Night Train is the latest re-release from Multi award-winning (including the Horror Writers Association’s coveted Lifetime Achievement Award) author, Thomas F. Monteleone. You can check out my thoughts on the book from last week’s posted review HERE to find out why you should take a moment right now to order your copy before proceeding further.

Now that’s out of the way, get comfortable, grab a beverage of your choosing and enjoy a conversation with Tom and yours truly as we discuss Night Train, his approach to writing multi-layered stories, and what’s next to come.

Dark Bites: Although this is the first time Night Train has seen the light of day by means of a beautiful hard cover edition, it was originally published in 1984. Of all the great books in your library of work that arguably deserve a re-release, why this book, and why now?

Dark Bites: Although this is the first time Night Train has seen the light of day by means of a beautiful hard cover edition, it was originally published in 1984. Of all the great books in your library of work that arguably deserve a re-release, why this book, and why now?

Thomas F. Monteleone: Kinda a long story . . . I wrote a  lot of paperback originals back in the eighties and into the early nineties because all the agents and editors of that era thought it was the shopworn “Wave of the Future” . . . and that “the hardcover book was dead!” and similar such crapola. The problem with that ploy was that paperback originals did not get reviewed in the “right” venues of that era like newspapers and genre magazines. They also did not have the lifespan of hardcovers on bookstore shelves and of course no sales to libraries.

All of which is to say, once your paperback novel had its run on the revolving racks of drugstores and airports, it was pretty much consigned to that place where buggy whips, betamax machines, iPods, and phone modems go to die. Once out of print, it was sayonara, baby.

Gauntlet and some other small presses have been toying with the idea of bringing a line of the old eighties/nineties pb’s in small hardcover runs for collectors, new readers, and even some library sales. Barry asked me if there was anything I’d like to see back in print, and there are a few, but I’d always thought Night Train was one of my more “out there” horror novels that, even though it was by-the-numbers, has some fun concepts along the way. So, yeah, Night Train.

DB: How did the partnership with yourself and Gauntlet Press come together the way it did rather than having a single publisher do all the promo and the actual publishing of Night Train?

TM: Barry Hoffman at Gauntlet and I have been friends for 30+ years, and we had done a few joint imprints in the past—notably the Gaiman/Doctor Who book and the David Morrell Rambo novels—so I was more than happy to help Barry market and promote this title as well.

DB: Reading descriptions for this book from its first release, I noticed the names of your characters have been changed. Can you explain this change and let us know what other changes readers of the original publication might notice?

TM: Ha! I was wondering if you would notice that! Here’s the story. I belong to (a) high octane charitable organization called the Associated Italian American Charities. Through a variety of events, we raise more than a half million dollars that we allocate in toto to the charities of our choice (based on how much each member personally raised. One of the events is a tremendous golf tournament that features $500/golfer ($2000/foursome) and we usually field 72 foursomes (!). We also have silent auctions and live auctions during the after-golf dinner. Two years ago, I did a live auction item “Become a Character in a Novel!” in which I would use the name of the winning bidder as the protagonist of my next book. The winning bidder ($1800!) was a guy named Tommy Iacoboni and I was planning to use him in my sequel to Submerged but that next book became tangled up in the demise of Samhain and some other contractual crap. So time went by and Tommy is bugging and making noise about when he was going to see his name in a book!? I told him I was running late on my sequel novel (plus I don’t write as fast-and-dirty as I used to), and just hang in there. And then when Barry talked to me about Night Train, I realized I had the answer to satisfy Mr. Iacoboni! Presto-Change-O with the name-O!

DB: Considering the vivid details in the way you describe the underground subway system of New York, I got the impression that you may have spent many a long hour down there yourself, mapping things out and taking notes along the way before taking us all with you. How much research and personal experience did you endear for the sake of such descriptive story telling?

TM: Yeah, I spent a huge amount of (pre-internet/pre-Google) time researching that book. I actually interviewed NYC reps of the Transit Authority, Sewers, Steam, Health, and all the utilities. I was taken on tours and promised to use the names of more than one of my tour guides. I studied maps, grids, and schematics, and of course I rode a lot of trains so I knew what the stations looked like. I think I spent about a year researching the book to make it as accurate as possible.

As far as a lot of the stuff Lane Carter (a thinly disguised Lin Carter) talked about was also based in extant arcane literature, some Lovecraftian lagniappes, and some archeological discovery stuff about NY dating back to the Dutch.

The scene dealing with Prometheus was probably my most outrageous posit of underground NYC and was actually lifted almost whole cloth from a short story (“Taking the Night Train”) I did for a long-defunct magazine called Night Voyages wherein I openly declaimed the story was an homage to the style and bravado of Harlan Ellison. (Yeah, I had stones . . . even back then.)

DB: How much of Night Train (other than the otherworld monsters – I hope) is lore and how much is based on actual fact?

TM: Lots of specific details of the workings of the various agencies underground are (or were when I originally researched them) factual. No train ever went missing down there, but wouldn’t it be cool if it had?

DB: It must have been quite an undertaking to keep all the characters, various twists and assorted facts straight while writing this one. Did you have an outline or other reference notes handy while you wrote? Feel free to share your schedule and approach to writing Night Train, or in general, if you will.

TM: About ten years before I wrote this one, I’d read a book entitled The Taking of Pelham One Two Three by John Godey. (a pseudonym for Morton Freedgood who had done a lot (of) really good mystery and suspense novels) For some reason that book stuck with me because of the writer’s masterful handling of the multiple viewpoint narrative, and I used it as a model for the way I would write a lot of my own novels when multiple viewpoint was the obvious choice for advancing a complex plot. It was a technique that worked for me and I remained comfortable with that narrative approach up to this day.

As far as Night Train, I’m pretty sure I didn’t have much of an outline because I usually wrote without a net . . . making it up as I went along and trusting my subconscious to have things figured out ahead of time. I would most likely have a vague idea of how I wanted things to resolve themselves but that was about it. Although back in those days, my agent could get a book contract based on the old “three chaps and an outline” proposal . . . so maybe I did have a kinda/sorta outline to get the book off the ground. Whether or not I actually followed it was a different story.

DB: Although you may have ended this novel the way you did, I couldn’t help but wonder if this might be a world you’ve considered tapping into for a bit more adventure from our surviving characters. Any plans to keep this particular train going?

TM: Honestly, I thought about it way-back-when, but never got around to working up a credible sequel.  The last paragraph of the book was a purposeful dangle that I could grab onto if I wanted to . . . but it just never happened. And as far as me do it now, no, I have other projects that are keeping me plenty busy.

DB: And, the million-dollar question as always with interviews about new books, what are you working on next for us fans to keep a lookout for?

TM: Well, as they say, there are always new stories to tell, always new places to go. I am still working on a (research-heavy) sequel to Submerged, and of course I will continue to work with my daughter, Olivia, on new volumes of our (award-winning) Borderlands anthologies. For the very-now moment, I am just about finished wrapping up a novella for the latest and most striking iteration of the classic mag, Weird Tales. I’m also putting together a new short story collection (as yet untitled), an omnibus of all my oddments of non-fiction called Opuscula and Other Weird Notions, and eventually a second volume of my Mothers And Fathers Italian Association columns. So . . . plenty of work ahead.

DB: Thanks so much for your time and your talent, Tom!

TM: It has been a real pleasure to do this with you. Grazie mille!

And, if you haven’t already, you can still order your copy of the hardcover edition of Night Train while copies last right HERE!