Your novel is an unrelentingly intense reading experience. Where did you get the inspiration for this story, and was it as harrowing to write it as it is to read?

The inspiration came from my own experiences with rock climbing—literally just asking myself, “How can I put rock climbing in a horror story?” Further development came when a friend told me about LiDAR. He actually did want to use it to scan for new rock walls, and he graciously let me use that idea in my book as the impetus that lures the group to the spooky woods. And somehow from there, it spiraled into a cursed spot of woods in Kentucky that has been luring people there forever. I love the horror genre because it allows me to funnel my anxieties and fears into something productive. I don’t scare easily, per se, but I definitely know the adrenaline and unease that can hit you when you’re climbing, especially outdoors, 50 or 60 feet from the ground with only a few pieces of metal, a rope, and a human below you keeping you from crashing to the ground. Beyond the climbing, I love body horror, gore, and ghosts, so that all came naturally to me. When I worked with Cynthia Pelayo during PitchWars, we really focused on character work and building deeper POVs, which I think really turned it up a notch. That edit, I think, was pivotal in really making the scary things become really visceral.

The rock-climbing frame was fascinating. You explore the technical details, the rush of the experience, and the reality of today’s young rock-climbing athletes and their need to market themselves. What is your relationship to the sport, and why was horror the best vehicle to explore it?

I started climbing a little over a decade ago, and I fell in love pretty much immediately. I find that is a very common story—the love of the sport grips you as soon as you ascend the first route, and it doesn’t relent. For me, it’s the perfect exercise because it’s like a puzzle, because it challenges both my body and my mind. I have unfortunately been a bit too busy the past couple of years to climb much (who knew opening a bookstore while also working on your debut novel could be time consuming?), but I usually climb in gyms, with occasional outdoor trips to Red River Gorge or a small bouldering area called Muscatatuck in Indiana.

Climbing can be a very dangerous sport. It requires a lot of safety gear, and sometimes this can fail—things can break or wear out; distracted climbers or belayers (the person on the ground managing the rope) can improperly clip the rope to the wall or let out too much slack; climbers who boulder can fall awkwardly onto the crash pads; pieces of rock can break away from the wall unexpectedly. I think it lends itself well to the horror genre, as it is naturally scary and adrenaline-inducing. However, for me, This Wretched Valley started simply as wanting to combine two of my favorite things, climbing and horror fiction. But if you need any real-life proof that they are a great match, just watch the documentary Free Solo.

You are also the co-owner of a horror-focused independent bookstore. How do you see your role as a bookstore owner in the community? Is there any overlap with your work as an author?

One of the reasons I decided to open the store was that, as an author, I was connecting and discovering all these amazing and interesting things being published in the horror community, but they were nearly impossible to find on the shelf. Hardly any bookstore I’d visit would have a horror section, let alone a selection of indie titles. And if they did have a horror section, it usually ended up being the Stephen King section, bookended by a few others from bigger publishers. I see the store as a place to share all those interesting books being published by indie presses like Ghoulish Books or Tenebrous Press, as well as giving shelf space to local authors and artists. Of course, it is nice to have a guaranteed spot for my own work, but ultimately Butcher Cabin Books is a labor of love for the genre. One benefit to being a bookstore owner and an author is that I now know how both sides of the process work!

As a curator of horror for your customers and a writer yourself, I know the library workers reading this are dying to know what books and authors you are most excited about right now.

Some titles and authors I’ve enjoyed recently or have high on my TBR include Andrew F. Sullivan, author of both The Marigold and The Handyman Method (coauthored with Nick Cutter); Laurel Hightower, author of Below; Cynthia Pelayo, author of Children of Chicago and the upcoming Forgotten Sisters; Hailey Piper, author of Queen of Teeth; Todd Keisling, a fellow Kentuckian and author of Devil’s Creek and the upcoming Cold, Black, and Infinite; and Erin E. Adams’s debut, Jackal. I could probably go on forever.

Some publishers that are doing great and interesting work include Tenebrous Press, who release unique weird fiction like Danger Slater’s House of Rot and Ashley Deng’s Dehiscent, and they also produce great anthologies that benefit good causes, like Your Body Is Not Your Body or their upcoming Thanks for Joining the Algorithm. Ghoulish Books also releases great horror that usually has a good blend of humor and terror.