Gothic revival

Set aside any notions that the countryside is a place of rest and retreat in the novels of Andrew Michael Hurley. The author’s take on folk horror turns the British countryside into disquieting landscapes – harsh places where malevolent forces are buried beneath the surface, waiting to unleash weird terror on those unwise enough to disturb them. From his award-winning 2014 debut The Loney to his third book, 2019’s Starve Acre (now out in paperback and the perfect eerie read in the run-up to Halloween), Andrew has mapped out a landscape to explore dark fears and elemental otherness.

With its grisly evocations of supernatural rooted in old ways and rural life, folk horror is a relatively new genre, but its roots are buried deep in the old storytelling traditions, particularly of remote places. Films, from horror classics The Wicker Man (1973) and Witchfinder General (1968) to last year’s outing Midsommar, present the countryside as a site of ancient terror waiting to trap the unwary trespasser.

‘Folk horror’s a really tricky thing to try to define,’ says Andrew. ‘The term is fairly new – 10-15 years at the most – but a lot of the ideas and imagery have been around for centuries. It’s a really interesting area to work in. It’s similar to gothic – a sub-genre of gothic, of horror. But with its own particular qualities- for me, I guess I’m looking around at films, – it’s particularly British, draws on British folk stories and history. It’s