Writes horror and suspense novels, is a producer, and actor.

Please, introduce yourself. Tell us about your personal life, family, education.

I’m David Tocher. It’s pronounced “talker.” I’m based in the Okanagan region of British Columbia, Canada, where I write primarily horror and suspense fiction.

My 2024 novel Spider Seeds was optioned for film, with Stephen David Brooks attached as screenwriter and director, and Liane Curtis (Sixteen Candles, Girlfriend from Hell, Critters 2) attached as both lead actress and producer. The novel also received the Literary Titan Gold Book Award for Fiction.

My other works include Canadian Dreadful: An Anthology, which I edited and contributed to. The collection received praise from First Blood author David Morrell, who called it “a harrowing tour of the northern landscape that will leave you both dazzled and terrified.”

I also wrote She Who Hunts: The Tale of T’lejhánka, a prequel to Spider Seeds, which expands the mythology and deepens the world introduced in the original novel.

Most recently, JaFra Publishing released Moonlight Desires: A Cinderella Retelling on January 5, 2026, a dark fairy-tale reimagining that leans into Gothic atmosphere and emotional transformation.

I’m currently completing Spider Sister, the sequel to Spider Seeds, scheduled for release later in 2026. This final installment will bring my spider-horror series to its conclusion.

What is Spare Time?

What do you like doing in your spare time?

Spare time? What’s that? Kidding. I rarely have spare time. But when I do, I often have to force myself to relax and watch a movie as a reward for the hours I’ve put into writing.

I also enjoy baseball. My favourite National League team is the Chicago Cubs, and my favourite American League team is the Red Sox. In the summer, you’ll likely find me in the seats at Elks Stadium, watching a Kelowna Falcons game.

I like football too. I root for the Buffalo Bills. Josh Allen all the way.

If you are active in career fields other than writing, what do you hope for the future of that business? Describe your work or business activities in which you are presently active.

I had a strong and formative experience studying acting. A great deal of Hallmark and Lifetime Channel productions are filmed here in the Okanagan, and I have worked extensively as a background actor in these projects over the last few years. So, if you are ever watching one, pay close attention—if you blink, you’ll miss me.

Beyond acting, I have supported the production of independent horror films and hold producer and associate producer credits on several of them. There are two projects I’ve backed that I’m especially proud to be connected to, with honorary producer credits. The first is I Know What You Need, written and directed by Julia Marchese and adapted from Stephen King’s short story of the same title. It’s a great adaptation, and if you get a chance to see it at a film festival, take advantage of the opportunity!

The second is the 2024 remake of Jack Hill’s cult classic Spider Baby, Or the Maddest Story Ever Told, written and directed by Dustin Ferguson and featuring genre icons Brinke Stevens, Beverly Washburn, and Ron Chaney.

If I continue moving into principal roles, I see myself fitting naturally into the tradition of reliable, grounded character actors such as Barry Corbin, M. Emmet Walsh, or Stacy Keach.

Writing, however, remains the centre of my professional life and takes up the majority of my time. It is where my voice is most fully expressed, and it continues to be my primary passion.

Do you have hobbies? How did you get started in them?

I’m not sure I have a “hobby” in the traditional sense. Most of my creative energy is already accounted for. That said, I’ve been increasingly interested in visual art. I’d like to learn to draw with pencil and eventually paint landscapes.

If I decide to pursue this, it wouldn’t be for public consumption or professional goals. It would be a private discipline, something tactile and quiet that I can enjoy just for the sake of doing it.

An Avid Reader

If you are a writer, are you an avid reader?

Yes, I’m an avid reader and have been since early childhood. I don’t believe a person can become a competent, or even a successful, writer without being a committed reader. You have to read, and not only modern fiction. You need to read your favourite author’s favourite authors, and then keep going further back.

What is your ultimate writing goal as you see it today?

My main writing goal is to continue mastering the styles of the Romantic and Victorian periods of English Literature, and make these styles feel natural to modern readers. The Romantic Period is my favourite era, especially the Gothic strain that came out of it, where mood, emotion, and atmosphere matter as much as plot. Victorian writers didn’t throw that away, but they used it differently. A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens is a good example of that in how he used ghosts, old London architecture, and heightened emotion to push Scrooge’s moral awakening.

In my novel Spider Seeds, I draw from both traditions the best I can. I reference Romantic writers like Emily Brontë and Victorian writers like George Eliot, and I tried to let my quieter scenes breathe in a romantic way, through my main character’s memory and reflection. My descriptions of Victoria, British Columbia’s older buildings were shaped by Gothic ideas as well. I wanted the setting to be an actual character itself that carried history and emotional weight, and wasn’t just a backdrop.

