Category: sorcery

on

by
1

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

on

by

Welcome ….to…. Dweller of the Dark!

https://youtube.com/@dwellerofthedark?sub_confirmation=1

I thought of underground rites in temples now given to dust; of posturing worship before great idols of gold—manshaped figures bearing the heads of crocodiles. I recalled the tales of darker parallel worships, bearing the same relationship as Satanism now does to Christianity; of priests who invoked animal-headed gods as demons rather than as benignant deities. Sebek was such a dual god, and his priests had given him blood to drink. In some temples there were vaults, and in these vaults were eidolons of the god shaped as a Golden Crocodile. The beast had hinged and barbed jaws, into which maidens were flung. Then the maw was closed, and ivory fangs rended the sacrifice so that blood might trickle down the golden throat and the god be appeased. Strange powers were conferred by these offerings, evil boons granted the priests who thus sated beast-like lusts. It was small wonder that such men were driven from their temples, and that those sanctuaries of sin had been destroyed.
–Robert Bloch (The Eyes of the Mummy)

on

by
1

Dim, dubious, bat-like creatures seemed to be flitting to and fro between one of the stone vats and the group that toiled like sculptors, clothing the bony foot with a reddish plasm which they applied and moulded like so much clay. Gaspard thought, but was not certain later, that this plasm, which gleamed as if with mingled blood and fire, was being brought from the rosy-litten vat in vessels borne by the claws of the shadowy flying creatures. None of them, however, approached the other vat, whose wannish light was momently enfeebled, as if it were dying down. –Clark Ashton Smith (The Colossus of Ylourgne)

on

by

HIS voice came to us again. He said, at first, that he saw nothing in the abyss below him. Then he gasped, swayed, and almost lost his balance. We could see the sweat standing out on his brow and neck, soaking his blue shirt. There were things in the abyss, he said in hoarse tones, great shapes that were like blobs of utter blackness, yet which he knew to be alive. From the central masses of their beings he could see them shoot forth incredibly long, filamentine tentacles. They moved themselves forward and backward — horizontally, but could not move vertically, it seemed. They were, he thought, nothing but living shadows.
Robert A.W. Lowndes (THE ABYSS)

on

by
1

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.

on

by
1

‘It’s not the kind of story that the columnists like to print; it’s not the yarn press-agents love to tell. When I was still in the Public Relations Department at the studio, they wouldn’t let me break it. I knew better than to try, for no paper would print such a tale. We publicity men must present Hollywood as a gay place; a world of glamor and star-dust. We capture only the light, but underneath the light there must always be shadows. I’ve always known that—it’s been my job to gloss over those shadows for years—but the events of which I speak from a disturbing pattern too strange to be withheld. The shadow of these incidents is not human.’

—Robert Bloch (Return to the Sabbath)

on

by
1

#vampire #Ghost #youtube #books #horrorstories #youtube #horrorstory #booktube #horrorshorts #horrorstories #pirates #flowers ‘She was wild, almost savage, with her great dark eyes boring into him. Her skin was white, smooth as alabaster. Her hair was jet black; and a waving coil of it, like a broken cobweb of pitch strings, framed her face. Grotesque hoops […]

on

by

#weirdtales #books #icehorror#lovecraft #resurrection #youtube #winter #horrorstories #death #cold #necronomicon #horrorstory #horrorshorts #appalachians You ask me to explain why I am afraid of a draught of cool air; why I shiver more than others upon entering a cold room and seem nauseated and repelled when the chill of evening creeps through the heat of a […]