WiHM: Quick Six Questions With Lydia Prime

Welcome to The Horror Tree, and thank you for participating in Women In Horror Month. First, tell us a bit about yourself and your interest in horror. 

Thank you for having me, it’s an honor and a pleasure! I’m Lydia Prime—just your typical soulless ginger kid, trying to steal everyone else’s—no big deal, right?

My interest in horror stems from childhood if I’m completely honest. I was always a bit… off. My infatuation with all things mysterious and spooky peaked after I received a deep sea creatures book. Upon seeing some of those terrifying beasties, boogie-men became real, and I wanted to find them—I wanted to find others outside the depths.

I suppose it goes without saying at this point, but I love, love, love creatures! The freakier the better. My favorite part of horror is getting to go on a wild ride with the unfortunate characters in universes created for them. There’s something hauntingly beautiful in being able to vicariously live through their experiences and feel what they feel. I found that while my real life was chaotic (to say the least), I could put those issues into my own works. Having the ability to share my own monsters (real and imaginary) and fears (also, real and imaginary) through writing gave me a catharsis I’ve never turned away from. 

A few years back, Nina D’Arcangela took a chance on me. She brought me into her world and welcomed me to the Sirens Call Publications family. Although I stepped down from my role at SCP, we still work closely to keep the Ladies of Horror Picture Prompt Challenge going every month on her blog, Spreading the Writer’s Word.

When I’m not working to promote the work of others in our community, I’m always working on the next project, piece, or finding a way to summon the undead. Y’know, just girly things. 

Why is Women In Horror Month important, and what do you say to someone who says ‘Oh, I don’t care if it’s by a man, a woman, etc., as long as it’s a good story’?” 

Women in Horror Month is extremely important for countless reasons. It provides a spotlight that isn’t always available to us. When the entire community comes together to promote each other it’s amazing to discover work you might have missed otherwise. There’s a glass ceiling in every industry, but Women in Horror Month seems to be the crack in the glass that can shatter any barrier.

While I understand the desire to want to be known by the quality of one’s work rather than their preferred gender, I’m not sure we’ve reached that point just yet. To those who say, “It doesn’t matter as long as the story is good!” Well, you’re right, it doesn’t matter—BUT—the problem is that in this case, you might miss a quality story just for the gender bias that lurks around our world.

Our visibility has always been impeded with so many random road blocks, but Women in Horror Month has been the beacon that demanded we be seen. 

Who are some Women In Horror (or other women) who have influenced your work, and why?

Ahh! There are so many amazing women who’ve influenced, guided, inspired, and helped me with my work and the search for my voice. I’m going to try and limit myself to four (in no particular order), if I didn’t, the list would be almost infinite!

Nina D’Arcangela of course, she’s been a massive help and an amazing friend. Her meticulous nature matched with my own, driving our need to find the exact right combination of words to make a piece go from flat to gut wrenching. She’s got a masterful way of storytelling that has definitely helped shape the way I think about setting up a piece from beginning to end. 

Angela Yuriko Smith’s pieces that she contributes to Nina’s Ladies of Horror project are always next level for me. Some pieces may be shorter than others, but they pack in all the emotion and twisted turns that give me chills. Her kindness and humor is unmatched and I’m pretty sure Super Slug and the War Pigs know what I mean.

Jill Girardi has become an irreplaceable staple in my daily life. From bouncing ideas, to reading each other’s work and finding ways to improve together—we’re two creepy peas in a pod that will explode to unearth lots of freaky monstrosities. Working with her has been nothing short of fun and inspiring. She is one of the most humble people I know, and has got some of the most engaging characters. Not to mention how awesome it is that she has a press (Kandisha Press) that’s solely dedicated to the voices of women in our genre—how cool is that? 

Gillian Flynn, I can’t help but admire her work. She has these wicked characters who are so tremendous and sometimes a bit nuts. The way she wrote Libby Day in Dark Places was so darkly amusing and somewhat relatable. (Truth be told, I’m still reading it… so.. no spoilers!)

 2020 will probably be remembered as a TERRIBLE year for many of us; tell me something GOOD that happened in the past 12 months.

In the last 12 months, I made new friends in the community who, coupled with my pack, have been helping me push out of my shell. I’ve had several stories included in the Kandisha Press Women in Horror anthologies (the most recent one having been released Feb 1st!). My story that appeared in the first volume (Under Her Black Wings), Sadie, won the Critters 23rd Annual Readers Poll for Best Horror Short Story of the Year. 

What have you got planned for Women in Horror Month, and the coming months of 2021? 

My plans for Women in Horror Month were initially to promote all the womenz! With The One That Got Away having been released days ago, I definitely intend to do a deep dive into it and check out what everyone’s written. I also stock piled several books written by women I’m not particularly familiar with so that I can find some new faves. 

For the coming months, I’m not entirely sure. I’ve got my hands in a couple of projects that are still in top secret mode. I wanted to give myself a shot at writing longer fiction and/or a novel, but we’ll see if that works out, haha!

Is there anything else you’d like to tell our readers? 

Thank you for celebrating this fantastic community, it’s so great to see everyone work together and to be introduced to new people every year! This is one of the very few places I’ve ever found comfort from and didn’t have to hide my oddball tendencies. Stay spooky!

Thanks for participating in Women in Horror Month! 

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