Paul Tremblay

Tremblay leaned toward a realistic reading of the ending in which events largely happened but are distorted by Winifred's narration.

“You know, most of the stuff happened, but it's being refracted through Winnie and go towards more realistic interpretation”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 52:11

Tremblay said that on a second reading he noticed the green dress given to Winifred was likely poisonous and could be affecting her mind.

“And the green dress she gave her that was probably poison. I missed that on the first read somehow”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 39:43

Tremblay argued that readers misremember Victorian Psycho as a story in which Winifred kills only bad people, when she kills indiscriminately.

“have, like, false memories of this book because they want to root for her and they assume, oh, no, she's only killing bad people”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 35:46

Tremblay's main advice to young writers is to accept that it is okay to like and be passionate about things.

“you come to the realization that it's okay to like things”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 12:05

Tremblay said the growth of own-voices authors is among the most exciting developments in horror film and publishing.

“we're getting to see way more own voices. And, you know, to me, that's like one of the most exciting parts about what we're seeing”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 8:42

Tremblay cited Publishers Weekly reports that horror acquisitions have risen sharply year over year, and worried it could be a bubble.

“the publisher acquisition of horror novels is up 25% from last year, which is up 25% from the year before”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 8:14

Tremblay said he deliberately avoided deciding a true ending for A Head Full of Ghosts so that uncertainty would drive its horror.

“Like I want A Head Full of Ghosts, if it was scary at all, to be scary precisely because we didn't know”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 27:50

Tremblay said the A Head Full of Ghosts film had wrapped filming and would probably be released within about a year.

“But anyway, yeah, wrapped and probably out in a year from now”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 4:13

Tremblay described himself as mostly a skeptic and atheist who nonetheless gets frightened at night.

“98% of my day I'm a card-carrying skeptic atheist, don't believe in anything”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 1:04:12

Tremblay said horror comedies that are genuinely both scary and funny are rare, but Victorian Psycho and Widow's Bay achieve it.

“It's really hard to find, in my mind, horror comedies that are both scary and funny. Yeah. Especially in terms of film. And I agree, this book does it”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 59:39

Tremblay said he underestimated how upset readers would be by not learning whether the world was ending in The Cabin at the End of the World.

“The cabinet at the end of the world, I way underestimated how many people were going to be upset not knowing if the world was ending or not”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 28:11

Tremblay recounted that seeing Jaws at age ten gave him a decade of recurring shark nightmares.

“I had 10 years of shark nightmares after that movie”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 23:38

Tremblay argued that people who use generative AI are not real writers or artists and likened them to scabs.

“you're not a writer or a visual artist if you're using it. You're a scab to use”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 14:55

Tremblay said he was one of the original plaintiffs in the first writers' lawsuit against OpenAI.

“I was a part of the first lawsuit suing OpenAI on behalf of writers”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 14:25

Tremblay argued that Get Out played a major role in getting mainstream culture to take horror seriously.

“So I think honestly, Get Out has a lot to do with it. Like when that came out, like that was the first time”

Morbid: Morbid Book Club: Victorian Psycho By Virginia Feito (Jun 26, 2026) · Listen from 9:36