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(Photo is “Shiver My Bones002″ by bjfrenchphoto.) Today I want to highlight two excellent reading recommendation lists from Sublime Horror that are perfect for this spooky season, both written by a scholar whose work I follow with great enthusiasm, literary historian Melissa Edmundson. Here they are: 1) “Ghost stories by Victorian women, a reading list chosen by Melissa Edmundson” and 2) “Supernatural novellas by Victorian women, a reading list chosen by Melissa Edmundson.” This is an excerpt from one of the supernatural novellas mentioned in the second list, the ghost story Cecilia de Noël, by Lanoe Falconer (1910): It was a tall figure in a long grey garment, who carried a lighted candle in his hand. For a moment, startled and stupefied as I was, I failed to recognise the livid face. “Canon Vernade! You are ill?” Too ill to speak, it would seem, for without a word he staggered forward and sank into a chair, letting the candle almost drop from his hand on to the table beside him; but when I put out my hand to ring the bell, he stayed me by a gesture. I looked at him, deadly pale, with blue shadows about the mouth and eyes, his head thrown helplessly back, and then I remembered some brandy I had in my dressing-bag. He took the glass from me and raised it to his lips with a trembling hand. I stood watching him, debating within myself whether I should disobey him by calling for help or not; but presently, to my great relief, I saw the stimulant take effect, and life come slowly surging back in colour to his cheeks, in strength to his whole prostrate frame. He straightened himself a little, and turned upon me a less distracted gaze than before. “Mr. Lyndsay, there is something horrible in this house.” “Have you seen it?” He shook his head. “I saw nothing; it is what I felt.” He shuddered. I looked towards the grate. The fire had long been out, but the wood was still unconsumed, and I managed, inexpertly enough, to relight it. When a long blue flame sprang up, he drew his chair near the hearth and stretched towards the blaze his still tremulous hands. “Mr. Lyndsay,” he said, in a voice as strangely altered as his whole appearance, “may I sit here a little—till it is light? I dread to go back to that room. But don’t let me keep you up.” I said, and in all honesty, that I had no inclination to sleep. I put on my dressing-gown, threw a rug over his knees, and took my place opposite to him on the other side of the fire; and thus we kept our strange vigil, while slowly above us broke the grim, cold dawn of early spring-time, which even the birds do not brighten with their babble. Silently staring into the fire, he vouchsafed no further explanations, and I did not venture to ask for any; but I doubt if even such language as he could command would have been so full of horrible suggestion as that grey set face, and the terror-stricken gaze, which the growing light made every minute more distinct, more weird. What had so suddenly and so completely overthrown, not his own strength merely, but the defences of his faith? He groped amongst them still, for, from time to time, I heard him murmuring to himself familiar verses of prayer and psalm and gospel, as if he sought therewith to banish some haunting fear, to quiet some torturing suspicion. And at last, when the dull grey day had fully broken, he turned towards me, and cried in tones more heart-piercing than ever startled the great congregations in church or cathedral— “What if it were all a delusion, and there be no Father, no Saviour?” And the horror of that abyss into which he looked, flashing from his mind to my own, left me silent and helpless before him. Yet I longed to give him comfort; for, with the regal self-possession which had fallen from him, there had slipped from me too some undefined instinct of distrust and disapproval. All that I felt now was the sad tie of brotherhood which united us, poor human atoms, strong only in our capacity to suffer, tossed and driven, whitherward we knew not, in the purposeless play of soulless and unpitying forces. The entire novella is available online here from Project Gutenberg. View the full post.

