HORROR AND FANTASY WRITER
SPOILER ALERT! "The Call Shift" by N.J. Gallegos won the 2025 Alien Buddha Horror Showdown. It's a slice-of-life tale from the point of view of a resident doctor dealing with exhaustion and a zombie virus amid a pandemic. Gallegos also won the Showdown in 2022 with her domestic horror story titled "The Fruits of Her... Continue Reading →
(Editor’s note: SHORT SHOTS is an occasional feature where I review horror short stories.) For me, the most uncomfortable horror fiction starts in the womb. In April 2022, I read and reviewed “Birth” by Lisa Quigley, the Bram Stoker Award-nominated author of The Forest. The story was in Issue #8 of Unnerving Magazine, and it... Continue Reading →
The End of the World As We Know It: New Tales of Stephen King’s The Stand officially hit the shelves August 19 and became an instant bestseller. It debuted at No. 3 on The New York Times Best Sellers list for September 7, at No. 16 on USA Today's Best-selling Booklist for August 27, and reached No.... Continue Reading →
Curdle Creek by Yvonne Battle-Felton won the prestigious Novel category at the 2024 Shirley Jackson Awards presented at Readercon 34 in Burlington, Mass., on July 19. Billed as a surreal American gothic novel "for fans of 'The Lottery' and The Hunger Games," Curdle Creek is the story of Osira, a 45-year-old widow who follows the strict conventions... Continue Reading →
Fresh off nominations for 2024 Shirley Jackson Awards, Gwendolyn Kiste and Monika Kim won top honors during the 2024 Bram Stoker Awards presented by the Horror Writers Association on June 14 at StokerCon 2025 in Stamford, Conn. The Haunting of Velkwood by Gwendolyn Kiste won for Superior Achievement in a Novel, and The Eyes Are... Continue Reading →
(Editor’s note: SHORT SHOTS is a column where I review short stories from horror anthologies, collections, and zines.) “Knock on Wood” by Leigh Kenny invokes the elemental fear of A Nightmare on Elm Street and The Amityville Horror by blending a terrifying boogeyman with a haunted house. It transported me back to the best old-school... Continue Reading →
There’s a moment in the horror movie Solitude when Kara, a contestant on a survival competition show, stares despairingly into her camera and repeats, “I’m going to die out here!” However, after she looks at her daughter’s photograph, she says, “I’m not going to die out here.” Her resolve strengthened, Kara looks outside her shelter... Continue Reading →
(Editor’s note: SHORT SHOTS is a column where I review short stories from horror anthologies, collections, and zines.) SPOILER ALERT! I like receiving newsletters in my email from my favorite horror writers, and one of the best is The Fear County Chronicle by Splatterpunk Award-winning author Ronald Kelly. His newsletter provides an introspective and sometimes... Continue Reading →
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... Continue Reading →
Version 1.0.0 Voting for This Is Horror Awards 2024 is open until May 8 at 12:01 a.m. British Summer Time, according to thisishorror.co.uk. The five categories are Novel, Novella, Short Story Collection, Fiction Podcast, and Nonfiction Podcast. Each category features five nominees for works published in 2024. Anyone can send their votes to awards@thisishorror.co.uk with the... Continue Reading →
LIONEL RAY GREEN 