Find Haunted Houses near you using our online haunt finder directory. Hauntworld also helps people rate and review haunted attractions. Hauntworld helps you find haunted houses by city, state, or zip code. Hauntworld has reviewed more than 200 haunted houses across America and Canada. Hauntworld features over 7,500 different haunted attractions near you including haunted houses, hayrides, corn mazes, pumpkin patches, escape rooms, ghost tours, real haunted houses, and Halloween attractions. Hauntworld also reviews and rates the scariest haunted houses open near you with our annual Hauntworld Top 13 Haunts and America's Scariest Haunted House list.
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Here is the Table of Contents for the upcoming book titled THE HORROR ZINE'S BOOK OF MONSTER STORIES!
INTRODUCTION
by Gemma Files
THE STORIES
SEE ME
by Terry Grimwood
NIGHT OF THE CRICKETS
by Christopher Beck
THAT SUMMER
by Bentley Little
LAST STOP BEFORE LANGSTON
by Brian J. Smith
OPENING DAY
by Eddie Spohn
WHAT LURKS WITHIN
by Tyler John Kasishke
J-78
by Simon Bleaken
THE MAN WHO COULD TALK TO MONSTERS
by Tim Waggoner
ALL HAIL THE QUEEN
by Sumiko Saulson
THE INFESTATION
by Ken Foxe
MOUTHS
by Shawn Phelps
THE TOURNAMENT
by Jason Frederick Myers
NOM NOM
by Elizabeth Massie
RED SPIDER
by Chris Allen
ALL ALONE
by J.A. Heath
BREAKING AND ENTERING
by Jared Spears
SOMEWHERE IN THE SWAMPS OF NEW JERSEY
by Shawn P. Madison
PURPLE BLOOM
by Simon Clark
THE PARASITE
by Theresa Jacobs
A STRANGE OCCURRENCE AT A FOOTBALL GAME
by Gabriel White
IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE
by Eliza Hyde
THE GRUGER
by Christopher Sweet
A MOTHER’S LOVE
by Chris McAuley
THE CADENCE OF DECAY
by Lee Andrew Forman and Elaine Pascale
HIS MAJESTY’S REVENGE
by Donna J. W. Munro
THE SCARECROW
by Keiran Meeks
NIGHT OF THE SPIDER
by Dan Allen
THE TERROR OF SWEDE TOWN
by Trish Wilson
THE MONSTER WHO BLED MEMORIES
by Bruce Memblatt
WHERE THE WATER FLOWS
by Dean H. Wild
THE GOLEM
by Jeani Rector
SPOOKTACULAR! The Film Documentary that Takes a Look at the Theme Park From Horror’s Golden Age to Today! World Premiere 9/23
Spookywood Productions is honored to announce that Fantastic Fest will host the World Premiere of Spooktacular!, director Quinn Monahan’s gripping documentary that unravels the secrets behind SpookyWorld, America’s iconic Halloween extravaganza, which set the template for the multi-billion-dollar industry of terror. Presented by executive producer Tom Savini, Spooktacular! will bow in Austin at the largest genre film festival in the US, specializing in horror, fantasy, sci-fi, and action movies from all around the world. After Fantastic Fest, Spooktacular! will make its West Coast Premiere at BeyondFest and its International Premiere at Sitges.
At the heart of it all stands David Bertolino, the mastermind behind SpookyWorld, the first-ever multi-attraction Halloween theme park that redefined the haunted house experience. From humble beginnings as a whoopee cushion salesman, Bertolino’s journey culminated in a terrifying hayride trail through the woods that captured the imaginations of thousands, and soon became a sensation.
As the crowds swelled, so did SpookyWorld’s reputation, attracting A-list horror celebrities like Tom Savini, Linda Blair, and Kane Hodder. The documentary delves into David’s audacious advertising campaigns, electrifying sponsorships, and unforgettable charity events that drew attention from national media outlets, turning SpookyWorld into a global phenomenon.
Through captivating storytelling, the memories of the most revered names in horror and exclusive behind-the-scenes footage, Spooktacular! captures the essence of SpookyWorld’s Camelot days, when screams mingled with the crisp New England night air and memories were etched into the souls of fans.
Ahead of the world premiere, Monahan shared: “I was inspired to embark on this filmmaking journey by my friendship with David Bertolino and the story of his extraordinary quest to create the world’s first Halloween theme park. His incredible stories of those heady days resonated with me on a personal level, drawing parallels to my own upbringing in a theater family.
" My hope is to transport our audience to the unique time and place that was SpookyWorld. I want them to experience the pre-digital era, where immersive experiences were constructed with plywood, duct tape, and raw talent, rather than virtual reality goggles and computer code. This is an opportunity to relive a bygone era when fun was tangible, vivid, and real, before the indelible impact of 9/11 and the subsequent technological and political changes which now permeate American life. I hope we have honored the memory of this Camelot of Halloween attractions in the most genuine and faithful way possible.”
Spooktacular! at Fantastic Fest:
Festival & Screening Details
Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar
Sat, Sep 23rd, 2:00 PM CDT Theater 3
Wed, Sep 27th, 11:10 AM CDT Theater 7
Wed, Sep 27th, 11:10 AM CDT Theater 9
See the original article HERE
Could the pugnacious writer ever have imagined that he would one day become a cult hero?