(Photo is “Spooky Woods” by GypsyMist.) Do you consider crime thrillers and murder mysteries good reading fare for the Halloween season? I do. And I’m glad that we’re in a time when crime fiction by Indigenous American writers is increasingly recognized and celebrated. Here’s a terrific article by Lakota author David Heska Wanbli Weiden for CrimeReads: “Why Indigenous Crime Fiction Matters.” He also contributed this useful reading list for The Strand: “Seven Essential Native American Crime Novels.” Speaking of David Heska Wanbli Weiden, I read, thoroughly enjoyed, and highly recommend his gripping 2020 novel Winter Counts, which is a (to borrow the official description) “groundbreaking thriller about a vigilante on a Native American reservation who embarks on a dangerous mission to track down the source of a heroin influx.” A tense and engrossing read. And speaking of his essay on “Why Indigenous Crime Fiction Matters,” I was very glad to see Cherokee novelist John Rollin Ridge mentioned front and center. Earlier this year in my monthly “Looking Back on Genre History” segment on the StarShipSofa podcast, on Episode 628, I discussed how we can trace parts of Batman’s origin back to John Rollin Ridge and his fiction. (Photo by Yours Truly.) Perhaps my favorite discovery this year is the wonderful Cash Blackbear mystery/crime series, including Murder on the Red River (2017) and Girl Gone Missing (2019), by White Earth Nation author Marcie R. Rendon. Set during the Vietnam Conflict, these books follow 19-year-old Cash Blackbear – “aged-out foster child, girl pool shark, truck driver from Minnesota’s White Earth reservation” – who asks questions, has dreams, and regularly helps out her friend Wheaton, the cop who is her family by choice rather than blood, as he solves crimes. These books deliver on mood and atmosphere while also telling difficult, important, meaningful stories. Here is one of Cash Blackbear’s vivid and haunting dreams: Cash pulled herself up and out of her window. Her heart beat in her ears and she shivered uncontrollably. Her eyes darted left and right as she ran barefoot across the damp ground. She reached the plowed field. Her foot sank into the cold, damp dirt. When she tried to pull her foot up, her front leg sank further into the earth. She threw herself forward, clawing with bare hands, hearing the heavy, labored breathing of the person chasing her. Fear forced her from her body so that she was soon flying above herself. She looked down to see her body stretched out in the mud below, buried to her knees, arms flailing, hair catching in her hands. Instantly, the body in the field changed from herself struggling to two paler, longer-legged, blonde women. The young women looked up at Cash. They mouthed, “Help me, Help me.” - from Marcie R. Rendon, Girl Gone Missing (2019) View the full post.

Halloween 2020, Day 4 The ghost knew his master was about to die, and he wasn’t exactly unhappy about it. He knew that sounded bad. You’d think, after all those years together, that even he might have felt a twinge of sadness about the whole situation. But it’s hard to feel sorry for someone when: a) you’re a ghost, and everyone knows ghosts don’t have hearts, and b) that someone made her living out of forcing you to make other people miserable. He stared at her now as she lay on the narrow bed, gray and gaunt in the light of the full moon, her breath rasping and shallow. Watching her teeter slowly toward the end was a bit like watching a grape slowly become a raisin: the years had sucked the life and vitality out of her until she was nothing but a wrinkled shell of her former self. “Well,” she wheezed, squinting at him. Well, he said. “One more for the road, eh?” she said, nodding to the full moon out the window. And she grimaced as she offered him the ring finger of her right hand, as she had done so many times before. The ghost nodded. It seemed frivolous, but after all, he still needed to eat, whether or not his master lay dying. As he bent his head over the wrinkled hand, his sharp little teeth pricking the skin worn and calloused from time and use, the witch let out a sharp breath. Her blood used to be rich and strong and so thick with her magic that the ghost could get himself drunk on it, if he wasn’t careful. Now all he tasted was the stale tang of age, the sour notes that came with impending death, and a bitter aftertaste he couldn’t quite place. Regret, perhaps. It was the regret that was hardest to swallow. The ghost drank nothing more than he had to, finishing quickly and sealing the tiny pinpricks of his teeth on her skin with spit. It is done, he told her, the words familiar as a favorite song, the ritual as comforting as a warm blanket. And I am bound to you, until the end. The witch patted his horned head gently. Her touch surprised him—she had never been particularly affectionate. “Well,” she said, her voice nothing more than a sigh. “The end is now.” – from The Girl and the Ghost by Hanna Alkaf (2020) This year I fell in love with the middle-grade novel The Girl and the Ghost, which is based on Malaysian folktales about the pelesit, a shape-shifting spirit bound to serve a single master. In the novel, young Suraya inherits such a ghost from her witch grandmother and learns that this pelesit is loyal – and jealous. Hanna Alkaf offers genuine chills as well as laughs, but most importantly she delivers a thought-provoking, heart-warming, life-affirming story of loss, grief, friendship, and family. The characters feel so real! Don’t let the middle-grade classification of this story fool you; The Girl and the Ghost has much to offer readers of all ages, including plenty of ghosts, graveyards, and spookiness. You can read a longer excerpt from The Girl and the Ghost here or listen to sample from the audiobook here. View the full article

