by Joel Glover.
In conversation with Steve Hugh Westenra – author of The Erstwhile Tyler Kyle (TETK), The Wings of Ashtaroth (WoA), and So Sing the Barrows (SSTB).
You’re originally from the UK, right, but moved to Canada? How does that background creep into your writing and cultural contexts?
That’s right!
Now, it’s important, I think, to note that I was one year old when my family moved to Canada, so I did grow up here. That said, Newfoundland, my home province, is very much a small community in a way that will be familiar to others who’ve lived in small communities. I say this not as a judgement, but as a piece of honest reporting, that to be a Newfoundlander in a way that other Newfoundlanders will recognize, you really have to have a family history there. Back in the 90s, when I grew up, this was arguably even more true. The population in the town of CBS (Conception Bay South), where I was raised, was mostly made up of people whose families had fished Newfoundland shores for generations. At school–at least up until a Dutch girl moved to town when I was in junior high–I was the foreign, exotic kid. The fact that a white person from England was in any way “exotic” will probably communicate a lot. People are mostly very friendly in Newfoundland, I think, in the way that people everywhere are, ultimately. But I think there was a very particular way in which I saw even adults being standoffish toward my parents and our family out of what, upon reflection, was probably a fear of being judged on some level, and that itself instead turned into judgement. I’ve grown to recognize that defensiveness in many new contexts since then, and I’m sympathetic toward it, because often a small bit of patience is what it takes to defuse those feelings.
This is particularly interesting to me because The Erstwhile Tyler Kyle has a thematic element of small town isolation and a community turning in on itself.
Newfoundland is an odd, beautiful place to be from (and not from), and as an odd person it was probably one of the best places I could have grown up. It is home, and I’m quite happy to be both of it and, simultaneously, an eternal outsider.
There was this weird disjuncture when I moved to the mainland. Whereas back home, when people asked where I was from, I’d give the name of the town I grew up in (CBS), but saying I was from England originally was part of my rote response. On the mainland, people seemed to react strangely to “Newfoundland, but England originally,” especially when they learned how young I’d been when we moved, so gradually I shifted that to just “Newfoundland.” I also learned the name Conception Bay South was funny to anyone not from there (it’s honestly one of the less strange Newfoundland place names!), so if I’m feeling fun I might slip that in there to make someone smile.
All that preamble is to say that, I think it would be impossible for my confused cultural context not to slip into my work. Many of my characters tend to be outsiders of some kind, and often they’re outsiders to the community where the story takes place (whether they’re immigrants like I am, religiously Other, or a literal traveller).
How would you characterise your cultural diet, in those formative years – was it parental reaching back to the UK, was it “immigrants seeking to include themselves in new environment”? Was it a strange mix of the two?
I think mostly the first? Partly it was that CBS is a very small town, so unless you already knew people, you wouldn’t really know what was happening locally. It wasn’t like a big city where you have posters and flyers advertising events, and typically it was mostly get-togethers between locals rather than formal gatherings oriented around something like theatre, a movie, or an exhibition. There was more of that in St. John’s (the provincial capital), but even then not as much as you would think.
I’ve always found my UK-ness a bit “off” though. My parents left in the late eighties, so a lot of what I absorbed from them is a bit like a cultural moment frozen in time. I suspect, too, that my family would have been considered a bit eccentric even back in the UK.
I do think questions of belonging and a kind of yearning for emplacement, or rootedness find their way into my work through a number of avenues. And there’s a way I tend to combine cultural artefacts that, sometimes very intentionally, draws on both my Newfoundland and my English background. In So Sing the Barrows, my upcoming, Norse-inspired fantasy, I very deliberately infused the culture and language of my characters with bits of Newfoundland English, my dad’s Derbyshire background, and my Mom’s Fulbourn accent.
