Generated by All in One SEO v4.9.5.1, this is an llms.txt file, used by LLMs to index the site. # Lawrence C. Connolly fiction, media, rock-n-roll ## Sitemaps - [XML Sitemap](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/sitemap.xml): Contains all public & indexable URLs for this website. ## Posts - [The Writing Life:](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2026/03/02/the-writing-life/) - Running Twice as Fast to Get Ahead. I've been runnin' a long timeOn this traveling groundWishin' hard to be free ofGoin' round and round … This Traveling Ground. Cat Stevens’s "Bitter Blue" (1971) recalls a scene in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass (1871). In Carroll's story, Alice and the Red Queen race full tilt - [Moving Forward:
Life in a Science-Fiction Novel
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/04/24/moving-forwardlife-in-a-science-fiction-novel/) - A few months back, while prepping for The International Conference on the Fantastic, I wrote a piece titled "Existential Threats" that considered how social media and digital tech were reshaping our culture. The essay centered on two sf classics, Ray Bradbury's "The Murderer" (pictured at left) and Arthur C. Clarke's "Dial F for Frankenstein." Since - [Super Stocking Stuffers!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/12/11/super-stocking-stuffers/) - Minute Men in Print, eBook & Audio. Books are “the quintessential Christmas — or Hanukkah or Kwanzaa or other December celebration — gift.” So writes New York Times book review editor Jennifer Harlan in her article “How a Good Book Became the ‘Richest’ of Holiday Gifts.” Supporting that point, writer and editor Tom Connair sent us the - [Into the Gray: Rediscovering Richard Connell](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/10/12/into-the-gray-rediscovering-richard-connell/) - Titled A Little Gray Book of Grisly Tales and published by Borderlands Press as part of their well-regarded Little Book Series, this compact edition reprints Connell’s aforementioned classic along with five lesser-known tales that fall into a gray zone–somewhere in the shadow of horror, mystery, and satire. - [Now on the TEDx Channel:](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/11/21/now-on-the-tedx-channel/) - The Resilience of Frankenstein. [The following is a transcript of my TEDx talk on Mary Shelley and resilience, presented in Rea Auditorium, Sewickley PA, May 11. 2024. The video is currently streaming on the TEDx Channel.] It occurs to me that when I think about resilience, I think everything I've learned comes from a novel - [T. P. Cooke's Demon:
The First Pop-Culture "Frankenstein"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/08/26/t-p-cookes-demonthe-first-pop-culture-frankenstein/) - An explosion. Fire and smoke. Laboratory doors shatter. The Demon appears in a blast of red flame! That’s how the Frankenstein monster made its entrance in the first dramatic adaptation of Mary Shelley’s novel. Loosely adapted by Richard Brinsley Peake and starring actor T. P. Cooke as the monster (referred to as "The Demon" in - [Mystery Begins Here!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/11/15/mystery-begins-here/) - The Granddaddy of Them All. Before Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot, long before Philip Marlowe and Benoit Blanc, there was master sleuth C. Auguste Dupin. First appearing in Edgar Allan Poe's short story "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" (1841), and returning in "The Mystery of Marie Rogêt" (1842) and "The Purloined Letter" (1844), Dupin - [Audiobook Countdown!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/11/10/audiobook-countdown/) - Coming to Your Earbuds on November 25. In just two weeks, Minute Men: Execute & Run arrives in audio from Tantor Media, a division of the world’s largest producer of literature for the ears. Currently available for preorder from Amazon and Audible, the audiobook is read by Tom Beyer, a seasoned actor who has appeared - [Frankenstein Week:
Print, Audio, & Video Previews
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/11/02/frankenstein-weekprint-audio-video-previews/) - If this past weekend was Frankenstein Weekend (see my previous post if you have any doubts about that), then this week must be Frankenstein week. At least it looks that way judging from the advanced media attention that Prime Stage Theatre’s all-new production of Frankenstein has been getting. Out today are previews from three of - [Man of Mystery, Horror & Imagination](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/11/03/man-of-mystery-horror-imagination/) - Edgar Allan Poe as Performance Artist Mustachioed, scowling, dressed in black—Edgar Allan Poe stares at us from the silvered surface of a faded daguerreotype. It is the face of a tortured poet destined for early death, but although the portrait was taken during the height of his struggle with depression and ill health, I can’t - [Prime Alternatives](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/10/21/prime-alternatives/) - Where to go when the giant has "issues." Earlier this week, a pale-blue banner (see above) began appearing on the Amazon website. The text within it read: We’re sorry if you’re currently experiencing issues with the Amazon site. We’re working to fix it as quickly as possible. The announcement came after a week in which - [EXTRA: WE BROKE AMAZON!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/10/15/extra-we-broke-amazon/) - Minute Men: Execute & Run sells out on Launch Day. Launch Day was going well. Folks were phoning, texting, and sending us photos about their freshly minted print editions of Minute Men: Execute & Run. Prime members were getting their pre-orders. Others were making new purchases with promises of fast two-day delivery. And then—BAM! Not BAM! as - [LIFT OFF!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/10/14/lift-off/) - The Adventure Begins NOW. The wait is over. Minute Men: Execute & Run is now available in print and eBook at a bookseller near you. Have you ordered a copy? Have you started reading? We’re eager to hear what you think, so please drop us a review when you can. And if you haven’t purchased a copy, - [Two Days to Launch](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/10/12/two-days-to-launch/) - And the reviews are electrifying! This is the third in a series of posts featuring advance reviews for Minute Men: Execute & Run, the new science fiction novel from Caezik SF & Fantasy. The book releases on October 14! You can find some previous reviews here and here. Today's Review In this post, we hear - [More Praise for Minute Men](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/10/11/more-praise-for-minute-men/) - The Word is Out! In yesterday's post, I shared World Fantasy Award-finalist Michael Libling's take on Minute Men: Execute & Run. You can find that review here. Today, we'll hear from poet, critic, and novelist Albert Wendland, author of the acclaimed Mykol Ranglen science-fiction series, which includes the novels In a Suspect Universe, Haunted Stars, - [Make Way for the Minute Men](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/10/10/make-way-for-the-minute-men/) - Execute & Run Releases October 14! This is the world of The Minute Men: The day after tomorrow. Technology has advanced, wars rage, and a disparate group of wounded warriors bands together to confront the ultimate evil. The Reviews Are In Starting today, and continuing throughout the month, I'll be posting advance reviews of the - [Super Strange Super Villains](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/09/29/super-strange-super-villains/) - Evil or Just Plain Weird? The Vintage Villain Lineup Our most recent challenge over at the Minute Men Newsletter asks folks to identify the six baddies pictured above. If you're a newsletter subscriber, you know the details. If you're not, you can subscribe or check out the challenge by clicking here. Either way, read on! - [Guitar Superpower](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/09/15/guitar-superpower/) - Tied Up in Bows The guitar acquired a new voice in 1969. I remember hearing it on Led Zeppelin's first album, most notably on the LP's final track, which featured a series of long notes that sounded like the moaning of a humpback whale ... or perhaps the reverberations of some massive heavy-metal machine. Here's - [The Art of Rotoscoping](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/09/01/the-art-of-rotoscoping/) - Animating Life Since 1917 Nearly a century before James Cameron transformed 5′ 7″ Zoe Saldaña into the nine-foot-tall Neytiri in Avatar, cartoonist Max Fleischer pioneered the first motion capture device in his Brooklyn living room. Consisting of a projector mounted behind a transparent easel, the rotoscope machine transformed the art of animation by allowing cartoon - [Rockhounds](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/08/22/rockhounds/) - The Ballad of Marsh and Cope Heard about the Bone Wars? You're not alone if you haven't. Back in 1977, I doubt my brother John had heard about it either when I showed up to band practice with a new song called "The Rockhoud Rag." In truth, it was more bluegrass than ragtime, but I - [4.5 Million Podcasts](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/08/17/4-5-million-podcasts/) - Are you listening? Lots of folks are. According to Variety, last week’s installment of the New Heights podcast racked up 13 million views in just 24 hours. Of course, it helped that pop star Taylor Swift dropped by to join her buddy Travis Kelce to talk about her upcoming album. I’m sure brother Chris and - [Classic Spinoffs](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/08/04/classic-spinoffs/) - "You Know--For Kids!" Name the Classic A recent challenge in our Minute-Men: Execute and Run newsletter asked folks to identify the classic predecessors to the six books and films pictured above. Some of the contemporary spinoffs--like The Scarlet Letter Man and All for One--are fairly obvious. I figured the titles alone were enough to link - [Iconic Book Illustrations](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/07/22/iconic-book-illustrations/) - Worth 1,000 words. Artists have been illustrating the written word for ages, and in some instances, the illustrations have made such indelible impressions that they’ve become forever identified with the author’s work. With that in mind, we asked newsletter subscribers and social media followers to consider the above illustrations. The Challenge Can you name any - [Minute-Men Preview at ...](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/07/15/this-month-at/) - Plus Panels on AI, Horror, Writing ... and more! This year at Confluence, I’ll be joining brother Christopher Connolly for an in-person preview of our forthcoming novel Minute-Men: Execute & Run, set for release this fall from Caezik Science Fiction & Fantasy, an imprint of Arc Manor Books. The preview will take place 2:00 on - [Mail-Order Monkeys?](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/07/07/mail-order-monkeys/) - Comic Book & Magazine Merch of the 60s Kids Today Are Missing Out Sure, they have tablets, iPhones, TikTok, and YouTube. They can stream anything they want when they want. They can even get a bot to do their homework. But X-ray vision? Asiatic insects? Live monkeys? Nope, nope, and double nope! It was different - [Deleted Movie Scenes](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/06/23/deleted-movie-scenes/) - Kill your darlings ... spare the dog. In a recent installment of The Town, podcaster Matthew Belloni shares a list of deleted or added scenes that would have dramatically changed some popular films. In Pretty in Pink, Molly Ringwald originally ended up with John Cryer, not Andrew McCarthy. Loki initially died in Thor: The Dark - [Deleted Darlings](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/06/10/deleted-darlings/) - Newsletter Challenge #2 In a previous post, I shared details and images of a deleted scene from the anthology film Nightmare Cinema. Produced by Mick Garris and featuring the critically acclaimed segment This Way to Egress (directed by David Slade and based on my short story Traumatic Descent), the film had a scene that never - [Strangest Superheroes Ever](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/05/27/strangest-superheroes-ever/) - Who Are They? As announced in a previous installment of this blog (find it here), my brother Christopher and I have launched a newsletter featuring production updates, photos, concept art, videos, and audio recordings relating to our forthcoming book Minute-Men: Execute & Run. Installments of the newsletter also feature puzzles and challenges, with the most recent - [Newsletter Challenge #1](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/05/13/newsletter-challenge-1/) - Forgotten Superheroes Recognize these guys? If you've subscribed to the Minute-Men: Execute and Run newsletter, you know all about the challenge associated with them. If you're not a subscriber, please consider signing up via this handy subscription box: Either way, now that you're here, let us know if you can identify any of the characters - [Opening Week: Bring on the Nightmares](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/06/22/opening-week-bring-on-the-nightmares/) - We have arrived! The anthology project that Producer-Director Mick Garris first envisioned when his ground-breaking series Masters of Horror concluded its run in 2007, is now playing on big screens across the country and on home screens via VOD (where it is currently closing on Jordan Peele's top-ranked Us. Also of note (for me and - [Out Now: "Echoes" in Weird Fiction Review](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/05/08/out-now-echoes-in-weird-fiction-review/) - Prosperous Progeny. "And now, once again, I bid my hideous progeny go forth and prosper." That's Mary Shelley, writing in her Introduction to the 1831 edition of Frakenstein. While writing the book as a teenager, she could not have imagined how successful the novel would become. But as an adult, after witnessing a reissue of the - [Newsletter: Ready for Launch](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/04/23/newsletter-ready-for-launch/) - How to Sign Up. Earlier this year, a newsletter subscription offer appeared on this website. Can you find it? If you're reading on your phone, the box is near the bottom of this page. Otherwise, it should be off to the right. See it? The Substack logo that you click to enter your email address - [Sleuth 1972 on Blu-ray](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/03/16/sleuth-1972-on-blu-ray/) - At last! The Blu-ray holy grail! For years, I’ve been convinced we would never see a decent home video release of the ultimate two-hander, the parlor mystery that pits wealthy blue-blood Andrew Wyke (Laurence Olivier) against first-generation Brit Milo Tindle (Michael Caine). Written by Anthony Shaffer and directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, the film made - [The Power of the Known](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/02/19/the-power-of-the-known/) - The Power of the Familiar Two days ago, during my presentation at Duquesne University (see my previous post for more details), I asked a student to recall a passage that had effectively drawn him into a piece of writing. Without hesitation, he identified the opening of Washington Irving's "Rip Van Winkle." Whoever has made a - [Ideas](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/02/17/ideas/) - Back to the River You can’t step into the same river twice. So said the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus. It’s not just that the river changes. We do as well. And the change becomes more pronounced with time. I made that point a few months back in a post about rewatching John Carpenter's They Live. - [Movies: Best of the Longest](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/01/29/movies-best-of-the-longest/) - Est Picture Winner Last week the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences announced its Best Picture nominees for 2025. Only one came in at 120 minutes—the length that many have come to regard as the ideal length for a feature film. (Although a recent poll conducted by Talker Research says the majority favors 92 - [The Longest Movies](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/01/23/the-longest-movies/) - Est Things We're fascinated by est things. You know, like the biggest, smallest, longest, shortest, tallest, what-everest things in the world. Such est fascination is certainly why the Guinness Book of World Records has sold over 150 million copies (making it one of the best-selling copyrighted books of all time) and why Roadtrippers Magazine has - [Minute-Men, Werewolves, and Poe](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/01/17/minute-men-werewolves-and-poe/) - The Minute-Men Locus Magazine’s People & Publishing Roundup for January includes an announcement of my upcoming novel Minute-Men: Execute & Run. The book will be released this fall by Caezik, the science fiction and fantasy imprint of Arc Manor Books. As mentioned in a previous blog post (find it here), Execute & Run is - [Splash Music:
What are the shortest songs ever recorded?
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/08/02/splash-music-what-are-the-shortest-songs-ever-recorded/) - Two of the more popular posts featured on this website deal with flash fiction. That is according to Google Analytics, which shows Putting the Flash in Fiction and The Shortest Flashes Ever Written continue to garner clicks years after being posted. Such interest in ultra-short stories has me pondering their musical equivalents … and contemplating - [Ignoring the Inner Critic](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/01/10/ignoring-the-inner-critic/) - While the Critic Sleeps I like to write in the morning. The earlier the better. It’s not just because the world is quiet then. My thoughts are as well, mainly because the critical part of my brain--the part skilled at finding fault--is still sleeping. As a result, if I start early enough, I might get - [It's 2025 ... and We're Just Getting Started.](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2025/01/01/its-2025-and-were-just-getting-started/) - Execute & Run It's been a month since my previous post. That's generally an indication that I'm neck-deep in a writing project. As I've pointed out before, I'm a bit of a monomaniac. One thing at a time, that's me. A similar gap occurred in January-February 2024 while I was working on a novel titled - [Unboxing John Carpenter's Prince of Darkness](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/11/22/unboxing-john-carpenters-prince-of-darkness/) - What's in the Box? Psionic transmissions from the future, multiverse portals, body horror transformations, a capsule of pure evil, Alice Cooper, and a heady dose of weird science—it must be a John Carpenter movie. And for my money, it’s one of his best. For last night's re-watch of Prince of Darkness, I picked up Shout - [The Pub Shall Rise Again](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/11/19/the-pub-shall-rise-again/) - I read the news today, oh boy. Last Thursday, the texts started arriving. My daughter got the first one. It was from Liam Macik, a playwright, director, and podcaster who was a frequent special guest at Riley's Storytelling Nights a few years back. The second text came to me. It was from Christopher Laughrey, my long-time musical - [They Live ... again.](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/11/18/they-live-again/) - Movies don't change. We do. As the Greek philosopher Heraclitus proclaimed long ago, “You cannot step into the same river twice.” The reason is simple. Both you and the river change with time. But experiencing art is different. Take movies. The original Star Wars trilogy notwithstanding, the films you see in your teens are the - [More from Milford Fest: Live and In Person.](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/09/23/more-from-milford-fest-live-and-in-person/) - In an age when professional magazines are inundated with computer-generated submissions and screen actors can be replaced by CG doppelgangers, there are still activities that remain exclusively in the human domain. I'm referring to in-person events. You can try and simulate them with Zoom and Facetime, but there's nothing like the real thing, and I - [Milford: Authors, The Anchorage, and Arrowhead](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/09/19/milford-authors-anchorage-and-arrowhead/) - Around the world, the town of Milford in eastern Pennsylvania is famous for its role in the development of science fiction. Isaac Asimov, Damon Knight, Kurt Vonnegut, Harlan Ellison, Gene Wolfe, James Blish, Virginia Kidd, and Anne McCaffrey are just a few of the luminaries who have traveled to Milford to be part of the - [Forward into the Past: Milford Writers Festival](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/09/17/forward-into-the-past-milford-writers-festival/) - Eliot ... crashed a convention of science-fiction writers in a motel in Milford, Pennsylvania …. “I love you sons of bitches,” Eliot said …. “You’re all I read any more. You’re the only ones who’ll talk about the really terrific changes going on, the only ones crazy enough to know that life is a space - [Story Night @ Riley's: Fear and Resolutions](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/02/03/story-night-rileys-fear-and-resolutions/) - We never know where the stories are going to take us at Riley's Pour House. This year's first story night (January 27) featured a number of strong storytelling debuts as well as the return of one of 2014's All Star champions. The theme was "Resolutions," and although all of the stories addressed the topic, many also touched on the - [Halloween: Magic, Mystery & the Macabre Trick or Treating with Friends](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/09/08/hallowen-magic-mystery-the-macabre-trick-or-treating-with-my-friends/) - Halloween comes early this year, with the September release of Halloween: Magic, Mystery, and the Macabre – another terrific anthology from award-winning editor Paula Guran and the good people at Prime Books. The book is a follow up to Paula’s 2011 anthology Halloween, which featured 33 classic reprints by the likes of Ray Bradbury, H. - [Scop 101](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/06/25/scop101/) - scop (skop) — n (in Anglo-Saxon England) a bard or minstrel an Anglo-Saxon minstrel, usually attached to a particular royal court, although scops also traveled to various courts to recite their poetry. In addition to being an entertainer who composed and performed his own works, the scop served as a kind of historian and preserver - [Vortex: Book Three of the Veins Cycle](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/11/04/vortex-book-three-of-the-veins-cycle/) - I'm thrilled to report that Vortex: Book Three of the Veins Cycle is now available. Illustrated by Rhonda Libbey and produced by Fantasist Enterprises -- the press known for illustrated fantasy books such as Blood and Devotion, Modern Magic, The Stories in Between, and others -- Vortex goes on sale today across all major retail - [
The Prousting of Axle
Day 1 of the Veins Blog Tour](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/05/the-prousting-of-axleday-1-of-the-veins-blog-tour-2/) - If you've been thinking about reading Veins, now's the time to grab a copy. For the next five days, the ebook edition will be on sale for $0.99 at Fantasist Enterprises, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo. To coincide with the sale, I'll be doing a series of guest blogs and events at some of my favorite websites, starting - [Ten Years After: The Veins Cycle](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/08/15/ten-years-after-the-veins-cycle/) - Out of the Past Today's throwback post revisits a blog tour from September 2014. Promoting the upcoming release of Vortex, the third book in the Veins Cycle, the tour featured posts written for other websites. The first installment was a Proustian interview with the Veins Cycle's central protagonist--a troubled young man with strange dreams and - [The Virtual Real](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/08/24/the-virtual-real/) - I am inspired by the curvature of space. Not necessarily by the vast, physical manner that Einstein postulated early in the last century, but in a more personal, immediately perceivable way. There is something in each of us that allows (and sometimes forces) us to bend the hard-edged realities that we move through and interact - [One Night Only:
Connolly Brothers @ Riley's
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/05/one-night-only-connolly-brothers-rileys/) - It was inevitable. After reuniting for shows with former band mate Chris Laughrey and brother Mark Connolly, could a reunion with other-brother John Connolly be far behind? After a couple of house concerts in Hawaii and Denver, we're going to bring the original Connolly Brothers sound back home for a big show under the big top at Riley's - [Storytelling @ Riley's:
Midsummer Night Stories
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/08/21/storytelling-rileys-midsummer-night-stories/) - There's something alluring about a good story, and that was certainly clear at our last Storytelling @ Riley's session. The theme was Midsummer Night Stories, and it featured a night of fine tales from some Riley's regulars as well as quite a number of volunteers from the audience. Stories included a camping adventure in Cook Forest, - [Six Days on the Road:
Muddy Buck, Bear Mountain, Burns Pub, and back to Riley's
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/07/17/six-days-on-the-roadmuddy-buck-bear-mountain-burns-pub-and-back-to-rileys/) - I've returned from a whirlwind tour of Colorado, one in which the spheres aligned to allow reunion performances with some of the musicians and performers who have helped define my world of music over the past few decades. It also gave me the chance to make some new musician friends while discovering some incredible live-performance - [Theatre Stories @ Riley's (Part 2):
Sean Sears
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/07/01/theatre-stories-rileys-part-2-sean-sears/) - One of the rewards of hosting Storytelling at Riley's Pour House is getting the chance to feature the work of both seasoned and up-and-coming performers and showcasing their talents in a single night of spoken word performances. Such was certainly the case on June 24, when Storytelling at Riley's featured tales by Pete Grubbs, Joe - [Theatre Stories @ Riley's (Part 1):
