Welcoming Callum Rowland

Flame Tree Press welcomes writer-publisher Callum Rowland, to talk about his short story “The Soup of Life”, which appears alongside a stellar line-up in the groundbreaking anthology This Way Lies Madness, releasing in September from Flame Tree Press in our Beyond & Within series. In the introduction to the work, the book’s co-editors, Dave Jeffery and Lee Murray, say the anthology “defies convention by bringing together authentic, sensitive portrayals of mental illness in a genre that has notoriously lacked such tenets.” Comprising 23 stories and poems, the book also includes accompanying vignettes offering insight into the authors’ motivation for their work.

Today, Callum Rowland shares an excerpt from his story along with a short glimpse into his inspiration.

Excerpt:

It is my third consecutive day on analysis duty. I’m fairly certain Grant is cheating, though how you prove cheating in a game of chance is quite beyond me. Perhaps I have some unidentified tell.

The confinement is making my skin itch. Of course, I can stretch my legs whenever I feel like it, but stepping out under the azure sky to stare at a phenomenally alien landscape only makes me all the more sullen to return inside. I’ve found myself talking freely to Harold on numerous occasions. I know he can’t possibly understand me, but it’s more cathartic than stewing in my thoughts.

Callum writes:

“I approached this story knowing I wanted to write a ‘descent into madness’ style story, focusing specifically on the paranoia and anxiety that can warp our realities – something most of us have experienced at one point or another. 

Reality as an idea interests me; how one person’s reality can be very different to another’s, and neither is necessarily right or wrong. Our reality in any given moment is very much based on, or shaped by, our perceptions, and mental state obviously plays a huge part in that.

Taking a group of people and placing them in a confined space for a prolonged period can be a natural catalyst for heightening these thought processes. Using science fiction trappings and an alien life form as a physical manifestation allowed me to take this idea to the nth degree.”

As well as Rowland’s story, Murray and Jeffery invite readers of This Way Lies Madness to discover “tales of trauma, dissociation, body dysmorphia, psychosis, depression, anxiety, and more, captured in all forms of horror from the extreme to the nuanced. There is jaw-dropping violence, skin-crawling body horror, and quirky dark humour, alongside the quiet, heartbreaking introspections of people spiralling into madness. Yet all the stories and poems in this volume are framed so that the insensitive, stereotypical presentations of mental illness commonly found in horror are resoundingly and appropriately absent.”

"A mesmerizing and remarkably ambitious mosaic of delicate minds possessed, of spoiled and haunted hearts, of gaping wounds both seen and unseen. This Way Lies Madness weaves a beguiling and profoundly revealing tapestry of psychological terror with such nuance and depth in each collected story." – Eric LaRocca, author of Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke

Callum Rowland is a UK-based writer and co-founder of charity publisher TL;DR Press. He writes across all genres, although science fiction, fantasy, and horror are closest to his heart. When not writing he works in the medical supply industry, is parent to the protagonist of his and his wife’s story, and fights a losing battle against the ever growing to-be-read pile of books. A finalist in the Writers of the Future competition, his stories can be found in: Daily Science Fiction, Aphelion Webzine, ExoPlanet Magazine, Bandit Fiction, and a number of other markets and anthologies.

This Way Lies Madness is out September 9th 2025: Pre-Order Now