I took a trip to Tampa to visit my brother for his bachelor’s party. I know that conjures some imagery for some, but it was a low-key affair. Just golf, beers, cornhole in his buddy’s backyard, and football on the TV—admittedly not how I normally spend my time, but it was cool to see my brother and his bride-to-be. He’s found his people, which is all anyone can ask for at the end of the day. He’ll be getting married around the time you’re reading this post, and I’ll be flying up to Pennsylvania with the whole family for it. It’s all my daughter can talk about—she’s so excited to go to her first wedding.

Like a lot of you (hopefully all of you), I’m heartbroken, enraged, and terrified by everything happening in our country. It honestly feels gross to promote myself in any way at the moment, but putting words on the page is one of the only things I know how to do well, and to not write is to court insanity. So, here we are.

According to Banksy: “Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.” I’ll take his word for it, and hey, what’s the name of this newsletter again? If you’re cosmically disturbed—by world events, your personal life, or some hellish combination of the two—I hope coming here brings you comfort.

As promised in the last issue, here is the second chapter of my novella Skull Forest.

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Chapter 2

I considered calling Haley first, enticed by the prospect of talking to her alone. Not that I knew what I’d say. Probably just complain about Eldon, mention anything cool that might have happened that day, in case I’d forgotten to tell her something earlier. Maybe tell her about Mama’s new painting, though I wasn’t sure I was ready to talk to anyone about that yet. This compulsion to talk to her one-on-one confused me like the way she sometimes made me feel.

On these group video calls, where we played a dark fantasy storytelling game called Island of Teeth, I usually called Donner first, and I decided not to break from routine.

The CALLING icon blinked on the screen of my laptop for a few seconds. Then the postered wall of Donner’s room materialized. I hadn’t seen half the movies these posters advertised but Donner often talked about them with near-religious reverence. The Fog, “a creepy classic.” The Gate, “so freaking cool.” C.H.U.D., “hilarious.” There were many more posters, even some for more recent films. It, Chapter 2. The Witch. Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. I had seen a few of those.

Most of the posters had been accumulated in the past year or so, after his father left. There was even a poster for one of Uncle Rudy’s movies, Goblin Gods.

I saw Donner’s room, but where was Donner?

“Hey,” I said. “You there?”

“Yeah, sorry.” Donner’s stood up in front his computer. The dark curls framing his face were untamed as usual, and he was cradling a fluffy orange cat. “Stupid Chips was trying to get under my desk again.”

He scratched the cat’s belly, which instantly earned him a swat on the hand.

“Aw, hi, Chips!” I said, grinning.

“Don’t encourage him. He’s a jerk.”

With that Donner tossed Chips toward the door. A frustrated meow followed, but the cat didn’t come back.

“He’s gonna eat your eyes when you sleep, you keep tossing him around like that.”

“I’d like to see him try.” Donner settled into his desk chair. “So, what’s up?”

“Nothing, you?”

“Eh, watching Twilight Zone.”

“That show sucks.”

Donner frowned and shook his head. “No, the old one.”

“Never seen it.”

“Aw, dude!”

“Yeah, I know. I haven’t seen anything cool.”

“That’s not true. I’ve shown you some stuff.”

“Like I said…”

“Hey!”

“Well, anyway,” I said when the laughter wore off. I was trying to sound nonchalant. “I guess we should call Haley.”

“Yeah, I guess so. You wanna?”

“Sure.”

I added her to the call. A third window popped up on his monitor, the CALLING icon blinking. Haley answered. Her cornsilk hair was wet and she was carrying her laptop through some hallway in her house.

“Just wait a minute,” she said. She walked to her room, which was far less decorated than Donner’s, though she did have a couple of mostly full bookshelves. “Okay. Hi.”

“Hi,” Donner and I said.

“So, who’s calling Ben?” she asked. “Pretty sure he’s still mad at me.”

“I can do it,” I said. “Though I’ll probably tell him he had it coming.”

“We were just messing around,” Donner said.

“Yeah, and I cut him off when I thought he went too far,” Haley said. She frowned. “Maybe I should call him then. Apologize for making fun of his laugh. He was right; it was a low blow.”

“You don’t have to,” I said. “He’s probably fine.”

She shook her head. “Me calling is best.”

A fourth window popped up on my screen, CALLING icon blinking.

It kept blinking. Thirty seconds passed. Donner shrugged. Haley frowned.

“Maybe he’s really mad at me,” she said when a message popped up to say Benny Bird couldn’t be reached. “You want to try him, Nathan?”

“Sure,” I said and tried adding Ben to the call.

My effort yielded the same result. Confused looks all around.

“So, what now?” Donner asked. “Should I call?”

“Doubt it will make a difference,” Haley said.

“You guys still feel like playing?” Donner said.

For several seconds, everyone held their peace. Though I couldn’t speak for the others, playing Island of Teeth without Ben felt wrong. Island of Teeth had no Games Master. It was collaborative storytelling meant for two to five players and centered on an adventure scenario. Ben’s ideas were always the strangest and sometimes even funny. Usually he included side characters that were either clowns or robots, sometimes both. Neither type of character made much sense given the Mysterious Island vibe the game gave off, but I got a kick out of Ben’s contributions, and so did the others.

“I don’t want to play without him,” I said.

“Aw, why not?” Donner asked.

“I’m with Nathan. It doesn’t feel right.”

“Do you think he’s okay?” I asked, mostly directing his question to Haley.

“Why wouldn’t he be?” Donner asked.

Haley said nothing. Her face held a solemn expression, and I would've killed to know what she was thinking.

“He usually lets us know if he’s not gonna make it,” I said. “We all do.”

I had nothing to base this on. None of us ever missed game night. It was sacred. Sometimes we had to move it due to heavy homework loads, but we never went a full week without getting together like this. Ben’s absence gave me an uneasy feeling, especially when I thought about Mama’s painting and the faces in it that only I could see.

“I’m sure he’s fine,” Haley said, but her expression didn’t change.

“Why wouldn’t he be?” Donner asked again.

He sounded a lot less sure of himself.

After I hung up with my friends, I went to the kitchen to get some water and tried not to think about Ben. Sure, he could be a jerk, but I’d hate if something bad happened to him, especially on a day where I was still kind of mad at him for the dumb prank in the fog. That gave me a sinking feeling for a reason I couldn’t articulate in a satisfactory way.

My mothers were sitting in the living room watching TV. Some cop show, it looked like. I didn’t really like that kind of stuff. Too much procedure. Too much talking. Not enough dragons.

On my way back to my room, Mama called out to me. I faced her, and Mom was looking at me too. She had her hair wrapped in a towel, no doubt having showered after working in the garden all afternoon.

“What is it?” I asked.

“We just wanted to remind you Uncle Rudy will be here in a couple of days,” Mama said.

“Really? Cool!”

Mom smiled, and I returned the expression.

I liked Uncle Rudy. The prospect of seeing him almost made me forget about Ben. I always looked forward to his uncle’s visits. He didn’t work on movies anymore, but he had a ton of stories from back when he did. Now he worked on cars. Classic cars like his Mercury Comet and the Ford Galaxy that he sometimes let me drive in vacant parking lots.

“Is your room clean?” Mama asked.

“Yes, I cleaned it yesterday.”

“Okay, good.” Mama cocked an eyebrow. “All your homework done?”

“Of course.”

“Isn’t tonight game night?” Mom asked.

“Yeah but Ben…” I thought about how to proceed. My mothers were good parents, but they were still parents and adults sometimes made a big deal out of nothing, and of course this was nothing because Ben had probably just forgotten, even though he never forgot before. There was a first time for everything, of course everything was okay. “He couldn’t make it. I’m sure he’s fine,” I said, trying to downplay it.

But maybe this is something worth making a big deal out of.

Maybe you should tell your mothers about this.

Tell them what, exactly?

My indecision made me want to leave the room.

“Well, I’ll see you guys in the morning,” I said.

“Folks, ladies, or y’all,” Mama corrected.

“Good night, y’all,” I said in a put-on cowboy accent.

My mothers wished me good night, and I went to my room. I took a sip of water, kicked off my shoes, and lay down.

Then I jumped back up.

I forgot to print out my social studies homework. With a sigh, I rolled out of bed and went to my laptop. I brought up the document and hit PRINT. Then I left my room. My mothers watched me cross the living area.

“Everything okay?” Mom asked.

“Just forgot to print something,” I said.

As I went from the living room to the kitchen, through the garage and toward the den, I put my worry about Ben out of my mind. Instead, I thought about seeing Uncle Rudy again. It’d been a month, but it felt like a lot longer. I wondered if my uncle would have comic books for me. He had a bunch of stuff from the old days, long before I was born. They were all in great condition, too, and even though Mama said I should keep them for a few years and then sell them back to make money, Uncle Rudy and I both agreed they were better off read. Rudy liked to tease Mama about being a writer who didn’t value good literature. She always retorted that comics were not good literature but fluff. Stuff for kids. She didn’t care what Marvel movie won the top spot at the box office that weekend.

I entered the den and approached the printer. My document was nearly finished. Mama’s printer was outdated and always so slow. She probably overworked it. She insisted on editing all her manuscripts by hand, just like Eldon insisted on physically marking up homework instead of using the portal like every other teacher in the 21st century.

While I stood there waiting for my homework to print, I turned toward the painting and froze as if an icicle had impaled me from the top of my head and all the way through to the base of my spine. The dread inspired by what I saw paralyzed me.

It was Ben’s face. One of the featureless faces embedded in one of the tree trunks had taken on Ben’s features. His mouth was an ‘o’ of sheer terror, his eyes were wide open and filled with panic, as he screamed without sound. The details were unmistakable. It was Ben all right: even the scar above his left eyebrow given to him by a stray B.B. fired by his older brother was present.

I tried to make sense of the sight but could not. It defied everything I knew about the world. At nearly thirteen, I knew that such a thing was not possible. It was the subject of nightmares or one of those dumb movies that Donner watched all the time, not reality. And yet here I was, staring this impossibility in its literal face.

The printer spat out the last page of my document with a rapid series of mechanical whines and groans that made me jump.

I closed my eyes and counted to three. Clearly my imagination had run away from me. No way was Ben’s face really in that painting. Both my mothers had insisted there were no faces at all. Since both of them had denied seeing the faces earlier in the afternoon, I almost convinced myself that maybe I hadn’t seen what I thought I’d seen. But here I was again, seeing not just the featureless faces in the painted trees, but Ben’s face among them.

I took a deep breath and opened my eyes. Maybe I hadn’t really seen it, I thought, looking down at the newly printed pages. I looked toward painting again.

Ben’s face was still there.

With that in mind, let’s get 2026 kicked off the right way. My newsletter is called Fiction for the Cosmically Disturbed? Fine. Here is some fiction. What follows is the first chapter of a novella called Skull Forest. A version of it was published by Thunderstorm Books in the collection Patterns of Chaos, which is now out-of-print and only available secondhand. The version you’ll find here has been heavily altered—because only a small audience saw the original text, I’ve no qualms about going back and making changes so that it more closely resembles the story I always wanted it to be.

It’s a tale of cursed images, of childhood, and coming-of-age. Since it only requires revisions, I’ll be serializing it here, a chapter at a time, every month. No paywalls, no gimmicks, no sales pitches. This is for you, just for subscribing. If you want to support me further, you can buy a book or commission a story. Otherwise, enjoy . . .

Signed Books and Story Commissions

Chapter 1

I climbed the backyard fence and slipped into an opaque wall of fog to cut through the canyon on the way to school. All around me, the fog limited visibility but I knew the terrain well enough. I’d been down here many times with my mothers, with Donner and Haley, and sometimes by myself. I used to think of it as a magical place full of wolves and elves and maybe even a dragon or two. Now, I still sometimes imagined these creatures living among the squat trees, tufts of tall grass, and the clay-walled ravine the kids at school called Dead Man’s Ditch.

I stutter-stepped the last few paces down the slope and glanced around, still unable to see more than five feet in either direction. Donner and Haley weren’t here yet.

I dug my phone out of my pocket. It was 7:45. The first homeroom bell would ring soon, which meant I better get moving.

“Come on, guys, where are you?” I wondered out loud.

I squinted, hoping to see some sort of activity in the surrounding fog. No such luck. I stuffed my hands in my pockets and sighed. After fidgeting for another half-minute, I started in the direction of school. My friends would have to catch up.

As I walked, my backpack gently rocked against my lower back and pulled on my shoulders. It seemingly got heavier every year. After several paces, I saw a flashlight in the opaqueness ahead.

“Donner, that you?” I called. “Haley?”

The person with the flashlight came closer but didn’t answer.

“Ben?” I sighed and balled my hands into fists. “Guys, it’s not funny.”

I remembered a story from elementary school, an urban legend of sorts. Dead Man’s Ditch was haunted by someone named Pig-Man. He was a local who went crazy one day and roamed the canyon wearing a pig mask and looking for children to butcher. I no longer believed such silly stories, but now, the flashlight beam bouncing up and down but always shining in my face, I entertained the possibility.

A hand fell on my shoulder, and I screamed.

Benjamin guffawed at my fright. He doubled over and grabbed his knees. His laughs were high-pitched and squeaky. We tried not to make fun of him because he caught enough flak from the other kids. Now though, I wanted to punch him in his pudgy face. I turned to see who was holding the flashlight. Whoever it was had started to jog toward us. I hoped it wasn’t Haley.

Donner emerged out of the fog. He put the flashlight under his chin and contorted his face. When he saw me, his features softened.

“You okay, Nathan?”

I backhanded him in the chest.

“No, I’m not okay. You guys scared the hell out of me.”

Ben hadn’t stopped laughing.

“We were just having a little fun,” Donner said, now looking down and kicking at a few pebbles.

“Yeah, well… I’m surprised I didn’t hear Chubs sneaking up behind me.”

Ben stopped laughing and gave me a hard shove. “Hey, you take that back!”

I backhanded him. “You had it coming.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Hey, guys!” Haley’s voice came from somewhere up ahead. “What are you idiots doing? We’re gonna be late.”

Idiots. Does she really think I’m an idiot?

“We’re coming,” Donner said.

“Yeah, wait up,” I said.

“You hear Nathan scream like a girl?” Ben asked.

“No, but I heard you laughing like one.”

That shut him up. We came within sight of Haley. She was wearing a David Bowie shirt with a pink lightning bolt on it. She liked all those old rock star guys, even the dead ones.

“That was a low blow,” Ben said when we caught up to her.

“Yeah, well, maybe you should be nicer. Just a thought!”

“We should probably pick up the pace,” I said. “Otherwise Eldon will have a seizure.”

Nods all around. Ben took his Nintendo Switch out of his backpack and started playing something that sounded like Luigi’s Mansion 3. Donner took out his phone. Haley rolled her eyes and came up beside me.

“Don’t sweat Eldon,” she said. “I had him last year and he turned out not to be so bad by the end.”

“I dunno…”

“Just work hard and show up on time. You’ll get on his good side.”

“He has a good side?”

She laughed and gave me a light punch on the arm. It didn’t hurt, just kind of tingled.

When we reached Riveroll Middle School, we said bye to Haley and scooted into Eldon’s classroom right as the second bell rang. He flashed us a disapproving look but said nothing. He couldn’t say anything if we were in the classroom before the second bell, though he much preferred we be seated by that time. I remembered what Haley said and offered Eldon a sheepish grin. He narrowed his eyes.

After homeroom came algebra. I hated math at any time of day but especially before lunch. Then came social studies, then literature. After that, I had gym. I used to enjoy P.E. in elementary school because back then it was less structured and more conducive to free play. Ever since I started middle school that year, I got forced into team sports and mile-long runs. The runs were okay, but team sports were hard, especially since my friends had gym in different periods. After lunch I had home economics, computer science, and English—which was really just another literature course, but at least it assigned better books: adventure stories like The Hobbit and A Wrinkle in Time. Sometimes, I liked reading these books on the way home.

But on this first day after spring break, I walked home with Donner, Haley, and Benjamin. We said goodbye at the bottom of the slope behind my house where they met me that morning. Haley lingered for a few seconds, smiling at me, and I smiled back, feeling warm inside.

“See you around, Nathan,” she said.

“See you.”

I walked up the slope and hopped the fence into my backyard. Mom was already out in the garden. From the look of it, she was planting beets, squash, and cucumbers. She looked up, smiled, and waved.

“How was school?”

“It was okay.”

I went inside through the sliding glass door and entered the den where Mama did all her writing. She wasn’t at her desk, which was rare. I glanced around to see if maybe she was standing by one of her bookshelves. That was when I saw the painting.

It was hanging over one of the dusty bookshelves in an antique frame. Mama was always picking up things from antique shops—old lamps, mirrors, and grandfather clocks. She must have gotten this painting from one of those places.

I hated it right away. It looked like something Donner would like. Maybe it was innocuous enough, but when I looked more closely, dread sat heavy in my stomach. The painting depicted a forest with faces in the tree trunks, clusters of branches, and tufts of leaves. They all screamed without sound.

Mama entered and gasped when she saw me. “Oh, you’re home! How was school?”

“It was good,” I said.

She looked from me to the painting, simultaneously smiling and furrowing her brow. “What? You don’t like it?”

“Those faces are kinda creepy,” I said.

She tilted her head and asked, “What faces?”

