About

Brian Anthony Carney

What Does Brian Write?

Brian writes Horror Fiction (Dark, Gothic, Noir, Psychological, Speculative, and Young Adult), Mysteries, and Suspense Thrillers. He has a passion to tell gripping stories with compelling characters – stories that evoke and provoke, push boundaries, and lead readers into the darkness – filling their minds with dread, anxiety, and grief – and maybe a little humor to help break the tension. He’s not a complete monster.

Why Does Brian Write?

Because it is Brian's passion and love

Because people should have a world to escape to

Because knowledge and literacy are powerful tools

Because writing matters

Where Does Brian Write?

Brian writes in his circa 1950s writing room. With Alfred Hitchcock posters on his wall, Halloween decorations on his desk, and views of his front yard and the splendor of Vermont’s (six) seasons outside his window, he finds lots of inspiration for creating stories full of sensory experience, mood, and atmosphere.

How Does Brian Write?

It comes with no surprise that Brian has true love for well-crafted stories – stories that catch his attention and never let go – stories that make him laugh, cry, think, and scare him half to death. He found this true love when he was ten years old.

He grew up in Burlingame, California in the early ‘80s. One rainy Saturday morning in October, he was curled up on a window bench in a dark alcove in his public library reading Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley. He read the book in its entirety in one sitting. It was the first time a book put fear into him. It was Shelley who sparked his love for horror stories.

Soon after, while home sick and unable to go to school, he was wrapped in a blanket on the couch watching Rear Window followed by Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein – the first of hundreds of viewings. The chemistry between the characters, the growing tension as those stories unfolded, and the paranoia those films created, sparked his love for mystery, suspense, and terror in cinema.

These influences, as well as Shirley Jackson, Edgar Allan Poe, Oscar Wilde, and Toni Morrison, among many others, have all fueled his imagination and have helped define and enlighten his own writing style.

He learned from a young age that stories of horror and terror can be told in print or cinema without the need for cheap or over-the-top shock value. He believes a great story can hold your attention, create a sense of discomfort or anxiety, get under your skin, make you think, unsettle you, creep you out, find your vulnerabilities, and still, you voluntarily follow it as it leads you through the darkness. The best stories are those that play upon human nature and emotions, are psychological reflections of self and society, and make readers feel a level of terror and horror based on their own personal experiences and fears. Those are the type of stories that stay with you forever.

This is how Brian writes.