Recommended Reading: A Little Horror for Your Halloween

Having only recently taken an interest in horror, I don’t have a lot of personal experience with the genre. That’s why when I started research for Bloodletting, I asked friends and family what aspects they liked best and what books/movies were their favorites. In the process, I found out that several good friends of mine are big horror fans. These two sites are ones they recommended I look at as part of my research. What better way to celebrate Halloween than to share them with you?

No Sleep

Reddit has a page called “No Sleep” where anyone can submit single horror stories or serials. According to the moderators, they try to encourage quality work by excluding posts that are only images or videos, and they do monthly “BestOf” awards to showcase great stories. There seem to be a wide variety of styles. Readers will like some better than others, but the variety is great for writers to see what works and what doesn’t – especially in relation to the reddit rankings.

Pseudopod

For those who’d rather listen than read, try “Pseudopod” where short horror stories are transformed into podcasts. I’m picky about voice acting and audiobooks, but the little snippets I heard were good enough that I’m still open to listening (when I have time). Since reading stories aloud generally takes longer than reading them on a page, they tend to like flash fiction, so this can be great training for getting a mood and effect across in fewer words.

There you go. Have a great Halloween and many happy frights!