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Chapter Notes

Special thanks to Rae Glassford, Shelby Guthrie, and Ryan Harding for reading an earlier version of this story. Rae, especially, helped get the pacing of the chapter you just read into its current form.

The canyon described in this chapter is modeled after the one that was behind my childhood home. On foggy mornings, an optical illusion made it appear that our fence was the only thing separating my backyard from the end of the world. One day, I’ll try to paint what that looked like, as it’s difficult to put into words, even for a writer.

The idea of a cursed painting is hardly original, but I did try to put my own spin on it. My hope is that the originality shows with the characters and how the story develops in subsequent chapters.

As always, thanks for reading.

I convinced Jean to watch Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein with me. We got about halfway through before we needed to go to bed, so it took us two nights to finish it. The film is elegant and epic in scope, with believable performances and colors that pop (especially those reds, which feel too noticeable not to be symbolically significant). I also appreciate the emphasis on how disgusting the good doctor’s endeavor would be if done in real life.

The latter half is heavy on the pathos and brutality. Jean had a hard time with it, and to be honest, if I’d known how gory it is, I would have watched it on my own. Now, I owe her a night or two of watching a movie or show she prefers. She isn’t a horror fan, so I try to be selective with what I show her. She’s liked what she’s seen from Guillermo del Toro, so I assumed she would like Frankenstein. She didn’t dislike it, but she’s completely unfamiliar with the story outside of the creature’s status as a cultural icon, so she was unprepared for how sad the story is.

I have always adored Frankenstein, and my appreciation for it has only grown as I have grown. If you’ve ever felt lonely, rejected, or different, the creature is someone with whom you can easily identify. But the beauty of Frankenstein is that it isn’t black and white because if you’ve ever felt single-mindedly passionate about something, only to have it not turn out the way you hoped, then you will see yourself in the doctor. Hopefully, you’ll be more compassionate than Victor at his worst moments, but in the context of a horror film, his cruelty lends much to the work’s effectiveness.

As a father, I see it as a story about how we must do better by our children (i.e., our creations). They won’t be what we expect, and sometimes they’ll remind us a little too much of ourselves. The key is to remember that this is okay, and that they’ll still need us, especially in their formative years. The creature needed a friend, yes, but more than that, he needed his father.

Frankenstein isn’t a story for these modern times: an age of meme-speak when everything is reduced to team sports (Team Edward, Team Jacob, etc.). If you are firmly Team Doctor or firmly Team Creature, I think you missed the point. In a truly effective story, you can understand the actions of its characters, even if you find said actions abhorrent. This is something Mary Shelley got right in her novel, and it’s something pulled off masterfully in del Toro’s film.

Several years ago, I wrote an essay called “Workshop of Filthy Creation” where I posited that Mary Shelley’s novel was a metafictional story about writing, specifically about the process of writing a horror novel. I don’t know if I still stand by that thesis, but it was a fun thought experiment, and to this day, it remains the only piece of nonfiction for which I’ve been paid professional rates.

Oddly enough, I do think there is some of that going on in del Toro’s adaptation. Meaning, the film at times feels like a depiction of what it may be like to make a Hollywood film. We’ve even got the wealthy benefactor who wants to be part of the final product, even though the doctor knows Herr Harlander’s diseased flesh is less than worthy (it is telling that the real meat of the story begins after Harlander meets a grisly end at the bottom of a shaft).

I still have a lot to meditate on when it comes to this movie, but it might be my favorite adaptation of the novel. It is extremely heavy, though, so I desperately needed a palette cleanser. Thankfully, my pal and colleague Judith Sonnet sent me a link to a movie called Harvest Brood. It’s 54 minutes, free on YouTube, and so much fun to watch. Its creator Joe Meredith had this to say about it:

I love that because that’s exactly how this movie feels, like something weird you’d catch on late-night TV in October. Shot like a trashy mockumentary (complete with interviews and splatter film reenactments), Harvest Brood tells the story of a series of bizarre murders that take place in a small town in October 2006. The main narrative is wrapped in lore reminiscent of C.H.U.D. (think toxic waste and cryptids). In addition to the mockumentary elements, the film employs analog horror techniques and features homemade special effects. Meredith is no Brian Paulin in that latter respect, but I don’t think that was his goal. Rather, he leans into the cheapness and emerges with something artful because of it.

This was a perfect juxtaposition to Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein, which had much higher production values and thus higher ambitions. However, to compare the two, to judge them within the same parameters, is to miss the point. That said, I imagine Joe Meredith is much kinder to his creation than Victor Frankenstein is, and I bet he loves it more than del Toro loves some of his studio films. While I wouldn’t mind del Toro’s money or clout with the powers-that-be, I am much more at home, much more aligned with Meredith’s loving, amateurish approach to making art.

If you too need a palette cleanser from the heaviness of Frankenstein without abandoning the horror genre completely, check out Harvest Brood below.

Until next time: love, light, and thanks.

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Listen: you will change. I will change. The world will change. No change is permanent.

If you’re not careful, your safe space can become a place where you rot in isolation.

As I wrote in Saint Sadist, “No safe space can protect you from yourself.”

The other side of that is if you invite too many people in, you may forget you’re you.

My oldest kid described his brain as a city, in which every thought is a denizen. Cities are busy places, loud. Every voice demands to be heard at the same time. He is changing, developing into a being with fully formed ways to articulate himself. I’m grateful he has the words to describe them and the ability to use those words in a creative way. I cannot stop thinking about that: a city of intrusive thoughts.

My youngest told me death isn’t real. My oldest tried to correct her, but my response was a bit more ambiguous. I said, “It depends on what you mean by ‘real’ and what you mean by ‘death.’”

Death is a shedding of skin. A change.

My oldest growing beyond the age of pure abandon and innocence is a change—akin to a death, if you will—but it is also a growth, an evolution. Alchemy.

I took him and his cousin to their first concert back on 10/19. We saw The Living Tombstone. For the uninitiated, The Living Tombstone is an electronic duo who went from appealing to an extremely online niche (composed mostly of “bronies” and fans of the Five Nights at Freddy’s franchise) to a full band on a world tour.

It was a great show. The audience was into it, dancing and singing along to every verse. A good percentage of them were in costume. Although it was several days before, the whole thing felt appropriately Halloween-themed. The band even launched into a rendition of “Spooky Scary Skeletons.” Although a part of me would have preferred to take them to see one of my favorite bands, it was a much better experience seeing an artist who they both love.

It’s easy as an older guy to dismiss something like Five Nights at Freddy’s as something that’s strictly for the kids, but after attending that concert, I absolutely see its appeal. For one, there is a strong visual component: horror fans love cosplay. Indeed, they would have Halloween every month if they could. Creating visually striking characters has long been a key part of horror, going back to the old Universal Monsters—most likely long before that.

Secondly, the lore behind the games and film is tragic. The animatronics, though frightening, are not the true monsters. They contain the souls of children and were put there by the franchise’s real villain—the very human William Afton. Pure evil characters do have their place in the horror pantheon (see Freddy Krueger, Art the Clown, and Chucky), but the yin to that yang is the plethora of sympathetic monsters. Frankenstein’s creature, Jason Voorhees (with a little imagination), Louis from Interview with the Vampire, and several werewolf characters fit this description.

Lastly, the franchise isn’t afraid to let fans own a piece of it. The Living Tombstone has built their musical career off of songs inspired by the games. And it paid off—the song, “FNAF,” showed up in the end credits of that film.

Say what you will about game creator Scott Cawthon (and I could write a whole, less-than-flattering essay about that guy), but he managed to create something truly special that’s crossed over into many demographics. It all fell into place for me just how special these games and its associated media are with an extremely diverse fanbase while I was at this show. Folks my age, teens, LGBTQ, men, women, and POCs filled the venue, all of them excited for every song The Living Tombstone played, and many of them dressed as characters from FNAF. It was a truly inspiring, eye-opening experience.

Change is always feared but why? It’s not like we haven’t changed before.

I always fear my next moment of self-doubt will be my last, meaning that it will be so severe, I’ll finally stop doing the things I love because I’ve temporarily forgotten why I love them. But the truth is this: these moments are part of the process, and I always come back as a better writer, better father, and better husband than before.

I’m Lucas Mangum. I’m a Splatterpunk Award-winning author and weirdo. This is Fiction for the Cosmically Disturbed. Sometimes, I will post stories here. Sometimes, you’ll get personal essays. Other times, it will be like whatever I wrote in the above paragraphs. This space is always changing. If that’s not your thing, that’s fine. You can move on, no hard feelings.

If that is your thing, hello and welcome. I’m glad you’re here.

Last week of October was all about Halloween. The Texas heat finally broke, and we started getting days that were less than 90 degrees. It was even cold on some mornings and evenings. On that night of nights, it was perfect trick or treating weather. As is tradition, we went out with a bunch of neighbors and their kids. Even Shane McKenzie drove to our development so he and his son could join us. He’s got a new book out, and you’re gonna want it. Just saying!

The costumes and houses were a balanced mix of the cute and the monstrous. I want to give a special shoutout to the couple who had a baby possum with them on their porch. The creature was curled up on one of their laps, getting doted on by kids and adults alike.

October and Halloween came and went too fast. As I suspected, I didn’t watch anywhere near 31 horror movies in 31 days. I did get some reading in, though. I dug the audiobooks of You Like It Darker by Stephen King and Gorgeous Gruesome Faces by Linda Cheung. The latter almost reminded me of Suspiria but set in the world of an academy that prepares girls for K-Pop stardom. It’s YA, but don’t let that deter you: the book goes hard.

I had to get up early the next day to drive with my pal Ryan Bradley to Books and Boos, an event in Nacogdoches held at the Fredonia Brewery. The whole thing was organized by Grim’s Fiction, an indie bookstore focused on genre fiction and gaming. It was an overall positive experience. These types of things usually are. Although the writing itself is my favorite thing about what I do, I’ve got to say that meeting readers and fellow writers is a close second.

Perhaps some things never change.

In closing, here’s a passage from Digital Darkness II that I wrote last week with change and evolution on the brain. Let me know what you think and be sure to pick up the first book if you haven’t already.

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Long before Tanya followed up on a lead about a video game with a dark history, she was like anyone else: a composite of instincts searching for ways to express themselves and receptors seeking input. In other words: a child. On those occasions where she meditated on her younger days, it sometimes disturbed her that she couldn’t tell where the input ended and the more primordial version of her began. When it was all stripped away, was she merely a blank slate? Was she merely the sum of impressions left upon her by others?

She wanted to believe there was something—her true self, her essence—beyond the assembled identity, beyond the masks she wore, including the one she donned to record her videos. But when she had those rare moments of silence, those fragments of a day where she allowed herself to be bored, to simply be, she heard no inner child crying out for recognition, no true or higher self that spoke without sounding like so many others who had spoken to her before. There was only a blankness, an atonal humming beyond interpretation, the vastness of the restless void. Now, broken down and remanufactured for the coming war, she felt a similar break from all previous versions of herself.

That’s it for now, fam. I’ve also un-paywalled the entirety of my archive here, so if you’re new and want to see what I get up to, take a peek!

I can hardly believe it’s been three years since Terrifier 2 took the horror world by storm. With viral marketing that claimed moviegoers were hospitalized after witnessing the on-screen graphic violence and an all-out performance by David Howard Thornton as Art the Clown, Damien Leone’s little franchise that could was suddenly a massive phenomenon. It was wild to see everyday people suddenly taking an interest in a film series that firmly resides within the horror’s most extreme niche. Because I’m “that guy who writes horror stories,” dads in the neighborhood were so curious if I knew anything about the movie. One of them—a salesman—was predictably excited about how it was marketed and how it managed to cross over to mainstream audiences, making $15.82 million on a budget of $250,000.

It’s kind of insane that Terrifier 2 did as well as it did. This wasn’t a snarky, self-aware slasher made by a major studio and featuring a cast made up of hot A-listers, nor was this Oscar bait dressed up for Halloween where the monster is a metaphor for a single person’s trauma. It doesn’t directly address sociopolitical issues in the age of Trump, and it isn’t a remake of a popular film from the genre’s storied past. This is a sequel to a mostly plotless effort that had garnered a cult following due to its impressive practical effects and Thornton’s performance. Like its predecessor, Terrifier 2 leans hard into sadistic violence, but unlike that film, the sequel boasts a runtime of over two hours, and it contains elements of the surreal.

And yet, somehow, this fiercely independent horror film has seen a level of success seldom seen anymore outside the machinations of the studio system. People who don’t love it sure seem to love talking about it, and for Damien Leone and his investors’ bottom line, that’s more than enough.

II.

Despite the hype, I didn’t catch Terrifier 2 in the theater. The me of 2022 and the me of 2002 couldn’t be farther apart. In the early 2000s, my priority was seeing as many horror movies as possible. Old ones, new ones, independent, mainstream, meekly suggestive, unabashedly hardcore—it didn’t matter; if it was horror, I was either lining up to see it in the theater or renting it on VHS or DVD.

My life is different now. Bandwidth is hard to come by when you’re an adult with responsibilities, so I’m particular about how I spend that bandwidth. The fact of the matter is this: although I appreciated the practical effects and Thornton’s performance in the original Terrifier, its lack of story pretty much guaranteed that any follow-up would end up on the backburner in favor of films with storylines that more immediately excited me and, of course, reading books. It’s worth noting that back in the early 2000s, I had filmmaking aspirations, so devouring every horror movie I could made more sense than it does for me now as a writer of horror prose.

I was also admittedly intimidated by the movie’s two-hours-plus runtime. How the hell could something as episodic as the first keep up that kind of momentum for over two hours? Did I really want to subject myself to gory set piece after gory set piece for that long if there wasn’t a story to support these moments of bombastic graphic violence? Honestly, not really.

Listen, I’ve seen Cannibal Holocaust, both versions of Last House on the Left, I Spit on Your Grave, Tokyo Gore Police, A Serbian Film, The Human Centipede 2, Hostel, both Nekromantik movies, Septic, Rob Zombie’s entire filmography, Bloodsucking Freaks, a handful of the Saw movies, and House on the Edge of the Park. In other words, I don’t need to prove anything to myself as far as whether I “have what it takes” to visually and sonically subject myself to such cruelty. I got my gore card in my wallet. The blood may be dry and darkened to more of a dull brown than a lurid red, but it’s still there, tucked behind old receipts and a library card.

That said, Terrifier 2 hasn’t gone away. People are still talking about it. A third entry was released last year to much fanfare and box office success, and a fourth is currently in production. Like Freddy, Jason, and Michael, Art the Clown isn’t going anywhere.

With October upon us, I’ve decided to try yet again to watch 31 horror movies in 31 days. I have never been able to do this successfully. Between my ADHD (which seems determined to stop me from forming new habits), familial obligations, and my own creativity, something always gets in the way. I usually get off to a good start, though. This year, if I watch 31 horror movies or only three this month, I hope to keep my viewings strictly to films I haven’t seen or haven’t seen in a long time.

After the kids went to sleep on October 1, I decided it was time.

Terrifier 2. Let’s do this.

III.

The opening scene picks up immediately where the original left off. This is something Halloween II did way back in 1981. I don’t know if it’s because this creative choice is done so rarely or if it’s because doing so comes with a certain immediacy, but I’ve always enjoyed seeing a sequel that starts as if no time at all has passed since the film that preceded it. Here, Art the Clown is in the morgue, fucking shit up after being resurrected by a demonic little girl clown that, at first, only he can see. After washing his clown suit, playing a game of pat-a-cake with clown girl, and impaling a bystander Phineas Gage-style, the film jumps forward a year. It’s here where we meet Sienna Shaw, a final girl unlike any final girl you’ve ever seen.

What transpires over the next two hours is a brutal game of cat-and-mouse. Sienna, haunted by nightmares of the Clown Cafe and memories of her deceased father, prepares for Halloween. We get insight into her relationships with her hardworking but damaged mother, oddball little brother, and two friends. This gets intercut with moments of Art wreaking havoc in increasingly violent ways before he and Sienna have their big showdown.

We get a couple of cameos along the way from Felissa Rose (known for her role as Angela in Sleepaway Camp) and Chris Jericho (professional wrestler and outspoken fan of the aforementioned Bloodsucking Freaks). We’re also treated to some inspired use of synthwave tracks, most notably The Midnight’s “The Equaliser (Not Alone),” which plays as Sienna builds her angel-winged Halloween costume to prepare for a party on that night of nights. It’s a song that brings both comfort and menace, oddly fitting when thinking about this film. Like House of 1000 Corpses, Trick ‘r Treat, and those gorgeous autumnal shots from the opening moments of Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers, the spooky, cozier horror imagery cocoons us in a false sense of security that makes the savagery even more jarring.

And “savagery” is an apt description for the violence in Terrifier 2. I don’t know if I’m getting softer as I’ve matured, but I had a hard time watching Art doing his thing. Most disturbing (and perhaps realistically), his victims don’t die right away. Unlike what’s typically seen in slashers, people don’t catch a hatchet to the face or an arrow to the throat and then slump lifelessly before the scene cuts away. These poor souls struggle in the best-case scenarios. In the worst, pain and terror has stripped them of the will to live, yet their bodies won’t let them slip away.

I hated watching these scenes, but here’s a hot take for your Tuesday morning: I wasn’t supposed to enjoy watching these atrocities. For the first time in years, the desensitization I’ve built up was smashed, flayed, burned, and melted away. I didn’t just want Art to get his comeuppance by the end of this thing. I fucking needed it.

