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scop (noun): Old English – bard, minstrel, storyteller

  • Best Horror Movies 2019

    First of all, you’ve got to love a list that features an above-the-headline image of the Mashit demon from Nightmare Cinema. But beyond that (and the fact that NC comes in ranked among the top 20), the year’s-best-horror list at Rotten Tomatoes confirms that 2019 was a banner year for the genre. For the record,…

  • Writer at Work:
    Santas, Wizards, & Life behind the Curtain

    Merry Christmas! I’m always impressed by writers who despite busy schedules manage to produce timely blogs and podcasts. I try. But when other work piles up, I tend to vanquish into the world of deadlines.  This month has brought some exciting projects and opportunities that I hope to share in the weeks ahead, but right…

  • Horror Writers Association – Pittsburgh Chapter

    A few days ago, I came across a blog post by novelist Robert Yune, author of Eighty Days of Sunlight. Titled “22 Indisputable Reasons Pittsburgh Is The Perfect City For Writers,” the post does an excellent job of laying out some of the major reasons I still live in western Pennsylvania. And now there’s one…

  • World Fantasy 2019 & Writing Fantasy for Television

    Following close on the heels of Sustefest X, this year’s World Fantasy Convention provided a marked change of scenery – from Valle de Santiago’s old-world streets and dormant volcanoes to LA’s multi-lane highways and active wildfires. Fortunately, skies around the Marriott Airport Hotel (the site of this year’s convention) were clear despite the proximity of…

  • Nightmares at Sustefest X!

    The southern portion of Guanajuato, Mexico, is a magical place – lush, mountainous, and dotted with volcanic craters arranged like the stars in the Big Dipper. It’s also home to the Sustefest Film Festival, which this year hosted the release of Nightmares, the new Spanish-language anthology featuring stories by members of the Nightmare Cinema writing…

  • Nightmare Cinema: Now on AMC’s Shudder!

      Just in time for the Halloween season, Mick Garris’s Nightmare Cinema comes to Shudder — AMC’s streaming platform devoted to the best in horror, thriller, and supernatural films. Now, for a monthly subscription of $4.99, you can watch hundreds of titles in addition to the anthology film that Nightmarish Conjurings has called “an absolute…