WIHM 2026: Meet A.J. Van Belle

Tell us a little bit about yourself and how you contribute to the horror genre.
I’m an author with a horromantasy novel and a cyberpunk novel on submission right now, plus quite a few horror short stories on the loose. The most recent are "Goat-God and Lime Slip" (If There's Anyone Left, Vol. 5) and “Of Seagrass Fins and Slippery Fingers,” (Augur 8.2), which is on the 2025 BSFA longlist.

As a scientist with a PhD in decay and rot (the ecology of fungal decomposition), I have a nonfiction book on the way that delves into some real and imagined horrors and the science behind them. It’s called A Dozen Dystopias and How to Dodge Them, on the real science of fictional dystopian scenarios from extreme weather events to zombie attacks, coming soon from Bloomsbury (publication date TBA).

As an agent, I represent some amazing authors of horror and horror-adjacent fiction. Keep an eye out for Arwyn Sherman’s horror novel We, the Missing, coming later this year from Sobelo Books. And for sci-fi and fantasy fans, there’s Millie Abecassis’ work: The Color of Time, a sci-fi/hopepunk novel with some distinctly unsettling horror-adjacent elements, coming May 19 from Shiraki Press; and A Legacy of Blood and Bone (Row House Publishing, 2025), a sapphic historical fantasy with a delightfully dark and creepy magic system and threads of body horror.


What drew you to the horror genre?
I didn’t find out I’m a horror person until about five or six years ago, when I started coming across a bunch of intriguing calls for horror short story submissions. That got me reading more horror, writing stories for these sub calls, and ending up with horror work in anthologies and journals. I used to think I didn’t like horror, and that’s because I couldn’t—and still can’t—watch certain horror movies without becoming convinced for the next two weeks that life is actually as utterly bleak and hopeless as the movie portrayed it. It might be that I’m especially susceptible to the visual element, because it turns out I enjoy reading horror of just about any kind, and I can be immersed in the story and afterward still go make dinner without expecting a zombie to come around the corner while I’m chopping veggies. Once I did get into horror, I was drawn to stick around because it’s a genre that encourages a tremendous amount of creative freedom, as well as deeply insightful thinking about our world, both what it is and what it might become.
 

If you could recommend one creation of horror that everyone should consume, whether that be a book, podcast, movie, art, etc., what would you recommend?
I’m going to go classic here and recommend Dracula. Despite how famous it is, and how important it is to understanding our roots, I encounter plenty of people who’ve never read it. If you can go along with the epistolary format, the 19th-century language, and some willy-nilly blood transfusions with no regard to blood type, it’s a masterpiece of pacing and tension. It's also a key ancestor to much of the modern horror genre.
 
When folks look back at the Women in Horror movement of today’s day and age, what do you think the defining characteristic will be?
I think modern horror, especially by women and femme-identified authors, is a space that pushes the boundaries of hope. That might seem paradoxical, but there’s a light in the darkness. Modern horror makes explicit all the pervasive traumas of being a woman and/or perceived female in a society still riddled with sexism like a barely acknowledged but deadly disease, then (often) shows us a way out of the cage of unknowing. Even the most tragic endings take us a step closer to surviving, to thriving, because they tell the truths we may not have known how to voice.
 
What advice would you give to the next generation of women coming into the horror genre?
As a writer, don’t be afraid to experiment with form, with genre blends, and with subject matter. As a reader, explore widely, reading the oldest books of the genre as well as the newest. Pick up award winning novels and obscure horror zines alike. And trust that there’s room for innovation, for you to create something unique as a writer and for you to come across things that surprise you as a reader.


Where can folks find you these days?
I’m @ajvanbelle across socials, or you can find me at www.ajvanbelle.com or at my agent profile page, https://www.thebookeralbertagency.com/aj-van-belle.html.