If you haven’t discovered J.Lincoln Fenn yet, you should check out her debut novel, Poe (2013, 47North). It’s got lots of dark humor, a great, quirky narrator, and while the story is firmly grounded in the present, it’s also a fantastical tale of insanity with a chilling, gothic feel. Poe also made the preliminary ballot for this year’s Stoker Awards. If any of that intrigues you, today Poe is available as a Kindle Daily Deal, so it’s a great time to check it out.

1.) Can you give our readers a brief introduction?

I’m just a white girl from Massachusetts who lives in Hawaii and writes dark things. My debut novel Poe won the 2013 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award for Sci-Fi/Fantasy/Horror, which led to its publication by 47North. A complete and utter surprise since about 10,000 people enter that contest each year.

Poe is a genre blend of horror/urban fantasy/dark humor, more along the lines of John Dies in the End than your standard horror novel. It centers on Dimitri Petrov, a 23-yr. old, snarky obituary writer who wakes up on a slab in the morgue after a Halloween séance gone bad. Things go downhill from there.

2.) Why do you write horror?  What draws you to the genre?

Probably my Roman-Catholic roots and New England upbringing draws me to horror. Christianity is a religion based on one of the goriest books ever written, with a Sunday ritual involving the transfiguration of a wafer and wine into flesh and blood, which everyone consumes. And New England is just inherently spooky. Those long, dark winters with the wind howling around the eaves explain a lot about Hawthorne, Poe, and Lovecraft.

I write horror because I think it’s where we get to explore our darkest fears. Stephen King said, “Fiction is the truth inside the lie.” The truth inside horror is our fear of death. Some cultures take this on more directly. In Tibet, they practiced ‘sky burial’ where a corpse was dismembered as an offering to the vultures, a more literal form of transfiguration except the deity is impermanence.

3.) Can you describe your writing style or the tone you prefer to set for your stories?

I want to wake people up when I write. I want to them to read something and go, no, she didn’t just say that, did she? I want my words to do something. When I was writing Poe I was reading Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Great Expectations. Tonally there’s something gonzo-style about Dimitri’s voice, and the only better snark than Charles Dickens is George Eliot.

I also like playing disparate notes at the same time. The Prologue (to Poe) is horrific, with gory descriptions of the morgue, but the dialogue is funny, and there’s danger and threat too. Wakey wakey.

4. Who are some of your influences?  Are there any women authors who have particularly inspired you to write?

Even though Poe has almost nothing to do with E. A. Poe, he is a big influence. My grandfather, who worked in a factory, was somehow talked into buying Poe’s complete works. A wonderful discovery one long, dull summer.

I have an altar to Margaret Atwood. She sets an impossible standard, but I forgive her for that. Other women writers I find inspiring are Gillian Flynn, Ann Patchett, Isabel Allende, Joyce Carol Oates, Toni Morrison, and Carolyn See. I had the good fortune to meet and take a course with See, who gave great advice on writing and the writing life.

5.) What authors do you like to read?  Any recommendations?

I started reading Neil Gaiman after my PW weekly review said his fans would like Poe, and I thought oh yes, here’s a kindred spirit. The Ocean at the End of the Lane and David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas were two of my favorite reads in 2013.

If it’s been a while since you read Frankenstein (probably high school), pick it up again. It holds up, and in these days of glow-in-the-dark bunnies and genetically engineered tomatoes, scarily prescient. Then read Oryx and Crake. And be afraid.
6.) Where can readers find your work?

For less than the cost of a latte and scone, anyone can pick up a Kindle version of Poe on Amazon. There’s also a paperback, which has a nice, waxy cover, and an audiobook. Readers can also find my most current musings on my blog at www.jlincolnfenn.com. Also I follow back.

Interested in learning more? Here’s a link to J. Lincoln Fenn’s Amazon page. You can access her most recent tweets and blog posts– they appear in the column to the right of the main page.

Have a great day, and check back soon to see another profile!