The thing that has been growing inside me that is not rage and is not spite and is not fear or pain.
PLOT SUMMARY
By day, Maeve Fly works at the happiest place in the world as every child’s favorite ice princess.
By the neon night glow of the Sunset Strip, Maeve haunts the dive bars with a drink in one hand and a book in the other, imitating her misanthropic literary heroes.
But when Gideon Green – her best friend’s brother – moves to town, he awakens something dangerous within her, and the world she knows suddenly shifts beneath her feet.
Untethered, Maeve ditches her discontented act and tries on a new persona. A bolder, bloodier one, inspired by the pages of American Psycho. Step aside Patrick Bateman, it’s Maeve’s turn with the knife.
GRADE: A
REVIEW:
This book aches to be a female lead American Psycho type of novel, with protagonist Maeve Fly at the wheel. Maeve is obsessed with Halloween music, doxxing terrible people online, and her job at DisneyLand where she impersonates Elsa from Frozen. Maeve is indifferent to most people except for her best friend Kate and dying grandmother, a former Hollywood silent movie star, Tallulah Fly. I enjoyed Maeve’s journey although sometimes Maeve’s obsessions and edginess seemed forced. Most of the brutal scenes weren’t described in detail – we were only hinted at what would happen and it’d cut to black. For a book promising an edgy, dark character it kind of annoyed me (but I’m probably in the minority here) that we didn’t get to see more gore.
I read Story of the Eye in my early 20’s and have recced this book to many people (is this why they think I’m twisted?), and Maeve is obsessed with this book too. I must say, that I was supremely HAPPY that a certain scene came to fruition after the promise of the book’s cover. I would’ve been annoyed otherwise.
However, I did LOVE this book – so don’t take my little gripes at heart. I just love girl villains so want people to push the envelope when it comes to that. The final line of this novel though is PURE PERFECTION and I absolutely love it. In other words, I will definitely look forward to this author’s next novel!
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Being someone who receives many ARCs (advanced reader’s copies) for review purposes for this blog, I read many of the 2023 releases last year. So, these are three books that I didn’t receive ARCs for, but still want to read all the same.
SHE IS A HAUNTING BY TRANG THANH TRAN
When Jade Nguyen arrives in Vietnam for a visit with her estranged father, she has one goal: survive five weeks pretending to be a happy family in the French colonial house Ba is restoring. She’s always lied to fit in, so if she’s straight enough, Vietnamese enough, American enough, she can get out with the college money he promised.
But the house has other plans. Night after night, Jade wakes up paralyzed. The walls exude a thrumming sound while bugs leave their legs and feelers in places they don’t belong. She finds curious traces of her ancestors in the gardens they once tended. And at night Jade can’t ignore the ghost of the beautiful bride who leaves cryptic warnings: Don’t eat.
Neither Ba nor her sweet sister Lily believe that there is anything strange happening. With help from a delinquent girl, Jade will prove this house–the home they have always wanted–will not rest until it destroys them. Maybe, this time, she can keep her family together. As she roots out the house’s rot, she must also face the truth of who she is and who she must become to save them all.
SILVER NITRATE BY SILVIA MORENO-GARCIA
Montserrat has always been overlooked. She’s a talented sound editor, but she’s left out of the boys’ club running the film industry in ’90s Mexico City. And she’s all but invisible to her best friend, Tristán, a charming if faded soap opera star, though she’s been in love with him since childhood.
Then Tristán discovers his new neighbor is the cult horror director Abel Urueta, and the legendary auteur claims he can change their lives—even if his tale of a Nazi occultist imbuing magic into highly volatile silver nitrate stock sounds like sheer fantasy. The magic film was never finished, which is why, Urueta swears, his career vanished overnight. He is cursed.
Now the director wants Montserrat and Tristán to help him shoot the missing scene and lift the curse . . . but Montserrat soon notices a dark presence following her, and Tristán begins seeing the ghost of his ex-girlfriend.