How do you decide on the title of a book?

I think a title should prompt a question in the reader’s mind. I usually start by asking, “What is…,” and then insert the possible title. If the book genuinely answers that question, then I know I have the right title.

For example, my novel Spider Seeds invites the question, “What are ‘Spider Seeds’?” You have to read the book to find the answer.

The same is true of Moonlight Desires. “What are ‘Moonlight Desires’?” The way to know is to read the story.

Have you developed a specific writing style and why?

I’ve developed my style around the conventions of the Romantic Period of English literature and the Victorian era, as those traditions speak to me most strongly. William Wordsworth, in his Preface to Lyrical Ballads, lays out a blueprint for interiority:

“Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquillity.”

This principle translates to fiction writing as well. The author does not simply experience nature, but is conscious of, and able to articulate, what is happening within him as he encounters it, and then he endows these emotions and articulations to his characters.

I do my best to apply the techniques these writers developed to build world, character, and story, allowing inner experience and outer reality to transit into one another.

How much of your books is realistic and experiences based on someone you know, or events in your life?

I’ve found that if I want the characters to feel like living, breathing people who think for themselves, I have to step out of the way and listen. When I do, they speak to me. They tell me their own stories. If I base a narrative too closely on events from my own life, or on people I know, I tend to get blocked. The process becomes one of control rather than discovery. I don’t want to force the story. Instead, I want to uncover it. A few times, I’ve had characters go completely silent the moment I imposed myself on them. And that was just for assigning them names instead of listening for the names they wanted to give themselves.

I believe real authors aren’t inventors or creators. Rather, we are listeners first. Scribes. Amanuenses. Attentive and patient, recording what the characters choose to reveal in their own time and in their own voices. The tools of creative writing, when used properly, are not instruments of control but of attention. They help the writer listen.

Favorite Writer

Who is your favorite writer, and what is it about their work that really strikes you?

William Shakespeare. He’s the greatest English writer to ever have lived. What about his work really strikes me? Everything. Absolutely everything.

Do you remember the first book you read?

Honestly, I think it was Superfudge by Judy Blume. I read it in grade four.

Is there an author, past or present, you would love to meet? Why?

Hmm. Probably Stephen King. He was my gateway. My desire to become a writer first awakened when I read his books around ’89 or ’90. I was just an elementary school kid then. His work didn’t just make me want to write. It pushed me to study literature, to pay attention to how stories are built, and to become a lifelong student of the craft of fiction. If I ever met him, I’d want to shake his hand and thank him. Not for any single book (okay, I’d thank him for Rose Madder), but for opening the door and showing me that this path was even possible.

If you could not write, how would you express what you wish to convey through any stories?

I play guitar, so I’d probably tell stories through the notes on the strings.

When you see new authors struggling, what single piece of advice could you give them on a moment’s notice?

Single piece of advice on a moment’s notice? Let’s see. New writers often make the mistake of trying to create an idea from scratch, invent characters from scratch, and develop the plot from scratch. The work has already been done for you. Take a story that already exists and retell it. Change the circumstances, the characters, the theme, the setting, and so on, but keep the core plot trajectory the same.

Even Shakespeare borrowed other people’s stories and retold them. The Comedy of Errors is based largely on Plautus’s Menaechmi. Romeo and Juliet is based primarily on the English poet Arthur Brooke’s The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet. Hamlet is based on the Danish legend of Amleth, found in Saxo Grammaticus’s Gesta Danorum, and it was also shaped by later retellings, including François de Belleforest’s French prose version. There are more, too.

Stories are retellings of previous stories. You need to know what those stories are so you can tell them again through your point of awareness. As Stanley Kubrick is often quoted as saying, “Everything has already been done. Every story has been told. Every scene has been shot. It’s our job to do it one better.”

That’s your job, authors. Find out what’s been done and do it again, but better.

How do you want others to see you or remember you? Is it important to you?

A man who owns his mistakes, tries to be better than he was yesterday, aims to give readers something that matters rather than just entertainment, and looks for the truth without being driven by the need to please people.

Do you have a blog or website viewers can visit for updates, events and special offers? Include HTML links to any and all of your sites.

Readers can visit my website at https://www.davidtocher.com

They can follow me on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/tocherd/

And they can subscribe to my Substack newsletter at https://substack.com/@davidtocher for regular updates.

Read David’s Books Excerpt here: https://writeanygenre.wordpress.com/2026/01/22/david-tocher-2/