INTERVIEW: Jonathan Maberry
Photo by Sara Jo West
I recently had the pleasure to interview new Weird Tales editorial director Jonathan Maberry. Here’s what he had to say.
JAMES AQUILONE: What kind of stories are you looking for in the new Weird Tales?
JONATHAN MABERRY: I’m open to a lot of things for this rebirth of Weird Tales. With social media and its much longer reach, new writers can find us and I can find them. Here in the States but also around the world. There are a lot of fantastic writers out there, and I find it personally exciting to have so many diverse voices whispering scary stories in my ear.
One big focus for me is to explore as many different kinds of storytelling as possible. Not just in different formats—and we’re publishing novelettes, short stories, flash fiction, and poetry—but in the experiences of the writers. I’m a straight white man of middle years, with a deep background in martial arts. The things that scare me aren’t likely the same things as would scare a black writer, or a queer writer, or a person growing up in a different culture or country. Fear is such a deeply personal thing that I want those varied voices to speak up and write from their lives, their experiences, and from their hearts. I also want to open doors for newer writers and give them a chance to scare us. Or freak us out.
JA: What can we expect in future issues of Weird Tales?
JM: I just wrapped the contents for issue 364 (or issue two of our new run). I have killer short stories by multiple Hugo Award winner Seanan McGuire; Bram Stoker winner Weston Ochse; multiple Julius Vogel winner Lee Murray (from New Zealand); celebrated fantasist Gregory Frost; Philip K Dick Special Citation winning author Marguerite Reed; and three-time Stoker winner Rena Mason. There’s killer flash fiction from Marie Whittaker, an award-winning essayist and author of dark fantasy and psychological horror stories; Bram Stoker winner Tim Waggoner; and dark fantasist Gabrielle Faust. Plus poetry by award Stoker Award winners Linda Addison and Alessandro Manzetti. That’s one hell of a lineup.
In future issues we’ll have an original Renfield story by Dacre Stoker (grandnephew of Bram Stoker) and his writing partner, Leverett Butts; a new 30 Days of Night tale by Steve Niles; a collaboration by the legendary Joe R. Lansdale and his daughter, Kasey Lansdale; mega-bestseller Heather Graham; double Lambda-award winner Jewelle Gomez; Nebula and Compton-Crook-winning author Fran Wilde; award-winning Australian poet Anne Walsh; and so many others. We’ll also have some art and maybe a collaborative story or two by Mike Mignola, creator of Hellboy and The BPRD.
Writers whose books are already on your shelves, and writers who you will want to read more of.
And we’ll have some killer artwork by a variety of artists—longtime pros and newer artists—that will live up to the tradition of wonderful and creepy art Weird Tales has always been famous for. Our cover for the first new issue (#363) by Abigail Larson was a direct homage to the legendary Margaret Brundage.
JA: What’s your definition of weird fiction?
JM: People have been wrestling with that definition since the 1920s. For me, if it isn’t “straight horror” or “straight fantasy,” then it’s weird. It falls into that crack in our expectations and lands somewhere to the left of our comfort zone. Swords and sorcery fiction, for example, was mostly born in the pages of Weird Tales with the adventures of Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian and CL Moore’s Jirel of Joiry. Those stories were not quite epic or high fantasy, and presaged the dark complexities of, say, Game of Thrones. The concept of “cosmic horror” gained its first foothold on our literary landscape with the stories of H.P. Lovecraft and his many followers—notably August Derleth. The weirder side of the occult detective tales, such as Seabury Quinn’s tales of Jules de Grandin. And even bizarre blends of science fiction and dark fantasy—such as some of the stranger tales by Edmond Hamilton—found a home in the magazine. These stories would have been out of place in magazines that took a more conventional approach to the genres of horror, fantasy, science fiction, or mystery…but they were perfect for Weird Tales.
JA: What’s the perfect Weird Tales story?
JM: If I can guess the ending too soon, it’s not weird enough. If the story takes no strange twists or turns, then it’s not a Weird Tale. If it relies on imitation rather than innovation, then…nope. Weird Tales stories are fresh and strange, they take risks. They draw blood. I’d loved Weird Tales as a boy and fell in love with it all over again during Ann VanDerMeer’s classic run. She understood what “weird” was, and I want to honor that legacy—and the decades of great storytelling going back to the magazine’s inception—with the stories I pick for this run.
JA: What drew you to become the editorial director of Weird Tales?
JM: I’d first written a story for the magazine, which was, admittedly, a lifelong dream. As it is with so many writers. But once that was sold they asked me to help pick—and eventually curate—the rest of the stories. They gave me a free hand with selecting writers. I reached out to those writers whose stories and poetry would send a message that Weird Tales is truly back and it’s hungry for blood. First person I asked was Victor LaValle, whose story is a brutal gut punch. And we have stories by Josh Malerman, author of Bird Box; million-copy bestseller Sherrilyn Kenyon; award-winning poet Stephanie Wytovich; five-time Bram Stoker winner Lisa Morton; and fan favorite thriller author Hank Schwaeble. Newcomer Tori Eldridge crafted a killer epic poem, too. We kicked some ass and left blood on the floor.
