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Shimmering with sadness, speculative manifestations of madness with each shadow on the bough,
Filled me with exhilaration—palpable dread that crevassed never before…
THE HAUNTED OWL

You are about to meet the horrific dead. Masters of horror who made my heart race, my blood chill, and kept me up for days. Some of these dead writers you will recognize. Especially if you listened to DWELLER OF THE DARK, you most certainly will.

Now, I know it’s eerie–even for me–that century old writers can still scare the Hell out of you exquisitely. This selected group of beloved undead inspired me to become a writer. As I have clawed along, these same ghastly ghouls drove me to become a member, active writer, affiliate, and a whole lot more with the Horror Writers Association.

On to the book before the bad moon rises. HOWLING JOHN KANE is on the prowl! I see the wolf bane blooming already.

In my humble opinion, these are dreadful classics that scared many and inspired many more into the dark chasms of terrifying horror. Will you have the same dread or response as I did to each one? I don’t know. How calloused, how jaded are you to horror these days. I can say with surety though, these are the stories that got the greatest response from fans of DWELLER OF THE DARK. If these stories can haunt that devoted group of horror and supernatural maniacs, it is safe to say that you should get a ghost or two to linger.

Maybe a demon…I’m not picky.

Pleasant nightmares–JL

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To feel alive with your terrified pulse pounding, to feel the warm embrace of love, to have your teeth chatter with fear, the stomach quivering nausea of dread, or the blinding throes of rage, is what I offer with this collection. These horror poems I share with you have blazed the flames brightly to inspire me to create the most ghastly of horror tales and the most powerful of rock songs to date. You’re going to know my soul crushing angst in ‘Blood in the Pouring Rain’ as I saved my father’s life. You’ll look over your shoulder a glance or two maybe with a tear hearing the haunting ‘Sarah the Eternal’. And maybe you will laugh and howl along with ‘Ghost on Christmas Mountain’ to lift your spirits.

“Yes,” continued my friend, his eyes still fixed on the spot.
“But the strange thing is that I see the body lying on the top
of it. Of course,” continued Holger, turning his head on one
side as artists do, “it must be an effect of light. In the first
place, it is not a grave at all. Secondly, if it were, the body
would be inside and not outside. Therefore, it’s an effect of
the moonlight. Don’t you see it?”
“Perfectly; I always see it on moonlight nights.” –Francis Marion Crawford (For the Blood is the Life)

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#weirdtales #werewolf #horrorstories #books #icehorror#manlywadewellman #witchcraft #booktube #horrorstory #youtube #winter #horrorstories #death #cold #necronomicon #horrorstory #horrorshorts #appalachians “How could they know the frenzy, the throttling rage and the blood-thirst that closed over me like water in my locked room—every month, on the night when the moon was full?” —Manly Wade Wellman (The Werewolf Snarls) https://youtube.com/@dwellerofthedark?sub_confirmation=1 […]

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Then his voice rose until it filled the cavern. “But the curse was nothing. Words can do no harm, can do nothing, to a man. I live. A hundred generations have I seen come and go, and yet another hundred. What is time? The sun rises and sets, and another day has passed into oblivion. Men watch the sun and set their lives by it. They league themselves on every hand with time. They count the minutes that race them into eternity. Man outlived the centuries ere he began to reckon time. Time is man-made. Eternity is the work of the gods. In this cavern there is no such thing as time. There are no stars, no sun. Without is time; within is eternity. We count not time. Nothing marks the speeding of the hours. The youths go forth. They see the sun, the stars. They reckon time. And they pass. –Robert E. Howard (The Lost Race)