JOHN AJVIDE LINDQVIST, who wrote the novel LET THE RIGHT ONE IN is based on.

On writing the novel
I finished this book seven years ago, and it got rejected by a helluva lot of publishers in Sweden, but it was published by Ordfront. It was my first novel, that became this completely unlikely and unexpected success here in Sweden and I just originally started from wanting to depict the place where I grew up - Blackeberg, a suburb to Stockholm, like I did back when I was a stand up comedian, I used to talk a lot about Blackeberg, or like a fictitious Blackeberg with rival gangs of senior citizens and well, what it was like there. And then I sort of returned there when I was going to write my first novel, to create a Blackeberg where I depicted it in such a way that it was going to be possible for a vampire to be living there. That a world where a vampire, a 12-year-old vampire, would be able to exist and I wanted to approach my subject completely seriously and absolutely reject all.. sort of "romanticized" notions about vampires, or what we've seen earlier of vampires, and just concentrate on the question: If a child was stuck forever like, in a 12-year-old existence and had to walk around killing other people and drink their blood to live - what would that child's existance really be like? If you disregard all the romanticized clichés. And then it struck me when I wrote the book that it would be an absolutely horrible existence. Miserable, gross and lonely. And hence, the way Eli is depicted.

On reading some vampire literature and explored the mythology.
I'm an old horror fan anyway. When I go to these... Fantastic Film Fest or I was at something called Fright Fest in London... Every person there knows more about the genre than I do, even though I make a living on it. But yeah I read some vampire novels and watched some vampire moves before I wrote this one. But that was... in horror, the vampire genre is the one that excites me the least, or I think is the least rewarding. I don't read that, don't watch that... Horror - absolutely - still. But to me it's a bit... boring, when you walk into a bookstore and the horror section - it's like half of them are about vampires.

On going from comedy to horror because he's a horror fan
I tried to write in other genres and also to write more conventional literature, but it caused me to start struggling terribly with the language, and I tried to behave like... well 'How would a REAL author write?  Hmmm... probably like this...' and I made these heavy, long sentences and it was very conscious of style and very bad. And it wasn't until I kind of allowed myself to try and write a horror story, this genre that I actually know and really love... It took me many years, what was I? 32 or something. When I finally tried writing this genre, it was the first time that I was writing and discovered, 'Good lord - this is EASY! I can do this. I know what's going to happen next. It's just about writing the story as effectively as possible. Not worry about the language or that it's supposed to be literature. I'll just try to throw in a story that's as exciting as possible, and heartbreaking, and do it to the best of my ability.

On taking a lot from his own childhood
Yeah I have, partially. What I say at the end of the book, that everything in it is true, just that it happened in another way, it's exactly like that. That things of a similar meaning, and a life that was kind of like Oskar's, was mine. And I probably longed for the same type of rescue as he gets and because of that it was very important to me with the movie that I would be allowed to write the screenplay myself. It's possible, that I would ruin the story, that I wouldn't be able to write a screenplay but then at least it would have been me and I wouldn't have had to feel resentment towards another person or my life because he ruined my story. It's particularly close to me, this book, out of all I've written.

On writing stand-up comedy and a novel
The difference between standing on stage of course is, that there you have an immediate response - they're laughing, now it's funny. Now things are going well. But when you write a book it's... the book lives so long after the laughter and can continue to scare people all over the world if you're lucky. But what's harder? They're so different... techniques. I think it's very fun when people say 'I read your book at night... I couldn't fucking sleep. I couldn't sleep so I just had to keep going so I read all night until it was over. Damn you'. That makes me happy. I want to hear that, that's what it's supposed to be like. That's the equivalent to a big laughter and a long applause while on the stage doing stand up routine. But I think that, what I have with me from the stand up comedy and the years I've been doing that, writing material for others where it's so directed towards - It's [swedish comedian] Babben who's going to say this, it's [swedish comedian] Ulla Skoog who's going to say that, it's written for that particular person to say. That's what it's like, and it's aimed to an audience. I can try mumbling it to myself as I write like I did in the beginning. This stylistic thing, it's really you sit there satisfying yourself. I mean, this is aimed towards, I always imagine a reader one way or another like it's someone listening to it who has to like it. You have to be able to read it out loud too. And in that case, that's the stylistic considderation that now I sit reading the text out loud as I'm writing it to hear that it sounds good, because I know that I've got to read it out loud to my wife as well and then it's got to be fucking good. Otherwise, she'll say that it's no good. That makes me sad and I've got to re-write it. So I make sure I'll try to get it right from the beginning.