As they work together to unravel the mystery of the film and the obscure occultist who once roamed their city, Montserrat and Tristán may find that sorcerers and magic are not only the stuff of movies.
LOOKING GLASS SOUND BY CATRIONA WARD
In a cottage overlooking the windswept Maine coast, Wilder Harlow begins the last book he will ever write. It is the story of a sun-drenched summer of his youth and of the killer that stalked the small New England town. Of the terrible tragedy that forever bonded him with his friends Nat and Harper in unknowable ways. Of a horror that has followed them over the years.
Wilder has returned to the town decades later in an attempt to recount that summer’s events in his memoirs. But as he writes, Wilder begins to fear his grip on the truth is fading, and events in the manuscript start to chime eerily with the present. He’s even started seeing a dark-haired woman down in the icy waters below the cottage, but nobody else can.
No longer able to trust his own eyes, Wilder begins to fear that this will not only be his last book, but the last thing he ever does…
What are some of the reads you’re looking forward to this year?
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I’m so proud to announce that my feminist horror novel GIRL THAT YOU FEAR is finally out! You can order through my publisher’s website, Black Bed Sheet Books, Amazon, or Google Play!
Plot Summary:
It’s the fall of her Senior year and Spencer Torres, next in line for valedictorian of Sacred Heart High, has a perfect life. That is, until her idyllic existence is shattered when a visit to the infamously haunted steamship The Queen Mary causes her to become possessed by an evil demon who encounters her there. But this isn’t your run-of-the-mill demon—Dever is cunning, attractive, and manipulative. Somehow, this possession causes memories of an earlier horrible trauma to resurface.
Nothing will stop Spencer from seeking the truth embedded deep within those memories and most importantly, vengeance….even if it means losing herself completely to the demon’s clutches.
Comp Titles: The Exorcist, Come Closer, and My Best Friend’s Exorcism
If you’re a bookblogger/bookstagrammer/booktoker and wish to receive an ebook copy of the book for a review, just hit me up in the contact section!
EXCERPT:
Madame Zella began to place the five cards accordingly. Spencer watched with curiosity as she recalled the placements of the cards for a book of tarots she and Fallon had read years ago and their significance. The first one at the top was to symbolize the potential, then three cards below that one. The card to the left indicated her past, the middle her present, and the one to her right the future. Madame Zella then placed a final card below the three cards, pointing to reason. Spencer studied Madame Zella’s movements intently as she slowly uncovered the cards, one by one. But as she did, something strange occurred. Each card was dripping with blood as Madame Zella shook her head, frightened.
“What’s going on?” Spencer inquired.
Isla grabbed Spencer’s hand and squeezed it, and she sensed that her sister was just as afraid as Madame Zella was.
“A dark force! It has hold of you!” Madame Zella said, her accent evident with each word. “Too late! Too late!”
“What do you mean? What dark force?” Isla interrupted.
Madame Zella suddenly got up from the table, and the chair fell back with a crash. She stared directly at Spencer and screamed like she was Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween. It was raw and terrifying. Spencer couldn’t believe what she was seeing. The cards were drenched in blood now, dripping down the table. The table began to shake violently. They both got up from their seats, not understanding what was going on until Spencer looked beyond Madame Zella’s shoulders and saw that behind her was a tiny mirror. In the mirror, she could finally see what the woman was seeing. A dark shadow hovering over her shoulder, its fangs glittered menacingly. No, no, no. She spun to look at Isla, but from her position, she couldn’t see the mirror, couldn’t see if what Spencer was seeing was real.
“You let him in!” Madame Zella told her. “Get out! Get out of here! And don’t come back!”
Isla yanked on Spencer’s wrist pulling her away from the tent. But she couldn’t move, she was transfixed by the blood dripping from the cards, the shadow in the mirror, and that familiar scent of night flowers and musk. Then the cards burst into flames and she snapped out of her fixation as they both hurried out of the tent.
She could still hear Madame Zella’s cries from inside.
