Did you know that Gigi Griffis’s newest book, We Are the Beasts, was inspired by a real historical mystery? It’s true! Learn all about the original beast and how Gigi Griffis created her latest YA horror novel.
Introduce yourself!
Hey there, I’m Gigi! An author, history nerd, and aspiring bog witch living in Porto, Portugal. I’m a sucker for little-known histories, “unlikable” female characters, and all things Europe.
We Are the Beasts is rooted in a real-life horror! What is the story of the Beast of Gévaudan ?
The Beast of Gévaudan is a real, unsolved historical mystery!
In a former province of France called Gévaudan, a mysterious beast stalked the countryside attacking, maiming, and killing people—mostly shepherdesses. The situation got so bad that even the king (who wasn’t always super attentive to the impoverished rural regions of his country) sent out his best hunters to try and take the monster down.
To this day, we don’t know what was stalking French peasants—though there are many theories.
How did you research this story?
In addition to reading plenty of nonfiction books and scholarly papers on the history of the beast (and other adjacent historical topics, including witch hunts), I took a week(ish) hike through the Gévaudan region, finishing in the town of Mende (which is where We Are the Beasts is set).
My pint-sized Yorkie mix, Luna, and I walked anywhere from two to seven hours a day, sleeping in pilgrim accommodations at night, eating local food at tables full of fellow hikers, and learning about the geography and local customs (like drinking tea and coffee from bowls, never mugs!) along the way.
Why were you inspired by it?
I love unsolved mysteries, weird historical details (some of the ways they tried to catch the beast were BANANAS), and anything horror adjacent, so I had long been fascinated by the story of the beast. But I could never find a way to write about it, because I’m tired of books (and movies and shows) about dead girls. I’m tired of our deaths being the inciting incident in someone else’s story.
Which is why I didn’t write this book until I realized that mine wasn’t a story about dead girls. It is a monster story about saving girls. About two girls who used the beast as cover to fake the deaths of their friends and get them out of the nightmares they’d been living in closer to home.
What do you love about writing horror? Do you ever scare yourself?
I think what scares us is very individual.
Some of the books, movies, or ideas that scare me half to death barely register with some of my friends. On the other side of things, my previous book (The Wicked Unseen) didn’t scare me to write, but got an early review saying it gave someone else nightmares for weeks.
The type of horror I write is always rooted in the real world, which does scare me, but not in a jump-out-of-my-seat kind of way. It’s more creeping dread. More “we need to do something about this” and my something is to write about it.
Which is why this isn’t a book about the terror of the beast so much as it’s a book about the terror of being hurt in our own homes, our own communities.
And that’s what I love about horror, really—the ability to explore the darkest parts of life, of ourselves, of the world we live in, and ask what we can do to triumph against it all.
How do you keep track of twists and turns?
I plan all my books before I write them. So while I learn plenty more about the characters and the world and the story along the way, the big twists, the reveals, the climax the book is hurtling toward . . . they’re all in place before I write the first chapter. This makes it pretty easy to track things. I just have to find the right spot in my outline if I can’t remember what comes next or what came before.
Are there any interesting behind-the-scenes anecdotes you’d like to share?
Fun fact: There’s a little museum in Mende, France, with a big Beast of Gévaudan exhibit. They’ve asked for a copy of We Are the Beasts for their collection!
Share a favorite out-of-context quote from the book. (No spoilers, of course!)
“Even as she calls me soft for wanting to help them, I know the truth: it’s the fatal part of me that wants it, not the soft part. I want to leave my teeth marks on the souls of each of those men, make them scared to put their hands on another girl.”