Michael McBurney
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/06/30/theatre-stories-rileys-3/) - "All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players." So says one of the characters in William Shakespeare's As You Like It, and this month, at Riley's Pour House, an impressive roster of storytellers got the chance to prove the wisdom of those words. The event was Storytelling Night at Riley's, - [The Virtual Real](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/08/12/the-virtual-real-2/) - Bending reality. I am inspired by the curvature of space. Not necessarily by the physics that Einstein postulated early in the 20th century, but in a more personal way. There is something in each of us that allows (and sometimes forces) us to bend the hard-edged realities that make up our daily lives. Surely you’ve - [Storytelling Night @ Riley's Presents: Writers on Writing](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/05/29/storytelling-night-rileys-presents-writers-on-writing/) - Outside, rains rolled in to hammer the pub's street-side windows, but the inside remained warm and friendly as a packed house gathered for Storytelling Night at Riley's Pour House. The night's theme: The Writing Life. Special quests for the evening were members of Write or Die, Seton Hill University's Writing Popular Fiction Program, and contributors to - [A Warm Up for WoW](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/05/23/a-warm-up-for-wow/) - That's WoW as in Writer on Writing, the storytelling event at Riley's Pour House that will be featuring writers from Seton Hill's Writing Popular Fiction Program and the writing group WorD. I'll be hosting the event on May 27. But before that, I'll be playing some of my favorite songs on the Riley's stage from 8:00 - [The Brighton Readings: Part One](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/11/08/the-brighton-readings-part-one/) - Call me the warrior scop. Maybe I didn't battle monsters at this year’s World Fantasy Convention in Brighton, but I did spend some time beating back gale-force winds that rivaled those of England’s Great Storm of 1987. And I did get a chance to wield an artisan-made sword from a dealers-room display. So maybe I - [The Shape of Things Come](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/07/02/the-shape-of-things-come/) - Wearable tech, near-planet colonization, computer-assisted telepathy – the future looks amazing, so why aren’t more people writing about it? In a literary scene dominated by backward-looking steampunk and pessimistic dystopia, isn’t it time for some forward-looking, problem-solving science fiction. Last Thursday, during the summer residency at Seton Hill University’s graduate program in Writing Popular Fiction, - [Textual Origins of Mary Shelley’s Monster: The Grave Misconception](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/04/01/textual-origins-of-mary-shelleys-monster-the-grave-misconception/) - A few months ago, a monster came to town. It started as a small disturbance south of Jamaica and grew as it headed north, picking up speeds and moisture, and finally developing into a hurricane as it ascended the eastern seaboard of the United States. Along the way, it earned the name Sandy, but that - [. . . next thing I knew, I was on the ground!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/03/07/next-thing-i-knew-i-was-on-the-ground/) - It’s been a while since my last post. There are good reasons for that. I had some new stories to finish, and the new novel is still coming together. But the really big thing since my last post is dealing with the aftermath of a nasty fall I recently took while jogging. That’s what I - [From World Fantasy to Riley’s Pour House](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/11/17/from-world-fantasy-to-rileys-pour-house/) - Still decompressing from World Fantasy in Toronto, I’ll be resurfacing at Riley’s Pour House this Saturday (November 17) for a marathon performance – four hours, four sets, 60+ songs. A real aerobic workout, and I can’t think of a better way to spend a Saturday night. I’d like to tell you about that show, but first - [Ireland: Songs of Leaving](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/05/13/ireland-songs-of-leaving/) - Ever notice how all the songs about Pittsburgh are about leaving it? A musician friend back in the early 70s used that line to introduce the song “Six Days on the Road,” a seminal truck-driving tune made famous by Dave Dudly. It’s a terrific piece of country-rock, and I’ll be playing it this Saturday (May 19) at - [Primordial Score](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/02/10/primordial-score/) - Nearly sixty years ago, a Japanese composer dragged a leather glove across the strings of a contrabass and created one of the most distinctive sounds in 20th century cinema -- Godzilla's Roar. I was six when I first heard it, sitting on the floor of my Levittown living room, watching a staticy cathode-ray television. It - [Mystery Theatre has Moved](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/08/05/mystery-theatre-has-moved/) - Find PSMT at its new domain. Launched during the height of the first COVID wave, Prime Stage Mystery Theatre was initially designed to fill a gap left by live theatre performances during those dark months of social distancing. Thus, the theatre company known for "bringing theatre to life" took on the new mission of "bringing - [Prime Stage Theatre Presents:
A Knavish Piece of Mystery - Act II](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/10/08/prime-stage-theatre-presents-a-knavish-piece-of-mystery-act-ii/) - Strange things are afoot at the Newtowne Theatre! Two actors are missing. Another has run off to hide in a water closet. And the New Town players are struggling to open a locked room that may harbor a terrible secret. But August LaFleur holds back. An expert at devising and solving mysteries, he’s convinced that - [Greg Hall on Mystery Theatre](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/10/23/greg-hall-on-mystery-theatre/) - I once said that if Greg Hall didn't exist, the horror genre would have to invent him. That's still true. He's one of a kind. An improve comic who became an internet radio pioneer who went on to write stories and books leavened with equal dashes of horror and outrageous humor. He's a versatile guy, - [Nightmares and Mysteries:
Prime Stage Mystery Theatre - Season Two
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/02/23/nightmares-and-mysteries-prime-stage-mystery-theatre-season-two/) - Heard about the actor’s nightmare? It’s a variation of the dream in which you find yourself completely out of place and unprepared for a given situation. You know, like being in the produce section of a grocery store, standing behind a stack of vegetables and hoping no one notices you're naked. Or perhaps it’s the - [Prime Stage Mystery Theatre:
"What's the alternative to looking?"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/03/05/prime-stage-mystery-theatrewhats-the-alternative-to-looking/) - The image at left is from the recently restored film Sherlock Holmes (1916), starring William Gillette in the first-ever screen portrayal of the master sleuth. The film is currently streaming on Apple TV. There’s more than one way to find a missing person, but could you do it without actually looking? This week’s episode of - [The Sound's the Thing:
Audio Clues on Mystery Theatre
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/03/12/the-sounds-the-thingaudio-clues-on-mystery-theatre/) - In Francis Ford Coppola’s film The Conversation (1974) surveillance expert Harry Caul (Gene Hackman) becomes obsessed with a cryptic recording that he believes suggests a young couple is in danger. Similarly, in Brian De Palma’s Blow Out (1981), sound engineer Jack Terri (John Travolta) investigates a mystery by listening to a recording made at the - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
Going Up in "The Play's the Thing"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/03/26/this-week-on-mystery-theatregoing-up-in-the-plays-the-thing/) - It’s opening night. You make your entrance, hit your mark, and then – silence. Your mind goes blank. You can’t remember your first line. It’s called “going up” on stage – a reference to the reflexive way people have of looking up and to the side when they can’t remember something. According to actor John - [A Trap Full of Monsters:
The Return of Prime Stage Mystery Theatre
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/10/07/a-trap-full-of-monstersthe-return-of-prime-stage-mystery-theatre/) - “It is of the highest importance in the art of detection to be able to recognize out of a number of facts which are incidental and which are vital.” The above advice comes from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes and the father of modern detective fiction. And it will be good - [This Month at Prime Stage:
Mystery Theatre & A Wrinkle in Time
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/03/01/this-month-at-prime-stagemystery-theatre-a-wrinkle-in-time/) - You are in a circular room with twelve locked doors. Each door is positioned like the hours of a clock and stenciled with an apparently random word or phrase. You have 12 keys, each labeled with a different code. Your task: decipher the codes, unlock the doors, and begin unraveling a mystery that must be - [This Weekend at Prime Stage:
Study the Clues of "A Most Deadly Poison"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/05/06/this-weekend-at-prime-stagestudy-the-clues-of-a-most-deadly-poison/) - A selection of drinks stands on the table. Their labels read Obnoxious Padre Wine, Stained Fork Ale, and Roast’d Knife IPA. There’s also a pot of Goofy Odour Tea and a plate of wafers simply labeled A Set of Tea Biscuits. The challenge: determine which are safe and which (if any) might be poisoned. Such - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
An Escalating Puzzle for a Way-Out Mystery
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/03/10/this-week-on-mystery-theatrean-escalating-puzzle-for-a-way-out-mystery/) - The electric sign reading Way Out glowed before the ascending treads of a stainless-steel escalator. Mounted on the wall beside the rising stairs were advertisements for Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Blockbuster Video, and American Pie 2. But soon those early 21st-century advertisements gave way to ones for Crystal Pepsi, Bill & Ted’s Excellent - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
The Eyes Have It!
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/03/18/this-week-on-mystery-theatrethe-eyes-have-it/) - Camera glasses like the ones featured in this week’s Mystery Theatre were a bust when Google and Snapchat tried launching them a few years back. But it seems that smart specs are returning for another try, thanks to companies like Ray-Ban and Facebook. And if they take off this time, I wonder how long we'll - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
Time-Travel Recommendations
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/03/22/this-week-on-mystery-theatretime-travel-recommendations/) - A couple of weeks ago on Prime Stage Mystery Theatre, we asked: What is your favorite time-travel story? We had already listed a dozen titles (all featured in the Mystery Theatre story "Time is Out of Joint"). You can check out our posts of March 3rd and March 8th for more information on those titles, - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
Another Door, Another Time-Travel Story
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/03/24/this-week-on-mystery-theatreanother-door-another-time-travel-story/) - Which classic time-travel device would you use to escape the clock room in Prime Stage Mystery Theatre's "Time is Out of Joint"? Find out in today’s installment, which also features some time-travel recommendations from folks active in the field of science fiction, mystery, fantasy, and horror. You can hear it all by clicking here or - [Mystery Theatre Exclusive:
Signed copies of Nightmares and Visions
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/03/29/mystery-theatre-exclusivesigned-copies-of-nightmares-and-visions/) - Gauntlet Press is now shipping the numbered edition of the first English-language release of Nightmares, an anthology in which I rejoin three of my collaborators from the feature film Nightmare Cinema (2019). The stories featured in the book are: “As You Sleep” by Mexico’s bestselling author Sandra Becerill, whose most recent books include La Soledad - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:"
The Conclusion of "Time is Out of Joint"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/03/31/this-week-on-mystery-theatrethe-conclusion-of-time-is-out-of-joint/) - In this week's episode of Mystery Theatre's "Time is Out of Joint," we explore what mystery writer August LaFleur calls “the dream hemisphere.” That is, we consider stories that “depict time travel as a state of mind rather than a mechanical process.” I’ve always been intrigued by such stories, exemplified by titles like A Christmas - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
Arsenic, Old Lace, and Obnoxious Padre
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/05/12/this-week-on-mystery-theatrearsenic-old-lace-and-obnoxious-padre/) - For a gallon of elderberry wine, I take one teaspoonful of arsenic, then add a half teaspoonful of strychnine, and then just a pinch of cyanide. That’s Aunt Martha's recipe for wine with a kick (as in kick the bucket) from Joseph Kesselring's dark-comedy classic Arsenic and Old Lace, and it's too bad Jonathan Brewster - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
The Case of the Rotating Portrait
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/05/17/this-week-on-mystery-theatre-the-case-of-the-rotating-portrait/) - You study the girl in the portrait, her face askance, as if she is in the process of turning away from the viewer. Her skin is smooth, neck slender and adorned with a ribbon, head high and capped with a bonnet. You fix your gaze, study her until, in a blink, the portrait changes. The - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
Strange Paintings and Stranger Names
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/05/19/this-week-on-mystery-theatrestrange-paintings-and-stranger-names/) - Is the woman in the portrait turning toward or away from the viewer? Is she young or is she old? And what if anything might she reveal about the name Ms. Ambertin? It’s enough to confound even a master sleuth, and yet--according to August LaFleur--everything you need to answer the questions and more may be - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
Flipping, Turning, and Rotating Clues
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/05/26/this-week-on-mystery-theatreflipping-turning-and-rotating-clues/) - The person in the picture is not standing by a lake. In fact, he isn’t standing at all—a realization that becomes obvious once the photo is rotated 90 degrees to the left, at which point we see that the boy is lying with his back to a fallen tree and a foot propped against its - [A Week of Readings:
HWA, Frankenstein, & Mystery Theatre
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/10/08/a-week-of-readingshwa-frankenstein-mystery-theatre/) - The last time I posted about the Pittsburgh Chapter of the Horror Writers Association was back in the halcyon days of 2019 (read that post here) when the effects of pandemics were relegated to films like Steven Soderbergh’s Contagion (2011) or books like John Scalzi’s Lock In (2014) and Stephen King’s The Stand (1978). Back - [New on Mystery Theatre:
Episode 1 of "In the Ghost Light's Glow"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/11/03/new-on-mystery-theatreepisode-1-of-in-the-ghost-lights-glow/) - Following a rehearsal for a play based on the life of Mary Shelley, you return to the darkened theatre to find a mysterious stranger standing on the stage. Is it a ghost? An intruder? And what does it have to do with a collection of props gathered from the theatre’s basement? One thing's for sure, - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
Listener suggestions and responses
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/11/10/this-week-on-mystery-theatrelistener-suggestions-and-responses/) - Ghost light. It’s the light in a theatre that never goes out. Some say it’s to keep ghosts away. Others claim it’s to light the stage for dead performers. Still others insist it merely provides illumination for stagehands. Whatever the case, tonight you enter a darkened theatre to find a figure standing in its glow. - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
The Most Haunted Place in Pittsburgh
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/11/17/this-week-on-mystery-theatrethe-most-haunted-place-in-pittsburgh/) - For two weeks running, audiences who attended Prime Stage Theatre's production of Frankenstein witnessed a haunting at the New Hazlett Theatre. Of course, it was part of the performance, with actor Suzanne Ward appearing as the white-clad spirit of Victor Frankenstein's mother. - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
Ghosts & Stories
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/11/22/this-week-on-mystery-theatreghosts-stories/) - In response to last week’s post "The Most Haunted Place in Pittsburgh," Facebook friend Michael Brendan informs us that his father actually had an encounter with a Playhouse ghost. “It was John,” Michael writes, referring to the ghost of deceased thespian John Johns. “Dad saw him once in the seats after a show had ended. - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
The "Three-Things" Writing Prompt
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/11/29/this-week-on-mystery-theatrethe-three-things-writing-prompt/) - Lately I’ve become a fan of crazy unrelated ideas being woven into the fabric of a story. So writes best-selling mystery writer Jordan Dane in a blog about what has been called the three-things writing prompt. It’s a great way for jumpstarting the muse, and—as it ties in with this week's episode of “In the - [Investigating a Playhouse Ghost:
What is the Sound of One Ghost Clapping?
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/02/28/investigating-a-playhouse-ghostwhat-is-the-sound-of-one-ghost-clapping/) - The story behind a real-life theatre mystery. This month's five-act installment of Prime Stage Mystery Theatre picks up where our previous story left off, with mysterious sounds emanating from somewhere in a theatre building. But before diving into this new mystery, I had the chance to meet with writer and martial arts enthusiast Michael Brendan - [Next on Mystery Theatre:
Dragons, Ciphers, & Two Locked Doors
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/02/25/next-on-mystery-theatredragons-ciphers-two-locked-doors/) - A few years ago, I discovered bats in the attic. A whole family nesting in the rafters. After consulting the local critter specialist, I learned that evicting a bat family is a bit more involved than eradicating carpenter ants. You can just exterminate them. Nor can you trap them and take them to someone else’s - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
There's Something in the Basement
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/03/02/this-week-on-mystery-theatretheres-something-in-the-basement/) - Who's there? Here's the setup: You’re in the basement of a theatre building. Alone. The rest of the company is next door, painting a set on the main stage while you hunt for something called a snow-patterned gobo. The basement is a mess. No organization. Just a chaotic jumble of old props and flats ... - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
Cracking the Code
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/03/06/this-week-on-mystery-theatrecracking-the-code/) - The irregular tapping came from the other side of the sheet-metal wall that separated Paul’s and Harold’s cell from the totally enclosed tank for desperados next door. Experimentally, Paul tapped on his side. “Twenty-three—eight-fifteen,” came the reply. Paul recognized the schoolboy’s code: one for A, two for B … twenty-three—eight-fifteen” was “Who?” That’s a rudimentary - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
Knock-Code Charts & Ancient Alphabets
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/03/13/this-week-on-mystery-theatreknock-code-charts-ancient-alphabets/) - Can the arrangement of carved squares on the front of a locked wardrobe provide a clue for decoding the tapping sounds coming from within? And what about the red-and-white dragon heads in the center of each square? Could they possibly indicate the language of the coded message? Those are just some of the questions you - [Origins of Body Horror](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/07/31/origins-of-body-horror/) - Did it begin in the 1980s? In the decade before computer-generated animation gave us morphing faces in Michael Jackson's Black or White and the fluid flesh of James Cameron's Terminator 2, cinema's masters of practical effects were busily corrupting the human form. Dick Smith gave us rippling flesh in Altered States (1980); Tom Sullivan, the - [Obscure SF Films: Part 2](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/07/25/obscure-sf-films-part-2/) - The lightning round. In my previous post, I reported on the first round of The Obscure Science Fiction Movie Game. Held on the first day of this year’s North American Science Fiction Convention, the game asked panelists to identify great-but-forgotten films. Points were awarded based on how many in the audience had seen and liked The lightning round. In my previous post, I reported on the first round of The Obscure Science Fiction Movie Game. Held on the first day of this year’s North American Science Fiction Convention, the game asked panelists to identify great-but-forgotten films. Points were awarded based on how many in the audience had seen and liked - [Obscure SF Films](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/07/21/obscure-sf-films/) - ... the search continues. The hunt for overlooked genre films (see my previous post) resumed in Buffalo, NY, when Hugo Award Winning artist Frank Wu hosted a panel on forgotten science fiction films. Held on the first day of the 16th North American Science Fiction Convention (NASFiC), the panel gave me the chance to join - [Wanted: Standalone Novels](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/07/15/wanted-standalone-novels/) - Can you find the standalone science-fiction novel? Last week's post concluded by asking, "Do you have any recent stand-alone sf books to recommend?" Alas, it seems coming up with such recommendations is not as easy as it sounds. Consider, for example, the books pictured above--seven titles I've either read or reread in preparation for a - [Great but Forgotten Films](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/07/11/great-but-forgotten-films/) - One of the “great” science fiction films I recall seeing as a kid is World Without End, a post-apocalyptic adventure in which a band of astronauts lands on a primitive planet that turns out to be Earth in the future. That’s not a spoiler. Other films might present similar surprises as twist endings, but World - [Science Fiction Summer](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/07/08/science-fiction-summer/) - Summer days. Books. Spaceships and dinosaurs. That pretty much captures my misspent youth—so much so that even now I associate lazy July afternoons with Winston juveniles, Ace paperbacks, and EC Comics. Given that association, it’s fitting that summer is the season of the Nebula Conference (which I posted about here) and the two major science - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
A Challenge to the Listener
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/03/09/this-week-on-mystery-theatrea-challenge-to-the-listener/) - It's really a simple matter. I maintain that at this point […] you have all the facts in your possession essential to a clear solution of the mystery. The mystery writing team Frederic Dannay and Manfred Bennington Lee (writing under the pseudonym Ellery Queen) used to include the above statement toward the end of their - [Overcoming Writer's Block:
Bono, R.E.M. & The Doorway Effect
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/03/27/overcoming-writers-blockbono-r-e-m-the-doorway-effect/) - Some of the best advice for overcoming writer's block comes from U2’s Bono by way of R.E.M.’s Michael Stipe. At least, I think that's the case ... though try as I might, I can't locate any record of the interview. Nor do I recall anything else said in the interview or even if I came - [This Week on Mystery Theatre:
The Language of Anglo-Saxon Ælves
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/03/20/this-week-on-mystery-theatrethe-language-of-anglo-saxon-aelves/) - This week's installment of Prime Stage Mystery Theatre includes a conversation about the Old English language with scholar and actor Patrick Conner. You can listen to an excerpt of our interview with Dr. Conner in Act IV of Mystery Theatre's "The Ælf in the Wardrobe" by clicking here or using the media player at the - [This Week on PSMT:
The Mystery of the Hidden Key
