I’m excited to announce that my book 100 Jolts: Shockingly Short Stories is a finalist for the 2004 Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in a Fiction Collection. Also worth celebrating: the very document you’re reading now — The Goreletter — is a finalist for the Stoker in the Alternative Forms category.
I’m also very happy to see the weekly e-journal, Hellnotes, on the shortlist for the award in Non-Fiction — my column in that newsletter, “Instigation,” is a spin-off of the same Instigation prompts I publish here.
Needless to say, I’m extremely honored — and humbled — by this wonderful event. The Stokers are arguably the highest accolade in the horror writing community, awarded annually by my colleagues in the Horror Writers Association. Other writers up for this year’s awards include Stephen King, Peter Straub, Chuck Palahniuk, Douglas Clegg, Christopher Fowler, Tom Monteleone, Gary Braunbeck, Mark McLaughlin, Andy Duncan, Tim Lebbon and…well, far too many other great writers to type, but let me just say I admire them all and the competition is so fierce that I’ll be very LUCKY if I happen to win anything. But it isn’t really a competition. Being shortlisted for the award is an award in itself, and I’m very proud. Thanks, HWA!