Steven Deighan

I’m Steve Deighan. I am an Edinburgh-born, Lanarkshire-based writer of horror fiction. I have had stories published in national and international publications since the late 90s. But there was a time – twice, actually – I almost didn’t get to write about any of the following...

In 2015, I privately published my short story The Tent as a limited-edition, landscape hardback with illustrations (it landed on every major UK publisher’s desk!), and it introduced me to Bethany Childs, my forthcoming fictional demoness, and the eponymous protagonist of my/her 2020 novel. She is a trademarked entity, so there is that to consider regarding [her] ownership. Do not dismiss her beauty and passive nature; she has had a ‘hell’ of a time, and she’s still only a teenager.

In July 2017, I suffered a massive stroke. This was at a time I was beginning to stretch out Bethany Chiller® beyond a word count I only ever dreamed about. Eventually making steady progress on and off the page, I spent many evenings emailing prospective publishers in and out of the UK until mid-2018. I spent many subsequent afternoons reading their replies that were in the way of “Thanks, but no thanks…” until Glasgow’s Ringwood Publishing sat on the manuscript for a bit. A period of indecision ensued but, in that time, American publisher Dreaming Big Publications emailed me with an acceptance. I had committed a cardinal rule: submitting a manuscript simultaneously! I approached Ringwood with the situation and their advice was to go with DBP, since they still had other projects to contemplate before considering mine wholeheartedly.

February 2019: doctors at the Golden Jubilee Hospital in Clydebank told me on my first ever visit there that I needed to stay for a few days. My congenital cardiomyopathy had worsened to the point I was in advanced heart failure and had been for some time. I was placed on the list for heart transplantation. The operation followed on Easter Sunday. I had been brought back to life. Saved, again, by the amazing NHS. I was only 35.

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“It was one of the most difficult manuscripts for us,” emailed DBP’s editor-in-chief, Kristi King-Morgan, sometime mid-2020. She does not mean the content, which itself is brutal and harrowing. DBP prides itself on publishing challenging fiction. Kristi was growing reluctant to making excess changes I wanted made to the manuscript. “I’m not confident with portions of the text,” I explained, some of it being a couple of years out-of-date. Plus, the marketing campaign I was running meant that everything – from the Bible quotes to the original, commissioned artwork – had to be consistent. “No errors,” I insisted. Regrettably, some remained and are visible in the finished product. I’m proud of what we achieved. Bethany treasures the most intimate tale of possession. And it was finally told.

Steve Deighan

January 2021