ricochet of fear poem

NaPoWriMo 2021

I always enjoy National Poetry Month (and its sibling, National Poetry Writing Month -- NaPoWriMo) in April each year. I try to acquire new poetry books, read more classics, host poetry workshops and teach contemporary poets in my classes at SHU, and write poetry more often than I usually do. In the past, I've treated NaPoWriMo as a kind of obsessive challenge; this year, I'm just taking it easy and sharing my poems old and new alike on various platforms when the mood strikes me. In this blog post, I'll keep track of poetic things I've shared or published in…
The Goreletter Returns This April 2021!

The Goreletter Returns This April 2021!

If you didn't already catch word of the good news -- I have finally found what I hope will be a more secure and stronger email server to reboot my newsletter, The Goreletter! The first issue will be sent in mid-April, 2021. Even if you're a past subscriber, you'll need to resubscribe. Sorry, but it'll be easy. Just.... Sign up at Revue or fill out the form right here: Never heard of The Goreletter? I've also resurrected the back issue archive, which you can peruse at your leisure in the gorelets Repository. Lots of people tell me they like it,…
Voices Echoing in Your Head

Voices Echoing in Your Head

At the end of March, I returned to the Visited by Voices vidcast series hosted by Lorne Dixon, to participate in the first VbV Writer's Roundtable and it was a pretty amazing conversation! I chatted and laughed for over an hour with a diverse group of horror writers, all of whom I hold in high esteem: Ramsey Campbell, Brian Hodge, Mary SanGiovanni, Mark Allan Gunnells, doungjai gam & Lorne Dixon himself. It was kind of like being on a panel discussion at an international horror convention... or more like a chummy roundtable. Check it out. We talked about so many…
Instigation: Prompts About Masks

Instigation: Prompts About Masks

If you write horror or otherwise create "on the dark side," look into acquiring my prompt collection, INSTIGATION: Creative Prompts on the Dark Side. In my day job, I teach creative writing at Seton Hill University, and one of my many tasks is advising the campus literary magazine, Eye Contact. They are running a special theme issue on "Masks" for Spring 2021, in response to the Covid pandemic, and I made a list of prompts for one of their workshops, as well as for my current creative writing class. Since masks are an icon in the horror genre, I thought…
Stoker-Inspired Special Spring ’21 Update

Stoker-Inspired Special Spring ’21 Update

Spring is springing and I thought I'd share a general update, sparked by my registration for StokerCon this May... StokerCon -- the annual convention of horror genre professionals run by the Horror Writers Association -- announced it was going virtual this year (due to the Covid pandemic; a wise move), so I registered and WILL be attending and probably be a part of the program in some fashion. I'm proud to report that there are several alumni from the MFA in Writing Popular Fiction program (where I teach horror) in the running for the Bram Stoker Award to be given…