It’s that time of the year, so I thought I’d share some spooky season recs with you again. This Halloween, I’m recommending a handful of short horror stories I’ve enjoyed recently. All are free to read online.
“Rippling Salt, Like Rolling Waves” by Jorja Osha in Weird Horror #9
Stories about grief and its complications always get me; ditto stories about sibling relationships. This short piece delivers both the thorny emotions and some gut-churning body horror. It’s so dank and atmospheric I can practically smell it.
“The Pit and the Penitent” by Steve Toase in Kaleidotrope
The absence of names gives this story about a disgraced athlete taking part in a deadly competition a surreal, dystopian air. Toase never tells us what the offence was that got the athlete blacklisted from public life, though as I read I found myself desperately wanting to know – what he’d done, whether this was a punishment, whether in some way he deserved it. I think that was the point. It’s a nasty, uncomfortable story that confronts the reader with their complicity in the theatre of pain.
“The Apostle” by James Bennett in The Dark
CW for child abuse and animal cruelty.
This stark, brutal historical piece captures both a world where devils seem to lurk around every corner and a deep sense of religious trauma, in which cruelty begets cruelty and compassion is nowhere to be found.
“Museum of Silences” by Michael Gardner in Interzone
This one came out last year, but I’ve yet to recommend it here, I think. Mike is a friend so I’ll admit to a little bias here, but I love the conceit of this story and the quietly eerie ending, which seeps into your bones like a winter chill.
“The Hunt” by S.A. McKenzie in Kaleidotrope
This is an odd, exquisitely-written little piece that asks more questions than it answers, painting vivid pictures and ending on a perfectly open note that hints at greater horrors yet to come.
“Canonical Victims” by Carson Winter in Seize the Press
A serial-killer story with a hint of the supernatural, but one that’s less about the gory killings, and more about the lengths we’ll go to in order to avoid thinking or talking about mortality – even when we’re making macabre entertainment out of murder. Sharply observed and finely written.
“doorbell dot mov” by Jennifer R. Donohue in The Deadlands
Just a short, chilling, perfectly-told ghost story. Sometimes, that's all you need.
Writing News
Not much new this month. Mostly I've been chipping away at the ol' novel, though I did also start a short horror story for the first time in what feels like forever. It'll be nice to (fingers crossed) actually finish something!
In other short story news, my contemporary fantasy story "A Universe Cupped in the Palm of Her Hand" will be appearing in the
from Bannister Press. Publication date TBA, but watch this space!
What I've been reading
On a recommendation from a friend, I picked up
, a frothy, neo-Victorian crime caper featuring decapitated heads, rampaging ferrets, a mostly-queer cast of eccentrics, and enough casual Welsh to make me smile.
What I've been watching
I was lucky enough to catch the Sherman Theatre's production of
Odyssey 84
before it closed earlier this month. A reimagining of the Odyssey set during the Miner's Strike, it was by turns harrowing, tender, and laugh-out-loud funny -- and shone a spotlight not only on the striking miners, but the women who kept their communities going through the hardships imposed by the Thatcher government.
What I've been listening to
A (different) friend turned me on to
, whom I highly recommend if you were 16 in 2000 or so and feel like re-living that era (possibly minus the teenage heartbreaks and zits).
That's all from me for now. 'Til next time!
JL