The Scarecrow is a creature as old as agriculture whose existence is built on fear. What a perfect fiend for Halloween! To honor of these pumpkin-headed kings I hearby offer this harvest of 13 songs to keep the corn swaying at your Halloween party.
Here is your one stop trick-or-treat spot for this year’s original Halloween content:
I returned to the parlor for another great conversation with Patrick on The Big Séance Podcast.
I appeared as the character ‘Big Ears’ in the H.P. Lovecraft Literary Podcast’s production of ‘THE COLOSSUS’ and almost had their entire month dedicated to JeffCCartober.
October is the perfect season for horror marathons.
The two are almost synonymous. Not even Christmas, that twinkling 800-pound gorilla, can boast such round-the-clock programming. Of course, wintertime itself is a constant reminder of the year-end holidays, and there is truly no escaping all of the Christmas music, commercials, office parties, decorations, rampaging Krampi, etc.
Horror marathons are important because they set a mood, or what I like to call ‘Halloween Spirit’. Even if you can’t enjoy cascades of brilliant leaves and cozy hayrides, you can always open a portal to the moon-kissed realms on your television.
Here are 13 TV mini-series or single seasons for you to freshen up this year’s marathon.
Ultraviolet – BBC
This stylish techno-thriller is only six episodes long. It stars Idris Elba (!), with an appearance by Stephen Moyer as a vampire (!)
Hemlock Grove – Season 1
The first season of this show has werewolves, vampires, monsters, and mad-science. The cast is great (Famke Janssen, Bill Skarsgard, Dougray Scott, Lili Taylor) and so is their chemistry. And it’s DARK.
Werewolf
This sleeper hit from the late 80’s was the most elusive thrill of my childhood. Every rare once in a while I’d manage to catch an episode and watch transfixed as colossal werewolves battled for dominance.
Being Human
This low-key BBC series is about a werewolf, a ghost and a vampire who share a flat. The show runs for several seasons and was adapted in America, but Season One is a strong mix of character and horror.
Juda
This Israeli production is a horror-comedy about a small time criminal who returns from a trip in Romania with new problems, powers and a terrible thirst. It’s suffers from a lower budget but makes up for it with mad-cap performances.
The Frankenstein Chronicles
Also from BBC, this mystery set in the grimdark Victorian era follows Sean Bean(!) as he tracks down the one responsible for a rash of mutilated bodies. Season One is phenomenal – fortunately it is a complete story, so you can avoid Season Two.
The Passage
This vampire thriller only lasted one season on Fox, but the relationship between leads Mark-Paul Gosselaar and child actress Saniyya Sidney was fantastic. The secret power struggle with the psychic vampire master Jamie McShane is also great – the entire cast kills it in this one. Don’t worry about the show being cancelled – it wraps up at the end.
Dracula
This NBC adaptation starring Jonathan Rhys Meyers is bonkers in a wonderful way. It functions almost like a prequel to the story we know, re-mixing and re-contextualizing the relationships and motivations between all the classic characters.
Forever Knight
The last vampire show on this list is a 90’s gem about a vampire cop. One of the vampires from Forever Knight even made a blink-and-you’ll-miss it cameo on Buffy.
Slasher
The first season of this show was more brutal, clever and fun than I expected it to be. If you like the ‘Scream’ franchise, you’ll like season one of Slasher.
Scream
I’d also recommend MTV’s first season of Scream! A worthy addition to the franchise.
Death Note
The animated adaptation of Death Note floored me, even though I’d already read the manga. This twisty supernatural saga about dueling geniuses and death gods has a global body count.
Death Valley
MTV made a COPS style mockumentary show about an LAPD task force that handled the werewolves, vampires and zombies in the San Fernando Valley. Bizarre, gory, silly, fun.
A twisted faerie finds a lost child, a teenage werewolf sneaks out during a full moon, and a legion of monsters begins the downfall of man. Explore Halloween from Appalachia to the Arctic Circle and journey from the Old West to Mars.
This spooktacular goody bag harvests all the joys and terrors of the best night of the year. If you love air crisp as cider and scented with burning leaves, if you greet the darkness with a jack o’lantern grin, and if you yearn for the veil between worlds to grow thin, then you bleed orange & black.
