Erin Brown will be featured in the upcoming anthology And One Day We Will Die: Strange Stories Inspired by the Music of Neutral Milk Hotel with a story inspired by the track “Avery Island / April 1st”.
Erin Brown is a frequent contributor to Hungry Shadow Press with stories in It Was All a Dream: An Anthology of Bad Horror Tropes Done Right and Deadly Drabble Tuesday. Her love of fairytales, fabulism, and fantasy make her a wholly unique voice in the indie horror community. We caught up with Erin to chat about her story, how NMH hits different for a “weird” kid in high school, and tackling a “pre-quarter-life-crisis existential crack in consciousness.”
We’ll put your bio up on the site along with the interview, but for the uninitiated, would you like to give a quick introduction to yourself and your work?
I’m a speculative fiction author and poet, mainly writing horror and dark fabulism. There is a common theme of the marginalized experience in my work, since it gives so many opportunities to discover new monsters.
My story is written for the short instrumental song “Avery Island/April 1st.” It’s about a guy who is wondering if all he is is what everyone sees and how much agency he should take in what he reflects of the world—which is alarming to him because he is a literal sentient ambulatory funhouse mirror.
What made you excited about contributing to an anthology of Neutral Milk Hotel-inspired fiction?
It’s so specific! And, Neutral Milk Hotel was part of a unique and powerful cultural moment.
No matter what we write for this anthology, no one is going to see it coming, and I’m willing to bet that what we write would not be written without this specific muse in mind. That’s alluring!
Tell us about your experience with NMH. When did you discover them? What does their music mean to you?
I was introduced to NMH in high school. I was weird in high school, and I was resigning myself to a life of being found generally off-putting by my peers. In my hometown, NMH was part of the cultural movement at the time to give a wild, disruptive, honest voice to the disaffected, just for the joy of finally being allowed to be perceived. (Or, that’s what it felt like in high school. Emotions are so elevated during those years.) It’s really grounding for a person when the chaos in their spirit is in harmony with the chaos in an album full of songs by somebody else. It was a shock. I found their music mesmerizing, for this and many other reasons.
Why did you pick the specific song you picked? What about that song sparked an idea for a story?
The sad-happy sound, the lush, vivid cover art, the damp and cozy emotion of it. It’s so alive.
The anthology is titled, in part, “Strange Stories Inspired by the Songs of Neutral Milk Hotel.” Did the request for a “strange story” cause you to approach this project differently? If so, how?
Oh, ALL of my stories are strange.
I write mainly about monsters and decay—but in funny, uplifting ways, or at least that’s my intention. But this story is different in that it tackles the horror of a pre-quarter-life-crisis existential crack in consciousness. I wrote this story for the person I was back when I discovered the band, because it’s hard to separate NMH songs from the way they make you feel when you listen to them.
What’s next for you? What projects are you working on? Selfishly, I love a scoop.
I’m working on a short story collection of dark speculative fiction, and a pair of horror-fable novellas.
And One Day We Will Die: Strange Stories Inspired by the Music of Neutral Milk Hotel is an upcoming anthology from Hungry Shadow Press and editor Patrick Barb that challenges indie horror authors to write weird and horror fiction stories inspired by songs from indie folk rock icon, Neutral Milk Hotel. It is slated for release in late 2024.
Erin Brown 
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