Books to Die For

Sinister Seven: TONYA LIBURD on Women in Horror Month and more

Another February, another Women in Horror Month. How to celebrate this year? I invariably find myself asking this question every winter. Over a half-decade in, we've heard from lots of women in horror about lots of varied experiences, both good and bad. But this got me thinking, who do we not hear enough from? The conclusion I came to is perhaps a surprising one - or perhaps not. Every February we hear from the women who've made it, the women who carved careers and legacies out of our beloved genre, but we hear much less from those who are battling their way up in the trenches right now, the next generation of voices in horror, if you will. So instead of another interview with another bestseller or seasoned scream queen, I cornered up-and-coming horror scribe Tonya Liburd, hot off the inclusion of her story "The Ace of Knives" in POSTSCRIPTS TO DARKNESS VOL. 6, to discuss what it's like starting out in the world of genre literature today as woman and person of colour.

It's Women in Horror month, a celebration of female horror creatives and creators that leaves some folks feeling a bit cold. What's your opinion on WiHM, necessary or not, and why?

Oh, it's necessary. And not necessary in the way where you can just put a white woman into the all white male equation and then claim "diversity!" There has to be more than that.

What has your experience in the genre been like so far, both as a woman and a person of colour?

Without getting into specifics, there has been, and continues to be, places, events, where I go in and not only do I feel like what I call "feeling like a speck of black pepper in a sea of white bread," there's a decidedly Eurocentric vibe that you felt you just couldn't penetrate. I've been to conventions where there's a diversity panel and all the panelists are white. Yes, that happened, and one older woman of colour in the audience addressed it. But I can't say it's all been unfriendly; I started being involved in the Toronto convention scene since 2003, dipped off the radar for some years, and came back. There are very friendly and supportive people. But things have to improve.

People still refer to the horror as something of "white men's club," do you agree or do you feel this is finally beginning to change? If you think the latter, what do you credit with being the impetus behind that change?

I'm new to horror, but that, yeah, that is what I've heard people say. I'd like someone else than Linda Addison to win a major award in my lifetime, and people like Usman not have to tie with someone else, and win an award solo, on their own feet.

I read your excellent horror short THE ACE OF KNIVES in preparation for this interview, it's a piece that deals with violence, mental illness and dysfunctional families, among other timely topics, can you tell me a little bit about your inspiration behind it?

They say, "write what you know", right? Well, it's not biographical, but there are pieces of me in there. I know pain. I know isolation. I'm extremely familiar with mental health illness issues and child abuse issues. I've been through the child welfare system and it's not a walk in the park. Just not a couple years ago was it, a Children's Aid group home was tied in with child trafficking. I'm what you call "system shy," like most street youth are - like the protagonist in The Ace Of Knives is - which necessitates places exist like the Evergreen, just south of Covenant House by Yonge and Gerrard. You'd have termed me a "system kid" rather than a "street kid." The last time, several years ago, when I poked my head in that fancy-dancy building Covenant House's got now, one of the staff behind the front desk remembered me. I was supposed to be one of those that would make it. I'm passionate about these things, and I wanted to have my say on paper, somehow, in some way.

What sparked it? Reading Amal-el Mohtar's lovely "Wing" over at Strange Horizons, reinterpreting a gamer's name while killing pixels in Team Fortress 2, and someone telling me, "Don't apologize for what you have to write. Ever. Don't censor yourself. Because if you do that you'll never get to what you need to write. Don't apologize for what you have to write." That literally unstopped the cork for me, and for the first time in my life, I got a first draft of a story over the course of a weekend. It normally took longer for me.

I absolutely love that you use both non-white central characters and what feels like a bit of ethnic folklore in the story, why is it important that readers get exposed to tales from a wide variety of cultures and experiences, and make an effort to read outside of their comfort zones?

Because, quite frankly, most of the world ISN'T white. I grew up in Trinidad, which should consider changing the national anthem bit that goes, "Where every creed and race finds an equal place" to "where every creed and race finds an equal place in the gene pool." Anyway, I am what you'd call black, but my ancestry has three races in it, and not that far back, either; like great-grandparents. so this informed my worldview, which was, by default, inclusive. Most North Americans... don't have inclusive worldviews or attitudes, and I'm risking alienating folks by saying I consider those attitudes backward.

Don't go outside your comfort zone so you have some new material to exploit in your fiction. We're not looking for white people to start going around and telling what are our stories [are]. Because Nisi Shawl used the Ace of Knives in her workshops to showcase code switching (seamlessly going from vernacular/dialects to standard English). I'd recommend her material on Writing the Other for the sincere.

As a female POC and a writer, is there a particular type of horror story or subgenre of horror that appeals to you? Perhaps a part of the genre you feel could really benefit from having more diversity injected into it.

Hm. As I said, I'm still new to horror, and am not as well-read as I'd like to be. I'm enjoying Lucy Snyder's While the Black Stars Burn, and I recommend Eden Royce's Spook Lights collection, Claude Lalumiere's The Door to Lost Pages, and I'm still getting through Victor LaValle's The Devil in Silver. There's all kinds of monsters from non-Western traditions and folklore. I utilize them all the time in my short fiction and in the novel I'm finishing up.

As I'm sure you are aware, the World Fantasy Awards decided late last year to the replace the Lovecraft statuette with a different image, largely due to some of HPL's more problematic writings about race. Do feel this was the right decision? And how should we handle other literary legends that have a similar tarnish on their otherwise influential body of work?

I was the sort of kid - now mind you, I was in Trinidad growing up as a kid, not in North America - and I recall being replled by black-and-white films and old-time movies. They were stark reminders of what I considered backward, and a more oppressive time. If my family were a black North American-based one, we wouldn't be able to vote, and so much more. We don't go around saying the "N" word at all down there, either. Richard Pryor did a piece where he talked about not using the N-word ever again after going to Africa.

So knowing that about me, you may guess that my thoughts are: yup, toss Lovecraft's racist facade off of the award statue. I'm not of the school of people who try and fool themselves by saying, "Well, he did this good work and we have to give him some leeway. NO. You can't separate the artist from their work that way; you're trying to hold up a horrendous status quo. Not to talk with authority on this, but Bill Cosby's sitcom legacy is completely tarnished. Michael Jackson's musical legacy was as well when the pedophile allegations came out.

Someone's a homophobe? A racist, misogynist? Worse to kids? Toss them out, AND their work. Why give them ANY royalties or profit, or credit?

Read more from Tonya at her blog at Spiderlilly.com