While perusing the list of nominations for the 2025 Splatterpunk Awards, one name stands out: Bad Dream Books. Billed as a “boundary-breaking artist collective,” Bad Dream Books produced one-third of the nominees with at least one title represented in all five categories. That’s an impressive eight out of 24 nominations.
Benjamin co-authored by Aron Beauregard and Shane McKenzie and The Old Lady by Kristopher Triana earned nominations for Best Novel. A Life of Crime by Beauregard and For the Better by Daniel J. Volpe received noms for Best Novella. “Together Forever” by C.V. Hunt and “Baby, I’d Die 4 U” by Triana were nominated for Best Short Story. Sucking Chest Wound and Other Horrors by Volpe scored a Best Collection nom, and The Obituaries #6: Red Romance is up for Best Anthology.
I do want to highlight the gritty, violent novel Benjamin as a particularly creative work that offers “an immersive entertainment experience” and demonstrates the collaborative aspect of Bad Dream Books. A labor of love for the authors, Benjamin is set in a dark city with a high murder rate where a new designer drug and a rash of mysterious disappearances plague the population. Benjamin features interior illustrations by Jim Agpalza plus scannable QR codes leading the reader to almost 15 minutes of animated videos designed by Jorge Jaramillo to complement the story and give readers “a sense of atmosphere before beginning the experience.” A member of the collective, Jaramillo is a talented Colombian director and animator based in Los Angeles, and Benjamin is actually dedicated to his hard work on the project. The novel also features a beautiful hand-painted cover by Frank Walls.
The Bad Dream Books collective itself is the brainchild of Beauregard, Triana, and Volpe.
“Originally, the brand began as a vehicle to release the extreme underground horror series The Obituaries,” according to BadDreamBooks.com. “The idea was to bring no-holds-barred extreme horror directly to the reader, with no publisher or cooperate distributor to veto the themes or imagery of their publications. It has since expanded into a tight-knit collective of like-minded writers and artists who support one another and the common goal of distributing disturbing literature to the masses.”
Of course, with three of the top names in Splatterpunk and extreme horror fiction, the dominating performance of Bad Dream Books should not be surprising. Beauregard, Triana, and Volpe have consistently released some of the best hardcore horror fiction on the market since the presentation of the first Splatterpunk Awards in 2018. The trio has combined to compile a whopping 22 nominations and five wins. Triana has 10 nominations with two wins for Best Novel (The Night Stockers with Ryan Harding, 2022; Full Brutal, 2019). Beauregard has earned seven noms with two wins (Playground, Best Novel, 2023; Beyond Reform, Best Collection, 2022). Volpe has received five noms with one win for Best Novella (Plastic Monsters, 2023).
Bad Dream Books lists 12 authors and artists in its stable. Among them are Grindhouse Press owner C.V. Hunt, two-time Splatterpunk Award-winning authors Edward Lee and Bryan Smith, J.F. Gonzalez Lifetime Achievement Award recipient Wrath James White, and four-time Splatterpunk Award-winning author Ryan Harding.
Bad Dream Books is best known for The Obituaries, an extreme horror series sold in limited quantities directly to readers. Each edition features a theme and new stories from Beauregard, Triana, and Volpe. As I write this, there are seven issues, including ones with special guest authors Lee, Smith, Hunt, and White. The books feature “gruesome” cover art by various artists and “brutal” interior illustrations by Nick Justus.
Visit BadDreamBooks.com for more information or to purchase The Obituaries.
LIONEL RAY GREEN 