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/03/30/this-week-on-psmtthe-mystery-of-the-hidden-key/) - Last fall, in the final act of Prime Stage Mystery Theatre's "In the Ghost Light's Glow," we discovered a key inside the secret compartment of an old pencil box. Then, last week, in Act IV of “The Elf in the Wardrobe,” that key made a return appearance as our characters attempted to open a locked - [Canyon of Dreams](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/06/11/canyon-of-dream/) - If you dig it, they will come. In the early 1900s, the Union Rock Company excavated a tunnel through the base of a mountain in what was then called Brush Canyon. Their intent was to extract rock to pave the streets of LA. What they left behind was something more enduring. Over the years, the - [Putting Together A Short Fiction Collection](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/05/31/putting-together-a-short-fiction-collection/) - You’ve been writing stories. Some have appeared in magazines and anthologies. A few are still making the rounds. And a few more—possibly the best of the lot—don’t seem to be a good fit for the current markets. But one thing’s for sure. You’ve got enough for a collection. So what do you do? Next week, - [Writing & Resilience](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/05/22/writing-resilience/) - Later this morning, I'm leaving for Milford, the town where Damon Knight, James Blish, and Virginia Kidd helped establish science fiction as a respected literary genre and where The Virginia Kidd Literary Agency still operates out of Kidd's former residence. Blish and Kidd dubbed their residence Arrowhead, and during the 1960s it served as a Today I'd like to share some thoughts on Writing & Resilience from a recent TEDx event. - [Writing in Private](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/05/21/writing-in-private/) - “Writing, at its best, is a lonely life.” So said Ernest Hemingway when accepting the Nobel Prize in 1954. And yet, a few decades earlier (according to his recollections in A Moveable Feast) he wrote many of his short stories in public—surrounded by (and occasionally taking inspiration from) the strangers who came and went as Are you a private writer? Or do you like talking about your works in progress by sharing daily word counts and summaries of your recently drafted scenes? “Writing, at its best, is a lonely life.” So said Ernest Hemingway when accepting the Nobel Prize in 1954. And yet, a few decades earlier (according to his recollections in A Moveable Feast) he wrote many of his short stories in public—surrounded by (and occasionally taking inspiration from) the strangers who came and went as - [Cabrini Opens](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/03/07/cabrini-opens-friday/) - I haven’t posted in a while. There’s a reason. It’s one I’ve written about before, most recently in a piece titled Walking and Talking, in which I wrote about my inclination to focus on one thing at a time. That’s what I’ve been doing. Focusing. Following a round of meetings on a new film project - [Happy Holidays](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/12/24/happy-holidays/) - I first posted the above photo for a Christmas 2016 installment titled Santas, Wizards, & Life behind the Curtain. But the photo is older than that. From back in the 90s, when my father was enjoying a successful third act as a professional model. I believe the Santa gig was part of an ad campaign - [AFM: Breaking the Boundaries of Today's Film Marketplace](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/11/05/afm-breaking-the-boundaries-of-todays-film-marketplace/) - We used to have to go out for our entertainment, but today it's piped into our homes, taken for granted as just another utility. Given that reality, how can we make storytelling special again? - [AFM: What Do Audiences Want?](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/11/03/afm-what-do-audiences-want/) - It used to be said that laughter was the universal language. So what are we to make of the fact that American comedies don't do well world wide, and that horror appears to be the only genre that consistently performs? - [This Week at AFM](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/10/31/this-week-at-afm/) - This week, filmmakers from around the world are heading to Santa Monica to attend the American Film Market. According to their official website, “AFM is the premier film acquisition, development, and networking event where more than $1 Billion in distribution and film financing deals are closed each year on completed films and those in every This week, filmmakers from around the world are heading to Santa Monica to attend the American Film Market. - [An Interview with Sheldon Higdon](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/09/11/an-interview-with-sheldon-higdon/) - Halloween is coming, and to help get us in the mood, Sheldon Higdon's Middle-Grade novel The Eerie Brothers and the Witches of Autumn is now available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or your favorite bookseller. New York Times best-selling author Jonathan Maberry calls it "a fun, freaky, and frightening novel," and if Sheldon's previous works Halloween is coming, and to help get us in the mood, Sheldon Higdon's Middle-Grade novel The Eerie Brothers and the Witches of Autumn is now available. - [An Interview with Michael Libling](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/08/21/an-interview-with-michael-libling/) - Ever wondered if murder is a genetic? Michael Libling has, and the result is a serial-killer novel unlike any you have read. - [AI: The Future is Now](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/08/07/ai-the-future-is-now/) - Sometime in the 21st century, human actors and writers will become obsolete. Movies, television shows, and even stage plays will be performed by automatons, created from scans of the world’s top human performers, and controlled by programs that have replaced human writers and directors. Sometime in the 21st century, human actors and writers will become obsolete. Movies, television shows, and even stage plays will be performed by automatons, created from scans of the world’s top human performers, and controlled by programs that have replaced human writers and directors. - [Same Site, New Design](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/08/01/same-site-new-design/) - Designed for viewing on a variety of platforms, this site’s new fluid-grid design should make for easy viewing on a variety of screen sizes. - [This Way to Egress: Monster Performances](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/06/27/this-way-to-egress-monster-performences/) - [This is the fifth in a series of posts on the filming of the "This Way to Egress" segment of Nightmare Cinema. The film is available for free on Freevee and Tubi or to rent or own on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu.] Creating the monsters in “This Way to Egress” was a team effort. Starting - [Voices & Music at Jozart Center for the Arts: A Stoker Homecoming](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/04/03/voices-music-at-jozart-center-for-the-arts-a-stoker-homecoming/) - What is the sound of horror? We explored the question at last week’s World Horror Convention in Salt Lake City, with a multi-media reading from Voices: Tales of Horror. As part of the on-going 21st-Century Scop project, the presentation featured prose selections set to the music of Veins: The Soundtrack. This week, the exploration continues at - [Dancing in the Headlights](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/08/06/dancing-in-the-headlights/) - That's just one of the topics that Greg Hall and I talked about during a fast hour of conversation on Friday’s installment of The Funky Werepig Show. If you didn’t get a chance to tune in to the live podcast, you can download the full interview here. The Funky Werepig Show – August 4, 2012 Along the way, we - [Coming Soon: Rock On!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/07/06/coming-soon-rock-on/) - The Greatest Science Fiction & Fantasy Hits Edited by Paula Guran and coming this fall from Prime Books, the World Fantasy Award-Winning publisher of science fiction and fantasy. Kick out the jams with hot licks and fantastic riffs on rock and roll from the only kind of fiction that feeds the soul: science fiction and - [Have Stories: Will Travel](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/10/27/have-stories-will-travel/) - Continuing the tradition of the traveling bard, the 21st Century Scop will be hitting the road this week, heading off to England to give readings at the University of Brighton on Wednesday, October 30 (5:30 PM), and then at the World Fantasy Convention’s Reading Café on Saturday, November 2 (12:30 PM). If you’re going to - [Spotlight on All-Star Storytellers:
Joe Coluccio
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/12/21/spotlight-on-all-star-storytellers-joe-coluccio/) - The Twelve Days of Story Night continues with a spotlight on another one this year's top storytellers: Joe Coluccio. Truly a man for all seasons, Joe is currently the President of Parsec, Pittsburgh's premier science fiction organization, founded to promote awareness of all aspects of the speculative fiction genre. As part of its mission, Parsec annually - [All-Star Night:
When Scops Come Out to Shine
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/12/31/all-star-nightwhen-scops-come-out-to-shine/) - scop (skop) — n (in Anglo-Saxon England) a bard or minstrel In addition to being an entertainer who composed and performed his own works, the scop served as a kind of historian and preserver of the oral tradition […]. -- Encyclopedia Britannica, 2008. If Riley's Pour House is continuing the tradition of the Anglo-Saxon meed-hall by - [In Praise of Indie Bookstores](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/09/25/in-praise-of-indie-bookstores/) - You walk inside. Right away you sense you’ve arrived someplace special. Books fill the aisles, stacked on a combination of antique, handmade, and prefab shelves. And there’s art, lots of it: on the walls, tables, and even painted directly onto the chairs. But best of all, you’re greeted by someone who knows books – a - [21st Century Scop does Horror Realm](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/03/11/21st-century-scop-does-horror-realm/) - The undead sure know how to party. I’ve just returned from Horror Realm, where I shared billing with John Amplas (Martin), Mike Christopher (Dawn of the Dead), and Kyra Schon (Night of the Living Dead). Also in attendance were Chris Rickert (Eljay’s Books), Tiffany Apan, and lots and lots of zombies. Primarily a media convention, - [Sounding the Depths](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/04/16/sounding-the-depths/) - World Horror fans give the V-sign at Voices & Music reading. Sounding the depths. That’s what I call it. It’s that phase of the writing process that exists apart from lived experience, the time when (as Wordsworth said) the stuff of life can be “recollected in tranquility.” I’m currently spending a good bit of my - [Twilight Zone Magazine Remembered: Then & Now @ WFC 2012](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/11/09/twilight-zone-magazine-remembered-then-now-wfc-2012/) - Last Thursday I returned to the Twilight Zone. But I didn’t go alone. Also along for the journey were Scott Edelman, Nancy Baker, Darrell Schweitzer, and Elizabeth Hand – fellow contributors to Rod Serling's Twilight Zone Magazine, the legendary publication that dominated the fantasy landscape in the 1980s Christopher Roden of Ash-Tree Press introduced our panel at - [Between Books](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/03/13/3127/) - They say you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone. That’s generally true, but there are exceptions . . . and Between Books is one of them. You see, I knew from the first time I stepped inside that I had found someplace remarkable. Between Books is a real book store. Within its long - [Biggest 'Ah-Ha!' Moments in Writing](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/06/07/biggest-ah-ha-moments-in-writing/) - Once upon a time I was working on a story about a kid with an imaginary friend. The first few pages seemed to write themselves, but then everything stalled. I had no idea where the thing was going, only that it wasn’t in the direction I had intended. For nearly a week I wrestled with - [Rhonda Libbey to Illustrate Vortex](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/06/12/rhonda-libbey-to-illustrate-vortex/) - Fantasist Enterprises has announced the artist for their upcoming release of my next novel Vortex: Book Three of the Veins Cycle. Here's an excerpt from today's press release: We’re [...] pleased to be adding to the FE family with Pittsburgh artist Rhonda Libbey, whose wonderful art will help bring the final arc of the cycle - [Fantastic Fiction at the KGB](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/06/16/fantastic-fiction-at-the-kgb/) - “Admission is free, drinks are cheap and strong, and the level of excellence is such that KGB has been named best literary venue in New York City by New York Magazine, the Village Voice, and everyone else who bestows these awards of recognition.” That description is right from the source, Denis Woyochuk, co-founder and president - [Time Management for Writers](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/07/03/time-management-for-writers/) - Writing is all about anticipation. A writer spends months writing a book that might see publication in a year, might garner good reviews sometime after that, and eventually – over the course of a decade – might contribute to a body of work that will define a career. It is, as fantasy author Jim C. - [GoingLIVE with the 21st-Century Scop](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/07/28/goinglive-with-the-21st-century-scop/) - Fiction, art, and the pending release of Vortex: Book Three of the Veins Cycle -- those are just some of the things publisher Will Horner and I talked about in our recent interview on FCTV. The episode was conducted in conjunction with Seton Hill University and the In Your Write Mind Workshops that we both - [The Portal Opens: GenCon Preview, Part 2](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/08/13/the-portal-opens-gencon-preview-part-2/) - The portal opens, and for one week the city changes, reality morphs, fantasy rules. The event is GenCon, the massive fantasy and science fiction gaming convention that takes over Indianapolis each August. Attendance this year is projected to break past records, which were well beyond 40,000 attendees. Part of the event is the GenCon Writer’s - [The Stars Align](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/10/19/the-stars-align/) - I’ve just heard from a good friend who has a membership to the World Fantasy Convention in Brighton. The convention sold out over six months ago, and since then memberships to the international gathering of writers, editors, publishers and fans have been trading like stock futures. If you’re interested in fantastic literature, WFC is definitely - [Fantasy, SF, and Horror @ Rickert & Beagle](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/08/02/fantasy-sf-and-horror-rickert-beagle/) - Join Michael Arnzen, Stephanie Wytovich and Lawrence Connolly for a reading and booksigning at Rickert & Beagle Books — Pittsburgh’s awesome new bookstore for fantasy, science-fiction and horror fiction — at 2pm on August 2nd, 2014. If you haven’t been to the store yet, this is a great opportunity to check it out. Peter S. Beagle (author of The Last Unicorn) and . . - [Taken Out of Context](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/30/taken-out-of-context/) - Context always ends too soon. Three amazing days of panels, readings, special events, and networking -- and suddenly it's over for another year. Alas! I've been attending since 2007, and in that time Context has become one of my favorite regional SF cons. It's a small affair with big ambitions, and it always manages to - [Rocking the Pour House:
A Great Way to Spend a Friday Night
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/01/17/rocking-the-pour-housea-great-way-to-spend-a-friday-night/) - Riley's Pour House just keeps getting better. Since Jim and Cheryl Riley took over a few years back, the pub has become a mecca for people who love fun times and good music . . . and last night was no exception. My good friend Duane Davis joined me on bass and backing vocals. We've been - [The Brighton Readings: Part Two](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/11/10/the-brighton-readings-part-two-2/) - Long ago, when I was first entertaining notions of sharing my stories with a wide audience, I came across a passage in Ben Bova's Notes to a Science Fiction Writer. It describes a photograph that he saw in a book titled The Faces of Man. Bova writes: [The photograph] shows an African village, where most - [Binge Reading: The Veins-Cycle Challenge](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/01/31/binge-reading-the-veins-cycle-challenge/) - Last week, when Google Play announced that they were reducing the prices on all three Veins Cycle Books, I posted the following comment on the Fantasist Enterprises Facebook page: I'd love to hear from someone who dives in and reads (or re-reads) the entire cycle straight through, letting the central narrative unfold in real time. Well, yesterday - [New Release: Gaslight Arcanum](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/09/14/new-release/) - Sherlock Holmes plunges from Reichenbach Falls and wakes to find himself in the care of a mysterious inventor with a terrible secret in my new dark mystery story “The Executioner,” out now in Gaslight Arcanum, the third in a series of Holmes anthologies from Charles Prepolec, Jeff Campbell, and the good people at Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy. - [Upcoming Appearances](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/10/18/upcoming-appearances-4/) - Saturday, October 29 6:00 - 8:00 PM Edge Publishing Book Launch World Fantasy Convention Town and Country Resort 500 Hotel Circle North San Diego, CA I'll be reading from "The Executioner," one of the featured stories in Gaslight Arcanum: Uncanny Tales of Sherlock Holmes. If you're going to be attending the con, please plan to join - [Many Genres: One of This Year's 10 Terrific Writing Books](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/11/09/many-genres-one-of-this-years-10-terrific-writing-books/) - The December 2011 issue of Writer Magazine has named Many Genres, One Craft:Lessons in Writing Popular Fiction (Headline Books, Inc.) one of this year's 10 Terrific Writing Books. Using a compilation of instructional articles penned by well-known authors affiliated with Seton Hill University's acclaimed MFA program in Writing Popular Fiction, the book emphasizes how to write - [Hear the Voices!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/01/02/hear-the-voices/) - What people are saying about Voices: Tales of Horror “. . . eleven previously published short stories and a pair of originals, all in [Connolly’s] trademark style of thoughtful horror.” —Publishers Weekly “Connolly is a master of the short story. He writes with an economy that hums with the quiet power of a finely-tuned engine. - [Upcoming Appearance: Horror Realm](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/03/07/upcoming-appearance-horror-realm/) - Horror Realm is a media convention with a nice roster of people affiliated with the horror film industry. Here is the information from their website: Saturday, March 10 Crowne Plaza Pittsburgh South Bethel Park, PA Lawrence C. Connolly Panel Moderator: Chris Rickert, co-owner of Eljay’s Books Join the 21st Century Scop in exploring media, music and literature. - [Day of the Dancing Dead](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/09/22/day-of-the-dancing-dead/) - Crowne Plaza, Pittsburgh South: 164 Fort Couch Road Pittsburgh, PA 15241 412-833-5300 - $15 single day (Friday or Saturday). Includes admission to after hour events on the day of the ticket purchase. Excludes VIP event. - $35 weekend pass. Includes admission all three days of the convention and after hour events. Excludes VIP event. - - [Stories in the Songs](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/10/17/stories-in-the-songs/) - This Saturday, October 20, I'll be returning to Riley's Pour House for another night of stories and songs. If you live around Pittsburgh and you haven't discovered Riley's, you're missing out on the pub that Pittsburgh Magazine has identified as one of the best around. Great food, terrific people . . . and lots of music. - [Writing Popular Fiction @ SHU](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/01/01/writing-popular-fiction-shu/) - I'll soon be heading out to my twice-a-year residency at Seaton Hill University. This term I'll be speaking about Current Trends in Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror (January 6) and The Art of Revision (January 9). Full report coming soon! - [
The Prousting of Axle
Day 1 of the Veins Blog Tour](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/05/the-prousting-of-axleday-1-of-the-veins-blog-tour/) - If you've been thinking about reading Veins, now's the time to grab a copy. For the next five days, the ebook edition will be on sale for $0.99 at Fantasist Enterprises, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo. To coincide with the sale, I'll be doing a series of guest blogs and events at some of my favorite websites, starting - [
Instigation Showcase
Day 3 of the Veins Blog Tour](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/08/instigation-showcaseday-3-of-the-veins-blog-tour/) - Michael A. Arnzen's website Gorelets.com is always brimming with terrific writing advice. That's not surprise, given that Mike is both a founder of Seton Hill University's graduate program in Writing Popular Fiction and the author of the book Instigation: Creative Prompts on the Dark Side. Instigation is a treasury of over 500 tips, scenarios and sparks - [
Join Me in the Madhouse
Day 4 of the Veins Blog Tour](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/08/join-me-in-the-madhouseday-4-of-the-veins-blog-tour/) - Yes, this really is Day 4, just as my previous post (also dated September 8) really was Day 3. It seems the date in my Wordpress settings went a little crazy and moved to another time zone. But it's all corrected now. Amazing what a little revision can do. Which bring us to the topics of - [
The Prousting of Samuelle Calder
Day 7 of the Veins Blog Tour](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/11/the-prousting-of-samuelle-calderday-6-of-the-veins-blog-tour-2/) - I hope you grabbed your copy of Veins while the e-book edition was on sale for $0.99 at FE, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo. The sale has officially ended, but a check of the sites indicates that the discount is still listed at all but Kobo . . . so there's still time (though I can't say how much). If you want a - [This Week at PARSEC:
Dreams, Memory, & Time Travel
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/04/07/this-week-at-parsec-dreams-memory-time-travel/) - This week I'll be appearing at PARSEC for a discussion of dreams, memories and a form of everyday time travel that speaks to something central to the human condition . . . and the nature of story. PARSEC, an active contributor to Pittsburgh's literary scene, is a non-profit organization promoting science fiction, fantasy, and horror in literature, media and - [Returning to Riley's Pour House on June 13](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/06/01/returning-to-rileys-pour-house-on-june-13/) - Save the date! I'll be returning to Riley's with Duane Davis, Lauren Connolly Moore, and friends on Saturday, June 13. Show starts at 8:00 PM. Come early. Stay late. And expect the unexpected. In the photo: Tommy B. (in front), Lauren Connolly Moore, Duane Davis, and the 21st-Century Scop. See you there! - [Seaton Hill Workshops @ WPF & IYWM](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/06/25/seaton-hill-workshops-wpf-iywm/) - The 21st-Century Scop is at Seton Hill University this week, giving presentations on The Art of Revision and The Shortest Stories Every Written. "Revision" comes first, offered on Thursday at 1:00 PM as part of SHU's graduate program in Writing Popular Fiction. "The Shortest Stories." follows on Friday at 11:00 AM, presented by In Your Write Mind, a - [Parade Day & St. Patrick's Day Shows](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/03/05/parade-day-st-patricks-day-shows/) - March 11 (Parade Day) 6:00 – 7:30: Riley's Pub Stage with bassist Duane Davis. 8:00 – 10:00: Riley's Pub Stage with bassist Duane Davis and vocalist-mandolinist Lauren Connolly-Moore. March 17 (St. Patrick’s Day) 5:00 – 7:30: Riley's Garden Center Stage. 8:00 – 11:00: Riley's Pub Stage with bassist Duane Davis. March 18 8:00 – 11:00: Riley's Pub Stage with - [A Place at the Table with
Lawrence M. Schoen & "Eating Authors"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/12/18/a-place-at-the-table-with-lawrence-m-schoen-eating-authors-2/) - One of the more interesting blog themes to come down the pike in recent years is Lawrence M. Schoen's Eating Authors, which features some of the biggest names in fantasy and sf reminiscing about memorable meals. Since launching the blog in 2011, Schoen has featured hundreds of stories by the likes of Gregory Benford, Brenda - [Hearing Voices:
Recorded Live at Fantastic Fiction @ KGB
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/07/03/hearing-voices-recorded-live-at-fantastic-fiction-kgb/) -  The audio from my June 20 KGB appearance with Mary Robinette Kowal is available now. It features the stories "Aberrations," "Step on a Crack," and "Prime Time!" (all from the collection Visions: Short Fantasy & SF) and an excerpt from "Siren" (the bonus story from new digital edition of Voices: Tales of Horror). For her part, Mary Robinette Kowel - [Unfolding:
New SciFi Horror on The Wicked Library
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/12/17/unfoldingnew-scifi-horror-on-the-wicked-library/) - It seemed a harmless obsession, folding paper into hollow spheres, pyramids, and stars. But the administrators feared the power of his art. He had to be stopped. To save the world. To save himself. Hear the complete story on Season 11 of The Wicked Library, available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Podchaser, Stitcher, or - [Up-Coming Appearances](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/07/04/191/) - July 08, 2011 7:00 PM Borders Books & Music 4221 Concord Pike Wilmington, DE 19803 Join me for an exploration of the art of revision and steps that turn drafts into published stories. Prizes will be awarded. A book signing will follow. [More at Borders.com] July 09, 2011 12:00 Noon Garden State Horror Writers East - [Last Weekend @ Riley's:
The St. Patrick's Day Shows
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/03/25/last-weekend-rileysthe-st-patricks-day-shows/) - Pittsburgh’s still the best place to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day. That’s according to Niche.com, which places the Burg ahead of Boston (the city that held its first St. Patrick’s Day Parade in 1737) and Chicago (where they dye the Chicago River green in the saint’s honor). Pittsburgh’s Parade Day traditions might be younger than Boston’s, - [What Riley's Scops Talk About . . .
