Horror writers share the stories you must read this Halloween
An Infected with Will Smith as Robert Neville in a scene from Warner Bros. Pictures' and Village Roadshow Pictures' "I Am Legend," based on the classic horror novel of the same title written by Richard Matheson. The novel is among those chosen as must reads by a panel from the New England Horror Writers Association. ( Warner Bros. photo)
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on October 27, 2015 at 7:00 AM, updated October 27, 2015 at 7:11 AM
With Halloween at its most notorious day, October is well known for its horror-themed happenings. This is true in literature and pop culture, too, when bookstores and libraries put out their scariest titles for those who can't wait to be kept awake by page-turning trepidation.
MassLive asked Massachusetts members of the New England Horror Writers Association which books kept them awake at night. Here are there answers:
Jennifer Allis Provost: "I am Legend" and "We Have Always Lived in a Castle."
Provost grew up in Western Mass. and she "writes books about faeries, orcs and elves. Zombies too."
Jennifer Allis Provost
Provost started her writing career "as many others do," by writing "by monster of the week short stories, but quickly moved on to more psychological horror."
"Truly, the inside of our minds is the scariest place," she said.
Provost is the author of the fantasy series "The Chronicles of Parthalan" and the urban fantasy "Copper Girl." Her latest release, "Heir to the Sun," launched June 1, 2015, and "Changing Teams," the first in a new contemporary series, will be release Nov. 10 from Limitless Publishing.
Social decline is something that unnerves her, and it is present in both of the books she chose, starting with the book that influenced George Romero's zombies in "Night of the Living Dead," "I Am Legend," by Richard Matheson.
"'I Am Legend' was the first book that truly scared me," Provost said. "Is he really the last man alive?"
Provost also recommended Shirley Jackson's final novel, 1962's "We Have Always Lived in the Castle."
"In 'We Have Always Lived in the Castle,' readers follow two sisters and an uncle," she said. "The family used to be bigger, that is until some arsenic found its way into the sugar bowl one evening. Unreliable narration and creepiness at its best."
Jeremy Flagg: "Exquisite Corpse," "Night Watch" and "In the Blood."
Jeremy Flagg
Flagg is a high school graphic design teacher and the MetroWest region's liaison for the NaNoWriMo project, a novel-writing project which takes place each November.
He is currently working on the third installment of his horror satire and science fiction series, "Suburban Zombie High." Book one looks at the outlandish world of suburban high school students and the realities they face in "the real world" when their school becomes ground zero for the zombie apocalypse.
"Suburban Zombie High: The Reunion," was released in August. Flagg is working on the final chapter of the series while also preparing a new series for publication. He can be found on Twitter under @writeremyflagg.
"Exquisite Corpse," by Poppy Z. Brite: "When murder can be described as intimate, I get intrigued," Flagg said. "When you start to make me like the killer, then I begin to get worried."
"Night Watch," by Sergei Lukyanenko: "It's horror and it's Russian, it must be good," Flagg said. "Vampires, werewolves, and witches walk among us, and police one another. Less frightening, but more a darkness that looms in the setting and in the soul of the characters. Beautifully dark."
"In the Blood," by Nancy Collins: "A prostitute turned vampire, hell bent on revenge? Falling in love with a man the demon in your mind hates. Violent and gory; conflict on all fronts."
Trisha J. Wooldridge: "The Girl Next Door," and "Big Sister, Little Sister."
Trisha Wooldridge
Wooldridge is a freelance editor, writer, and journalist and former president of Broad Universe, an organization that promotes science fiction, fantasy and horror written by females.
She has written three novels, "The Kelpie," "Silent Starsong" and "The Earl's Childe." In addition, she has contributed award-winning stories to the anthology series "Bad-Ass Faeries" and is the writing partner in the webcomic "Aurelio."
Find her on Facebook, or on Twitter under @novelfriend.com
"Jack Ketchum's "The Girl Next Door" left me completely disturbed, but I could not put it down," Wooldridge said. "In short stories, one that always springs to my head first is Jennifer Pelland's 'Big Sister, Little Sister,' which is science-fiction horror.
Matthew M. Bartlett: "Mannequins in Aspects of Terror."
Matthew Bartlett
Bartlett, of Northhampton, is the author of "Gateways to Abomination," it's companion piece, "Anne Gare's Rare Book and Ephemera Catalogue," "The Witch-Cult in Western Massachusetts," and "Rangel." In addition, Bartlett's short stories have appeared in several anthologies, including "Resonator: New Lovecraftian Tales From Beyond" and "High Strange Horror." Find him on Twitter under @MattMBartlett
"The story 'Mannequins in Aspects of Terror,' by Mark Samuels, unnerved me," Bartlett said. "It concerns an art exhibit held in an abandoned office building.
"The feeling that something is lurking around every corner, the isolation and disorientation experienced by the narrator, the feeling that he is being watched, or, worse, controlled—it is edge of your seat reading," he said. "I had to laugh when I noticed the physical reaction I had while reading it. My eyebrows were up. I was chewing my thumbnail. My legs had curled up under me. Few stories truly move me to fear. This was one of them."
Amber Fallon (formerly writing as Alyn Day): "Ghoul"
Amber Fallon
Fallon lives in a small town outside Boston. A self-described "techie by day and a horror writer by night," Fallon's published stories include "So Long and Thanks for All the Brains," "Daily Frights 2012," "Women of the Living Dead," "Zombie Tales," "Here Be Clowns," "Horror on the Installment Plan," "Zombies For a Cure," "Quick Bites of Flesh," "Daily Frights 2013," "Mirror, Mirror," "Operation Ice Bat," 'Return to Deathlehem," and "Daughters of Inanna." She can be found on Twitter under @Z0mbiegrl.
"Brian Keene's 'Ghoul' is a really great example of what we writers like to call 'bleeding on the page,'" he said. "There's an awful lot of the author himself there, as well as monsters of both the human and inhuman kind."
From: Mass Live
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