Nick Lehr/The Conversation
Edgar Allan Poe, who would have turned 214 years old on Jan. 19, 2023, remains one of the world’s most recognizable and popular literary figures.
His face – with its sunken eyes, enormous forehead and disheveled black hair – adorns tote bags, coffee mugs, T-shirts, and lunch boxes. He appears as a meme, either sporting a popped collar or aviator shades as Edgar Allan Bro.
As a Poe scholar, I sometimes wonder whether Poe’s appeal is less about the power and complexity of his prose and more about an attraction to the idea of Poe.
After all, Poe’s most famous literary creations tend to be unsympathetic villains. There are psychopaths who perpetuate seemingly motiveless murders in “The Black Cat” and “The Tell-Tale Heart”; protagonists who abuse women in “Ligeia” and “The Fall of the House of Usher”; and characters who exact cruel, fatal revenge on unwitting victims in “The Cask of Amontillado” and “Hop-Frog.”
The degenerate characters whose perspectives Poe invites readers to inhabit don’t exactly align with a cultural moment characterized by the #MeToo movement, safe spaces and trigger warnings.
At the same time, the conception of Poe the writer seems to tap into a cultural affection for outsiders, nonconformists and underdogs who ultimately prove their worth.
A character assassination that misfires
The idea of Poe the underdog began with his death in 1849, which was greeted by a cruel notice in the New York Tribune: “This announcement will startle many, but few will be grieved by it.”
The obituary writer, who turned out to be Poe’s sometime friend and constant rival Rufus W. Griswold, claimed that the deceased had “few or no friends” and proceeded with a general character assassination built on exaggerations and half-truths.
Strange as it seems, Griswold was also Poe's literary executor, and he expanded the obituary into a biographical essay that accompanied Poe’s collected works. If this was a marketing ploy, it worked. The friends that Griswold claimed Poe lacked rose to his defense, and journalists spent decades debating who the man really was.
During Poe’s lifetime, most readers encountered his work through magazines, and he was rarely well paid. But Griswold’s edition went through 19 printngs in the 15 years after Poe's death, and his stories and poems have been endlessly reprinted and translated ever since.
Griswold’s defamatory portrait, along with the grim subject matter of Poe’s stories and poems, still influences the way readers perceive him. But it has also produced a sustained reaction or counterimage of Poe as a tragic hero, a tortured, misunderstood artist who was too good – or, at any rate, too cool – for his world.
While translating Poe’s works into French in the 1850s and 1860s, the French poet Charles Baudelaire promoted his hero as a kind of countercultural visionary, out of step with a moralistic, materialistic America. Baudelaire’s Poe valued beauty over truth in his poetry and, in his fiction, saw through the self-improvement pieties that were popular at the time to reveal “the natural wickedness of man.” Poe struck a chord with European writers, and as his international stature rose in the late 19th century, literary critics in the U.S. wrung their hands over his lack of appreciation “at home.”
Poe’s underdog story takes off
By the turn of the 20th century, the stage was set for Poe to be embraced as the perennial underdog. And Poe often did appear on stage around this time, as the subject of several biographical melodramas that depicted him as a tragic figure whose lack of success had more to do with a hostile cultural and publishing environment than his own failings.
That image appeared on the silver screen as early as 1909 in D.W. Griffith’s short film “Edgar Allen Poe.” With Poe’s wife, Virginia, languishing on a sick bed, the poet ventures out to sell “The Raven.” After meeting rejection and scorn, he manages to sell his manuscript and returns home with provisions for his ailing wife, only to find that she has died.
Later films also depict Poe as being misunderstood or underappreciated in his lifetime. A wildly inaccurate biopic, “The Loves of Edgar Allan Poe,” released in 1942, ends with a voice-over commenting, “…little did [the public] know that the manuscript of ‘The Raven,’ which he tried in vain to sell for $25, would years later bring the price of $17,000 from a collector.”
When John Lennon sang “Man, you should have seen them kicking Edgar Allan Poe” in “I Am the Walrus,” he didn’t have to say who was kicking him or why. The point was, Poe deserved better; the most interesting plants do grow in the shade, unlovely and unloved.
And that’s exactly why so many people – aspiring writers and artists, but also everyone when they’re lonely and misunderstood – see a little bit of themselves in the weary-but-wise image of Poe.
See more HERE
FX SCHEDULES ‘AMERICAN HORROR STORIES’ SEASON 3 FOR OCTOBER
written by Thomas Tuna
Halloween season just got even spookier.
The third season of American Horror Stories will debut on Hulu in October with a special four-episode Huluween Event. Check out the bizarre poster on this page.
The spinoff anthology series–hitting Hulu Oct. 26–was created by Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk, and has aired 15 episodes so far over the first two seasons.
The show features hour-long, self-contained episodes–telling tales of horror myths, legends and lore that are mainly unconnected to the original American Horror Story series.
No details on storylines and casting have been revealed at this point, but previous seasons have starred such genre standouts as Matt Bomer, Billie Lourd and Alicia Silverstone.
Go HERE to learn more.
The HWA interviews Jeani Rector
Tom Joyce of The Horror Writers Association introduces this interview by saying, "If you ever get despondent over the state of the publishing industry, think of Jeani Rector. Jeani...talks about what she looks for in a submission."
See the interview HERE
THE HORROR ZINE IS PUBLISHING BOOK REVIEWS
The Horror Zine welcomes book review requests.
To learn how to submit your book for review, go HERE.
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