I’ve been interviewing writers just like you and me since 2012. I started with written interviews called the Thursday Throng, and maybe at some point, I’ll bring that archive over into Substack.
Since 2020, I have changed it to a podcast. The important thing about these conversations is these are people who have dared put their words down on paper (metaphorical or otherwise). I find I learn something from all of the lovely writers and authors I speak to, I hope you do too.
My guest is Denarii Peters, winner of the Hysteria Writing Competition short story category in 2023. Denarii’s first collection of short stories, Will You Walk Into My Parlour?, has now been published by Crystal Clear Books, and is available in all good online bookstores, links below.
Denarii and I discuss:
The art of short storytelling,
Her writing process,
Where her ideas come from,
Competition success.
Peters' Parlour of Story-telling Pearls
Review of Will You Walk Into My Parlour? on Booksprout
"Denarii Peters’ collection offers as its title an invitation. Or is it? Nothing is quite what it seems in the world of this master-short story teller.
For to begin reading her stories suggests the title more as a challenge – so, dare you?
As fortune, it is said, favours the brave, those with strong hearts will be rewarded with a deliciously dark and witty tour of her imagination and into the most delightful twists of narrative. And just as Dahl and Poe are remembered not just for their writing but their strangest ideas, so it with Peters that her quirky take on things is one that will bring a smile to your face.
This originality sets her apart from so many published writers these days whose formulaic structures led by their publishers’ market spreadsheets leave you ultimately unfulfilled.
Murder, death and the afterlife are never far from Peters’ thoughts in this anthology of 27 stories but so are dystopian landscapes and the thoughts of inanimate objects. Absurd? Yes - yet she breathes life into all these themes with a wit and style that is her own. No matter how bizarre the subject, she somehow makes it work with vivid characterisation and a mischievous sense of plot twist. Yes, you will be led up a garden path to find it’s no garden at all but a malevolent jungle and that path is actually a staircase to hell.
She hooks you with beautifully teasing titles such as How to Murder a Ghost, asks you to consider why the devil invented ink and, while we’re on the subject, what might be considered hell for one who actually loves the place.
Sorcery and witchcraft are favourite themes of Peters but none of her characters can compete with the spell that she herself will cast on you through her imagination, good humour and concise writing that absolutely nails the very definition of a perfect short story." DeeJay1 (on Booksprout)
Buy Now Links:
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In conversation with Denarii Peters