“I think the internet is a great marketing tool–but marketing is not my job. I’m a writer. My job is to write novels.”

I know that I, personally, lost respect for writers who, when there was a downturn in the market, started shouting from the rooftops that they wrote thrillers and suspense novels rather than horror.

Like most authors, I’m a raging egomaniac. I know that about myself. And I know that, if I had internet access,

Hope was a dangerous emotion that more often than not led men into foolishness and peril, made them risk their lives and lose their wives and part with fortunes that they never recovered.

Life is short. Eternity is long.

I would waste countless hours looking up things about myself, writing fake posts about how great I am and arguing with people who don’t like my work. It saves me a lot of time and frustration to just stay out of the loop.

Real life was messier than fiction, and in it you didn’t always have time to do or say the right things.

I write horror because I enjoy it. I’m endlessly fascinated by the supernatural, by death, by darkness. And, to be honest, I don’t have much choice. This is the way my mind works.

Horror writers can write about everything in the real world that a mainstream novelist can–plus the supernatural, which is the most fertile field for metaphor imaginable.

The Revelation was my master’s project, and after I finished it, I thought I’d send it off to a publisher and within a year or so be a rich and famous writer.

In real life, good people die all the time and a**holes can live long and happy lives. It’s a crapshoot.

Murder is an inherently evil act, no matter what the circumstances, no matter how convincing the rationalizations.

I write horror. And if no one wants to buy my books, I’ll just keep writing them until they do sell–and get a job at Taco Bell in the meantime.

It helps readers identify with their problems. It also helps ground the supernatural events that follow in a recognizable reality and perhaps gives some of my wilder scenarios a little verisimilitude.

As far as I’m concerned, those wussboys should sever all ties with the horror community if that’s the way they feel and get out of the way so real horror writers can do their work.

I write what I want to write. Period. I don’t write novels-for-hire using media tie-in characters, I don’t write suspense novels or thrillers.

I think readers appreciate those of us who stay in the trenches and fight the good fight even when times get tough.

Generally the reason they fail in the job is, you made some mistake in the hiring process in that you didn’t match… them to the needs of your company accurately enough. That’s the #1 reason this fails. And that’s generally a good place to start.

The job of the evangelist is never easy.

Once a job it has begun, do not stop until it’s done. Whether it is big or small, do it well or not all.

How do you make your company a good place to work in general? That’s a really really really large and complex set of skills.

If you ask any police officer what the worst part of the job is, they will always say breaking bad news to relatives, but this is not the truth.

If you have never done the job, how do you know what to want?

I have to tell you that June Cleaver had a job in ‘The New Leave It to Beaver.’ She did. Sure, she was a council woman.

You wouldn’t show up to a great job with a terrible resume, so don’t show up to a great man with a terrible past.