This story feels quiet thanks to its forest setting, but it’s also quite tense – and the tension ramps up incrementally, building towards the reveal at the end. How did you approach building tension in this story? Were there any particular moments you wanted to stand out?

I’ve always loved a slow-burn, where you have this feeling that something is very wrong, but for much of the story that wrongness seems to be lurking just behind the curtain, showing its face only in cryptic and brief fashion. I knew I wanted the story to exist in that sort of atmosphere and let that general sense guide me tension-wise. There were moments in the first half that I hope stand out in terms of establishing that feeling of wrongness, but as far as wanting the tension to really rise to a boil it was all about the penultimate scene for me, with that uneasy conversation between Paul/Paulson and the mysterious ranger. 

And! Any tips for other writers out there about how to craft tension successfully?

This almost certainly wouldn’t apply to every kind of story seeking to develop tension, but I often find a dash of absurd humor to go a long way for me in terms of cultivating that underlying sense that something is just off! It probably has to exist in tandem with something genuinely unsettling to be effective in this regard, but when used as seasoning atop that meal of dread I think it can serve to amplify a feeling of (potentially sinister or at least uncomfortable) disconnect between your character and their surroundings.

Where did the premise for this story come from? Did you draw on personal experiences, or was it inspired by something external?

Fortunately it did not come from personal experience, aside from that universal sense of the mysterious and expansive that we all feel at certain intervals when in nature. But the story owes a lot more to the movie “Lovely, Dark, and Deep” by Teresa Sutherland, which inspired the idea of a forest ranger encountering some cosmic evil that may, as it turns out, have a substantial  degree of influence on the natural order. 

I’m curious: What other works — books, films, or art – influenced the tone or style of this piece?

Aside from “Lovely, Dark, and Deep,” certain elements of the story were influenced by the work of Brian Evenson and Thomas Ligotti, two of my very favorite writers. Ligotti has been huge for me in terms of experimenting with (and discovering just how much I love) the kind of florid, dense prose that runs through Paul/Paulson’s voice. Evenson’s influence on my writing has been wide-spanning, and includes things like an emphasis on embodiment and hyper-precise sensory detailing that I hope feel present here, but in particular when it came to this story I was inspired by several of his pieces that employ the “let me tell you a tale…” framing at some critical point, wherein a strange, usually sinister character lays out the horrific truth of what’s really happening from the standpoint of telling the (often doomed, at this point) protagonist something like a campfire story. This trope/device has always been very effective for me as a reader, and I thought I found an appropriate vehicle in the enigmatic bug-eyed ranger to try it out myself.