Allison's Tears by Thomas Stewart
TPP EP 15

TPP Episode 15 with Thomas Stewart

Mark: what makes a great thriller tick? And what does it take to write one? Welcome to the Thriller Pitch Podcast, where bestselling award-winning and emerging thriller authors share the craft research and real world experiences that power today’s most gripping stories. I am your host, mark p Jay Adell.

Whether you’re writing thrillers or can’t get enough of reading them, this show takes you inside the minds of the authors, behind the twists, characters, and moments that keep us turning the page. This week you’ll be hearing from horror thriller author Thomas Stewart, who wrote his latest novel in just three months.

No outline, no rewrites, every word meaningful from the moment it hit the page. We talked about trusting instinct over planning, writing through lived experiences, and giving even the scariest characters real emotional depth.[00:01:00]

Thanks for listening and make sure you’re following the show so you don’t miss episode 16 with Maria Franklin, author of the Psychological Thriller. I don’t like Mondays.

We talk about how a Monday morning moment on a Trane platform sparked the story, why she outlines just enough to stay flexible, and how she built a 50 reader early feedback team to sharpen each draft. I wanna go deeper. You can get early access bonus content, and the after show with rapid fire questions, plus the chance to ask future guests your own.

Over on Patreon, there’s even a free tier with extra content. The links in the show [00:02:00] notes.

Mark: Thomas, thank you so much for being here. Welcome to the show.

Thomas: Yes. Thank you. Mark.

Mark: We are gonna get right into it with, Allison’s Tears. Pitch Me your book.

Thomas: Allison’s tears, a horror novel. The circle must be closed. Following her uncle’s gruesome demise a family’s secrets are uncovered when Porsche Derringer and her father are called to their uncle’s old cabin in grin view pines. A routine getaway was all it was to her, but to others, those trapped within the confines of the old cabin it’s much more than that. It’s cold, unforgiving revenge. In the search for answers portia and her girlfriend’s minds, bodies, and even their souls are put to the ultimate test to survive not only the onslaught of the Unquiet [00:03:00] dead but the truth of Portia herself. Some truths can be deadlier than lies,

Mark: That’s great. Thank you. So what sparked the idea for this book?

Thomas: so the answer to that is actually twofold. I had always had an idea in my head about a story or just a scene where a man is struggling to try and scribble out a note or a final testament of some sort. While some impending doom is just slowly creeping up behind them. I’d had this idea but never knew entirely how I wanted to execute it until I saw A call for submissions on Facebook for an anthology surrounding the idea of ghosts. [00:04:00] Just basically an anthology of ghost stories. And so with the original intention of trying to submit to this, I began writing Allison’s tears. And in true Thomas Stewart fashion, what started as a short story became a full length novel rather quickly. This book was written in just a little over three months.

Mark: Wow. That’s great.

Thomas: Yes.

Mark: So what was the process like for, you’ve written more books. This is what your latest book or upcoming book, what’s your process like now? And for this book, do you, are you what they call a pantser where you just kind of have an idea and you go with it? Or do you outline? Okay.

Thomas: no, personally, when it comes to the pantser v Plotter [00:05:00] debate i’m very much a pantser and I believe honestly, it allows for a much nicer flow to a story because I’ve seen where people will talk all about their plotting process. They have all these notebooks, and all I can think is dude. If this were me, I’d be on book two before you’ve written chapter two. Like, come on, get on with it. No, and I also realize it alleviates a lot more frustrations because you’re not so caught up in trying to force a story into a specific mold that you may realize it’s not meant to fit.

Mark: Yeah. And then how is your rewriting process? ’cause the other side of [00:06:00] not planning is little bit more time rewriting. Do you find you spend more time rewriting?

Thomas: No. actually I very seldom, if ever rewrite, that’s actually something I kind of refuse to do. I’m very deliberate in the way I write something. I write it exactly the way I wanted it to sound.

Mark: And you do that on the first attempt? Yeah. Wow. That’s a gift.

Thomas: Well, it’s one of the things about being an aspe, um, Asperger’s syndrome or autism spectrum disorder. We tend to try and be very deliberate and very upfront with what we say are what we communicate. And yes, that translates a lot into my writing.

Mark: Yeah, and you did a good job with it, so I’m impressed that you were able to do that. Wow.

