Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Maria J Pérez Cuervo @mjpcuervo.bsky.social · 7d

Vincent Price advertising monster-shaped vitamins.

Vincent price says
"Come a little closer, madam-I want to save you 25€ on Monster Vitamins"
Kids love Monster" Vitamins. They come in 7 monstrous shapes and colors. And they taste terrific. Even more important, Monsters contain 10 essential vitamins. Children should get vitamins by eating right, but when they don't, Monster Vitamins and Monster Vitamins Plus Iron sure help.

3 13 85

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Hellebore @helleborezine.bsky.social · 13d

The folkloric belief that reflections, portraits and shadows contain part of a person’s soul influenced two of the greatest Gothic novels of the 19th century.

Read more in @coffinboffin.bsky.social ‘s piece for The Mirror Issue. Pre-order on helleborezine.com

Sam George
THE VAMPIRE'S
LOST REFLECTION
In 1890, Sir James Frazer recorded in The Golden Bough the belief across many cultures that reflections, portraits and shadows were thought to contain part of a person's soul. These folkloric notions influenced two of the greatest Gothic novels of the 19th century: Dracula and The Picture of Dorian Gray. Bram Stoker's Dracula, the most enduring of all fictional vampires, is a creature with virtually no representation: he doesn't have a reflection, his likeness cannot be painted, and he cannot be photographed.
Some modern vampires do have a reflection, but Dracula's lack of representation makes him a profoundly unsettling figure.
Linked with the realm of shadows, he remains the embodiment of an ancient evil who cannot be comprehended nor captured

1 12 58

🦇Shell🦇 @lotnumber249.bsky.social · 13d

If #HammerHorror is your thing, then you might enjoy this talk Lauren and I are giving as part of our annual Halloween celebrations. 🦇

Tickets are available via our website www.issegyptomania.com/events

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Infested Publishing @infestedpublishing.bsky.social · 16d

Check the comments to see what you get in this limited edition bundle. This @jvgachs.bsky.social collection releases October the 27th but you have a chance to grab it NOW! 🐁🖤🐀
www.infestedpublishing.com/product-page...

Sins of My Sisters Pre-order Bundle | INFESTED PUBLISHING

Enter the confessional with J.V Gach's horror collection, Sins of My Sisters. Fourteen visceral tales of love, loss, hauntings, and antifascist revolution. Haunting and unflinching, this collection p...

www.infestedpublishing.com

1 6 9

🦇Shell🦇 @lotnumber249.bsky.social · 16d

I had a short story published in the wonderful Blood Orange Zine this month and have another spookier tale coming out on a podcast next month. Happy Autumn! Working through redrafts this weekend and submitting submitting, submitting! #writing

2

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Emily Brand @emilybrand.bsky.social · Sep 4

🌟 OUT TODAY 🌟

Anthony Delaney's Queer Georgians: a MARVELLOUS, eye-opening new book on queer life & love in the Georgian era

Hugely recommend to all interested in the 18th/19th centuries, LGBT+ history, social history, British history & the history of love ❤️
uk.bookshop.org/p/books/quee... #books

1 7 53

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Dr Sam Hirst @romgothsam.bsky.social · Sep 2

Come join us and spread the word, please!

(Feel free to share with your networks elsewhere too!)

Dr Sam Hirst @romgothsam.bsky.social · Sep 1

I've put up the new call for papers for the 2026 Romancing the Gothic programme!

Come join us!

(I welcome feedback)

romancingthegothic.com/2025/09/02/r...

Romancing the Gothic 2026 Talk Series – Call for Papers

In 2026, our annual conference will be celebrating the 200th anniversary of Ann Radcliffe’s final, posthumous, publications. An early Gothic writer, Radcliffe was known to some as the ‘…

romancingthegothic.com

10 11

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Scarred For Life @scarredforlife.bsky.social · Aug 17

North East weirdies, @bobfischer.bsky.social and I will be bringing our Folk Horror show to @arcstockton.bsky.social on Wednesday 10 September! Everything from The Owl Service to Enys Men, and all points in-between. Robes and goat masks optional.

Tickets: bit.ly/44Jh9EJ

2 11 38

🦇Shell🦇 @lotnumber249.bsky.social · Aug 17

30 pages of script down. 60 to go. Absolute torture. Wouldn't have it any other way.