(Photo by Yours Truly. Skulls from Toscano.) Today I bring you several recent articles that are perfect for getting into the Halloween spirit. 1. From Danielle Trussoni for The New York Times: “Grisly Slabs of Gothic Horror.” 2. From Marc E. Fitch for CrimeReads: “Literature Is Built on a Foundation of Horror.” 3. From Dr. Sam Hirst for Tor.com: “More Thrilling than Fiction: The Real Life Heroines of the Early Gothic.” One of the heroines mentioned in the article above is Mary Darby Robinson (1758-1800). Here is an excerpt from her poem “The Haunted Beach” from Lyrical Tales (1800): And often, while the moaning wind Stole o'er the summer ocean, The moonlight scene was all serene, The waters scarce in motion; Then, while the smoothly slanting sand The tall cliff wrapp’d in shade, The fisherman beheld a band Of spectres gliding hand in hand– Where the green billows play’d. And pale their faces were as snow, And sullenly they wander’d; And to the skies with hollow eyes They look’d as though they ponder’d. And sometimes, from their hammock shroud, They dismal howlings made, And while the blast blew strong and loud, The clear moon mark’d the ghastly crowd, Where the green billows play’d. And then above the haunted hut The curlews screaming hover’d; And the low door, with furious roar, The frothy breakers cover’d. For in the fisherman’s lone shed A murder’d man was laid, With ten wide gashes in his head, And deep was made his sandy bed Where the green billows play’d. Read the complete poem here. View the full article

(Artwork is “Autumn” by lunarhare.) Today’s reading recommendation list is “Joke’s on you: Five parodies of the ghost story” by Lewis Hurst for Sublime Horror. In Hurst’s words, “I used to avoid ‘funny’ ghost stories. Humour seemed at odds with the effect I sought from reading about the supernatural. It dispelled the atmosphere, leaving the stories, and the reader, disenchanted. Later on, I learned that horror could be funny, and that funny things can be horrific.” And here is an excerpt from one of the stories Hurst mentions, “The Open Window” by Saki (1914): “Then you know practically nothing about my aunt?” pursued the self-possessed young lady. “Only her name and address,” admitted the caller. He was wondering whether Mrs. Sappleton was in the married or widowed state. An undefinable something about the room seemed to suggest masculine habitation. “Her great tragedy happened just three years ago,” said the child; “that would be since your sister’s time.” “Her tragedy?” asked Framton; somehow in this restful country spot tragedies seemed out of place. “You may wonder why we keep that window wide open on an October afternoon,” said the niece, indicating a large French window that opened on to a lawn. “It is quite warm for the time of the year,” said Framton; “but has that window got anything to do with the tragedy?” “Out through that window, three years ago to a day, her husband and her two young brothers went off for their day’s shooting. They never came back. In crossing the moor to their favourite snipe-shooting ground they were all three engulfed in a treacherous piece of bog. It had been that dreadful wet summer, you know, and places that were safe in other years gave way suddenly without warning. Their bodies were never recovered. That was the dreadful part of it.” Here the child’s voice lost its self-possessed note and became falteringly human. “Poor aunt always thinks that they will come back some day, they and the little brown spaniel that was lost with them, and walk in at that window just as they used to do. That is why the window is kept open every evening till it is quite dusk. Poor dear aunt, she has often told me how they went out, her husband with his white waterproof coat over his arm, and Ronnie, her youngest brother, singing ‘Bertie, why do you bound?’ as he always did to tease her, because she said it got on her nerves. Do you know, sometimes on still, quiet evenings like this, I almost get a creepy feeling that they will all walk in through that window—” The short story is online (in Saki’s collection Beasts and Super-Beasts) here at Project Gutenberg. View the full article