Thomas: Thank you.[00:07:00]

Mark: So Allison’s Tears is a powerful title, especially given what happens in the story, which I don’t want to give spoilers away, but where did that title come from? Did that title come first or was it after you wrote the book, you just thought this is the perfect title for this book?

Thomas: No, actually, normally it is the latter. Normally the title doesn’t come until after at least most of the stories written. This is one of the few though, where this title was just a faceless title, if you will, just lingering in my mind. I’m like, I, I have to have some story out there by the name of Allison’s Tears or Adeline’s Tears, and I went with Allison.

Mark: And what about the book cover? How did that come about?

Thomas: Yes. This is a [00:08:00] product of grim poppy designs or on Facebook, you would know her as Christie Aldridge. She is an absolute wizard when it comes to book cover art, and I found her when I was publishing with Unveiling Nightmares Press last year with my book Skin that screams. That was when I saw firsthand the kind of prowess she had and the kinds of things she could do with book cover art that I couldn’t do myself. ’cause I, when I started, I was making all my own book covers. Some came out better than others. But when she did the cover of that book, that’s when I realized, I was like, oh, okay. This book originally was gonna actually have a different cover. One that was equally as good. That was good. But then literally the [00:09:00] same night I was gonna do a, cover reveal, I found that she had already sold that exact same book covered to someone else on accident. So I just went to her and I was like, Hey, did, did, did you, did you happen to notice that? And she was like, oh, okay. And so I was like, can, can I just swap this? And she’s like, go right ahead. That’s when I found this one. I’m like, okay, you know what? This one is objectively better honestly captures the creep factor in this book because I will say, I’ve said it before on my socials, of all 16 titles, one is easily a candidate for my new favorite child, and quite easily quite possibly the creepiest book, [00:10:00] the actual most objectively creepy book I’ve actually written, like horror wise, it might actually be the scariest one I’ve done so far.

Mark: Yeah. When you’re writing, how do you balance when you’re building the setting? Because in this, you had. Like vast temperature changes, where as a reader you almost didn’t know, is this happening or is this in their mind? And it’s all like impacting them so much and it’s so vivid. How do you build that?

Thomas: Well, so you mentioned temperature changes like when they are suffering extreme cold or extreme heat. And for me, I’m sometimes a little more temperature sensitive than others. so whereas some, may experience like a light brisky temperature, to me it might be damn near Sub-Zero [00:11:00] temperatures. So. I, I guess that’s kind of where some of that stems from that and sometimes at random I get like real bad chills. ‘Cause there have been several times, especially in the past where, some mornings I’ll wake up and like a full, like a cold sweat. But I’ll be shivering like the house’s temperature is at subzero or below.

Mark: So do you find, I guess that’s like a lived experience. Do you find a lot of lived experiences end up in your book like that?

Thomas: I’m not sure I’d say that’s a regular occurrence. But certain things like that, like what you were describing, perhaps.

Mark: When you made, when you crafted Allison as a character, and we’ll try not, try not to go into spoilers, but she’s a character that we fear and we gain sympathy for. How do [00:12:00] you balance that where there’s that? Yeah. The fear and the sympathy where I’m like, I’m terrified, but at the same time, damn, the poor girl.

Thomas: Well, that’s, so to me, I feel like that’s a little bit of just a common trope when it comes to ghost stories.

Mark: Okay.

Thomas: You come to realize that as terrifying or as vengeful as the phantom may be, there’s typically a reason for it. And that, and I just have a knack for Trying to give villains or even just even just monsters or creatures trying to give them some sort of depth. Allison I wanted someone, wanted, I wanted you to be a little more sympathetic for her, even though yes, you will fear her. But she does, she’s [00:13:00] not entirely just a blood, a blood thirsty, psychopath. She’s,

Mark: Yeah.

Thomas: she just wants the ones that responsible for what had happened to her.

Mark: As a panther, does that come to you as you’re writing the story? Was she scary first in your mind and then her backstory came about? Or do you feel like all these characters live in your mind and then you just put them on the page? They’re kind of developed already, just through like the thought process.

Thomas: With the case of Allison venter, very much so. To put it into more perspective with her character, I always tried to imagine something along the lines of I don’t know if you’ve ever played, I don’t know if you play video games very much, but one video game series I’m very much a fan of, especially if you delve into some of [00:14:00] the lore of it, is the Fear Series. First encounter, assault, recon which is basically just, if Call of Duty met the ring.