Wings is an absolute doorstop of a book, a proper exemplar of modern epic fantasy, which felt more inflected by fellow canuck Guy Gavriel Kay than the Tolkien-aspirant waves… then you move to Erstwhile, which has the bright veneer of a YA protagonist but I would say is definitively not YA for all that. Now you’ve written a Norse inspired fantasy, and nordic is frequently a signal that things are going to get grimdark… what’s your approach to selecting themes, tropes, settings, and narrative, and what does it mean for the future?
This is such an excellent question (and set of observations!). I’ll comment first that I was (perhaps surprisingly) a bit of a latecomer to GGK. Even now, I’ve only read one of his books (though I plan to read others, as I’ve been told I’d really love his stuff). The work of Tad Williams, Mervyn Peake, and George R. R. Martin was probably more of an influence on Wings, along with the usual wide variety of stuff that always creeps into my writing.
It’s funny that you bring up the Grimdark/Nordic connection, because with So Sing the Barrows, my intention was actually to write something more lighthearted than Wings. It was my “funny” book, before I’d written TETK. Now, it feels a lot darker to me, but I do think the darkness still has more to do with its set pieces rather than its themes or tone. It’s very tongue-in-cheek in places and there’s some camp humour there that preceded (or predicted) some of the directions I went in TETK.
In terms of how I settle on themes, tropes, settings, etc, a lot comes through in the writing. Certainly, theme is something I don’t usually nail down in a concrete way, and that I tend of think of as something that naturally layers itself (or that becomes layered) in the telling of any story. Sometimes, a particular motif or idea will stand out and serve as the jumping off point for theme. So, for example, sacrifice in The Wings of Ashtaroth. The more I wrote of the story (and, later, the more I edited the story), the more that motif became layered in (I hope!) more complex ways, developing theme. When it comes to tropes–or, what we now think of popularly as tropes–I think the conversation these days is much more complicated than it needs to be. You see endless posts either defending or decrying the use of tropes, as though they’re something you can actively choose to avoid. Really, in the way the term is used now, tropes are simple “options for things that can happen in or be true of a story.” There’s no way to avoid that, and it’s laughable that someone would try. I do dislike the way so-called trope-based marketing has come to dominate. You’ll pick up a book in the bookstore sometimes and it’ll just say “[insert fandom character] x [insert fandom character], archetype, archetype, snow vibes,” and nothing else. There’s something anti-intellectual about it that feels very corporate to me. I often see it leading to disappointment from readers as well. Someone will have picked something up based on the trope a publisher chose to emphasize in the marketing, but the trope or character archetype won’t be done in the really specific way that particular reader likes, and then they complain (as a note, this has never happened to me personally–I don’t have a publisher!). If our expectations of a book become so specific that there’s no room for creativity, originality, or the subversion of expectation, I think that’s a real shame, and a genuine detriment to our continuing ability to think both creatively and critically.
That was a bit (a lot!) of a tangent, apologies! It’s just a term that I think evokes a lot of intense feelings and opinions in myself and other people.
In terms of how different elements of a story come to me, or how I decide on them, I think it’s often really random. Sometimes, it is a particular atmosphere that comes to me seemingly out of nowhere (but really, is probably the result of the colour of the sunset making me feel a certain way, or, less romantically, a weird meal I ate that was slightly off and that I probably should have tossed days ago). I think I tend to absorb a lot of material from disparate places before I feel fully ready to write. I might have the skeleton of an idea: a priest chooses to burn an infant in sacrifice to avert worse disaster and a demon assaults a crown prince, leading his courtiers to believe he’s mentally unstable (Wings); a closeted young man travels to an isolated island ruled by a despotic mayor and where a gruesome and mysterious ritual is taking place (TETK); there are Viking who are lesbians (So Sing the Barrows). My latest non-sequel project was the result of watching a lot of reality TV and becoming fascinated by the psychology of that.
If I am right, you’re an academic – how is that pairing with the writing, do you get to cross research streams, how does one support the other (or undermine it?)