Star Wars is all about Halloween! Are you in the mood for some Star Wars Halloween goodness? 1. If you’re feeling crafty, learn how you can make a creeptastic Darth Maul bookmark here! 2. Check out the General Grievous Halloween audiocast! This was an audiocast recorded by Matthew Wood as General Grievous and released on StarWars.com for Halloween of 2005. It was re-released on October 31, 2014. Today you (or your trick-or-treaters) can feel the Force of fright! Download this free audiocast to bring Star Wars scares to your October! 3. Did you know that Halloween was part of the classic Star Wars Expanded Universe? According to Wookieepedia, Halloween, or Hallowe'en, was a festival held in certain locations in the galaxy, including the Jedi Temple on the planet Coruscant and the settlement of Bright Tree Village on the Forest Moon of Endor. For the Jedi, the festival entailed decorating the temple with carved pumpkins and cobwebs. For the Ewoks of Endor, the festival was an annual highlight characterized by revelry, costuming, laughter, and a large feast. During the Halloween of 3 ABY, a predatory creature known as a hanadak attacked Bright Tree Village but was coaxed into leaving when Wicket W. Warrick and other Ewoks placed pacifying blue dlock leaves upon it. Later during that same Halloween, a band of Duloks kidnapped the Ewoks’ leader, Chief Chirpa, but Warrick and his friends Teebo and Kneesaa rescued the chief and allowed the Halloween festivities to continue. 4. Check the official Star Wars site’s Halloween Hub for a “ghoul-actic collection of articles, crafts, and more”! In particular, don’t miss the chance to hang around with mynocks! 5. In 2018, Star Wars knocked it out of the ballpark with new publications Are You Scared, Darth Vader?, one of the best Star Wars picture books I’ve ever read (and a terrific tribute to Halloween!), and the Tales from Vader’s Castle limited comic series, inspired by classic Hammer Horror films. I can’t recommend these enough! Last year, we got the Return to Vader’s Castle series. This year, both Tales and Return will be combined into the single-volume Beware of Vader’s Castle! But wait, there’s more! October is the annual Star Wars Reads celebration. Star Wars Reads combines the love of a galaxy far, far away and the joy of reading. Star Wars Reads Printable Activity Kit and Posters: Plan your own Star Wars event with this amazing party kit, complete with party invitations, posters, and activities for kids to adults. Click here for goodies! There will be events around the world sponsored by Star Wars publishers, so keep your eye on the Star Wars Reads Facebook page for more information. View the full article

(Artwork is “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here” by theycallmedanyo.) For today I have an article/reading recommendation list to share by T. Marie Vandelly for Crime Reads: “Domestic Horror: A Primer.” And here are some atmospheric quotes from some of the novels that appear in the list: “It’s bad when the dead talk in dreams,” said Odessa. ― Michael McDowell, The Elementals (1981) “The origins of the bottle tree were African, Helen had once told her; it was a folk tradition brought to this country by slaves, who, working with whatever materials were at hand, devised a crude method of catching and trapping malevolent spirits, to prevent their passage through human doors.” ― Attica Locke, The Cutting Season (2012) “In folktales a vampire couldn’t enter your home unless you invited him in. Without your consent the beast could never cross your threshold. Well, what do you think your computer is? Your phone? You live inside those devices so those devices are your homes. But at least a home, a physical building, has a door you can shut, windows you can latch. Technology has no locked doors.” ― Victor LaValle, The Changeling (2017) View the full article

(Photo by Yours Truly. Poe by Dellamorteco.) On this day in 1849 – 171 years ago – Edgar Allan Poe died at the age of forty under mysterious circumstances. For more information, read “Mysterious for Evermore” by Matthew Pearl, an article on Poe’s death from The Telegraph. Pearl is the author of a fascinating novel about the subject, The Poe Shadow. (Photo by Yours Truly.) The following are some of my favorite links about Edgar Allan Poe: PoeStories.com: An Exploration of Short Stories by Edgar Allan Poe Poe-Land: The Hallowed Haunts of Edgar Allan Poe (I highly recommend this book by J.W. Ocker, and I suggest that you enter “Poe” into the Search feature at his Odd Things I’ve Seen site, as well, for many Poe-riffic posts!) The Poe Museum of Richmond The Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore Hocus Pocus Comics is Poe-centric to the max, and I invite you to visit the site! In addition, check out this beautiful time-lapse video of David Hartman drawing an exclusive Kickstarter cover for The Imaginary Voyages of Edgar Allan Poe – and subscribe to the Hocus Pocus Comics YouTube channel while you’re at it! The Caedmon recordings – that’s 5 hours of Edgar Allan Poe stories read by Vincent Price & Basil Rathbone – are now available on Spotify (download the software here). (Thanks, Jessica!) And now, here is one of my favorite readings of Poe: Gabriel Byrne’s narration of the pandemic-relevant and all-too-timely “The Masque of the Red Death.” The red death had long devastated the country. No pestilence had ever been so fatal, or so hideous. Blood was its Avatar and its seal – the madness and the horror of blood. There were sharp pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores, with dissolution. The scarlet stains upon the body and especially upon the face of the victim, were the pest ban which shut him out from the aid and from the sympathy of his fellow-men. And the whole seizure, progress, and termination of the disease, were incidents of half an hour. But Prince Prospero was happy and dauntless and sagacious. When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one of his crenellated abbeys. This was an extensive and magnificent structure, the creation of the prince’s own eccentric yet august taste. A strong and lofty wall girdled it in. This wall had gates of iron. The courtiers, having entered, brought furnaces and massy hammers and welded the bolts. They resolved to leave means neither of ingress nor egress to the sudden impulses of despair or of frenzy from within. The abbey was amply provisioned. With such precautions the courtiers might bid defiance to contagion. The external world could take care of itself. In the meantime it was folly to grieve or to think. The prince had provided all the appliances of pleasure. There were buffoons, there were improvisatori, there were ballet-dancers, there were musicians, there was Beauty, there was wine. All these and security were within. Without was the “Red Death.” – from “The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe (1842). Read the complete story here. View the full article

