Brian Keene has written so many damn books!
…and I had never read any of them.
This absolute horror faux-pas (and my embarrassment) is the reason that it’s taken so long to get Brian on the show. But I set a week aside and read as many Keene books as I could and here we are… on a leisurely stroll through Brian’s life and career,both of which he has devoted to stories of really nasty s*** happening to undeserving people.
We talk abouthis bleak coming-of-age novel, Ghoul, his story of a homicidal nightfrom hell, The Complex, and his sombre study of mortality and writing inthe 21st century, The End of the Road.
And between all that we cover hope and nihilism, we ask if horror could help shore up the failing centre, and Brian talks me through all the great writers I missed when I wasn’t paying enough attention to horror.
Enjoy!
Other books mentioned:
The Rising (2003), by Brian Keene
Entombed (2011), by Brian Keene
Ghoul (2007), by Brian Keene
End of the Road (2020), by Brian Keene
The Cellar (1980), by Richard Laymon
The Beast House (1986), by Richard Laymon
The Island (1995), by Richard Laymon
A Writer’s Tale (1998), by Richard Laymon
The Girl Next Door (1989),
by Jack Ketchum
Survivor (2002), by J.F. Gonzalez
A Choir of Ill Children (2007) by Tom Piccirilli
“Sticks” (1974), by Karl Edward Wagner
“West Of Matamoros, South of Hell” (2017), by Brian Hodge
(in Best Horror of the Year, Volume 10, edited by Ellen Datlow)
The Day of the Door (2024),
by Laurel Hightower
The Better To Eat You With (2024), by Wesley Southard
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