As she says in the following email interview, Ellen Datlow has edited the annual anthology series The Best Horror Of The Year, “…(in one form or another) for 37 years.”
But in that same time, she’s also assembled collections of horror short stories around a theme or type of scare, including Body Shocks: Extreme Tales Of Body Horror, Screams From The Dark: 29 Tales Of Monsters And The Monstrous, and When Things Get Dark: Stories Inspired By Shirley Jackson.
Which brings me to her latest thematic anthology, Fears: Tales Of Psychological Horror (paperback, Kindle), which has stories by Joyce Carol Oates, Josh Malerman, Stephen Graham Jones, Priya Sharma, Margo Lanagan, and others.
In the following email interview, Datlow talks about how she defined the term “psychological horror” for this anthology, as well as how she chose the stories to include in it.
For people unfamiliar with the term, what is “psychological horror”? Or, more specifically, how did you define it when it came to this anthology?
I consider “psychological horror” horror that is primarily created by the actions / inaction of people — caused by their own failures, their own or someone else’s behavior and not by supernatural beings or events.
Who came up with the idea for Fears: Tales Of Psychological Horror?
The theme was discussed and agreed upon mutually by me and Jacob Weisman, publisher of Tachyon. I’ve edited several reprint anthologies for Jacob, and we always come up with our ideas for these books together. I love psychological horror and I figured that it was a broad enough theme with which I could collect a really interesting group of stories. Jacob always wants me to work with a broad theme so I can acquire a wide variety of stories
So, are the stories in Fears all-new — i.e., written for Fears — are they older stories, or a mix?
They’re all reprints because, as a small publisher, Tachyon can’t afford to pay me or contributors for an original anthology.
Aside from having to be psychological horror, how did you decide what stories to get for this anthology?
I already had in mind a few stories I wanted to use; stories I’d read and loved (and occasionally previously published on a website or in another anthology). I contacted dozens of writers whose published short fiction might have included stories of psychological horror. I let them know what I was looking for and asked them to send me a few possibilities.
And while talking to these writers, did any of them say, “You should talk to this person, they’d be perfect”?
Sometimes, while I’m working on a reprint anthology, a writer I ask for a story might recommend another writer or a specific story by someone else. I don’t recall if that happened with Fears.
What other parameters did the stories in Fear have to fit?
I ask for recent stories and those that have not been overly or recently reprinted.
Other than that, no.
But I usually don’t want stories that are too long, as they’d take up too much space in the book. Fears is about 118,000 words, with the longest stories being 11,000 and 10,300 words.
My guidelines initially stated that there could be supernatural aspects to the stories, but that the main thrust needed to be psychological. I soon removed that caveat because I was receiving too many submissions in which the supernatural was prominent.
As we’ve been discussing, all of the stories in Fears are psychological horror. But are there any other genres as well? Like, is there a sci-fi psychological horror story, or a romantic psychological horror story…?
In many of the stories crimes are committed (but dark crime is often psychological horror, it just depends how dark they are). Some are considered mainstream (“Endless Summer” by Stewart O’Nan and the classic “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” by Joyce Carol Oates).
As far as I can recall, there’s no science fiction in the book.
Stewart O’Nan, Joyce Carol Oates
So, how often while reading one of the stories in Fears did you regret reading it late at night and have to, I don’t know, chant your safe word or pet your dog until you calmed down?
Never. Horror never affects me that way.
Hollywood loves makes scary movies. Are there any stories in Fears that you think would work really well as a movie? And, more importantly, is one Hollywood would actually make into a movie?
The Oates’ is the second oldest story in the book (1964) and has already been made into the movie Smooth Talk with Laura Dern and Treat Williams.
Laird Barron’s “LD50” would make a great movie as it stars one of his best, ongoing characters: Jessica Mace. It’s an adventure as much as a horror story.
So, is there anything else you think people need to know about Fears?
Only that I’m really happy with the mix of stories I acquired for the book, and especially happy I was able to secure rights to the Oates, which is likely not well-known to the horror crowd. I always try to pick great stories that horror readers are unfamiliar with but that in my opinion they should be.
Finally, if someone enjoys Fears: Tales Of Psychological Horror, and it hasn’t scared them off reading for life, which of the other horror anthologies you’ve edited would you suggest they read next?
If they want to know what’s going in the horror field they might want to pick up the most recent The Best Horror Of The Year, The Best Horror Of The Year 15 [or, if you read this after October 29th, 2024, The Best Horror Of The Year 16], an annual reprint series I’ve been editing (in one form or another) for 37 years.
My most recent original anthology is Christmas And Other Horrors.