We Bleed Orange & Black is FREE for the next few days!
We Bleed Orange & Black presents 31 fun-sized tales of Halloween from author Jeff C. Carter.
Reviewers are saying,
“This book is a MUST READ for Halloween lovers.”
-Jamie, 5 Star Amazon Review
“I LOVED THIS COLLECTION. The stories were well-paced, distinctive, and held my attention throughout. I highly recommend this book to anyone looking to keep the spooky spirit alive this year.”
– Briana Morgan Books
“Each tale is unique and transports you to a different place or time, providing the perfect escape during a Halloween season that we will likely need it most.”
-All Hallow’s Geek.com
“I absolutely loved it and it was the perfect way to kick off October! “
A twisted faerie finds a lost child, a teenage werewolf sneaks out during a full moon, and a legion of monsters begins the downfall of man. Explore Halloween from Appalachia to the Arctic Circle and journey from the Old West to Mars.
This spooktacular goody bag harvests all the joys and terrors of the best night of the year. If you love air crisp as cider and scented with burning leaves, if you greet the darkness with a jack o’lantern grin, and if you yearn for the veil between worlds to grow thin, then you bleed orange & black. Get it now!
Book 3 of the acclaimed Weird Western series, Merkabah Rider!
The Rider and Kabede must rally a US Cavalry troop against an army of the undead led by three of Adon’s renegade riders if they are to survive THE LONG SABBATH.
The Rider infiltrates an Apache stronghold to convince the combined forces of Vittorio and Geronimo not to lend their might to the forces of THE WAR PROPHET.
The Rider sets out to rescue the succubus Nehema from the wrath of THE MULES OF THE MAZZIKIM.
In a frontier prison, he comes face to face with his greatest enemy, THE MAN CALLED OTHER.
Finally, seeking to learn the remaining secrets of Adon’s plot to bring about The Hour of Incursion, the Rider and his companions arrive in Tombstone only to be confronted with the horror of THE FIRE KING TRIUMPHANT.
Phew! That’s a lot of books, I bet the shelves inside your eReader are starting to creak. If I could toss one more slim volume upon the pile, it would be my new collection:
Between The Teeth
16 tales of horror and science fiction that will sink their fangs into you and won’t let go.
Get it here, enjoy your books and have a Happy Hallowe’en!
Before you fill up your sacks with candy and razor blades, be sure to collect these terrifying reads!
All is Dust in the Land of the Eternal Sun
All is sand and dust Civilization teeters on the brink of collapse as the last vestiges of humanity toil beneath an unforgiving sun. Jethro finds himself the unwilling hero of a tale that brings godless men, lawless bandits, and the savage people that inhabit the fringe into conflict. With his own past haunting his every step, can he find redemption? It hasn’t rained in years. It may never rain again. For fans of Ray Bradbury, There Will be Blood, and Oil!
Write Like Hell is the first horror and dark fantasy anthology released by Sentinel Creatives. Adapted from the zine released under the same name, Write Like Hell features stories from Scott Miller, Justin Probyn and Mitchell Luthi.
Between these pages, you’ll find a feast of fiction for you to sink your teeth into. This release see the debuts of not one but two writers.
Scott Miller’s Panopticon is as unsettling as it is well-crafted. Pessimistic horror at its finest, this is a must read for fans of Connolly and Ligotti.
Justin Probyn’s debut, Void Born, blends gritty sci-fi, gore and cosmic-horror into one seamless festival of the obscene.
My own collection, Between the Teeth, collects 16 tales of horror and science fiction that will sink their fangs into you and won’t let go.
– A serial killer ends up in an emergency room, but a heart attack may be the least of his problems.
– A researcher hunts a rare spider in the jungles of Myanmar.
– A greedy dentist gets the most interesting client of his life.
Witness soldiers trapped in a crocodile infested swamp, a preacher hunting demon outlaws, and karma catching up to a Bangkok body snatcher. Whatever flavor of the macabre you crave, you will find it Between the Teeth.
Author Jeff C. Carter 