Horror Writers Association

THE HORROR WRITERS ASSOCIATION (HWA) is a nonprofit organization of writers and publishing professionals around the world, dedicated to promoting dark literature and the interests of those who write it.



Bram Stoker Awards
Final Ballot Announced


               

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The HWA Honors Indigenous Peoples Day

The HWA Honors Indigenous Peoples Day

 
Introduction to Latinx Heritage in Horror 2022

Introduction to Latinx Heritage in Horror 2022

 
A Point of Pride Series

A Point of Pride Series

 

Recent Posts

It’s National Poetry Month—How Incredibly Frightening!

by Denise Dumars

Now that I’ve got your attention, April is National Poetry Month. Naming the month thusly implies that something of great value is being overlooked. Every poet in America knows what I’m talking about. Poetry has never had the huge following in the U.S. that it boasts in some other cultures; in fact, if you are an HWA member who lives in another country, I’d love to hear how poetry is viewed by the general public where you live. I know some countries where it is very much a part of the national conversation, and is not reserved

The Seers’ Table April 2023

Linda Addison, Member of the Diverse Works Inclusion Community

You can see any of “The Seers’ Table” posts since inception (March 2016) by going to the HWA main page and selecting menu item “Our Blogs / Diverse Works.”

Kate Maruyama recommends:

Since Latoya Jordan’s sophomore English class in high school, she knew she wanted a career as a writer. However, she didn’t realize she’d be writing by day and by night: in addition to her fiction, poetry, and the occasional essay or reported piece, she works as a professional writer for a local government agency. Her writing has appeared …

Women in Horror: Interview with Kaaron Warren


Shirley Jackson award-winner Kaaron Warren has published five novels and seven short story collections. She’s sold over 200 short stories to publications big and small around the world and has appeared in Ellen Datlow’s Year’s Best anthologies. Her novel The Grief Hole won all three Australian genre awards. She has lived in Melbourne, Sydney, Fiji and Canberra and her most recent novella is Bitters, from Cemetery Dance. She won the inaugural AsylumFest Ghost Story Telling Competition in 2022.

What inspired you to start writing?

I loved words from the moment I could read them. Any group of words formed …

Women in Horror: Interview with Pamela Jeffs

Pamela Jeffs is an Australian horror author with a love for writing short fiction. Pamela has published five short story collections, co-authored an anthology with Aiki Flinthart titled ‘The Zookeeper’s Takes of Interstellar Oddities’ and published 80+ short stories in various national and international magazines and anthologies including ‘SNAFU: Dead or Alive, by Cohesion Press and ‘Lawless Lands: Tales from the Weird Frontier’ by Falstaff Books. She has been shortlisted for multiple awards throughout her career including numerous Aurealis Awards, Ditmar Awards and has been noted in the Writers of the Future Competition. For more information,

Women in Horror: Interview with Angel Leigh McCoy


Angel Leigh McCoy writes the Wyrdwood series of interconnected paranormal suspense and mystery novels. The Wyrdwood Welcome trilogy kicks it off with Stalking the Moon.

She’s also the mastermind behind Wily Writers, a community of writers who come together for support and to share publishing knowledge. Wily Writers recently published the latest in the Wily Writers Presents series of Horror anthologies, including Tales of Dread, Tales of Nightmares, Tales of Evil, and Tales of Foreboding. Find out more at WilyWriters.net

Previously, she worked as a senior narrative designer for AAA video games such as Guild

Women in Horror: Interview with Nadia Bulkin

Nadia Bulkin is the author of the short story collection She Said Destroy (Word Horde, 2017). She has been nominated for the Shirley Jackson Award five times. She grew up in Jakarta, Indonesia, with her Javanese father and American mother, before relocating to Lincoln, Nebraska. She has two political science degrees and lives in Washington, D.C. You can find her reviewing horror movies on Twitter and Instagram @nadiabulkin, or contact her through her website: nadiabulkin.com

What inspired you to start writing?

My brain uses narrative to process. I was retelling stories that my mother read to me before I

Women in Horror: Interview with Victoria Nations


Victoria Nations writes Gothic and weird horror, often about creatures with emotional baggage. Her fiction has appeared in IN SOMNIO: A Collection of Modern Gothic Horror, Blood & Bone: An Anthology of Body Horror by Women & Non-Binary Writers, and Dangerous Waters: Deadly Women of the Sea, among other publications. Her poetry has appeared in Magpie Messenger Literary Magazine, HWA Poetry Showcase, Volume IX, and the Bram Stoker Award-nominated anthology, MOTHER: Tales of Love and Terror.

Victoria lives in Florida, U.S.A. with her wife and son, who indulge her love of monsters. Find her …

Women in Horror: Interview with Gemma Files

Formerly a film critic, journalist, screenwriter and teacher, Gemma Files has been an award-winning horror author since 1999. She has published for collections of short work, three collections of speculative poetry, a Weird Western trilogy, a story-cycle and a stand-alone novel (Experimental Film, which won the 2015 Shirley Jackson Award for Best Novel and the 2016 Sunburst Award for Best Adult Novel). Her collection In This Endlessness, Our End (Grimscribe) won the 2021 Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in a Fiction Collection. This year she has two fiction collections coming out — Dark Is Better (Trepidatio) and

Women in Horror: Interview with Meg Hafdahl


Bram Stoker Award nominated Meg Hafdahl is the creator of numerous stories and books. Her fiction has appeared in anthologies such as Eve’s Requiem: Tales of Women, Mystery and Horror and Eclectically Criminal. The Wicked Library and The Lift produced her work into audio, and she is the author of three popular short story collections, including Twisted Reveries: Thirteen Tales of the Macabre. Meg is also the author of the three novels; The Darkest Hunger, Daughters of Darkness, and Her Dark Inheritance called “an intricate tale of betrayal, murder, and small town intrigue” by Horror Addicts …

Women in Horror: Interview with Tonia Ransom

Tonia Ransom is the World Fantasy Award-winning creator and executive producer of NIGHTLIGHT, an IGNYTE Best Fiction Podcast featuring creepy tales written by Black writers, and Afflicted, a horror thriller best described as Lovecraft Country meets True Blood. Tonia has been scaring people since the second grade, when she wrote her first story based on Michael Myers. She lives in Austin, Texas. You can follow Tonia @missdefying on all the socials. Risen is her debut book.

What inspired you to write?

As a child, I told myself stories at night to help me fall asleep. I don’t really remember when

Women in Horror: Interview with Christa Carmen


Christa Carmen lives in Rhode Island, and is the author of the short story collection, Something Borrowed, Something Blood-Soaked. Her debut novel, The Daughters of Block Island, is forthcoming from Thomas & Mercer in Fall 2023, and her second novel with the mystery, thriller, and true crime imprint will be out in Fall 2024. Christa studied English and psychology at the University of Pennsylvania and has an MA from Boston College and an MFA from the University of Southern Maine.

When she’s not writing, she keeps chickens, uses a Ouija board to ghost-hug her dear departed beagle, and …

Women in Horror: Interview with Sadie Hartmann

Sadie Hartmann, a.k.a. Mother Horror, is the co-owner of the horror fiction subscription company Night Worms and the editor-in-chief of her own horror fiction imprint, Dark Hart. Her non-fiction book 101 Horror Books to Read Before You’re Murdered is coming from Page Street Books in August 2023. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband of more than 20 years, where they stare at Mt Rainier, eat street tacos, and hang out with their three kids. They have a Frenchie named Owen.

What inspired you to start writing? 

My mom told me about Goodreads ten years ago and

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