(Art is “The Innocent Abandoned” by ExDolore.) For today’s spooky reading recommendation list, check out “Five Haunted House Books Written By Women” by Lisa Kröger and Melanie R. Anderson for Tor.com. Here is an eerie snippet from one of the novels in the list, The Graveyard Apartment by Mariko Koike (U.S. edition 2016). It’s pretty close to perfect, Misao thought. What more could anyone want? Two LDK (real-estate shorthand for two bedrooms, living room, dining area, and kitchen); nearly a thousand square feet, including the balcony; a building that was only eight months old; full-time resident managers, right on the premises. For a family in search of a wholesome, peaceful life, it was really quite ideal. Not bothering with a tablecloth, Misao laid out two coffee cups on the bare dining table, along with Tamao’s mug, which was adorned with a picture of a cartoon bear. When she happened to glance toward the balcony, a fleeting wave of misgivings about the location washed over her. Shaking it off, she made a conscious effort to focus on the positives. Beyond the sliding-glass doors, the verdant-smelling March air was whipping around, and there were no buildings nearby to obstruct her field of vision. If only the sublime greenery belonged to a park, and not a graveyard … Misao gave her head a quick, purposeful toss, as if to banish such futile thoughts, then laughed out loud. There she went again, fretting about minor drawbacks and useless hypotheticals. As if she had time to waste on that kind of nonsense! Cut it out, she told herself sternly. The percolating coffee began to fill the room with a delicious aroma. Misao grabbed a frying pan that had just been unpacked a few moments earlier and gave it a quick rinse under the tap. She heated the pan on the stove and added a splash of cooking oil. When the oil began to sizzle, she dropped in three of the eggs she had brought from their previous place—painstakingly packed to make sure they wouldn’t get broken in transit. As she worked, Misao couldn’t keep her eyes from wandering to the living-room windows. The nearly perfect apartment was partially surrounded, from the south to the west side, by a vast graveyard that belonged to an ancient Buddhist temple. To the north were some uninhabited houses, long since fallen into ruin and engulfed in weeds, while on the east side there was a patch of vacant land. Beyond that empty field the smokestack of a crematorium was clearly visible, and from time to time the tall, cylindrical brick chimney would belch out a billow of thick black smoke. Depending on which way the wind was blowing, it wasn’t inconceivable that some of that mortal smoke might waft in through the apartment’s open windows from time to time. A longer excerpt is available online from Macmillan here. View the full article