So, who’s up to such a task? More importantly, how do they pull it off.

Let’s get weird, my friends.

IV.

Alchemy is an ancient tradition concerned with purifying, maturing, and perfecting certain materials. It’s mostly known as the practice of turning base metals into gold, but that’s only one alchemical practice, and even that may only be a symbolic description of alchemy’s true aims. The discipline has been practiced throughout history in numerous regions throughout the world by people from various walks of life. The process of breaking down, rebuilding, and perfecting is universal, sometimes undertaken formally by self-proclaimed magicians and other times practiced intuitively and unknowingly by faithful, noble fools.

The story of alchemy is a one of transformation, of perfecting oneself into a higher form in a process called the “magnum opus” or “The Great Work.” Storytelling theories like the hero’s journey most certainly detail a transformation process, but I argue that its many steps both dilute and add rigidity to what already exists in alchemical tradition, and that the best stories are alchemical acts.

This transformation has four stages: First comes the decomposition, a blackening—it’s a state of chaos, of massa confusa. You can see this in the original Terrifier; its episodic senseless violence in which the only surviving character is left literally without a face is this tale’s prima materia, the chaos from which the story emerges. We also see it in the remnants of final girl Sienna’s life: the sketchbook left behind by her father prior to his death, the fallout from his suicide, her prophetic nightmares featuring Art the Clown, and the blackening of the wings she’s made for her Halloween costume when her room catches fire.

The second stage of alchemical transformation is concerned with bringing light and clarity to the prima materia and dividing the two opposing principles. In Terrifier 2 this is shown by the sword (a gift from her father) emerging from the bedroom fire’s ashes unscathed. It’s shown in how the narrative divides between Art’s murderous antics and Sienna’s home life, dual plot threads destined to intertwine but first must be separated. The killings themselves, bodily destruction by a perpetrator who is now more than physical matter, also represent a separation of sorts—that of life from flesh.

In the third stage, the alchemist’s inner “solar” light shows. They no longer need their reflective “lunar” light. They are more purely themselves, less the reflection of others. We see this most in Terrifier 2 when Sienna is rolling on ecstasy and in the midst of a scolding by her permanently exhausted mother, she realizes how much she loves her mother and makes it a point to tell her. They share a moment, brought on by intoxication, yes, but it’s still honest, expressed after the disintegration of Sienna’s inhibitions while under the influence of the drug. The ecstasy is a plot device to get us to this beautiful moment. Were this a sword and sorcery adventure, this sudden and passing appearance of Sienna’s pure spirit would have been expressed differently, but in a 2022-set slasher film, it makes sense to be coaxed out under these circumstances.

In the finale of Terrifier 2, Sienna returns from death, dressed in her Valkyrie outfit and wielding her father’s sword. I could be wrong, but I think this is the only instance of a “final girl” becoming as supernatural as the killer in order to defeat him (at least until the next sequel). This mirrors the fourth stage of alchemy, which is all about the integrating of opposites and the emergence of a newer, truer self.

V.

I don’t know much about Damien Leone.

From what I’ve read and seen, he strikes me as a fan above all—he’s tenacious, creative, and business-savvy, but a fan just the same. Like a lot of us, he longs for the innovation and playfulness embodied by 1980s horror movies. If any of these movies were “about” something as far as higher metaphors went, enjoyment was not predicated on understanding such deeper meanings or aligning with any political ideology (yes, I know there are exceptions like Society and Day of the Dead, get outta my comments). You can meditate on possible deeper meanings (and I encourage you to do so), but the beauty of these films is that they also work just fine if you’re simply looking to escape life for 90 minutes.

I bring this up to say that I sincerely doubt Leone knows anything about alchemy or intentionally imbued his insanely popular sequel with elements of the esoteric. If those elements are there, and I argue that they are, it’s most likely by accident. He’s less Magician and more of a Fool.

There’s nothing wrong with that, by the way. The Fool acts on faith, on intuition, and on instincts. This sometimes means he faces a major learning curve. In Leone’s work, this shows in the episodic sloppiness of the first film. I haven’t met a single person who doesn’t like the second better than the first. This is because Leone is also committed to learning by doing, learning in public, and he’s okay with failing forward. I think that’s why a lot of indie horror creators (regardless of their chosen medium) cite him and Terrifier as an inspiration. They see themselves in this work, in Leone.

And here’s the thing about Fools: when they land on a goldmine, it’s usually because they’re doing something they genuinely love. Damien Leone loves this strange, violent universe that powers his money-printing franchise. If he didn’t - if he was writing and directing these movies cynically, in hopes of making a quick buck - I seriously doubt they’d be as successful as they are. It takes a special kind of talent or a property with a built-in audience (hi, Marvel) to do something solely for the money and still have it connect with people.

VI.

Listen, I don’t have a huge audience, but I do have a dedicated one. That isn’t a flex. I say this to demonstrate that I know a thing or two about building a fanbase. Anytime I tried writing to market, I produced an inferior product. I have struggled to stay consistent on social media (yes, even Substack) for more than a couple of weeks without burning out and needing time away. I make the art I love; I’ve even gone as far as to call a good many of my books “love letters.” Sometimes, they’re love letters to a piece of media that’s stuck with me: Goddamn Graveyard Zombies pays tribute to Return of the Living Dead, while Snow Angels owes much to John Carpenter’s The Fog. I’ve also written love letters to my younger self (Haunted Hearts). 1

I hear people describe certain works of prominent creators as “passion projects.” For me, they’re all passion projects. I think the same can be said about Damien Leone and his Terrifier universe. The success of these films has been attributed to a more violent culture, a creeping sociopathy that’s spread through us, as even our most secular news venues are doing everything to convince us that the End Times are here.

I see Terrifier’s popularity through a different, more hopeful lens. It’s a testament to one’s passion, dedication, and pure expression winning out. In a lot of ways, we aspire to be Damien Leone: a person with a stubborn vision that crosses over in spite of itself. Personal expression—artistic and otherwise—is how we cope with the mad world. It’s what makes life livable.

See, Art is the living embodiment of the misery inflicted upon us by a larger world that is indifferent to us at best and actively hostile toward us at worse. He rips us and our loved ones apart, and he fucking laughs about it. It’s hard not to draw comparisons between him and the powerful people who seek to do us harm. Like those elites, this cruelty is his art.

Sienna Shaw is us, struggling to persevere and transcend despite the bloodbath around her. Only through alchemical transformation does she overcome, and through evolution (emotional, psychological, spiritual, etc.), we will too. It will look different for each of us because we’re each aiming for our best, truest selves. However, like Sienna making her own costume in her bedroom as Halloween and destiny approach, I suspect it will begin with our art.

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The Central Texas heat hasn’t lifted, but on paper, fall is here.

We dug Ah-ooh, our 7-foot-tall animatronic werewolf, out of the garage and set him up in our dining room. This year, the kids helped me put him together. They were excited to have him out again. Our oldest even talked about keeping him out all year and gave us some ideas for doing so: having him wear a Santa hat around Christmas, hold a platter of turkey for Thanksgiving, sparklers for 4th of July, a heart-shaped box of chocolates for Valentine’s Day. I think it’s a splendid idea. Jean is on the fence about it. Our youngest is just happy her “best friend” is back.

It’s been a hard summer—hotter than usual, for longer than usual. We struggled to settle into a routine after the school year ended. Our oldest attended a few camps that he only somewhat enjoyed. Our youngest outgrew her daycare center. Jean got pushed out of her job. I stopped meeting up with a friend and his crew for weekly runs because I’m not built for running in extreme heat. I put out a book that was largely ignored, despite it containing some of my best prose.

The heat wasn’t just hard on the home front either.

Friends separated from spouses. One lost a parent. The horror writing community saw a huge dust-up around a popular event that happened this summer. There was political violence, the public’s reaction to said violence, and the weaponization of these reactions by powerful people who don’t give a fuck about any of us.

These are the burning times: the trauma season will give way to the dying season. The trees will shed their leaves, and we will shed our skin, but in the meantime, it’s still too damn hot.

You’ve felt it, haven’t you? It will get worse before it will get better, but it will get better. I believe that firmly, perhaps foolishly. But at the end of the day, I’d rather die an optimistic fool than a bitter hermit.

With Ah-ooh out of his box in the garage where he hibernates November-August, our house has been full of snarling and howling of the lupine variety. See, if you push Ah-ooh’s button, the big orange one that says, “try me,” he snarls and howls. The sounds are frighteningly realistic and enough to put this seasoned horror fan on edge, but the kids just run and laugh, daring each other to push the button.

Werewolves are one of my favorite monsters. In the right book or film, they still have the ability to freak me out if I get in my head too much. The idea of wandering the dark woods, stalked by something that’s neither fully beast nor fully human makes me deeply uncomfortable. Some of this undoubtedly stems from the subconscious memories of past lives lived as prey. But there’s more to it than that, isn’t there? There’s the notion of our fellow humans becoming beastly and preying on each other. And then what if we survive such an attack? The mainstream literature suggests that we may become one of these hybrid beasts ourselves, the very monsters which caused us such trauma to begin with. Maybe what we fear most of all is that underneath the toothy snouts, jagged claws, and bristly fur, we’ll find ourselves.

Why wolves? I’m not sure, honestly. They’re not the only predatory animal, nor are they even the most frightening or fierce. It works, though. That much is for sure.

So, why did I let one of these creatures into my home? The easy answer is that after our kids saw the display version in Costco, they weren’t about to let us leave unless we loaded one of these bad boys into our cart. And besides, werewolves aren’t real—this is merely an animatronic Halloween decoration, albeit an extremely detailed and imposing one.

Maybe he’s our way of symbolically integrating our shadow.

Maybe that’s exactly what Halloween (spooky season, if you will) is all about. And if this past summer is any indication, we need this.

Listen, I’m no gatekeeper. If how you engage with the macabre begins and ends at Tim Burton or Riley Sager, that’s cool. If that’s not enough, if you need to watch A Serbian Film or Landmine Goes Click, to fully grasp the spectrum of how dark things can get, go with God. The House of Horror has many rooms.

Just . . . don’t be a prick. If you like horror’s cozier side but wander into the basement where they’re watching Cannibal Holocaust or reading the newest Aron Beauregard book, don’t go on TikTok and call them a bunch of incels because you’re too much of a teenager to admit that you found your personal limits.

And it goes both ways: if the only public readings you attend are Grossout Contests or you’re someone who thinks Nekromantik is the ideal date movie, don’t be mean if you wander onto the room where they’re watching Ernest Scared Stupid. Don’t tell them they aren’t true horror fans because they can’t stomach Terrifier 2 or won’t read a book by Wrath James White. Most reasonable people gave up these attitudes after high school, and you’ll make more friends if you do the same.

I say this partly for selfish reasons. Over the course of my dozen-years-plus career, I’ve written everything from cozy horror to splatterpunk and everything in between. I have friends whose limits run the spectrum of horror’s numerous subgenres. Even though Jean enjoyed The Stuff, Night of the Living Dead, and An American Werewolf in London, she doesn’t actively seek out horror to watch or read. My oldest and my youngest both love Ah-ooh, but they’re clearly too young to watch or read most of the stuff I enjoy with my friends.

I also say this because this is the time to give serious thought to what integrating our shadow looks like. It’s time to put up some Halloween decorations early, maybe leave them out all year long. You can change their outfits or accessories to reflect other holidays, but most of all, meditate on them. What they mean to you. It’s a time for horror. We’re burning alive without it, and this fire’s been going for a lot longer than a single summer.

I left off with the above paragraph, knowing I would need to come back to this piece because it felt incomplete. Even nonfiction pieces have three acts, so here is the third act for this essay. . .

After dinner, we went to the neighborhood greenbelt to see the fort our oldest built with his friends earlier that day. It was 6:00 PM, and the heat was still stifling. Our youngest started melting down as soon as we hit the trail. I’d already seen the fort that afternoon, so I stayed behind with her while Jean and our oldest walked ahead. Her Elsa dress started dragging in the grass where a minefield of dried-up dog turds lay in front of us. A section of backbone from some large animal, detached and picked clean, sat in the grass beside one of the fences like a bad omen, and our presence kicked off a cacophony of barking dogs.

Nervously, I tried to get her to pick up the bottom of her dress so it wouldn’t drag in the dog shit. At the same time this happened, something must have bit her or scratched her because she flipped to pure meltdown mode. She said she hurt all over and would not stop screaming. I tried to calm her down by showing her that there were no marks on her legs, but she said she hurt on the inside. I was panicking and scared, so I raised my voice, which helped about as well as you can imagine.

Thankfully, when Jean got back, she was able to take over. We got home, got our youngest in the bath, and eventually, she (and I) calmed down. We hugged it out and said we loved each other.

I don’t know what that was all about, but I’m ready for the heat to end.

Later that night, I went with movie pal and fellow horror writer to see Him at the local theater. With comparisons to the work of Ken Russell and a divided response from audiences, I knew the film would at the very least be unique.

I fucking loved it. This is a movie and a half. Critic and filmmaker Scout Tafoya once told me that “the image matters,” and boy-oh-boy, Him is rife with resonant, meaningful imagery. Part fever dream, part modern American myth, this film looks at sports stardom, masculinity, hero worship, and the cult of it all through the experiences of a young athlete being groomed as “the next big thing.” Powerful performances abound, but Marlon Wayans outshines them all as the veteran quarterback who runs an increasingly bizarre and sadistic training camp at his compound in the middle of the desert. There is some clever misdirection, and some moments that truly put me on edge.

Although there are no werewolves on screen, the beast that lives inside men is a prevalent theme. I’ll say no more for fear of spoiling it for those interested in watching, except to say that in this film, beastliness has a lineage.

Something to think about. . .

The monsters in us thrive in extreme climates. The temperance of autumn cools the feverish frenzy of summer, and when it gets too cold, we await the first flowers of spring. I’m glad Ah-ooh is here. I’m grateful for the fall, for spooky season. For the nightmarish effigies that help us remember, that contain.

The air is still like a furnace in Central Texas, so things are moving slower than they should. The monsters we try to repress are feeling the heat and lashing out, but they’ll get the memo soon.

Put up those ghoulish decorations, my friends. Start the horror movie marathon. Crack open your favorite book of scary stories. Put on a record by The Cramps.

It’s long past time to give these monsters a place to play where they can’t hurt us.

Until then, there’s always October.

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A big question I wrestle with on my self-healing journey revolves around my relationship with the horror genre. I’ve been a fan of horror for as long as I can remember. I’ve written too many horror stories to count, some of which you can read in the archives, while others are available at the book places and in my store. Most of my social circle consists of fans and fellow creators. I love horror’s aesthetics and enjoy every aspect of it from the spooky and cozy to the transgressive and everything in between (provided that it’s done well). My book Snow Angels won the Splatterpunk Award for Best Novella, and I’ve had newer writers say that they see me as a mentor.

At the same time, the horror genre explores and sometimes glorifies the darker aspects of life. It focuses on death, fear, cruelty, and the imaginary creatures that often symbolize these very things. So, on the surface, what use does someone who is seeking to better themselves have for horror?

Quite a lot, it turns out.

The concept of integrating one’s shadow to become a more complete version of themselves has reemerged in recent years thanks to TikTok. From what I can see, the renewed interest in this idea traces to the publication of The Shadow Work Journal, a book that encourages you to explore your damage, your dark thoughts, and the things that hold you back in a frank, guided-journal type of way. The idea is that by doing this you become a better version of yourself—much like the concept of gaining power over a demon by knowing its name, this is a “name-to-tame” approach to our psychological wounds and our baser tendencies.

I truly believe that horror fans (be they readers or cinephiles) and horror creators do this all the time, albeit not always intentionally or consciously. While there’s nothing wrong with engaging with the genre on a purely surface level, most of the people I know get something more out of it.

Because writing about this topic intimidates me, I tagged in some friends and writers who can add tremendous value to this discussion. I asked three fellow authors what it means to them when I say, “Engaging with the horror genre is shadow work.”

Cynthia “Cina” Pelayo is an author who I feel needs no introduction, but for the uninitiated, she’s a Bram Stoker Award and International Latino Book Award-winning author and poet. She holds a Master of Fine Arts in Writing from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and is pursuing a PhD in English. She’s also an adherent of Positive Psychology and has taught workshops on it and how it relates to writing.

Here’s what she had to say when I reached out to her with my question:

Per Carl Jung, the shadow is that unconscious part of us. We have our conscious (active) and our subconscious (background programming running). Now, with our subconscious, guess what? It's always on. It's been recording every single thing you've ever heard and experienced since you were born. Aspects of our shadow are these parts of ourselves that we have repressed, for a number of reasons. Now, there are people who have been able to integrate that shadow self with their conscious self to create what Jung calls the Integrated Self, but those are few and far between - because people are going to people and blame everyone else for their problems, and very often will not confront themselves with the single strongest question we could ask ourselves "What did I do to contribute to this situation?"

What happens with most people is they navigate the world as their conscious self, but there's always this subconscious self - their shadow, with them.

With horror, it could be argued that many people come to this genre or write in this genre because they are exploring aspects of that shadow self, but that's also a controversial stance, and why is that? Well, historically there are people who say that people who write horror are unwell, or have aspects of themselves that, if given the right circumstances in the real world, would act out deviancy. I'm firmly not going to say either or, because I don't like making blanket statements in this vein, and I will just allow people to explore these concepts on their own.