On writing horror
I think the most important thing with horror, where a lot of horror fails, or [the] horror doesn't work, or that it dies for me is that I don't care about the people that nasty things are happening to. I mean, you got like this little family, and then the genetically mutated grizzly comes along and he's found a barrel of goo out in the forest so he's become like really dangerous and he kills the boy and the mom, the dad lives. If I think they're pretty unpleasant and I don't believe at all from how they talk to each other that they would really care about one another, these people, and that they're just walking around trying to look good in a movie - what the hell do I care what this bear does? While... it's so, I mean... You can take a person that you don't care about on film and just slowly cut him to pieces with a chainsaw and just [go]... 'Oh well...' But if a person you're really engaged in steps on a nail... That's the most important thing, and that I think is where a whole lot of horror doesn't work. That I really can't care about these people. That guy, with the cut off T-shirt, he's the hero. He's the one who's going to save them when they're in that cabin out in the woods, from that psycho killer who's stolen all the gardening tools and is planning to put them to some use. And I know that he's the hero, and he's so fucking bad and self absorbed, and I'm just thinking 'Take him first with the pick ax. Him first, so that I won't have to see him again', and you haven't really succeeded then.

On the American remake
Tomas' film is the definitive film, it is, I can't imagine how anything would be better. BUT, that said, I was very happy when I heard it would be Matt Reeves when I knew there would be a Hollywood production, I thought it was cool that it was him. It had nothing to do with this, but I watched Cloverfield a year ago and thought it was really good. Or, I thought it was a worn out theme that was done in a completely new way, a cool way. So I liked it. And he's also emailed me and expressed how much he likes the actual story and could identify with it and that he really would treat it with respect and he looks forward to doing this, it's not something they've just tossed at him. 'You're gonna make this movie, Matt! Chop-chop!'. He really wants to make this film. I think that's a really cool place to start. He's read the book, and he very much likes the book, and I also like very much that from what I hear he's writing the screenplay himself. It's really a re-adaptation. He will make a new film based on the book, and not remake the Swedish film. So I think it's more exciting than anything.

On excluding information in the novel that's not in the film
The return of Håkan, Virginia drinking her own blood... Virginia's vampire transformation on the whole and what that leads up to... there are so many other things to take from the book and you can make this entirely different sort of movie, you can make this much more violent horror movie type of film. And I don't mind that if it's done with a sense of honesty and intent and the talent that I actually think he has, Matt Reeves. So I think it could be something, it'll be something completely different, but it's going to be really interesting to see.

On writing subgenres of horror
It would be werewolves then, but I really... I do have a werewolf idea, but it's not prominent - Now Anne is listening! (laughs). No there won't be a werewolf. That was too... there was even a screenwriter who wrote to me just to check like 'You're not writing about werewolves anytime soon, right?' 'No, I'm not' 'Well, good. Because I'm doing that now, so... Thanks.' (laughs). No but it's... ghosts, in the latest novel. But it's very strange ghosts, they're not conventional ghosts at all. Have you read it, MÄNNISKOHAMN? [no English title decided yet]. It's two teenage ghosts driving around on a moped, and they quote The Smiths all the time. So they're not regular ghosts. They use the Smiths quotes instead of rattling chains. And Trolls, I've written about that too. But in the upcoming books there's none of that kind of, no monster at all. None of that horror movie... horror story... basic commodity. The next book is more... there's nothing supernatural in it but it'll be very... unless you think a baby that can sing absolutely pitch perfect is supernatural, but that's just really very strange. There's not much left. Mummies? Oh hell no. There's like nothing left.