When They Talk About Love
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/02/26/what-rileys-scops-talk-about-when-they-talk-about-love/) - The polar vortex didn't keep story lovers from turning out at this month's storytelling night at Riley's Pour House. If you were there, you know firsthand how thoroughly the act of storytelling can warm a frigid night. If you didn't attend, and you live anywhere in the Pittsburgh area, you owe it to yourself to - [Storytelling @ Riley's Pour House:
Weddings, Baseball, & Other May Rituals
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/05/25/storytelling-rileys-may-26/) - Who doesn't have a baseball or a wedding story? We'll find out when Storytelling at Riley's returns Tuesday, May 26. We're currently taking advance signup for storytelling. If you have a story to share, we’d love to add you to our roster of storytellers. Send emails to: the21stcenturyscop@yahoo.com You can also leave a post on - [This Week @ KGB: We'll Take Manhattan](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/09/14/this-week-kgb-well-take-manhattan/) - Trust me, you won't want to miss this month's installment of Fantastic Fiction at the KGB. The place has been named the best literary venue in New York City by New York Magazine, the Village Voice, and others. And since the 1990s, the Fantastic Fiction Series has been the premier showcase for live readings in the sf/f/h genre. - [Teaming Up for NIGHTMARE CINEMA](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/11/07/teaming-up-for-nightmare-cinema/) - This Way to Egress, a script that I've co-written with David Slade (Hannibal, 30 Days of Night), goes into production early next year. It's based on my short story "Traumatic Descent." Yes, I'm jazzed about this. Here's the press release from Daily Dead: Press Release: LOS ANGELES, CA, Nov. 6, 2015 – Ten years after launching - [Fantasia Film Festival & Nightmare Cinema](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/05/05/fantasia-film-festival-nightmare-cinema/) -  This summer, Nightmare Cinema will have its long anticipated premiere at the Fantasia Film Festival in Montreal. I'll be posting more about this prestigious unveiling in the days ahead, but -- for now -- here's a brief description from the Festival's Facebook page: Five Forces of Fear Come Together for A Terrifying Dose of - [A Weekend of Fiction and Music](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/09/27/a-weekend-of-fiction-and-music/) - The latest installment of Context is shaping up to be one of the best ever. In addition to conducting two of my favorite writing workshops, I’ll be moderating music-and-fiction themed panels with Alex Bledsoe (Fantasy Guest of Honor), L. E. Modesitt (Con Guest of Honor) Bill and Brenda Sutton (Musical Guests of Honor), and Tom - [An Evening of Nightmares](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/06/12/an-evening-of-nightmares/) - With the theatrical release of the new anthology film Nightmare Cinema just over a week away, Cranked-Up Films and Shudder are launching An Evening of Nightmares -- a curated screening series that, according to a recent article at Deadline.com, "centers on filmmakers showcasing their own work and the work of their creative influences." Scheduled for June - [Bracing for Nightmare Cinema:
This Week & Beyond
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/06/17/bracing-for-nightmare-cinemathis-week-beyond/) - This week, five strangers will enter an abandoned theater to watch their darkest fears play out before them. And you can join them. It all kicks off this Thursday, June 20, when the cast and crew of Nightmare Cinema gather at the historic Hayworth Theatre (2511 Wilshire Blvd) for a special pre-release screening of the - [HWA Pittsburgh:
Gearing Up for StokerCon® 2023
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/04/03/hwa-pittsburghgearing-up-for-stokercon-2023/) - Last week I got the chance to hang with some of my favorite writers and aficionados of horror and dark fantasy when the Pittsburgh Chapter of the Horror Writers Association gathered at the Sheridan Inn at Station Square to tour the site of this year's StokerCon®. Above: Members of the Pittsburgh Chapter of the Horror - [This Way to Egress: Looking Back](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/06/01/this-way-to-egress-looking-back/) - Mick Garris’s anthology film Nightmare Cinema was released to theatres four years ago this month, with premiere events held at The Dynasty Typewriter and Arena Cinelounce in LA, the Frida Cinema in Santa Ana, the Parkway Theatre in Pittsburgh, and others. I covered those events in previous blog posts, along with accounts of earlier festival - [Tonight: Live on Stage](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/11/06/tonight-live-on-stage/) - Join us for the opening night performance of Karloff: The Man and the Monster by Randy Bowser. The curtain rises at 8:00 PM at Pittsburgh's New Hazlett Theatre. After the show, I’ll be joining Director Art DeConciliis and Producing Artistic Director Wayne Brinda for a discussion of the show and next season's premiere of Frankenstein. - [Upcoming Appearances](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/09/19/upcoming-appearances-3/) - September 24, 3:00 PM Eljay's Books 3233 West Liberty Avenue Pittsburgh, PA 15216 I'm really looking forward to this one. It's my penultimate event for 2011, winding down a tour of eight states that started with the International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts in Orlando this past spring and concluding next month with World Fantasy - [Book Miles](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/07/10/book-miles/) - So here’s a question: how important are live events in the marketing of books? I trust everyone reading this blog is a book reader and buyer, and many of you are writers as well. So what do you think? Do the wonders of Social Media make is possible for a writer to rely on virtual - [Book Miles: GenCon & Beyond](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/08/14/book-miles-gencon-beyond/) - I’m back from GenCon. This year the con at large attracted well over 30,000 paid members, with its con-within-a-con The GenCon Writer’s Symposium bringing in nearly 3,000 attendees for its 77 scheduled panels, readings, and workshops. This year’s roster of attending sf/f/h professionals included Maurice Broaddus, Jerry Gordon, Bill Fawcett, Jean Rabe, Jason Sizemore, Michael Stackpole, - [The Writer & Social Media](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/07/26/the-writer-social-media/) - Virtual Panel: Robert, J. Sawyer, Jonathan Maberry, Heidi Ruby Miller, Matt Schwartz, S. J. Browne, Jon Sprunk This summer I’ve moderated two panels on social media. The first was at last month’s Bram Stoker Weekend in New York. The second was this month at Confluence in Pittsburgh. Both panels considered how social media can - [Airships and Sherlock Holmes](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/10/22/airships-and-sherlock-holmes/) - The master sleuth and Master of the World. What’s not to love? The World Fantasy Convention has just released its program schedule for 2011, one that offers an impressive blend of topics centering on this year’s theme: Sailing the Seas of Imagination. At the con, I’ll be joining a discussion about airships and reading from my latest Sherlock Holmes - [Everything you want to know about writing ... and then some.](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/01/15/everything-you-want-to-know-about-writing-and-then-some/) - Any questions? Lots of presenters conclude with that phrase. I’m different. I like to start with it. The strategy may not be as harebrained as it sounds. I’ll explain. I’ve just returned from my biannual residency in Writing Popular Fiction at Seton Hill University, where I always open my presentations by passing out index - ["Dramatize it! Dramatize it!"](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/01/18/dramatize/) - In my previous post I promised to spend time responding to questions submitted during my most recent presentation on “The Art of Revision” at Seton Hill University. If you want to know more about the backstory, please take a look at that previous post, otherwise . . . read on! The next question in my stack - [Beyond the Walls of Horror](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/02/05/beyond-the-walls-of-horror/) - Horror isn’t a genre. It’s an ingredient. A seasoning. Such things have been pointed out before, most notably by Douglas Winter in Revelations (1997), but a quick look at this year’s Bram Stoker Award™ Preliminary Ballot shows that it bears repeating. This year the short-fiction jury has selected three strong works from mainstream publications, Ramona - [Communing with the Masters](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/02/19/communing-with-the-masters/) - It’s about community, not competition. A number of people have submitted emails in response to the news post I put up yesterday, and some have asked about the meaning of the Dante quote: e più d’onore ancora assai mi fenno, ch’e’ sì mi fecer de la loro schiera . . . The lines are from - [Off to Salt Lake City . . . and the Stokers!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/03/27/off-to-the-salt-lake-city-and-the-stokers/) - Utah! Home of the Sundance Film Festival, the Bingham Canyon Mine, and – this year – the Bram Stoker Awards. My interest in surface mines is obvious, given the setting for the Veins Cycle, but this year's big draw in Utah is the World Horror Convention, where I’ll be doing a number of book and media events later this - [Back to the Pour House](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/06/12/back-to-the-pour-house/) - I’ll be taking a break from writing Vortex: Book 3 of the Veins Cycle to play a return engagement at Riley’s Pour House this Saturday, June 16. If you’re coming, you can expect four sets of Irish and American music – and a few surprises. You see, I like mixing things up. I love the trad tunes, - [Monster Wrangled!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/06/23/monster-wrangled/) - Mission accomplished . . . but of course I had expert help from the fourteen talented writers who attended the presentation. Together, we considered how to effectively present strange creatures in genre fiction. With a nod to Christopher Priest’s novel The Prestige, the discussion explored how some of the most effective monster scenes in science - [Monster Wrangling](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/06/18/monster-wrangling/) - We all do it. Metaphorically, at least. Life sends us challenges, and we do our best to work them into submission (writers will note the intended pun). The writing life is full of such challenges, and I’ll be talking about some of them this week when I begin my summer residency at Seton Hill University, where - [Your Favorite Genre Song?](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/09/03/your-favorite-genre-song/) - The forthcoming publication of Rock On: the Greatest Hits of Science Fiction and Fantasy has me contemplating some of the great rock ‘n roll genre songs. There certainly is a ton of them. Science fiction? How about David Bowie’s “Space Oddity,” Genesis’s “The Return of the Giant Hogweed,” or Mastadon’s album-length epic Crack the Skye? - [Horror Songs @ Horror Realm](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/09/19/horror-songs-horror-realm/) - I saw Lawrence Connolly do a one-man performance called "Songs of the Horror Writer" equipped with nothing but a guitar and a microphone. He sang songs about Lizzie Borden and insects and crimes of passion...and everybody loved it. It was a hilarious subversion of the con's filk programming. -- Michael A. Arnzen Michael Arnzen made - [Zombie Gumby Endorses Voices](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/09/25/zombie-gumby-endorses-voices/) - It’s true. And if you were at Horror Realm this weekend, you can vouch for me. But the real highlight for me was the chance to get together with people like Chris Rickert of Eljay’s Books (the best bookstore in Pittsburgh), Paul Anderson and Eric Beebe of Post Mortem Press, and writers like the Rhysling-Award - [Remembering Twilight Zone Magazine @ World Fantasy 2012](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/10/30/remembering-twilight-zone-magazine-world-fantasy-2012/) - The big news today might be Frankenstorm, but once that monster blows through, I’m hoping to head north for something bigger. This year, Toronto will be playing host to The World Fantasy Convention, an international gathering of writers, editors, scholars, readers, and others associated with all aspects of fantastic literature. This year, my first big - [When you look into this book . . .](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/11/23/when-you-look-into-this-book/) - . . . it looks into you. For their new anthology, the good people at Post-Mortem Press have assembled an impressive lineup of writers who’ve made careers probing the depths of human existence, with editor Eric Beebe challenging each to examine the intersection between science fiction and horror. In the publisher’s words: The search for knowledge and - [Among the Sports Writers and Historians: Books in the Burgh](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/12/01/among-the-sports-writers-and-historians-books-in-the-burgh/) - I'll be signing books at his year's Books in the Burgh event at the Heinz History Museum in Pittsburgh. The fun starts at 10 a.m. on Saturday, December 1, and runs until 3 p.m. The museum books store has plenty of copies of Veins, Vipers, Visions, Voices, and This Way to Egress on hand. I'll - [Looking ahead to The Next Big Thing.](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/01/13/looking-ahead-to-the-next-big-thing/) - Two months ago, as Frankenstorm raged through the region and I was steeling myself for a rainy journey north to World Fantasy in Toronto, my good friend Stephen Volk (award-winning screenwriter of Ghostwatch and The Awakening) asked me if I wanted to take part on The Next Big Thing. Alas, I had too much on my - [The Next Big Thing (Part 2)](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/01/17/the-next-big-thing-part-2/) - If you read my previous post, you know that my good friend Alice Henderson has tagged me in The Next Big Thing blog-hop, and now it’s my turn to respond. Here we go! What is the working title of your book? Right now it’s titled Vortex, although there is a good chance the title will - [The 21st Century Scop @ SHU](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/04/12/the-21st-century-scop-shu/) - This week the 21st-Century Scop visited Seton Hill University, where four-time Bram Stoker Award winning author Michael A. Arnzen teaches an undergraduate class in horror writing. The students are currently working on horror-related media projects, and Michael invited me to drop by to talk about plugging-in the ancient art of storytelling. It was a great - [Report from the KGB](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/06/23/report-from-the-kgb/) - From the outside it looks like a redbrick townhouse, with only a small sign above the door to let us know we’ve arrived at the KGB Bar – the place that both New York Magazine and the Village Voice have named the best literary venue in New York. The doors are likewise unremarkable, opening to - [30 Years in the Zone](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/07/02/30-years-in-the-zone/) - I used to spend a lot of time in New York, crashing at the Hotel Chelsea where my brother had an apartment. It was the same place where Arthur C. Clarke wrote 2001: A Space Odyssey and Sid Vicious lived and died. That was some 30 years ago, and there was a bit of edgy - [Supporting the Mead-Hall](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/07/15/supporting-the-mead-hall/) - The fantasy genre first found its voice in the mead halls, gathering places where traveling scops told tales of heroes, monsters, and adventures in distant lands. Today, the tradition of live storytelling continues every fourth Wednesday when fantastic fiction lovers gather for Fantastic Fiction at the KGB Bar, at 85 East Fourth Street in New - [The Connolly Brothers Reunion @ Riley's: Looking back at then from now.](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/07/07/the-connolly-brothers-reunion-rileys-looking-back-at-then-from-now/) - “. . . looking back at then from now.” That’s a line from “Leaves and Dust,” a song that my brothers and I performed back in our folk-rock salad days. The lyric makes a pretty good tagline for today’s post. (And you can hear our vintage recording of the song by clicking on the link - [Guest Scop: Stephanie M. Wytovich](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/07/22/guest-scop-stephanie-m-wytovich/) - In my previous post I talked about the mead-hall, its place in the history of fantastic literature, and how its tradition continues today in places such as the KGB Bar in New York. But for the scops of the 21st century, the mead-hall need not be a physical location. It can be any place where - [The Portal Closes: Looking Back @ GenCon](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/08/23/the-portal-closes-looking-back-gencon/) - Imagine 50,000 people packed into a single indoor space. Now add a 20-foot tall Cthulhu (made entirely of balloons), a Stay Puft Marshmallow Man (in a top hat, no less), armies of warriors and monsters, and a roster of top sf and fantasy writers. Yes, it got crowded. But that’s GenCon. Never mind that the - [A Season for Book Events](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/09/21/a-great-season-for-book-events/) - Some of the best book-related events seem to come in the fall and early winter. It certainly has something to do with promoting book purchases for holiday giving, but I suspect it’s also related to the changing weather and the need to stock up on books before falling temperatures drive us indoors. The 20th Century - [Book City](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/10/02/book-city/) - I sometimes get the feeling that we book people are citizens of a kind of portable municipality, a diffused city that reforms around various conventions, conferences, festivals, symposiums, and literary events. We’re united by the love of story, the feel of books, and the knowledge that vicarious experience can be as meaningful and real as - [Putting the Flash in Fiction](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/10/06/putting-the-flash-in-fiction/) - What makes for a good flash fiction story? The answer is elusive, even though we know the good stories when we read them. They’re the ones that grab our attention, hold our interest, and conclude with a punch. But there’s more to it than that. There always is. Next week, I’ll be giving a presentation - [The Shortest Flashes Ever Written, or . . . How Short is Short-Short?](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/10/26/the-shortest-flashes-ever-written-or-how-short-is-short-short/) - In an earlier post, I shared my thoughts on “Bedtime Story” by Jeffrey Whitmore – a short-short story that weighs in at a flyweight 55 words. Since then, I have given flash fiction presentations at PAISTA and in my advanced writing class at Sewickley Academy – both of which have given me the opportunity to - [The Brighton Readings: Part Three . . . Ghettos, Universities, Feesters, & Wonder](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/11/16/the-brighton-readings-part-three-ghettos-universities-feesters-wonder/) - I was standing on the side of a multi-tiered lecture hall at the University of Brighton when Gina Wisker, one of my hosts for the evening, snapped the picture on the left. I didn't see her take it. I was preoccupied with the stories I was going to present that night, queuing them in memory, - [Chris Shearer: Celebrating The First](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/01/13/chris-shearer-celebrating-the-first/) - When working on important projects, I like to pull the plugs as much as possible, disengaging the social media distractions that (for me at least) tend to derail the creative process. As a result, this is my first post since November. But it’s for a good cause. This week took me back to Greensburg for - [Martin Springett: The River of Stars Suite](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/04/05/martin-springett-the-river-of-stars-suite/) - As any book lover knows, the reading experience goes beyond words on the page. It starts with the cover, which can (when properly rendered) do more than attract potential buyers. In the hands of a master, a good cover – like any work of art – informs in subtle ways that change and grow richer - [Veins: Book One - The Cycle Continues](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/05/10/veins-book-one-of-the-veins-cycle/) - Early next week, Veins: Book One of the Veins Cycle (Fantasist Enterprises, 2008), will make its long awaited debut in ebook format. It's going to be quite an edition, retaining all the original illustrations from the printed book, plus some bonus material in support of the upcoming ebook release of Vipers (coming June 11) and the - [Writers on Writing @ Riley’s:
An Evening of 21st-Century Scops
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/05/17/writers-on-writing-rileys-an-evening-of-21st-century-scops/) - Long before the age of books, radio, television, YouTube, and Kindle, the public house served as the center of entertainment, the place where people heard the great storytellers of their age, fantasists who sang tales of heroes and monsters, gods and demons. No doubt, if the ancient scops were alive today, they’d be writing fantasy, - [Randall Silvis:
One of the Writers on Writing @ Riley’s
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/05/18/randall-silvis-one-of-the-writers-on-writing-rileys/) - The first in a series of profiles on some of the writers being featured at this month's Writers on Writing @ Riley's. Hailed as "a masterful storyteller" by the New York Times Book Review, Randall Silvis is the author of fourteen critically acclaimed books of fiction and nonfiction in various genres. A former contributing writer - [Stephanie M. Wytovich:
One of the Writers on Writing @ Riley’s
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/05/22/stephanie-m-wytovichone-of-the-writers-on-writing-rileys/) - Just returned from the World Horror Convention in Portland, where her critically acclaimed book Hysteria was a finalist for the Bram Stoker Award, Stephanie M. Wytovich will be bringing her distinctive blend of madness and the macabre to this month's story night at Riley's Pour House. Followers of this blog may recall Stephanie's guest appearance - [Researching a Monster](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/05/24/researching-a-monster-2/) - I’m fairly old-school when it comes to researching a book. I’m not averse to consulting Internet sources when a work is in progress and I’m stuck behind the computer pounding the keys, but I’ve learned over the years that information gathered through real-world experience and interaction generally trumps anything gleaned from a Google search. As - [Michael A. Arnzen:
One of the Writers on Writing @ Riley’s
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/05/25/michael-a-arnzen-one-of-the-writers-on-writing-rileys/) - As a writer who often transcends what have become art's traditional boundaries, Michael A. Arnzen personifies the role of the 21-st Century scop. Often funny, always terrifying, Michael Arnzen has created everything from prize-winning novels (Grave Markings) to poetry books (The Gorelets Omnibus) to refrigerator magnets (The Fridge of the Damned). He is also the - [Going Live with FCTV at PA LitFest](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/06/05/going-live-with-fctv-at-pa-litfest/) - This past weekend, writers and readers from across the state and beyond gathered in Uniontown for the first Pennsylvania Literary Festival. It was an amazing time. I was there to do the first in a series of soft launches for Vortex: Book Three of the Veins Cycle, which has an official release date of July 1. - [Theatre Stories @ Riley's](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/06/18/theatre-stories-rileys/) - Following last month's amazing night of storytelling, Riley's Pour House will be presenting an evening of theatre stories on June 24, hosted by The 21st Century Scop and featuring storytellers from Pittsburgh’s Throughline Theatre. Think Moth Radio with a thespian twist. Among the storytellers confirmed so far are: Mike McBurney, Sean Sears, C. S. Wyatt, - [More Highlights from Stories @ Riley's](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/07/24/more-highlights-from-stories-rileys/) - So much to do . . . so little time! If you live in the western Pennsylvania area, the next few days are going to offer something for everyone: the world-premier comedy A New Death at The Throughline Theatre in Lawrenceville (currently running through July 26), the Confluence science fiction convention in Mars (July 25-27), - [August Mania:
Madness, Music, and Mannequins
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/08/08/august-mania-madness-music-and-mannequins/) - Sorry. Couldn’t resist the alliteration, but it’s as good a way as any to summarize this month’s events. The Madness That's madness of the fun variety, of course. Earlier this week I joined Raw Dog Screaming Press authors Stephanie M. Wytovich and Michael A. Arnzen for a reading at Rickert & Beagle Books. That’s the three - [Storytelling @ Riley's presents:
Flash Fiction & Short-Short Stories
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/03/storytelling-rileys-presentsflash-fiction-short-short-stories/) - You'll want to be at Riley's Pour House on September 30 when some of the region's top storytellers return for a special night of flash-fiction and short-short stories. Among the performers already confirmed are four-time Bram Stoker Award winner Michael A. Arnzen, Rhysling and Stoker Award finalist Stephanie M. Wytovich, and Eerie Horror Film Festival Award winner Sheldon Higdon. All three - [
Instigation Showcase
Day 3 of the Veins Blog Tour](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/08/instigation-showcaseday-3-of-the-veins-blog-tour-2/) - Michael A. Arnzen's website Gorelets.com is always brimming with terrific writing advice. That's not surprise, given that Mike is both a founder of Seton Hill University's graduate program in Writing Popular Fiction and the author of the book Instigation: Creative Prompts on the Dark Side. Instigation is a treasury of over 500 tips, scenarios and sparks - [
Join Me in the Madhouse
Day 4 of the Veins Blog Tour](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/08/join-me-in-the-madhouseday-4-of-the-veins-blog-tour-2/) - Yes, this really is Day 4, just as my previous post (also dated September 8) really was Day 3. It seems the date in my Wordpress settings went a little crazy and moved to another time zone. But it's all corrected now. Amazing what a little revision can do. Which bring us to the topics of - [
Narrative Tension
Day 5 of the Veins Blog Tour](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/09/narrative-tensionday-5-of-the-veins-blog-tour-2/) - In his well-known and often quoted poem “Musée des Beaux Arts,” W. H. Auden writes about the place of suffering in the world, “how it takes place / While someone else is eating or opening a window or just / walking dully along.” Writers do well to keep this relationship in mind, not only when - [Mannequins, Back to School &
Short-Short Stories @ Riley's
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/10/mannequin-back-to-school-short-short-stories-rileys/) - Last week, I posted a preview of the short-short story and flash fiction event that will be rolling into Riley's Pour House on September 30. That event is already shaping up to be one of the most exciting Storytelling Nights yet, so -- if you haven't seen the post (which includes Michael A. Arnzen's story - [Spotlight on Storytellers @ Riley's:
Albert Wendland joins September lineup
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/21/spotlight-on-storytellers-rileys-albert-wendland-joins-september-lineup/) - Our roster of top storytellers for Storytelling Night @ Riley's Pour House continues to grow with the addition of SF author Albert Wendland, who will be joining us on September 30 with a short-short tale titled "The Everything Box." Albert Wendland teaches literature at Seton Hill University and co-directs the MFA program in Writing Popular Fiction. Though - [
The Prousting of Samuelle Calder
Day 7 of the Veins Blog Tour](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/11/the-prousting-of-samuelle-calderday-6-of-the-veins-blog-tour/) - I hope you grabbed your copy of Veins while the e-book edition was on sale for $0.99 at FE, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo. The sale has officially ended, but a check of the sites indicates that the discount is still listed at all but Kobo . . . so there's still time (though I can't say how much). If you want a - [Werepigs, Beatniks, & Panels @ Context 27](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/09/25/werepigs-beatniks-panels-context-27/) - The Context SF Convention in Worthington, Ohio, continues to impress me as one of the best regional cons in the country. With a strong writing track and lively panel discussions. I go whenever I can, and this weekend I'll be on hand for a number of events. First up will be the panel "What is - [Aberrations: Flash Fiction for the Ears](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/10/06/aberrations-flash-fiction-for-the-ears/) - Since launching this blog a few years ago, I've written a bit about the art of storytelling and flash fiction. Along the way, I've posted a few samples from Aberrations, a radio demo featuring stories from Visions: Short Fantasy & SF and This Way to Egress. Now, while preparing a couple audio samples to promote the - [Veins: The Great Goodreads Giveaway](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/10/20/veins-the-great-goodreads-giveaway/) - Goodreads Book Giveaway Veins by Lawrence C. Connolly Giveaway ends October 27, 2014. See the giveaway details at Goodreads. Enter to win With the November 4 release date of Vortex: Book Three of the Veins Cycle rapidly approaching, the good people at Fantasist Enterprises are sponsoring a Goodreads Giveaway of Veins. The campaign begins October - [Storytelling @ Riley's Presents: Masks](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/10/25/storytelling-rileys-presents-masks/) - This month at Riley's we'll be telling stories about masks. Think Halloween, theatre, deception, and the roles people play in everyday life. The theme is open to a variety of interpretations, and we're looking forward to hearing yours. If your interested in sharing a story, you can let us know by posting to our event - [Halloween Special:
Dracula in the Theatre
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/10/30/halloween-special-michael-mcburneys-dracula/) - What happens when Dracula has too much to drink? The answer to that question and more was revealed at this month's Storytelling Night at Riley's Pour House. Held on the last Tuesday of each month, Storytelling Night features stories told on a variety of themes. This month, in honor of Halloween, the theme was "Masks." - [Spotlight on All-Star Storytellers:
Larry Ivkovich
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/12/19/spotlight-on-all-star-storytellerslarry-ivkovich/) - It's almost here. Not Christmas. Not New Year's Eve. I'm talking All-Start Storytelling, the event that will feature this year's top storytellers from Story Night @ Riley's Pour House. With fewer than two weeks to go to the event, I'd like to begin highlighting some of the storytellers who will be appearing at our year-end competition. - [Spotlight on All-Star Storytellers:
Marlene Pendleton
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/12/23/spotlight-on-all-star-storytellers-marlene-pendleton/) - Only seven more scopping days till All-Star Story Night, and, if you're still wondering what to get that special someone, you might want to check out the limited edition Tri-Lax Chair (pictured below). It's an inspired piece of German engineering, and it's also the subject of a story that Marlene Pendleton will be telling when she returns to - [All-Star Night (Part 2):
Finding Hysteria with Stephanie Wytovich
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/01/01/all-star-night-part-2finding-hysteria-with-stephanie-wytovich/) - Welcome back! Just in time to start the New Year off with a little hysteria. Yesterday's post featured Owen Kilbane and his story about discovering the powers of music in attracting the opposite sex. If you missed it, you will definitely want to go back and check it out. Here's a link. Owen's performance was - [All-Star Night (Part 3):
Richard “Shag” Shaughnessy
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/01/07/all-star-night-part-3richard-shag-shaughnessy/) - craic (/kræk/ krak) — n news, gossip, fun, entertainment, and enjoyable conversation, particularly prominent in Ireland. — wikipedia.org Of all the 21st-century scops who frequent the storytelling nights at Riley's Pour House, perhaps the the greatest practitioner of craic is Richard "Shag" Shaughnessy. Delivered in a folksy, conversational style, Shag's stories brim with local flavor and history . - [What's Axle's Buried Secret?
