Michael A. Arnzen's Blog

The Goreletter Vol. 6, #1 was e-mailed to subscribers on Halloween, 31 October 2009 @ 9:30pm est. It contains extra material not available here on the weblog version, including a great contest to win some very RARE Arnzen-related collector's items, and a chance to get a signed numbered bookplate.

If you subscribe and did not receive this issue, e-mail me for a replacement or review the archives at gorelets.com.

Subscribe today…it's free and you can always unsubscribe if it terrorizes you too...

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"Could it think, the heart would stop beating."

– Fernando Pessoa (died 1935)

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Last year's Shirley Jackson Award winner for "Best Anthology" — The New Uncanny: Tales of Unease, edited by Sarah Eyre and Rah Page (Comma Press, 2008) — is a knockout example of genre renewal. The book features some of the best British horror authors alive, including Ramsey Campbell, Nicholas Royle, A.S. Byatt, Christopher Priest and many more…even Matthew Holness (whose comedic double from the BBC, Garth Merenghi, is echoed here). The book definitely deserved the Jackson Award for its...

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Tap-tap-tap. Class, pay attention. I'm going to teach you a new word today. It's called "gavage." Say it out loud. No, not like "savage," Little Jimmy. It's pronounced like "garage." That's right, Mary: guhvahzh. Really resonate that last syllable in your mouth. What? No Patty, "garvage" is not a word.

Gavage. Do any of you know what it means?

No, Jimmy, it's not the trash you run over in your garage.

No, Mary, it's not a battlefield dressing invented during the French revolution.

What's...

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all chocolate is Chocula —

it seduces with its riches,

wraps your desire in the cape

of your mouth, and invites

the sink of teeth. we never bite

gently; we always suck it

to vapor, feeding on its potency

until we are left only with the empty

pang for more and more and more.

we are undead with diabetes,

obese with our obsession,

unquietly unquenched

while we dwell upon

the mortality of the melt.

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For your next movie night, rent:

Never Too Young To Die (Bettman, 1986)

Wanted: Dead or Alive (Sherman, 1986)

Runaway (Crichton, 1984)

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Just read this important post at Horrorgy that the 'myspace for horror fan' site, The Haunt, is shutting down in early November and becoming a discussion forum sponsored by the Horror-Mall instead. Sorry to hear it…I liked the concept, but it's true that participation was lacking after the initial buzz of the place wore off. Hopefully the discussion forum will spark interest and continued community, rather than leaving a 'ghost town' in its wake. I probably won't play there very often; I f...

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Last week the English Club at Seton Hill University invited me to read at a Halloween event they sponsored, and I had a lot of fun reading some new story sketches and poems with them. I recorded it, so I could share a few audio clips here in celebration. Click the play button below to hear "Endless Shrimp" (2:10), "Silence" (3:17) and "The Christmas Doll" (0:46). Happy Halloween (…and Christmas, too!)

[Audio clip: view full post to listen]

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Kindle International Launches Today: Watershed Moment?

It's time to go ebook, if you haven't already. Today amazon.com releases their next generation Kindle2 ebook reading device, which is now able to pull information out of the (cell phone) wireless networks internationally…and you don't have to subscribe to a cell phone service to do so.  This means that the medium has gone totally global; you can read an ebook anywhere — and update/sync/buy anywhere, too. 

So what? This means that...

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Cthulhu the Obscure

A Connecticut Devil in King Arthur's Inferno

The Golden Bowl of Blood

The Isle of Dr. Moreau and Mr. Hyde

As I Lay Resurrecting

Creature from the Walden Pond

Of Mice and Tentacles

A Midsummer Night's Scream

Jane Weyrewolf

Oedipus Rex: The Boy With the X-Ray Eyes

Uncle Tom's Cannibal Cabin

A Poison Clockwork Orange

Rabid Animal Farm

Lord of the Giant Flies

Clone King Richard the Thirtieth

A Morgue of One's Own

**

With irreverence for: Quirk Classics

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