We're Off To Never Never Land

Further to my delight in having sold my story "Being Needed" to the anthology Bluffs I found out that one of my favourite authors, Sean Costello, will also be in the same anthology.

When Sean's first novel Eden's Eyes came out in the late 1980's, I was delighted to discover that the novel (a wonderful horror novel about an eye transplant patient who receives the eyes of a deranged psychopath) was not only set in Sudbury, Ontario, but that the author was also from Sudbury. He then went on to write The Cartoonist (this one was set in Ottawa, where I'd moved to attend University, and featured an ancient mysterious patient in a hospital whose drawings were either predicting horrible fortunes, or perhaps shaping them). He followed that with Captain Quad (where a tragic accident leaves an "all-star" popular teen paralyzed from the neck down, sinking into a deeply passionate hatred with a result not unlike Stephen King's Carrie) and then took a hiatus from writing until he released his first non-horror title, a thriller with dark humour undertones, Finders Keepers (which follows a winning $10 million dollar Lotto 649 ticket down a path of greed, mayhem and murder) in 2002 and followed that up with another non-supernatural thriller entitled Sandman (about a psychotic anesthesiologist), which is on the list of one of the best thrillers I've ever read.

Sean is a brilliant writer who starts off with a quick and solid hit to the solar plexus, then he doesn't stop hitting you as the novel rolls on. You're compelling to keep reading the book until you get to the end, barely willing to pause to take a breath. His writing style is very readable and easy to lose yourself in. However, I think one of the things that makes Sandman so frightful is that Sean is actually an anesthesiologist. Imagine living in Sudbury, having read this book and then going in for an operation and there he is, the author of this book, a man who has created some truly frightening, shockingly evil characters, and he's the one putting the mask on your face and saying "okay, you're going to sleep now?" (and what did that quick wink he just gave me mean?)

Needless to say, I'm a huge fan of Sean's writing, and can't rave enough about his work. We've become friends, (I was fortunate enough to get a sneak peek at Sandman before it went into print, and was honoured that Sean actually trusted and valued my comments about it). Sean was actually a major catalyst towards me finally getting One Hand Screaming put together, and I'm happy to say that my writing has benefited not only from having read his writing, but also from the comments he's made on my own writing over the last couple of years (including my yet unpublished novel Morning Son. And now, my work will be appearing alongside his in an anthology featuring Sudbury area writers. That's quite a thrill for me. (Yes, I'm having a giddy schoolgirl moment . . .)