I think ultimately, the shadow self is an aspect many people do not want to face, and they really need to. We need to confront these uncomfortable feelings, traumas, and subconscious programming we've had installed since birth.

Now, what happens when we don't confront our shadow selves in our lifetime? Well, we become a terror to everyone around us and self-sabotage. People who ignore the shadow self may have repressed anger, guilt, shame that may surface in destructive ways, like that self-sabotage I mentioned, such as destroying friendships, relationships, being reactive and so on. Does writing horror allow us to explore these things, like anger, guilt, shame, destruction ... well, most certainly.

This was an in-depth, nuanced, and well-thought-out answer. If you’re familiar with Cina or her work, you should know to expect nothing less. I want to highlight a couple of things she said. The question posed at the end of her first paragraph is a vital one, and it’s worth pointing out that it isn’t suggesting we should blame ourselves. It’s less about taking accountability for what happened—things outside of our control happen to us all the time, especially if we’re children or vulnerable in some other way—and more about figuring out how to respond in subsequent seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years, etc.

And how often in horror are the events that unfold the result of unresolved grief, unhealed trauma, misplaced rage. “Jason should’ve been watched every minute! He was . . . He wasn’t a very good swimmer.” In Friday the 13th, Pamela Voorhees had all this unaddressed damage around the death of her son, a trauma she relived every time someone decided to try reopening Camp Crystal Lake, and eventually, she had a psychotic break and carried out the murders that launched a movie franchise. Examples like this are why I get a bit miffed when people on both sides of the argument act like the genre grew a conscience in 2017 and that everything made before then was pure schlock. I’ve written before about schlock having its place, but I do want to stress that many horror creators cared about psychological, social, and political issues long before the mid-2010s, and I’m not just talking about George Romero or The Twilight Zone.

I also want to applaud Cina for not making a blanket statement regarding the argument that horror writers are unwell or would act out their deviance under the right circumstances. I see this argument made far too often (usually on TikTok or Reddit), and it never fails to set my blood to a boil. People can have this stuff swirling around in them and still be well-adjusted. I would even argue that knowing that you have this in you will make you less likely indulge it in a harmful way. There are exceptions, of course, but there are bad actors everywhere. The horror community has them, but so does the romance, fantasy, comedy, and science fiction communities. To make a blanket statement on this would be a misstep, so I appreciate Cina acknowledging the nuance of this.

Definitely check out her work if you haven’t yet.

I also asked Grant Wamack, author of Bullet Tooth and the newly released The Scarecrows Will Watch Over Us, to weigh in. He said:

In psychology, they say we have a shadow—all the repressed parts of ourself. So I feel like sometimes this might come out in fiction because we repress a lot of dark thoughts and such. So in a way, I think it helps integrate some parts of our shadow if that makes sense

I like this response because when we’re writing—and I mean when we’re really grooving—we tend to enter a flow state. We’re (to paraphrase Joe Lansdale) writing like everyone we know is dead. All that ugly, unresolved shit bubbles up from the subconscious, spills onto the page, onto the screen, onto the canvas, into the recording interface. For a moment, you feel like you can breathe. It’s akin to a mental purge, an emotional detox, a spiritual cleanse. And it should: many, if not all aspects, of our shadow come from outside ourselves, from people who harmed us, from bad situations, from living in a topsy-turvy and often unkind world.

This clarity happens to those who consume horror as well. Much like getting a feeling of relief that comes from crying over a cheesy romance or laughing at a screwball comedy, something similar happens when we get to experience the unsafe in a safe way. Take those Terrifier movies, for example, the exploits of the nonverbal, homicidally maniacal Art the Clown. Having him only communicate with his face, body language, and acts of violence is a stroke of genius in that really gets at what I’m talking about here. The thing about the shadow and the elements contained within is that it is often inexpressible with common language. Images and sounds articulate what we cannot say, which is why writers of fiction are discouraged from telling instead of showing. The horror genre’s innovations of the 70s, 80s, and 90s are less prevalent, but what we are seeing is an era of distillation, a purification of form.

Lastly, I reached out to Clare Castleberry, author of Azalea House, Dark Feminine Energy, and Journeys Through Fear.

I think as horror writers, we're more aware of the power of the subconscious mind and how it shows us signs and symbols of things we need to work on, prepare for, or accept. Those signs often appear in odd or disturbing ways, via dreams or even paranormal events

This was the answer I was hoping for from Clare. She went on to specifically reference last week’s post about my dream-within-a-dream and how that sounded like an example of this from my life. I especially appreciate that she didn’t discount the possibility of the paranormal—Jung sure as hell didn’t—and if you follow her here (you should!), you know this response is very on-brand for her.

Horror creators (perhaps SF, fantasy, bizarro, and magical realism writers as well) are definitely more in tune with the subconscious because we rely heavily on it for our imagery and themes. Horror isn’t the genre of the hero’s journey. Its stories don’t see the “belly of the whale” as a mere pit stop on a mythical quest for some sword-wielding paladin. Rather, it asks you to stay down in the dark for a bit.

Let your eyes adjust.

Listen to what the creatures that dwell there have to say for themselves.

Linger.

Big thanks to Cina, Grant, and Clare for weighing in on this topic and helping me articulate what I wanted to say. I don’t think I could’ve done it without them.

Thanks also to all of you for taking the time to read this post. This is my 150th post on Substack. I didn’t even realize this until I prepared to hit publish, so that’s crazy! I can hardly believe I’ve kept up with this for so long, and I’m even more humbled by the fact that so many of you keep showing up for me.

Lastly, my book Digital Darkness reached #10 in Cosmic and Eldritch Horror on Amazon, so I appreciate those of you who picked it up. I should have signed copies in stock soon, but you can place an order on the store in the meantime, and I’ll ship them out once I have them in hand.

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I staggered down the hall to my parents’ room and pushed open the door. My parents were sitting up in bed, but they weren’t themselves. Their skin had turned charcoal black, with reddish orange cracks pulsating with an inner fire. They were like human-shaped volcanic rocks, each of them ready to erupt into a living inferno. Their eyes had no pupils or irises. Instead, they were gray scales, like windows of abandoned buildings, painted over and whitewashed. And their teeth . . . Their teeth were much larger than they were before and filed into sharp points.

I ran back to my bedroom to warn my brother, but he was already awake, sitting cross-legged with his head down. A violent, crimson stream spewed from his mouth—a mouth that was open wider than possible. I screamed his name, not sure if he was dying or becoming one of them, only wanting this nightmare to end because that was all this could be, a nightmare, because people didn’t turn into demons, and people didn’t vomit blood, not like this anyway, this was like water from a burst pipe dyed red. The fluid made a puddle around his legs as it soaked into the sheet and comforter.

I covered my ears and backpedaled, shaking, sweating. Denying. Screaming at myself to wake up. Wake up NOW.

Like a cut in a movie, I was outside with my mother. It was daytime now, late afternoon. I accepted this transition as people tend to accept dream logic when they’re dreaming.

“I had a dream last night,” I said. “It felt so real.”

A heavy, synthesized chord vibrated through the air. Someone had scored this scene, and why wouldn’t it have a soundtrack? Music could express what words could not, and the sustained minor chord spoke the language of this unvoiced darkness, the unease inspired by the nightmare, a nightmare still ongoing, though I didn’t yet know it.

Cut to my parent’s bedroom, later. Dusk had dimmed the light coming in from outside. My father was holding my hand after I told him about the dream. He would not let go. He pulled me toward him, into the bed, under the blanket, into a darkness without a bottom.

He looked like himself, but I knew he had changed. The dream felt real because it was real. He was a demon. My mother was a demon, playing the role of comforter during our walk on the street. And my brother, where was he? Was he dead or had he also changed?

I pulled away so hard I fell backwards and hit the floor. The impact woke me up, for real this time. I was in my bed. It was time to get ready for school. I clenched the sheet in my fists and took a deep breath, tried to convince myself I was safe, I was in my body, I was real.

I got up and walked to the bathroom. I got dressed and ate breakfast. Headed to the bus stop. Every step was a reassurance, a recalibration of reality, or at least the familiar one.

I had that dream thirty years ago—almost exactly. It was the first and, as far as I can remember, only time I’ve experienced the dream-inside-a-dream phenomenon. Unless you’ve experienced that yourself, I don’t think the words exist to make you understand just how disorienting it can be for the dreamer. I went through the motions that day, sure enough—school, homework, TV, dinner with the family—but it was a few days before I accepted that I was awake and indeed in my familiar reality.

Some thoughts: that was sixth grade, September, so I was in a new school. My parents’ marriage was on the cusp of its disintegration, which I think kids pick up on more than adults fully realize. I was starting to go through puberty, so all sorts of shifts were happening in my body.

The world I knew no longer was, and my subconscious was reckoning with it and preparing me. I don’t think we fully appreciate how powerful our brains are, but they are limitless, and the more we listen to them (its real voice, not the voices of those who tried to tell us who we are, the noise that sometimes garbles things in the form of intrusive thoughts), the more we realize that they have our back. We just might not always immediately understand this because our subconscious speaks a different language.

However, the concept of dreams inside dreams throws reality itself into question. This can be scary or comforting depending on your state of mind. All you can do really is take one breath and then another, accept the rules of whatever reality you find yourself in, and work within them until you’re not simply surviving but thriving.

Have you ever experienced a dream inside a dream? What was that like for you? I’d love to hear about it in the comments.

On that note, the Author’s Preferred Edition for Digital Darkness is up for pre-order. You can buy a signed copy from my store, or you can purchase the digital and paperback editions from Amazon and such. The official release date is tomorrow, September 9, 2025 (or 9/9/9, a number which symbolizes transformation or completion).

This book has undergone a lot of transformations, and I believe that this is its most complete version. Gone are the moments that drag the narrative down, and I’ve cut many (but not all) of the threads that leave the door open for more books. I explain why I chose to do a new version in the foreword of this edition, but long story short, Digital Darkness is a story that always felt unfinished. Now it feels less so.

Here’s the back cover copy:

Vanessa just wanted to see her favorite musician in concert. Now, she's fighting for her life against ravenous rats and superhuman sentries in a game called Rusted Blood. But surviving is only the beginning. The virtual reality she tries so desperately to escape has spilled into the real world, and the sinister inhabitants and architects of the game have come with it.

In this new, author's preferred edition of Digital Darkness, Splatterpunk Award winner Lucas Mangum (author of Snow Angels, Gods of the Dark Web and Saint Sadist) invites you into a nightmare where reality isn't what it seems.

The book is for fans of ARGs and survival horror. It contains graphic content and a deep sense of derealization.

Check out the badass cover by Matt Seff Barnes.

Signed Paperbacks Here

The construction of the tech company’s new campus in Central Texas started bringing all kinds of wildlife out of the undeveloped land across the highway and into our suburban neighborhood. It was pretty cool at first for a guy like me who loves nature and spotting animals on his early morning walks. Families of deer, screech owls, and snakes all migrated from what used to be ranch land. We could see them in our greenbelt, the associated park, and sometimes crossing the street. Coyotes were out and about too. I heard rumors of a cougar as well, which was mildly alarming, but that just let me know I needed to be careful about where I walked alone, and to make sure I didn’t walk when it was too dark.

Overall, I embraced the presence of these visitors. Often, while sipping beer and smoking pot on my neighbor’s porch, we glimpsed something other than the usual squirrels, furry creatures of various shapes and sizes and temperaments wandering the neighborhood after dark. It wasn’t until one foggy morning in May when I started to worry more about what kinds of creatures were coming out of the previously uncharted wilderness and creeping through our more human-friendly space.

That morning, I got up at the usual time, as dawn crept its way from over the eastern horizon. I made a cup of coffee in the French press, put on my sneakers, and headed out the door. The sound of my feet and the twittering of birds in the trees were the only real sounds around this time. The early morning commuters were not as numerous as the ones who would be out around seven or eight, so the sounds of their engines weren’t as overwhelming.

I sipped my coffee and felt grateful for the hour of quiet afforded me before the kids and Jean got up for the day. I loved my family, but I’d always been sensitive to too much noise—an affliction that seemed to get far worse after becoming a parent, especially after the Covid years. Taking these quiet moments were crucial to me being an engaged and more patient father.

I took my usual route, which led me through the park and into the greenbelt. The other morning, I had seen three bucks grazing in one of the clearings, and I hoped to see them again. Maybe I could even get a closer look. Of course, I noted, that might be hard to do in the fog.

Fog had always made me think about other worlds and the vaporous nature of reality. See, I’m a horror writer and sometimes my imagination likes to drift.

I wasn’t imagining the sound of something big moving in the nearby cluster of trees, though. My first thought was that it was likely a deer, but my more vigilant side thought it could be the cougar, stalking me. I kept walking and looked toward the thick set of trees. The fog and lack of full sun made it difficult to see much between the trunks and leaves other than a few shadows. I faced forward again and quickened my pace.

The rustling and heavy footfalls followed me, but I dared not look back until I got to the greenbelt exit. That was when I saw it, standing in the middle of the composite gravel trail fifteen paces behind me. It was humanoid, standing on two legs, but it was covered head-to-toe in white scraggly fur. It had broad shoulders, and its hands were tipped with claws. Most alarming was the lupine snout, pointed ears, and the amber eyes that seemed to glow.

I thought maybe it was someone in a costume, even though it was much too early for Halloween, but the more I looked, the more realistic the creature’s appearance. It was undoubtedly an animal but no animal I’d ever seen, in a book or real life.

I turned and started walking toward home. I wanted to run, but my instincts said that if I did, I’d be chased, so I kept my pace to a brisk walk.

Every time I looked back, I saw that the creature had taken several more steps out of the greenbelt. It was following me, but thankfully not giving chase. Its legs were long and strong looking, and I was sure it could catch me if it ran.

Once I turned the corner onto the main drive that cut through our subdivision, I did run. It was a little busier with car traffic and better lit, so I was gambling on those two details deterring the creature from pursuing me further. By the time I reached my street, I stopped and looked back again. Confident that I wasn’t followed, I breathed a sigh of relief and walked the rest of the way home.

All morning through breakfast and my second cup of coffee, I couldn’t stop thinking about what I’d seen. Once I got the kids off to school, I checked forums and local history websites for any mentions of something that sounded like the creature that had come out of the greenbelt. It took me several minutes before I stumbled on an article titled “The White Wolf of Central Texas.”

Apparently, in the 1950s, reports of lethal attacks on livestock coincided with local sightings of a white wolf that stood on its hind legs. Witnesses threw around words like “Skinwalker” and “werewolf.” According to the article, these attacks and sightings lessened as the area got more developed. I supposed whatever these folks saw back in the day had been confined to the wilderness and mostly forgotten as strip malls and neighborhoods like ours went up. It, or its descendants, didn’t wander out of the wilderness because it didn’t need to, at least not until the tech company started building on its hunting grounds.

I don’t know what I saw that morning or if it’s dangerous. What I do know is that the world is still not devoid of mystery, and that there is a lot of things most of us seldom see, let alone understand.

I no longer go into the greenbelt before the sun is out.

Although the above story is written as if it’s true, it is not. I’ve been listening to a podcast called Unexplained Encounters. You can probably imagine the content based on the title alone: personal accounts of brushes with cryptids and other paranormal creatures. I’m somewhat addicted, usually listening to it when I’m drifting off to sleep or on a long drive. I wanted to see if I could write something in that style.

Anyway, Killer Con’s in two weeks. Will I see you there? I’ll be tabling with talented up-and-comer Sarah DeRosa and selling signed books. Can’t make it to Austin in two weeks? That’s okay, you can find signed books at the button below.

Signed Books Here

If you follow me on Facebook or if you’re a longtime reader of this Substack, you know that my mental health has not been great these past few months. While I can directly attribute it to very tangible things, I decided to bite the bullet and increase my meds. I didn’t arrive at this decision lightly, as I always worry about blunting my emotions or losing my creativity (or my sex drive, God forbid!), but something had to change. I’m running twice a week, eating right, staying sober-ish, and consistently getting a good night’s sleep, and I still feel like dogshit, so yeah, psych meds it is.

While in this tumultuous state, I’ve been thinking a lot about horror, my place in it, and what it means to someone on the path of self-improvement. Here are some thoughts I’ve had:

1. Why should I read/watch/write horror when I’m trying to become someone who doesn’t need it?

2. Do I really need to put more darkness into myself and/or the world?

3. Horror is shadow work, and shadow work is never done.

4. I’m too extreme for people who enjoy mainstream horror but not extreme enough for the hardcore horror crowd.

5. I’m tired.

When playing my own therapist, I find it helpful to provide counterpoints to my intrusive thoughts. I don’t always remember to do this when such thoughts present themselves, but I can and will do that now.

1. I loved horror long before I needed it. As a child who knew little of suffering beyond stubbed toes and upsetting my parents, I latched onto the imagery of death. Mummies, vampires, werewolves, and ghosts were like friends, albeit dangerous ones that perhaps needed healthy boundaries. The old Universal Monsters collection got re-released on VHS when I was eight or nine, and I devoured them all. I read Goosebumps and Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark with glee, drew skeletons on copy paper, and fantasized about houses full of creepy clowns. No matter how mentally or emotionally well I am, I suspect I will always enjoy horror, and I’m done feeling like I need to justify why it appeals to me.

