So, Douglas E. Wright,...mind if I call you Dougie? No, I can tell by that mean look you'd rather I didn't. Okay. I'm ashamed to admit that upon first meeting you on the online message board The Haunt, I mistook you for Douglas Winter that wrote all those nonfiction books about Stephen King. Has that happened to you before? (Please say yes and save me from dying of embarrassment.)


No. Not even my sister calls me Dougie. As for the Douglas Winter comment. Another great big, NO! LOL No, I can't say it ever happened before. However, I have been mistaken for screenwriter Doug Wright. Hence, the 'E' now in my name. No reason to be embarrassed. I liked it.


You're one of those exotic Canadians. What part of Canada are you from and where do you live now? And do you feel your geography has influenced your writing at all?


For all those who think Toronto is Canada, have I got news for you! Get your Canadian map out people. I know you have one. Anyway, I was born in Goose Bay Labrador but actually started school in Moose Jaw Saskatchewan. Yes, Canadians have a thing for animals. I then lived in the Thousand Islands area of Ontario with a brief stint near Niagara Falls, where my daughter was born. I also lived along the Ottawa River, in Iqaluit Nunavut, Springdale Newfoundland, Victoria BC and now in Whitehorse Yukon.

It seems that as I grow older I am returning to the Thousand Islands for my stories. I have a town I call Cranberry Creek which is really a mishmash of Brockville, Lyn, Prescott & Renfrew Ontario. I tend to use Newfoundlanders in my stories too. So, yes, I promote places that I have lived. But, not usually until after I have gone.

That my friends, keeps me safe.


So tell us, are you a single man or do you have an old ball and chain at home? Kids?


I've been single for a few years now with a few romances in with red-haired ladies in between. After my marriage took a dive 12 years ago, I went on the road with Canada Post. I have two daughters, both grown, that still live around the Thousand Islands area.


You have shared with me before that you've had trouble breaking into markets in the States. Where has your work appeared before you starting publishing here? Also, what was your first sale and publication?


My first piece sold and published was written in Newfoundland. It landed in the HORROR EXPRESS magazine in the UK. I had a few tales appear in that publication as well as in other magazines which are either defunct or have left print for online, such as THIRTEEN and the HUB.


You have credited Tom & Billie Moran, who run SideShow Press, for finally making your work available here in the U.S. How did you come to work with them?

I did have a story appear in the USA right after the HORROR EXPRESS piece. It was in an anthology LARRY SELLS put together. But, you're right, it was TOM MORAN that really brought my tales to the USA.

I sent in a story, about someone returning to the age of 17, for a magazine he was editing at the time. WICKED KARNIVAL. He rejected BREATHING IN THE PAST outright, but made a couple suggestions. I took his advice and revamped the tale. Afterward, I sent him a thank you note and told him I had applied his suggestions. He then asked for the story back and soon afterward accepted it for an anthology (WICKED KARNIVAL -HALLOWEEN EDITION) he was putting together at the time.


You are currently promoting a novella, BOOGALOOS, which will be coming out from SideShow in September of this year. Can you tell us a little about how this project came about?


I can't remember exactly what happened, but early last year Tom and I had been emailing each other when he mentioned he would like to see some longer work from me. Maybe in the range of 30,000 words. He had already published a few of my short stories in BLACK INK HORROR. So, I set out writing a novella. After a couple months I had hit the 50,000 word mark. I emailed him and he said he couldn't use it; it was far too long for what he had planned. I don't think there was a date given for my novella at that time so I kept working on BARRACUDA. Then one day I did a search of my name. Yes, I do that! I came up with an interview Tom gave about BIH and SIDESHOW PRESS. So, I read it and immediately realized a good part of the interview was about me and my writing. I sat back and said holy shit! I knew I had to get something to Tom immediately. So, I went to a short story I had done and began a rewrite. I sent Tom the first draft, just so he knew I was working on something.


The setting of your novella is a post office, where I know you personally work. Many of us don't know much about what goes on in a post office, not really. Are there any trade secrets you can tell us? Will your novella shed any light for those of us who are curious about the inner workings of the place?


BOOGALOOS is really stretching the inner workings of the post office. But, there are things in the book such as return-to-sender mail that are as relevant today as they were 30 years ago. A lot of people think something they have mailed has gotten lost in the system when it neither arrives or is returned. But, most times, it is as simple as not having a return address on the exterior or inside the mailed item. Improper labeling of parcels. Labeling on one side of a package instead of on all four. (These are going through machines people.) Then what is the post office to do when there is no return address and it can't be delivered to the addressee? Anyway, this story is really a culmination of my 30 years at the post office. A lot of what is described is no longer done in the fashion stated. A lot of it is automated nowadays. I talk about manual sorting or dumping bags of mail. In Canada, bags of mail really no longer exists. So much of what the post office sees is electronic, even the tiniest of offices that I look after in the Yukon are getting computer systems. There's a lot of emphasis today on health & safety, identity theft and terrorism, in addition to the security of the mail. Most don't think of the post office in those terms. And in this day and age, they have to start.


BOOGALOOS is the first release from SSP's FIRST CUT series of novellas by up and comers. How did you feel when you learned you had been chosen to lead the pack with this new series?


