Some authors spend years perfecting the art of the jump scare. They study the rhythm of suspense, the geometry of the dark, the precise moment a door should creak. Richard T. Wilson has spent forty‑odd years doing something harder. He has helped teenagers feel seen.
Before he was the architect behind the Emmy‑winning teen drama Maple Ave—a series that, as his IMDb page notes, focuses on the everyday struggles of teens and their parents—before he co‑founded Mad Shelley Comics and poured his grief into the supernatural adventures of a ghost named Charlotte, Wilson was already asking horror’s most urgent question. Not what goes bump in the night. But why we open the door.
That question sits at the dark heart of Breach of the Soul, his latest novel, and of his celebrated Halloween Girl graphic novel series. Across more than seventy produced plays and films, work that has appeared on ABC World News Tonight, National Public Radio, PBS, and The Independent Film Channel, Wilson has always been less interested in the monster itself and more in the moment we invite it in. Evil, he argues, arrives in banal clothing. It offers a free alarm clock. We take the deal.
We’re all surrounded by evil and regularly invite it in because it’s giving away a free alarm clock that week. Evil always suits up in the most banal clothing.
Richard T. Wilson: The Horror of the Everyday
Let’s start at the very beginning. For our readers, please introduce yourself. Beyond the author bio, tell us a little about who you are when you’re not writing, what you love doing, what fascinates you, and what fuels your creativity.
Well, I’ve been married 37 years to a wonderful woman, and we have one amazing daughter and a nearly 19-year-old dog named Max (which I guess makes me The Grinch)! I’ve spent the bulk of my career trying to help teenagers feel seen via my film work in OutreachArts and our Emmy® Award-Winning TV drama series, MAPLE AVE. Now that I’m retired from film work, I spend my days writing the supernatural adventures of the ‘Halloween Girl’ in graphic and straight novel form.
In the early stages of a new project, what tends to come to you first: a compelling character voice, a central thematic question, or a vivid image/scenario? How does that initial spark then guide you in building the rest of the story?
I think it’s a series of visuals and whatever old music snippets are filling my head. I let them build to a crescendo and then start digging in and making notes. It all starts with a diary, writing down the randomness and then questioning it all until the meaning starts to reveal itself.
Every book has its own unique set of problems to solve. What was the most difficult ‘puzzle’ you had to crack while writing this book? Was it a plot hole, a character’s motivation, the structure, or something else entirely?
My latest book, ‘Breach of the Soul’ is a straightforward novel, consisting of two connecting stories. The connective tissue in this one is how we’re all surrounded by evil and how we regularly invite it in because it’s giving away a free alarm clock that week, or whatever! The harder part for me was tackling the beginning stages of evil worming its way into people’s lives in the second half of the book, since evil always cleverly suits up in the most banal clothing. I got there by comparing what things were like before the current rot had set in.
The journey from a finished manuscript to a book in a reader’s hands can be a surprising one. What was the most significant way your book evolved during the editing and publishing process, something you didn’t anticipate when you typed ‘The End’?
Well,I had been seriously ill prior to writing ‘Breach of the Soul’ and almost bought the farm so, I approached this book as if it were my last. I was surprised how much teen angst still animates my soul – the soundtrack for this one was very dark, Post-Punk! Honestly, writing ‘Breach of the Soul’ has reenergized me.
Once a book is published, it no longer entirely belongs to the author; it belongs to the readers and their interpretations. Has a reader’s reaction or analysis ever revealed something about your own work that surprised you?
I’m always surprised that readers pick up on the deep compassion I have for my characters. I keep thinking that intimacy is so under the radar, but apparently it’s not!
Writing is a demanding, often solitary pursuit. Beyond the apparent goal of ‘telling a story,’ what is the specific, personal fuel that keeps you going through the difficult stretches? Is it the joy of discovery, the need to understand something yourself, the connection with a future reader, or something else?
I love storytelling, and I’ve been writing since I was 10. For me, I can’t fully express myself any other way and I love connecting with other people via my work. Also, if you’re not continually curious, you’re dead!
We often hear about authors being influenced by other books. What are some non-literary influences on your work, such as a specific piece of music, a historical event, a scientific theory, or even a landscape, that have profoundly shaped your storytelling?
Gothic horror films and rock & roll (with a special emphasis on Post-Punk). My favorite band is the Psychedelic Furs, and Joy Division’s ‘Closer’ remains the height of teen angst for me!
Is there an author, living or dead, whom you consider a ‘silent mentor’? Not necessarily someone you try to imitate, but whose approach to the craft made you feel permission to write in your own way?
