Jennifer Anne Gordon

Jennifer Anne Gordon is a gothic horror novelist. Her work includes Beautiful, Frightening and Silent (2020) which won the Kindle Award for Best Horror/Suspense for 2020, and From Daylight to Madness (The Hotel book 1), and When the Sleeping Dead Still Talk (The Hotel book 2).

She had a collection of her mixed media artwork published during spring of 2020, entitled Victoriana: mixed media art of Jennifer Gordon Jennifer is one of the hosts as well as the creator of Vox Vomitus, a video podcast on the Global Authors on the Air Network, as well as the Co-Host of the You Tube Channel “Talk Horror to Me”. She had been a contributor to Ladies of Horror Fiction, as well as Horror Tree.

Jennifer is a pale curly haired ginger, obsessed with horror, ghosts, abandoned buildings, and her dog

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“Lord Tubby”. She graduated from the New Hampshire Institute of Art, where she studied Acting. She also studied at the University of New Hampshire with a concentration in Art History and English.

She has made her living as an actress, a magician’s assistant, a “gallerina”, a comic book dealer, a painter, and burlesque performer and for the past 10 years as an award-winning professional ballroom dancer, performer, instructor, and choreographer. When not scribbling away (ok, typing frantically) she enjoys traveling with her fiancé and dance partner, teaching her dog ridiculous tricks (like ‘give me a kiss’ and ‘what hand is the treat in?’ ok these are not great tricks.) as well as taking photos of abandoned buildings and haunted locations.

She is a Leo, so at the end of the day she just thinks about her hair.

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Uncaged welcomes Jennifer Anne Gordon

Uncaged: Welcome to Uncaged! When the Sleeping Dead Still Talk is your newest book and is the second book in The Hotel series. Can you tell readers more about this book? How many books are you planning on in this series?

Hi!, Thank you for the interview. “When the Sleeping Dead Still Talk” is the second in a series of historical gothic horror/psychological suspense novels. It takes place in the late summer through the winter of 1873. It follows the story of Francis (a character that first appeared in From Daylight to Madness, the hotel #1) who is a tormented priest. When we meet him in the first book it is unclear what his intentions and past really are. He is in his early thirties and presents with now what we would think of as bi-polar disorder. But there is so much more to him than that. When the Sleeping Dead Still Talk is at its core, a love story centered around someone who may or may not be hallucinating almost all the time. It is a story of childhood trauma and repressed memory, but also a story about hope and love. It does take place in a Victorian Asylum and that location may be haunted, or maybe it’s just him…

As for more books in the series, I will say this, From Daylight to Madness and When the Sleeping Dead Still Talk, are a duet. The story I started in book one is ending now. BUT ...I have had a lot of fans of the first book, and the ARC readers for the new work that have begged for a third book about one of my side characters, Agnes. So that is not off the table, but it would not be a directly related follow up to these books. The story of Isabelle (From Daylight to Madness) and Francis (When the Sleeping Dead Still Talk) are done.

Uncaged: What are you working on next that you can tell us about?

It is still early days…but I am working on a contemporary speculative fiction novel, that is best described as either “The Stand with a meet cute” or “Contagion meets Lost in Translation”. I was scared to write a virus book right now, but I came up with the idea of this story and these characters pre-covid and I really wanted to tell their story now when it is something “relatable”. As a horror author, I always try to write form an emotionally honest place, but sometimes the scenarios are not overly relatable to all people and I

Uncaged: How has the coronavirus pandemic changed your lifestyle? Have you had to change any book promotion plans because of it?

Well, my first book “Beautiful, Frightening, and Silent” (Winner of the Kindle Award for Best Horror 2020 finalist for the Author’s on the Air Award for Best Horror 2020 and Best Book 2020) was up for presale late last winter, and then released the during the last week of February. It was a crazy time for me, I had JUST come back from Europe, my now husband and I were traveling in Spain. I came home and went back to my day job (which was being a professional dancer and choreographer and dance instructor) and then my book came out. It was incredible to have my dancers come in with my book and I was signing books and talking about the future…and then within two weeks of being home…the world ended. Our job shut down, out state shut down, the country shut down. So, I was on top of the world, I was a new author, fresh home from our annual trip to Europe and then there was nothing. So, to be honest I don’t know how my book promotion really has changed, as I have mainly launched new books in a pandemic universe. I will say it has allowed me to focus on writing more than I ever would have been able to pre-pandemic as my career as a dancer and performer has abruptly ended. I hope to someday be able to do” in person” events, and book readings, right now I am just thankful that zoom exists.