Tom, Billie and I had been talking about numbers and what types of book this would be in regards to physical presence. We looked at what SSP & TREVOR PALMER had started with, but with the recession hitting the US especially hard, Tom asked if I minded changing the format and numbers. Being relatively unknown in the USA, I agreed we should look at a different pricing system and way to deliver this product. It didn't make sense that I would have the clout to pull in the market like Graham Masterton. It wasn't until later I learned they were putting out the imprint, FIRST CUTS. And I have to say, when I learned I was the lead product of a new line, I was truly humbled. For Tom & Billie to think of my work as a lead for their new imprint completely stunned me. A great big THANK YOU, Tom & Billie.


Tell us a little about the story? What inspired it, how long it took to write, anything you want to share.


BOOGALOOS started life as a short story a couple years ago. I was having difficulty coming up with anything interesting. It took a month or more, writing it in pieces, not knowing where to go. And the only thing I could think of was the post office. And even that sounded too familiar to me to be interesting for anyone else. After the story was finally completed, I sent it to my pal Louise Bohmer for some input. I just figured I had dried up creatively. But, she loved it. So, I worked on it some more and started to send it out to magazines. The novella has been rewritten so many times and has taken up most of my life up until now.

The story is about aging postal workers, one in particular. Crozier Buck. This guy hurts from arthritis, but still doesn't want to retire though he has enough time in. However, his friend Jerry Atkins, tries to convince him he should just go. Jerry uses the fact that Crozier has never gotten over losing his wife twenty years previous to a streetcar accident and stills lives with her memory guiding his life. That in some way he isn't right in the head.

Another postal worker, George Androski, works the dead mail room and is going to retire. He also thinks Crozier has some untapped talent that would be helpful in the DEAD MAIL room where a vindictive ghost uses the return-to-sender mail to plot his revenge against a system that was in place generations earlier. As it turns out, Crozier has had a gift all along; he just didn't realize to what degree.


The novella will be available in two editions, a deluxe hardcover and an economical soft cover. It is my understanding that the hardcover, which sold out only days after being put up for pre-order on Horror Mall, contains a "lost chapter." Tell us about that.


THE LOST CHAPTER: THE GHOST SCARE OF '79 was only touched on in the book. It runs no more than a paragraph. Tom asked for something more about George. Though George Androski is in the book to a great extent, there's no history about him like there are with the other characters.

In THE LOST CHAPTER, George is a creative soul that had traveled Canada in a rock band since high school trying to become famous. After a few years, he had grown weary of starving. While playing in the Yukon, he finally gave in and returns to Toronto where he's hired at the local post office. This is when George encounters the vindictive ghost for the first time. And it is only a couple years later that another encounter with it and its followers, the BOOGLAOOS, lead him to believe they are related to an outbreak of ghostly behaviors in the Toronto suburbs close to work.


If you had to describe your writing style, what would you say about it? And from where do you draw your inspiration?


I really don't know what my style is. I do see certain themes arising from my work, and I watch to see if others see the same as I. However, Tom has said my writing is literary and classic. I hope classic doesn't refer to my age, but was surprised to see the word 'literary'.

As for inspiration, it doesn't take much. It's usually a phrase I've heard that sets my mind in motion. I don't usually listen to music when I write, but I have put on Deep Purple, David Bowie and Alice Cooper tunes to set me in the mood for writing. Also, when I listen to King's On Writing or watch Wonder Boys, I get the urge to write. I also tend to get turned on my Hitchcock and Tim Burton too.


What writers, both classic and modern, do you admire? Do you feel their work has influenced your own at all?


I like M.R. James, Arthur Machen, Edgar Allan Poe, Franz Kafka, Aldous Huxley, Ray Bradbury, Hugh B Cave, Richard Yates, Shirley Jackson, John Gardner, Alice Sebold, Susie Moloney, Jack Ketchum, Cormac McCarthy, Rick Hautala, Kealan Patrick Burke, Nancy Kilpatrick, Stephen King, Simon Clark, Joe Hill and so on.

I was once told I was a cross of Koontz & King, but I think I write something akin to Yates and King. I write like me! It's ultimately up to my readers to decide. I think writers are usually wrong about where or how they come across to the public.


What projects are you working on at the moment? Any other publications we can look forward to? Any exciting ideas percolating in your imagination?


Right now I have 2 novels completed. One is in first draft and another that I feel needs reworking, just because I am not happy with the final draft. I have a few short stories started, but who knows how long they will become.


What is your writing process like? Do you have a set number of pages or a set number of hours you feel you must write every day? Longhand or on the computer?


BARRACUDA is a novel being rewritten now. When I wrote the first draft, I was doing 2000 words a night. I write only on the computer. Faster that way. I have to write something everyday, but unlike you, I tend to focus on one story at a time. Give it my all. However, I am going to try to be more like Brian Keene in output.


I certainly appreciate your taking the time to answer my questions and letting me play Barbara Walters, just a shame I didn't get you in tears. Any parting words?


I have to thank you for the opportunity to discuss the post office and BOOGLAOOS. I'm sorry about rambling on, but writing and the post office is in my blood. If I don't get it out, I'll explode!

At one time, I would never had thought about writing with the post office as a backdrop. But as King once said, sorta - If you are a plumber, write about a plumber -- on a spaceship!

Thanks again, Mark.