2. But that’s not what I’m doing, is it? Interestingly, I think this intrusive thought is answered by the one that follows it.

3. “Horror is shadow work, and shadow work is never done.” Great thought. 10/10. No notes. I could elaborate, but I feel as though that’s better suited for its own essay. I may even ask some of my more mystically minded colleagues to weigh in on this idea.

4. There’s some truth to this particular thought, but this position has its advantages. My work is great as entry-level extreme horror, perfect for a reader who isn’t quite ready to read Playground or The Bug Collector but is perhaps weary of books where the horror is suggested rather than frankly stated. It’s also great for people who have reached their limits in terms of extreme sex and violence and no longer feel the need to go there (but aren’t about to start sipping tea and exclusively reading cozy horror either).

5. Bro, I should be tired. It’s okay to be tired. I’ve done some of my best work while tired, and that’s not about to change.

Anyway, I hope you’ve enjoyed this trip inside my brain. Lots of new subscribers these past couple of weeks, so welcome, and I hope you don’t mind getting tossed in the deep end. Seriously, though, every single person who takes the time to read my work is a treasure to me, and I’ll never not be grateful for you.

Speaking of grateful, summer’s almost gone, and in Texas, that’s worth celebrating.

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Currently reading: Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero

Currently watching: Nemesis (1992, Directed by Albert Pyun)

Currently hearing: Unexplained Encounters

The infernal screen split into three pillars of fire, and Lauren was no longer in the woods. Instead, she lay in a hallway, with illumination coming solely from the three fiery figures. The walls were moldy and cracked. The floor beneath her was buckled and cluttered with rubble and refuse. She could see no windows, no doors. The hallway seemed to stretch on forever. She tried to speak, but the destruction to her throat had rendered her mute. However, she felt no pain.

“You don’t need to speak. We can hear your thoughts.”

She couldn’t tell which of the fiery shapes had said that. She thought it might have been all three of them, speaking as one. The voice was vaguely feminine, but it had a warbly, synthesized quality. Not human, but something imitating humanity.

What is this place?

“You’ve entered the liminal zone between life and death. Our name for it is unpronounceable in any human language.”

I’m dying?

The memory of the monstrous man squeezing the life out of her felt both eons ago and all too recent.

“We won’t allow that.”

Who are you?

“We are what you might think of as angels, though none of your sacred texts seem to depict us correctly. Think of us as guardians. Protectors.”

From what?

“From the evil presence inside the man who crushed your throat.”

Well, you’re a little late. He already lopped off my boyfriend’s head and killed that ranger.

“Unfortunately, the Impulse is more often than not several steps ahead.”

But you’re gonna stop him now? Because, and this is just a theory, I don’t think he’s done killing.

“No, Lauren,” they said. “You are.”

Before she could process that bombshell well enough to ask what they meant, the maybe-angels were already upon her. The two on the side had their hands on the shoulders of the middle figure, as the middle one reached for Lauren. One fiery hand pressed against her chest, while another touched her forehead.

Warmth threaded through Lauren’s bloodstream, and something electric pulsated within her frontal lobe. The three pillars of flame once again merged into one opaque screen of rippling reds and yellows before flashing to a deep purple and then extinguishing itself.

When the fire dissipated, Lauren was back on the gravelly path outside the ranger station. She sat up with a hoarse gasp. She could breathe again, and her voice had returned, but it was far from a hundred percent. She shook her head and stood to reorient herself. Her blood thrummed with renewed purpose as she strode away from the ranger station and deeper into the campground.

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All right, friends. Here’s the deal: That might be the last of The Impulse you see for a while. I want to take some time to plot out what should happen next, if anything. I mean, I think it’s obvious. Fiery final girl Lauren and murderous mountain man Slater are destined to fight forever, but that isn’t much of a story, is it?

With that in mind, I’ll either leave it at that, or I’ll figure out some more twists and turns. If I decide to continue the story, I will most likely introduce new characters to follow before reintroducing the horror elements. These first seven entries are relentless, if I do say so myself, so I’d like to give my readers (and myself) the chance to breathe if The Impulse is to be a longer piece.

I’ve been in a strange place mentally. Lots of highs, lots of lows. Absolutely NOTHING in the middle, so hey, at least the kids can’t call me “mid” anytime soon.

I posted this Note a couple of weeks ago during a moment of self-doubt.

Shoutout to Sadie Hartmann (aka Mother Horror) for reminding me that true fans will stick around regardless, and that I shouldn’t obsess over things like subscribers. If you follow her online, you already know that she is usually right about this kind of thing.

With that in mind, you can still expect fiction here, but you will also get personal essays, updates on writing life, and probably a whole bunch of random stuff. If you want someone who posts consistently and sticks to the same type of content week in and week out, well, this probably isn’t the newsletter for you. I won’t take it personally.

For the true fans—family, friends, readers old and new—thank you for being here.

My latest book Goddamn Graveyard Zombies is out, and I have a limited number of signed paperbacks on hand. They come with the usual bookmark and sticker, but ALSO, a tiny piece of my brain. Watch the unboxing video I posted to Reels a couple of weeks back.

Signed Paperbacks Here

Currently reading: Depraved by Bryan Smith and The Modern Prometheus by Jayson Robert Ducharme. I grabbed the latter a year or two ago after hearing about it on social media. You might not know this, but I am a Frankenstein junkie and always on the lookout for retellings, analyses, and anything related to Mary Shelley’s iconic book. It’s too early to tell yet, but I suspect Ducharme’s book will deliver. And of course, I’m loving the Smith book. He’s a legend for a reason.

Currently watching: Twin Peaks (again), Six Feet Under, and Home Improvement.

There was an inherit compassion to how David Lynch wrote and filmed his characters, perhaps especially in Twin Peaks. Juxtaposed against the dark elements of the show, it’s truly something special. I’ll never stop missing that man, so I’m glad he’s left us so much we can revisit.

I’m liking Six Feet Under, but I think we’re going to hit pause. Jean wants a newer show, and I can respect that.

I watch Home Improvement to fall asleep. Before that, it was Seinfeld. 90s sitcoms have a deep connection to my inner child, and they put me at ease when it’s time to shut down for the day. Sometimes, I don’t even watch them. I put them on my phone, face my phone down, and just listen to the dialogue and laugh tracks through one headphone. I’ll probably do Cheers next.

All right, my loves. That’s it for now. We’ll talk soon.

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Hello, and welcome back to Fiction for the Cosmically Disturbed, a newsletter for family, friends, and readers of my work. As promised, my serialized story, The Impulse, continues this week with its sixth chapter. You can catch up on previous entries (for free) in the archives. If you’d like to support me beyond the newsletter, you can grab my latest book Goddamn Graveyard Zombies. That link gets you the book for $10, but it’s also available in the usual book spots, albeit for a slightly higher price tag. As always, thank you for reading. If you like what I do here, make sure you subscribe.

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In the blackness, Slater Mars knew only pain and the sensation of falling. He didn’t know how long he was falling through the agonizing darkness before he heard the voices. It could have been a few seconds, or it could have been several hours. The voices shouted, screamed, wailed. He didn’t understand the languages, but he could detect the meaning of the cries. They were full of accusatory rage and unfathomable suffering. They belonged to victims of the past and victims to come. He opened his mouth to join the maddening choir, but before he could, the darkness lifted, and the voices fell silent.

When he regained consciousness, he was awash in blue light. Somewhere in the woods, lying on a bed of gravel.

The Impulse made him sit. He looked around, remembering where he was, what he was doing. He stood and saw her inside the ranger’s station. She held the phone in a white-knuckle grip and had wrapped herself in its cord. She was blubbering something into its mouthpiece. Slater could only guess, but she was of course crying about him, about what he’d done. All the while, she remained oblivious to what he would do.

She was his, he felt it down to his marrow. She had always been his. Their encounter had not been the result of chance. Rather, it was predestined.

He knew it because of how she fought him. How, already, she’d managed to bring him down twice. This would be a long-term pursuit, one with eternal potential.

The Impulse thrummed with anticipation of endless violence, and Slater Mars took a lurching step toward the ranger station.

“Don’t tell me to calm down!” Lauren shouted. “I just watched my boyfriend get his fucking head cut off by the same motherfucker who tried to kill me. How do you expect me to calm down?”

“I’m sorry, miss. I’m just trying to get as much information as possible, and it’s hard to concentrate when you raise your voice to me.” The operator’s voice was calm and clinical. He may as well have been a robot. “Now, please, tell me again where you are.”

“I’m inside the ranger station. At Henshaw Valley Falls State Park. The ranger is dead. My boyfriend is dead. The assailant is—”

She turned to the window facing the outside and saw the beastly man standing under the blue light. The illumination only added to his otherworldly aura, and she knew without a shadow of a doubt that this killer was not human. Even so, she shook her head in defiant disbelief. Her grip loosened on the phone.

“Miss, are you there? Miss?”

“Please hurry,” she whimpered.

The killer slammed his fist into the window, raining chunky shards of glass into the station. Survival instincts stamped down the urge to scream. Her fist tightened around the phone, and she swung it in a fierce arc. The blunt force collided with the killer’s head.

She reared back to strike again, but this time he caught her hand. With a sequence of quick motions, he snapped her forearm in two and dragged her across the windowsill. She twisted and kicked, screaming as the remaining shards dug crimson grooves into her flesh.

He took her by the throat and slammed her onto the gravel. The impact drove the air from her lungs and made her vision swim. The killer squeezed until her trachea collapsed.

Instead of the blackness she expected, a vibrant sheet of fire swept across her field of perception, and she wondered if she had gone to hell.

Currently reading: Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Flesh Eaters from Hell by Jonathan Tripp.

Currently watching: 1923 (Paramount+), Home Improvement (Netflix), The Legacy (1978, directed by Richard Marquand).

Hey. Welcome back to Fiction for the Cosmically Disturbed, a newsletter for family, friends, and readers of my work. As promised, my serialized story, The Impulse, continues this week with its fifth chapter. You can catch up on previous entries (for free) in the archives. If you’d like to support me beyond the newsletter, you can grab my latest book Goddamn Graveyard Zombies. That link gets you the book for $10, but it’s also available in the usual book spots, albeit for a slightly higher price tag. As always, thank you for reading. If you like what I do here, make sure you subscribe.

Now, let’s get gory.

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Lauren stumbled out of the woods and onto the gravel road leading into the Henshaw Valley Falls campground. She gasped for breath and finally slowed her steps, as if breaking out of the unpaved land was some symbolic victory. That now, back at something close to civilization, nothing bad could happen to her. No hulking beast men could chop off her boyfriend’s head or throw an axe at her.

The ranger’s station was only a few short paces away. A blue light bulb in a metal cage flickered above its door. She moved toward it, every inch of her body throbbing, itching, burning. Behind her, smoke billowed from the wreckage of her car.

“Hello,” she called hoarsely. “Help me please.”

The door to the ranger station banged open and a young man of average height emerged. He had a baby face but broad shoulders and, most importantly, a gun. Although she was sure the killer was dead, the sight of a polished revolver and an authority figure made her feel a lot safer.

“Ma’am? Are you all right?”

Then again…

“No, I’m not all right! Do I fucking look all right?”

The ranger froze, caught off-guard by her outburst.

“There’s no need to shout,” he said, holding up a hand in what he likely thought was the universal signal of peace and benevolence. “I’m here to help.”

“You want to help me? Let me use your phone.”

“Has there been an accident? I thought I heard a crash out on 73 …”

“There’s been a lot more than that, genius. Walt, my boyfriend, that psycho chopped off his head.”

“What’s that now?”

“Just let me use your phone, please.” She looked down at her filthy, bloody clothes. “I need to get to a hospital.”

“Jeepers, is all that blood yours? I’ll get my first-aid kit, and ….” He looked past her, toward the border of trees. “Ma’am, is that guy with you?”

She looked over her shoulder. “Oh, God.”

Impossible, yet as sure as she was standing, that motherfucking killer was standing too. He loomed at the road’s edge like a human-shaped stone, some aberrant rock formation that could somehow breathe.

With a cry of frustration, fear, and rage, she faced the ranger and reached for his gun.

“Whoa, ma’am,” the ranger protested, snatching her wrists.

The killer took a step forward. Lauren twisted in the ranger’s grip. Her fingers clawed at his holster. The killer drew closer. He no longer held the axe, but given his size and strength, his hands were sufficient weapons. How the hell was he still alive? How the hell was he moving?

Lauren tangled with the ranger. Her fingernails scraped the grip of the revolver.

“Ma’am, if you don’t stop reaching for my gun, I’m going to have to use force!”

He was trying to put some bass into his voice, but he was just a kid. A kid with a badge and a gun, probably experienced in no more than busting marijuana farms and citing campers for fires during one of the county’s many burn bans. Violent confrontation was as new to him as it was to her.

Now, violence was bearing down on them both on two monstrous feet.

In a fit of panic and misguided self-preservation, the ranger shoved Lauren to the ground. She landed at the killer’s feet. Bathed in blue light, his sloping forehead and scraggly beard appeared even more pronounced, more otherworldly, more beast than man. He gritted his crooked teeth and lifted a boot to pulverize her head.

She rolled aside in the nick of time, just as his boot collided with the gravel, kicking up dust and small stones.

“Hey!” the ranger called in a trembling voice. He had his gun out now, and it was trained on the killer’s chest. “You stop right there, or I’ll shoot. I mean it.”

The killer looked at the ranger and narrowed his eyes. Lauren crawled away from the mountain of a man and scrambled to her feet. The killer looked at her, then at the ranger. He took a step forward.

“I said, ‘stop!’” The ranger sounded shrill now, almost childish. The killer kept coming. “Just hold it now. I’m warning you.”

“Fucking shoot him!” Lauren yelled.

The ranger glanced in her direction. That momentary distraction allowed the killer to swipe a stray stone off the ground. He reared back and hurled the projectile just as the ranger squeezed the trigger.

The slug caught the killer in the chest, right beside the gaping axe wound; the stone connected with the ranger’s mouth, shattering teeth and caving in his jawbones. The ranger fell with a mouthful of blood and bone shards. The killer took two steps backwards, looked again toward Lauren, and reached for her with a meaty hand. Then, he collapsed.

Lauren exhaled and limped her way past the ranger, who was still gagging and twitching. She half-heartedly murmured that she’d call for help, knowing full well nothing could save him. Nonetheless, she entered the station and took the phone off the hook.

Check out the awesome cover by Matt Seff Barnes and the book description after that.

Splatterpunk Award winner Lucas Mangum is back with a brand-new novella of fast-paced, gory horror.

Villano and Iyana want their wedding to be special, something that fits their unique personalities. That's why they chose their town's historical Lazarus Cemetery as the venue.

But their special ceremony has some uninvited guests.

When toxic ooze spills into a nearby well, the dead rise to crash the wedding with an insatiable hunger for brains.

Now, the young lovers and their friends must fight for survival in a struggle that leads them below the cemetery where the town's dark secrets await them.

Goddamn Graveyard Zombies is an old-school romp through the cemetery infused with twenty-first century nihilism.

You can get this chunk of gory undead fun in all the book places ($3.99 for the e-book and $14 for the paperback), BUT just for being my loyal subscribers, I’m offering this super-exclusive deal. If you click the button below, you can get the paperback for $10. This offer is exclusive to subscribers locate in the US and UK only.

This publication just crossed 500 subscribers, which feels like a huge milestone. Just know that I sincerely appreciate all of you, and I want to show that appreciation in a tangible way. Have an awesome week and remember: Books are good for your BRAAAAIIINZ!

Get GGZ Right Here

Currently Reading: Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia and In the Night Room by Peter Straub.

Currently Watching: Alucarda (directed by Juan López Moctezuma), Simon, King of the Witches (directed by Bruce Kessler), and Dope Thief (Apple TV+).

Happy Memorial Day! Here's Chapter 4 of my slasher novel, The Impulse. Chapters 1-3 are in the archive.

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Lauren watched as her boyfriend’s headless body slumped, first to its knees and then to its side. The lifeless vessel came to rest beside the head it had so recently lost and squirted crimson jets as its heart pumped out the last of its beats.

She ran around the vehicle, heading for the driver’s door instead of the passenger side where she’d been sitting. The man with the axe followed. He made purposeful, deliberate strides toward her. He was in no hurry despite her sitting behind the wheel of an SUV. It was as if he somehow knew he would catch up eventually. Vehicles inevitably run out of fuel. Victims run out of places to hide, and they can only run so far for so long. In theory, she could fight back, but she would stand little chance against a gargantuan like the man in pursuit.

Lauren cranked the keys, and the ignition shrieked. The engine was already running, and keying the ignition was unnecessary.

She grabbed the gearshift and worked the pedals, putting the SUV into first.

The man was standing up against the trunk now, rearing back with the axe. The SUV was rolling forward but not fast enough. She stomped the clutch and shifted into second, pressed her foot on the gas pedal. The man who’d killed her boyfriend held the axe high in both hands.

Lauren was picking up speed, creating space between her vehicle and the axeman, ready to go into third gear. She glanced up at the rearview in time to watch him hurl the axe at her back window.

She had no time to brace herself for the impact and the awful sound that accompanied it. When the axe struck the glass, she swerved. Beads of glass sprayed the interior, clattering across the camping gear in the trunk, raining onto the backseat, and showering her hair.

