PH - I had the pleasure of asking actor, writer and director Annie Knox some questions about her debut novella, and her love of the genre. Below is the interview in full, enjoy!
Please tell us a bit about yourself and your relationship with the genre?
AK - So I’ve always loved horror a lot- even as a kid I absolutely loved ghost stories- but as I got older I think I started to use horror and other genres (psychological dramas, thrillers, stories with dark themes) as a way to explore the world and my relationship with it. I’m a huge fan of authors such as Stephen King, who don’t just write scary ghost stories but who explore the humans and the characters and look at both the darkness and the light in the situations they create.
I also love horror movies as well as books, and I love to work with dark scripts, both as a writer and an actress. They’re so much fun to explore and they really make you push yourself to the extreme and they help you to find some really deep and hidden parts of yourself.
There’s just something really captivating in fear I suppose!
PH - What was your introduction to the horror genre?
AK - Book wise definitely Stephen King- the first one I read was ‘Salem’s Lot’ and it remains a firm favourite, and then I remember reading David Gatwards ‘The Dead’ trilogy, and then ‘The Shining’. Movie wise I started off on ‘What Lies Beneath’ and then the original ‘Halloween’.
PH - Where do you get your inspiration?
AK - So many random places! Sometimes it just happens, like I’ll be walking down the road and see a pigeon and my brain will be like imagine catching and eating that (which is especially weird because I’m a vegan), and then two minutes later into walking I’ll be imagining some dystopian, post-nuclear war future where mutant pigeon cannibals rule the world. I can’t explain why that happens in my head haha!
Sometimes it’s simpler- things I see or hear that just spark an idea. Sometimes thinking about things I could have done in certain situations or the impact certain situations have had on me.
PH - Who are some of your favourite people working in the genre at the moment (both in the book world and in film)?
AK - Film- from the people I’ve worked with, some I would definitely call out are Andre Harrison (Ocular Noir Films) for originality with his amazing ideas! I’m a huge fan of Mycho films and both their horrorverse and their work ethic. And myself of course, haha! Bookwise- there are so many gems but David Wong is a massive stand out for me (John Dies at the End, Don’t Touch this Book it’s Full of Spiders).
PH - Please tell us a bit about your new novella?
AK - Dimension is something I’ve worked on for years and years and years now! I had this nightmare when I was really young where my bathtub floor opened up and I fell through with all the water into this weird haunted house. A bunch of my friends from primary school were there too, and the walls were covered in roots and vines that came to life and started to trap and suck everyone into the walls one by one. There were pumpkins everywhere (something that doesn’t feature in the book haha!) and I couldn’t find my way out and the plants kept grabbing at me. I always remember it because it freaked me out so much. At the very end, I think just before I woke up, I’d somehow gotten out and I was climbing up this hill opposite the house to try and get away, and when I turned back I could see people watching me from the porch on the front of the house.
Anyway, that was the birth of Dimension, which became a short story, and then over the years I would randomly find it and rewrite it. I actually had a draft of it when I was about sixteen that I entered into an anthology competition and the host got back to me to tell me he loved the story but it just didn’t quite fit, and so I got upset and hid it away again. And then a few years later rewrote it again, and then over and over. Last year I subbed it to like forty agents and publishers and got rejections from everyone who replied. And then in the end I thought even if it’s not good enough to publish traditionally, I can’t hold this to myself for the rest of my life because I worked so hard on it and I’m really proud of it and what I put into it personally, so I got my friend Ben to do the amazing cover art and just put it out there. I hope everyone likes it because it feels like it’s such a big chunk of me at this point haha! So many random little influences from my life growing up went into it as I revisited it over the years.
PH - And are there any other projects you're involved with at the moment that you'd like to talk about?
AK - You know sadly pretty much everything I had planned has fallen victim of the #coronacancel. It’s a bummer because I had one of my busiest ever months as an actress prepped to go!! But I’m making the best of it and working on a Covid19 themed anthology with my friend Dare Emmanuel, which we hope to release next week. I’ve got about 18 other book ideas I’ve been meaning to work on since then so it’s a challenge to see how much I can get done in that time! I hope everyone enjoys the book and stays safe.
Thank you again to Annie Knox for being the first Positively Horror interview.
Below is a list of links to Annie's work to check out:
Annie's showreel:
https://vimeo.com/395231716
Debut novella Dimenion:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0868X185B/ref=cm_sw_r_apa_i_XJCFEbMG3VPJ9
Cat and Mouse short film written and directed by Annie:
https://youtu.be/85L2gjSe4tY
Pandamonium from Mycho Entertainment featuring Annie:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07ZW8N3BQ/ref=cm_sw_r_apa_i_5VCFEbAF3DN3F
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