Answer to Win an Amazon Gift Card
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/01/25/whats-axles-buried-secretanswer-to-win-an-amazon-gift-card/) - The good people at Fantasist Enterprises, publishers of the Veins Cycle books, are interested in buried secrets. They're also interested in giving away a $25.00 Amazon Gift Card. Here are the details. First the set up: Vortex: Book Three of the Veins Cycle opens with a boy burying something beneath his house. He thinks he is - [Rockin Riley's:
St. Patrick's Weekend and Beyond
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/03/15/rockin-rileys-st-patricks-weekend-and-beyond/) - Pittsburgh is the number-one city for St. Patrick's Day celebrations. That's according to Niche.com, who shows the Burg beating out Chicago, Philadelphia, and even Boston for top honors. According to Pittsburgh Magazine, past attendance at the city's St. Patrick's Day Parade has ranged from 150,000 to 350,00. Fittingly, the best advice anyone can give about - [Featured Audio
A Story by Horror Master Stephen Volk
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/03/20/featured-audioa-story-by-horror-master-stephen-volk/) - I've been a Stephen Volk fan ever since I caught the movie Gothic at a midnight run back in 1987. Directed by Ken Russell, the same over-the-top director responsible for such classics as Altered States and The Devils, Gothic presents Stephen Volk's reimagining of events that led to the writing of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Among his other film - [Sinister Appetites & Dark Discoveries](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/04/13/sinister-appetites-dark-discoveries/) - I've been a fan of the stories of Robert Aickman since I first discovered them in the pages to F&SF in the 1976 and then went on to savor his collections Cold Hand in Mine, The Wine Dark Sea, and others. Strange, surreal, and imbued the essence of dreams -- his tales helped kindle my interest in - [Springtime Stories @ Riley's](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/04/30/springtime-stories-rileys/) - The Anglo-Saxon storytellers marked the ages of their characters in winters. Consider, in Beowulf the hero is said to have lived fifty winters, not fifty years. Why? Because anyone can survive a summer, but if you live through a winter, it's time to celebrate. And that's exactly what our band of 21st-century scops did Tuesday, April 28, when Story - [Simon Kurt Unsworth's debut novel
The Devil's Detective
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/05/06/simon-kurt-unsworths-debut-novel-the-devils-detective/) - I first met Simon Kurt Unsworth in 2008, at the World Fantasy Convention, held that year in Calgary. While there, we did a reading together, during which Simon shared an excerpt of his story "Old Man's Pantry" (from the Ash-Tree Press anthology Shades of Darkness, edited by Barbara and Christopher Roden). Spare, gripping, and imbued with a - [Pennwriters: the place to be this weekend](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/05/14/pennwriters-the-place-to-be-this-weekend/) - Writers’ Conferences are great for learning and networking. With many conferences to choose from, it’s hard to decide which one is for you. Should you choose the conference closest to home? The New York conference with the high cost? The conference with the most workshops? A genre-specific conference? Before you become overwhelmed by the choices, consider - [The 21st-Century Scop in French?
Sacré bleu!
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/05/16/the-20th-century-scop-in-french-sacre-bleu/) - Sacré bleu! A new French translation of one of my growing-up-in-Levittown stories will soon appear in the French anthology Ténèbres 2015, edited by Benoît Domis and published by Dreampress. The story, which originally appeared in Twilight Zone Magazine back in 1982, and has since been reprinted in Year’s Best Horror: Series XII and my collection This - [Next Show: May 22 @ Riley’s](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/05/18/next-show-may-22-rileys/) - Ah, spring! Leaves on the trees, birds in the air, and the big tent opening at Riley’s Pour House. It’s that time of year when musicians look forward to moving out of the pub and onto the summer stage under the big top known as Riley’s Gardens. It’s a great place to party, and I’m - [Professor Challenger:
New Worlds, Lost Places
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/06/16/professor-challenger-new-worlds-lost-places/) - "The whole matter is very fully and lucidly discussed in my forthcoming volume upon the earth, which I may describe with all due modesty as one of the epoch-making books of the world's history." - Professor G. E. Challenger When the World Screamed Featuring cover art by Academy-Award winning artist Dave Kelsey and new fiction from - [Storytelling Night at Riley’s:
Starry Nights, Cosmic Conversations
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/07/02/storytelling-night-at-rileysstarry-nights-cosmic-conversations/) - It was SRO when co-host Diane Turnshek and I presented "Starry Nights and Cosmic Conversations" at Riley's Pour House last Tuesday. The event featured an impressive roster of storytellers performing a stellar mix of astronomy-related stories. Starting today, I'd like to share some audio highlights from that evening, starting with two exciting spoken-word performers who made their Riley's debut - [The Stars Came Out @ Riley's:
Starry Nights, Cosmic Conversations
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/07/03/the-stars-came-out-rileysstarry-nights-cosmic-conversations/) - Welcome back! This is the second in a series of blogs and podcasts centering on June's Storytelling Night at Riley's. If you missed the first round, you can check it out here. Our theme for the event was "Starry Nights, Cosmic Conversations," and as our story events often do, this one started off with music by Reni - [From "Starry Nights" to "Life’s Adventures"
Story Night Rocks!
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/07/06/from-starry-nights-to-lifes-adventures-story-night-rocks-on/) - In the recent posts "Storytelling Night" and "The Stars Came Out," I endeavored to cover last week's "Starry Nights and Celestial Conversations," which had far more highlights than can be covered in three blog posts. In other words, if you want to get all that Story Night has to offer, you just have to be there. In addition to - [This Week's Show: The Story in the Song](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/07/07/this-weeks-show-the-story-in-the-song/) - Whether sung or recited -- it's all story. And this weekend Lauren Connolly-Moore and I will be exploring the connections between story and song in a four-hour show that gets underway at 8:00 on Saturday evening. The place is Riley's Pour House in Carnegie, the same place where our story night events have been taking - [Researching a Novel: My Lost World](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/07/27/researching-a-novel-my-lost-word/) - Rain forests, deserts, volcanic mountains, green-sand beaches. They're all part of the alien landscape of a novel project that links and expands my novelettes "Daughters of Prime" and "The Others" (both of which originally appeared in F&SF). Since the alien setting will feature ever-more prominently in the book-length version, I figured it would be a good idea to experience such - [Researching a Novel: Into the Abyss](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/07/29/researching-a-novel-into-the-abyss-2/) - It glows by night, filling the air with a blood-red cloud. By day, its rising steam billows dull gray from an active crater. Either way, it's a wonder to behold, a doorway to a hot spot of subterranean fires that recalls the opening lines from Canto Three of Dante's Inferno: Only those elements time cannot wear Were made - [Researching a Novel:
Lost Worlds above the Clouds
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/08/01/researching-a-novel-lost-worlds-above-the-clouds/) - It was a dull gray landscape, and as I gradually deciphered the details of it I realized that it represented a long and enormously high line of cliffs exactly like an immense cataract seen in the distance, with a sloping, tree-clad plain in the foreground. That's George Edward Challenger describing the Amazonian plateau in Arthur - [Researching a Novel:
Trekking the Rain Forest
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/08/17/researching-a-novel-trekking-the-rainforest/) - The untouched or virgin rain forest was called primary jungle. Primary jungle was what most people thought of when they thought of rain forests: huge hardwood trees, mahogany and teak and ebony, and underneath a lower layer of ferns and palms, clinging to the ground. Primary jungle was dark and foreboding, but actually easy to - [Mind Games @ Riley's](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/08/22/mind-games-rileys/) - Sometimes the stars align. On the last Tuesday or every month, Story Night takes the stage at Riley’s Pour House, featuring storytellers and performers celebrating the art of story. This month’s theme: Mind Games. Every year, The Throughline Theatre features the works of new, up-and-coming playwrights as part of their regular season at the Grey - [Reading with Tom Monteleone:
A Night of Fantastic Fiction at KGB
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/09/19/reading-with-tom-monteleone-a-night-of-fantastic-fiction-at-kgb/) - We took Manhattan. This past Wednesday, my good friend Tom Monteleone and I performed for an enthusiastic crowd at New York's KGB, the literary venue in the East Village that has become known as the best literary venue in the city. That's us (left) plotting before the show, having a sit down in a scene that looks - [Hearing Voices:
The Sound of Fantastic Fiction at KGB
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/09/27/hearing-voicesthe-sound-of-fantastic-fiction-at-kgb/) - Time travel is possible. Thanks to Gordon Linzner and Rajan Khanna, you can attend a growing list of past performances at Fantastic Fiction at KGB. The reading series is hosted by Ellen Datlow and Matthew Kressel, and since the 1990s it has featured readings by some of the top writers in the science fiction, fantasy, and - [Today at PARSEC:
Change at the Speed of Thought
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/10/03/today-at-parsec-change-at-the-speed-of-thought/) - This month’s discussion topic at PARSEC is: Science Fiction - Change at the Speed of Thought. Along the way, we'll be considering a claim made recently by Josh Raulerson (one of the event's panelists) on the podcast Nanograms. “Science fiction is imploding because all the hypotheticals are coming true.” Should make for an interesting discussion. Here's - [Fantasy Musician Martin Springett:
Ready to be Reborn
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/10/19/fantasy-musician-martin-springettready-to-be-reborn/) - Some cool news arrived today from fellow musician Martin Springett. It seems that one of his early albums The Gardening Club is going to be re-released by Space Wreck Records in 2016. This is cause for celebration. Here's the press release from Space Wreck: In 1984, UK-born Martin Springett—an accomplished musician and illustrator who had produced comics - [Mick Garris on NIGHTMARE CINEMA:
"Horror Films are Good for You"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/12/11/mick-garris-on-nightmare-cinemahorror-films-are-good-for-you/) - Ever since the anthology series Masters of Horror premiered on Showtime back in 2005, the show's creator Mick Garris has wanted to do something more international in scope. Now, ten years later, that dream is becoming a reality with Nightmare Cinema, a feature film currently in pre-production in Los Angeles. Featuring five short films directed - [The Craic of Night:
When Storytellers Shine @ Riley's
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/12/08/the-craic-of-nightwhen-storytellers-shine-rileys/) - All-Star Story Night returns to Riley's Pour House on December 29, when the top storytellers and spoken-word performers from the past year will return for a night of amazing stories. It's a chance to relax in an authentic Irish pub and engage in the time-honored tradition of craic -- the art storytelling. The photo at left was taken - [Seeing Stories:
All-Star Story Night Preview - Part II
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/12/17/seeing-storiesall-star-story-night-preview-part-ii/) - Seeing is believing. With that in mind, if you still need convincing that you should be at this month's All-Star Story Night at Riley's Pour House, be sure to check out the links at the end of this blog. My previous All-Star Preview featured audio from Anna Voelker's June performance--a show-stopping, draw-dropping delivery of a piece titled - [Stories & Poetry @ Riley's Pour House:
A Stellar Finish to 2015
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/01/03/stories-poetry-rileys-pour-housea-stellar-finish-to-2015/) - Once again, the power of story transformed Riley's Pour House, changing it from a boisterous music venue to a storytelling forum. Over the course of two hours on Tuesday, December 29, fourteen storytellers, poets, and spoken word performers proved that the scop still has a place in this media-saturated world. If you were there, you - [. . . and the Band Plays On @ Riley's](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/01/05/and-the-band-plays-on-rileys/) - Ten years ago, after finishing our CD Home from the Field at Imagine Audio + Media, The Laughrey Connolly Band stopped at Riley's to unwind over a couple pints. Another band Corned Beef & Curry was setting up, and we stayed for their first set. They're one of my favorite pub bands. Click the link above or this one here - [Laughrey Connolly & Friends @ Riley's](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/01/14/laughrey-connolly-friends-rileys/) - What a night. The place was packed and the old song were as fresh as ever. That's the thing with music. Musicians might get older, but the tunes remain timeless. Furthermore, since Riley's Pour House is the venue that the original members of the Laughrey Connolly Band played regularly before bandmate Chris Laughrey moved to the Rockies, performing - [From Page to Screen: A Story's Journey](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/02/03/from-page-to-screen-a-storys-journey/) - It's the journey, not the destination. Emerson said something like that once. He might have been talking about screenwriting. The path that "Traumatic Descent" (a.k.a. "This Way to Egress") has taken on its way to the screen is the subject of a newspaper article in a recent issue of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. On the whole, the paper - [St. Patrick's Day Shows: Music Marathons](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/03/08/st-patricks-day-shows-music-marathons/) - If you want to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day in style, Pittsburgh is the place to be. That’s according the Niche®, who also says: Pittsburgh has one of the highest percentage of its population identifying as Irish, great access to bars, a thriving St. Patrick’s Day Parade that boasts over 20,000 participants, and a staggering amount - [Parade Day 2016 @ Riley's Pour House:
"the sweetest melody"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/03/13/parade-day-2016-rileys-pour-housethe-sweetest-melody/) - "I thought I heard a piper play the sweetest melody / People gathered round a’ dancing and singing so merrily . . ." – "Caledonia" by Dougie MacLean But we didn’t just think it. If you were one of the 1,000-plus revelers who packed the tent and pub at Riley’s Pour House on Parade Day, you - [Spring Events:
April is the Coolest Month
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/04/13/spring-events-april-is-the-coolest-month/) - Apologies to T. S. Eliot, but I couldn’t resist the headline. And there will indeed be some cool things happening now that the winter that "kept us warm" has come to an end. First up, I’ll be giving a talk at the Penguin Bookshop in Sewickley on April 27, sharing details surrounding the adaptation of my - [Penguin Bookshop, Nightmare Cinema,
& "This Way to Egress"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/04/21/penguin-bookshop-nightmare-cinema-this-way-to-egress/) - Don't go to sleep! Nightmares are coming. On Wednesday, April 27, I'll be visiting the Penguin Bookshop in Sewickley to talk about writing stories and adapting them for film. Along the way, I'll be sharing some of the latest news about Nightmare Cinema, the forthcoming feature film that will include an adaptation of my story "Traumatic - [From Page to Screen:
Talking about Writing @ The Penguin
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/05/02/from-page-to-screentalking-about-writing-the-penguin/) - It all began with Robert A. Heinlein. Back in the 1940s, Heinlein gave what may well be the best writing advice ever given, a five step approach to achieving success as a spinner of tales. And last week at The Penguin Bookshop, an attentive crowd joined me in a consideration of those rules and how they apply - [Writer at Work:
Out of the Stories and into the World
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/12/11/writer-at-workout-of-the-stories-and-into-the-world/) - It’s been a while since I’ve posted here. There’s a good reason for that. I’ve been working. I’ve always regarded blogging as a leisure activity, fun when there’s time for it, but readily set aside when big projects hit. Last June, with a new film script sold and an ambitious novel expanding beyond expectations, I - [Writer at Work: Trusting the Process](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/12/29/writer-at-work-trusting-the-process/) - There’s a scene in Henri-Georges Clouzot's Le Mystère Picasso, a 1956 documentary that shows the artist Pablo Picasso at work. The artist starts with random lines, splashes of color. There seems to be no method in what he's doing, but soon a few recognizable images emerge -- a boat pulling a water skier, a woman - [Writer at Work:
Standing up for Your Writes
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/12/18/writer-at-work-standing-up-for-your-writes/) - “The art of writing is the art of applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair.” C.S. Lewis gave that advice in 1937, in an article titled, “Breaking in Print.” But it didn’t originate with him. He got it from his mentor Mary Heaton Vorse, who seems to be the source - [Writer at Work:
Santas, Wizards, & Life behind the Curtain
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/12/23/writer-at-worksantas-wizards-life-behind-the-curtain/) - So it’s December 1997. I’m driving north out of Oakland, toward Bigelow Boulevard and downtown Pittsburgh. It’s a gray day, light snow falling. Colored lights trim some of the buildings along North Craig Street, but it doesn’t feel like Christmas. Then I see him. I clear the rise toward Bigelow Boulevard, and there he is—fourteen-feet - [Parade Day & St. Patrick's Day Shows](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/03/05/parade-day-st-patricks-day-shows-2/) - March 11 (Parade Day) 6:00 – 7:30: Riley's Pub Stage with bassist Duane Davis. 8:00 – 10:00: Riley's Pub Stage with bassist Duane Davis and vocalist-mandolinist Lauren Connolly-Moore. March 17 (St. Patrick’s Day) 5:00 – 7:30: Riley's Garden Center Stage. 8:00 – 11:00: Riley's Pub Stage with bassist Duane Davis. March 18 8:00 – 11:00: Riley's Pub Stage with - [Parade Day Preview](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/03/11/parade-day-preview/) - With St. Patrick’s Day Parade scheduled for March 11, a week in advance of the actual St. Patrick’s Day weekend, Pittsburgh has the opportunity to celebrate all week long. Last night at Riley’s Pour House, bagpiper John Walsh kicked off the weeklong celebration by marching through the pub in advance of our 8:00 show. John - [Parade Day @ Riley's: Just the Beginning](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/03/12/parade-day-rileys-just-the-beginning/) - The Parade Day Celebration at Riley's Pour House topped all expectation -- a veritable three-ring wonder featuring entertainment under the big top, in the pub, and even (when the famed Irish Belly Dancers arrived) on the bar. If you were part of the multitude in attendance, you know what I'm talking about. If you weren't, - [Looking Ahead to the Nebula Awards](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/04/14/looking-ahead-to-the-nebulas/) - The Nebula Awards are coming to Pittsburgh next month. The following is from SFWA's official release for the event: Focusing on three tracks relevant to professionals in the genre, attendees will be able to choose from career management, professional development, and expert knowledge panels and workshops throughout the weekend. You will also be able to - [The Streams Converge at Confluence](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/08/03/the-streams-converge-at-confluence/) - This weekend, the rivers of speculative fiction will converge at the annual literary event known as Confluence. Launched in 1988 as a cooperative effort between the University of Pittsburgh science fiction club and Parsec, Confluence has grown from a one-day event to become one of the great regional SF conventions. This year's program will feature - [Confluence: One of the Great Regional Cons](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/08/12/10480/) - Confluence, one of the great science fiction conventions, was held last week at the Sheraton Pittsburgh Airport Hotel. As always, it provided an opportunity for fans to connect with professionals in the field and for professionals to get out from behind the desk to spend some real-world time with folks they see all too seldom. - [Celebrating the Roots of the Genre:
Pennsylvania’s Place in SF History
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/08/15/celebrating-the-roots-of-the-genrepennsylvanias-place-in-sf-history/) - Next month, I’ll be helping celebrate the roots of modern science fiction by heading east to Milford, Pennsylvania, where some of the genre's biggest names helped establish sf as we know it today. It’s an exciting history that will be commemorated on September 15-17 at The Milford Readers and Writers Festival. I’ll be attending as - [Big Things Cooking in September:
Milford Writers & Son of Monsterpalooza
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/09/08/big-things-cooking-in-septembermilford-writers-son-of-monsterpalooza/) - Big things are brewing this month, with the Milford Readers and Writers Festival on the east coast and Son of Monsterpalooze on the west – both on the same weekend (September 15-17) and 3,000 miles apart. Makes me wish I had a teleporter. Nevertheless, despite the distance and the impossibility of two places at once, - [Looking Ahead:
This Weekend at the Milford Festival
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/09/12/looking-aheadthis-weekend-at-the-milford-festival/) - Sixty-four years ago, science fiction writers Virginia Kidd and James Blish moved to Milford, PA, into a home that they called Arrowhead. It was there that Virginia Kidd founded the first literary agency devoted to the sf genre and where James Blish and colleagues such as Damon Knight and Kate Wilhelm wrote stories that helped - [Genre is a State of Mind:
Books and Authors @ In Your Write Mind
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/06/25/genra-is-a-state-of-mindbooks-and-authors-in-your-write-mind/) - The genre stars came out on Saturday night for the latest installment of the In Your Write Mind book event – a massive gathering of science fiction, horror, fantasy, mystery, romance, and YA writers that’s held each June at Seton Hill University. This was my first time back at IYWM in four years. June is - [Voices: Tales of Horror
New Edition Preview @ Fantastic Fiction
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/06/17/voices-tales-of-horrornew-edition-preview-fantastic-fiction/) - The good people at Fantasist Enterprises are preparing a couple special editions of Voices: Tales of Horror for release this summer, starting with the book’s first-ever digital edition and following it with a second print edition. Both will feature a new foreword by Mick Garris (Showtime's Masters of Horror and the upcoming Nightmare Cinema) and - [Bi-Coastal Weekend: Stories & Nightmares](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/09/23/bi-coastal-weekend-stories-nightmares/) - Writers do most their traveling at home. It's inward travel, exploring memory and imagination in the creation of stories that might one day enter the real world as published stuff. But sometimes the draw of outside events cuts through the reverie, and that's the way it was last weekend when I had writing-related gigs popping on - [Back to Fantastic Fiction!
