As a writer and lover of horror and science-fiction, I’ve always been influenced by films and media and these are just some of the texts that impacted not just my writing, but my life. Each does so much with its genre; regardless of their length, the stories are full of great characters and concepts and dabble with the perception of their genre in interesting and memorable ways. My many years of academic study were always bolstered when we were given texts such as these to dive into, and I’ve even based some of my writing style and published works on the themes, messages, and presentation of these texts.
In my view, thequintessential Stephen King book,Itis so much more than a scary tale of an otherworldly being that feasts on children using the guise of a clown. A story of love, loss, and childhood long forgotten, Itis a powerful coming-of-age tale that perfectly captures what it means to grow up and apart from friends you were once so close to.Add to that the terrifying concept of a shapeshifting creature that feasts upon fear and has terrorised a town for centuries—the implications of which verge on the Lovecraftian by the conclusion—and you have an epic tome that, while long-winded in places, not only delivers with its scares but succeeds in tugging at the heartstrings as well.
This tie-in edition will be available from 16 July
TIE IN TO A NEW MAJOR MOTION PICTURE, IT: CHAPTER 2, ADAPTED FROM KING'S TERRIFYING CLASSIC
27 years later, the Losers Club have grown up and moved away, until a devastating phone call brings them back...
Derry, Maine was just an ordinary town: familiar, well-ordered for the most part, a good place to live.
It was a group of children who saw- and felt- what made Derry so horribly different. In the storm drains, in the sewers, IT lurked, taking on the shape of every nightmare, each one's deepest dread. Sometimes…
Set against the background of eighties excess and consumerism, American Psychois not for the squeamish; the story of a high-powered banker who literally hides his true face beneath a façade of expensive suits and foods,American Psycho doesn’t just toe the line of decency, it speeds past it and gives it the finger! Filled with gruesome and unsettling imagery, long rants about music and fashion and food, and charting title character Patrick Batemen’s descent into all-out anarchy,American Psychonever fails to have me questioning just what is reality and how are we perceived by others.
While many turn to Lovecraft’s Cthuluwritings as his best work, it was this short story of Houdini’s fictional encounter with an unspeakable beast beneath the Great Sphinx of Giza that had the most impact on me. Told from the perspective of Harry Houdini, the tale masterfully captures the mounting dread and claustrophobia of the famous escape artist as he unwittingly delves further underground, to say nothing of the fantastical horrors that await him. Forced to witness strange mummified creatures, under the direction of the malevolent Nitokris, give offerings to one of Lovecraft’s trademark many-tentacled monstrosities, Houdini may dismiss his encounter as a mere flight of fancy but the implication that some gruesome Old One was responsible for the creation of some of the world’s most awe-inspiring structures hits just a little differently.
H. P. Lovecraft was one of the greatest horror writers of all time. His seminal work appeared in the pages of legendary Weird Tales and has influenced countless writer of the macabre. This is one of those stories.
A classic gothic horror widely studied by scholars and students alike, Frankensteinis perhaps the most influential story of the dangers of science ever written. The story of aspiring scientist Victor Frankenstein’s attempts to create life, Frankensteinholds a mirror up to society and shows its ugly reflection without compromise or apology in the form of its memorable Monster. A twisted mish-mash of body parts and memories, the Monster is turned from a gentle, inquisitive being into a vengeful and destructive force through the rejection of his creator and the judgemental aggression of society. Ahead of its time in more ways than one, Frankenstein is easily one of the most recognised lessons in karmic justice ever published and its thematic qualities and horror still make an impression to this day.
One of the BBC's '100 Novels That Shaped Our World'
'That rare story to pass from literature into myth' The New York Times
Mary Shelley's chilling Gothic tale was conceived when she was only eighteen, living with her lover Percy Shelley on Lake Geneva. The story of Victor Frankenstein who, obsessed with creating life itself, plunders graveyards for the material to fashion a new being, but whose botched creature sets out to destroy his maker, would become the world's most famous work of horror fiction, and remains a devastating exploration of the limits of human creativity. Based on the third…
Perhaps better known as the futuristic Arnold Schwarzenegger action vehicleTotal Recall, I’m picking this novelette over some of Dick’s other, more popular works simply because it makes the most of its short length to tell a snappy and surprisingly amusing and layered the story. The tale of a menial office worker haunted by dreams of Mars, this novelette peels back perceptions of identity and memory by having protagonist Douglas Quail’s dreams be distant recollections of a former life. While this drops him into a cycle of violence and memory erasure, the novelette pulls an effective and humorous twist by having Quail, once seen as just another expendable peon, actually be the one man standing between the Earth and total destruction!
Includes the stories that inspired the major motion pictures Total Recall and The Adjustment Bureau
“The collected stories of Philip K. Dick are awe-inspiring.” —Washington Post
Countless readers worldwide consider Philip K. Dick to have been the greatest science fiction writer on any planet. Since his untimely death in 1982, interest in Dick’s work has continued to mount and his reputation has been enhanced by a growing body of critical attention as well as many films based on his stories and novels.
Featuring the story We Can Remember It for You Wholesale, which inspired the major motion picture Total Recall,…
The Summoningis a collaborative effort from the minds of five independent horror authors—Dr. Stuart Knott, Jessica Huntley, H. Everend, Shantel Brunton, and Alice Stone. Together, they have created a haunting tale of four struggling authors offered the chance of a lifetime, but at a horrifying cost. The book is part-novel, part-anthology, with four short stories acting as interludes to the main horror, with each exploring the limits of fear and dread.
I’m fascinated by the mind-body-spirit’s impact on our human experience. Especially the aspect of mind, because deep within us resides the shadow-self described by Carl Jung. Most of us spend our lives hiding this part, but it’s there, waiting to pounce. These are the stories I tell, and with my background in Health and Wellness and in Creative Writing, I write paranormal, supernatural, and horror stories containing the simple truths about our human experience. All are designed to bring out the shadow lurking within and expose it to the light. As a counterpoint to these dark tales, I write evocative poetry, uplifting children’s stories, and some educational books with my writing partner, Derek R. King.
A hair-raising, side-splitting supernatural adventure!
In the idyllic town of Pine Port, Kelsey was on the cusp of realizing her dreams. In weeks, she'd clasp her high school diploma and beauty license. Or so she thought, until her life took a supernatural detour, far removed from the ordinary path she'd envisioned before she stumbled upon her extraordinary ability—she could hear and see the deceased as if they were still living.
This wasn’t what she had hoped for and certainly not the kind of beauty treatment she had in mind. Juggling the intricacies of the living was already a challenge, and…
A hair-raising, side-splitting supernatural adventure!In the idyllic town of Pine Port, Kelsey was on the cusp of realizing her dreams. In weeks, she'd clasp her high school diploma and beauty license. Or so she thought, until her life took a supernatural detour, far removed from the ordinary path she'd envisioned before she stumbled upon her extraordinary ability—she could hear and see the deceased as if they were still living.
This wasn’t what she had hoped for and certainly not the kind of beauty treatment she had in mind. Juggling the intricacies of the living was already a challenge, and now…