Mike Thorn’s debut collection, Darkest Hours, lurks just around the corner. It will be published through Unnerving Magazine on November 21st and the cover art alone has me frothing at the mouth. Add to this the fact that I already know Mike can spin a good yarn having come across his work in Dark Moon Digest. I also know he is passionate and knowledgeable about the horror genre and its writers. His Thorn’s Thoughts reviews over at Unnerving Magazine provide in-depth analysis about books and I always look forward to reading them. I thought now would be a good time to get to know a bit more about Mike Thorn and his new book.
TGR: Mike, thanks for stopping by. Firstly, who are some of the authors that have helped shape you as a writer and where did your love of dark fiction come from?
Thanks so much for having me! I think my love of dark fiction came fully into being when I was suspended from school at thirteen years old, and I picked up Stephen King’s Pet Semataryrather than reading my assigned class materials. Since then, I’ve always associated horror expressly with more productive and adaptable forms of transgression.
When it comes to writers who have inspired me, I always have a hard time compiling an exhaustive list. In addition to King, a few of my favorite working horror writers are Kathe Koja, S.P. Miskowski, Eden Robinson, Robert Dunbar, Thomas Ligotti, Joyce Carol Oates and Gwendolyn Kiste. I also read a lot of stuff outside of the genre—off the top of my head, I love Herman Melville, Virginia Woolf, Charles Dickens, Jim Thompson, William Faulkner, Hubert Selby Jr., William Blake, Flannery O’Connor, Georges Bataille, Don DeLillo and Roberto Bolaño. I’m sure I’m forgetting some essential names here, but those are definitely some of my major influences!
Mike Thorn 
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