JA: What are some of your favorite Weird Tales stories and authors?
JM: I was a big fan of the Conan tales as a kid. I was introduced to them by author L. Sprague de Camp, who was largely responsible for the rebirth of that character in the ‘50s and ‘60s, decades after Robert E. Howard’s suicide. De Camp was a mentor of mine when I was in middle school, and later a close friend. He, along with Harlan Ellison, introduced me to H.P. Lovecraft and Seabury Quinn; and De Camp’s wife, Catherine, told me I had to read CL Moore’s Jirel of Joiry stories (to, and I quote, “avoid being awash in testosterone”). I loved all of these stories, and loved that the writers returned to the same characters or set-ups. That made me feel like I was making friends.
JA: What do you see as Weird Tales’ contribution to speculative fiction as a whole?
JM: Weird Tales expanded the range of the kinds of stories writers could tell. Because it wasn’t strictly bound by genre lines, the contributors were free to truly speculate on what could be out there in the dark, or lurking in the shadows of our own hearts. Weird Tales included science fiction, philosophical fantasy, dark fantasy, heroic fantasy, horror, thriller, mystery, humor, and other aspects…so when you began a story you weren’t always sure what kind of chocolate you were about to bite into. A mixed metaphor, but you get the idea. Because the writers were so free, they tended to make the concept of “speculative fiction” truly that—a speculation unbound by convention or stricture. This is one of the many reasons such great writers have been drawn to it, as fans and as contributors. In those pages we’ve seen works by Lovecraft, Howard, Moore, Derleth, and Quinn, but also Ray Bradbury, Theodore Sturgeon, Robert Bloch, Manly Wade Wellman, Fritz Leiber, Ramsey Campbell, Tanith Lee, Steve Rasnic Tem, Michael Moorcock, Cat Rambo, Isaac Asimov, Clark Ashton Smith, Frank Belknap Long, and…well, hell…the list goes on and on. All the way into our modern era. And a lot of those authors are well known as either writers of science fiction, fantasy, or other genres. But they also wrote for Weird Tales. Often, first.
JA: How do you manage to be so productive?
JM: I’m a full-time writer and a high-output writer. I like working fast and I like working a lot. I tend to write between two and four novels per year, usually in different genres; and I write comics for Marvel, Dark Horse, IDW, and more recently, DC Comics. I write short fiction, essays, and other material. And I edit anthologies. A lot of it is experience, learning how to manage my time and avoid time-wasting mistakes. A lot of it is a deep love for what I’m doing. After all, I get to play in my imagination all day long and then get paid for it. That’s a pretty nifty job, so why wouldn’t I want to do that all day long?
JA: What projects are you working on now?
JM: I’ve got a bunch of stuff on the burner and a bunch of stuff ready to come out. I just wrapped my new science fiction bioterrorism comic, Pandemica (IDW Publishing); I’ll be doing an original graphic novel for DC Comics. I recently finished the first of three linked science fiction novellas for Audble; I’ll be writing another novella that’s a prequel to a classic science fiction movie; I’m writing the 12th in the Joe Ledger weird-science/Special Ops thriller series, and signed to write the first two in a new series of epic fantasy/swords and sorcery novels about a new character, Kagen the Damned. That one would have fit very well into Weird Tales. And I have a successful adaptation of my ROT & RUIN young adult post-apocalyptic zombie series on Webtoons; and that same novel is in active development for film by Alcon Entertainment. My seventh ROT & RUIN novel, LOST ROADS, debuts in August; my upcoming middle grade anthology, DON’T TURN OUT THE LIGHTS—the official tribute to SCARY STORIES TO TELL IN THE DARK—debuts in September from HarperCollins in September; and in November my standalone horror novel, INK, debuts. I have a lot of stuff working at any given time, and that’s how I like it.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
James Aquilone was raised on Saturday morning cartoons, comic books, sitcoms, and Cap'n Crunch. Amid the Cold War, he dreamed of being a jet fighter pilot but decided against the military life after realizing it would require him to wake up early. He had further illusions of being a stand-up comedian, until a traumatic experience on stage forced him to seek a college education. Brief stints as an alternative rock singer/guitarist and child model also proved unsuccessful. Today he battles a severe chess addiction while trying to write in the speculative fiction game.
His first novel, DEAD JACK AND THE PANDEMONIUM DEVICE, has been optioned for film and TV. His short fiction has been published in such places as Nature's Futures, The Best of Galaxy's Edge 2013-2014, Unidentified Funny Objects 4, and Weird Tales Magazine. He lives in Staten Island, New York, with his wonderful wife. Sign up for his newsletter here: http://eepurl.com/bx5axT or visit DeadJack.com.