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Hi Gang!
Pant pant pant...
Well, if this is even possible...this might have been my most exhausting October EVER. There were dozens of interviews, panels, and presentations, in media that included live radio, podcast, YouTube video, and good ol' print.
Given that craziness, you'll have to forgive me if this newsletter is somewhat slimmer than usual! Hopefully by next month I'll be caught up and back onto some sort of sane regular schedule again.
I hope that your Halloween was festive (and perhaps a little less tiring!), and here's to a thoughtful Dia de los Muertos / All Souls' Day, and a Thanksgiving that merits some gratitude.
Lisa
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Still Life
In which I rhapsodize about favorite movie photos from my collection
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What did you watch for Halloween?
Me, I finally caught up with What We Do in the Shadows, which is now one of my favorite shows. What better way to relax after a long day of jabbering away about Halloween?
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The Halloween Spirit
Tips for keeping it going all year 'round
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Halloween isn't the only celebration around this time going on in my house.
As a lifelong resident of Southern California, I've known about Dia de los Muertos for a long time; as a Halloween expert, I've studied it in depth as Halloween's Mexican cousin. It's a beautiful observance with its own character. Although it's technically held on November 2nd (All Souls' Day), it may take place (depending on what part of Mexico you're in) anywhere from one to thirty days, with three (October 31st-November 2) being perhaps most common.
One of my favorite parts of Dia de los Muertos is the building of ofrendas. These are memorials to loved ones who have passed on, a way to not just remember them but to invite their spirits to return for a day to the land of the living. An ofrenda typically includes a photo of the deceased, the lovely bright orange marigolds that help lead the spirits to the right place, and food, drink, or even objects that they loved in life.
We built an ofrenda this year to a few of those we've lost who meant something to us (see above). I'd like to think that they're here with us now; they certainly are in memory, and perhaps in spirit as well.
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Strange Doings
The weirdest thing I've recently uncovered in my research
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McKamey Manor was a hot topic this year.
Every year, there's one question I get asked over and over in my Halloween interviews. A few years ago it was all about sexy costumes. Last year it was how Halloween fared in the 1918 influenza epidemic.
This year there were two subjects that popped up in a few interviews: the first was the tradition of telling ghost stories at Christmas. The second was McKamey Manor.
In case you don't know about McKamey Manor, it's a so-called haunt located in rural Tennessee. I say "so-called" because it's a source of debate among longtime Halloween haunters and fans about whether McKamey Manor qualifies as a haunt or not. Why the debate? McKamey Manor is at the far end of "extreme" haunts; an extreme haunt is one in which you may be touched.
McKamey Manor does more than touch its guests. Guests may be forced into locked ice-water baths, forced to eat repellent things, be covered in live insects or snakes, have their heads shaved, etc.
I'm not sure why McKamey Manor is suddenly coming up in questions, although its appearance on the Netflix series Dark Tourist may have something to do with it. In one episode, host David Farrier visited McKamey Manor...or tried to, since he gave up as soon as they shoved a dental spreader into his mouth, which happened before he even entered the Manor proper.
If you'd like to know more about McKamey Manor, click the blue button and read a piece I wrote about it for Nightmare Magazine in 2019.
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"Robert Chambers Reads The King in Yellow"
(from Under Twin Suns: Alternate Histories of the Yellow Sign)
When editor James Chambers invited me to contribute a story to his King in Yellow-themed anthology Under Twin Suns, I had just finished a big research project on the author Robert Chambers (that project will be unveiled soon!), so I knew I wanted to tackle a question that had obsessed me as I'd dug into Robert Chambers' life: why had he only written four King in Yellow stories? When the stories were published in 1895, they were immediately well received and the book sold much better than his first collection, yet he never returned to that brilliant, horrifying world. Why?
I decided to answer that question in fiction. I would structure the story to mirror the creation of the four King in Yellow stories, and use my favorite of Chambers' characters (the title character from the story "The Repairer of Reputations") as the antagonist.
The story was great fun to write, although I certainly acknowledge that my suggestion is unlikely to be the real reason Chambers gave up the King in Yellow mythos...or is it?
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Staying organized.
The farther along you are in your writing career, the more staying organized will become one of your biggest challenges. There's a reason that big-name authors hire assistants as soon as they can afford the payroll - they don't want their writing time to go entirely to correspondence, contracts, keeping track of payments, social media, etc.
I recently had an issue with my domain host that ended up with me losing years worth of e-mails. Not only did this inspire a few hours of panic (like I needed THAT right in the middle of my busy season!), it also made me aware that I needed a better system for keeping track of the correspondence side of things.
In the end, I opted for an app called Mailbird that I installed on my main computer. I set it up for POP3 (as compared to IMAP) so that it would keep all incoming messages on my machine unless I manually delete them. It also includes things like a calendar and a to-do list, which I've also set up.
Other writers use things like spreadsheets, white boards, post-it notes, or even apps like Milanote to keep track of deadlines, what's out in submission, what publisher still owes them money, etc.
It's all about finding what works for you and staying on top of it.
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WIP It
My current works-in-progress
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My fourth collaboration with Les Klinger has now been officially announced! Haunted Tales: Classic Stories of Ghosts and the Supernatural will be published on August 2, 2022.
I received a mind-blowing shout-out from esteemed critic Michael Dirda in The Washington Post for my story "Robert Chambers Reads The King in Yellow".
My essay "When the Final Girl Grows Up" is now a free read at Nightmare Magazine.
And it's pretty hard to beat a mention from Shondaland, which listed Trick or Treat as one of their "16 Spine-Tingling Reads for Halloween".
Here's a (partial) list of my recent appearances:
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Night Terrors & Other Tales
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This, my first major non-themed collection, is now available. Includes twenty reprints plus one new story, "Night Terrors", written for the collection.
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Haunted Tales: Classic Stories of Ghosts and the Supernatural
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My Ghost Stories partner Les Klinger and I have re-teamed for a new anthology of more classic horror tales. Coming in August 2022.
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Classic Monsters Unleashed
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Coming in 2022...includes my Headless Horseman tale, "Hacking the Horseman's Code".
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There is No Death There are No Dead
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Includes my story "Meeting Katie King".
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Humans Are the Problem: A Monster's Anthology
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Includes my story "In the House of the Elemental".
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Calling the Spirits: A History of Seances
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Now in a second printing: my comprehensive survey of the history of spirit-calling looks at necromancy, Spiritualism, modern ghost-hunting, and more. Illustrated and fully indexed.
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Weird Women Volume 2: 1840-1925
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Coming September 2021: a new volume of Weird Women, with stories by George Eliot, Edith Wharton, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and more!
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My story "Robert Chambers Reads The King in Yellow" appears in this wonderful new anthology.
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In Darkness, Delight: Fear the Future
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Includes my short story "Airborne".
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Professor Charlatan Bardot's Travel Anthology to the Most (Fictional) Haunted Buildings in the Weird, Wild World
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Includes my short story "The Gulch".
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This month it's a hardback copy of Weird Women 2, signed by me! Just click the button below to enter, and good luck!
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