This is a great follow-up to the above question! The skills you develop as an academic and researcher are really helpful for a writer (and, honestly, in any field or for any person). In the humanities and social sciences, while you do train as an expert on particular topics, the bigger part of what a degree like that does for you is teach you how to research, which includes critically assessing sources, etc. I don’t think there would be a way for me not to use those skills when researching for my fiction, because it’s not something you can (or should) easily turn off. While when brainstorming for my fiction I often start off with fragments, traces, vague vibes, etc, it inevitably always turns into research. Some of the fruits of that research won’t end up on the page in a tangible, obvious way, but it all helps, I think, to enrich the work as a whole.
In terms of specifics, my History and Religious Studies background definitely helped inform how culture, religion, and history play out across my work (but most obviously in Wings and SStB). Because I work on horror and monsters academically, I will say that part of me was hesitant for a long time to write a book whose primary genre was horror. It felt like crossing two different realms, in a way. I’m glad I did though. I think I was worried because as a reader and viewer of horror I’m very picky, and I didn’t want to do a poor job. It ended up being an incredibly fulfilling experience though.
What prompted the shift in genre, and what are your plans for the next thing?
My friend pressured me! Ahaha. I wish it was deeper than that. As I said, I was nervous about writing fiction in this genre that I was such a huge fan of, as well as an academic expert on. Horror always made its way into my work though, so it was definitely a natural progression. During the pandemic, I got really close with SStB to landing an agent, but a very positive R&R turned into a rejection. I’d definitely got my hopes up way too much with it and was really depressed afterwards. A friend was encouraging me to write something new and asked about other ideas I’d had for stories. I told her about this really old short story I’d started that was the basis for TETK, and she encouraged me to write it and to write fully in the horror genre. I immediately knew the atmosphere and affective response I wanted to create with the story, so along with the skeleton plot it’d had ten or fifteen years before, I had this vibe I was anxious to evoke. One of the best things that’s come from putting the book out there has been seeing readers really latch onto and identify the exact feeling I was trying to create.
How much does lurking on the internet inform your writing?
Probably more than it should but less than you’d think! Wings was the least influenced by the internet, because the initial concept for it was something I dreamed up when I was 13-14 and didn’t have the internet or really use it. SStB was directly influenced in that it was actually a Twitter post that led me to writing the book. If I remember correctly (and unfortunately now I can’t check, because I’ve since deleted my Twitter), I posted something like: “I think I’ll write a book about lesbian Vikings” and people responded very positively. It was super random! Then a few months later, if I remember rightly, that article about the two Viking women found buried together went viral.
I will say, I wrote SStB to get published. I’d absorbed a lot of the wisdom various querying gurus and agents had generously shared through a number of sites, and wrote SStB to be a kind of (at the time) ideal length for a fantasy novel, whose inciting incident was in the first chapter, etc, etc (when I got into Pitch Wars, the inciting incident actually got pushed back, haha).
TETK is very very informed by onlineness. Early on, one of the questions I decided I wanted to explore was how being online changes us, and this divide between the IRL and online self. In a larger sense, it’s about identity and how our identity is never really one thing, but many things. Originally (way way back when I’d written the start of TETK as a short story), Tyler was a biology grad student investigating a rare bird on this isolated island. When I decided to revisit the story, I changed him to an online cryptid investigator. It was sort of random, sort of not. I needed something I felt more comfortable writing (I’m not a biologist, though I’m fascinated by biology!), and both the themes of parasocially identifying with online people; obsessing over these imagined, one-sided relationships; and of creating a false or alternate, fictional persona really spoke to me. I’ve never been as online as most people in my generation and younger, but I had roleplayed very intensely with two of my best friends from childhood through my twenties, and taking on the roles of those characters definitely impacted how we all interacted with each other and the world in a way I wanted to explore.
