1. Tell us a little about yourself.
Hey! I'm A.D. Aro and I live in Salisbury, MA with my girlfriend Kelly, and our son, Levi. I write a middle grade series called Bumps In The Night that is inspired by the likes of Goosebumps, Bone Chillers, Shivers, and other '90s era kids horror books. I'm also a musician and have been playing in various bands since the age of 12. I'm currently the vocalist for a metallic hardcore band called Kusozu.
2. When did you first discover you wanted to be a writer?
Since I was a child. I've always loved books and reading. R.L. Stine was the author that truly inspired me at a young age. I was enamored with Goosebumps, and wanted to be just like him when I grew up. I had a typewriter as a kid and would spend weekends typing away on stories and ideas. It totally makes sense why I'm writing the Bumps In The Night books now!
3. What made you decide to submit your pitch as a Terrorcore Rewind book?
I was already going to write Baby's Breath anyway. I had a plan in place to create my own Point inspired series of more mature YA horror novels. When I saw the call from Terrorcore, it was exactly what I was planning to do, so I figured I would pitch my idea and see what happened.
4. Where did the idea of Baby's Breath come from?
Originally, it was supposed to be a Bumps In The Night book. I had the title and the basic idea was a body horror story about waking up one day and the MC finds themselves pregnant. It was the thought of, how would you handle that and also, what is growing inside you? After thinking on it some more, I realized the idea was a bit too much for the target audience of those books and I morphed the idea into what it is now: shifting to a high school setting, focusing on a senior, using a health class baby doll instead as a plot driver, and of course, adding in a stalker element because how can you have a Point book without a stalker of some kind!?
5. Our lead character, Sabrina, really goes through a lot in Baby’s Breath. How would you describe her and her relationship to the creepy doll?
Sabrina is the "perfect" student. She gets straight As, is the head cheerleader, always follows the rules, etc. At the start of the book she wants to change her image and do things more on her own terms. She's always been following the guidelines of others, doing what she thinks is expected of her. As her senior year begins, she truly feels the weight of what is at stake, of all the decisions she will have to make, of her future looming ahead. Sabrina is not a perfect person, despite how others perceive her, and I really wanted to delve into that idea of image versus reality. As far as the baby doll, Sabrina is not a fan and is truly the catalyst that undoes everything she had planned for her senior year.
6. The ending for Baby’s Breath is like a punch in the gut. Without spoilers, can you tell us about the book’s tone when compared to books from the 1990s? Would you say it’s darker than what some may expect?
Oh, it is much darker. I love, love, love dark endings to books. Many of the Bumps In The Night books also had dark endings and I've had many readers reach out to me saying they did not expect that. With Baby's Breath, I wanted to evoke the feelings and tropes of a classic Point book: high school, teenage melodrama, a mysterious stalker, romance, trips to the mall, but I also wanted to elevate things. Not many of the Point books were gruesome, and a lot of deaths happened off the page. I wanted the ending of Baby's Breath to shock the reader with where it goes.
7. What’s your favorite Point Horror, R.L. Stine, or Christopher Pike book?
This is mostly for nostalgic reasons, but I'd have to say I Saw You That Night! by R.L. Stine. It was the first Point book I read, back in third grade when it was probably a bit above my maturity level, but the cover grabbed me and obviously, with Stine's name on the cover, I had to get it. It's a fairly typical Point story, with a girl witnessing something she wasn't supposed to and now someone is out to silence her. Weekend by Christopher Pike is also a lot of fun. I really enjoyed the Native American mysticism that Pike brought to that novel. It's something you don't see much in other Point books.
8. What’s next? Any new books on the horizon?
Yes! Lots of exciting things in the pipeline! I'll have a short story coming out later this year in the Terrorcore's Book of Monsters anthology, and it will be the first adult horror story many have seen from me. Bumps In The Night #5: Hair Today, Ghoul Tomorrow is also in the works. Planning to have a really cool Halloween double release for the series as well. I have other ideas for Point inspired YA books and also want to pen my debut adult horror novel shortly.
