We chat with author Lindy Ryan about Cold Snap, which follows a grieving mother and son who hope to survive Christmas in a remote mountain cabin, in this chilling novella of dread, isolation and demons lurking in the frozen woods.
Hi, Lindy! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?
Hello! I’m Lindy—professor by day, horror writer by night, and life-long spooky girl.
When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?
Elementary school Scholastic Book Fairs, hands down. Those of us who grew up in the nineties know there was nothing better than Book Fair days. I’d save up my allowances, scrape up extra money (I had a somewhat lucrative potholder-making business, thanks to a seemingly endless supply of loops and a very marketing-savvy great-grandmother), and wheedle my mother for every extra cent I could, and then I’d blow it all on Goosebumps and The Baby-Sitters Club (and stickers, always stickers). Reading those stories made me want to write more—and R. L. Stine forever remains my hero.
Quick lightning round! Tell us:
- The first book you ever remember reading: Piggle-Wiggle by Betty MacDonald.
- The one that made you want to become an author: Welcome to Dead House, by R. L. Stine.
- The one that you can’t stop thinking about: My favorite book of all time is Wally Lamb’s She’s Come Undone. Published in 1992, She’s Come Undone was Lamb’s debut novel, and selected as Oprah’s Book Club’s fourth book in December 1996. I mention the timeline because it’s important: She’s Come Undone is not horror as you might expect, but a coming-of-age odyssey that follows a sometimes unlikeable and always gritty Dolores Price. Both Dolores and I were thirteen in 1997 (when I first read the book), and both us slogging under the weight of troubled homes and bad attitudes. We’ve come a long way over the years, Dolores and I, and even as an adult, I still revisit my friend in those pages every year.
Your latest novella, Cold Snap, is out October 15th! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?
The brilliant and talented C. J. Leede, author of Maeve Fly and American Rapture, called it a “frost bite fever dream” and I could not think of five better words.
Where did the inspiration for Cold Snap come from?
Much to my son’s chagrin, I love to tell the story about how we once spent a winter solstice snowed into a cabin deep in the Pennsylvania Wilds when he left the lights in my Toyota on and killed the battery (he maintains he did not). Our family spent the night telling each other scary stories in front of a fire that absolutely refused to stay lit before walking miles through a blizzard for a replacement battery. That’s the true version of the story, and while my own experience deep in those frozen woods was quite different from the characters’ in Cold Snap, when I think back to that night, so long ago, it comes with a certain amount of grief: a palpable memory, so close and yet forever gone, my then ten-year-old now almost grown. It’s incredible how we grieve the versions of our children that they outgrow. The infant, the toddler, the preteen, the young adult. That grief feels like a haunting to this mother, and that’s where the real story and fiction intersect as Christine fights to protect her son in the face of her own monstrous grief.
Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?
As a novella, Cold Snap is a sharp sting of a nightmare, and every moment and character was so much fun to write, but there’s a certain scene involving a freezer that was particularly powerful—not because it’s gruesome and horrible, but because it’s fearless and raw. It’s a rendering of the horrors we’re capable of getting through when “getting through” is simply what must be done. Our brains go on autopilot to protect us. The shock sets in afterward, and we’re left simultaneously revolted and awed by what we managed to do when forced to survive. There’s a terrible beauty in that, which is what I hope readers will experience.
Why horror?
Why not? Horror is everything: thrills, humor, heart, vulnerability, courage, strength, redemption, and hope.
What’s next for you?
The next book in my Bless Your Heart series, Another Fine Mess, drops April 2025 from Minotaur books, and I’m currently wrapping up edits on an unannounced standalone novel for 2026!
Lastly, what books have you enjoyed so far this year and are there any that you can’t wait to get your hands on?
Naturally, my nose stays stuffed between pages as much now as it ever did—which means I’ve enjoyed a lot of incredible books! This year I’ve been binging short stories and shorter books, and some of my favorites include the short story Cut and Thirst by Margaret Atwood, the novella Comfort Me with Apples by Catherynne Valente, and the shorter novel A Certain Hunger by Chelsea G. Summers. Most recently, I’ve just finished advance copies of Delilah S. Dawson’s It Will Only Hurt for a Moment (out this month from Del Rey) and Grady Hendrix’s Witchcraft for Wayward Girls (coming January 2025 from Berkley) and both were absolutely phenomenal.
