I’ve heard said that one should not ruin an apology with an explanation. So, let me just say that I'm sorry it has been a while since my last blog post.

Some fun and interesting things have been going on at Casa Irwin, as visitors to my Facebook site would know.  I've been doing some very enjoyable TV development work with the Emmy and BAFTA Award winning anges sur la terre at Hoodlum Entertainment – including the early stages of turning two of my own ideas into TV series.  TV story development feels like a mad game of water polo compared with the slogging cross-channel solo swim of novel writing.  It's really invigorating to be talking story and character with the talents in the room – batting ideas about, coming up with wacky ideas, dismissing some and loving others.  Pure creativity skimming on a shared love of good storytelling.

Speaking of novels, 'The Broken Ones' has enjoyed a resurgence in local publicity this last fortnight or so, with lovely reviews on ABC Radio, on their website, and an interview for the Sunday Mail.  Something that comes up regularly in interviews – for me, at least – is discussion about genre.  Interviewers, associates, and reader fans often say something similar to the effect of: you write horror, so … I guess you skin nuns alive in your basement?

The answer is (wait; must silence, that screaming from downstairs. There.)  … no.  The only things I’ve skinned in my dark little workshop downstairs are my knuckles.  The question feels kind of groundless (particularly if you’ll grant I am not a dermis-rending Bates Motelier, but you can only take my word on that).  For starters, I don’t really believe ‘Horror’ should be a genre in its own right; far too many stories get stained with the damning chalk mark of ‘Horror’ and lose readers who would otherwise, I’m sure, enjoy them immensely.  Certainly, there are some books out there that are the literary equivalent of splatter films, and it's those who – if any – deserve the horror moniker.  But there are countless other excellent works that, while they have elements that are scary or unsettling, are simply darned fine stories.  They are mysteries; they are thrillers; they are human dramas; they are literary fiction of high order; they are deliciously refined pulp.  But ‘Horror’?  The word 'horror' rightly implies the decent reader would wish to turn away from it – and what right-minded author would want to truly repulse her or his bread-and-butter?  Many crime novels have more horrific story elements than your average ‘Horror’, yet I don’t think a casual bookstore browser would pass by a crime novel so readily – perhaps even so disdainfully – as they might a work labeled ‘Horror’.  Stories that fall under the banner are so various it is impossible to begin to net them: ghost stories; tales of fantastical beasts and aliens and ancient gods; stories of changeable humans, haunted inside and out; explorations of places and spaces and minds with powers that defy our everyday.  Yes, they are scary and deliberately so … but not at the expense of good storytelling – not the good ones, anyway.  Me: I call my books supernatural thrillers – they are (I hope) easy-to-read page-turners with an element of the otherworldly about them.

Genre is a little dangerous, and more a little limiting.  Talking about genre is a bit like discussing cuisine.  Labeling a meal as, let’s say, Italian could well put off a narrow-minded diner who dislikes pizza and pasta.  Well, Italian cuisine is as varied and wonderful as the Italian landscape, and anyone thinking that all there is to it is spaghetti and pepperoni slices is missing out big time.  Same with genre.  Genre is semi-useful for talking about story (or, maybe, for placing stories on shelves), but not much use for enjoying story.  The fact is, a good story is its own creature.  Like a horse, it doesn’t care what type other creatures call it – do you think a horse cares if humans have classed it a Falabella or an Appaloosa or a Swedish Warmblood?  It just wants to run and eat and (if it hasn’t been gelded) get busy with the fine filly in the next paddock.  It wants to live.  That’s what we writers hope for, anyway: to create a story that seems to have its own spark, its own organic desires and unpredictability – something to take you, the reader, on a wild ride.  As a rule, we writers don’t care if you the reader is tall or short, svelte or stocky, fair haired or suffering male pattern baldness – we just want you in the saddle!  And I think that's what readers want, too – to be taken on a surprising journey upon steady, strong legs.

It is so hard when you are shopping for your next read to find the time to choose it with care.  Each of us seems to be getting time poorer and poorer, and relying more and more for the taxonomies of our shopping systems to do our thinking for us.  But please: try to take a little longer, and carry a grain of salt to deal with where the story has found itself pigeonholed.  A good book is much more than the genre it is filed under.