Mark: okay, that’s a good pitch

Thomas: it’s a horror first person shooter in which the main antagonist is a phantom by the name of Al Alma Wade. And she did have a lot of inspiration in how I wanted to craft Allison Venter.

Mark: Okay.

Thomas: someone who was, whose as a child was absolutely tortured and witnessed and suffered the absolute worst of humanity, such as the cruelty she, she endured at the [00:15:00] hands of an extremist. An extremist religious cult.

Mark: And how did you then balance someone like Joseph who, there’s a scene early on, so I don’t think it’s that much of a spoiler, but he’s almost like, I liked him for a moment when he’s in the boat with her because he’s just sympathetic and very human. And until I find out later his actual story and, and it’s very surprising ’cause you could have gone either way. He could have been a complete jerk, which is why it led him to being who he, we know we find out who he is later. But you chose to have him a little bit more sympathetic with her.

Thomas: You’re talking, you’re talking about Roger? Yes.

Mark: Oh, I thought it was Joseph. Oh, maybe it was Rogers sir. Okay. And they had, I thought it was Joseph. Oh, okay. I got them confused. Okay. Sorry.

Thomas: When it came [00:16:00] to the Dinger family, the three brothers, Roger, Joseph, and Richard. I, of course wanted them to have like that. Normal family life style and their other dealings were what they kept in secret.

Mark: Okay.

Thomas: And you know, again, it is explained why they do. it. This is also inspired by a true. Supposed, Poltergeist, the Hum Mansion, which is a story where a family, would kidnap children, specifically young girls, and they would sacrifice them by drawing and quartering them and using the blood to seal off a supposed portal to the underworld and one one [00:17:00] year it didn’t work. So the father went throughout the house and slew his entire family, and it was said that their spirits as well as the spirits of their many victims would live within the walls. I very much took inspiration from that. When I was coming up with the idea of the Derringer cabin, all of the children’s they were they were basically trying to make sure that the doorway to the other side. Would never open up or never remain opened in which they would have to kidnap and sacrifice young girls.

Mark: Yeah. So I have a question for you from our last [00:18:00] author that was on the show. ’cause we kinda had let one author ask another author a question. This comes from Melissa Rus, and she asked if you’ve ever written a scene that scared you so much, you had to walk away for a while and then come back to it.

Thomas: In this book no, there’s only been one time though where I was writing. It didn’t scare me, but it did hit me because I realized just how much of myself, especially at the time I was putting into it. That was when I was writing my very first novella, my serial killer novella no less by the title of Mortimer. And it was when Mortimer was giving his backstory and I realized there’s a scene in this that. Very much [00:19:00] mirrored a real life situation I, I had to witness. That would be the only time anything close to that has ever happened, because I wrote it and then I had to, I had to stop for a moment.

Mark: How long does it usually take you to finish these, these books? Well, you said three months for Allison’s Tears. Is that fairly typical for you to turn them novel over that quickly?

Thomas: It depends. My very first novel titled to Hunt RAs, I literally finished that and it was almost 60,000 words. I finished that in Almo in just over a month.

Mark: Wow.

Thomas: Other, the second novel, the second full length novel I ever wrote and published I did in about three months, and that was 61,000 words. Sometimes I can crank a novella out in just [00:20:00] a couple of weeks. Other times it’ll be a couple of months. It just depends because I don’t always just dedicate all my time, all my writing time to just one project. Sometimes there’ll be weeks where I devote an entire week to one project. Then the next week it’s another project and so on. Or I might one project one day, another project another day, back to the first object and the next day, and then like a whole new project the next day. It, it. It just depends. Depends.

Mark: Wow. That’s challenging. I’ve had a few projects on the go before and my mind gets scrambled with all the characters and trying to keep their arcs.

Thomas: I’m racking up some new, like unfinished WIPs. And then, funny enough, I was actually going through some of my [00:21:00] old stuff here in my room today, and I stumbled across an old handwritten manuscript that I never finished from, say, back in either late 2020 or very early 2021.

Mark: So you’re gonna jump back into that.

Thomas: The thought has entered my mind. However, as of just a couple days ago, I already have started a brand new project, which again, just like this was supposed to be nothing more than a short story and is, and now my brain’s trying to turn into a goddamn novel.

Mark: That’s not, do you see that as a, a bad problem to have or do you see that as like a gift of, it’s great that you can [00:22:00] turn something small into something that big.

