StokerCon 2025 Keynote Speech: Why We Need Horror Authors in the Fight For the Freedom to Read

On June 14th in Stamford, Connecticut, Becky Spratford gave the keynote speech at StokerCon 2025. You can watch the entire awards on YouTube, and you can see her keynote speech HERE.

Why We Need Horror Authors in the Fight For the Freedom to Read

Hello. As many of you know, my name is Becky Spratford and I am the Secretary of the Horror Writers Association and the Co-Chair (with Konrad Stump) of our Libraries Committee. I have been a librarian for 25 years–the entirety of this century–and I don’t think this will shock any of you, but the last five years have been some of the most Horrific times to be in this profession in the 150-year history of the American Public Library.

So yes, you can see where this is going now. Right? Where better to talk about the Horror that we library workers have been facing than at a celebration of Horror Writers?

I am not trying to bring the mood down here. This is THE Keynote for our Bram Stoker Awards ceremony–our Horror prom if you will. What I am trying to do is quite the opposite, however. I am taking advantage of my time here, in front of a ballroom full of Horror professionals, along with everyone watching on YouTube, to enlist every single one of you in the fight to protect the freedom to read for all. Because who is better to talk about the horror of book bans and the terror of suppressing intellectual freedom than those of us who ply our trade in horror and terror every single day?

It’s true. We know Horror, and when it comes to intellectual freedom, we are all living in a Horror novel right now.

The freedom to read what we want, when we want, is under serious attack. The freedom for parents to make their own choices for their own kids is gone. Both have been replaced by nefarious groups who are trying to remove everything from our schools and libraries that does not uphold the white, cis, heteronormative agenda they are pushing.

What began five years ago as a concerted effort by a few organized groups to infiltrate school and library boards and suppress access to information and leisure reading items by marginalized voices in a few states, has evolved into state sponsored censorship.

Books by all writers, no matter their identity, need to be available for all readers–from the youngest children to teens to adults. When we remove them from public school curriculums and libraries (even if all the library does is move that book from a youth section to “adult”), access to that information is sacrificed. The books that will be the most easily accessed will only be about the lives of white, cis, heteronormative humans.

Reading fiction, and Horror fiction in particular, has been shown time and time again as one of the best ways for people to build empathy for others. Reading is a foundational skill, critical to future learning, and to exercising our democratic freedoms.

I could go on and on here, and I know I am preaching to the choir, but here’s the thing– being angry is not enough. I am here standing up before all of you to ask you to fight against this Horror and to help us defeat this monster. But I am also a Horror writer myself, and a good librarian, so I am also here to help you draft this horror story where we will all triumph over evil.

I am asking you tonight to commit to attending a meeting (or two or three) of your local library board in the next few months. Even if, and especially if, they are not experiencing any book challenges. Why? Well, first, they probably are and you just don’t know it. The Federal Government is actively stripping money from every public library in the nation right now. They have put the American Library Association on their “enemies” list. We library workers are in the thick of this horror novel-level chaos every single day. What we need is to see the public to come out and support us.

And again, who better than those who truly understand Horror than all of you to help us. Go to your local library’s website and check when their meetings are. My board, for example, meets the third Tuesday of every month at 7 pm. Most government and board websites post calendars and agendas for upcoming meetings, and some also livestream them. Even if book bans or collection policies aren’t on the agenda, many boards and councils allow comments on issues of concern from any community member.

I will be including a link to the information from United for Book Bans with the recording of this event on YouTube because they have everything you need to know from how to contact your library to talking points to a few of these pointers I am going to mention now.

Before you head to a board meeting, you’ll need to know the following:

1. When and where will the meeting take place?
2. The policy around public comments:

• • Where do public comments fall in the agenda?
  • How long do you have to speak during public comments?
  • Do you have to register ahead of time to make a public comment?
  • Are there any rules for the contents of comments?

1. 1. Is there a dress code or a code of conduct attendees are expected to follow? I suggest bookish t-shirts if you can.

You don’t need to remember these pointers and questions, though, because I will have the resources available for all of you to consult. But, and I cannot say this enough– WE NEED YOU. Please don’t leave this for someone else to do. IT IS YOU– ALL OF YOU. We need you to be at meetings, speaking as an author, community member, and supporter of the freedom to read. Prepare your comments, but speak from the bottom of your hearts.

Go before there are problems, if you can. Go multiple times (you can make the same statement over and over again), so your voice against book banning and for intellectual freedom is in the public record. Bring your friends. Get them involved. Figure out a way to have someone there to speak favorably about the library every month, if you can.

Think that is overkill? Well, I am going to be honest with you here. That is the playbook for the groups working together to get books banned. They are organizing and having people speaking against intellectual freedom at every board meeting, every time, in many towns across America.

Now, if your community is already trying to actively ban materials, this is even more dire. And I also want to be honest here, speaking out in a meeting, in your community, where there is a consensus against you is hard. But it can be done. I want to take a moment and ask HWA member Doug Murano to stand up and be recognized because he did just this. He stood up in a contentious meeting, risking great harm to himself and his reputation, to fight for the freedom to read at a school board meeting. Doug, thank you.

Hopefully, none of you will ever have to deal with what Doug faced, but know, the best way to not live that dystopian reality, is to speak up BEFORE there are problems.

I know we are an international organization and this talk may seem American-centric, but let me say to all of you in the rest of the world, two things. 1. I know many of you have dealt with an assault on intellectual freedom before. I also know when you dealt with those, American writers probably didn’t help because, well, we thought we were impervious to censorship and didn’t listen. So, let me apologize to you for that behavior now, and 2. I want to ask for your help as well. Share what you know with us. Let us know how you have fought already so that we might be able to learn from you.

We are here to celebrate another great year of Horror. We will give out awards, honor volunteers, and present Lifetime Achievement Awards. And while we will all come away with our dark hearts bursting with joy, I also hope you leave raring for a fight. I hope you are ready to, as one of my favorite bookish t-shirts says, ban the fascists and save the books. Because who better than to stop the Horrors of censorship than those who spend their days immersing themselves in stories of terror, fear, and unease. Who better to understand the monster we are dealing with? And most importantly, who is better prepared to fight it.

We are.

And your Halloween librarians are here to help you. We are but a quick email away– dozens of us, ready to help you stop the Horror of book bans in a free society. Simply email libraries @ horror dot org. Check out United Against Book Bans (link to be provided) for all of the talking points and tips you need to get yourself in front of your library board to speak out against the Horror of Book Bans.

Thank you in advance. We can do our best work to protect the intellectual freedom of all, no matter where they live, if we work together– one library board meeting at a time.

Becky Siegel Spratford

Secretary, HWA

June 14, 2025

Please note: this speech was directed at Horror authors, but I hope all of my readers use it as a template to speak to their community members about the importance of speaking out for the freedom to read and use the “how-to” component in the speech to give them the tools they need to take action.