This blog gives my perspective as an editor, but for once I had the chance to get someone else’s perspective. This week, I was able to ask Steve Diamond, author of Residue and Parasite (among others I haven’t yet reviewed) about his writing career, the nature of horror, and some advice on rewrites.

For those who don’t know him as the popular writing podcast the WriterDojo, Steve Diamond is an accountant, a former professional reviewer and bookseller, publisher of special editions, brisket connoisseur, and sworn enemy of the eldritch selachimorphs that have lurked in the depths of the oceans for millions of years. In fact, he goes into the latter in the excellent early episode of the above-mentioned podcast, Season One, Episode Twelve, “Horror” — an episode quite relevant to today’s post! If you’ve never listened to it, go ahead. This post will still be here when you get back.

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Novel Ninja: How would you describe yourself as an author?

Steve Diamond: Man, that’s a tough one. I think I try to be an entertainer. I’m not that guy that agonizes over every sentence. I don’t think I’ll ever be the guy that people call “literary,” and that’s fine by me. My only goal is to entertain… to have loftier goals than that feels hyper selfish and prideful to me.

Now after the entertainment factor, I’d say I’m rather mercenary. I’ll write whatever I’m paid to write. Maybe that’s straight-up Lovecraftian fiction, a Winnie the Pooh story (thanks public domain!), giant robots, or even a spy-thriller. I’ll write whatever I’m asked (and paid) to write. The great thing about this method is that I get to write all sorts of different things, and that keeps my stories fresh. It also helps me practice, which I think shows in my fiction.

Novel Ninja: I noticed that there’s a big difference between your books, with competent people facing overwhelming odds, and the popular image of horror that emphasizes helplessness in the face of madness. The latter has always been my concept of horror. Is your take on horror unique, or have I been missing out by effectively ignoring the genre?

SD: I’ve been on a ton of horror panels where the panelists will literally say, “Horror is victim fiction. If they aren’t the victim, it isn’t horror.” And out in the audience, I’ll see a lot of the attendees nodding their heads in agreement. I can’t really agree that that’s the only way to do horror. It’s certainly ONE way. But typically not the way I go about it.

Even if I have the main characters of a story be a victim in the beginning, the idea that they have to remain victims is boring to me. I want character growth and progress. I want them being active rather than passive. Competent characters rarely stay passive. Simply having the character’s mindset be, “I’m gonna figure this out, make plan (even a bad one), and move forward” makes a massive difference to readers, in my opinion.

Now, this doesn’t mean they will succeed. In fact, in horror the characters often fail. I often make the general observation that in Urban Fantasy, no matter how often the characters fail they’ll ultimately succeed. In horror, no matter how great things are going, the characters will ultimately fail. Of course there are a million examples to disprove the observation, even within my own writing. But it’s that attitude that I like. I love characters who grit their teeth and fail forward. Maybe the consequences of “winning” is their ultimate destruction. Or loss of sanity. But if the journey of a story is supposed to matter—and it does—then I want to journey with characters who are good at what they do, and push through the pain. And ultimately, I think showing how a competent character is sooooo far out of their depth can be really compelling and makes the reader cheer for them even more. And it makes the failures and triumphs mean more than if the characters just sat there and played the victim card for the whole story.

I can go on and on… but I don’t think anyone wants to hear me ramble any more than I have!

Novel Ninja: Even though expanded novels and second editions have been around since the invention of publishing, there’s been a long time bias against “correcting” novels. What made you decide to rewrite the book?

SD: I touch on this in the “Author Commentary” section at the end of the revised edition of Residue. There were a lot of reasons. I’m a better writer now than when I wrote the first version of the book. My initial two publishers didn’t implement copyedits into the novel, no matter how much I asked. Heck, they wouldn’t even put cover-quotes I’d obtained from Terry Brooks and Robert McCammon on the covers.

Apart from that, I was asked, “Well, who normally reads the book?” The answer was, “Adults.” Over the years, I got tired of the Young Adult market. Not the readers, but rather the industry. It became so politicized, and people were looking for reasons to drum up hate for the authors and their works. I initially wrote Residue because there were hardly any YA novels targeted at teen boys. But the industry did like that. In fact I was told by a publisher that they couldn’t buy it because the main character was a dude. So, when I was approached about doing a revision, the first idea was to age up the characters a tad bit. It actually helped get rid of a few logical issues form the original edition, but I didn’t have to change the actual story hardly at all.

Novel Ninja: What was your plan going into the rewrite? What did you need to consider first?

SD: I figured I’d just sit down and do some light edits to age up folks. It was supposed to be simple. Famous last words.

After the first page, I’d changed something in nearly every line. I’d cut, change, and add. It was way more intense that I originally thought it would be. By the time I was done, I’d added ten-thousand words by changing forty-thousand. For all intents and purposes, I kinda re-wrote the book.

So I ended up focusing first on cleaning the prose. Then I worked on clarifying places that upon re-read felt way too loose. Then I added some stuff as better foreshadowing into the sequel, Parasite. Then I aged up the characters and edited those ramifications through Residue and Parasite. And then I had a professional editor give it the business. It was a massive undertaking that probably took me as long to complete as writing the initial draft did.

Novel Ninja: What was the worst part for you? If you had to do it over, what would you change?

SD: For me it was reading the same things over and over. It was like I was doing a 100th draft. It often felt pointless.

But at the end of the day, the book is light-years better. The story hasn’t changed, I just executed a such a higher level. In 20 years I’ll probably look back and cringe, but that’s just the nature of getting better as a writer.