Uncaged: Past or present, which authors would you love to sit and have lunch with and why?

I feel like “lunch” with either of these authors that I will mention would end up being drinking whiskey mid-day at a bar someplace in New England. I cannot choose between two authors, so I need to say both. One, is Shirley Jackson, the Godmother of horror. She is my writing idol (for fiction). She wrote true terrifying horror that blended reality, mental illness, and the idea of a haunting, in such a masterful way. I also know she suffered from

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mental illness herself and I would love to be able to sit with her over drinks, oh I mean “lunch” and try to make her laugh. My other choice would be Anne Sexton, who is the most profoundly emotional poet in history. I would want to lunch with her for all the same reasons as Shirley Jackson….now I know both of these women are dead, so if I have to name a living author I will go ahead and say Stephen King. I say this because I know I cannot interview him on my podcast Vox Vomitus, so King.

(I would also love Peter Straub, if he was up to it, but I know I would just want him to talk about Ghost Story the whole time and there would be no eating.)

Uncaged: Have any of your characters ever done something that you didn’t intend when you began?

ALL THE TIME!!! Truthfully, my characters are more in charge of their stories than I am sometimes. I know there is a “throwaway” moment in my book “Beautiful, Frightening, and Silent” where someone offers my main character Adam some Oxy- Contin (he is an alcoholic but no drugs) he always says no, but one time, one time he said yes. I won’t lie, I screamed at my own hands as I typed it. I said, “No Adam, you are making the wrong choice.” I know now that it was the only choice he could have made, but he broke my heart when he did it, but even as a writer I knew I could not stop him.

Uncaged: What are some things you like to do to relax when you aren’t writing or working?

I used to have so many answers to this, but now the world has changed…I will say what I did “before” and what I do now. What I used to do was visit abandoned buildings and photograph them. My husband and I would travel to find beautiful places of “decay” or “haunted” locations. It was and is incredibly relaxing for me to take photographs and to spend time editing them. This is what I miss most about our current world, the fact that our world’s have gotten smaller. Now for relaxation I spend time teaching my dog some really ridiculous tricks like “crawl” and “give me a kiss” and “what hand is the treat in” and now even “jump through my hoop hands.”

Uncaged: What does success as an author look like to you?

We all want a multi-book deal with an option for a Netflix limited series (Mike Flanagan…hello????). But the truth of this to me it is having people that are actively reading my books and connecting when them on an emotional level. So, in many ways I have achieved this, I have had people write to me and talk to me about how my books have resonated with their trauma, grief, or even love. In that way I am successful, I have people that are emotionally moved by my books. When I was young I could not have dreamed for more than this, to have my work win awards, and be read….but that being said… Mike Flanagan, if you are looking for a Haunting season three…I’m here. I was lucky enough to just interview Matt Ruff (Lovecraft Country) and he said it better than I ever will. He said, “I didn’t ask to be famous; I’m just thrilled I can pay my rent.”

Uncaged: Do you prefer ebooks, audiobooks or physical books? Are you reading anything now?

My preference is paper, always paper. I owned a comicbook store for years, and I love paper. Give me a book any day. I read more on Kindle than I do paper nowadays, I have space issues in my house. I will say with authors I love; I buy the kindle and I buy the paperback/hardcover. I LOVE audio books. I went to school for theatre, so it combines my live for production and writing. Now that I don’t leave the house much, I don’t do audio books as much as I did. But audio books are a true artform, and I love them.

Uncaged: What would you like to say to fans, and where can they follow you?