“TOO LATE! TOO LATE! YOU’RE DOOMED!” She heard the tarot reader shout from the tent. Spencer looked up at the sky and it seemed to turn into a hideous shade of blood red before, once again, she was struck with a nosebleed and then fell limp against Isla’s arms.
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Four years after her tumultuous senior year, Jade Daniels is released from prison right before Christmas when her conviction is overturned. But life beyond bars takes a dangerous turn as soon as she returns to Proofrock. Convicted Serial Killer, Dark Mill South, seeking revenge for thirty-eight Dakota men hanged in 1862, escapes from his prison transfer due to a blizzard, just outside of Proofrock, Idaho.
Dark Mill South’s Reunion Tour began on December 12th, 2019, a Thursday.
Thirty-six hours and twenty bodies later, on Friday the 13th, it would be over.
GRADE: A+
REVIEW:
I fell in love with Jade Daniels in book one,My Heart is a Chainsaw. Although the sequel begins with Jade going as Jennifer and wanting to put all her slasher movie days behind, yearning for a fresh start. Only Leda Mondragon, the girl Jade thought was going to be the final girl in the first book has now taken her scepter, analyzing slasher movies and trying to get Jennifer to return to her days of Jade and Bay of Blood.
As with any good sequel, we have both old and new characters, but as any successful slasher sequel knows, it needs to be bloodier than the first film, and SGJ completely delivers on the bloodier deaths and the higher body count. If book one had most of the deaths happening in the latter portion of the book, Reaper begins with blood and ends in blood. Not to mention that this time our beloved characters have to also deal with nature, ie. blizzard.
I absolutely LOVED this book. There’s something about Jones’s writing and the fact that he’s a huge slasher fan that just makes the inner slasher fan in me squeal in dark delight anytime I catch any reference to a slasher that many aren’t aware of (in this case, Curtains). Maybe if you’re not a slasher fan you can’t enjoy that part of the book as much as someone who is, however, the novel on its own packs such a punch that you can’t help but wonder what will happen in book three and how much damage the survivors of book two will take into the following book.
If you love slashers, the supernatural, serial killers, folklore and much more more, then you will love Don’t Fear the Reaper as it has a bit of everything to satisfy even the pickiest of horror readers. Honestly, I can’t wait to dive back into Proofrock and see what else is going to haunt them next time around.
*Thank you so much to NetGalley and Gallery/Saga Press for the digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
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Shawn is a scientist developing the formula for a drug that may cure blindness by stimulating another area of the brain that controls perception. When he surreptitiously tests the drug on himself, he accidentally accesses a neural pathway that appears to allow him to communicate with a complete stranger through telepathy instead. When Shawn finally discovers the significance of their connection and of the drug’s true effects, it is too late to stop the damage their intimate friendship has set in motion to unfold.
GRADE: A
REVIEW:
A genre-bending sci-fi horror that will have you turning pages into the night. Shawn is a scientist on the quest to cure blindness – he has invented a pill that should offer such a respite – and decides to be the guinea pig for his own invention. Slowly, Shawn begins to hear a voice – is it an auditory hallucination induced by the drug, a ghost, or something else? The mystery behind the voice and how the protagonist soon finds himself smitten by the female he can only hear in his head proves to be an interesting love story, albeit a strange one. The writing is fresh and evocative – with realistic dialogue, and a plot twist that will have you questioning everything you’ve read up to that point. You don’t want to miss this one out – especially if you love your spooky to come with a side of body horror.
Short Q & A with Author
What inspired this novella?
I’m not a fan of science fiction traditionally, but two things pushed me to write Optic Nerve. During the pandemic, I found that a number of my friends—all of them were my age: 40s and early 50s—discovered increased strains on their personal relationships. Some ended up separating from their partners. The isolation and the stress of lockdown acted like steroids in an already anxiety-prone time of their lives, middle age. Most of my characters tend to be in their thirties, or early forties at most; I wanted to write about someone middle-aged for Optic Nerve, to address that anxiety head-on. At the same time, I started to experience a marked decline in my eyesight, and that was, and still is, terrifying to me. I’m an English teacher by day and an editor and writer by night: my eyes are my most utilized tools, so the experience of losing them is a true horror.