One of the coolest new-to-me discoveries of this year is The Black Vampyre; A Legend of St. Domingo (1819), which Andrew Barger (in The Best Vampire Stories 1800-1849: A Classic Vampire Anthology) credits as quite possibly “the first black vampire story, the first comedic vampire story, the first story to include a mulatto vampire, the first vampire story by an American author, and perhaps the first anti-slavery short story.” Common-Place: The Journal of Early American Life has a “Just Teach One” page devoted to The Black Vampyre, including the complete text with introduction and notes prepared by Duncan Faherty (Queens College and the CUNY Graduate Center) and Ed White (Tulane University), and several illuminating essays written by teachers who have included this text in their classes. You can read or download The Black Vampyre and these additional resources for free here. Here is a spine-tinging excerpt from The Black Vampyre: When reason and sense returned, she [The Lady] found herself in the same place; and it was also the midnight hour. She was laying by the grave of Mr. PERSONNE, and her breast was stained with blood. A wide wound appeared to have been inflicted there, but was now cicatrized. Imagine if you can, her surprise; when, by a certain carniverous craving in her maw, and by putting this and that together, she found she was a—VAMPYRE!!! and gathered from her indistinct reminiscences, of the preceding night, that she had been then sucked; and that it was now her turn to eject the peaceful tenants of the grave! With this delightful prospect of immortality before her, she began to examine the graves, for subject to satisfy her furious appetite. When she had selected one to her mind, a new marvel arrested her attention. Her first husband got up out his coffin, and with all the grace so natural to his countrymen, made her a low bow in the last fashion, and opened his arms to receive her! View the full article

(Artwork is “Jack-o-lanterns” by NocturnalSea.) If you’re looking for more Halloween festivities, check out the Science Fiction Poetry Association’s 2020 Halloween Poetry Reading, which is already underway and will continue updating throughout the month. Images! Audio! Spooky poetry! And speaking of poetry… Oh, heard you that deep hollow sound, That seem’d to shake the troubled ground? And heard you that low rust’ling sweep, Which seem’d across the grass to creep? ’Tis hapless Henry’s restless shade, Which nightly walks the silent glade. Unhappy youth! a maid he lov’d Who false to his affections prov’d; The morn she promis’d him to wed, That morn she with another fled: ’Twas then that Henry, on his heath, His God forgot – and rush’d on death. Unhallow’d here, his body’s laid; O’er him no burial prayer was said; But on his grave the rank weeds grow, And o’er the place the loud winds blow; Whilst on the stake the rav’nous bird The long drear night is screaming heard…. - excerpt from “Henry’s Shade” by “Susan,” originally from October 1894, as published in Schabraco and Other Gothic Tales from The Lady’s Monthly Museum 1798-1828, edited by Jennie MacDonald (2020). View the full article

Here’s a Halloween-relevant article by Kim Taylor Blakemore at CrimeReads: “The New Gothic: Feminist and Unapologetic - Tracing the Evolution of Gothic Heroines from the Mid-20th Century to the Present Day Through 7 Novels.” On a related note, this is a timely reading list from Emily Wenstrom at Book Riot: “5 Modern Authors Upholding the Gothic Feminist Tradition in 2020.” One of the works recommended is one of the stellar “must read” novels of the season, Mexican Gothic by Sylvia Moreno-Garcia. Here, have a taste: Catalina slowly leaned closer to her, whispering in her ear. “It’s in the walls,” she said. “What is?” Noemí asked, and the question was a reflex, for she found it hard to think what to ask with her cousin’s blank eyes upon her, eyes that did not seem to see; it was like staring into a sleepwalker’s face. “The walls speak to me. They tell me secrets. Don’t listen to them, press your hands against your ears, Noemí. There are ghosts. They’re real. You’ll see them eventually.” - from Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (2020) Chilling, no? A longer excerpt is available here: “Read an Excerpt from Mexican Gothic, Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s Haunted House Mystery.” View the full article

