I interviewed author Derek Gunn about his  series, Vampire Apocalypse, and his zombie thriller, The Estuary . Read further to find out more about this author’s worlds of terror.

LT:  Tell us about The Estuary.

DG: The Estuary is a novel of claustrophobic terror that happens to have flesh eating zombies in it. I love zombie novels and films but one thing that was getting too played out, in my opinion, is the number and destructive ability of the guns that everyone seemed to be able to get their hands on. In ‘Night of the Living Dead’ there were very few weapons and the atmosphere was one of relentless terror as the zombies kept crashing against the door. I wanted to capture that atmosphere but in a bigger setting so I set it in Ireland.

We don’t have guns in Ireland, oh sure we have some elite armed police, but you just don’t have access to weaponry. I thought it would be interesting to see how, or even if, people could survive an outbreak of such creatures with no bazookas and an endless supply of bullets.

I happened to visit some friends in a small town in Waterford for the weekend and the town set off my imagination. The town is beautiful but it is surrounded by mountains on three sides and the sea on the other so this was perfect to give that hemmed-in feeling. All I needed was a reason for the outbreak.

The estuary in the town is gorgeous and I just had to include it somehow. The Keep isn’t there unfortunately, but it did supply that out-of-reach sanctuary I was looking for. The PH science in the book is real and gave me a credible reason for the affliction.  Again, I wanted to stay away from comet trails and the like. As my wife says the book is more a thriller than horror, but it will get your heart beating faster and that is exactly what I wanted.

LT:   You also have written three books in a series called Vampire Apocalypse. Tell us about these stories.

DG: The Vampire Apocalypse books take the vampire lore a little further than most. By the time the first book starts the world is already ruled by the vampires. These guys are not your angst-ridden sexually smoldering hunks either. They are vicious and violent creatures that are far too powerful for any single person to have a hope against. They control the human populations with a serum that renders them incapable of independent thought and use thralls to control the humans and guard them during the day.

Thralls are humans who have been bitten to ensure loyalty and, through the bite, have been granted strength and speed far greater than a normal human. So it’s  a pretty bleak picture but, of course, there is a small band of humans who live in one of the walled cities serum free.

Circumstances force them out of the city and into direct conflict with the vampires and thralls.

These are books about the human spirit and all that entails. The first book is very much a human against vampire book with lots of action. It is set in one city and serves to introduce readers to the characters and the world the story is set in.

The second book grays the lines a bit and we see that not all the humans are team players. In-fighting and petty-minded jealousies start to encroach on the small community and the thralls start to get their act together. The story is set over three states and begins to expand the world view. By the third book all three factions are in disarray and the action begins to spread countrywide. There are new characters introduced and plenty of adversity for the humans to overcome.

LT:   Are there plans for another Apocalypse book?

DG: Yes indeed. There are a number of loose ends that I have to address. I took a break to do The Estuary  and try to write a thriller that has been in my head for a few years. I am nearly finished that now and have a few ideas for a forth book. I try to inject as much reality into an unreal situation as I can so, as you will see in book 3, Fallout, elements of the past begin to infringe on the characters and shape the future. I have a few ideas which will expand on this and the inner conflicts and traitorous acts have to be explained.

There have been a number of calls for a sequel to The Estuary as well. I hadn’t planned for one originally but, I kept being asked about one and it got me thinking and I have a few twists that would work very well. So I’m going to be busy. There’s also the Graphic Novel of Vampire> Apocalypse that is currently in the works with New Baby Productions. I’ve just seen the first page of artwork and it looks fantastic! You can see it on my blog if you visit

www.derekgunn.com 

LT:   Why does the end of the world play such an important role in your books?

DG: I love disaster movies, and, judging by the box office, many other people do as well. I suppose it allows me to strip away the normal and see how my characters would react if everything changes. I find myself walking along city streets and wondering ‘what would happen if everything just changed?’ I love to think up situations and then try to figure out how characters would deal with these new situations. It would be a true test of our humanity, charity and strength of character. And maybe we all wouldn’t quite deal with it the way we would like.

LT:    Having written about zombies and vampires, what other beasts would you like to conquer?

DG: I’m not sure. I would like to do a werewolf book but I haven’t come up with a different angle yet. I like to try and be a bit different so I will keep thinking and it will come to me one day. I have written a book about demons called The GateKeeper . It’s  a story of legend, myth and pitched battles between demons and human armies. It’s very different and, hopefully, that will come out soon.

LT:    If you had a chance to write a non-horror book, what would it be about?

DG: Funny you should ask as I am nearly finished one at this time. I love Robert Ludlum and Alistair MacLean and have always wanted to write that type of story. I have had a story in mind for some time but never got around to it. It’s very different writing a thriller. The level of research is huge. I can’t just make up a scene that suits my purposes. This book is set in real cities so I had to research each country my characters visited. I hope to finish it before Christmas so, with any luck, it will see the light of day after that.

LT:   What happens when you get a new story idea?

DG: I start to write. I don’t always have a clear idea of how it will definitely end. I usually have an idea but sometimes that changes as the story develops. I have ideas written down on scraps of paper in my office and look over them now and again to see if they fit in or if I need to change them.

LT:   What authors do you like to read?

DG: On the horror side I love James Herbert, Stephen King and Graham Masterton. As I said before Robert Ludlum, Alistair MacLean in the thriller field and Terry Brooks, Allan Steele and Peter Hamilton on the Fantasy and Science side.

LT:  What challenges do large scale mechanics of creating a “world” within your stories present?

DG: It’s always difficult to apply rules and logic to any setting. Even though we are dealing with vampires or zombies I like to try and apply some realistic reason for their existing. This always creates a challenge, especially when I need to introduce a weakness that the heroes can exploit. But it is imperative that these rules exist, otherwise the story falls short of any logic.

LT:  What’s the best thing about writing?

DG: It’s a time when I can lose myself in fantasy for a few hours. I have music playing and my dog sits at my feet. It doesn’t get much better.

LT:  And the worst?

DG: Finding the time. Unfortunately I have to work full time so writing has to fit in when I can get to it.

LT:  Do your stories ever scare you?

DG: The stories don’t but the settings can be un-nerving. I mean, what would we do if the dead rose from the graves. We’ve all seen the movies but would we stand tall or run?

LT:  If you could bring one character to life and let him or her run rampant, who would it be?

DG: Batman. Wouldn’t it be so cool to have a dark avenger to protect us all?

LT:   Is there anything else that you’d like to add?

DG: Vampire Apocalypse Fallout is available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble etc. Kindle versions of all three books will be available as well over the next week or so. Keep an eye on Amazon if you like electronic versions. As I mentioned earlier there is a Graphic Novel version of the first Vampire Apocalypse book in the works. The entire Prologue of the book will be available for free at conventions across America next year and the full book will be available in 2011. Check out New Baby Productions,

http://www.elementalfources.com/  for details and T-shirts – yes I did say T-Shirts.

Thanks for your interest in reading this and I hope you enjoy the latest installment to the Vampire Apocalypse series.

© 2009 Lori Titus

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 8th, 2009 at 12:00 am and is filed under Derek Gunn, SUNDAY SPECIAL. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.