Hi, Josh! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?

Hey! I’m Josh and I love scary things! I live in Suffolk, England with my cat Penny, and when I’m not rewatching movies like Scream, Labyrinth, and Lisa Frankenstein, I’m reading books by Adam Cesare, Rainbow Rowell, Chuck Tingle and CJ Tudor. I also love to go on long walks to figure out what horrible thing I’m going to write next.

When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?

I don’t remember a specific moment, but it’s something I’ve always done. As a kid, I used to rewrite books I’d read to either change the ending or get rid of the scenes I didn’t like. I also wrote my own stories, hopping between fantasy and horror like a weird little frog demon. I’ve always loved storytelling—whether that’s movies, books or beyond—and I’m so grateful that I get to tell my own.

Quick lightning round! Tell us:

• The first book you ever remember reading: Grinny by Nicholas Fisk (terrifying)
• The one that made you want to become an author: The Whitby Witches by Robin Jarvis (exceptional)
• The one that you can’t stop thinking about: Maeve Fly by CJ Leede (eyeball)

Your latest novel, Heads Will Roll, is out July 30^th! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?

KILL! KILL! KILL! KILL! KILL!

What can readers expect?

Heads Will Roll is about a sitcom star who gets cancelled for something she posted online, and so checks into a digital detox camp for cancelled people—but somebody there wants to cancel them FOR GOOD. *insert axe emoji* The book is a love letter to slasher movies like Friday the 13^th and Urban Legend, so there are a lot of horror-movie Easter Eggs sprinkled throughout (I’m a sucker for an Easter Egg). I also really wanted to tell an upbeat LGBTQ+ story about confronting and overcoming shame, and drawing power from being true to yourself no matter what people may think of you.

Where did the inspiration for Heads Will Roll come from?

Nothing screams “HORROR!” to me more than social media. While I’ve made some fantastic connections on social platforms, I also find them hugely anxiety-inducing. When I was first brainstorming Heads Will Roll in early 2022, Twitter felt like such an oppressive, judge-y place where you’d get pounced on for every little thing you wrote. Virtue signalling, “cancelling” and public shaming were (and are) rife. That, to me, is terrifying—almost as scary as an axe-wielding maniac stalking a bunch of campers—which is why I decided to tell a story about the ramifications of cancel culture and how it could be taken to gory extremes.

Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?

The main character, Willow, is a horror nut who somehow wound up being a sitcom star. She’s essentially living her life trapped in the wrong genre. That, to me, was such a fun idea to explore, and I loved watching Willow grow and change over the course of the book. In terms of moments I enjoyed writing, there’s a prolonged chase scene that is my homage to Sarah Michelle Gellar’s big moment in I Know What You Did Last Summer that was PURE JOY to do.

This is your third published novel. What are some of the key lessons you’ve learned as a writer and the publishing world since your debut?

Have fun! As a writer, you’re basically making stuff up and hoping people will read it. That’s it. I think it’s possible to get very serious about your “brand” and your sales. I’m really trying to focus less on the business pressures and more on having fun, telling stories, and getting to know more people who love the same things that I love.

What’s next for you?

I’m finishing up a YA book that I’m very excited about (think small-town weirdness and big-time 90s vibes), and then I’m diving into my next novel with Putnam, which is going to be very different from anything I’ve done before, but in the best way (think cats, think blood, think sunscreen…).

Lastly, what books have you enjoyed so far this year and are there any that you can’t wait to get your hands on?

Books I’ve loved: Cicada by Tanya Pell, Bury Your Gays by Chuck Tingle, Horror Movie by Paul Tremblay, This Thing Between Us by Gus Moreno and Zero Stars, Do Not Recommend by WJ Wassmer. Books I cannot wait to read: Candy Cane Kills Again: The Second Slaying by Brian McAuley, I Was a Teenage Slasher by Stephen Graham Jones, Mewing by Chloe Spencer and Jackal by Erin E Adams.

