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Halloween Haunts: The Severed Hand
Halloween Haunts: The Severed Hand
By Michael Subjack
Halloween has always been my favorite time of year, but there was an odd period between trick-or-treating as a child and enjoying more ambitious pursuits as an adult that found me homebound but still eager to celebrate the holiday. This interlude occurred from eighth grade through my senior year of high school. I generally had friends over to watch horror movies while I handed out candy. The street I grew up on was on a direct path to a building known colloquially as the Armory, which hosted a family-friendly Halloween party every year. That meant the traffic and breathless cries of “Trick or Treat” ran non-stop. Some people liked to stand guard and prop their doors open or lower the upper pane on their storm door to avoid the insistent gong of their doorbell.
Halloween Haunts: Healing Halloween
Halloween Haunts: Healing Halloween
By Lauren Drinkard
A Child of the 80’s
Being a first model Millennial (1981) my love of all things spooky and haunted started as a young child. My gateway drugs were Hellraiser, Nightmare on Elm Street, Evil Dead, Child’s Play, Dracula, Pet Sematary, and Misery. I was just as influenced by my generation’s young adult horror books: Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, The Halloween Tree, Goosebumps, and The Witches. Dark thrillers and evil plots had become part of my DNA.
Halloween Haunts: Obsession
Halloween Haunts: Obsession
by Dean Cade
Costumes and makeup effects have always been a part of Halloween for me. When I was a kid in the 70s, I would get one of the simple plastic outfits with a generic mask of a skull or a not quite Frankenstein’s Monster from TG&Y to go trick or treating. There was also a brief period of running around in Superman Underoos with a red towel for a cape to my mom’s chagrin. As I got older, I took an interest in painting my face and using fake blood. Fascinated with horror films, I rented VHS tapes at a 24-hour gas station, slashers like The Slayer, Maniac, and Scalps, and would watch them late into the night along with classic monsters on TV. My interest poured over into other media, including horror books and magazines. When I discovered Fangoria in 1984, I found a place to get better makeup and blood than the local store. I rented a VHS camera one October and tried doing a zombie/slasher film in my backyard. The footage was mostly terrible, with the exception of one scene where I poured fake blood over my grandmother’s head, and she looked up and said, “I hope you rot in hell.”
Latinx Heritage in Horror Month 2024: An Interview with Iona Wayland
What inspired you to start writing?
To be honest, it was a group of alley cats. Even before I could write, I’d literally scribble and loopity-loop in a composition notebook about the cat families I saw outside from my window. The way I portrayed their stray lives was often like an anthropomorphized telenovela and I remember being frustrated when no one could read what I’d written.
Halloween Haunts: Evoking Dread: A Balancing Act
Halloween Haunts: Evoking Dread: A Balancing Act
By Alexa Tanen
I’ve always loved horror stories; the scarier, the better. But there have been so many examples of an idea I adore that’s given a not-so-scary execution. As both a reader and an editor, there are a few key areas where writers can lose that all-important tension that’s integral to horror.
Latinx Heritage in Horror Month 2024: An Interview with Ericca Chavez
What inspired you to start writing?
I was inspired to start writing because of the ghost stories I would hear as a kid, in particular, La Llorona; they sparked my imagination. I made up worlds in my mind and found myself lost in them—still am most days. Then one day, I decided to bring these worlds to life by actually putting them down on paper.
Halloween Haunts: Arachnid Teachers
Halloween Haunts: Arachnid Teachers
By Heddy Johannesen
I recall a night many years ago when I passed by a cemetery as I was walking home. Something was odd about the cemetery. Cemeteries are naturally spooky places. The streetlights lit the headstones in the eeriest glow I have ever seen. It inspired me to write a horror poem which did get published later.
Latinx Heritage in Horror Month 2024: An Interview with Erick Mancilla
What inspired you to start writing?
For a long time, I wanted to be a comic book writer/creator. I wrote various stories in the comic book medium. Unfortunately, the search for an artist/collaborator was a difficult task. After quite some time of fruitless searches, I did some deep soul-searching and made the jump to writing genre fiction where I had no one but myself to rely on. It has turned out to be the best decision I could have ever made for my creativity.
