F.C. Marrow

The Craft

Before the books, I spent years learning how things are made. Art school first, where I made the President's List with a top 1% standing. Then teaching, with a Teaching English as a Foreign Language degree to show for it. Somewhere in between, I picked up the rest of the job titles: writer, musician, artist, content creator, podcast host.

They change depending on the day. The instinct underneath them never does.

Build something. Make it land.

That same instinct is why Marrow-House Publishing exists. Once my own novels were out in the world, I started helping other independent writers get theirs out too — editing, publishing, cover design, the whole road.

The art side started early. I taught myself Photoshop at sixteen and I've been a digital artist and graphic designer ever since.

How I Write

Books raised me, sure — but cinema shaped the way my mind frames a moment, and video games taught me how a story moves. My imagination has always been visual first, textual second.

When I write, the scenes don't arrive as sentences. They arrive as shots. Lighting cues. The slow rise of a score only I can hear. Actors I've cast in my head long before a character even has a name.

About the Dark Stuff

Let's get one thing straight, because it comes up more than you'd think.

I am not, have never been, and will never be into the occult. Or masochism. Or sadism. Or any of the other depraved things that crawl around inside my books.

I write about what terrifies me. And a lot of what terrifies me lives in the places people would rather not look: transgressive relationships, body horror, and the thin lines between love and hate, sex and death, desire and fear.

I write what pushes my own envelope, in the hope that it pushes yours too.

Where I Come From

I'm a late-'80s baby from rural Kentucky — the kind of place that held "Drive Your Tractor to School" days without a shred of irony. I was the rock kid in a sea of camo. Baggy black pants. Converse. Flannel. Hair spiked like Mike Shinoda's, soul patch and all. Yes, I was that guy. Linkin Park carried me through high school.

My childhood ran on Power Rangers, Ninja Turtles, Pokémon, and Dragon Ball. I was ten, shuffling Pokémon decks on the floor of my grandmother's church. (First holo: Machamp. I remember.) Child's Play 2 was the first horror movie I ever watched start to finish, and horror is still my favorite genre.

And every time I walked out of a movie theater as a kid, I walked out as someone new. Some things you never outgrow.

The Worlds

When I was eleven, I sat in front of a CRT playing Resident Evil and wanted one impossible thing: to be there. That want never left.

A story has never been "just" a story to me. A Dragon Ball episode, a Linkin Park record, a Resident Evil game — the things I loved growing up reached places in me that sermons and speeches never could, and they taught me how to survive. Nothing that teaches you how to survive is "just" anything.

Beyond the Page

Anime, video games, music, horror, kpop (specifically), martial arts, and a whole lot more — I'm obsessed with all of it. Most of it ends up on the blog sooner or later, usually with strong opinions attached. Some of them very strong. You've been warned.

The martial arts thing isn't a hobby credit. Multiple-time Taekwondo World Champion. Two-time state champion. Fifteen-time regional trophy holder. Black belts in Taekwondo and Judo, and a blue belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. That practice has shaped just about everything else in my life.

The kpop thing isn't small, either. One look at the blog — or at a photo of my office — and it's obvious this stopped being a hobby a long time ago. Yes, that's a TWICE cap. I said what I said. When my wife asked me what I wanted for Christmas, I said "Momo," and she got me Momo.

TWICE also got me through the hardest thing I've ever done to my own body: losing a hundred pounds in under a year. They were the soundtrack to every mile of it.

And the music runs in the family. I got the singing from my mom.

These days, home is Thailand, with my wife and our two hateful cats, who want nothing to do with either of us.

TWICE for life. ONCE forever.