Des Lewis is a writer who’s quietly become a legend. He’s had 1200 or so short stories published (under the name D.F. Lewis) since the mid-80s (a great era for the horror genre), making the Year’s Best Horror Stories collection on five consecutive years. In recent times he’s focussed on reviewing fiction in real time. He’s very select in what he reviews and stories are dissected in a unique way, as he makes his way through a story or collection. Many writers consider it as an honour to have their work reviewed by him, including myself. I’m chuffed to say that a fair amount of my stories have received the Lewis treatment and I’ve been blown away by the results. The photo above shows Des looking back at his review of Trigger, which appeared in the mighty Vastarien (a journal of work inspired by Thomas Ligotti’s writing) in 2018. It was the only review published of that story that I know of, which I’ve assumed is because of the subject matter – a person self-harming before taking their own life, and I’m grateful to Des for doing so. It was a piece that needed to be written; some thirty years ago I went through a period of cutting myself, for reasons I won’t go into here and I’ve lived with mental illness for most, if not all, of my life. I took this part of my history and linked it to the suicide of a friend of a former partner, who killed herself pretty much in the way described in the story, although I wouldn’t presume to know her reasons or thoughts at that moment. I saw the dent in the concrete where she hit the ground and I went to her funeral. Now that’s pure horror. Vastarien was probably the only publication that would have even considered accepting the piece, and I appreciate them for doing so. Review aside, I did get a message from a US serviceman, who found the story ‘reassuring’. I thanked him for writing but I didn’t push him to explain exactly what he meant. I hope it was that it made him feel heard and less alone. Looking back I worry about whether I got that right. I hope he’s alive and well.
LEVANTHIA 