Tomorrow is a new day. Although it is technically now today... because somehow it is 1am again.

#WiP #writing #theatre #horror

2

🦇Shell🦇 @lotnumber249.bsky.social · Aug 15

Thank you, Mary! :)

1

🦇Shell🦇 @lotnumber249.bsky.social · Aug 15

Thanks Jim! 😁 Quite looking forward to having a period of uninterrupted focus this weekend!

🦇Shell🦇 @lotnumber249.bsky.social · Aug 15

This weekend is all about locking myself away to get a massive chunk of my play done. The deadline approaches, rather too quickly.

#writing #theatre #WiP #horror

2 5

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Emily ✨🎃 @emilyoram.bsky.social · Jun 24

Cause of death: Pedro Pascal for Vanity Fair

A black and white photo of actor Pedro Pascal wearing a white tee and black leather pants, reclining on a bed covered in a white sheet.

Pedro Pascal, a 50 year old Latino male with short dark hair is standing on a crumpled bed while wearing an oversized olive(?) sweater, no pants, grey boxers and black socks

Pedro Pascal stood in front of a full length mirror facing towards the camera. He has his arms folded and his biceps are full and obvious under his white tee that has the sleeves rolled up. He’s wearing grey dress pants and you can see his ass which is bulging against the fabric, in the mirror behind him.

Pedro Pascal sat slumped on a chair covered in a dusty rose coloured sheet, he has bare legs, maybe white boxers and a thick, full length military style coat on in olive green. He has a hand resting on his face and his eyes are closed.

34 270 1K

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Craig Wallwork @craigwallwork.bsky.social · May 16

June 27th sees my fourth collection of stories released. THE SKIN WE FEEL
MOST COMFORTABLE IN is a blend of horror and traditional stories that I consider some of my best.

It’d mean the world if you could spread the word or even preorder:
£1.99 U.K. amzn.eu/d/ibfaJoh
$2.99 US: a.co/d/00cmHAt

Black and white book cover showing a girl in a pretty white dress missing her head. Where her head should be is the o in comfortable. The title of the book is The Skin We Feel Most Comfortable In. In pink lettering is the author’s name: Craig Wallwork. There’s a quote also in the cover from author Kealan Patrick Burke that says, One of the most impressive books I’ve read in years.

Photo of author Kealan Patrick Burke: “Every now and again comes a collection that marks the arrival of a spectacular voice in horror fiction. THE SKIN WE FEEL MOST COMFORTABLE IN is such a collection. Like a nightmarish fusion of Poe, James Herbert, and Clive Barker, Craig Wallwork executes his stories with a ruthless, surgical precision, resulting in a veritable Grand Guignol of visceral delights that will truly get under your skin, and it'll do so with protracted glee. One of the most impressive books I've read in years."

- Kealan Patrick Burke, Bram Stoker Award-winning author of KIN and SOUR CANDY

Photo of author Ross Jeffery: “The Skin We Feel Most Comfortable In showcases a writer at the very peak of their undeniable talent, who weaves story after story of inescapable and insidious horror. Wallwork has the uncanny ability to write stories that not only leave you horrified, moved and forever changed, but ultimately render you awed at his gift as a raconteur. This collection further cements Wallwork as one of the best short story writers of our times, a national treasure and a true master of the genre.”

- Ross Jeffery, Bram Stoker Award-nominated author of Metamorphosis and The Devil’s Pocketbook

Photo of author Catherine McCarthy: “From the Gothic to the grotesque, this collection taps into the psyche with a hammer and chisel, leaving the reader raw from the flailing. There's heart here too though, heart and dark humour.”

- Catherine McCarthy, author of Mosaic and Death of a Clown.

1 9 17

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Laura ‘Infested’ Cathcart @cutfingers.bsky.social · Jun 23

Excerpt from the wonderful @g0blinegg.bsky.social
story, ‘John Barleycorn’.