(Art is “Jack O Lantern” by TheArtistJW.) It seems like 2020 hasn’t just been a year, it’s been a decade! The next few weeks won’t be easy, either. But I won’t let 2020 rob me of my very favorite holiday ― or of the chance to celebrate it with my friends throughout the whole of October. This is the fifteenth year I’ll be counting down to Halloween with daily posts. I look forward to sharing quotes, images, links, book reviews, reading and viewing recommendation lists, and various creepy odds and ends with you. I hope you will consider every post a spooky moment of escape, a bite-sized treat (not a trick!) each day. (Source is “The Hooting Of The Owl” by Yesterdays-Paper.) Because 2020 marks the 100th birthday of Ray Bradbury, it seems fitting to start this countdown with the words of that great October Ambassador himself. So welcome to my October countdown… and welcome to the October country… “…that country where it is always turning late in the year. That country where the hills are fog and the rivers are mist; where noons go quickly, dusks and twilights linger, and mid-nights stay. That country composed in the main of cellars, sub-cellars, coal-bins, closets, attics, and pantries faced away from the sun. That country whose people are autumn people, thinking only autumn thoughts. Whose people passing at night on the empty walks sound like rain…” ― Ray Bradbury, The October Country (1955) Also… “For these beings, fall is ever the normal season, the only weather, there be no choice beyond. Where do they come from? The dust. Where do they go? The grave. Does blood stir their veins? No: the night wind. What ticks in their head? The worm. What speaks from their mouth? The toad. What sees from their eye? The snake. What hears with their ear? The abyss between the stars. They sift the human storm for souls, eat flesh of reason, fill tombs with sinners. They frenzy forth….Such are the autumn people.” ― Ray Bradbury, Something Wicked This Way Comes (1962) And… At the edge of the deep dark night ravine he pointed over the rim of the hills and the earth, away from the light of the moon, under the dim light of strange stars. The wind fluttered his black cloak and the hood that half shadowed and now half revealed his almost fleshless face. “There, do you see it, lads?” “What?” “The Undiscovered Country. Out there. Look long, look deep, make a feast. The Past, boys, the Past. Oh, it’s dark, yes, and full of nightmare. Everything that Halloween ever was lies buried there. Will you dig for bones, boys? Do you have the stuff?” He burned his gaze at them. “What is Halloween? How did it start? Where? Why? What for? Witches, cats, mummy dusts, haunts. It’s all there in that country from which no one returns. Will you dive into the dark ocean, boys? Will you fly in the dark sky?” ― Ray Bradbury, The Halloween Tree (1972) (Source is “Imps And Pumpkins” by Yesterdays-Paper.) And from one of my very favorites, “Usher II” (1950)… “Let me out, let me out!” There was one last brick to shove into place. The screaming was continuous. “Garrett?” called Stendahl softly. Garrett silenced himself. “Garrett,” said Stendahl, “do you know why I’ve done this to you? Because you burned Mr. Poe’s books without really reading them. You took other people’s advice that they needed burning. Otherwise you’d have realized what I was going to do to you when we came down here a moment ago. Ignorance is fatal, Mr. Garrett.” Garrett was silent. “I want this to be perfect,” said Stendahl, holding his lantern up so its light penetrated in upon the slumped figure. “Jingle your bells softly.” The bells rustled. “Now, if you’ll please say, ‘For the love of God, Montresor,’ I might let you free.” The man’s face came up in the light. There was a hesitation. Then grotesquely the man said, “For the love of God, Montresor.” “Ah,” said Stendahl, eyes closed. He shoved the last brick into place and mortared it tight. “Requiescat in pace, dear friend.” He hastened from the catacomb. ― Ray Bradbury, “Usher II” (1950) View the full article

Tomorrow is October! This will be the fifteenth year I count down to Halloween with daily “spooky posts.” I hope you’ll join me. Throughout October I will also be rereading one of my all-time favorite books, Roger Zelazny’s A Night in the Lonesome October (1994). It recounts (from the point of view of the dog Snuff) the story of a very eventful October and has 31 chapters, one for every day of the month. In recent years I’ve started treating it as an advent calendar of sorts for Halloween. It’s simply brilliant. Here are a few atmospheric quotes. “Such times are rare, such times are fleeting, but always bright when caught, measured, hung, and later regarded in times of adversity, there in the kinder halls of memory, against the flapping of the flames.” ― Roger Zelazny, A Night in the Lonesome October “I felt a strong desire to howl at the moon. It was such a howlable moon. But I restrained myself.” ― Roger Zelazny, A Night in the Lonesome October “I took Jack his slippers this evening and lay at his feet before a roaring fire while he smoked his pipe, sipped sherry, and read the newspaper. He read aloud everything involving killings, arsons, mutilations, grave robberies, church desecrations, and unusual thefts. It is very pleasant just being domestic sometimes.” ― Roger Zelazny, A Night in the Lonesome October And here’s one of my favorite passages. Snuff is describing Sherlock Holmes, disguised for his investigation as a woman, playing his violin with Romani travelers in their temporary camp: “He played and he played, and it grew wilder and wilder– “Abruptly, he halted and took a step, as if suddenly moving out of a dream. He bowed then and returned the instrument to its owner, his movements in that moment entirely masculine. I thought of all the controlled thinking, the masterfully developed deductions, which had served to bring him here, and then this ― this momentary slipping into the wildness he must keep carefully restrained ― and then seeing him come out of it, smiling, becoming the woman again. I saw in this the action of an enormous will, and suddenly I knew him much better than as the pursuing figure of many faces. Suddenly I knew that he had to be learning, as we were learning other aspects, of the scope of our enterprise, that he could well be right behind us at the end, that he was almost, in some way, a player – more a force, really ― in the Game, and I respected him as I have few beings of the many I have known.” ― Roger Zelazny, A Night in the Lonesome October View the full article