Looking back, though, I think I would change a couple things. Mainly I would tell my editor not to go at it so hard. He treated it like it was a brand-new book needing a full-on edit. Residue didn’t need that much attention. I wish I’d have had an edit like that at the beginning, back in the day. But now? It ended up bogging down the process.

Additionally, I there were times where I caught myself agonizing over a sentence, trying to figure out how to correct it… when no correction was needed. Going back, I’d trust my writing a little more.

Novel Ninja: How much of the rewrite was done specifically with the audiobook in mind?

SD: Not directly. So much of how I write now is with that in mind, but it’s not a conscious thought. I strip out a ton of dialogue tags. I use better descriptors. I read stuff out-loud to see how it sounds, and then adjust if it’s weird. For horror scenes I try to use gross words. I also try to turn exposition heavy scenes into conversations. All of this helps for audio, but it also just makes the book paced better.

Novel Ninja: How did you go about selecting a narrator?

SD: Simple: someone else picked for me. MA Rothman already knew an award-winning narrator, so it was an easy choice. He does a great job, because he can make himself sound younger than he is, which is perfect for this book.

Novel Ninja: What do you think indie authors should consider when preparing for an audiobook? Do you think it’s a good idea to write with audio in mind, even if it will be a long time before they might be able to hire a narrator?

SD: I think people should always write with audio in mind. Again, not only will it make an eventual audiobook better, but it will make the reading experience better as well. I say this regardless of whether or not the author actually has an audiobook produced.

I think the biggest things to consider are, 1) Is it even financially viable? In the beginning, it might not be. 2) Who is the narrator? Frankly put, if your narrator isn’t good, he/she is bad. There are no in-betweens. My first narrator sounded like a 60-year-old chain smoker. That’s good for a detective, but for teens? Nah. Again, this is why I like the new guy, Tim Campbell, so much. If the book is poorly narrated, or the reader just doesn’t fit, it won’t matter how good the story is. The listener will return the book. And don’t even get me started on A.I. narration. You’re just asking for negative reviews and press.

Novel Ninja: At the end of the book, you asked your readers if they’d like to see short stories in this universe, and to suggest characters and events they’d like to see covered. How has that response been? Have you written any of those stories, and if so, where can they be found?

SD: I’ve had a few people ask for stories about Wyatt in Vietnam. I mainly get asked for stuff that’s between novels. I have one of these stories partially written that takes between Residue and Parasite. It will likely be in a new collection of my shot fiction releasing next year.

Novel Ninja: A lot of people have benefited from your WriterDojo podcast. What’s the most noticeable way you’ve improved your own writing as a result of doing the podcast?

SD: For me, just saying things out-loud helps. By talking about my process, or about world-building, or characters, I find my brain starts internalizing it all on stories that I have in-progress. Whether it’s something I say myself, or something Larry Correia says, or our guests, I start thinking of things in different ways.

Mainly, Larry and I tend to be fairly positive on the show, and that positivity has helped me through some rough moments.

But at the end of the day, I’m just happy we’re helping people. New writers need to know that this while author thing isn’t magic voodoo. It’s not a mystery. And there’s no one way to do things, despite what they hear out in the world.

Novel Ninja: What’s the best way for readers to know about your upcoming releases and events?

SD: Oh, the usual places. Facebook and X. I have a website I haven’t had time to update in a while.

Honestly, I talk a lot about works in progress on the WriterDojo podcast. That might be the best place these days. I’ll likely send out newsletters as part of my publishing company, Diamond Editions. I produce limited editions there, but it will also be a home for my own work and news.

Novel Ninja: Other than your own, what novel would you like to plug that you don’t think gets enough attention? And what nonfiction book do you think every author in your genre needs to have?

SD: I think Twelve by Jasper Kent is highly underrated. Boy’s Life by Robert McCammon is one of my favorite novels that no one seems to have read. As for nonfiction… Boy I don’t know. Probably Band of Brothers by Stephen Ambrose. If I go nonfiction, I tend to go for documentaries for the visual aspect of it. I like WWII documentaries, and true-crime stuff. I also adore sports documentaries and books. I think sports show such a unique take on failing forward, and I try to implement those lessons and mindsets into fiction.

Novel Ninja: Thank you for taking the time to answer these questions!

SD: Any time! Thanks for the kinds reviews of the books!

I definitely gained a greater appreciation for horror from Steve Diamond’s description of failing forward, especially after he mentioned how sports documentaries depict that concept. I’m far from a sports fan myself (despite my wife’s efforts!), but that comparison crystalized for me at least one of the attractions of the horror genre.

Life is something that can beat you down. Maintaining optimism in the face of overwhelming struggle and insurmountable obstacles is difficult. Tolkien wrote in his famous essay “On Fairy Stories” that this is one of the purposes of fantasy: to provide a rest and respite from the drudgery of life. Horror, at least as Steve described it here, provides the same benefit from another direction. Instead of letting you take a break in a more wondrous world, horror lets us deliberately immerse ourselves in something existential with permission to fail. Steve prefers the kind of failure that comes from refusing to give up, where the character might lose himself in the darkness but goes down swinging.

Matching that up to sports was eye-opening for me. Underdog stories are one thing, but every description of the benefits of team sports I’ve ever read includes the character-building that comes with both accepting a loss and still playing your best even when that loss is inevitable. In this, it seems horror can prepare us for the struggles of life just as much as Tolkien’s preference for more optimistic fantasy.

I don’t know if I’ll be reading much horror in the future, but after talking to Steve about this I’m definitely open to the possibility.