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Four Desert Stories
by H.J. Dutton Among the most inhospitable places on the planet is the desert. The desert’s unwelcoming attitude is something our pop culture depictions get (mostly) right. In T.E. Lawrence’s 1926 classic Seven Pillars of Wisdom (the basis for the 1962 film Lawrence of Arabia), George Miller’s Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), and Arizona-based author
Four Jungle Stories
by H.J. Dutton One of my favorite horror topics is underused settings. Like the jungle. Though not as rare as other neglected settings – zoos, prehistory, etc. – the jungle certainly isn’t a staple, either, which is odd, because by all means it should be. Anything could hide inside that mess of green, waiting to
Five Tales of Aquatic Creepy Crawlies
by H.J. Dutton This article builds on two previous articles, “Five Stories about Bugs and Creepy Crawlies” and “Four Stories Set Underwater.” Although reading those articles is not necessary for understanding this one, understandings of creep-factors and specific underwater frights are related… and you can also get similar thrills from those articles’ recommendations. So, like
Four Stories Set Underwater
by H.J. Dutton Thousands of years of experiences with unpredictable tides and unreliable ships have hammered in a deep fear of the world beneath the waves. Even if their plots don’t center around the sea, horror stories – especially those of the modern Gothic variety – often take place near the ocean. Less common, though,
EXTREMELY WEIRD SPLATTER: Teaser Quotes from the Stories
PART ONE: Extremely Weird Sex Whenever she called him to arrange an assignation, she always signed off by saying, I’ll get myself ready, turning up to meet him with a little bag of make-up to touch up the candyfloss-pink lipstick he always kissed away and a bottle of lube to counter vaginal dryness, because even
Interview with Maxim Volk, Author of Deadbeat and “My Love, Like Moss, Envelops You”
by L. Andrew Cooper I caught up with Maxim Volk, author of the story “My Love, Like Moss, Envelops You” in the anthology Extremely Weird Splatter forthcoming from Horrific Scribblings, to talk about their book Deadbeat just in time for its release. About the Author Maxim Volk (they/he) is not in a cult anymore. Now
EXTREMELY WEIRD SPLATTER Written in Its Authors’ Guts: Group Interviews, Part Three
by L. Andrew Cooper As I put together the table of contents for the forthcoming anthology Extremely Weird Splatter, I asked authors to answer three basic questions about why they and their stories fit with a project aiming to fuse extreme horror and splatterpunk with weird fiction. Not entirely randomly, I’ve sorted responses into three
Four Stories About Dogs
by H.J. Dutton Dogs often enjoy more diverse roles in horror than cats. While the feline almost always plays a spooky set piece or antagonist, the canine might play victim, protagonist, tragic villain, or maybe an agent of evil. Of these options, the last is least common. Historic and evolutionary connections between dogs and humans
EXTREMELY WEIRD SPLATTER Written in Its Authors’ Guts: Group Interviews, Part Two
by L. Andrew Cooper As I put together the table of contents for the forthcoming anthology Extremely Weird Splatter, I asked authors to answer three basic questions about why they and their stories fit with a project aiming to fuse extreme horror and splatterpunk with weird fiction. Not entirely randomly, I’ve sorted responses into three
EXTREMELY WEIRD SPLATTER Written in Its Authors’ Guts: Group Interviews, Part One
by L. Andrew Cooper As I put together the table of contents for the forthcoming anthology Extremely Weird Splatter, I asked authors to answer three basic questions about why they and their stories fit with a project aiming to fuse extreme horror and splatterpunk with weird fiction. Not entirely randomly, I’ve sorted responses into three