Today is the anniversary of the Long-Expected Party celebrating the eleventy-first birthday of Bilbo Baggins and the coming of age of Frodo Baggins in The Lord of the Rings. It was on this day that Bilbo gave his infamous birthday speech, saying “I don’t know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve,” before disappearing from the Shire forever. Also on this day, according to the Appendices of The Lord of the Rings, 99-year-old Samwise Gamgee rode out from Bag End for the final time. He was last seen in Middle-Earth by his daughter Elanor, to whom he presented the Red Book. According to tradition, he then went to the Grey Havens and passed over the Sea, last of the Ringbearers. And now, in honor of the Baggins Birthdays, the departure of Samwise, and Hobbits in general, here is the song of one of J.R.R. Tolkien’s (and, for that matter, world literature’s) greatest heroes, Samwise Gamgee, when in Cirith Ungol. In this very difficult times, I find myself returning to these verses in particular. They are the epitome of Hobbits and of hope. In western lands beneath the Sun the flowers may rise in Spring, the trees may bud, the waters run, the merry finches sing. Or there maybe ‘tis cloudless night and swaying beeches bear the Elven-stars as jewels white amid their branching hair. Though here at journey’s end I lie in darkness buried deep, beyond all towers strong and high, beyond all mountains steep, above all shadows rides the Sun and Stars for ever dwell: I will not say the Day is done, nor bid the Stars farewell. - J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King View the full article

The First Scientific Utopia Still Matters 400 Years Later View the full article

dramyhsturgis: Happy birthday to Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (30 August, 1797 – 1 February, 1851)! “Life, although it may only be an accumulation of anguish, is dear to me, and I will defend it.” - Mary Shelley, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818) View the full article

Today is the centennial birthday of Ray Bradbury. Here is my recent talk on why we should read Fahrenheit 451 in 2020. View the full article

STAR WARS, HARRY POTTER, and More in the World of Academia It me! I was delighted to be interviewed about my undergraduate and graduate classes for this article in Nerdist. View the full article

In 1920, Native Women Sought the Vote. Here’s What They Seek Now. Native women were highly visible in early 20th-century suffrage activism. White suffragists, fascinated by Native matriarchal power, invited Native women to speak at conferences, join parades, and write for their publications. Native suffragists took advantage of these opportunities to speak about pressing issues in their communities — Native voting, land loss and treaty rights. But their stories have largely been forgotten. View the full article

“I think that there is no genre of horror fiction that so easily and intuitively speaks to our present day anxieties as the gaslit fantasies of our distant ancestors.” Terror and Power: Is Gothic Horror Poised for 21st Century Revival? View the full article

The power of literature in a time of plague View the full article

This is a real winner for me. One of my other favorites is Miskatonic University - so, yeah, I don't mind smelling like a Starbucks. Wet it's coffee, coffee, coffee with a buttery, semi-sweet note. Dry it's a pumpkin latte; the pumpkin and spices come to the fore to balance, but not overwhelm, the coffee. The vanilla - which I don't always like - is subtle and not oversweet. Overall this has great staying power, too, which is another plus. This is just about the ideal fall scent, as far as I'm concerned. I may have to get another bottle of this one. Yum.

I just adore this! Wet it smells like pumpkin pie, but dry it settles into the clove and nutmeg, with a warm pumpkin underneath - to me, it's not so much a "pie" smell as the smell of fall. It's not too sweet, and just ideal for autumn and winter. Definitely worthy of a big bottle.

This is my very favorite BPAL scent! There's just enough of the dark roast coffee to keep the irish cream from being too sweet. I love the staying power of this one. I feel like I'm carrying a little coffee shop - the kind attached to a used book store, with lots of fascinating old volumes on thick wooden shelves - around with me all day long!