Reading at New York's KGB Bar on June 20
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/06/11/back-to-fantastic-fictionreading-at-new-yorks-kgb-bar-on-june-20/) - A line stretches around the block outside a bar in New York's East Village, but the crowd hasn't gathered to hear a band. Instead, they've come to attend a fiction reading at the place New York Magazine has called “the best literary venue in New York” -- the fabled KGB Bar. You've got to love it when a fiction - [Gone Scopping:
Keeping the Oral Tradition Alive @ KGB
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/06/24/gone-scoppingkeeping-the-oral-tradition-alive-kgb/) - If you’re like me, you spend a lot of time reading screens. When it comes to accessibility, the digital format is hard to beat. But is it the best format for sharing stories? I recall an article at CNN.com in which a writer lamented the loss of print: “I miss the edges – physical and psychological. I - [Don't Sleep: Nightmares are coming!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/10/14/dont-sleep-nightmares-are-coming/) - They enter the Rialto only to have their darkest fears brought to life by The Projectionist – a ghostly figure who holds the horrifying futures of all who attend his screenings. And by the time the viewers realize the truth, escape is no longer an option. For once the ticket is torn, all fates are sealed. - [Yesterday Today:
SF's Roots on View at Milford Festival
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/09/29/yesterday-todaysfs-roots-on-view-at-milford-festival/) - My previous post concluded with mention of the grand finale at this year's Milford Readers and Writers Festival and the promise of a follow up post. Here, then, are some of the talking points from our three-hour program at the Milford Theatre, a conversation that considered how science fiction came of age in Milford during the - [Putting on the Music Hat](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/10/07/putting-on-the-music-hat/) - The 21st-century scop wears many hats. It’s not like the old days, when the traveling minstrel-storyteller showed up at the mead hall with a repertoire of poetry and epic tales uploaded to his personal memory. Today stories are delivered through books, films, digital downloads, spoken-word and musical performances. The most recent posts at this site - [A Place at the Table with
Lawrence M. Schoen & "Eating Authors"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/12/18/a-place-at-the-table-with-lawrence-m-schoen-eating-authors/) - One of the more interesting blog themes to come down the pike in recent years is Lawrence M. Schoen's Eating Authors, which features some of the biggest names in fantasy and sf reminiscing about memorable meals. Since launching the blog in 2011, Schoen has featured hundreds of stories by the likes of Gregory Benford, Brenda - [Two Hundred Years Ago Today:
First Publication of a Misunderstood Classic
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/01/01/two-hundred-years-ago-todayfirst-publication-of-a-misunderstood-classic/) - On New Years Day 1818, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein first appeared in a press run of 500 copies. Though published anonymously, readers at the time assumed it was written by her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley. That incorrect assumption proved to be only the first of many associated with Shelley's greatly misunderstood novel. A few years ago, - [Connolly-Davis Band:
Ready to Shamrock the House for St. Pat's
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/03/14/connolly-davis-bandready-to-shamrock-the-house-for-st-pats/) - The Connolly-Davis Band is ready to shamrock the house this Saturday. The place will be Riley's Pour House, where we'll be performing alongside The Wild Geese, Young John Gallagher, and the Danny McGoo Duo. The music starts at Noon and continues nonstop on two stages until St. Patrick's Day 2018 ends at midnight. Pittsburgh is - [Getting our Irish on @ Riley's Pour House](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/03/18/all-day-musicgetting-our-irish-on-rileys-pour-house/) - The music started when Young John Gallagher took the stage before a packed house in Riley’s Outdoor Pavilion. An hour later, The Connolly-Davis Band followed suit before an SRO crowd inside the pub. For the rest of the day, Riley’s delivered a double-track of Irish-trad and Celtic-rock that also featured The Danny McGoo Duo, John - [Fall Premieres:
Mexico, England, Canada, Spain, Austria ...
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/09/23/fall-premieresmexico-england-canada-spain-austria/) - ... a world of nightmares. Since premiering at The Fantasia International Film Festival in July, Nightmare Cinema has gone on to screen at some of the world's most prestigious film festivals devoted to fantasy, science fiction, and horror. So far this month, NC has played on both sides of the Atlantic, first in a French - [Grimmfest Film Festival: Day 1](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/10/04/grimmfest-film-festival-day-1/) - Manchester, England. Grimmfest. Day One. This year’s festival kicks off with the screening of a remastered classic, Stuart Gordon’s Re-Animator, which Entertainment Weekly has called “One of the greatest horror film of all time.” Based loosely on H.P. Lovecraft’s Weird Tales novella “Herbert West–Reanimator,” the film helped launch the career of Barbara Crampton, this year’s - [Tales from the Hood 2
Horror, History, Humor & Politics
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/09/22/tales-from-the-hood-2horror-history-humor-politics/) - “All of that art-for-art’s-sake stuff is BS. What are these people talking about? Are you really telling me that Shakespeare and Aeschylus weren’t writing about kings? All good art is political!” – Toni Morrison Morrison’s words are particularly relevant to the horror genre. After all, horror literature is all about powers beyond comprehension. It’s true - [Nightmare Cinema: Fall Festivals & Events](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/09/16/nightmare-cinema-fall-festivals-events/) - These are busy times for the Nightmare Cinema team. This weekend, Mick Garris (the film's producer and writer/director of "Dead") and Sandra Becerril (writer of the Ryûhei Kitamura directed "Mashit") are in Strasbourg for the film's French premiere at FEFFS -- Le Festival européen du film fantastique. The premiere will take place at a special - [This Way to Egress:
The Manchester-Sheffield Connection
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/09/24/this-way-to-egressthe-manchester-sheffield-connection/) - Eighteen years ago. It's spring. Filmmaker Charly Cantor and I are driving around Pittsburgh. It's his first time in the States, having arrived the day before from London. He's come to collaborate on a new film adaptation of my story "Traumatic Descent," and today we're out looking at locations, places that might provide backdrops for - [These Writers Rock:
PG Sturges, RC Matheson, Craig Spector
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/08/26/these-writers-rockpg-sturges-rc-matheson-craig-spector/) - There’s an undeniable connection between horror and rock-n-roll, one that no doubt began long before the devil went down to Georgia or Robert Johnson stopped at the crossroads to barter his soul. I was reminded of this connection earlier in the month when I came across some album tracks that fellow Nightmare Cinema writer RC - [This Way to Egress: More UK Connections](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/10/06/this-way-to-egress-more-uk-connections/) - A couple of posts ago, I touched on the UK connections of the Nightmare Cinema segment “This Way to Egress.” That post dealt with my collaboration with David Slade (left) and the late Charly Cantor -- both from the Manchester area. In this post, I'd like to consider another UK connection. Eight years ago, the collection This - [UK Premiere:
Nightmare Cinema & “This Way to Egress”
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/10/07/uk-premiere-nightmare-cinema-this-way-to-egress/) - I first read Traumatic Descent - Larry Connolly’s short story that would be adapted into "This Way to Egress" 17 or 18 years ago. Soon after I worked with my dear friend Charly Cantor on ideas to adapt the story into a feature-length film which Charly would write. I loved Charly like a brother and - [Full Circle: Nightmare Cinema in Mexico](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/08/07/full-circle-nightmare-cinema-in-mexico/) - Three years ago at the Morbido Film Festival in Mexico, Mick Garris announced his plans for a project entitled Nightmare Cinema. This year – following the film's strong premiere at Fantasia Fest in Montreal -- Mick returns to Mexico to present a special screening at Macabro XVII in Mexico City. He will be joined by - [This Weekend:
Science Fiction, Fantasy & Rock-n-Roll!
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/07/26/this-weekendscience-fiction-fantasy-rock-n-roll/) - I've been spending the week behind the keyboard, working on some new projects that I hope to be blogging about in the days ahead. But this weekend, I get to leave the realm of fiction and once again mix it up with the real world -- starting with some panels and readings at Confluence (the - [More Reviews:
Nightmare Cinema & This Way to Egress
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/07/20/more-reviewsnightmare-cinema-this-way-to-egress/) - The Connolly Brothers played last night, performing for a full house at Riley's garden pavilion. So much fun ... and exhausting in a way that always seems to leave one strangely energized. As a result, I'm up early today, catching up on writing and perusing the reviews for Nightmare Cinema that are continuing to appear - [Today's reviews:
Nightmare Cinema & This Way to Egress
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/07/14/12427/) - I’m heading out to catch a flight, preparing to face what everyone in Montreal is describing as nightmarish traffic – road closures and construction between downtown and the airport. So … while I’m experiencing nightmare traffic, I’ll leave you with some links to the latest reviews on Nightmare Cinema and “This Way to Egress.” It’s - [The Boys are Back in Town:
Connolly Brothers Band @ Riley’s on July 19
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/07/18/the-boys-are-back-in-town-connolly-brothers-band-rileys-on-july-19/) - The Fantasia International Film Festival was a blast, and it’s still going. I might have been tempted to stay longer if not for an opportunity to join brothers Mark and John for a recording session in advance of our July 19 show at Riley’s outdoor pavilion. Usually separated by thousands of miles (with one brother - [Don't sleep: Nightmares are coming!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/07/12/dont-sleep-nightmares-are-coming-3/) - Montreal is gearing up for the event that Quentin Tarantino has called "The most important and prestigious genre film festival on this continent" – The Fantasia Film Festival. It’s a fitting venue for the premiere of a project that producer Mick Garris began working on nearly a decade ago. That’s a long time to be - [Nightmare Cinema Premieres at Fantasia](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/07/13/nightmare-cinema-premieres-at-fantasia/) - An enthusiastic crowd gathered well in advance of Nightmare Cinema’s premiere. By 9:00 last night, the line already stretched around the block, assuring a full house for a project that producer-director Mick Garris began dreaming up over a decade ago. Shortly before 10:00, Festival Programmer Tony Timpone took the stage to introduce directors Mick Garris, - [Welcome to My Nightmares:
A Video Essay on Cinematic Monsters
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/07/02/welcome-to-my-nightmaresa-video-essay-on-cinematic-monsters/) - You've heard of man-made monsters. Today, let's consider a video essay about a monster-made man ... or at least a monster-made writer. Namely: the 21st-Century Scop. Here's the backstory: Last year I was invited to take part in a speaker series sponsored by the Uniontown Library. Helmed in part by author Heidi Ruby Miller (who also - [It’s Official:
Voices now in eBook from Fantasist Ent.
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/06/26/its-officialvoices-now-in-ebook-from-fantasist-ent/) - I'm back home, settling in after KGB and SHU. I wrote my posts on those events more quickly than usual, but they seem to be lucid (to me at least). Both book-related appearances offered an opportunity to get the word out about Fantasist Enterprises' new edition of Voices: Tales of Horror, and I'm pleased to - [St. Patrick's Day Weekend @ Riley's
Connolly-Davis Band & The Wild Geese!
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/03/09/st-patricks-day-weekend-rileysconnolly-davis-band-the-wild-geese/) - Next Saturday, over 200,000 revelers are expected to pack Pittsburgh’s streets for the annual St. Patrick’s Day Parade. That’s in the morning. But after the parade runs its course, the place to be will be Riley’s Pour House, where live bands will perform all day and into the night for some of the best people - [Nightmare Cinema at Irish Film Institute](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/10/27/nightmare-cinema-at-irish-film-institute/) - Nightmare Cinema screened last night before a packed house at the Irish Film Institute. The event included a Q&A session with producer Mick Garris, who will also be screening his earlier hits Critters 2 and Sleepwalkers at the festival. Next month, Nightmare Cinema returns to England for a screening in Leeds on November 9, then travels - [A World of Nightmares:
Latest Festival News and Reviews
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/10/21/a-world-of-nightmareslatest-festival-news-and-reviews/) - Two weeks after its UK Premiere at Grimmfest, Nightmare Cinema is continuing its run of successful festival screenings, winning fans and garnering strong reviews in the process. In an earlier post, I listed some of the screenings scheduled for October and November. Since then, new screenings have been announced in Dublin, Melbourne, and New York - [Back to Chelsea...
for Nightmare Cinema's US Premiere
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/11/29/back-to-chelsea-for-nightmare-cinemas-us-premiere/) - It’s the summer of 1977. I’m crashing at my brother Mark’s apartment at Hotel Chelsea, dreaming of following in the footsteps of other writers who used that iconic landmark as their home base in New York City. It’s the place where Arthur C. Clark worked on 2001: a Space Odyssey, where Alan Ginsburg revolutionized American - [Scenes from NYC Horror Film Fest:
If life's a shoot … memories are the movie.
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/12/06/new-york-city-horror-film-festivalif-lifes-a-shoot-memories-are-the-movie/) - "What is drama, after all, but life with the dull bits cut out?” -- Alfred Hitchcock I’m back home after the US premiere of Nightmare Cinema, reflecting on the highpoints of the trip and ready to consign the rest (long security lines, delayed flights, rush-hour connection in the city that never sleeps) to memory’s cutting-room - [Nightmare Cinema: U.S. Premiere, NYC](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/11/24/nightmare-cinema-u-s-premiere-nyc/) - Taking a final lap in its tour of the world's top genre film festivals, Nightmare Cinema is now racing toward its long-awaited US Premiere. Earlier this month, the film finished its circuit of the UK with a screening at The Leeds International Film Festival, the film went on to play at El Festival de Cine - [NIGHTMARE CINEMA:
In Theaters & On Demands on June 21:
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/04/23/nightmare-cinemain-theaters-on-demands-on-june-21/) - It's official! This summer, Mickey Rourke's Projectionist will unleash 100 years of nightmares onto a silver screen that never forgets. According to Cranked-Up Films, the new feature Nightmare Cinema will be released to theatres and on demand on June 21. Reviewer Mike Sprague sums up the film this way: Rourke plays the projectionist, and the shorts he - [A Bumper Crop of Short Films](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/01/15/a-bumper-crop-of-flash-films/) - Shorts used to be this artsy thing. But now there really is this explosion in filmmaking. With all this new technology, shorts films have a lot more interest among regular people, because so many people are making them and putting them on the web. Suddenly, we’re not explaining short films to people. Everybody’s seen one. - [Talking Writing with Laura Powers](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/12/28/talking-writing-with-laura-powers/) - Earlier this month, I got the chance to chat with the multi-talented Laura Powers about film festivals, Nightmare Cinema, and the philosophical approach to writing that I like to think of as "the long game." You can listen in on that conversation by clicking the player above. If you like what you hear, there's plenty more - [Nightmare Cinema Bought for 2019 Release](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2018/11/10/nightmare-cinema-bought-for-2019-release/) - A couple of interesting links this week. The first arrived a few days ago from G. Brandon Hill, Executive Director of Acquisitions and Distribution at Good Deed Entertainment. It’s a link to an exclusive piece in Variety that includes the long-awaited details about Nightmare Cinema’s release. According to the article: Cranked Up Films has partnered - [Unleashing 100 Years of Nightmares](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/06/01/unleashing-100-years-of-nightmares/) - I'm the projectionist, curator of 100 years of nightmares trapped in a silver screen that never forgets. -- Mickey Rourke as the Projectionist. This month, the new anthology film Nightmare Cinema concludes its successful run on the international festival circuit to open in select theatres around the country. The film releases on June 21, just - [Best Horror Movies 2019](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/01/06/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
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/12/26/writer-at-worksantas-wizards-life-behind-the-curtain-4/) - 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 - [This Weekend @ Confluence:
The Best Recent Horror & 50’s SF
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/07/24/this-weekend-confluencethe-best-recent-horror-50s-sf/) - This weekend some of the top names in science fiction, fantasy, and horror will gather at the Pittsburgh Airport Sheraton for the latest installment of Confluence, the region’s long-running sf convention, sponsored by Parsec, Pittsburgh’s premier science fiction and fantasy organization. The convention will run three days, July 26-28, and I’m looking forward to being there - [Recommended Horror:
Good Stuff You Might Have Missed
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/08/03/recommended-horrorgood-stuff-you-might-have-missed/) - Horror exploded in the 1970s. Following the runaway success of Rosemary’s Baby and fueled by the political turmoil of the time, horror publishing rode a wave that didn’t break until the late 1980s. That phenomenon is explored in Grady Hendrix’s Paperbacks from Hell (Quirk 2017), which presents a road map to the horror that filled - [Nightmare Cinema:
Q&A at The Parkway Theater (Part One)
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/06/30/nightmare-cinemaqa-at-the-parkway-theater-part-one/) - “Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” -- Robert Frost "This Way to Egress," the fourth segment of our new anthology film Nightmare Cinema, is about finding a way back home. This weekend, after a year-long tour of international film festivals and a week of theatrical premieres across - [Q&A at The Parkway Theater (Part 2):
Nightmare Cinema's Lost Spider Scene
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/07/05/qa-at-the-parkway-theater-part-2nightmare-cinemas-lost-spider-scene/) - We concluded our previous post with reference to King Kong's lost spider scene -- a sequence so horrifying that producer-director Merian C. Cooper insisted that it be removed from the final cut. His reasoning: "It stopped the show." A victim of judicious editing, that scene now joins other lost segments of film history, such as the - [Nightmares at Sustefest X!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/11/07/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:
Q&A at Frida Cinema in Santa Ana
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/06/26/nightmare-cinemaqa-at-frida-cinema-in-santa-anna/) - This week’s round of Nightmare Cinema release events concluded with a screening at The Frida Cinema on Saturday night. Sponsored by Horror Buzz and The Horrible Imaginings Film Festival, the event drew an enthusiastic crowd and concluded with a Q&A session where I joined directors Mick Garris, Alejandro Bruges, and Ryuhei Kitamura in a discussion - [Nightmare Cinema: Now on AMC's Shudder!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/11/01/nightmare-cinema-now-on-amcs-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 - [Double-Feature Book Review:
The Ritual of Illusion & Hollywood North
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/09/02/double-feature-book-reviewritual-of-illusion-hollywood-north/) - The thing I miss most about movie-going in the 21st-century is the lack of double features. I used to love watching those as a kid, sitting in a single-screen theater and letting a pair of thematically linked features roll over me. Things like Jack the Giant Killer & Last of the Vikings or Jason and the Argonauts - [Maintenance Time: Creative Hands at Work](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/08/15/maintenance-time-creative-hands-at-work/) - Things at this site aren't as messy as that men's room in "This Way to Egress." Nevertheless, you're likely to find the layout looking a bit different, maybe even a little messy while web designer Will Horner (of W. H. Horner Editorial & Design) and I work to give things an overdue upgrade. With more - [Fade In:
Talking Scary Movies with Bob Scott of CSW
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/08/11/fade-intalking-scary-movies-with-bob-scott-of-csw/) - Last month, following the release of Nightmare Cinema, I had the chance to drop by PCTV-21 for a conversation with Bob Scott of Carnegie Screenwriters. Bob is a screenwriter, playwright, poet, actor, director, producer, stage manager, and host of the series Fade In, now in its third season on PCTV-21. Since its debut in 2016, - [Screenshots: The Spider from "Egress"](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/07/10/screenshots-the-spider-from-egress/) - Last week's post about the "Egress" spider generated some terrific responses, with a number of readers asking about plans to include the scene on Nightmare Cinema's upcoming Blu-ray release. Although I have no information on that possibility, I do have a few more images from David Slade that offer a glimpse of what we might - [Nightmare Cinema in Japan](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/07/16/nightmare-cinema-in-japan/) - Nightmare Cinema’s release schedule continues this month with its Japanese debut on July 19, complete with promotional art that incorporates elements of the US poster with striking details of its own. In place of the demon from Ryuhei Kitamura’s “Mashit” segment, the Japanese poster features the face of a sleeping woman, head cleaved above the - [Horror Writers Association - Pittsburgh Chapter](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/11/19/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 - [Walking and Talking:
Things to Come in 2020
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/02/29/walking-and-talkingthings-to-come-in-2020/) - “If you’re going to talk the talk, you need to walk the walk.” You know the expression. It’s all about the importance of doing, as in Death of a Salesman, where all-talk Willy Loman is amazed to learn that all-walk Bernard is going to argue a case before the supreme court. “The Supreme Court!” Willy - [World Fantasy 2019 & Writing Fantasy for Television](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2019/11/09/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 - [Podcasts for Shut-Ins:
Tune In, Hunker Down
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/03/19/podcasts-for-shut-instune-in-hunker-down/) - I’ve been trying to track down a piece that I heard on NPR following the 9-11 attacks. I can’t remember who delivered it, but the voice in my memory sounds like Scott Simon. It was a reflective piece about the uncertainty felt in the aftermath of the attacks, a time when the country was bracing - [What's Inside the Locked Room?
A Knavish Piece of Mystery - Act 3
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/10/15/whats-inside-the-locked-room-a-knavish-piece-of-mystery-act-3/) - You might think that the best way to solve a locked-door mystery would be to open the room and see what’s inside. But what happens when what’s inside provides more questions than answers? We'll explore those possibilities today as Prime Stage Mystery Theatre's podcast A Knavish Piece of Mystery enters its third week with a - [Surviving World War C:
Music to Span the Social Distance
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/03/24/surviving-world-war-cmusic-to-see-us-through/) - Last week’s post offered a list of “Podcasts for Shut-Ins,” which included what was then an unreleased installment of Inside The Hive. Although I had expected that podcast to feature an interview with screenwriter Scott Burns (Contagion), it instead offered a conversation with radio host Kai Ryssdal (Marketplace). Titled “Coronovirus against the World,” the interview - [Fiction for the Ears:
Storytelling for Shut-Ins
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/03/30/fiction-for-the-earsstorytelling-for-shut-ins/) - […] there would be three months of enforced isolation and leisure, between the harvest that takes place just before the rise of the swamps and the clearing of new farms when the water goes down […]. As the swamps rose, the old men found it too difficult the walk from one homestead to the next, - [Countdown to Mystery: Zero Effect](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/09/29/countdown-to-mystery-zero-effect/) - Some of the greatest detectives don’t work alone. Think of Holmes and Watson, Cagney and Lacey, Batman and Robin. You get the idea. Among the most interesting pairings are Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin, from the series that the members of Bouchercon (the World Mystery Convention) nominated as the “Best Mystery Series of - [Upcoming Events at Prime Stage Theatre:
Mystery, Monsters, and More ...](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/09/23/upcoming-event-at-prime-stage-theatremystery-monsters-and-more/) - This site has been quiet for a while. Things have been busy, what with dodging the microscopic shrapnel of World War C. Through it all, I’ve been doing my best to learn from the examples set by writers who lived through past epidemics – Sherwood Anderson, Beatrix Potter, and W.E.B. Du Bois (all of whom - [Prime Online Presents:
A Knavish Piece of Mystery
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/10/01/prime-online-presents-a-knavish-piece-of-mystery/) - Something strange is afoot at the New Town Theater. A dressing room is locked. Two actors are missing. And You are there to join the investigation as a cast and crew confront a mystery in which nothing is as it seems. Get out your spy glasses and notepads ... and prepare to take part in a behind-the-scenes - [Countdown to Mystery: Sleuth (1972)](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/09/25/countdown-to-mystery-sleuth-1972/) - With a week to go before Prime Stage Theatre lifts the curtain on my new mystery series A Knavish Piece of Mystery, I thought it might be fun to look back at the plays, films, and stories that first got me interested in mysteries. I don’t intend this to be a definitive list of the - [Countdown to Mystery: Deathtrap](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/09/26/countdown-to-mystery-deathtrap/) - In our previous installment, I mentioned the meta-aspects of Anthony Shaffer’s Sleuth – a cat-and-mouse thriller about a writer who turns his estate into an interactive mystery in an effort to ensnare the man who's been sleeping with his wife. Today’s recommendation is Deathtrap (1982), and this time the story centers on playwright Sidney Bruhl - [Countdown to Mystery:
Murder on the Orient Express
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/09/27/countdown-to-mysterymurder-on-the-orient-express/) - We’re counting down to Prime Stage Theatre’s release of A Knavish Piece of Mystery, the first installment in a roster of virtual programming running this fall on Prime Online. The series has been generating good press in the past few days, with preview stories appearing on Local Pittsburgh and Trib Live. And I understand there - [Countdown to Mystery: The Last of Shelia](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/09/28/countdown-to-mystery-the-last-of-shelia/) - One strategy for writing an effective mystery: plot backward. Determine the ending, build from there. I’ve heard that’s the strategy employed by actor Anthony Perkins (Murder in the Orient Express, Psycho) and Broadway composer Stephen Sondheim (A Little Night Music, West Side Story) in writing their only produced screenplay – the intricately plotted who-done-it The - [Countdown to Mystery: Locked Doors](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/09/30/countdown-to-mystery-locked-doors/) - A woman enters a room. Closes the door. Then, from inside, a voice cries “Murder!” When her father breaks down the door, he finds her bleeding on the floor. She is alone. The windows are barred. There is no other exit. Yet the perpetrator is gone! And so begins The Mystery of the Yellow Room - [The Final Reveal:
Act V of A Knavish Piece of Mystery
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/10/29/the-final-reveal-act-v-of-a-knavish-piece-of-mystery/) - You've explored the mystery, assembled the clues, dismissed the red hearings. Now it's time for the final reveal. If you've been with us through the previous episodes of Prime Stage Mystery Theatre, you're ready to move on to the final scene. You'll find the link to that episode here. Otherwise, you'll want to access the - [Who's listening?