The SUV veered off the road, crashing through brambles and branches, bounding over stones and sloshing through stagnant puddles. It came to a jerky stop at the muddy edge of a pond. Filthy water splashed the windshield, turning it into a translucent black curtain. Lauren thumped back and forth in her seat, skinning her forearms against the deploying airbag.

The vehicle settled, and she cried out in frustration, grief, and fear. The pain would come later—if she lived long enough for the adrenaline to wear off.

Behind her, the hulking figure stood at the edge of the woods, surveying the destruction. She held still, even going as far as to hold her breath.

Please walk away. Please think I’m dead. Please. . .

He didn’t walk away. He walked toward her.

Lauren whimpered and fumbled for her seatbelt. The car was a lost cause, and she needed to get out of it immediately. The man tromped into the woods, following the path her crashing car had made. She jammed her finger into the buckle, releasing the seatbelt, and twisted out of the restraint.

The man kept coming, no indication at all that he’d just been hit by a car. He moved as able-bodied as one uninjured. It wasn’t possible and yet it was happening.

He was only twenty paces away.

Freed from the seatbelt, she snatched the door handle and pulled, it didn’t give.

“Oh God, oh God!”

Fifteen paces.

She reached for the door lock and pulled it up.

The man was coming closer, in no hurry at all. His legs moved in self-assured strides, knowing he would catch up to her, that she couldn’t escape him.

She pushed the door open and staggered out of the car. She swept her gaze around the woods and spotted the axe which had smashed into her back window. It had dislodged itself on the way through underbrush and now lay halfway between Lauren and the man who’d killed Walt.

She bit her lip and contemplated her next action. Despite the inner screams urging her to run away, she sprinted toward the weapon.

The man was nearly upon it but still moving at a walk. She could make it if he didn’t break into a surprise run. He reached forward with a meaty paw, still striding forward, the axe in his sights.

She swiped the weapon from its resting place and held it in both hands.

“Stay back, motherfucker!”

To the killer’s credit, he did stop. He cocked his head to the side like a dog. His husky breathing reminded her of the time her little brother had pneumonia, all wheezy and junky.

They stood across from each other like two gunslingers.

Her arms trembled, while he stood still as stone.

He reached for her, and she swung the axe. Its blade sunk into his left pectoral. When she yanked it free, a gout of blood sprayed from the wound. She backpedaled but couldn’t avoid all the warm, sticky fluid.

The killer dropped like a sack of flour and lay still. She raised the axe again and waited. Her arms were tired and getting sore, but she willed herself to hold them steadily. She chewed into her bottom lip and watched the fallen body for any sign of life, a twitch of the fingers, anything.

He didn’t move. The blood flow slowed, then ceased.

She half-laughed, half-cried as she tossed the axe aside and ran away from her smashed and smoking car, back toward the road.

Behind her, unseen, the fingers of Slater Mars started twitching.

Stay tuned for Chapter 5. If you'd like to support me beyond subscribing to this Substack, you can pick up my newest book, Goddamn Graveyard Zombies, on Kindle (paperback is still in production).

New Book on Kindle

Before we get started, I wanted to let you know that my next novel, Goddamn Graveyard Zombies, now has a Goodreads page. Please do me a favor and add it to your library. I’m almost finished formatting the book, so it will be released sooner rather than later.

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On the reading front, I’ve got about 200 pages left on Peter Straub’s A Dark Matter. I have lots of thoughts on it, but I will save those for when I’m done.

I recently revisited TMNT (2007) because I popped awake at 5 A.M. the other morning. It was a lot more fun than I remembered it being. To be honest, I didn’t remember anything about it from my first viewing. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were a bigtime favorite of mine as a kid, and they’ve been on my mind a lot lately. No particular reason, unless you want to say it’s part of my inner child work. I guess that tracks. The 1990 film is still the best of the batch.

Last thing before I we get into The Impulse, I’ve been slowly but surely returning to Instagram and TikTok. Because I am afraid of burning out again, I’m trying to be as strategic as possible. If you want to see what I’m up to, I’m [at] LucasMangumHorror.

“Oh, shit-shit-shit!”

Walt Peters was already out of his seatbelt and running toward the figure lying prone in the middle of the road.

“Please be okay. Please be okay. Please be okay.”

The hulk of a man didn’t look okay. He wasn’t moving, and the glistening fluid collecting around him could only be blood.

“Oh, shit. Shit!”

His gaze fell upon the axe lying beside the man. The implement was huge, like something Paul Bunyan would’ve wielded in some classic American tall tale. Its blade looked like it could carve a decent-sized hunk out of a Redwood. It could probably fell the conifers around here in one swoop, and it was all too fitting a tool for the fallen pedestrian. The guy’s hands looked like they could choke out a gorilla. His shoulders were broad, framing a chest the size of an engine block, and his legs were elephantine in their girth.

But massive or not, this guy couldn’t have withstood getting hit by the grill of Walt’s Suburban. The SUV had to have been going at least seventy. It was a wonder the man’s body was intact at all—most likely, his bones and innards were shattered, busted up, and rearranged on the inside.

Walt’s shoulders pinched his neck when he heard the car door open.

“Walt? What is it? What’d we hit?”

He angrily spun to face his girlfriend, Lauren. “I thought I told you to wait in the car!”

She only got as far as the trunk before she gasped. “Oh, God! Is it a man?”

He clenched his hands into fists at his sides. “Of course, it’s a man. Does this look like a cougar to you?”

She straightened her stance and furrowed her brow. “Why does he have an axe?”

Walt looked again at the huge cutting implement. He got a passing but intense urge to pick up the axe and use it to chop the man into manageable pieces. Then he and Lauren could bury the pieces somewhere in the woods, go home and fuck like teenagers, and pretend this bullshit never happened.

It would beat the alternative. Even if he was honest and called the police or a ranger, his integrity would only get him so far. He had been going way too fast around that bend, and he’d straight-up murdered someone as a result of his reckless driving. He may get a reduced sentence, but he imagined he’d still wind up in prison.

“What are we gonna do?” Lauren whined, still not leaving her post beside the trunk.

“I’m trying to think, goddamn it. Just give me a second to think.”

A wet, chunky wheezing sound emitted from the man on the pavement. A junky cough followed, and the man spat blood into his beard.

“Oh, Mister? Mister, I’m so fucking sorry. Are you . . . can you move? Are you okay?”

The man rolled to his hands and knees, and he expectorated another wad of gummy blood onto the pavement.

“Oh, man … maybe don’t move.”

“Walt?”

Walt shut his eyes and took a slow deep breath before facing Lauren again. “Yes?”

“Why does he have an axe?”

“Maybe he’s a lumberjack. Who cares? We need to get him some help.”

Lauren’s eyes widened and she straightened like a ramrod. Her lip trembled, and Walt felt a pang of guilt for shouting at her. The trauma of the moment, the adrenaline and panic, had made him act like a real prick. He took another deep breath and opened his mouth to apologize, but before he could utter a syllable, Lauren screamed, “LOOK OUT!”

He spun on his heel, doing a complete one-eighty, and came face to face with the man he’d hit with his vehicle—a man who very much should have been dead but was now standing. Holding the axe. Swinging it in a vicious arc.

The blade cut through Walt’s neck with a thick, wet slice. Walt’s head tumbled from his shoulders, giving him a dizzying view in the final few seconds before it plopped to the pavement, bouncing only once.

No flesh shall be spared.

That was from the Book of Matthew. Slater couldn’t recall the exact chapter and verse. He only knew that it came from a passage in which Jesus foretold a coming tribulation. It was meant to illustrate that the trials of the coming age would be so arduous that it would require God’s direct intervention for even the elect to survive.

It was also from a movie, he thought in passing.

Slater had not read the Bible or been to church since he was a teenager, but the memory of that verse, and its subsequent interpretation by his youth pastor, transmitted to him like a radio broadcast through the static of a fading signal. He heard just enough, remembered just enough.

Did the Impulse he now felt come from God, then? Or was its origin more diabolical?

Whether sacred or satanic, or some third unknowable source outside the binary of western religious thought, it was impossible for Slater to resist its pull. Like a cluster of celestial detritus in the grip of gravity, he moved, axe in hand, toward the violence of the inevitability he now embodied. He tromped down the mountain, not bothering to use the trail. His heavy footballs crushed fallen branches and dead leaves.

Much in the same way, the machinations of an uncaring universe had trampled all that was good in his life. It started when the sawmill where he worked ceased operations and he lost the job he’d held for almost two decades. Despite the promises of state and local politicians from both parties, the mill never reopened. Every rejected job application and past-due bill in the mail chipped away more and more of his self-worth.

He had the cabin—an old family homestead, already paid for and left to him by his parents, but Meredith insisted that it was no place to raise their children. Ultimately, after the foreclosure of their house in town, she took the twins to live with her mother, while he retreated up the mountain.

One might suspect that his economic and marital woes somehow made him a prime candidate for the influence of the dark transmission he received. Indeed, Slater experienced days where the absence of Meredith and the twins gouged him so deeply that he no longer felt human. In truth, however, the workings of the Impulse were and always would be mysterious. Many men and women suffered losses like those Slater endured and they didn’t turn to violence.

Slater himself gave no such thought as to why he trod down the mountain with an intent to kill. He only proceeded through the underbrush and branches with this newfound purpose leading the way.

Little of the man aside from his burly vessel remained. Even the memories of his family and his inability to provide for them felt as if they belonged to someone else. They were projected at him in low-res images from a great distance with faint, low-quality audio. He felt none of the pain these recollections usually brought him. Nor did he feel any physical pain or soreness. Although, he’d neglected to put on his boots, the bottoms of his feet only felt dull pressure whenever he stepped on something sharp or coarse. His muscles felt only echoes of the exertion they should have experienced as he descended the mountain carrying the heavy axe.

At the base of the mountain, he pushed through the last stretch of foliage and emerged on the gravelly shoulder of State Route 73. With the Henshaw Valley Falls campground across the way in his sights, he kept going, stepping onto the highway without bothering to look. By the time the headlights of the oncoming vehicle bathed him in a flood of white, it was too late for him to get out of its way.

The impact was sudden and severe, tossing his body over the hood and windshield, and then over the roof. He landed with a hard splat back on the pavement and relaxed his grip on the axe as he fell still. The vehicle screeched to a halt several yards ahead. Its brake lights splashed redness across his field of vision. Or perhaps that was just the blood seeping into his eyes.

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I decided to serialize this slasher here on my Substack. You can read the first bit here. For now, I’m calling the book The Impulse. My friend, author Judith Sonnet, thinks it’s a good title. I agree, but after Barn Door to Hell and Goddamn Graveyard Zombies, it doesn’t feel high concept enough. With the right cover and elevator pitch, I suppose that doesn’t matter.

I have more written, but I felt like this was enough for now. I still don’t have an outline or an idea of where the larger story will go. That’s because it can go so many ways. This is the first time in a long time where I have multiple ideas for the story’s future direction. It’s kind of exciting! Normally, I have one path in mind from pretty early on, but this time? So many possible paths! I’m thinking of different ways to take the story every day.

I almost made it a Choose Your Own Adventure, but the more I thought about that, the more it seemed like a pain in the ass. So, I won’t be doing that.

Anyway, I hope you like it, and I hope you’re okay with me serializing something instead of putting out regular short stories. I intend to post these weekly - every Monday, like the old newsletters.

Currently reading: A Dark Matter by Peter Straub

Currently watching: Lost on Netflix.

Revisiting Lost is such a fun experience. The show is even better than I remember, and it’s got a lot of personal memories tied up in it. While Jean and I were courting, we watched a lot of Lost. Early in our relationship, she bought me the box set of Season 3. That season’s ending left me feeling as desperate as Jack in those final moments. “We have go back,” indeed.

Anyway, until next time …

Signed Books for Sale

Slater Mars awoke, his dark cabin encasing him like a cage of shadows. He sat up in bed, and the moth-eaten comforter slid to the floor, landing with a muted thump. His nighttime erection throbbed like a subwoofer as he swung his legs off the edge of his bed and strode across the floor.

The blackness around him adjusted to a bluish gray, making the familiar shapes of the room into slightly more visible impressions. All the while, his ears tingled and faintly buzzed with the echoes of something whispered, something screamed; a dark, singular purpose after too many days of cyclical mundanity.

It was the same Impulse heard by a six-year-old boy in middle America right before he murdered his older sister. It had carried another boy on a bloody path from the bottom of a lake to the bowels of hell. It had driven a devout church lady to kill her husband with an electric knife, right before she slaughtered all nine of her children.

Now, it moved Slater from the confines of his cabin all the way to his work shed. The tools that hung on hooks and lay across the workbench—once objects of routine and daily toil—were now the technologies of Slater’s new bloody destiny.

The old had been made new.

He was an angel of death for the new age, imbued with a darkness as old as creation itself.

He took the axe off the wall and walked to the edge of the mountain. Every light twinkling below represented a life fit for his blade.

The whispers of the Impulse alchemized into one simple, singular command:

No flesh shall be spared.

I wrote the above 295 words by hand on Sunday morning with an old-school techno mix playing in my headphones. A few nights before that, my buddy Shane McKenzie told me I should try my hand at writing a slasher for my next book.

It’s actually kind of surprising I haven’t tried that already: when I was a teenager, I watched the big three slasher franchises over and over. I loved watching Jason, Michael, and Freddy doing their thing, and paradoxically, I also loved watching them get their comeuppance in the end. For some reason, even though all of them perform evil acts, Freddy was the only one I considered evil by nature. Going by the lore of each respective franchise, I suppose that makes sense. Jason is acting out of a warped sense of misplaced anger. Michael was beholden to a curse (in my head, the Thorn curse was canon). Freddy Krueger was just a nasty child killer, even before he became a dream demon.

I didn’t just enjoy the big three either. I dug some of the offbeat ones, like Sleepaway Camp, Madman, The Burning, Terror Train, Graduation Day—movies that admittedly don’t feel as offbeat or obscure in the era of streaming.

I saw Freddy vs Jason on the big screen on opening night (and then in the theaters two more times). I bought Hatchet and Laid to Rest without seeing either of them to find out if they were any good. I got a kick out of Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon, and marveled at the three-dimensional, literally eye-popping effects in the remake of My Bloody Valentine. I grew to love Rob Zombie’s remake of Halloween and its sequel because I respect the hell out of the fact that he tried something new, and I cried at the end of The Final Girls when I caught it in the theater because it felt like coming home.

(Yes, I fully realize how weird it is to feel wistful and nostalgic about a film genre centered around inventive depictions of murder.)

And yet, I’ve never written a pure slasher. Sure, I’ve written stuff that’s come close, like the currently out-of-print Cruel Summer and a few short stories, but I’ve never written a novella or novel that follows the slasher formula. Perhaps I was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to do anything new or interesting. Maybe I still am.

Fear’s a funny thing, though. Sometimes, it can paralyze you, but other times, it can motivate you to try something different.

The above passage was written with the love I have for the slasher genre coursing through me. My knowledge was there, too, informing it. I’m sure you caught the Easter eggs for Friday the 13th and Halloween.

I can take this piece a lot of different ways, and I spent most of Sunday trying to decide which direction to take. I still have no idea, but I like what I wrote, which, at this stage, feels like a damn blessing, and that’s just going to have to be enough. At least until I write the next page. And the one after that. And the next two hundred or so after that.

I don’t know if I’ll be serializing this book here on Substack or anything (I might - I’m just not sure), but I felt compelled to share that brief excerpt with y’all today. I hope you enjoyed it, and I hope I figure out what the hell comes next. My guess is I need to outline. Even if I later ignore or discard it, mapping a book is a good cheat code for writing an early draft. Something noncommittal that won’t hurt so badly to change.

In case you missed it on Facebook or Notes, I figured I’d share the cover to my next book Goddamn Graveyard Zombies in this newsletter. We’ve still got another round of edits and some formatting to do, but it should be out in the world a lot sooner than expected. Here’s the cover:

And here’s the back cover copy:

Splatterpunk Award winner Lucas Mangum is back with a brand-new novella of fast-paced, gory horror.

Villano and Iyana want their wedding to be special, something that fits their unique personalities. That's why they chose their town's historical Lazarus Cemetery as the venue.

But their special ceremony has some uninvited guests.

When toxic ooze spills into a nearby well, the dead rise to crash the wedding with an insatiable hunger for brains.

Now, the young lovers and their friends must fight for survival in a struggle that leads them below the cemetery where the town's dark secrets await them.

Goddamn Graveyard Zombies is an old-school romp through the cemetery infused with twenty-first century nihilism.

There's no escape, not even in death.

Watch for a preorder link in the near future.

Currently reading: A Dark Matter and Floating Dragon, both by Peter Straub.

Currently watching: Still rewatching Lost. We’re almost finished the fifth season, and I have no idea why people turned against this show the way they did. Maybe they resented knowing it was coming to an end.

I also caught Sinners and I Saw the TV Glow. Both were incredibly special, each for its own reason. The former perfectly balanced the fun and poignancy that make the horror genre special. The latter left me absolutely gutted. Watch them both!

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Hey, friends. I’m sorry it’s been a while. I was head-down finishing the first draft of Goddamn Graveyard Zombies, which meant I was neglecting everything outside of that book that wasn’t family or close friends. I’ve missed you all, though! I mean that sincerely.

