Snowball contains several elements that readers of holiday horror might find familiar, but you brought an entirely new spin to the tale making it a new dark holiday favorite. One of the things I enjoyed most about Snowball was the way your characters developed, each of their unique storylines converging–and often in expected ways. How did you go about the process of mapping out such an integrated and multi-angle plotline?

When I first began planning this novel, which gestated for quite a long time, I really set out to capture the misery of winter, especially what I’ve experienced growing up in New England. So, as I gathered up my characters for the tale, I applied a different miserable and haunting experience for each of them. Originally, this book started out as two separate stories I planned to write, one a novella about people stranded on a highway in a blizzard and attacked by an unknown force in the storm, and the other a broader approach to winter hauntings involving the embodiment of death in the specter of a serial killer known as The Iceman. I ended up merging both ideas into one story where winter and everything that could go wrong with it played the major part. Once I brought my stranded travelers together in the storm, I needed a way to bring up their past haunts and settled on the idea of swapping stories while awaiting rescue. It’s a time-honored tradition of swapping ghastly tales in a horror story and felt right. The fact that all the travelers had a connection and weren’t where they thought they were was not part of the original plan but developed as I started writing the story. I don’t outline when I write, so a lot of what happens comes about as I’m going along. I take a lot of notes and jot things down, and then pick my starting point and forge ahead. Sometimes I’m amazed at what occurs without any real thought or planning. That’s the magic of writing, I guess.

The relationship between your toymaker and his business partner reminded me a bit of a twisted version of Scrooge and Marley from Dickens’s classic Christmas Carol. You also brought in some other classic holiday folklore with Krampus, and who doesn’t love a cold-blooded (pun!) murderer with your depiction of the Iceman (I keep thinking of Old Man Marley, the Shovel Slayer from Home Alone…just, you know, more murdery). Tell me more about you cast this group of Christmas horrors? Were the connections deliberate, and if so, how did that enhance your story?

Yes, the Scrooge connection was quite deliberate. I certainly enjoyed playing around with some of the holiday tropes. The Krampus figure is something I’d been fascinated with and knew there was no way I wasn’t going to find some way to fit it into my story but didn’t want to make the plot all about the creature. It’s just a great holiday legend that’s a lot of fun. Before beginning to write the tale, I still hadn’t found my ultimate villain for the story and eventually the twisted toymaker character emerged just from my deep thought process over who would be behind all the mayhem my travelers encounter. As far as The Iceman goes, he had always been planned to be a part of the original vision for this story, before it took on an entirely new concept. He still managed to seamlessly fit into the narrative as everyone loves a demented serial killer, right?

Redemption doesn’t come easy in Snowball. If you could have saved one unfortunate victim from your ill-fated Christmas caravan, who would it be, and why? 

This may seem an odd answer, but probably Lewis Felker, the Salvation Army guy. He’s probably one of the least likeable characters in the tale, yet one can feel kind of sorry for him and the miserable sad-sack life he has led corroded by alcoholism and psychological scarring. And he is the only one who senses the danger they are all in at the outset but is dismissed and looked down upon by most of the others. The most interesting and surprising character I found to be was the truck driver, Tucker Jenks, who started out as a very minor player, but as the story progressed, his role took on a much larger significance than even I had anticipated. That was a fun surprise.

Interviewer’s Note: I’d have saved Felker, too. FWIW.

I read in your bio that you spent two decades working at a small daily paper (and got to interview Bruce Campbell – I’m not jealous *at all*). How does your journalism background impact your fiction writing today?

It was probably one of the best educational experiences I’ve ever had. Working at a small-town paper, I learned a lot about the functioning of everyday life. I got an understanding of the inner workings of court trials, police and criminal investigations, city government, firefighting techniques, accident reconstruction, business development, political campaigns, education methods, spelling bees, farming, medical issues, weddings, divorces and obituaries. You name it and everyday life is sprawled across the pages of a daily newspaper. And of course, the strange stories and oddities one comes across is nothing but fodder to feed the active imagination of a developing horror/thriller writer. My second novel, “Loonies,” is a dark mystery that features a newspaper reporter as the main character and draws an incredible amount of inspiration from my time working in a newsroom.

Lastly, what’s next? Any new projects upcoming that readers should be keeping their eye out for?

I always have something that I’m working on, though I never like to talk about works in progress. Though I certainly will be thrilled to have something new for readers to hopefully enjoy and I’m very excited at the opportunity to continue working with Flame Tree Press.

Interviewer’s Note: Check out more of Gregory’s work here.

Will you be picking up Snowball? Tell us in the comments below!

The post Q&A: Gregory Bastianelli, Author of ‘Snowball’ appeared first on The Nerd Daily.

Bastianelli has assembled an ensemble cast of holiday commuters for his trip to holiday hell—including the quintessential executive, the freshly-engaged college couple, a single mother towing her kids, a trucker, an elderly couple in an RV, and more. Giving unique voices and winter torments to each traveller is something of a speciality for Bastianelli, who manages to create holiday torments that ring true for each passenger—and each reader.

The story’s shtick is in its title, Snowball, a process that starts from something small and builds upon itself, becoming graver through the inertia of its own momentum as it becomes disastrous. It’s a clever pun for the tale’s delicate if unrelenting tension-building arc, which not only connects all the seemingly unrelated travelers, but dooms them to share the same unfortunate fate as the weight of their past indiscretions bears down in an avalanche upon them all. Each of our travellers is on their way to the same frozen end, with some particularly chilling surprises in store for the naughtier on Bastianelli’s list. A word of warning to the reader: don’t get too cosy with any characters you meet on this journey home for the holidays—some don’t last, and most are not what they seem.

At times seeming to borrow heavily from recent holiday horror film Krampus, Snowball brings together contemporary interpretations of some of the darker folktales of the Yuletide, along with modern-day horrors and a sprinkling of Jack the Ripper-esque brutality to tie the festivities together. Whether it’s the Scrooge and Marley-like strained (or, I could say, more precisely, chained) business relationship between a twisted toymaker and his former business partner, carnivorous snowmen, a certain birch switch-swishing, children-snatching beasty of legend, or the Iceman, a murderous, ice tong wielding madman, Bastianelli serves up the perfect holiday monster for every reader. (Frankly, there’s a couple travellers that this reader found a mite creepy, too.)

It’s all in good spirit, though, because what would Christmas be without a little bit of fun to brighten revellers’ appreciation of the season? For a holiday that comes only once a year, there’s no time to waste; the game is already afoot.

If you’re looking for something to keep you cosy on cold winter nights, then find something else to read because there are no warm holiday tidings to be found here. But, if you’d prefer to spend the darkest nights of the year shivering as you await the temps to rise and the sun to return, then this is the holiday horror you’ve been waiting for.

Snowball is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers as of January 16th 2020.

Will you be picking up Snowball? Tell us in the comments below!

Synopsis | Goodreads

A group of motorists become stranded on a lonely stretch of highway during a Christmas Eve blizzard and fight for survival against an unnatural force in the storm. The gathered survivors realize a tenuous connection among them means it may not be a coincidence that they all ended up on this highway. An attempt to seek help leads a few of the travelers to a house in the woods where a twisted toymaker with a mystical snow globe is hell bent on playing deadly games with a group of people just trying to get home for the holidays.

The post Review: Snowball by Gregory Bastianelli appeared first on The Nerd Daily.