Having decided I wanted my MC to be a cryptid investigator and actor, I almost randomly decided to draw on the dynamic that Ryan Bergara and Shane Madej had/have on the YouTube show Buzzfeed Unsolved (now, Ghost Files). I already knew the heart of the story in terms of the emotional background for my MC, Tyler, had to do with this unrequited love he felt for his co-host/best friend (one that had been cultivated through he and Josh’s playing of these two online versions of themselves). The comedic duo dynamic of BU really fit that, and tied in with a very random influence–this movie I watched with my parents as a teenager in which there was this Hollywood comedy duo, one of whom was secretly in love with the other and who had mistakenly come to believe through their comedy routines that his partner shared his affections. I can’t remember the movie now, but I think that storyline was actually the b-plot, so if anyone remembers what it was, please let me know!
I came to BU later than most people who watched it, I think. I listen to a lot of true crime podcasts and shows and it was one I’d put on sometimes while I made lunch. Once I decided I wanted to draw on the show’s dynamic, I became really interested in online personas and fandom in a way I hadn’t been before. A friend turned me on to some stories about people being unhealthily obsessed with the personas of various YouTubers and online celebrities, and that became even more deeply important to the book. I definitely became much more of a fan of the show (Ghost Files), as a result of writing the book, which was honestly kind of neat. There’s a beauty to fan culture in some ways, to feeling like you’re enjoying something alongside other people. At the same time, TETK is also about the toxicity of online fan communities–something I definitely witnessed more as an outsider than an insider. I didn’t grow up with fanfic like a lot of queer people of my generation and younger did, so a lot of the detail in terms of fanfiction (specifically, Young Justice) was mined from my partner, who knows much more about it than me.
So TETK is very about onlineness (specifically, about the negative impact it can have on us and our senses of self), but it’s also about the self in general and about the roles we play throughout our lives. The topic of authenticity is such a big one nowadays, and it’s this term that in an online context has almost come to mean its opposite. One must seem authentic rather than be authentic (as a child I was always troubled by those Pantene shampoo commercials advertising “hair so healthy-looking it shines”–why only healthy-looking and not “healthy”?). Gradually, I’ve come to think of the authentic self as something of a white whale, or maybe “a Don Quixotian quest” is a better fit. Tyler, in TETK, is a little bit enslaved, I think, to this idea of authenticity, or finding his true self, that he forgets to be himself, or misses the things that have always been “real” about him. He thinks he’s only able to understand himself through his stage roles and through his online persona, in a parallel way to the stalker who believes they understand Tyler and his co-host through the fiction they’ve constructed about them.
This is a good place to wrap up – on a point where we are discussing understanding each other and ourselves through the lens of fiction!
Regardless of your taste, Steve has something for you – I heartily recommend you go and check it out.
Steve
Steve is a trans author of fantasy, science fiction, and horror (basically, if it’s weird he writes it).
He grew up on the eldritch shores of Newfoundland, Canada, and currently lives and works in (the slightly less eldritch) Montreal. He holds advanced degrees in Russian Literature, Medieval Studies, and Religious Studies. His current academic work focuses on marginalized reclamations of monstrous figures. He teaches the History of Satan and Religion and its Monsters.
In 2018, Steve’s lesbian Viking novel, Ash, Oak, and Thorn, was selected for the Pitch Wars mentoring program and agent showcase. During Pitch Wars, Steve was lucky to receive mentorship from fellow queer author, K. A. Doore.
His queer horror comedy, The Erstwhile Tyler Kyle, was mentored by Mary Ann Marlowe in the inugural #Queeryfest class.
He is a SPFBO9 entrant.
Steve is passionate about queer representation, Late Antiquity, and spiders.
Joel
Punk, poet, extrovert, accountant, and reformed mandarin, Joel is a cuddly teddy bear really. He lives in the woods of Hertfordshire with two boys and one wife.
He writes fantasy with a sardonic but romantic vein, heavy on politics, neurodiversity, LGBTQ themes and menace. He also writes poetry, science-fiction short stories, picture book scripts (with significantly less menace).