One might think that, for her first entry here during Women In Horror Year, that I would go with one of Nancy Collins’ Sonja Blue novels, or her Swamp Thing run, or her weird westerns.

Nicky quickly eviscerates that trope, delivering a gripping psychological thriller that allows itself to be a full-on horror novel couched in the traditions of southern gothic while traversing everything from coming-of-age territory to magic realism.

But Judith — like myself and J.F. Gonzalez and Nate Southard and Bryan Smith before her — wasn’t content to just write one thing or one style over and over again. Her more recent works are beginning to branch out into…

Until the advent of social media, we had a little something called Free Speech. Protecting that right didn’t mean protecting the words you agree with. It meant protecting the words you vehemently disagreed with.

Jeff Strand has written a pretty good thought piece about the HWA and the Bram Stoker Awards…

Sometimes, the universe puts you where you’re needed. I just wish it didn’t do so with brain fog.

And that’s important because the town is as much a main character in this novel as any of the other souls who populate it. I know these people. I know this town. I grew up with both, and it is very easy for me to tell when a fellow writer doesn’t “get” it. Sarah not only gets us — she, like the antagonist of the novel — knows all our secrets. Even the ones we keep from ourself.

…and while the teachers may be cool, if they linger too long, it gets weird, because it’s not cool to hang with the teachers. I guess maybe we’re just figuring out the social rules for this new phase...

…her poetry challenged conventions, bulldozed tropes, and moved the genre ever forward.

Originally published in 2016, Mayan Blue remains one of the most thunderous debut novels on the indie scene to come out over the last decade.

…there are parts of me that already seem to be edging towards retirement, while other parts continue with business as usual. Oddly, these two halves seem in sync so far.

Decades ago, probably around 2001 or 2002, a bunch of us were talking about some of our all-time favorite horror novels. (I can’t remember if it was at a convention or in the old Horrornet chat room. I suspect it was the latter). Regina Garza-Mitchell mentioned Elephantasm by Tanith Lee…

It was at this point that Mikey decided laying down in the road was better. Then John slid into the road and joined him.

The target of the intervention was myself, and the reason for the intervention was my wanton disregard for the proper use of semicolons. And it’s true. I abused the hell out of semicolons. My friends insisted that going forward, any time I felt the urge to use a semicolon, I should use an em dash instead.

She paved the way for authors today such as CJ Leede (whose work reminds me in some ways of Charlee — not as imitation or pastiche, but in heart and emotion) and Eric LaRocca, as well as authors who aren’t…

It’s something to be absorbing all of this history before Mary and I are guests at GenCon later this summer. At least, we are told that we are guests. We don’t yet seem to be listed on the website or any posted scheduled programming, but we keep being assured that we will be. I dunno. I figure worst case scenario I’ll just wander the dealer’s room in search of vintage Gamma World stuff all weekend.

This was not your parents’ Stephen King novel. Hell, this wasn’t even your older brother’s Skipp & Spector novel. Bad Brains was something new. Something different. It felt… dangerous.

I’m not the best qualified person to write about the history of our genre. The ones who were the best qualified — Karl Edward Wagner, John Pelan, and J.F. Gonzalez — are no longer with us. But I’ve also been championing Lisa Kroger and Melanie R. Anderson as the heirs to that position.

A member of federal law enforcement and an expert on serial killers, (including Dahmer), Elizabeth Steffan elevates what could have just been a lurid thriller into a brilliant and technically accurate police-procedural that is all the more chilling for its uber-realism.

…while I was reinventing zombies for a new generation during my time at Leisure Books, my fellow Leisure stablemate Christine Feehan was doing the same for…