book(s). There are freaking movie stars who come up to me and talk about some of the stories. Really, it just amazes me.

The process of that first collection we did was magical. How the stories went from three to seven to twenty-one, how we only had three stories written for it when we signed the contract, then how the creativity took us over and allowed us to create some truly amazing stories is really something that should be told by a better writer than me. It’s as if someone or something, like Perse on Duma Key, grabbed hold of us and made us supernaturally better.

With the exception of one story, though, everything we did was on our own. That one story wasn’t very long; I also think it was one of the weakest stories in the collection. That knowledge is one of the reasons we wrote the sequel collection, Appalachian Galapagos. That collection begins with a novella called Origin of the Species and is about Bradbury, Bigfoots, scary redneck preachers, wild Deliverance rivers, beer-filled canoes and Adrienne Barbeau’s titties. Twenty-one thousand words and I loved every minute of the creation of that novella. David and I split time, I’d right a page or two, then he’d take over. We didn’t have a plan, we just wrote and created waht was a really awesome adventure. If all collaboration was like that I’d do it every time.

And you know, that’s what I call real collaboration. Some stories and novels have pretty much been written by one person and then another takes it over and finishes and improves it. That’s collaboration too, I suppose, but not nearly as collaborative an effort as the way David and I did it in Species.

I’ve tried to collaborate again, as you know, and each time I had to quit. I wasn’t in the right place emotionally and creatively. I think when you collaborate you need to give and look forward to allowing the other person freedom to create. These last times I wasn’t ready and wasn’t very giving. I tended to want to control the outcome. I’m getting better. I think that given the right project, I’d work collaboratively sometime soon.

As far as more Scary Rednecks? I don’t know. There’d have to be a really good reason involving some…er…better left unsaid.

DNW: You live in a creative household (as do I). What is that like for you? You and Yvonne both have very different styles, and very different audiences…do you play off of one another, bounce ideas constantly, edit and fuss…or are your creative careers separate. What’s it like for you with so much talent under one roof?

WESTON: Yvonne writes books? What? Let me answer your question this way. I’m married to a beautiful, sexy, intelligent woman who just happens to think I’m great and, oh by the way, has written twenty novels. I definitely bounce ideas off of her (Interesting and unintended visual there). It’s like having a friend with benefits. She’s cool, she loves monsters, she can’t even get grossed out, and she’s my wife.

The thing is, though, that she and I have different processes. She and I create differently. She begins writing from a different place internally than I do. I don’t know if that makes sense to readers, but I can’t put it any other way.

So far we haven’t worked together, but I think we will some day, when we find something we each think is cool and puts us in the same creative place. But until then, she writes, I write, we go to conventions and talk about writing, we bounce ideas off each other, and then watch cheesy movies on the Sci Fi channel…how great is that?

DNW: Having pointed at your book long ago and said HEY - LOOK - THIS GUY IS GOOD - and having liked (basically) everything of yours I’ve read … I’m going to break my rule and ask a question other folks usually ask - but I’ll skew it. Can you run down the inspirations for your upcoming projects…why they are important from your perspective, what you like, and dislike…and tell us (of course) what they are?

WESTON: So you want a peek behind the curtain, huh?

In the works I have (Titles are kept under wraps until I finish the first draft):

Novel- the tale of a group of extreme sportsmen who run afoul of an ancient malevolent spirit. I’ve always wanted to write a sprawling global epic adventure story where I could incorporate some of the knowledge of all the countries I’ve been too. Call this my tribute to Jack London.

Novel-the tale of a group of D&D Gamers who reunite for their 20^th High School Reunion, only to find that they have to save the world using all their hard learned adventuring skills.

Novel-something percolating in my noggin about League of the Red Palm from my MuyMal arcs. I don’t know what it is yet, but I want to do something with this. It’s too good of a story just to let lie fallow.

Track of the Storm-the third and final book of the Cycle of the Aegis Trilogy. This has been some of the most fun I’ve ever had. Inspiration comes from Glen Cook, Neil Gaiman, Clive Barker and Captain America.

Miscellaneous Book- Blaze of Glory. This is a three part book with a screenplay, the novella that inspired the screenplay, and the story of how it traveled through Hollywood, including side trips with Michael Berryman(Hills Have Eyes) and Reg Bannister (Phantasm), to ultimately reach the hallowed halls of Aman Ra Entertainment where Wesley Snipes sat on high. (This one is done)

There you have it. Besides a few books my agent has right now, those are the ones in the works.

DNW: Standard question…you have one day to get the inspiration for a new story or book. You can spend it in a library with all the world’s books at your fingertips - visit a studio with all the world’s recorded music - or have a ride to anyplace in the world you want to spend the day. What do you do…and why?

WESTON: Easiest question yet. I’d take the ride. I’m the kind of writer who needs input–visual and aural stimulus all the time, all day long. I can’t work in silence. I hate silence. I’d much rather watch television and write or listen to music and read a comic book while I write, than just write. If you were to put me in the library, it would be like sending a Catholic to the Vatican. I’d spend all of my time looking at books and never once think about what I was going to write. And as far as music goes, it might just put me to sleep. But If I could take a ride, hell I could see so many things, hear sounds I’m still trying to create words to describe, and experience feelings of satisfaction and happiness that only have a color to represent them. Yeah. If it’s inspiration I need, then it’s definitely a road trip!

Oh yeah. I promised that I’d come back to Johnny Got His Gun. Now that we’re talking about inspiration, I think it’s an appropriate time. What’s interesting is that the horror of war was lost on me when I read the book. I was already a follower of Edgar Rice Burroughs, a first mate to Jack London and a veteran of the Battle of Helm’s Deep. War held no fear for me, even at such a young age, and neither did the prices paid by those who invest themselves in it. I wasn’t about to live my life being scared, I just wanted to live my life. So when I read this book about a young man who’d lost his arms, legs, eyes, nose, ears, tongue, both jaws and all of his face to an explosion, I was less horrified, as I was in awe of Dalton Trumbo and his ability to create such a character. Not only create the character, but to write from his point of view. Wow, I remember thinking to myself; I hope I can write like that one day. Twenty-five years later I wrote a character that owes his soul to Johnny. When Maxom Phinxs went to Vietnam and came home the Maggot Man, it was definitely a nod to Dalton Trumbo.

I hope I can keep writing for a long time. There’s a lot of literature to live up to.

BONUS QUESTION: I lost track and never found out what happened back when Catfish Gods was becoming a movie. Did it? If so, is it available?

WESTON: CATFISH Gods- The Movie.

Sadly, it went to the Land of Good Intentions, where most movies reside. It got all the way to primary filming. Casting had been done. The screenplay was complete and pretty darn good. Location shooting had begun. Everything was going good, except for cash flow. The producers ran out of money. But in all seriousness…and this is me grinning here…it was total fucking fun while it lasted!

DNW: Thanks Wes! Now, all of you readers… hop on over to THE HORROR MALL and shop for Wes’ books!

You can also read my review of SCARECROW GODS - this will be re-released soon in trade paperback!