I want to start posting here more often again, as doing so is good for my mental health. It’s a place where I can engage with my audience without feeling like I’m performing (looking at you, TikTok and Instagram). Since my activity here will increase, I won’t just be posting fiction. You’ll also get life updates, personal essays, and behind-the-scenes peeks at what I do.

Today, I’ve got a special treat for you. As many of you know, I released my book Barn Door to Hell around this time last year (only 5 signed copies left). It’s a book that’s near and dear to me because it’s pure B-movie funsies in book form. After some feedback from colleagues, I rewrote it from beginning to end after completing my first draft, and it’s stronger for it.

That said, the original version still has some scenes I love that didn’t make the final version. This is one of those scenes. Fair warning, though: this scene is about as R-rated as you can get. It’s got gore, sex, and bad language.

In other words, I’m sure you weirdoes will get a kick out of it.

Enjoy!

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Del stepped onto the buckled and cracked pavement of Cedar Hollow Road. The county was never gonna fix it in his lifetime. He had accepted that grim reality long ago, but it still made him grumble whenever he set foot on the cratered, gravelly mess. Not tonight, though. Tonight, he didn’t have the time to get bent out of shape over the glacial pace of government projects. His joints were aching. He wanted nothing more than to be back inside, resting on his couch with Yolanda’s head on his shoulder and reruns of Duck Dynasty on the television.

Instead, he was out here investigating this nonsense.

The fire blazed to the southwest. A glowing orange flower pulsating in the nighttime woods. Del saw no sign of the two figures in the dancing shadows. He smelled burning rubber under the smoke, though. Someone had peeled off in a hurry. Perhaps the same someone now cooking in that fire down the embankment. The thought made his stomach do a flip.

He hoped the emergency services were on their way.

He headed toward the fire just in case there was anything he could do to help in the meantime. As he walked that way, he kept looking around for the two figures. The gravel crunched under every step he took. A choir of crickets did their call and response routine, like the nocturnal insect interpretation of a Catholic mass. A chill breeze hissed through the trees. Flames crackled and spat sparks into the air.

Del stopped in the middle of the road to rest his joints and catch his breath. As he reoriented himself, his gaze drifted toward a dimly lit window on a nearby house. Someone was moving inside. Perhaps they knew more about what happened or where those two figures ended up.

He strode toward the lighted window and stopped at the edge of the property. Through the glass, he saw the lithe, naked torso of his nineteen-year-old neighbor Christi Orndorff. That boyfriend of hers lay beneath her, eyes wide with wonder as he took in the sight of the young woman on top of him.

Something stirred in Del’s pants. The stir was familiar, but he almost didn’t recognize it because so much time had passed. He was getting a hard-on. A damn miracle at his age. He couldn’t even remember the last time he got one.

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, he thought with youthful excitement and stepped forward for a closer look.

He was still vaguely aware of the smell of smoke and the hiss of flames, but these matters seemed less pressing. Help was on the way, after all. Best to let the professionals handle it while he took in this moment of revitalized arousal.

He found a spot behind a proud elm in the side yard and continued to peer through the window. Christi sure knew what she was doing. She rode her man at an easy rhythm and supported herself to give him a good view of her sleek, tight body. The guy beneath her was tense in his arms and face, doing all he could to keep his climax at bay.

Del’s hard-on was even more pronounced now. It pressed against the inside of his jeans with such force it was almost painful. He wished his grandson wasn’t staying with him tonight. He would love nothing more than to head back and have Yolanda take care of this for him.

His left hand found the crotch of his pants and began to lightly rub. As Christi continued to rock her hips, her face contorted in ecstasy. Del imagined he could almost hear her cries of pleasure.

He unzipped his pants and sighed when his fingers touched the skin of his long-neglected penis. He gave no thought to any religious reservations he might have had when it came to spilling his seed while watching this private moment between two people over half a century younger than him. No thought to his reasons for coming out here in the first place. No thought to the memory of chasing a peeping Tom from his own yard on a night like this, some thirty years back. He only thought of the pleasure that would soon come as he fumbled his erect member out of his underwear. It had been too long. He was too worked up.

Another set of fingers closed around his shaft. It wasn’t his hand. A heavy presence stood behind him that he hadn’t noticed in his state of reinvigorated lust. Before he could scream, a second hand clamped across his mouth. He tasted something bristly and dry in its palm.

Del attempted to wriggle free, but the hand around his quickly deflating penis lessened the intensity of his movements. He didn’t want to accidentally tear it off, especially now that it just started working again.

When the dead matter pressed against his mouth began to writhe, he couldn’t help himself. He flailed his arms and kicked. All the struggle proved useless. His assailant was freakishly strong.

Del’s lips started to tingle, as if he’d eaten something too spicy. The strands of straw tried working their way into his mouth, scraping against his gums and teeth like dental hooks. The tingle around his mouth became more intense, less a tingle and more like he’d pressed his lips to a hot pan. He remembered the gun strapped to his hip and reached for it. He unsnapped the holster as his lips burned and his cock ached. His fingers closed around the gun’s grip.

The assailant gave Del’s dick a fierce yank. The organ ripped free like a thick, stubborn weed from damp earth, dragging strings of flesh and muscle with it. The blood flow was instantaneous and copious, drenching the front of Del’s pants and the earth at his feet. The same earth where he nearly spilled his seed now soaked up his life force.

Roy Patrick held the gory prize overhead like a trophy as Del slumped against him. The strands of hay from his palm tunneled into Del’s throat. They melted and melded with the lining of the old man’s esophagus, infusing this new vessel with new animation, and making it another extension of the entity from Alvin West’s barn.

—

Something thumped wetly against the window and Gabriel stopped thrusting into Christi. She must’ve heard it too because she stopped bucking against him. He felt awkward standing still while embedded inside her even though he hadn’t finished, but he was on edge tonight. The fire, the screams, the phone call to the authorities. It was too damn much.

Whatever hit the window could’ve been a branch caught in the wind or a bird flying too carelessly. Gabriel could’ve easily ignored it on any other night, seeking instead the pleasure of his girlfriend’s wet warmth rather than anything else going bump in the night. Something made him look, though, and he instantly wished he hadn’t.

A bloody penis clung to the window like a clump of pale mud and tangled roots. Gabriel’s mouth opened and closed. No words would emerge—he could hardly breathe.

Christi spoke for him. “Holy fucking shit!” she shrieked and pulled away from him with a wet slurp.

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Hey friends. Happy almost spring! With the nice weather coming, I’ve been out in the yard. My front yard and backyard are both fixer-uppers, but they’ve got a lot of potential. The front yard was xeriscape when we bought the house a decade ago. Xeriscape is a good idea in theory, but it’s a pain in the ass to weed, and if your neighbors have lawns, you better believe that creeper grass is going to take over the space. So, I’m scaling back the rock-covered space and planting new things. If things will grow anyway, I’d like to control what grows. I’m beautifying the backyard too. No more clover-riddled lawn. I’ve got big plans, and big plans take a while to execute. And that’s fine. Working in the yard isn’t writing, but it’s a good thing to do when I don’t have my ass in my chair and my fingers on the keyboard.

This month’s newsletter will have an excerpt of my next book in lieu of a short story. I’ve been immersed in the writing of this novel and haven’t had time to pull away and work on a shorter piece. I hope that’s okay. Check it out beyond the Subscribe button.

Currently Reading: Slewfoot by Brom, Mars Attacks: Martian Deathtrap by Nathan Archer.

Currently Watching: Dope Thief (Apple+), Lost (rewatch, Netflix), Monday Night Raw (Netflix), Clown in a Cornfield (SXSW premiere, Directed by Eli Craig).

Currently Listening: 2 Guys Talkin’ Toys, 83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff, Operation: Mindcrime by Queensryche, Miscalculations of the Rat Angel Problematic by Rubix Kitten.

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Reynolds tossed Terry through the open cellar door, and the caretaker tumbled headlong down the wooden staircase. He kept his chin tucked and his arms over his head so as not to do any mortal damage, but it didn’t spare him any pain. Every roll on the bumpy way down ignited fresh agony that added to the throbbing sensations erupting all over his body. He landed on the dirt floor with an explosion of dust engulfing him like smoke.

He tried pressing himself back up but fell back to the ground almost immediately, coughing and spitting.

“What the fuck is your problem, man?” he said—he’d nearly sobbed it.

Reynolds descended the stairs, taking his sweet time. “I won’t bore you with my sob story, Terry.”

“Fuck that. If you’re going to toss me down the stairs and nearly kill me, you better tell me why. Please. Bore me.”

Reynolds paused, halfway down the staircase.

“I suppose I do owe you an explanation. Have you ever been in love, Terry?”

Terry glared over his shoulder at Reynolds. “Are you serious?”

“I asked you, didn’t I?”

“You did,” Terry said, fighting through the pain to get to a sitting position. He used his sleeve to wipe dirt and spit from his chin. “But I asked you first.”

He hadn’t been kidding with those girls earlier: he had seen his ex-wife in her wedding dress before the ceremony, and while the dissolution of his marriage was more complex than his failure to adhere to a superstition, that answer was a lot more entertaining and certainly less pathetic than the truth. But he didn’t want to talk about Rita, least of all to this asshole.

“Fair play,” Reynolds said and resumed his descent. “I suppose you have; even pathetic winos like you have at least tried to—”

“Watch it, Mister. I hate wine.”

Reynolds reached the bottom of the stairs. “I’m glad your sense of humor is intact,” he said and held out his hand.

Though his body desperately wanted him to lie back down, Terry stood on his own and crossed his arms. “You must think I’m pretty stupid if you think I’m gonna let you touch me again.”

“Well…” Reynolds sniffed and looked past Terry, peering into the darkness. When he met Terry’s gaze once more, his eyes twinkled with something devious. “Where are they?”

Terry thought about spitting in his face and again denying knowledge. The aches and stings still flaring through his limbs and torso warned him that he shouldn’t play with fire. He had no doubt Reynolds would delight in inflicting more pain upon him. Perhaps even killing him.

Would I even be missed? he thought grimly.

Probably not. Rita had remarried last he checked. She even had a few kids. As far as his employers went, the Ribald family would find someone else to take care of Lazarus, and the men who brought the canisters would find another sucker with bad habits to hide their dirty laundry.

Despite this, Terry didn’t want to die, nor did he wish to feel further pain or humiliation. He turned and pointed a crooked finger into the dark part of the cellar, where the mostly diminished outside light couldn’t reach.

“That’s a good boy,” Reynolds said.

He clapped Terry on the back, and the caretaker nearly crumbled with apprehension of having this man’s hand on him again. Reynolds knew it too—he chuckled lightly to himself as he stepped past Terry. He stopped briefly to pull the chain that switched on the overhead light bulb, then proceeded to the back of the cellar.

As Terry watched, mounting tension exacerbated his pain. Three canisters were lined up against the back wall. If not for the markings designating them as belonging to the U.S. Bureau of Defense Technologies, they could have easily been mistaken for oversized beer kegs. And with them being in the cellar of a known drunk, that was totally plausible.

He'd known these damn canisters were nothing but trouble the day the men in white suits brought him the first one. He’d wanted to refuse, too, but he’d been out of liquor and out of money that day. They’d offered him enough cash to get him through until the next pay period and then some. And at the end of the day, he was still an addict.

Now he had three of those damn things, and he could do nothing but stand by and watch as this Reynolds prick got a look at them and did whatever he pleased.

Terry stuffed his hands in his pockets and cursed himself for being an alcoholic and, most of all, for being a coward. Reynolds approached the one in the center and tapped on the lid of it.

“I can’t see inside,” he said and tried to pry open the lid.

“Well, don’t open it, you damn fool,” Terry hollered, unable to help himself. “What the hell do you want them for anyway? You never answered my question.”

Reynolds smirked at him. “You never answered mine.”

He turned back to the canister. Terry’s hands made fists in his pockets. Something ignited inside his whiskey-pickled brain, something he hadn’t felt for a long time. Not since before Rita left.

You know what? Fuck this guy.

Motherfucker pushes you down the stairs.

Now he’s gonna open that canister, and that’s gonna fuck things up for everyone.

Best case scenario: I lose out on that extra booze money and maybe even my job watching over Lazarus. Worst-case scenario…

The worst-case scenario is…

“The end of the world,” he muttered.

Reynolds faced him. “What’d you say, booze for brains?”

“I said, ‘I bet your dick’s smaller than an earthworm’s. You beat up on old drunks because otherwise, you’re just a worm-dick nobody.”

Reynolds took a step towards him. “You best shut your rotten mouth.”

“Or what? You’ll gag me with your nothing dick? Bet that tiny thing wouldn’t even clog one of my nostrils. Why don’t you come over here and let me see it. I might have a microscope upstairs.”

Reynolds was moving toward him now. Long, angry strides that were nearly lunges.

“Here he comes, ladies and germs: the worm-dick wonder. Can he find his tiny cock before New Year’s? Maybe he ought to put it on the end of a fishhook.”

Reynolds reared back with a fist. “I’m gonna fucking kill you,” he growled through gritted teeth.

Terry stumbled backwards, but on his way down, he swiped a handful of dirt. Reynolds swung and missed. Terry flung the dirt into his face.

Reynolds half-gasped, half-cried out. His hands went immediately to his face, and he staggered backwards.

Terry got back up and bared his teeth in a beastly snarl.

“Fuck you, motherfucker!”

He growled and rushed forward. Drove his shoulder into Reynolds’ abdomen. The collision forced Reynolds to backpedal. Terry held on, pushing with his legs and still growling with righteous rage. His growl became a bellow as he lifted Reynolds off the ground. It was no light feat, but Terry’s anger was his strength. The seconds he held Reynolds in the air were so empowering, he considered never having another drop of alcohol again. If he could take on this jerkoff, he could take on anything. Maybe he could remarry. Maybe he could even get Rita to take him back.

When he and Reynolds crashed into the cinderblock wall and the canisters lined up along it, all hope siphoned out of the moment.

He released Reynolds and watched the well-dressed asshole crumble to the dirt floor. One of the canisters tipped over beside him with a heavy clang, while its two counterparts wobbled from impact.

Terry watched the lid of the fallen container for signs of a breach. Ooze splashed against the inside of the glass rectangle in the lid’s center, but the lid was otherwise undisturbed. The two wobblers steadied themselves, while in front of them, a winded Reynolds held his midsection and contorted his face in agony from the blow he sustained.

Terry relaxed his shoulders and smiled with a self-satisfied feeling of accomplishment. Panic usurped the pleasant feeling when the lid to the middle canister popped open with a screech of ripping metal. It was followed by a sustained hiss as a column of yellow steam billowed from the opening. Terry watched in horror as the steam hit the ceiling and fanned out like a mushroom cloud.

Reynolds clambered to his feet and stumbled to Terry’s side. The steam stopped pluming from the canister, but it covered the ceiling like exposed insulation.

“What is that shit?” Reynolds said, his lips curling in revulsion.

Heat rose in Terry’s cheeks as he glared at Reynolds. “You know what it is! That’s why you wanted it: it brings back the dead!”

“But what’s it gonna do to us?”

Before Terry could answer, something bony and dripping emerged from the opening. At the end of it, five barb-tipped fingers clawed at the poisoned air.

“It’s a hand!” Reynolds cried. “It’s a goddamn hand.”

“Well, shit, nothing gets by you, does it?”

A second limb emerged. This one grasped the edge of the canister. Like the first, it dripped green ooze. Lesions blighted its gray skin; in the worst of them, Terry could see bone.

“We gotta get out of here,” Reynolds blubbered.

“You took the words outta my mouth,” Terry said, but neither man moved.

Something round and bulbous crested the opening. Ooze slid down the smooth surface like mud down a rock. The eyes that peeped over the edge were wide, but perhaps that was because the skin around them mostly had rotted away. They moved back and forth as they scanned the room. Their gaze locked onto the two terrified men and somehow widened even further.

The full face of the undead thing came into view. Its lips and cheeks were gone, rendering its mouth into a permanent toothy grin. Slime dripped down its chin like toxic drool.

“Yeah, screw this,” Reynolds said.

He clamped his hand on the back of Terry’s neck and shoved him forward. Terry fell to his hands and knees just as the canister tilted over, spilling ooze and ghoul to the floor directly in front of him.

The ooze was green and viscous, pocked with bubbles and floating flaps of half-melted skin. The ghoul crawled through the mucilaginous muck. It had spindly limbs that were knobby on the joints. A concave belly gaped beneath exposed ribs; the viscera was still present but deflated and torn. Its legs dragged behind it like a trailer with flat tires. It opened its mouth to reveal a tongue that seemed much too long and let out a gurgling wail that seemed both menacing and mournful.

Terry scooted back, not about to let the spreading ooze or the ghoul touch him. He got his feet under him and stood. Spun and saw Reynolds about to climb the stairs. He sprang to catch up.

Reynolds spotted Terry catching up. He quickened his pace, but Terry was too full of panic and rage not to gain enough ground. Terry charged, reaching forward with clawed hands like the ghoul behind him. He grabbed a fistful of Reynold’s shirt.

“Get back here, motherfucker.”

Reynolds twisted and flung an elbow to Terry’s cheek. “Get the hell off me.”

The strike caused another burst of pain and a white flash across his vision. He fell against the cinderblocks but didn’t let go.

“What the hell are you doing?” Reynolds said, still trying to pull himself free.

Behind and below them, the ghoul crawled forward.

“You tried to feed me to that dead thing! You tried to kill me.”

