Journals, Volume I: 1993-2001

“Epic and intimate . . . fascinating.”
— Booklife by Publishers Weekly

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About the book

For more than two decades, Matt Cardin has been one of the most dynamic writers of contemporary weird fiction. In addition, he has been a perspicacious commentator on weird literature, horror films, and related subjects. Now he presents the first of two volumes of his journals, which he began keeping years before he contemplated a career as a writer. In these journals Cardin wrestles with profound philosophical and religious issues, absorbing the work of thinkers ranging from Plato to Nietzsche to Alan Watts; at the same time, he speaks of his fascination with such writers as H. P. Lovecraft, Ray Bradbury, and Thomas Ligotti, whom he has made a special subject of study. Throughout these compelling journal entries, Cardin reveals his own shifting philosophical and psychological state, presents early drafts or synopses of his weird tales—including many partial drafts and plot germs for stories that he never went on to complete—and speaks with affecting candor of his personal relationships. Cumulatively, this journal reveals Matt Cardin to be one of the most intellectually challenging authors associated with horror literature.

Praise

“In probing, revealing entries dating back to his early 20s, in the 1990s, the celebrated writer, authority, and analyst of weird fiction digs into the topics readers might expect, like Lovecraft and Thomas Ligotti and the creative process, but also into the real world, its sickness, and the quandaries a philosophical dreamer tends to face while putting together a life. . . . Lovers of weird fiction will relish Cardin’s insights, story ideas, unsettling dreams, and reports on his reading, game-playing, and his fascinating spiritual and philosophical development. . . . The result is epic and intimate, a portrait of a mind and a milieu, with deep dives into the creative mind, the nature of the weird, and how to find one’s way in a world that’s sick.”
— Booklife by Publishers Weekly

“It’s a brave thing for an academic professional and professional fiction writer to present to the world the diaries of his younger self. Here we have a man’s doubts about everything in his life as they emerged: family, marriage, religion church, a career in academia, fiction writing. It is only late in the diary, as Cardin masters his subjective obsessions with reading and writing, with religious and aesthetic yearnings, and attains a level of detached calmness and satori, that mastery begins to emerge in his twin careers.”
— Goodreads reviewer

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