"Life is horror and fantasy, not necessarily in that order."
Jonathan Maberry earned two nominations in novel categories, and Lee Murray received a pair of nods for short fiction and anthology to lead the 2018 Bram Stoker Awards Final Ballot, according to a press release by the Horror Writers Association on February 23. “This year’s nominees demonstrate a continued lineup of quality work in the …
Continue reading Maberry, Murray lead nominations on final ballot of 2018 Bram Stoker Awards
One of my all-time favorite horror authors, Bryan Smith, led the nominations for the second annual Splatterpunk Awards with three works on the list, according to a February 4th press release by Wrath James White and Brian Keene, founders of the Splatterpunk Awards. Smith's novel Last Day and his two novellas, Dead Stripper Storage and Kill …
Continue reading Bryan Smith leads nominations for Splatterpunk Awards
The final hours of 2018 are nigh, and the first year of my website/blog is complete. This column is more for me as a way to look back on my year and keep track of my writing, but you're welcome to read on if you like. I'll start with my favorite joke I heard in …
The song tormented me for nearly three decades. But I found it (or rather it found me) on Sunday, and I cried when I realized the torment had ended. Oh, I'd forget about the song for years at a time, but it always reared its torturous melody in my brain during random moments in my …
Continue reading The Song That Tormented Me For Nearly 30 Years
The 2018 World Fantasy Awards were presented during the World Fantasy Convention held November 1-4 in Baltimore, Maryland. Charles de Lint and Elizabeth Wollheim won Lifetime Achievement Awards. Victor LaValle's The Changeling and Fonda Lee's Jade City tied for the win in the Novel category. Ellen Klages won in the Novella category for Passing Strange. …
I finally took the plunge and started participating in NaNoWriMo, the popular month-long novel-writing program to celebrate November as National Novel Writing Month. The goal is 50,000 words, and I topped 2,200 the first day while listening to Electric Light Orchestra. As a horror writer, I figured my NaNoWriMo novel would be one of a …
Continue reading Horror Writer Penning Romantic Comedy for NaNoWriMo
WriterWriter's mission is spreading stories by promoting and inspiring authors using resources and exposure via its website, writer-writer.com. Founded by talented writers in their own right, David Collins and Morgan Wright, WriterWriter provides a wealth of published fiction in the fantasy/SF and horror genres plus interviews, articles on writing, and contests for writers. I discovered …
Continue reading WriterWriter inspires my trip down ‘Scarecrow Road’
One of my favorite horror authors, Jeff Strand, released a filthy comedic thriller titled Bang Up on October 21st. I'm sad to report my 5-star Amazon review of the hilarious novella made Strand "cringe." That's one of the tidbits I learned in my exclusive 5-question email interview with Strand. A couple of other nuggets I …
Continue reading Horror Author Jeff Strand Does BANG UP Job in New Comedic Thriller
The title of the new Halloween film now in theaters should've been Laurie Strode vs. Michael Myers. That sums up this sequel set 40 years after the original 1978 classic. Jamie Lee Curtis reprises her role as Laurie, the victimized teen prey of the original. Four decades later, Laurie is an agoraphobic prepper waiting for …
The Girl Next Door by the late Jack Ketchum is the most depressing and devastating horror novel I've ever read. Published in 1989, the book is loosely based on the 1965 torture and murder of 16-year-old Sylvia Likens in Indiana by her caregiver Gertrude Baniszewski, Baniszewski's children, and other neighborhood youths. Reading details of the actual …
Continue reading Why I Love Chapter Forty-Two of THE GIRL NEXT DOOR