You’re a very prolific writer, often appearing in various anthologies. How do you stay motivated as an author?
I used to think I was alone in this approach, but I am the kind of writer who doesn’t sit down and create something unless she hears a line of it in her head, and the line usually comes out of nowhere. The experience is as close to having a muse as I can imagine. When I talked about this in another interview, a few authors reached out to me to say they, too, function that way. I wish I could say that x, y, and z motivate me to write, but the truth is, when a sentence appears in my head, I go with it. Sometimes I go months without writing anything because the lines just don’t appear; other periods, I churn out story after story. Someday, the lines may stop appearing altogether. I hope that isn’t the case, but it’s certainly a possibility.
I think we’ve all had an unconventional crush like Shawn, and usually, these unconventional crushes don’t always result well in the end. Are you a fan of unconventional crushes and love stories?
As a general rule, I’m jaded about romantic storylines. I don’t know why that is. Maybe it’s because I’m a realist at heart and I think Hollywood too often idealizes relationships. Whenever I stumble upon a saccharine movie on television, I have to keep my eyes from rolling out of my head. On the other hand, when authors capture the high we feel when we do make that unique connection with someone, it’s poetry. I think unconventional love stories are often the most realistic. Zora Neale Hurston described falling in love as a “soul crawl[ing] out from its hiding place,” and I think that’s spot on, but I don’t think those moments are as ubiquitous as Hollywood presents them. Those moments are rare and precious, and maybe I’m jaded specifically because of the fiction that dumbs them down.
Tell us about any other projects you’re currently working on right now or will be releasing soon.
My weird horror boogeyman-centered novelette Shagging the Boss just dropped this summer, and I had a great time writing it; it’s still one of my favorite projects. I’m proud to have stories in upcoming anthologies releasing this fall, too, including Sinister Smile Press’ Institutionalized, Omnium Gatherum’s In Trouble (100% of proceeds benefit the National Network of Abortion Funds), and Night Terror Novels’ Nerve-Janglers. In early March, my next edited anthology American Cannibal releases; it’s historical horror fiction and the stories are flat-out phenomenal. It’s like nothing else out there right now, and readers are going to be blown away.
What’s the horror book you always find yourself recommending?
I find myself returning to Joyce Carol Oates’ The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror over and over. It’s creepy and hypnotic. I’m a fan of unreliable narrators and Oates does them like no one else. (laughs) And there isn’t one sentimental romantic tale in the bunch!
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Leah is changed. A marine biologist, she left for a routine expedition months earlier, only this time her submarine sank to the sea floor. When she finally surfaces and returns home, her wife Miri knows that something is wrong. Barely eating and lost in her thoughts, Leah rotates between rooms in their apartment, running the taps morning and night. Whatever happened in that vessel, whatever it was they were supposed to be studying before they were stranded, Leah has carried part of it with her, onto dry land and into their home. As Miri searches for answers, desperate to understand what happened below the water, she must face the possibility that the woman she loves is slipping from her grasp.
The city of Elendhaven sulks on the edge of the ocean. Wracked by plague, abandoned by the South, stripped of industry and left to die. But not everything dies so easily. A thing without a name stalks the city, a thing shaped like a man, with a dark heart and long pale fingers yearning to wrap around throats. A monster who cannot die. His frail master sends him out on errands, twisting him with magic, crafting a plan too cruel to name, while the monster’s heart grows fonder and colder and more cunning.
These monsters of Elendhaven will have their revenge on everyone who wronged the city, even if they have to burn the world to do it.
MANHUNT BY GRETCHEN FELKER-MARTIN
Beth and Fran spend their days traveling the ravaged New England coast, hunting feral men and harvesting their organs in a gruesome effort to ensure they’ll never face the same fate.
