Life & Work with P.L. McMillan

Today we’d like to introduce you to P.L. McMillan. 

Hi P.L., thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstories.
My passion for writing started young, sparked by my love for the horror books of my childhood. I remember the excitement I felt every time my teacher would announce we had a writing assignment and the desire I had to be the best in the class. Often this drive made me go above and beyond what the assignment called for: creating covers, bio pages, and illustrations. 

In fifth grade, my enthusiasm earned me a call home to my mom about my artwork and content matter — at that point, I was obsessed with the Fear Street collection and many red pencil crayons were sacrificed in my illustrations of bloody haunted houses, bloody skeletons, bloody moons, everything blood — and the teacher was concerned to say the least. I have to hand it to my mom though, she told the teacher off for being upset at my creativity but also asked me to write horror at home and something else at school. 

In junior high and high school, I wrote novels. All of them passion projects I spent the majority of my free time on. All of them were horrible. 

In university, I got more serious and took creative writing classes, which probably did more damage to my writing career progress than anything else in my life. The professors, the other students, all looked down on genre writing. It was tough. It really affected my motivation as well and I didn’t end up seriously pursuing anything writing-related for quite a while. 

It was only when I was living in Japan that I decided, concretely, that I was going to aim for publication. 

Two years later, I was published for the very first time. 

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
As I mentioned already, the road I’m on is bumpy. It has twists and turns, surprise speedbumps, and random jaywalking moose. Okay, enough with the terrible road analogy. 

I don’t think I am alone in this type of struggle though. Writing isn’t an art that is gentle with its artists. You have to deal with a lot of self-doubt, criticism, and imposter syndrome. I’m no different. Rejection letters still break my heart — luckily a little less now that I’ve grown a thicker skin and have some publications under my (seat)belt. 

Additionally, I do deal with anxiety and depression. Most days, the voice – my inner monologue that tries to tell me that chances of success are too small, that I’m not good enough, and nothing I do will matter – is manageable. I can deal with it and push through. Other days, it’s a cacophony, a weight that crushes me down. 

In the end, I know it will never be a smooth road. I will encounter rejections, low periods, but I also know now that there will be successes and high points. And that’s the thing I try to focus on. 

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I really love being creative in different ways — I dabble in painting, resin art, cross-stitch, and digital art — but my one true passion is writing horror fiction. 

To date, my fiction has appeared in a wide array of anthologies and magazines like Hinnom Magazine, Howls from Hell, Strange Lands Short Stories, and more. In addition to print, my stories have been adapted to audio productions and appeared on podcasts like The Nosleep Podcast and Nocturnal Transmissions. 

I love writing and exploring a variety of themes using the horror genre, but I would say I’m likely known for my cosmic horror and sci-fi horror tales. Those are the sub-genres that I also enjoy the most. 

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.plmcmillan.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/authorplm/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/author.plmcmillan
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/authorplm
• Other: https://linktr.ee/AuthorPLM