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Book signing at Ottakar's, Bishops Stortford, 2006 Len (1953) and Mick (1952) have been writing together for a long time. We met in 1964, aged eleven, at Ambrose Fleming Technical Grammar School in Ponders End, Enfield. We weren't friends immediately, that came later, when, aged 18, we had left school and started work - Len as a lapidary in London and Mick for Lloyds Bank. Len works for the same employer, Mick left after 40 years. We began to talk one night, in the bar of the Crown & Horseshoes pub in Enfield, went for a long walk after closing time, and a life time of friendship was born. Mick is married to Clare, Len isn’t married to anyone any more, and there are two children between us, Iain Maynard and Emily Sims, and two grandchildren, Elizabeth Maynard and Macie Sims. We both live in Hertfordshire, about 25 miles apart. We began writing in 1972 with short horror stories that were either Pan Horror type stuff or very atmospheric mood pieces. Our first sales were in 1974, with Curtain Call to London Mystery Magazine for £7 and a second story, Benjamin's Shadow to Hugh Lamb for his Taste Of Fear anthology. Hugh has remained a lifelong friend. Our writing history settles into four main periods - the early traditional ghost story period of about ten years from 1974: a middle period when we wrote a lot without sending much off for possible publication. During this period we wrote and broadly destroyed about 11 novels, and wrote numerous stories. This 'barren' period lasted about ten years from about 1984. The third period began around 1994 and is when we began again in earnest and happily continues to the present day. During this period most of the published work featured on this website, bar the novels, was written. The fourth ten year period began around 2004 with the publication of what was (then) our last story collection, Falling Into Heaven. This phase is dominated by novels. We write supernatural thrillers but are branching out into crime and adventure as well. We'll have to see what phase starts in 2014! “Maynard and Sims. Those are the guys who write ghost stories and traditional horror, full of quiet and subtle effects, whose work you describe as 'atmospheric' because you're too old and self-consciously macho to admit they scared the crap out of you.” Peter Tennant
WHC 2010 – Len, Hugh Lamb, Mick. Our CV goes out like this at present – Four supernatural novels, Shelter, Demon Eyes, and the two Department 18 books (www.dept18.com) Black Cathedral and Night Souls, have been published mass market by Leisure in USA. Currently they have completed two standalone supernatural novels, one of which, Nightmare City, is out from Samhain in 2012, and the other, Stronghold, is being read by them. They have completed the third Department 18 novel, The Eighth Witch, which Samhain have purchased. They are working on the fourth Department 18 book, and a screenplay based on Department 18. They have completed two thrillers, one of which, Mere Mortals, they have published direct to Kindle, while the other, Touching The Sun, is being read by a publisher, and they are currently working on a third book. Numerous stories have been published in a variety of anthologies and magazines, including the Mammoth Book of Best New Horror, the anthology, Strange Tales, which won the World Fantasy Award 2004 and the Del Rey anthology, The Children Of Cthulhu Collections include, Shadows At Midnight, 1979 and 1999 (revised and enlarged), Echoes Of Darkness, 2000, Incantations, 2002, two retrospective collections of their stories, essays and interviews, The Secret Geography Of Nightmare and Selling Dark Miracles, both 2002, one introduced by Hugh Lamb and the other by Stephen Jones, and Falling Into Heaven in 2004. They have currently completed two collections of supernatural stories, one of which, The Odd Ghosts, they have published direct to Kindle, and the other, Flame, is out from Sarob in 2012. Novellas, Moths, The Hidden Language Of Demons, The Seminar, and Double Act, have been published in 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2007 respectively. They worked as editors on the first seven volumes of Darkness Rising, and the two annual Darkness Rising anthologies. They co-edited and published F20 with The British Fantasy Society. As editors/publishers they ran Enigmatic Press in the UK, which produced Enigmatic Tales, and its sister titles. They wrote essays for the Mark Chadbourn website At The World’s End. 3 Cutlers Close, St Michaels Mead, Bishops Stortford, Herts, CM23 4FW, England And they can also be found at http://www.myspace.com/maynardsims On Facebook, separately under Len Maynard & Michael Sims. And they have a message board at http://www.horrorworld.org/massmarket.htm
“Not
only has their influence shaped the supernatural fiction field in the
United Kingdom over the past couple of years, but now they are making
significant ingress across the Atlantic.”
Stephen Jones, editor
Mammoth Book Of Horror
series and many others. |
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Copyright © 2011 L.H. Maynard & M.P.N. Sims |