Robbie lives by his gun and one hard-learned motto: other people aren’t safe.
After a brutal accident entwines the three of them, this found family of survivors must navigate murderous TERFs, a sociopathic billionaire bunker brat, and awkward relationship dynamics—all while outrunning packs of feral men, and their own demons.
HAVE YOU READ ANY OF THESE BOOKS? WHAT ARE YOUR FAVOURITE QUEER HORRORS?
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Which is easier to believe—that killer mermaids exist, or that one person is worth risking everything for?
For fans of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Into the Drowning Deep comes a chilling horror story steeped in urban rumor.
GRADE: B+
REVIEW:
Killer mermaids is one of my favourite tropes, or in general, any story or film that has a mermaid already feels instantly cool so once I found out that this book had killer mermaids I knew I had to read it asap. In film form, I’m usually not a fan of found footage, but I do like the format in book form better (or at least ones I’ve read like World War Z or The Living Dead were awesome).
Having read the play Unboxed, I enjoyed the little Easter egg that the author placed in this book. The premise is pretty simple, a group of friends who have a YouTube channel decide to investigate an old military bunker in Georgia. What the group finds when going into the bunker is killer mermaids – and only one girl (Liv) survives to tell the tale. The police officer whom Liv is telling her story to Andie begins to catch feelings for her and readily believes her story. Although I don’t know if she believes Liv’s story because she’s blinded by her feelings rather than actually believing in the existence of mermaids. I don’t know why, but it seemed kind of unlikely that someone would readily believe such a far-fetched story, let alone someone in law enforcement.
We find out that the mermaids were being experimented on by the military, but I would’ve preferred the journal that they found to reveal a bit more as in a how they acquired the mermaids and how the military knew of their existence in the first place. I would really love a prequel to this novella to know the history of what actually went on in the bunker prior.
The story is very fast-paced and delivers all the slasher/gore needs a horror book should. I did like that the ending is ambiguous, but wasn’t a fan of everyone spilling their feelings for one another while they’re being killed (I can understand one person doing this, but then another does, and then the same person a couple of days later suddenly has feelings for another person, for a book so short, it just feels like they’re catching feelings way too fast). But other than that, the book is a fun, wild read and I recommend it for fans of horror who like gore.
*Thank you so much to Nightworms & the author for the digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
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All Rob wanted was a normal life. She almost got it, too: a husband, two kids, a nice house in the suburbs. But Rob fears for her oldest daughter, Callie, who collects tiny bones and whispers to imaginary friends. Rob sees a darkness in Callie, one that reminds her too much of the family she left behind.She decides to take Callie back to her childhood home, to Sundial, deep in the Mojave Desert. And there she will have to make a terrible choice.Callie is worried about her mother. Rob has begun to look at her strangely, and speaks of past secrets. And Callie fears that only one of them will leave Sundial alive…The mother and daughter embark on a dark, desert journey to the past in the hopes of redeeming their future.
GRADE: A
REVIEW:
Unsettling. That’s the best word I can find to describe Ward’s latest novel. It’s told in multiple POV’s in a nonlinear narrative which some readers found hard to follow, but that I personally love because it allows for the story to slowly unfold, the secrets to slowly be revealed for the picture to finally come into view, although the reader’s perspective will continuously change because much like The Last House on Needless Street, the heroes and villains aren’t so easily distinguishable.
Ward takes us deep into the Mojave Desert (a place that I already find creepy due to all the real-life disappearances that occur there every year). Rob and Jack are twins living with their research scientist parents Mia and Falcon. They live a somewhat hippy-ish life, isolated from anyone of their own age. Something terrible occurred in that desert and initially the reader isn’t sure exactly what it is or how it all ties in with Rob’s present – now married to a professor whose equal parts charming and terrifying in his subtle cruelty. But what’s got Rob worried is her older daughter Callie, who displays the typical signs of serial killers and thinks that the only way she can save her daughter is by taking her to the one place she vowed to never return to: Sundial. And so a terrible family saga unfolds.