Halloween Haunts: Sparkles: A Haunted House Story
Halloween Haunts: Sparkles: A Haunted House Story
by Cassandra O’Sullivan Sachar
When I imagine a haunted house, my mind conjures up broken windows, sagging floorboards, and cracked ceilings. I picture cobwebs in the corners and old-fashioned, dust-covered furniture. Rodents skitter about the hallways, their scratching claws punctuating the deathly silence.
Latinx Heritage in Horror Month 2024: An Interview with Victor H. Rodriguez
What inspired you to start writing?
It was a combination of two things: reading, and my day job. After I started working full-time, I developed the terrible habit of not reading anything longer than a magazine article. Then, per my mother’s recommendation – which is odd, considering how not into horror she is – I picked up The Books of Blood, short story collections by Clive Barker, those slim American paperback editions with the monstrous faces on them. The stories The Midnight Meat Train, The Forbidden, and In the Hills, the Cities tore a hole in my brain. I could barely believe people could write such things. I became a lifelong fan of his work. Meanwhile, my career took me in the direction of audio production for TV, movies, and video games. If you combine high-concept short-form story ideas and my fascination with sound, you get the lion’s share of my fiction.
Latinx Heritage in Horror Month 2024: An Interview with Valentina Cano Repetto
What inspired you to start writing?
I’ve always been a voracious reader, and I dabbled a bit in high school with a creative writing class, but I never really considered tackling anything substantial until I went through a bout of major depression that left me grasping for anything that could bring a bit of relief. Writing did that for me. I began with free writing, choosing a word at random and scribbling everything that came to my mind without stopping or correcting myself for five minutes. I’d then try to transform the themes I spilled on the page into poetry. It was purely therapeutic at first, but as I started filling notebooks, I began sending some poems out to a variety of journals and e-zines. Surprisingly, editors liked them. It all kind of spiraled from there.
Halloween Haunts: Writing Horror For Comic Books
Halloween Haunts: Writing Horror For Comic Books
By Jonathan Hedrick
Long before the now defunct Comic Code Authority was slapping their seal on funny books left and right, the medium was no stranger to the macabre story telling of horror. Spinner racks were jammed packed with titles like Witches Tale, Chamber of Chills, and The Haunt of Fear. Even now, the modern-day comic book reader can still find a plethora of spooky graphic novels at their local comic shops. From The Autumnal to The Walking Dead, this sequential art form remains a breeding ground for horror stories. But beware! Before you set out to write your next hair-raising script, heed the following tips, if you dare.
The Bloodless Birth of Blood & Spades: In the Words of Marge Simon
Being invited to Marge Simon’s Blood & Spades column in the monthly newsletter is, for many of us, a goal to aspire to. I’ve found many of the poets I love in her column and feel privileged to have been a guest once or twice. Here, in Marge’s own words, is how this dark poetry staple came about. This will also be my last poetry blog post. From here, Sumiko Saulson will be taking over the Dark Poetry Blog. We are in good hands. –aySmith
Latinx Heritage in Horror Month 2024: An Interview with Monique Beasley
What inspired you to start writing?
What actually inspired me to start writing was my sister. She has two children’s books out. One is called, I’m Hungry but No Bugs, Please, and Hello, Pretty Cloud, both available on Amazon. She was trying to write her first horror book and asked for my help. I gave her advice and helped with the editing. She asked me why I had never tried to write a book myself. She knows how much I love to read. I couldn’t believe I’d never thought of trying this before. I was also about to undergo major surgery and would have weeks of recovery time. I used that time to start brainstorming plot ideas. I instantly fell in love with writing and have been making time for it ever since.
Latinx Heritage in Horror Month 2024: An Interview with P.A. Cornell
What inspired you to start writing?,/p>
My parents are avid readers, so they instilled that in me from an early age. We always had lots of books in the house, and they would often read to me. Trips to the public library were frequent, and something I very much enjoyed. By age five I asked where books and stories came from, and my mother explained that there were these people called “writers” who created stories in their imaginations and wrote them down for other people to read. I knew instantly that this was what I wanted to do with my life.