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

The post Q&A: Josh Winning, Author of ‘Heads Will Roll’ appeared first on The Nerd Daily.

Intrigued? Well read on to discover the synopsis and an excerpt from Josh Winning’s Burn the Negative, which is out July 11th.

Arriving in L.A. to visit the set of a new streaming horror series, journalist Laura Warren witnesses a man jumping from a bridge, landing right behind her car. Here we go, she thinks. It’s started. Because the series she’s reporting on is a remake of a ’90s horror flick. A cursed ’90s horror flick, which she starred in as a child—and has been running from her whole life.

In The Guesthouse, Laura played the little girl with the terrifying gift to tell people how the Needle Man would kill them. When eight of the cast and crew died in ways that eerily mirrored the movie’s on-screen deaths, the film became a cult classic—and ruined her life. Leaving it behind, Laura changed her name and her accent, dyed her hair, and moved across the Atlantic. But some scripts don’t want to stay buried.

Now, as the body count rises again, Laura finds herself on the run with her aspiring actress sister and a jaded psychic, hoping to end the curse once and for all—and to stay out of the Needle Man’s lethal reach.

ONE

By the time Laura Warren realized she was fucked, she was already halfway across the Atlantic Ocean.

The plane was full and she’d popped a sleeping pill thirty minutes ago, washed it down with a plastic cup of red wine. It dulled the drone of the engine and made the shapes of her fellow passengers pleasantly hazy. She could almost pretend they weren’t there.

Travel was one of the few remaining perks of being a journalist. Her job had taken her all over the world: Tokyo, New York, Sofia. That last, an article about the city’s booming film industry, earned her a lethal-looking award two years ago that ended up buried in the cupboard she called an office, along with a small forest’s worth of Zeppelin magazine back issues. Awards weren’t her thing. She just wanted to write words that mattered.

Los Angeles, though.

That made her want to take more sleeping pills.

The digital flight chart on the seat back in front of her showed a plane edging closer to California no matter how badly Laura willed it to turn around, and the pill wasn’t working fast enough to numb the anxiety that razored her lungs. She wished the steward would circle back with the wine. He could leave the bottle if he liked.

Her neighbor grunted in his sleep, his knee pressing into hers.

Laura grimaced and shifted over. She wasn’t a nervous traveler, had never been freaked out by the altitude or baby food, but she found planes to be a lot. The lack of space made her feel enormous. Like she was taking up more room than anybody else. More air.

She had caught the look from her neighbor when he sat down. Annoyance that his ability to manspread would be inhibited all the way from London to L.A. She could tell him to go to hell, of course. That she wanted to be there as little as he did.

Instead, she made a joke about how cozy the next eleven hours would be and, when he merely nodded, swallowed her frustration and opened her first mini-pack of pretzels.

Thirty-seven years old and she still filled every awkward silence with a joke.

Taking a breath, she resolved to keep her mind occupied until she passed out. She tapped the iPad propped on the tray table, opening the press release she’d started to read but neglected to finish in the lead-up to the trip. Everything was always so last-minute these days, and press documents gave her a headache. Their robotic enthusiasm was exhausting.

Begrudgingly, she scanned the first couple of pages, then scrolled to the “About the Production” section on page three. She read the first line—

Streaming mini-series It Feeds is a modern reinterpretation of ’90s horror movie The Guesthouse.

—and every nerve in her body snapped.

Hair prickled on the back of her neck as if charged with electricity.

With numb hands, she dragged the iPad closer, convinced she was seeing things. She willed the sentence to change, to rearrange itself, but no matter how many times she read it, the words remained the same.

The Guesthouse.

THE GUESTHOUSE.

The goddamn motherfucking Guesthouse.

Her body suddenly felt distant, a concept rather than a physical object, as her mind went into overdrive. It buzzed with a single question like a wasp trapped in a glass.

How the hell did Mike find out about her past?

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