Advantages and Pitfalls of Wireless Audio
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/03/19/whos-listeningadvantages-and-pitfalls-of-wireless-audio/) - "I do community theater, and all muting and unmuting is done from the tech booth. Well, every once in a while, if the tech person can't mute an actor's mic right away when they leave the stage, the audience catches them saying something like, 'Well, I really f****d THAT up!'" The above account, courtesy of - [New From Borderlands Press:
Past Masters of Horror and Dark Fantasy
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/07/09/new-from-borderlands-presspast-masters-of-horror-and-dark-fantasy/) - Scholars, critics, and even psychologists have long touted the therapeutic benefits of vicarious horror. See, for example Why Do We Like Watching Scary Films? (from Psychology Today) or my previous post Horror Films are Good for You. And of course, there were the ancient Greeks, who some 7,000 years ago recognized the importance of purging - [Like a Preternatural Flash:
New Music from Craig Spector
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/07/28/like-a-preternatural-flashnew-music-from-craig-spector/) - Back in the early days of the pandemic, when the world was hunkering down for a year of cautious isolation, I posted a piece titled “Music to Span the Social Distance.” In it, I recommended finding respite from the bleak news of the day by seeking out tracks by some of my favorite musicians – - [Game On!
Exclusive Preview of a New YA Adventure
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/02/22/game-onexclusive-preview-of-a-new-ya-adventure/) - Yes, it’s been a while. But I’m back. Blogging again. I’ve never been one to balance professional writing and webpage management. When the two compete, the latter goes untended. Not that I’m complaining. The past two months have centered on some exciting projects. And now that most of those deadlines are either met or within - [Horror Therapy](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/11/05/horror-therapy/) - Horror can be therapeutic. That’s the point of a recent article in Psychology Today, where Robert T. Muller Ph.D. posits that horror allows us to “vicariously experience negative emotions in a controlled environment which may be useful for managing anxiety.” Or, as a team of researchers at Aarhus University put it in a recent study: - [Prime Stage Mystery Theatre:
Now on Audible
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2020/11/12/prime-stage-mystery-theatrenow-on-audible/) - The complete first season of Prime Stage Mystery Theatre is now available on Audible. Each episode of Season 1 features a segment of A Knavish Piece of Mystery -- a locked-door who-done-it that explores the intersection between life and storytelling. In addition, you'll also hear comments and interviews in which listeners responding to elements of - [Prime Stage Mystery Theatre:
Bringing Mystery to the Virtual Stage
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/02/25/prime-stage-mystery-theatre-bringing-mystery-to-the-virtual-stage/) - Agatha Christie had quite a formula. She didn’t discover it. Others employed similar elements before her, and many more have practiced it since. But Christie perfected it with her cozy who-done-its featuring Hercule Poirot. Above: Hercule Poirot (Albert Finney) explains his solution to the story's mystery in Sidney Lumet's adaptation of Agatha Christie's Murder on - [Craic at the Fright Pub:
Remembering the Premiere of Creepshow
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/05/16/craic-at-the-fright-pubremembering-the-premiere-of-creepshow/) - Stephen King and Peter Straub read from The Talisman at the World Fantasy Convention in New Haven, Connecticut, October 1982. Photo:The 21st Century Scop The first rule of Fright Pub is you must listen to Fright Pub. And the second rule of Fright Pub is bring something to drink. That's because, at this horror-movie podcast, - [Sandra Becerril's Nightmares:
First US Edition Coming this Fall
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/07/15/sandra-becerrils-nightmaresfirst-us-edition-coming-this-fall/) - Thanks to streaming services, it’s never been easier to catch shows from around the world. In the past week, I’ve watched episodes of Lupin (France), 30 Coins (Spain), Babylon Berlin (Germany), and Kingdom (South Korea). I’ve also noticed that many of the best children’s cartoons on Netflix are dubbed imports. Books, unfortunately, are another matter. - [Prime Stage Mystery Theatre:
Solving The Mystery of the Clock Room
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/03/08/prime-stage-mystery-theatresolving-the-mystery-of-the-clock-room/) - Last week's episode of Prime Stage Mystery Theatre presented the puzzle of an interactive space called the clock room. If you haven't yet listened to that installment, you can check it out here (where you'll also find all past episodes in the series). And for those of you who have listened to the segment, here's - [Beyond the Imagination:
Frankenstein, Shelley & Karloff
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/10/03/beyond-imaginationfrankenstein-shelley-karloff/) - It’s not easy making a monster. Just ask Victor Frankenstein who “worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an inanimate body.” And when he finally succeeds, he steps back, takes a look at what he has done, and flees in horror. Similarly, author Mary Shelley devoted a year - [Frankenstein, Karloff, and Spike the Mutant](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/09/03/frankenstein-karloff-and-spike-the-mutant/) - "I was euphoric in June. Look where we are now." So begins a new essay in the New York Times that considers how the summer we hoped for got preempted by Covid-Delta. That's the thing with monsters. You can never be sure they're gone for good. Cartoon by Dana Summers, Copyright 2021 Tribune Content Agency, - [Talking Frankenstein](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/10/21/talking-frankenstein/) - “You’re going to see and feel the essence of who this man was.” – Director Art DeConciliis discussing Prime Stage's upcoming production of Karloff: The Man and the Monster. In an earlier post, I mentioned how actor Boris Karloff—the man who gave us cinema's iconic performance as the Frankenstein creature—worked for years as a - [The Enduring Influence of Ambrose Bierce](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/10/10/the-enduring-influence-of-ambrose-bierce/) - Earlier this year, after turning in the manuscript for a new collection of Ambrose Bierce stories, I was watching The Criterion Channel and engaging in an activity that screenwriter Josh Olson calls “eating your vegetables.” In other words, I was finally watching some of those classic movies I’d heard about but had never got around to - [Mystery Theatre Supplement:
The Strange History of Devil's Doors
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/10/11/dd/) - This guest post is a response to Prime Stage Mystery Theatre's opening act of "A Trap Full of Monsters." If you have not yet listened to that episode, you can do so by clicking here. Also, you'll want to be sure to check out Act II when it drops on Thursday, October 14, where we'll be - [A Trap Full of Monsters:
Responses to Last Week's Mystery
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/10/14/a-trap-full-of-monstersresponses-to-last-weeks-mystery/) - “Well then, I suppose that leaves us no choice but to enter through the devil's door.” -- August LaFleur, "A Trap Full of Monsters," Act I Since our previous episode of Prime Stage Mystery Theatre concluded with August LaFleur suggesting that the only way into the New Towne Theatre is through something he called a - [Live Theatre: On Stage and In Your Home](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/11/18/live-theatre-on-stage-and-in-your-home/) - No doubt about it. We’re in the midst of a paradigm shift—a time for reconsidering old assumptions even as we hope for a so-called return to normal. Consider: the past two years have seen an explosion of teleconferences, delivery services, and online commerce. Mask wearing and physical distancing effectively canceled last year’s cold and flu - [More than a Monster:
Karloff Reveals the Man behind the Icon
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/11/07/more-than-a-monsterkarloff-reveals-the-man-behind-the-icon/) - Arrayed with costumes and memorabilia, the set of Karloff: The Man and the Monster presents a snapshot of the actor’s career. There’s a sheep’s wool vest from Son of Frankenstein, sarcophagus from The Mummy, gurney from The Bride of Frankenstein, wheelchair from the set of Targets. Behind it all, a projection screen displays the iconic - [Celebrating a Performance that was ...
"All part of the day's work."
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2021/11/11/celebrating-a-performance-that-was-all-part-of-the-days-work/) - Ninety years ago this month, when James Whale’s Frankenstein was being made, “nobody recognized the importance of the film and the impact it would have on cinema history. It was just part of the day’s work, as far as my father was concerned.” That’s according to Sara Karloff, daughter of the man who created one - [Prime Stage Mystery Theatre Presents:
A Time-Travel-Classics Mystery
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/03/03/prime-stage-mystery-theatre-presentsa-time-travel-classics-mystery/) - What is your favorite time-travel story? This month's audio tale at Prime Stage Mystery Theatre centers on a dozen time travel classics, including some of the genre's best-known science-fiction titles (The Time Machine, Back to the Future, A Wrinkle in Time), a few that lie on the edge of the genre (A Connecticut Yankee, A - [Coming May 5 to PSMT:
Episode One of "A Most Deadly Poison"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/04/14/coming-may-5-to-psmt-episode1-of-a-most-deadly-poison/) - With Prime Stage set to release a new season of Mystery Theatre in May, there's no time like now to catch up on past installments, all of which are available on Apple, Audible, Deezer, Libsyn, Spotify, or the podcasts page at PrimeStage.com. Each season features an all-new five-act mystery, with most episodes running between 10-15 minutes--just right for - [Poirot is Back:
Live at the O'Reilly & Streaming on Hulu
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/04/22/poirot-is-backlive-at-the-oreilly-streaming-on-hulu/) - Hercule Poirot enters in a swirl of mist–walking stick in hand, overcoat draped across his shoulders, and a great mustache perched atop his upper lip. In all, he seems to have stepped from the pages of one of Agatha Christie's novels. Played with great flair by Pittsburgh-based actor, director, and playwright Martin Giles, this Poirot - [Get out Your Spyglasses and Wineglasses:
A New Chapter of PSMT Begins Today
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/05/05/get-out-your-spyglasses-and-wineglassesa-new-chapter-of-psmt-begins-today/) - Would you drink a wine labeled Arrogant Frog? How about Big Ass Red or Cat's Pee on a Gooseberry Bush? Yes, they're real wines, and just a few of the crazier ones listed in a Vinepair article titled "10 Of The World’s Weirdest Wine Labels." And although a recent article in Bloomberg claims that winemakers - [Writing Mysteries:
Round-Robin Storytelling
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/06/01/writing-mysteriesround-robin-storytelling/) - In 1995, crime writers Edna Buchanan, Vicki Hendricks, Elmore Leonard, Paul Levine, and Les Standiford and eight of their writing colleagues penned the round-robin mystery novel Naked Came the Manatee. Conceives as a parody of the thriller genre and a response to an earlier multi-author novel titled Naked Came the Stranger (which has 24 writers!), - [This Friday at Confluence:
The Pandemic’s Impact on Horror Fiction
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/07/28/this-friday-at-confluencethe-pandemics-impact-on-horror-fiction/) - I’ve been doing my best to learn from the examples set by writers who lived through past epidemics – Sherwood Anderson, Beatrix Potter, and W.E.B. Du Bois (all of whom wrote during the 1918 flu outbreak); and Francesco Petrarca, Thomas Nash, and William Shakespeare (who penned some of their greatest works during Europe’s deadliest plagues). - [On a Night in November...
Shelley's "Hideous Progeny" Comes Alive
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/10/26/on-a-night-in-november-shelleys-hideous-progeny-comes-alive/) - "It was on a dreary night of November, that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils." So begins the creation scene in the book that The Guardian calls one of the top 10 novels of all time. And this November, that scene and more will come alive as Prime Stage Theatre premieres the first production - [One Night in Geneva:
The Birth of a Prosperous Progeny
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/08/30/one-night-in-genevathe-birth-of-a-prosperous-progeny/) - In 1831, her first novel having achieved pop-culture status thanks to a string of adaptations in England, Europe, and America (see last week’s post), Mary Shelley introduced the second edition of Frankenstein by writing: “Once again, I bid my hideous progeny go forth and prosper.” Little could she have foreseen just how prosperous it would - [A Monster of a Mix Up:
The Strange Case of Creepy No. 10
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/08/10/a-monster-of-a-mix-upthe-strange-case-of-creepy-no-10/) - Today we continue unpacking some of the titles mentioned during my conversation with Brentley Palmer and Nicholas Schwartz in the Frankenstein installment of their Horror Drafts podcast. if you haven't listened to that discussion, you can find it here. As for the previous blog posts in this series, you can find them here and here. - [Today at Confluence:
Where To Next? Trends in Science Fiction
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/07/30/today-at-confluencewhere-to-next-trends-in-science-fiction/) - Writing horror in the days of covid is a bit like living in a science fiction novel. Not the Michael Crichton variety, where things pretty much go back to normal after humankind deals with the inciting incident, but the Richard Matheson kind (think I am Legend) where things change and those of us who get - [First Impressions:
Discovering Frankenstein
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/08/01/first-impressionsdiscovering-frankenstein/) - A recent episode of Prime Stage Mystery Theatre features responses to the question "Where did you first encounter Frankenstein?" The responses are varied, with listeners referencing Mel Brooks, Boris Karloff, and (appropriately) Mary Shelley. But a response closest to my own experience is from a Facebook friend who reports that she had been aware of - [Thinking Like a Writer: Finding the Words](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/09/18/thinking-like-a-writer-finding-the-words/) - For Mark Twain, “The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.” For Mary Shelley, it is the difference between creature and being. We can see her deliberation in the excerpt (at left) of her Frankenstein manuscript, where she makes a choice that best - [A Child and a Monster go to the Lake, or ...
"What shall we throw in now?"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/08/19/a-child-and-a-monster-go-to-the-lake-or-what-shall-we-throw-in-now/) - Set in central Spain shortly after the Spanish revolution, Victor Erice's film The Spirit of the Beehive opens with the children of a rural village watching James Whale’s Frankenstein (1931). Two of the children, sisters Ana and Isabelle, watch wide-eyed as the monster encounters a young girl by a mountain lake. It’s the same scene you’ll - [Not Your Universal Monster:
The Hammer Frankenstein Series
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/08/04/not-your-universal-monsterthe-hammer-frankenstein-series/) - It’s alive! Out of the lab and in your earbuds, the latest episode of the Horror Drafts podcast featuring a two-hour discussion of all things Frankenstein is available now. Here’s the description from the podcast site: This week we are joined by author, screenwriter, playwright, podcaster, and all-around Frankenstein expert Lawrence C. Connolly to draft - [Frankenstein: The Creation Scene](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/10/27/frankenstein-the-creation-scene/) - Sutured body parts, flashing electrodes, bubbling chemicals--they’re some of the best-known elements of the Frankenstein creation scene. And none are in the novel. For over 200 years, playwrights, screenwriters, comic artists, and (more recently) game designers have endeavored to fill in the blanks of a process that Mary Shelley’s narrative covers in fewer than 100 - [Celebrating Frankenstein Weekend …
@ The Little Green Bookstore in Zelienople
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/10/29/celebrating-frankenstein-weekend-the-little-green-bookstore-in-zelienople/) - Yesterday was Frankenstein Friday. That’s according to the website National Today, which as near as I can figure is a site where folks suggest holidays and have them listed for others to celebrate. Though not to be confused with the official holidays and various observances identified on your Google calendar, National Today’s designation works for - [Frankenstein Reviews: It’s alive!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/11/12/frankenstein-reviews-its-alive/) - “A great adaptation of the classic novel.” So says Sean Collier on Pittsburgh Today, and it's just one of the many strong notices that Prime Stage Theatre’s Frankenstein has garnered since its opening on November 5. You can catch the entire Pittsburgh Today review by clicking the player at the bottom of this post. - [Creating Frankenstein:
Now Available at Scripts for Stage
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2022/12/18/creating-frankensteinnow-available-at-scripts-for-stage/) - Temperatures drop. Snow falls. Time to hole up inside, light a fire, and catch up on the latest books and movies. Or … if you’re a 21st-century scop … it might be a good time to take the Lord Byron stormy-night challenge and get to work on that novel or script you’ve been thinking about. - [This Way to Egress: Grit](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/06/05/this-way-to-egress-grit/) - [This is the second in a series of posts on the shooting of the "This Way to Egress" segment of Nightmare Cinema. You can find the first installment here. The film is available for free on Freevee and Tubi or to rent or own on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu.] Filming "This Way to Egress" began - [This Way to Egress: "Heft and Presence"](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/06/12/this-way-to-egress-heft-and-presence/) - [This is the third in a series of posts on the shooting of Nightmare Cinema's “This Way to Egress." You can find the previous installments here and here. The film is available to stream on Freevee and Tubi or to rent/own on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu.] In his essay “The Effect of Effects” (2008), critic Roger Ebert praises the cinematic illusions created for - [This Way to Egress: Toilet Nightmares](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2023/06/19/this-way-to-egress-toilet-nightmares/) - [This is the fourth in a series of posts on the filming of Nightmare Cinema's “This Way to Egress." The film is available to stream on Freevee and Tubi or to rent/own on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu.] Seven years ago this month, the crew of "This Way to Egress" transformed the restroom of a downtown LA office building to create the scene - [Hollywood Reporter:
First Look at "This Way to Egress"
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/11/04/hollywood-reporterfirst-look-at-this-way-to-egress/) - This is Helen from “This Way to Egress.” She’s out to get her kids back. If you’re a monster … you’d best get out of her way. The image above (featuring Elizabeth Reaser as Helen) has just been released as part of a "First Look" exclusive from The Hollywood Reporter. You can see more images - [Connolly Brothers: July 7th @ Riley's](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2017/07/03/connolly-brothers-july-7th-rileys/) - Brother Mark is in town from Colorado, I'm back from L.A., and now will be getting together at Riley's Pour House on Friday, July 7. We'll start at 8:00 and won't stop until midnight. Longtime bandmate Duane Davis will also be on hand to back us up on bass. Special surprise guests? Absolutely, but you'll need to - [Flash Fiction @ Sewickley Public Library](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2016/06/16/9706/) - This Friday, June 17, I'll be taking a break from working on the new book to drop by the Sewickley Public Library, where I've been invited to talk about one of my favorite subjects--flash fiction. It's a presentation that I've given before at various workshops and conferences, and I'm looking forward to dusting it off - [Who Says You Can't Repeat the Past?](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/04/21/who-says-you-cant-repeat-the-past/) - The good people at PARSEC, Pittsburgh premier science fiction organization, have posted the audio of my April 11 presentation "Dreams, Memory, and Time Travel." It's the first in what I understand will be a series of podcasts featuring speakers from Parsec's monthly meetings. Held in Squirrel Hill, the meeting gave me a chance to revisit my - [Scop Rock: This Week's Show](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/04/02/scop-rock-this-weeks-show/) - I'll be returning to Riley’s on Saturday, April 4, backed up by bassist Duane Davis. Along the way, we'll be joined by Tommy B on piano and others. This week's show starts at 8:00 PM and wraps up 60+ songs later at midnight. It's always a blast. If you live in Pittsburgh or are just passing - [Get Ready for the Party of the Year! ](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2015/03/10/get-ready-for-the-party-of-the-year/) - It starts Friday night at Riley's when Duane Davis and I take the stage at 8:00, and it'll continue Saturday when we open for the Wild Geese Band at 6:00. Should be a rocking good time. The party continues on Tuesday (the official St. Patrick's Day). Other musicians performing at the three-day event will include John Puckett , Mike Gallagher, and Mark Guiser. Seriously, you - [Spotlight on All-Star Storytellers:
Larry Ivkovich
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/12/19/spotlight-on-all-star-storytellerslarry-ivkovich-2/) - It's almost here. Not Christmas. Not New Year's Eve. I'm talking All-Start Storytelling, the event that will feature this year's top storytellers from Story Night @ Riley's Pour House. With fewer than two weeks to go to the event, I'd like to begin highlighting some of the storytellers who will be appearing at our year-end competition. - [Storytelling @ Riley's Presents: Masks](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/10/25/storytelling-rileys-presents-masks-2/) - This month at Riley's we'll be telling stories about masks. Think Halloween, theatre, deception, and the roles people play in everyday life. The theme is open to a variety of interpretations, and we're looking forward to hearing yours. If your interested in sharing a story, you can let us know by posting to our event - [This Week's Mine Meld at SF Signal:
Favorite Library and Bookstore Memories