I love facebook and Instagram (not so active on twitter) but the easiest place for all of the info is my website http://www.JenniferAnneGordon. com please find me on those platforms, I love new followers, expect a blend of books, memes, selfies

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Enjoy an excerpt from Beautiful, Frightening and Silent

Beautiful, Frightening and Silent Jennifer Anne Gordon Ghost/Horror Suspense

Adam, a young alcoholic, slowly descends into madness while dealing with the psychological scars of childhood trauma which are reawakened when his son and wife die in a car accident that he feels he is responsible for. After a failed suicide attempt, and more group meetings that he can mention. Adam hears a rumor of a Haunted Island off the Coast of Maine, where “if someone wants it bad enough” they could be reunited with a lost loved one. In his desperate attempt to connect with the ghost of his four-and-a half year old son, he decides to go there, to Dagger Island, desperate to apologize to, or be condemned by, his young son. Adam is not sure what he deserves or even which of these he wants more. While staying in a crumbling old boarding house, he becomes involved with a beautiful and manipulative ghost who has spent 60 years tormenting the now elderly man who was her lover, and ultimately her murderer. The three of them create a “Menagea-Guilt” as they all come to terms with what it is that ties them so emotionally to their memories and their very “existence”. Beautiful, Frightening, and Silent is a poetic fever dream of grief, love, and the terrifying ways that obsession can change who we are.

Excerpt

She walks slowly to his bed, leaving a trail of wet footprints in her stead. She is a ghost ship, silently making its way across the sea of his room. She looks at his sleeping form, he is curled in on himself. When he was younger and stronger, he would sleep like a warrior. He was so proud. He would dominate everything, his bed, his dreams, even sleep itself would bow down under his perceived strength. He is so much older now. These days he sleeps like a child, or a cat, both starving but petrified of the mouse. She hears the rattling of death, climbing out from the deepest parts of his lungs each time he exhales. It was the little things like these moments, she supposed, that she grew to love. They were her favorite part of all of this. Her favorite part of this very long endless day. This existence, it is not a life, but it is not death. She is in the in-between. She is in the empty. She climbs into his bed and into his world. She lies next to him; her body is damp and seemingly heavy. Her wet hair and wet face, and waterlogged body creep into his dreams. She is a memory revitalized, a nightmarish creature, a visitor come back to stay. She stares at him, intently, she is focused. You would think, after 60 years she would grow tired of his face, of this, her nightly ritual, but she hasn’t, and she expects she never will. She stares until she feels something building in her throat, it’s her anger, it’s her fear, it’s her rage. It feels like fire, it burns inside her, aching to get out. He opens his eyes, with the confusion of age, alcohol and too many dreams. Before thinking better of it, his arm reaches across the bed. It reaches for her memory. He finds the other side of the bed empty, but damp. She doesn’t let him touch her, not for many years. In the morning, his sheets will smell like the ocean, at least her side of the bed will. It will have the aching scent of brine, salt, and wet. It is so different from the way his side smells, which is of tears, whiskey, and the sour sweat of fear. He gets up, ignores the wet foot prints she leaves on the floor, the ones that lead to his bed, the ones that circle him while he sleeps. He plods to the bathroom, washes

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his face, rinses the staleness out of his mouth, he thinks for a moment he sees her out of the corner of his eye. She will always look the same, with her soaked hair, white dress, her head down, no, she doesn’t let him look at her face, not directly. His breath catches in his throat; he makes a sound, somewhere between a cough and a scream. He should be used to this by now, used to her. The simple fact she can still surprise him like this is what keeps all of this from becoming commonplace. He thinks he picks up on the sound of her laugh, the way it would ring like silver in his ears, but he is mistaken. She loves him. No, that’s not quite right. She loved him. She tries to remember the time before she felt those things. this task of hers is more difficult than one would expect, the simplicity of trying to remember when she existed before they met, before she wandered into his life. This a burden she has not yet managed to bear. Was there a time before they collided and destroyed each other’s worlds? She hates him. She never hated him while she was alive, she should have, she knows that he deserved it. He deserved her hate. She does hate him now. She knows is both a beginning and an ending. Hate can be powerful, but not as powerful as fear. She fears him now. She feared him then. There are ghosts and memories in this house that even she fears. This man, he only fears her. It is what keeps her here. She opens her mouth, and she invites the rage that burns in her throat to finally have a voice and it feels like fire, waiting to be born. She feels it rushing out of her. It is a scream that has taken 60 years to finally be birthed. She opens her mouth, and all that’s there is saltwater.

feature authors young adult | contemporary

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