“You’re gonna kill us both if you don’t let go.”

Terry glanced back at the oncoming horror. The ghoul was rising to its feet. It let out another pitiful, gurgling cry and came up into a full stance. With most of its core muscles rotted away, its torso swayed side to side like a mud-slicked tube man. Its barbed fingers clawed at nearby air. Its legs buckled but carried it forward and kept it standing. A third bloodcurdling bellow escaped its throat. Only the dregs of humanity remained in the sound. This was worse than bestial—it was otherworldly, demonic.

Terry let go of Reynolds. The polo shirt-wearing prick took a swing at him, again hoping getting a taste of Terry would slow the ghoul down. But Terry sidestepped the blow and Reynolds pitched forward. He landed face-first on the unfinished floor. His legs were still on the stairs, partly folded, with his feet caught between two wooden planks.

Reynolds groaned and shook his head. Tried pushing himself up, but the ghoul was already falling upon him. Pressing down on his shoulder blades and making him eat dirt.

For a fraction of a second, Terry considered intervening.

Then he remembered why Reynolds was on the ground. Why they were down here to begin with. And why a motherfucking ghoul was shambling about out of its canister.

The ghoul lowered its face and pressed its teeth against the back of Reynolds’ head. For being so decayed, the ghoul’s jaw had uncanny bite power. Its teeth broke into Reynolds’ skull, and brain matter fluffed out of the fracture like bloody cotton candy.

Terry couldn’t look away. Couldn’t stop watching as the ghoul took a bite of brain. As it chewed and its eyes rolled back in an almost placid expression. The ghoul sighed as if in ecstasy and took another bite.

Below it, Reynolds spasmed. His hands flapped against the floor like fish out of water. His feet jerked between the wooden planks that held them. Somehow those dull sounds were almost as bad as the wet chewing coming from the ghoul’s jaws. Almost.

Terry wanted nothing more than to run. To run and close this cellar door and forget this whole thing ever happened.

And he almost did. He even lifted one foot, preparing to spin and run up the stairs.

But I can’t do that.

No, no. I can’t do that.

I can’t do that because if I do…

“End of the world,” he said.

At the sound of his voice, the ghoul raised its head. A half-gnashed wad of brain plopped out of its mouth and into Reynolds’ blood-matted hair.

Terry put his foot back down, and the stair below it shifted—a loose board!

The ghoul stood, while Terry bent. The wood was coarse against the pads of his fingers as he pried. The ghoul took a tentative step over the motionless Reynolds and onto the first stair. Its tongue lapped the brain juice from its chin. It growled, hungry for more brains, for Terry’s brain.

Terry pulled on the board. It bent but didn’t break.

The ghoul drew closer. Its tongue wagged like an eyeless snake. Its bulging eyes zeroed in on Terry.

Terry put his foot on the adjacent wall for leverage. The board groaned under the pressure but remained attached. Terry groaned right back.

“Come on,” he said through gritted teeth.

The ghoul took another step. It was close enough for Terry to smell the pungent rot beneath the ooze that slicked and saturated its dead skin.

Terry knew he should run, but he was committed now. Stubbornness of wanting—no needing—to finish his task kept him glued to the spot, even with death so near.

A skeletal hand with fingernails that hadn’t stopped growing reached for him. It was inches from his face.

He moved his hands closer to the nail still holding the board in place and screamed as he pulled. The board came loose, knocking him off-balance and into the oncoming ghoul. Both he and the ghoul fell atop Reynolds. The dead man’s already ruined skull gave way with a wet crunch. More of his brain matter spilled onto the floor, drawing the ghoul’s attention.

It took a handful of the neural tissue and stuffed the fatty morsel into its mouth.

Terry stood and held the board like a Louisville Slugger. Swung like he was in the homerun derby. The blow connected, striking the ghoul’s skull and knocking the ghoul into a tumble.

It was tumbling toward the remaining canisters. If it reached them, things would go from bad to worse. Terry bolted after the rolling ghoul. He swung the board down in an arc, striking the ghoul on the upper arm and stopping it in its tracks. The force of the roll caused Terry to somersault. On the way down, his shoes grazed the rim of the canister that was lying on its side.

He winced and lifted his head to watch the lid for signs that it was opening. The ghoul took advantage of the distraction, bearing down on him with its jaws open wide. In an instant, Terry brought the board up, blocking the ghoul’s attack.

The ghoul grabbed the board and pulled, trying to wrest it from Terry’s grasp. Keeping his hands on the board, Terry gave a hard shove. The ghoul hung on and snapped its jaws like a bear trap. Its teeth made a mind-numbing clatter as they closed. Terry kept pushing to keep the ghoul at bay, but he couldn’t gather enough leverage or force to get it off him. He needed to get out from under the ghoul before the adrenalin wore off and his strength waned.

As he fought, he kicked. His feet intermittently struck the nearby canister, but he couldn’t stop himself. He could only pray that the lid would hold.

Please God, not for me, but for those kids down there just trying to have a good time. For Rita and her kids, even though they aren’t mine. Let the other canisters stay shut. Help me hold the line here.

The teeth gnashed, droplets of saliva splashing each time they closed. As they dripped against his face, he desperately tried to keep his eyes and mouth from entering the line of fire. God only knew what diseases this ghoul carried.

And the ghoul was pressing down on him. He couldn’t count on it running out of stamina before he did. Giving the board a final shove, he let it go and slipped out from under the ghoul. He rolled away from the second downed canister and stood.

When he reached his feet, he wobbled. Rolled his ankle and fell against the standing canister with all his weight.

The onset of panic swallowed the flare of new pain in his hip.

The lid unlocked with a hiss but didn’t pop open. He moved to fasten the locks, but a growl behind him drew his attention.

The first ghoul was lunging at him again. The board was stuck to its right hand, held in place by one of the remaining nails. Terry got an idea—not a great one, but a bad idea was better than no idea in situations like these.

He waited for the ghoul to get close and pulled open the lid of the canister against the wall. As the noxious steam billowed from the opening, he dived to the side. The outpouring engulfed the face of the first ghoul.

Caught off-guard, the ghoul thrashed and coughed. The steam clung to it like a piss-stained coat, and the ghoul staggered and swayed. The board flew free, taking the ghoul’s pinkie and a rag of skin with it.

Terry scrambled to the flailing ghoul and shoved it face-first into the open canister. Slammed the lid down on the back of its neck. Lifted and smashed the lid down again. A third time.

He opened the lid and kicked the ghoul to the floor. A divot in the back of its head bled black and green, but the ghoul was up and crawling within seconds.

A memory of movie dialogue about killing the brain to kill the ghoul flashed through Terry’s mind.

Well, that was clearly bullshit.

As always, thanks for reading. If you enjoyed that, you can support me by subscribing to this newsletter or buying a signed book by clicking the button below.

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Some housekeeping stuff before the story: my mascot/logo, made by artist extraordinaire Jim Agpalza, now has a name. I ran a giveaway on Facebook, and thanks to Autumn Hanna, this creature shall henceforth be known as Iris.

Isn’t she purty?

Currently reading: Hell Hath No Sorrow Like a Woman Haunted by R.J. Joseph and “Children of the Kingdom” by T.E.D. Klein.

Recently watched: The Unknown (directed by Tod Browning) and Wolf Man (directed by Leigh Whannell)

Currently listening: 83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff (re-listen) and A Rat Falling Apart from the Heart by Rubix Kitten.

I’ve still got copies of Meat District and Other Horrors over at the webstore. It’s a chapbook containing four short splatterpunk stories, and once they’re gone, they’re gone, so make sure you get on that.

All right, here’s this month’s story. It’s called “Analog Ritual, Tape 6.”

The weekend after her father’s funeral, Juniper Lee had the house to herself. Her mother was at a business conference and her brother Jacob was sleeping over at a friend’s house. She had the opportunity to stay with a girlfriend that weekend, but she opted instead to stay home and get used to the idea of this new emptiness she still couldn’t comprehend.

Her restless pacing that Friday night eventually took her to the basement. What her mother called her father’s Man Cave, like it was 2010 and that wasn’t the cringiest thing in the world. Her father called it his study, though what he was studying down there was never readily apparent to Juniper.

She descended the wooden stairs, listening to them complain under her weight as the dank smell of the underground space engulfed her like an unseen fog. The concrete floor gave her much-needed stability.

The basement had many of the expected items stacked against its cinderblock walls. Tools hanging from hooks and boxed-up holiday decorations. Cans of paint and expired cans of emergency food. Mostly, though, the chamber contained a series of wooden shelves, a boxy television and VCR, and a weathered recliner. The shelves were packed tightly with VHS tapes with titles ranging from the eerie-sounding Legend of Hell House to the outright lurid, like Cannibal Holocaust.

There had to be at least a thousand of these movies down here, but she could remember watching none of them. She hardly remembered coming down here at all, only standing at the top of the stairs to call her father up for dinner from time to time. If she had come down here to spend time with him, she couldn’t remember. It was his space, somewhere he went whenever he needed to decompress—the same way she sometimes locked herself in the bathroom with only her phone for company.

She browsed through the tapes, reading the titles on the spine and occasionally taking a box out to view the pulpy artwork. Some covers she recognized from T-shirts her father owned. On one of the bottom shelves, several tapes in generic cases sat together. They only took up half the shelf, but they had no other tapes beside them. She bent and grabbed one at random. It was marked TAPE #3. With a frown, she replaced it and saw all the blank tapes were numbered.

She took TAPE # 1 off the shelf and turned it over in her hand.

Almost impulsively, she slipped it into the VCR and pressed PLAY. There was a click and a whirring sound. The television screen went blue, and the word PLAY flickered at the top right corner of the screen. The blue cleared on scanlines over a black background.

The scene faded in on a campfire. Six figures sat around the blaze, all of them awash in a haze of orange-filtered analog fuzz. Everyone seemed to be in their late teens or early twenties. Despite the age and resolution of the footage, this appeared to be a professional production. The shot was competently framed and complemented by the sort of droning synth score common in movies from several decades’ past. Peculiarly, no title card or credits of any kind showed onscreen.

Still, Juniper could not look away.

The campers drank beers and passed around a joint. A girl with her dark hair in pigtails rested her head against the shoulder of a guy in a Slayer shirt. The overall mood seemed jovial except for a guy with a crewcut who was wearing a generic sports jersey. More and more, the camera seemed to angle on him. Though he probably wasn’t the protagonist, Juniper’s filmic understanding told her that he would soon say or do something to set things in motion.

“We shouldn’t be here,” he said, proving her instincts correct.

The music stopped. Everyone else looked at him.

“What’re you talking about?” Slayer said.

“They’re his woods, you know? We shouldn’t be here.”

“Who?” Pigtails asked.

Crewcut went into an expository monologue about a maniac who supposedly used the surrounding woods as a killing ground. A leather-clad dude with red hair worn in a feathered mullet chimed in, saying he heard all about that. The killer was supposed to be a preacher’s son. He’d watched his father steal from the collection plate and deflower teenage girls from the congregation.

“Or so the stories say,” Crewcut said.

“That’s disgusting,” said another one of the girls. She had bleach-blond hair that flared out at the bottom and kind of reminded Juniper of Brittany Murphy.

“So, anyway,” Crewcut said. “He was willing to turn a blind eye because he feared his father and was maybe even a little afraid of God. Like, what would God think if he turned against his father, even though he was pretty sure his father was a sinner? Honor thy father and mother and all that.”

“But that changed when preacher man’s next conquest was the girl our budding serial killer had a thing for,” Feathered Mullet said.

“That’s right,” Crewcut continued. “Watching his old man defile the girl he loved broke him. That night, he burned down the church with his father inside. And to atone for that transgression, he walked into the fire before the authorities came.”

“To cleanse himself,” Slayer said, seeming to contemplate the action.

“Ah-ha, but the Devil wouldn’t let him get off that easy,” Crewcut said, and Pigtails rolled her eyes.

At this point, Juniper considered shutting off the television. She had seen this movie. Well, not this specific movie, but plenty of movies like it. Killer in the woods. Young campers. Creepy backstory (though, she had to admit this backstory seemed somewhat original). Thinking of her father, now in the ground forever, she decided to keep watching. This was her way of keeping him around. Sure, any other movie on these shelves could do it, but the unmarked nature of this tape lent it a certain intimacy that the other, properly packed and labeled and presumably more widely distributed tapes did not have.

The characters at the campfire paired off. Shortly thereafter, the killing began.

Feathered Mullet was first to go, after stomping off angrily when one of the girls wouldn’t do more with him than a few brief kisses. He met his end via a sharpened stick rammed into his eye socket. The weapon pierced through with such force, it broke through the occipital lobe, emerging with its tip flecked with slimy chunks of brain matter.

Bargain-bin Brittany Murphy got her back broken over the killer’s knee when she left the tent she shared with Crewcut. This scene provided a shot of a bare breast, which popped out of the victim’s loosely buttoned flannel when the killer dropped her twitching form. She coughed flecks of blood onto the exposed flesh as she died, a visual the camera made sure to zoom into for a grisly close-up.

Crewcut opened the tent for the killer, thinking it was his lover returning, and received a hatchet to the mouth for his attempt at chivalry.

Slayer died trying to protect Pigtails but got felled by the same hatchet which dispatched Crewcut. His valiant effort was all for nothing, too, as Pigtails met her end after she, predictably, got her foot caught in a protruding root and fell. The killer pressed her face into the grate over still burning campfire. Her flesh bubbled, blackened, and cracked until enough heat and pressure caused her head to burst, spraying its chunky, wet contents into the roaring blaze.

Only the girl who’d turned down Feathered Mullet survived. She crawled into a cave, unseen by the killer who tromped angrily into the night.

The camera focused on the fire as it cooked the juices from Pigtails’ ruined skull before dying and causing the screen to fade to black. Juniper expected this to finally lead to a title card, but the darkness lifted to show a road traversed by an RV filled with another group of young people looking for an exciting weekend in the woods. They were all headed to a similar fate as the victims from the cold open, albeit at a slower pace to keep the movie’s runtime over eighty minutes.

In the final act, the cold open’s survivor emerged to help push the killer over a steep, stony cliff. The two final girls drove down the mountain together. Before the credits could roll, a man inferred to be the devil came to the side of the killer’s broken body. Using a magic that manifested as bright orange orbs rendered in primitive computer effects, he resurrected the menace so that the filmmakers could make a sequel.

The screen faded to black again. In lieu of credits, scanlines split the screen. The tape whirred and groaned, and the screen turned blue.

Juniper sat in a state she couldn’t define. It felt neither like shock nor nostalgia, but some elixir of the two that left her paralyzed in place until the tape rewound to the beginning and spat out of the VCR. Juniper put the VHS back in its cardboard case and took TAPE #2 from the shelf.

Juniper fell asleep in the middle of Tape # 5. She woke up with a hangover, though she hadn’t had a drop to drink. Fatigue weighed down all her limbs, and her head was throbbing. She got up from her father’s recliner and headed up the stairs. In the kitchen, she gulped down two massive glasses of water and prepared a cup of instant coffee. Outside, someone honked a car horn.

Everybody’s in a rush, she thought and encircled the coffee mug with her hands. She let herself relish the warmth and tried to remember what happened the previous night. Before she could recall anything beyond putting in the first tape, the horn honked again. This time, it was three beeps in rapid succession.

Juniper pushed away from the breakfast nook and peered out the front window. An old pickup truck was parked in front of her house. A woman wearing a flowery dress was making her way up the path to Juniper’s front door. Juniper didn’t recognize her, but she caught herself admiring the lady’s wavy brown hair. It fell past the visitor’s shoulders and flowed like something out of a shampoo commercial. Butterflies of anticipation fluttered in Juniper’s stomach as the woman reached the front door and the bell dinged.

Juniper opened the door and said, “Hi.”

“You’re not dressed?” the newcomer asked. “Junie, we gotta go!”

“Go?”

“To the mountains, of course. Don’t tell me you forgot.”

The truck’s horn honked again. The driver was leaning on it now. He was a dude in a muscle shirt and a green mohawk. He held up an impatient hand.

“Just a sec, Holden!” the woman at the door hollered over her shoulder.

“I … don’t know who that is,” Juniper said.

The woman frowned. “Are you feeling okay, Junie? That’s Holden. My boyfriend. When I feel like it.”

“And who are you?”

The woman’s frown deepened. Then, she rolled her eyes. “Wow, Junie. Is this your idea of a joke?”

Holden revved the engine. “Come on, Daria. What’s the holdup?”

Daria sighed. “Tell me you at least packed a bag.”

“Uh-uh,” Juniper said.

Daria rubbed her eyes. When she lowered her hands, she said, “Okay. Let me in, and I’ll help you.”

“Just wait a minute!” She paused. Daria stared, waiting for her to finish. Juniper had the words teetering on the tip of her tongue like kids on a diving board—I don’t even know who you are? Where are you taking me? What’s going on?—but they dissolved before they could take the plunge. Daria was her best friend. They were going to Mount Bloodmoon with some other friends this weekend. How had all that been so unapparent to her just seconds ago? She must have been hitting her mom’s liquor harder than she thought last night. “Sorry, just give me a few minutes.” She called out to Holden, “I promise I’ll be quick!”

Holden shook his head but didn’t protest further. Juniper went back inside, a bounce in her step.

She could hardly wait for their trip to the mountains, legends of undead serial killers be damned.