“The Wendigo was gaunt to the point of emaciation, its desiccated skin pulled tightly over its bones. With its bones pushing out against its skin, its complexion the ash-gray of death, and its eyes pushed back deep into its sockets, the Wendigo looked like a gaunt skeleton recently disinterred from the grave.” Basil Johnston, Ojibwe… Continue reading Weird World: The Wendigo
Recently I asked some readers whether they had ever experienced anything haunting, otherworldly, or just plain odd. I wasn’t sure whether anyone would respond, but I actually received a surprising number of replies – and some truly odd stories. Here are some of the best… From Kaylor, we have this haunting story: I have had… Continue reading Ghostly Goings-on: Readers Respond
“Some houses are born bad.” So wrote Shirley Jackson in The Haunting of Hill House, and she might have been talking about Borley Rectory, in Essex, England. The house seemed to have a bad reputation from the outset; locals claimed to have heard mysterious footsteps in its echoing corridors from its earliest days, and from… Continue reading Haunting Halloween Countdown: Borley Rectory, the Most Haunted House in England
Some say the world will end in fire, some say in ice … so said Robert Frost in his poem Fire and Ice. It’s one of his most famous (and certainly most anthologised) poems, and I’m not going to argue with the late, great Mr Frost, but still … when you think about it, there… Continue reading So, Exactly How Will the World End?
Fear. It’s an instinct that appears to have changed little since we first emerged from our caves, or indeed since we first climbed down from the trees. It’s necessary for our survival, of course – it alerts us to danger and prepares us to either fight or run like hell – and yet it also… Continue reading The Fear Factor
St Patrick’s Day is upon us, or so my desktop calendar assures me. Since I have (to the best of my knowledge) no Irish blood whatsoever, it’s not an occasion I usually celebrate. That doesn’t mean, however, that I can’t raise a glass of Guinness to some fine Irish authors, especially if they’re authors of… Continue reading Happy St Patrick’s Day: Irish Horror Writers
Re-blogged from Authors Electric. It’s that time of year again, when pumpkins are carved out, horror films dominate the TV schedules, and kids don Frankenstein masks and flit around their neighbourhoods asking for sweets. Well, technically speaking, I am of course a few days late, but my Authors Electric slot falls on the second of… Continue reading Things that Go Bump in the Night
Join me – if you dare – as I track the King Vampire down to his Transylvanian lair… Do you know what the place is? Have you seen that awful den of hellish infamy – with the very moonlight alive with grisly shapes, and every speck of dust that whirls in the wind a devouring… Continue reading Haunting Hallowe’en Countdown: Dracula
Join me as I go walkies with a dog that is most certainly not man’s best friend… For he was speechless, ghostly, wan,/ Like him of whom the story ran,/ Who spoke the spectre hound in man. – Sir Walter Scott
Join me as I continue my exploration of all things odd… I think we’re probably all familiar with the shambling, cannibalistic zombies made famous by Hollywood. Just in case you’re not, here’s a clip showing them in action:
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