Yes – Ray Bradbury and *Rick Moody *(still very much alive!). When I read their work, I connect with their rhythms instantly! I believe an artist’s rhythm is a story in and of itself.
Who was the first person to see your early drafts, and why did you trust them with your unpolished work? What is the most valuable piece of feedback they gave you?
My good friend, Kevin McElroy read the first half of ‘Breach of the Soul’ last year. Kevin is an amazing illustrator and writer and we both love horror – but we’re very different people. So, I feel like I’m getting a fair read from him – and he liked it!
Horror is often most potent when it’s internal. Beyond external monsters, how do you explore the slow unravelling of a character’s sanity or the horror of their own mind?
In this day and age, it’s easy! I’m simply reflecting my own internal horror at what I see on the news every night. Over the last 10 years in America, the willfully ignorant have become the willfully evil – unfortunately, you don’t have to dig too deep!
Setting in horror is often described as a character in its own right. How do you approach transforming a location, whether a house, a town, or a landscape, into a source of active dread?
I grew up in a wonderful small town called Laurel Springs. I’ve simply inverted that same tight-nit community, having it turn in on itself – that’s my nightmare fuel.
Writing a terrifying buildup is one skill; delivering a satisfying payoff is another. How do you decide when to finally show the monster or reveal the source of the horror?
I don’t worry about the monsters – if the atmosphere doesn’t creep you out, then I haven’t done my job. People who invest so much in a monster remind me of football teams that put all their money on the quarterback. They usually approach genre writing like a religion too – which I have no time for.
The horror genre is rich with established tropes and archetypes. How do you engage with these familiar elements, the haunted house, the ancient curse, the final girl, in a way that feels fresh and surprising? Do you consciously seek to subvert a trope, or do you focus on executing it with such depth and authenticity that it becomes new again?
I only bring in things that still terrify me to this day. Cue the witches and demons! Only I can tell my stories so I don’t worry my approach – people either dig or they don’t.
How do you approach writing scenes of intense terror or violence to make them feel physically impactful without tipping into gratuitousness?
I hate violence and gore. However, if a main character doesn’t feel their life is at stake, what’s the point? So, I draw inspiration from classic fairy tales like ‘Hansel & Gretel’ and the terrifying Jenny Greenteeth – something from another world is out to get you! I have no time for gore porn.
Do you have a favourite line or passage from your work, and would you like to share it with us?
Alma really sums it up…
“…as the human race advanced, it became increasingly more insular. So self-
involved that it told itself a new story…that good and evil simply didn’t exist. They
convinced themselves that most everything that came before was ‘fake’, that life was really
just one big ‘gray area’, and all at great expense to their souls.”
What is the specific, core truth you are trying to expose or explore through your horror?
That WE are the horror – and only we can save ourselves from its grasp.
You have precisely two minutes in a crowded bookstore to hook a reader who is skeptical of the entire horror genre. They look at your book’s cover and ask, ‘Convince me. Why should I read this? I don’t even like being scared.’
It’s both a teen adventure story and an allegory for the dark times we live in.
Fifteen-year-old Julie runs away from her abusive parents, heading for the shelter of an abandoned shack in the woods, remembered from childhood, and discovers it far from empty. A duplicitous witch, a mysterious teen ghost from the 80s, and, later, a collection of devils await her on the other side of the door.
The helpful ghost ultimately helps her escape, but first she must navigate the hellscape beneath them – home to the diabolical Wood Devils (who look suspiciously like her neighbors). The second part of the book continues in the world of the ‘Halloween Girl’ as the Wood Devils attempt to extend their evil reach through a campaign of lies and bigotry.
Julie joins Charlotte, Poe and their faithful feline, Simone, to uncover who or what is really behind two senseless murders in Crystal Springs, as the ‘Halloween Girl simultaneously struggles with her faith in humanity.
Richard T. Wilson
Emmy® Award Winning writer, Richard T. Wilson serves as the President of RTW Productions, Inc., home to nationally recognized educational film company, OutreachArts, Inc., its award-winning, sister company, Mad Shelley Films and the Rondo Nominated, Philip K. Dick Film Festival, New York Science Fiction & Horror Film Festival & New Media Film Festival Award-Winning, Mad Shelley Comics. To date, he has had over 70 of his plays and films produced and seen some of this same work featured on ABC World News Tonight, National Public Radio, PBS and The Independent Film Channel. Aside from his ‘Halloween Girl’ related projects, Wilson is probably best known for creating the Emmy® Award Winning teen drama series, ‘Maple Ave’. For additional info. please visit http://www.rtwfilms.com