Thomas: I think it is kind of cool. I, I think it helps make for a funny story in of itself. Sometimes though it does depend on whether I’m trying to get. If I was trying to write for a specific project, like an anthology or even a collaborative project, and it was just supposed to be like a short story, like something no bigger than 10 or 12,000 words and now I’ve done turned the damn thing into 30,000 word or better novela or novel, and I’m like, well, shit, now I gotta come up with something completely new

Mark: yeah, yeah, I could. I could see that as a problem. Yeah.

Thomas: Yeah, sometimes, sometimes.[00:23:00]

Mark: I have a Patreon member ask this question, how do you want someone to feel after they read your book? And are you happy if somebody is spooked or do you want them to be terrified after they’re done?

Thomas: When it comes to this book especially, I’m going to basically parrot what William Friedkin said in interviews concerning the film of the Exorcist. This with this book. You’ll get into it. You’ll get out of it. What you go into it with, if you go into this as a story of good, ultimately triumphing over seemingly insurmountable evil, evil or triumphing over ins seemingly insurmountable [00:24:00] odds. Then that’s what you’ll get out of it. You go into this with the sense of gloom and darkness, and that’s all there ever is and will be then that’s what you’ll get out of it with this book will say you will feel a range of emotions. of the reasons this book very quickly became a new favorite child of mine is because of that, and more specifically because I have this thing where if I’m writing a story that story has the [00:25:00] ability to damn near bring me to tears, or in the case of this, actually make my eyes well up with tears when I’m writing it, writing the end of it, or writing parts of it that that cements it. In a special place in my heart. This book Will, this book will get inside of you. I had one of my ARC readers, one of my advanced readers read this book and she blew through it in one night. Then I joined her in a TikTok live, and she was sitting in her car with a glum expression. She looked at me and she said, I just read the end of your book, and I get it. And I’m like, oh. So.

Mark: I [00:26:00] love

Thomas: book will terrify you because again, it is probably the most genuinely terrifying or genuinely creepy book I’ve written of all 16, but you will feel more than just fear reading this, and that was by design.

Mark: Yeah. As we wrap up, what advice would you give someone who has just published their first book? Because you were there many years ago now, but what advice would you give to someone who’s just kind of having published their first book? What do they do?

Thomas: Keep writing any, so I know this wasn’t entirely the question, but any advice I have to anyone who is seeking to be an author or a writer, the only advice [00:27:00] I can ever give you and the only advice I feel like anyone should ever pay attention to when it comes to advice and the craft of writing, it’s three words. That’s right. Even shorter than Stephen King’s, whole book or any of the books that other people have written. However, long of short, no. Three words. JFW, just fucking right. Because what you’ll realize is you’ll soon start developing your own style and what works for you and your stories. Everyone else is gonna try and tell you how, how they did it, and that you should do it like that.

But let’s think about this. You do that, then what makes you special?

Mark: Okay. That’s good advice. Just keep writing. Yeah. Where can listeners find your [00:28:00] book?

Thomas: Allison’s tier is currently available on pre-order on Amazon. It will release on October 31st in ebook and paperback. And if everything goes according to plan audiobook, because yes, I do have an audiobook for this in the works. And the last I heard from my narrator, she had just completed recording of chapter 12.

Mark: That’s great. Congratulations and audio book is a lot to get, produced.

Thomas: Yeah, so it, and it will be releasing on ku at the time, at this time, I also will have potentially copies, paperback copy is going up on my personal web store, [00:29:00] www.corpschildsanctuary.com/shop. I will potentially be having signed paperbacks going up on the store. So there will be that, although I will have to emphasize US shipping only. I cannot ship internationally. I’m sorry, but I can’t.

Mark: That’s understandable. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for taking the time. This has been great. I’ve really enjoyed learning more about Allison’s tears in that process. If you don’t mind sticking around for a few extra minutes, we’re gonna go into the lightning round after the show.

Thomas: Of course.

Mark: Thanks again.

Thanks for listening and make sure you’re following the show so you don’t miss episode 16 with Maria Franklin, author of the Psychological Thriller. I don’t like Mondays.

We talk about how a Monday morning moment on a Trane platform sparked the story, why she outlines just [00:30:00] enough to stay flexible, and how she built a 50 reader early feedback team to sharpen each draft. I wanna go deeper. You can get early access bonus content, and the after show with rapid fire questions, plus the chance to ask future guests your own.

Over on Patreon, there’s even a free tier with extra content. The links in the show notes.