I read this book in a matter of days, because I was so invested with wanting to know what exactly happened at Sundial, because from the very first page the prose is steeped in blood and dread and you know that the journey you’re about to embark on will be a dark one. It’s difficult to use the word “enjoyed” in terms of reading this book because of the unsettling things that occur that leave you cringing or feeling sick, but I did want to know more so it kept me flipping the pages well into the night.
There’s a story within a story, and I wish I understood the symbolism behind it because I’m quite unsure exactly what it revealed (if it revealed anything at all).
Overall I loved the darkness of this novel but if you’re a reader who detests any forms of animal cruelty in literature, then steer clear of this read – you’ve been warned.
*Thank you so much to NetGalley and Tor Nightfire for the digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
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The challenge: Spend a week hiding in an abandoned amusement park and don’t get caught.
The prize: enough money to change everything.
Even though everyone is desperate to win—to seize a dream future or escape a haunting past—Mack is sure she can beat her competitors. All she has to do is hide, and she’s an expert at that.
It’s the reason she’s alive and her family isn’t.
But as the people around her begin disappearing one by one, Mack realizes that this competition is even more sinister than she imagined, and that together might be the only way to survive.
Fourteen competitors. Seven days. Everywhere to hide but nowhere to run.
GRADE: C
REVIEW:
I want to premise this with the fact that I have a certain fascination for abandoned amusement parks. I think there’s something really creepy about a place that used to bring so much joy, and now evokes only dread (at least I think it does). This is what made me hit request super fast. Then when I began reading it I realized that I’ve read this author before, she has written The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein, and although I loved the premise of that novel, I ultimately didn’t enjoy the journey.
The same can be said of this novel. I LOVE the premise of this novel: 14 contestants play hide and seek for a week in an abandoned amusement park and the winner gets $50,000 (now I don’t know why the characters in the novel thought you could change your life with that amount because for some that was the amount of money they owed in student debt, I personally would’ve liked to have seen higher prize money in order to understand why many people stuck it out as long as they did, even after things started to get weird).
What I didn’t love about this novel was how the omniscient POV was handled. I love multiple POVs but not when the POV changes within the same paragraph! It was very jarring at times and I had to go back and try to figure out which POV I was in.
Another downside was that the protagonist Mack had an interesting background, but other than that she wasn’t that interesting as a person, nor did I care much about her surviving or not. I cared more about some of the side characters than Mack. I’ll grant that the big reveal was cool, but up to that point, it was somewhat slow and it somehow got even slower towards the end. I also feel like the end is set up for a possible sequel, however, I don’t know if I’d be interested to read it.
Overall, fun premise, sadly it lacks in the execution, and although it’s been promoted as an adult horror, it read more like a YA (not necessarily a bad thing but most adults could be turned off).
*Thank you so much to NetGalley and Del Rey for the digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
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Here’s to the lengths one might go to for everything.
With dark fiction from J.A.W. McCarthy, Avra Margariti, Marisca Pichette, Stephanie Ellis, Christina Wilder, Donna Lynch, Katie Young, Scott J. Moses, Angela Sylvaine, tom reed, Cheri Kamei, Shane Douglas Keene, J.V. Gachs, Tim McGregor, Emma E. Murray, Nick Younker, Jennifer Crow, Joanna Koch, Lex Vranick, Laurel Hightower, Eric Raglin, Eric LaRocca, Daniel Barnett, Bob Johnson, Simone le Roux, Hailey Piper, Bryson Richard, Jena Brown, and Christi Nogle.
Grade: A
Review:
This anthology has some really excellent stories that explore the theme of what are the lengths you’d go to for something you really want? Of course with horror, the lengths are very extreme and sometimes very gory. Here are some of my fave stories from this collection (in no particular order):
“Mos Teutonis” by Bryson Richard: A beautiful tale of lust and lunacy, so dark and seductive.
