Meet Kayleigh Dobbs

Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Kayleigh Dobbs. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Kayleigh, we’re thrilled to have you sharing your thoughts and lessons with our community. So, for folks who are at a stage in their life or career where they are trying to be more resilient, can you share where you get your resilience from?

I suppose that just comes from life as I’ve experienced it. My childhood was difficult for a number of reasons but I’ve always known there are good things out there, and I’ve always chased them.

Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?

I run a review website exclusively for horror, called Happy Goat Horror. I have plans to expand the content into films and gaming, but so far it has mostly just covered books (with a particular focus on indie horror).

I launched this website because as an author myself, I know how difficult it is to get book reviews – which is the most essential, crucial part of the marketing for books, especially if you’re self-published or working with a small or independent press. Additionally, for years I have been writing reviews of every horror book I read, and would then pitch them to other websites to post. One day, I thought, “Hey, I might as well just run my own book review website at this point!” – And so, Happy Goat Horror was born.

I would like to think that Happy Goat Horror is a little bit special because I’ve geared the entire thing around doing what I can to promote independent horror. I’ve created a space that I hope not only appeals to fellow horror fans and book fanatics like myself, but also my fellow authors and publishers. My goal is to foster a reader/writer community, a “tribe”, so to speak! I’d like for readers to know that I’m expressing my honest opinions about what I read, and for authors to know that my door is always open and I’d like to help promote them and their work as much as possible.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

My main area of knowledge is horror in general. My dissertation (for my BA) was about story-telling in a particular zombie franchise, and I have an MA in Scriptwriting (all of my scripts were horror, or horror adjacent). It’s my favourite genre, my main interest, and something that I feel really connected to and passionate about. Horror is the one thing I feel I can confidently speak about and critique.

Skill-wise, I’d like to think that my education and professional background makes me qualified to review books and stories. I chose to study Theatre and Media, and then Scriptwriting, rather than English, because upon looking up the typical reading lists for English degrees, I didn’t feel my area of interest was well represented. What I care about is the art of story-telling, which I was able to explore through my selected courses. I went on to work in a live performance environment, have scripted a few stage plays that were produced, and then spent a couple of years as a private home tutor (teaching English Language and Literature). As a life-long hobby, I have always written stories, and around the time of my MA, I started getting work published. This doesn’t necessarily make me more qualified than anyone else to discuss books, of course! Art is subjective and everyone’s opinions are valid. I do feel that I have a well-rounded overview of my chosen genre and the creative and technical process of writing, though, which I hope is useful for readers and authors alike.

Ultimately, I think the single most important thing that drives me and that has enabled me the success I’ve had so far is a genuine love for the indie horror community – it feels like a family home to me – and a sincere desire to add as much positivity and celebration to it as I can.

What is the number one obstacle or challenge you are currently facing and what are you doing to try to resolve or overcome this challenge?

Time! There is never enough time. Reading the books in the first place is a time commitment, and then there’s writing the reviews, making videos for the YT channel, and trying to use social media to bring new eyes to Happy Goat Horror. I really need to outsource some more content. The more I post, the faster the site and the YT channel grows, but I simply do not have the extra time required to make the extra content. I’ve been speaking with a number of potential contributors – people who can take some of the book review requests off my hands, others that want to review films, others that would like to talk about games, or write articles, etc. Hopefully this is the year that I can form a team (or a goat tribe, as I like to call it).

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