](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/08/06/this-weeks-mine-meld-at-sf-signalfavorite-library-and-bookstore-memories/) - From this week's installment of The Mine Meld at SF Signal: I grew up in Levittown in the 1960s. Ten square miles of uniformity, hundreds of houses just like mine, thousands of people just like me. To escape the normalcy, my friends and I imagined strange worlds with alien landscapes, adventures in places where weird - [Storytelling Night @ Riley's Presents: Writers on Writing](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/05/29/storytelling-night-rileys-presents-writers-on-writing-2/) - Outside, rains rolled in to hammer the pub's street-side windows, but the inside remained warm and friendly as a packed house gathered for Storytelling Night at Riley's Pour House. The night's theme: The Writing Life. Special quests for the evening were members of Write or Die, Seton Hill University's Writing Popular Fiction Program, and. . . - [Time to Listen to the Werepig!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/05/08/time-to-listen-to-the-werepig/) - If Greg Hall didn’t exist – the horror genre would have to just go ahead and invent him. I made that claim a few years back, and I think it might even appear somewhere on the cover of Werepig Feaver, Greg’s 2012 collection of stories and novelties – a book guaranteed to give you both - [What Are You Reading?](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/03/10/what-are-you-reading/) - If you're like me, you have a number of books going at once. Maybe there's a hardback open on your nightstand, a paperback waiting in your briefcase, an ebook queued up on your digital device. There's simply too much out there for b00k-at-a-time reading, and having so many books going at the same time means - [Back to Riley’s](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2014/02/09/back-to-rileys/) - St. Patrick’s Day is coming, and I’ll be celebrating with three shows at Riley’s Pour House on February 15, March 7, and March 15. That March 15 date will be part of Riley’s block party. If you attended last year’s event, I’ll hope to see you again this time around. If you’ve never been, you owe - [Book City](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/10/02/book-city-2/) - I sometimes get the feeling that we book people are citizens of a kind of portable municipality, a diffused city that reforms around various conventions, conferences, festivals, symposiums, and literary events. We’re united by the love of story, the feel of books, and the knowledge that vicarious experience can be as meaningful and real as - [GenCon Preview: Part 1](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/07/31/gencon-preview-part-1/) - If you plan on being one of the 40,000+ people attending GenCon in Indianapolis this summer, you’ll want to be sure to be a part of my reading with Paul Genesse, taking place at the GenCon Writer’s Symposium on Friday, August 16, at 5:00 PM. I’ll be reading a portion of “The Fourth Sign,” my - [Awaken Your Wonder: The Art of Vortex](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/07/11/awaken-your-wonder-the-art-of-vortex/) - Since founding Fantasist Enterprises a dozen years ago, Will Horner has taken readers to the high seas (Sails and Sorcery), the heroic past (Blood and Devotion) the inner city (Modern Magic), and beyond. Promising to “Awaken Your Wonder,” FE has become a showcase for some of today’s top and up and coming writers. Some of - [What's waiting on the other side of summer?](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/05/21/whats-waiting-on-the-other-side-of-summer/) - The farther we’ve gotten from the magic and mystery of the past, the more we’ve come to love Halloween—the one time each year when the mundane is overturned in favor of the bizarre, the “other side” is closest, and everyone can become anyone or anything they wish... and sometimes what they don’t. Eighteen original stories - [Laughrey Connolly Reunion @ Riley's](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/05/14/laughrey-connolly-reunion-rileys/) - It's the season for music reunions. Styx and REO Speedwagon are back on the road, and Lou Gramm might (or might not) be considering reuniting with Foreigner. But the really big event is happening this Thursday at Riley's Pour House, the spot that Pittsburgh Magazine has named the Best Irish Pub in Pittsburgh. That's where - [Spring Fever Blog Tour with Tracee Ford](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/05/05/spring-fever-blog-tour/) - Interview with Tracee Ford Did you always want to be a writer? If not what did you want to be? Funny thing. After five books and over 50 short fiction sales, I’m still not comfortable calling myself a writer. I’m just a guy who writes. It’s about the verb, not the label; about the doing, - [The Horror Zine on Fear the Abyss.](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/03/09/the-horror-zone-on-fear-the-abyss/) - There’s a sweet review of Eric Beebe’s Fear the Abyss over at The Horror Zine. It has some terrific things to say about stories by Joseph Williams, Jack Ketchum, Gary A. Braunbeck, Jamie Lackey, Tim Waggoner, Kenneth W. Cain, and Jeyn Roberts. And then there’s this: “Human Caverns” by Lawrence C. Connolly is a beautifully descriptive - [. . . next thing I knew, I was on the ground!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/03/07/next-thing-i-knew-i-was-on-the-ground-2/) - It’s been awhile since my last post. There are good reasons for that. I had some new stories to finish, and the new novel is still coming together. But the really big thing since my last post is dealing with the aftermath of a nasty fall I recently took while jogging. That’s what I want - [Looking ahead to The Next Big Thing.](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2013/01/13/looking-ahead-to-the-next-big-thing-2/) - Two months ago, as Frankenstorm raged through the region and I was steeling myself for a rainy journey north to World Fantasy in Toronto, my good friend Stephen Volk (award-winning screenwriter of Ghostwatch and The Awakening) asked me if I wanted to take part on The Next Big Thing. Alas, I had too much on - [December @ Riley's Pour House](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/12/15/december-rileys-pour-house/) - I’ll be returning to Riley’s Pour House tomorrow night for another four-hour marathon of Irish and American music. And with Christmas knocking at the door, I’ll be dusting off some seasonal tunes to get into the spirit. I also expect to be joined by special guest Lauren Connolly-Moore, bringing her terrific vocals to some of my favorite - [Zombie Gumby Endorses Voices](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/09/25/zombie-gumby-endorses-voices-2/) - It’s true. And if you were at Horror Realm this weekend, you can vouch for me. But the real highlight for me was the chance to get together with people like Chris Rickert of Eljay’s Books (the best bookstore in Pittsburgh), Paul Anderson and Eric Beebe of Post Mortem Press, and writers like the Rhysling-Award - [Horror Songs @ Horror Realm](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/09/19/horror-songs-horror-realm-2/) - I saw Lawrence Connolly do a one-man performance called "Songs of the Horror Writer" equipped with nothing but a guitar and a microphone. He sang songs about Lizzie Borden and insects and crimes of passion...and everybody loved it. It was a hilarious subversion of the con's filk programming. -- Michael A. Arnzen Michael Arnzen made - [Your Favorite Genre Song?](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/09/03/2171/) - The forthcoming publication of Rock On: the Greatest Hits of Science Fiction and Fantasy has me contemplating some of the great rock ‘n roll genre songs. There certainly is a ton of them. Science fiction? How about David Bowie’s “Space Oddity,” Genesis’s “The Return of the Giant Hogweed,” or Mastadon’s album-length epic Crack the Skye? (Great - [“Evocative” - Publishers Weekly](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/08/28/evocative-publishers-weekly/) - In Lawrence C. Connolly’s evocative “Mercenary,” sniper and musician Lorcan uncovers a dangerous truth about the mysterious, charismatic singer Bobbie Quicksilver . . . . - Publishers Weekly Needless to say, I’m really jazzed to be a part of this book. Fantasy and sf have always seemed to me to be a big part of - [Let's Get Funky!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/08/01/lets-get-funky/) - If you’re not a fan of Greg Hall and The Funky Werepig Show, you are definitely missing out. Funny, insightful, and in touch with all that is hot in the world of horror literature and media, Greg is the kind of personality that – if he didn’t exist – the horror genre would have to - [Confluence: Literary SF/F/H Conference](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/07/27/confluence-literary-sffh-conference/) - ~ Pittsburgh, PA July 27–29 2012 - Doubletree Hotel Pittsburgh Airport I'll be taking part in the following events. Hope to see you there! Fri 5:00 pm Are You a Member Here? with Steve Ramey, John Joseph Adams, and Sarah Goslee Fri 7:00 pm Iron-Writer Collaboration with Christopher J Pisano, KT Pinto, and Mike McPhail - [Monster Wrangled!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/06/23/monster-wrangled-2/) - Mission accomplished . . . but of course I had expert help from the fourteen talented writers who attended the presentation. Together, we considered how to effectively present strange creatures in genre fiction. With a nod to Christopher Priest’s novel The Prestige, the discussion explored how some of the most effective monster scenes in science - [The Pour House Show](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/05/20/the-pour-house-show/) - Thank you Pour House! The May 19 show was a terrific success, with special guests Lauren Moore and Ted Aiken . . . and all of my favorite people in the audience. Great vibes! And vibes are important when doing a four hour show of 60-plus songs. Without all the clapping, singing, and sometimes shouting along, I'd - [Stories in Song](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/05/19/stories-in-song/) - Long before books, stories were all about music and song. I'll be exploring that connection tonight at Riley's Pour House, starting at 8:00, wrapping up around midnight. A night of stories for the price of a print . . . or two. See you there! Riley’s Pour House 215 E. Main St, Carnegie, PA 15106 [More - ["The Executioner" in Good Company](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/04/20/the-executioner-in-good-company/) - Six of the eleven original stories from Gaslight Arcanum (edited by J. R. Campbell and Charles Prepolec for Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy) have made Ellen Datlow's HM list for the best horror of the year. The stories are as followes: “The Executioner,” Lawrence C. Connolly “The Deadly Sin of Sherlock Holmes,” Tom English. “The Adventure - [The 2011 Bram Stoker Award™ Winners!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/04/01/the-2011-bram-stoker-award-winners/) - The Horror Writers Association announced the winners of the 2011 Bram Stoker Awards™ at its annual awards banquet last night. This year’s presentation was held in Salt Lake City, Utah, at the World Horror Convention, and marks the 25th Anniversary of the awards. The award is named for Bram Stoker, best known as the author - [Communing with the Masters](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/02/19/communing-with-the-masters-2/) - It’s about community, not competition. A number of people have submitted emails in response to the news post I put up yesterday, and some have asked about the meaning of the Dante quote: e più d’onore ancora assai mi fenno, ch’e’ sì mi fecer de la loro schiera . . . The lines are from - [2011 Bram Stoker Award™ Nominees](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/02/18/2011-bram-stoker-award-nominees/) - Congratulations to my fellow the nominees. This is a very good day indeed! Dante said it best: . . . e più d'onore ancora assai mi fenno, ch'e' sì mi fecer de la loro schiera. For immediate release February 18, 2012 Contact Lisa Morton, HWA Bram Stoker Awards Event Organizer lisa@lisamorton.com Horror Writers Association announces 2011 Bram - [Voices - Reading Copies for HWA Members](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/11/23/voices-arcs-for-hwa-members/) - “. . . eleven previously published short stories and a pair of originals, all in [Connolly's] trademark style of thoughtful horror.” —Publishers Weekly Voices also features 15 illustrations by World Fantasy Award Nominee Jason Zerrillo, 13 essays recounting the origin of each story, and a new wrap-around piece of creative nonfiction to open - [HWA Announces 2011 Bram Stoker Award™ Preliminary Ballot](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/01/21/hwa-announces-2011-bram-stoker-award-preliminary-ballot/) - NOVEL: RECS: ◦Lamberson, Greg — Cosmic Forces ◦Longfellow, Ki — Houdini Heart ◦Malfi, Ronald — Floating Staircase ◦O’Neill, Gene — Not Fade Away ◦Warner, Matthew — Blood Born JURY: ◦Conlon, Christopher — A Matrix Of Angels ◦Dunbar, Robert — Willy ◦McKinney, Joe — Flesh Eaters ◦Oliver, Reggie — Dracula Papers, Book 1: The Scholar’s Tale - ["Dramatize it! Dramatize it!"](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/01/18/dramatize-it-dramatize-it/) - In my previous post I promised to spend time responding to questions submitted during my most recent presentation on “The Art of Revision” at Seton Hill University. If you want to know more about the backstory, please take a look at that previous post, otherwise . . . read on! The next question in my stack - [Seeing Voices](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2012/01/07/seeing-voices/) - Check out the new trailer for Voices: Tales of Horror. Produced by Fantasist Enterprises, directed by Billy Sullivan, featuring the jaw-dropping art of Jason Zerrillo . . . and some original music from Veins: The Soundtrack. Turn out the lights, crank up the sound, and enjoy. This video rocks! http://youtu.be/huNQNNj1ykM - [I'll Meet You in the Gaslight](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/12/09/ill-meet-you-in-the-gaslight/) - If you missed the Bitten By Books event last week, you can still access highlights at The Gaslight Gallery, a new blog sponsored by Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing. The blog features some of the best responses offered during the Bitten By Books event as well as new answers to some intriguing questions. Drop - [Meet the Gaslight Arcanum Authors @ Bitten By Books](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/12/01/meet-the-gaslight-arcanum-authors-bitten-by-books/) - The Gaslight Arcanum party is jumping over at the Bitten By Books website. Drop in if you get a chance. It's a great place for talking about fantasy, mystery, horror, Sherlock Holmes . . . or just reading and writing in general. The party in sponsored by the good people at Edge Science Fiction - [New Trailer for Gaslight Arcanum](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/11/21/gaslight-arcanum-trailer/) - The good people at Edge did a terrific job on this new trailer for Gaslight Arcanum: Uncanny Tales of Sherlock Holmes. The trailer features a catchy soundtrack, illustrations from the book, and photos of the authors. Great stuff! Related news, on November 30, the website Bitten By Books will be hosting a 24-hour interview session - [Airships and Sherlock Holmes](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/10/22/airships-and-sherlock-holmes-2/) - The master sleuth and Master of the World. What’s not to love? The World Fantasy Convention has just released its program schedule for 2011, one that offers an impressive blend of topics centering on this year’s theme: Sailing the Seas of Imagination. At the con, I’ll be joining a discussion about airships and reading from my latest Sherlock Holmes - [2011 World Fantasy Awards Ballot](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/09/04/2011-world-fantasy-awards-ballot/) - The World Fantasy Convention 2011 will be held October 27-30 in San Diego, California. Judges are Andrew Hook, Sascha Mamczak, Mark Rich, Sean Wallace, and Kim Wilkins Life Achievement winner Peter S. Beagle winner Angélica Gorodischer Novel Lauren Beukes, Zoo City (Jacana (South Africa)/Angry Robot) N K Jemisin, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, (Orbit) Graham Joyce, - [Upcoming Appearances](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/08/22/upcoming-appearances-2/) - August 26-28 Context 24 The Doubletree Hotel 175 Hutchinson Columbus, OH 43235 I’ll be presenting the following workshops. Some seats still remain. Please join us if you’re interested. Should be a terrific time! Friday, August 26 6pm-7:30pm - Building Narrative Tension Regardless of the genre (SF, fantasy, or horror), narrative tension is crucial to a - [Book Miles: GenCon & Beyond](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/08/14/book-miles-gencon-beyond-2/) - I’m back from GenCon. This year the con at large attracted well over 30,000 paid members, with its con-within-a-con The GenCon Writer’s Symposium bringing in nearly 3,000 attendees for its 77 scheduled panels, readings, and workshops. Read the complete blog post at The 21st Century Scop. - [New Blog Post: The Writer & Social Media](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/07/26/new-blog-post-the-writer-social-media/) - What's the first thing a writer should do to begin building a presence in social media? This summer I’ve moderated two panels on social media, the first at last month’s Bram Stoker Weekend in New York, the second this month at Confluence in Pittsburgh. Let's try putting them together into a virtual panel, in which responses from - ["Echoes" now available on YouTube](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/07/20/echoes-now-available-on-youtube/) - Rodney Altman's short film of my story "Echoes" garnered good notice on the festival circuit a few years back, winning Best Cinematography at the Fusion Film Festival in 2004. It's a dark little film, beautifully produced with strong performances and a haunting score. Take a look. Let me know what you think. Based on what - [Up-Coming Appearances](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/07/11/up-coming-appearances/) - July 22 - 23, 2011 Confluence 2011 The 23rd Annual Literary Sci-Fi Convention in Pittsburgh Doubletree Hotel Pittsburgh Airport 8402 University Boulevard Moon Township, Pennsylvania 15108 I'm scheduled for the following events at this year's convention. Hope to see you there! Friday - 4pm (Oak Room). Movies: Is schlock still schlock when the CGI is - [HWA Announces Stoker Winners](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/07/03/hwa-announces-stoker-winners/) - HWA announces the Stoker Winners for 2010: NOVEL: A Dark Matter by Peter Straub FIRST NOVEL: (tie) Black and Orange by Benjamin Kane Ethridge and The Castle of Los Angeles by Lisa Morton LONG FICTION: Invisible Fences by Norman Prentiss SHORT FICTION: “The Folding Man” by Joe R. Lansdale ANTHOLOGY: Haunted Legends by Ellen Datlow - [We're live!](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/07/06/were-live/) - Welcome to the new official site for Lawrence C. Connolly, designed by W. H. Horner Editorial Design. Please look around, check the links, sign on to follow the blog (21st-Century Scop), and let us know how everything is working. Also, if you have a website you'd like to have listed among the links, please let - [British Fantasy Society Announces BFS Fantasy Awards 2011: Shortlist ](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2011/07/04/british-fantasy-society-announces-bfs-fantasy-awards-2011-shortlist/) - BEST NOVEL (AUGUST DERLETH FANTASY AWARD) Apartment 16 – Adam Nevill – Pan McMillan Demon Dance – Sam Stone – The House Of Murky Depths Leaping, The – Tom Fletcher – Quercus Pretty Little Dead Things – Gary McMahon – Angry Robot Silent Land, The – Graham Joyce – Gollancz BEST NOVELLA 1922 – Stephen - [Out of the Past](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/08/11/out-of-the-past/) - Since this blog site underwent a redesign last summer, I've meant to go back through its 1000+ entries to check for broken links and configuration errors. I finally got around to it this week, working chronologically through a decade of past entries in a process akin to time travel. Turns out, things are in pretty - [Mighty Beasts of the 1950s](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/2024/11/25/mighty-beasts-of-the-1950s/) - Time Traveling Let’s go back in time. The distant past! To the days when terrible lizards roamed the imaginations of prepubescent minds. I’m talking about the 1950s. Dino Evolution Back then, dinosaurs were juggernauts: massive, lumbering brutes that had more in common with locomotives and steam shovels than with the T-rexes and Velociraptors envisioned today. ## Pages - [Home](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/) - Novels & Collections Stage & Screen Stories & Essays Audio Music Blog Videos About Vlog - [About the Author](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/about-the-author/) - Lawrence C. Connolly’s books include the collections This Way to Egress, whose eponymous tale of psychological horror was adapted for the Mick Garris film Nightmare Cinema; and the Bram-Stoker-nominated Voices, which features Connolly’s best stories from The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Twilight Zone, Year’s Best Horror, and other top magazines and anthologies of - [Books](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/books/) - FEATURED NOVEL Minute Men: Execute & Run Mission Impossible meets X-Men--with a twist. What if you only had 60 seconds to fight? Now on Audio Amazon, Audible, Barnes & Noble Print & ePub Barnes & Nobel, Books-A-Million, Thrift Books, Amazon& wherever fine books are sold. from Caezik Science-Fiction & Fantasyan imprint of Arc Manor Books - [Videos](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/videos/) - [Music](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/music/) - Featured Track The Laughrey Connolly Band The Best of The Laughrey Connolly Band Featuring Lawrence C. Connolly (vocals and guitar), Christopher Laughrey (vocals and guitar), Duane Davis (bass), Lee McGuinn (percussion), Al Snyder (keyboard), and Bob Banerjee (fiddle and mandolin), The Best of the Laughrey Connolly Band includes tracks from the band's studio albums Home - [Stage & Screen](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/stage-and-screen/) - MR. EDGAR A. POE PRESENTS:TALES OF MYSTERY, HORROR & IMAGINATION Master storyteller Edgar Allan Poe reimagines four classic tales that reveal as much about the nature of horror as they do about the dark genius that created them. Script byLawrence C. Connolly Based on the stories ofEdgar Allan Poe World PremiereThe New Hazlett TheatrePittsburgh, PA7 Scripts for Stage - [Vblog](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/vblog/) - Welcome to my video blog. As a complement to The 21st-Century Scop, the entries here deal with movies, books, music, my current projects, and things of interest to storytellers and media consumers in the 21st century. If there's a topic you'd like to see covered, or if you're a writer, musician, or filmmaker with a - [Audio](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/audio/) - Featured Podcasts Prime Stage Mystery Theatre: Each chapter presents an episode of a new five-act mystery in which you are part of the story. All 35 episodes are available here, or find them wherever you get your podcasts. The Wicked Library presents "The Other Kind" and "Unfolding," tales of psychological horror written and performed by Mystery Theatre - ["This Way to Egress" Still Gallery](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/nightmare-cinema-still-gallery/) - [CREATING FRANKENSTEIN Still Gallery](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/creating-frankenstein-still-gallery/) - Click the thumbnails for the full images. Photos by Laura Slovesko, courtesy of Prime Stage Theatre. - [Stories & Essays](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/stories/) - in alphabetical order “Aberrations” Visions: Short Fantasy and SF Fantasist Enterprises, 2009 Click here to listen to an audio performance of this story. “Beerwulf” Bash Down the Door and Slice Open the Badguy ed. William H. Horner III Fantasist Enterprises, 2007 “Beneath Between” The Stories (in) Between ed Greg Schauer, W.H. Horner, et.al. Fantasist Enterprises, - [Appearances](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/appearances/) - 2022 (All times Eastern) Mystery Theatre Event New Hazlett Theatre March 4 & 11, 7:00 p.m. 6 Allegheny Square East Pittsburgh, PA 15212 Talk Back: FRANKENSTEIN New Hazlett Theatre November 5, 8:00 p.m. (Show runs November 4-13) 6 Allegheny Square East Pittsburgh, PA 15212 Mystery Theatre Event New Hazlett Theatre Preview and Opening Night of - [Contact](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/contact/) - Lawrence C. Connolly: LawrenceCConnolly (at) gmail (dot) com Author’s Agent: Virginia Kidd Literary Agency P.O. Box 278 Milford, PA 18337 - [Tolkien points: Lord of the Rings ](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tolkien-points-lord-of-the-rings/) - by KEN CHIACCHIA From Pittsburgh City Paper Vol. 11, No. 51 copyright © 2001 by Ken Chiacchia You probably know at least one or two of us. We’re the ones sulking around the watercooler grumbling about the fuss over Those Other Books, cursing Hollywood in fluent Elvish. You may have learned, the hard way, not - [Scare Tactics: Horror writers consider their craft in the shadow of real horror. ](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/scare-tactics-horror-writers-consider-their-craft-in-the-shadow-of-real-horror/) - by Dawn Stanton From Pittsburgh City Paper Vol. 11, No 46 copyright © 2001 by Dawn Stanton Halloween has passed, the pumpkin is rotting, and you've tucked (or thrown) away the mask. For some, though, the weirdness remains. Horror writers see it all around them. It scratches and gnaws at them, screeches and whispers, until ## Categories - [21st-Century Scop](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/category/21st-centuryscop/) - [Appearances](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/category/appearances/) - [News](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/category/news/) ## Tags - [fantasy](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tag/fantasy/) - [science fiction](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tag/science-fiction/) - [horror](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tag/horror/) - [short stories](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tag/short-stories/) - [fiction](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tag/fiction/) - [poetry](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tag/poetry/) - [music](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tag/music/) - [performance art](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tag/performance-art/) - [oral storytelling](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tag/oral-storytelling/) - [Lawrence Ferlinghetti](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tag/lawrence-ferlinghetti/) - [International Poetry Forum](https://lawrencecconnolly.com/tag/international-poetry-forum/) - [Michael A. 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