“The Thread That Dreams Are Made Of: by Hailey Piper: I’m a total whore for fairtytales and fairytale retellings so I’m so here for a Rumpelstiltskin and Sleeping Beauty mashup.
“Silver Dollar Eye” by Laurel Hightower: This story pretty much sums up all the reasons why I’ve never meddled with the afterlife, some things are best left unknown.
“Ella Minnow” by Nick Younker: This story is the brutal tale of the lengths a father will go to in order to find out what happened to his missing daughter. The ending blew me away.
“Blood is Thicker,” by Angela Sylvaine: I’ve had the pleasure of having this author in two of my own anthologies, so I was excited to read a new story from her. I loved this tale of two twin sisters who will go to extreme lengths to succeed as painters.
“The Witch of Flora Pass,” by Scott J. Moses: This was one very creepy and dark story that now left me wary of rivers.
“With Animals,” by J.A.W. McCarthy: This story truly explored the extreme lengths someone would go to for a friend. Very gut-wrenching.
“Moira and Ellie,” by Marisca Pichette: In this story, almost every child has an imaginary friend for a limited amount of time and when you find out how and why these imaginary friends exist, it’s very chilling.
There are many more stories in this anthology that I thoroughly enjoyed, and those above are only a couple that stuck with me long after reading them. It’s a very well put together anthology and I truly recommend it for anyone whose a fan of horror and especially of indie horror.
*Thank you so much to the author for the digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
Short Q & A with Author
What made you select the particular theme you chose for the anthology?
I remember finishing Laurel Hightower’s CROSSROADS, and thinking, “How has no one done an anthology around this topic before?” When I got serious about the idea a couple months later, I already knew I wanted Laurel to introduce What One Wouldn’t Do.
A lot of the short stories selected deal with grief – same as your personal short story collection Hunger Pangs – why do you lean towards grief horror more than other subgenres?
You know, that’s a good question. Why do any of us write what we do? I think it’s just in us and that’s that. That said, I’ve always graduated toward the sadder things in life, and think that they, along with bittersweet endings, can shed the most light and hope on the things we’re afraid of or have yet to face.
Which horror authors have got you really excited about their work right now? Any cool books you’ve read this year that you may want to recommend?
Such a tough question, but here goes. A few authors I think deserve more readership are Eric Raglin, J.A.W McCarthy, Joanna Koch, and Daniel Barnett. They’re all astounding to me, and I highly recommend Raglin’s Nightmare Yearnings, McCarthy’s Sometimes We’re Cruel, Koch’s The Wingspan of Severed Hands, and Barnett’s Nightmareland Chronicles.
What are the pros and cons of being an editor for an anthology?
Pros: Reading tons of great submissions, discovering so many writers I really dig, having complete control of the project, and sending acceptances. And honestly, you learn so much about the submission process when you curate an anthology. Great stories are rejected all the time because they just don’t fit with the flow which forms as you read through the slush, or for example, say two stories have similar themes, monsters, and tone. To have both would be redundant, so one has to go, even if it’s amazing. It taught me a lot about rejections with my own work and that there are far more reasons a story gets rejected than it’s quality. Cons: Sending rejections is the worst. Period. Also, wading through the subs that didn’t bother to follow the guidelines. Quick tip: from my experience on this and the 423 submissions I got for WOWD, those who followed the guidelines we’re already ahead of the 30% that did not. That’s a pretty huge percentage when you think about it, yeah? Another con was that in me self-funding this project in its entirety, I didn’t have the resources to buy all the stories I would’ve liked. The spirit was willing, but the wallet was weak.
Are you currently working on any new projects?
I’ve been on a bit of a hiatus from writing these last months, but have stories publishing this year in various venues and more on submission. I’m thinking I’ll either keep adding to my sophomore collection or toss around this idea for a novella I’ve been sitting on. Thanks for having me, Azzurra. As per usual, you rule.
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The Inkblotters 