On the ending of the film, suggesting that Oskar becomes a new Hakan
I think that Tomas deliberately left that open. But I know a lot of people recieve it as now Eli has gotten herself a new helper that's going to follow [her]. That is NOT my version of the end. I've written a short epilogue to the epilogue, that is like my version which will come out in a few years. But it's just 5-6 pages. Until then, Tomas version will reign. It's a really good ending to the movie. It's perfect. But it's a different version from mine. It's in the book a little bit, Eli picks up Håkan from the gutter when he's grown up and filthy already. I like the open ending in the novel. But I would still at some point like to give it my much happier ending.

On characters in the film and the locations taken straight from the novel
Tomas had a different view of Oskar's mom, so he made her that way. Then also... there's a very nice scene with her and Oskar - when he wants her to tell him a story but she doesn't know any stories so she's going to sing, but then the moment has passed and he turns away from her - where she's really nice. But it was dropped. They are still side characters. Håkan is a very central character in the novel [but] he's very much a minor character here [in the movie]. It's a consequence of really concentrating on Oskar and Eli and letting their scenes take exactly the time they should. Even if it means you have to cut the smaller character's lives and destinies. That's a really big difference aganst the book where you have the whole Lacke thing and the whole Håkan thing and... it's... I really see that you read the book as a compliment if you like the film.
And the scenes that are kind of changed or added, most of it I've done myself, changed in the script, but then [there's] a couple of things that Tomas did that aren't even in the script. That part with Virginia where, when you look at her, with the bloody cottonball for example. That was a way to...We thought for a long time that we were going to do that bit where she drinks her own blood but Tomas backed away from that scene and so we got this instead. I feel, that it could have been that way instead [in the book]. That works. I could have [done] it like that instead. Because there is that [in the book] where she cuts herself on a prawn or something and she starts drinking from her finger.

On the title
It's a lot about going through the wrong doors and being in the wrong places. Crossing thresholds, it is. But you can see it in the movie too because of that scene I actually had to convince Tomas, [and] Tomas has reminded me he wasn't going to include that scene but I said it HAD to be in there, it HAD to. It's when Eli enters without being invited and starts to bleed. Because he couldn't see how he was going to be able to do that well. But I said, you'll have to figure it out. (laughs) Because it has to be in there, and later I know he's been very happy with it himself, how it turned out.

On writing for Sweden or internationally
I write for Sweden, I mean obviously. I would be stupid otherwise. This LET THE RIGHT ONE IN, it's so difficult, it is so very Swedish. It is so full of Swedish details, Swedish 1980s, and yet it's a huge success in Australia. You can't plan like that. It would just be bad. The next book I'm writing, [the national Swedish music event] ALLSÅNG PÅ SKANSEN plays a big part in it and i's pretty stupid [to write like that] from an international perspective. [ALLSÅNG host] Anders Lundin, yeah... But you just hope it goes okay, you have to write from... I mean I'm very rooted in Sweden and the Swedish [way] and I have to use that as a ground in everything I write. It's just about continuing to do that. If I tried writing something else and started thinking 'No this might not work in Holland. I shouldn't say anything bad about tulips. I'm gonna say tulips are good.' - You can't do that., it's just bad.

On writing from yourself
If I try to express it as carefully and honestly from my own sensibilities and what I feel... I start very much from 'These are the images, and I'm going to find my way to these images one way or another, I don't understand how this image will fit into this story but I know it's supposed to. I just have to change this and that and make so that some way we can reach this point where we get this image'. I wanted a boy, Tommy, who was just shut inside... that was one of these basic scenes, shut inside a pitch black room together with that which he fears the most. That's like the... primordial horror scene. Where Tommy is locked in with Håkan in the bomb shelter. That's like... and then see, can I make it, can I take it seriously enough, make it really nasty? Then it was just a matter of kind of figuring out a whole bunch of threads that leads up to him being locked in there with Håkan in this shelter so that I can get to write that scene which was very fun to write. That [other] rape scene was incredibly horrible to write, but that scene with Tommy and Håkan was just fun. Just this having to use... it became like 6-7 pages long or something and it's completely dark. To describe [something] when you don't get to use visual sensory perceptions, just the stuff inside the head. That was fun. ...yeah when you read the book. Tommy is a cool guy anyway and all, and Lacke, and they're very developed and so... but that's very impossible [to do] in the movie.

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