It’s the second most frequently asked question fans and readers pose at events and signings – “Where do you get your ideas from?”  I am sure the question is posed to nearly all authors – regardless of their chosen genre. With horror, however, the inquiry always seems to be laced with a healthy dose of fear – which is good – because fear is the fuel which powers my gray-matter engine. Everything I write boils down to me trying my very best to elicit fear in my readers – the humor and warm & fuzzy scenes I sprinkle into my stories are merely icing on the proverbial “nightmare cake”.

So where do I get my ideas? The answer might just surprise you.  Asylum Lake/Grave Undertakings started as a journal entry about struggling with the death of my father and the memories I would sometimes encounter when I travelled home to the small town where I grew up. Of course, there was no abandoned psychiatric hospital in my neighborhood or haunted board games to deal with. The inspiration for the story and the dark turns I take that inspiration are two very different things.

For FLIGHT, the project to follow the release of Grave Undertakings, inspiration came from a TIME Magazine article about the military’s use of passenger aircraft to transport the bodies of soldiers killed in action during the Gulf War.  The practice was eventually discontinued, but I oculdn’t get the visual out of my head of those flag-draped boxes next to the luggage in  the cargo holds of planes.  I merely, added a diabolical pharmaceutical company doing military rsearch and a spreading zombie apocalypse – just small elements which  make the actual story much more interesting (insert evil laugh here).

The lesson I’ve learned is that inspiration is a real bitch and that you sometimes have to take what the world gives you and turn it to your own dark devices.  You can imagine my glee when this headline from the BBC scrolled across my computer - SOUTH KOREA TO TARGET POWDERED HUMAN FLESH CAPSULES.

Will I do anything with this story? The jury is still out. I’ve been wrestling with a vampire story inspired by an article from Newsweek. You see, apparently scientists are on the verge of identifying the gene responsible for causing mosquitos to crave blood. Once modified, these malaria-carrying insects could be erradicated or at least controlled to no longer spread dangerous diseases.  In more capable hands this story would practically write itself.

So what will I do with these powdered human flesh capsules? As much as i would like to turn my imagination loose on developing the horrific who, what, where, and why – I just don’t have the time.  For now, I’ll just allow myself to quietly wonder what a powdered human flesh capsule tastes like and whether it is a  better strategy to  swallow them whole or to bite through and enjoy every last grainy morsel? 

Cheers from Bedlam Falls!

R. A. Evans