THE CLEANSING POWER OF FIRE OUT NOW ❤️‍🔥

1 2 7

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Horror Tree @horrortree.com · Jun 24

Ongoing Submissions: GRADEside Middle Grade & Young Adult Horror via ‪@gravesidepress.bsky.social‬
horrortree.com/ongoing-subm...
Payment: 50% royalties
Theme: Short stories, novels, and novellas - Horror stories for younger readers (middle school to YA)
#WritingCommunity #AmWriting

6 8

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Infested Publishing @infestedpublishing.bsky.social · Jun 21

OUT NOW!!
Sing and rejoice, brothers and sisters! Your redemption is here. Let fire purge whatever ails you.
🐁☀️🐀
Grab it in comments.

Cover image for The Cleansing Power of Fire anthology. Featuring a goats head through a red filter. Image by Cutfingers.

The full TOC for The Cleansing Power of Fire on a red background with a bowing skeleton.

1 16 29

🦇Shell🦇 @lotnumber249.bsky.social · Jun 22

A very hot and sweaty weekend spent fanning myself constantly. Saw Pulp again which was magic. Didn't get much #writing done over the past few days. Only managed about 80 odd words this weekend but better than nowt.

Onwards to a more productive week!

1

🦇Shell🦇 @lotnumber249.bsky.social · Jun 17

Join us on 15 July at 7pm for an online session all about the language and scripts of #ancientegypt

Tickets £5 or free for members

www.eventbrite.com/e/of-signs-a...

Of Signs and Sounds. Intro to the Scripts and Languages of Ancient Egypt

Come and join us for an evening of hieroglyphs, cursive scripts, and ancient Egyptian languages

www.eventbrite.com

2

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Scarred For Life @scarredforlife.bsky.social · Jun 8

CHILDREN AND DISUSED FRIDGES (1971): A classic PIF with a Cholmondley-Warner style voiceover telling us that, to a child, old fridges could be caravans, castles, and ships (to Indiana Jones, they were nuclear bomb shelters). Best practise is to get rid safely... "BEFORE IT KILLS A CHILD!"

6 22 120

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

John J Johnston @johnjjohnston.bsky.social · Jun 8

On the anniversary of his birth, remembering with much love and respect, my dear friend and Egyptological mentor Professor Kenneth A Kitchen (1932-2025).

Professor Kitchen, smiling into the camera, in his Liverpool garden in 2008, standing next to the writer.

1 1 24

🦇Shell🦇 @lotnumber249.bsky.social · Jun 8

Looking forward to sinking my teeth into this one by @verityholloway.bsky.social 🖤

Verity Holloway @verityholloway.bsky.social · Jun 3

Thank you so much to everyone who bought books to help cover her care. I'll be sending some more out as soon as I can.

I have some copies of Pseudotooth still looking for homes. All sales go towards these massive bills.

ko-fi.com/s/7292dd0671

Pseudotooth paperback (signed) - Verity Holloway's Ko-fi Shop

The debut novel from Verity Holloway, Pseudotooth is an adult take on ‘portal fantasy’, boldly tackling issues of trauma responses, social difference ...

ko-fi.com

1

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Verity Holloway @verityholloway.bsky.social · Jun 8

I'm posting a batch of books tomorrow! Vet's bills have now gone over £2000, so... yeah.

Verity Holloway @verityholloway.bsky.social · Jun 3

Thank you so much to everyone who bought books to help cover her care. I'll be sending some more out as soon as I can.

I have some copies of Pseudotooth still looking for homes. All sales go towards these massive bills.

ko-fi.com/s/7292dd0671

Pseudotooth paperback (signed) - Verity Holloway's Ko-fi Shop

The debut novel from Verity Holloway, Pseudotooth is an adult take on ‘portal fantasy’, boldly tackling issues of trauma responses, social difference ...

ko-fi.com

1 4

Reposted by 🦇Shell🦇

Brian Groom @groomb.bsky.social · Jun 8

The famous Viking attack on Lindisfarne took place #OTD in 793, regarded as the start of the Viking age in Britain. ‘Never before has such a terror appeared in Britain as we have just suffered from a pagan people,' wrote the scholar Alcuin.

3 10 62

🦇Shell🦇 @lotnumber249.bsky.social · Jun 8

First fiction submission in a while boxed off. 3955 words that I'm very proud of. Mostly proud that I've started submitting again and am putting myself out there. A good feeling. 😌

Already started work on the next one and I'm feeling excited about the story!

#writing

1 6